Couples Work

Communication Coaching and Mediation 
Can Help Both to Improve Your Communication Process and 
to Develop a Mutually Agreeable, Practical Vision for the Future

Day in day out, we spend our lives navigating and negotiating a wide variety of relationships. The work of being a good steward of our own welfare while also being a creative collaborator skilled in sharing life with others is a huge part of what life is about for social beings like ourselves.

This work is hugely rewarding, but can also be hugely challenging. And nowhere are the rewards and challenges greater than in the intimate partnership we share with our spouse or significant other.

Challenges come in all kinds, too. Some are unique events that require hard work, a clear sense of priorities, mutually devoted commitment, and some big decisions. Other challenges come in the form of ongoing relationship patterns that leave both parties feeling that there must be a better way to relate to each other. Still other challenges are a combination of stresses, unproductive communication reflexes, frustration and exhaustion that together threaten the admiration, passion, and joy shared between two lovers.

While the idea of couples counseling has entered the mainstream as a service that can be helpful to many, the value of communication coaching and couples mediation as processes that can help couples strengthen their relationship is still very new.

The fact is, however, that many relationships struggle with issues that do not require psychological therapy, but simply coaching in strategies and skills for better communication. As couples learn to forge new patters of communication, they acquire deeper insight and understanding both with regard to each other and to themselves.  At once, they experience the relief of being freed from the frustration of not being heard and the heart-felt meaning that comes with connecting to aspects of their partner they previously had not accessed.  As a result of these emotional shifts, individuals are able to notice needs, priorities and feelings within themselves they have not been able to give their attention to in the midst of the frustration, noise and conflict of their old communication patterns.  In this way, over time, couples communication coaching can help each person to find more clarity, peace and presence both on their own and when they are with their love, and the couple can acquire skills and mutual understanding that will help them to build a stronger, more satisfying relationship and future together.

Additionally, it may be said that many issues couples face need more than therapy in the sense that they involve life-choice dilemmas that will only be resolved if the couple can come to an agreement about a plan of action after achieving better understanding and communication. Couples mediation offers couples not only communication coaching and a means for more constructive interaction, but also a practical focus on the concrete obstacles they want to overcome.

The participation of an empathetic, neutral third person introduces a valuable functional dimension to the communication between two partners that often greatly improves the outcome of the couple’s decision making process. Even where the challenge facing the couple is a unique event, the experience of using mediation to negotiate a mutually agreeable plan of actions that meets both individual’s needs is likely to result in learning the couple draws upon repeatedly in the future as they continue to build their life together.

Consider the following list of potential issues that couples sometimes find get caught up in unproductive, painful communication patterns.

Family Planning • Parenting Values • Job Stress • Job Dissatisfaction • Career Relocation • Life Balance • New Goals • Personal Development • Religious Beliefs • Identity Issues • Unemployment • Past Trauma • Injury • Communication Patterns • Substance Use • Depression • In-Laws • Family Roles • Hard Choices

Mediation is a flexible tool that can be modified and applied in many contexts. If you have questions about whether couples mediation might be suitable and helpful way to strengthen your relationship with your spouse of significant other or if you would like to schedule an appointment for mediation, you can call me at (650) 762-TREE [762-8733] or email me using the email form on our Contact Us page.  

Hank Edson, J.D.          CALL: (650) 762-8733

Proprietor of Family Tree Mediation
Serving Redwood City, Atherton,
Menlo Park, Palo Alto, Mountain View,
Los Altos and the wider Peninsula &
San Francisco Bay Area.