Understanding love patterns to succeed in your relationship

Psycho –

Understanding love patterns to succeed in your relationship

In her book “How to fail your relationship for sure”, the French psychotherapist Emmanuelle Piquet invites duos to make a 180-degree turn in their relationship.

BotTalk

• Vicious circles are common in couple relationships.
• The key is to adopt behavior opposite to established habits.
• Changing perspective helps you understand others and their point of view.
• Loss of desire requires both awareness and change.

This article from September 17, 2024 was imported from Femina.ch and republished on our site on January 7, 2025.

Emmanuelle Piquet, you write that the couple is a factory of vicious circles… which explains the derailments?

The couple is a territory conducive to the creation and nourishment of vicious circles because it is a place where there is a lot of perseverance in things that do not work and to which we cling very rigidly. It is partly linked to the redundancy of wanting to absolutely change the other. We find it difficult to look at the relationship rather than looking at the other person. What the Palo Alto school teaches us, which I use in couples therapy, is to treat the dysfunctional relationship rather than the so-called dysfunctional being that we have in front of us.

Each protagonist has an idea of ​​how their relationship should work, is that the problem?

Yes, there is a utopia of what travel and its different destinations should be. This particular interaction can generate a lot of disappointment. And each and everyone has their own story of what is happening in the couple.

That’s to say?

Monsieur will say: “I get distracted by work, because when I am at home, I only get reproaches from my wife.” This is the way to punctuate interactions within your relationship. Madame will say: “He comes home later and later, that’s not what I wanted as a couple, that’s why I’m unpleasant and reproach him.” Both are right in a way, the difficulty is that they have a completely linear vision of the problem, and not at all circular or interactional. This is even more true in couples than in any other system.

How can we help them change their vision?

For example, I ask the protagonists to change places on the sofa, and each speak as if they were the other. The companion sees and hears for the first time the other adopt their perception of the problem, understand their point of view. It’s a very strong emotional experience because most of the time, you are focused on your vision of the problem.

In your approach, you propose to adopt behavior opposed to established habits, by making a 180-degree turn… not easy to negotiate, right?

It’s not easy, because turning around generates renunciations, risks, inconveniences. It is indeed difficult to make a 180 degree turn. This is especially true since most of the time, in couples therapy, the protagonists are very enduring to suffering. They endure things that they would not endure in systems other than the couple, such as the professional or friendly environment for example. Some manage to take this turn when the suffering is too acute.

Among the concrete examples of these 180 degree turns, in your book you tell us how to get out of repeating the same scenarios in love…

Yes, with the example of Justine, who dedicates herself 100% to each man she meets, hoping for reciprocity, which is logical, but unproductive. I ask him to go chat and interact with several men at once, which is a problem for him at first. She is no longer in her usual redundancy, she who even intellectually needs to devote herself to a single person. I encourage her to note to what extent some men can be hypocrites, and also because she will no longer have time to wait for her current lover, like Penelope. It makes him do something very different from his usual behavior.

The key is to adopt behavior that is opposed to established habits, then?

Yes. In action. We are better able to get out of these painful redundancies when we do different things, I don’t really believe in awareness. I believe more in interacting differently. More broadly, to return to the example of Justine and the repetitions of love scenarios, I emphasize with my patients the totally counterproductive aspect of what they put in place repetitively in each situation. Since that doesn’t work, it might be interesting to try the opposite. It allows you to stop doing what you’re doing. It’s impossible to be both lying down and standing up. From the moment I ask them to lie down, they can no longer stand.

In the case of loss of desire, which you also talk about, we are less in action than in awareness, right?

On the control of libido, the more you try to control someone’s desire, sexual or otherwise, the more this desire withers and you cause exactly the opposite of what you want. This desire must be able to find a “safe” place. However, when we focus on the loss of the other’s desire, each time we try to control it, to make it grow, this unfortunately generates a slightly more atrophied desire in the other. It is indeed more of an awareness, but it is just as much a complete change of course. I ask the men concerned (because they are the majority who complain about their wives’ reduced libido) to act differently, to say to their wives: “When I take your hand or touch your shoulder, It’s not with a sexual aim, it’s just out of affection.” This is an ultra-safe speech for women. On the other hand, I am clear from the start: that does not mean that his desire will be reborn. What I am committed to is that there will be sensory affection again, without necessarily talking about sexuality. It’s a 180 degree turn.

To read: “How to fail your relationship for sure”, Emmanuelle Piquet (Ed. Les Arènes)