First let me set the context.
Some weeks ago I had the privilege of bringing a couple for “a live” demonstration for a core skills training in Sacramento conducted by Rebecca Jorgensen, Paul and Nancy Aikin. Nancy did a wonderful job conducting “the live” in a separate room connected my close circuit TV. The couple, both committed “twelve steppers” who have valiantly struggled to make something special out of there love, hugely appreciated Nancy’s work laying out their cycle, the positive reframe of their conflicts, and the tight way she summarized their cycle at the conclusion of the session. The session left them feeling connected and understood.
But then something happened that I think they will remember for the rest of their lives, something akin to imprinting. And that was after the break when the couple came back for feedback with the 18 or so (unusually) highly experienced therapists in the training. Given the choice of how to receive feedback, the couple choose to receive the feedback directly from the therapists watching on. And then, for what seemed like thirty minutes, therapist after therapist showered the couple with both accurate and highly validating comments about how they saw them…how truly caring they are for each other, how hard they worked in the session, how their love was so clear, how bravely vulnerable they were, how they step up to the challenges of their relationship, how much respect they engendered, etc. My second hand words here cannot convey how incredibly therapeutic this group event was for the couple. Here we have these two individuals who have fought for years to even have lives, and now a life with one-another, who literally felt their relationship was blessed by the village elders. In meetings with the couple since, it is clear that in all of their years they have never felt such a community support for their relationship or their attachment efforts as happened on that day. On that day, a resource beyond the couple’s work itself was given to this couple. A place of safe harbor of sorts, a resource to protect against shame and defeat, a bestowal of community recognition of the goodness of their relationship.
Since that day the couple appears safer in their bones. They still have negative cycles, but they are clearer that the problem is the negative cycle, not some terrible wrongness about themselves. They are easier with each other. More secure. My impression is that it had something to do with that day, a the combination of a truly good live session followed by this remarkable group validation.
Couples attempting to heal have need of community support. Support that helps them believe in themselves. The outside support/validation can supply steadiness, holding and safety. It occurs to me that many of us live so chronically without that outside support that we are hardly aware of how much it is missing… or what a difference it can make… when it is present.
The event was striking enough, and I am thinking rare, that I wonder about some empirical investigation of such a thing? And I am curious to know how often it goes this way in live trainings throughout the eft world?
