Customer Reviews

From Anger to Intimacy: How Forgiveness Can Transform Your Marriage

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Unresolved anger --- many couples would agree that, despite the outward reasons for their problems, anger that has built up over weeks, months, years or even decades is at the heart of the trouble in their marriage. In FROM ANGER TO INTIMACY, bestselling author Gary Smalley, president of the Smalley Relationship Center, and Ted Cunningham, a speaker with Smalley's organization, offer the tools couples need to overcome the situations that created the problems, deal with the anger, and move on to a relationship characterized by genuine love and forgiveness.

This excellent resource for all couples begins with establishing the foundation for understanding anger. "Anger in and of itself is not a bad thing," the authors write. "Anger is an emotion designed by and given to you by God, but it's what you do with that anger that can negatively affect your spiritual, mental and emotional health." They describe anger as a secondary emotion that follows such initial responses as feeling betrayed, disrespected, belittled and so forth. If left unresolved, the anger that results will in turn result in sin in some form.

The authors then guide readers through the process of resolving anger; you can stuff it, spew it or study it, they write, but only by studying it can you gain mastery over it. Next they discuss recognizing your own cycle of anger and learning how to break out of it, as well as discovering what your personal hot buttons are.

From there, Smalley and Cunningham offer specific strategies for handling anger the moment it erupts. "If you look at the conflict in our world, you'll realize that it's impossible to live in peace with everyone," they maintain. "But it is possible to make every effort to live at peace." Among the six tactics they recommend are crying out to God and making a conscious choice to react differently.

The authors devote several chapters to the all-important topic of forgiveness --- what it is, what it isn't and how you can forgive your spouse even when you think that's an impossible undertaking. The book includes a number of sidebars, and here the sidebar takes the form of a forgiveness inventory, a 33-question assessment of how quick --- or how slow --- you are to forgive.

An entire chapter covers the critical subject of recovering from an affair or sexual addiction, among the most difficult betrayals for a spouse to handle. Smalley and Cunningham outline six absolute requirements for stopping the relationship or the behavior, and they offer specific steps for the offended spouse to take to deal with the situation and attempt to restore the relationship --- in time.

A companion study guide enables couples (or one spouse) to explore the material in the book at greater depth. The questions are thoughtful and at times challenging, and the correlation to scripture is evident throughout.

Highly recommended, even for couples who have a healthy marriage, FROM ANGER TO INTIMACY doesn't just offer a cure; it also serves as a preventative.

--- Reviewed by Marcia Ford

If you are familiar with Gary Smalley's early works, as I was, you may be disappointed. Smalley's contribution to this work is good; however, the majority of the book is penned by Ted Cunnigham. If you are a person dealing with anger and especially dislike people who talk about themselves in a less than humble manner, this is not your book. Cunningham falls all over himself throughout the book trying to show what great buds he and Gary Smalley are. At the outset of the book, Cunningham tells a story about an early life experience, halfway admitting that he was at one time a self-consumed egoist who reveled in his own accomplishments - which is why 40% of his church wanted to demote him. By the time I finished this book, my conclusion was that. . . Ted Cunningham is a self-consumed egoist reveling in his own accomplishments. The Lord's blessings upon Ted, but I don't know that his contribution is effective. This book is a collection of stories strung together by Cunningham in a manner in which he attempts to be cute and witty <wink, wink, grin, pointer finger gun aimed at you> while glorying in all he's experienced and accomplished. I'm thinking, "OK Ted, we get it. You've done so many cool things in your life, now where does this fit into ministering to people whose lives are ravaged by anger?" By the time you get to the Hawaii wave story, you're asking yourself, "what credentials does this guy have to make him an expert on anger?" His stories are cute and witty, yet their connection to his thesis is paper thin, to the point that you lose the purpose of his message amidst the flair, pomp and parade of the backdrop. If you're having a camp out and need someone to fill the time telling stories, this is your guy, believe me. There are brief glimmers of hope throughout the book. You almost want to say, "come on Ted, you can do it, you're making a great point here" until he reverts to more static and white noise. If you want to suffer through the book and pick out these nuggets, more power to you, friend. You may grow your patience. If you can get through the first two hours without discarding this volume, then you can probably make it through the rest. Good luck.

