In a world where busy days are followed by even busier days, reclaiming your control in the domains where you can is essential. This is why we recommend building 5 Rituals of Connection with your partner. Rituals in relationships are defined as meaningful actions repeated regularly by partners, with a specific emotional significance (Doherty, 2001). Rituals of connection can contribute to developing and maintaining positive and healthy relationships by reinforcing feelings of affection, comfort, and stability. Consistently investing time into your relationships can contribute to long-lasting and meaningful patterns that facilitate loving and enduring connections. Finding this time in your busy day will never go unnoticed by your partner.
Apologizing Effectively
The four steps to effective apologizing are laid out as follows:
Acknowledging – Whether you have hurt your partner willingly or unwillingly, you can begin an effective apology by taking responsibility and acknowledging the relevant offense. Demonstrate that you recognize your responsibility by “I” (“I messed up…” or “I am at fault…”). Acknowledge who has been hurt, as well as the nature of the transgression itself.
Give an explanation for the offense – Explain both that you never meant to hurt the other person and that it won’t happen in the future. This worksheet also provides tips on how to distinguish between excuses and explanations for an effective, meaningful apology.
Express your remorse – Naturally, we feel regret and remorse amongst other feelings when we hurt another person. Expressing the emotions that you feel – such as humiliation, shame, embarrassment, and so forth – can help your partner understand your recognition of the mistake. For example, “I feel really bad about what happened. For days I have felt embarrassed about how I let you down”.
Make amends – Follow up your verbal acknowledgment and apology with actions that aim to fix the damage caused. Talk to your partner and see what they might consider a good reparation for the damage to your relationship.
This worksheet describes each step and provides tips for you or your client to follow the next time there is a disagreement, argument, or breach of trust.
To read more about these steps, you can access the worksheet via a subscription to our Positive Psychology Toolkit©.
Naikan Reflection
While the Naikan Reflection worksheet is something for each partner to work on alone, it's still a great resource for couples who would like to build and maintain a healthy relationship. The exercise, which can be accessed via our our Positive Psychology Toolkit©, encourages the reader to remember not to take his or her partner for granted.
It helps to cultivate feelings of appreciation and gratitude while encouraging each partner become more aware of where they stand morally with their partner. Following these suggestions can help couples show their partners appreciation and inject some gratitude into their relationship.
Naikan Reflection is a Japanese method of self-reflection that features in therapy as three questions (Krech, 2001); on this sheet there is space for you to record your answers. Thinking back over the past 24 hours, and with your partner specifically in mind, reflect on the following:
What have I received? What support, care, and attention did you get from your partner? Did they say kind things to boost your self-confidence? Drive you to work or pick you up afterward? Was lunch packed for you? Feel free to list everything that you received from your partner over the past 24 hours.
What have I given? Did you ask them how school was? Did you call them just to say hi? Pick up their clothes or rub their shoulders?
What troubles or difficulties have I caused? Think now about the ways in which you might have caused any hassle or hurt for your partner throughout the day. Perhaps you snapped at them out of impatience, or pointed out something they forgot? Did you criticize some of their work, or forget to do something they were counting on?
One aim of this exercise is to cultivate your natural desire to help and care for your partner. By heightening your recognition of how much you really receive and offer in turn each day, Naikan Reflection is a useful exercise to boost your experience of gratitude and its benefits.