Dr. Gary Smalley, best selling author and the founder and president of the Smalley Relationship Center, suggests that you have three options when anger rears its head:


1) Stuff it
2) Spew it
3) Study it


Dr. Smalley co-authors his latest book with Pastor Ted Cunningham as they combine their years of experience in counseling to help teach readers the skills of conflict resolution. They each share some very personal experiences with anger and I appreciated their honesty in revealing various conflicts and how they overcame them.

Though the book was written with married couples in mind, I found it interesting (and helpful) that most of the communication skills they teach, are applicable in all areas of life.

One good example of this is learning to recognize and identify your personal "buttons". Once you've pin pointed your "hot button" areas, they share two main questions that you should ask when confronted with the temptation to get angry:

Question 1: What am I angry about?
Question 2: What am I going to do with my anger?

Using their approach of working through anger and frustration, you can apply this to not only your marriage, but friendships, family relationships and struggles with co-workers. This book offers a quiz to help you identify how you typically handle your anger, as well as a "forgiveness inventory" in which you find out how quick (or slow) you are to forgive.

The questions throughout the book offer some good starters for self examination, and for those who truly want to change, the book offers suggestions on how to start making headway.

One of my favorite chapters was the last one, Chapter 12, entitled "Answers to the Biggies". In this chapter the authors tackle some of the biggest questions frequently asked about anger and forgiveness in marriage and relationships.

If you have ever wondered "must I forgive someone who feels they have done nothing wrong?", this chapter is for you! Also included at the end of the book are meditations for forgiveness - memorizing and speaking these scriptures will help you cultivate a forgiving spirit in your everyday life.

This is an excellent book for couples to read together and discuss. The authors have a good grasp on the issue of anger and the negative affect it has on family life. Couples will learn such things as how resolve conflict and how to deal with anger in a healthy way, and how to apologize in such a way that it will be a healing balm. We often are taught to believe that all anger is wrong. The authors point out that anger is an emotion and it's the way we deal with that anger that matters.

I found this book very insightful and helpful and I plan to share it with others.

If you follow me you know I believe in Gary Smalley. He co-wrote this with Ted Cunningham (no relation to Ritchie) so here it comes. GOT ANGER? Is it KILLING your marriage? WANT TO CHANGE? Good luck, you need help. This book can help you but you really must want to disassemble your anger machine, let go of all blame (even justified blame) and move forward. Believe me it isn't easy, but nothing worth doing ever is (with the exception of a bubble bath). There is also another called Love Busters (not by these guys) that also has many great tools to kill the anger machine and a host of other blunders.

The book was very informative. I purchased it for an couples' class held at my church. I enjoyed very much. I even continued to read the material after the class was over.

another great book by Gary Smalley... a book that I was able and continue to examine myself and aid as a counseling tool in the ministry...

This gives practical insight into how to heal from anger caused by significant hurt. Forgiveness is key, but many don't know how to do this. This has really helped us.

I am a psychiatrist and a believer who regularly attends worship at a fairly evangelical church but they lost me when the story was related about some inconsiderate friends who crossed major boundaries on a joint vacation and they had an awful hurricane and it's related how fortunate he is that God gave him such a wonderful opportunity to grow as a person as a reult of these calamities. Why not hope your child is killed or you are diagnosed with a terminal illness, compliments of God, to help you grow? Why not marry an abusive person who "pushes your buttons" in order to get you to turn to God and thank him for giving you someone who is helping you figure out your issues? And since when is the "secret sin" of homosexuality grounds for the authorites to come to your house and confiscate your computer? Are we talking about child pornography which is this type of crime, dunno, never made clear. Sorry, but I cannot recommend this book. Get "Love Dare" if you want a good self help program.