Customer Reviews

Fall in Love, Stay in Love

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I recently reviewed Harley's book His Needs, Her Needs. This book contains a summary of his needs-based approach to marriage and love, and also incorporates further ideas from his book Love Busters, which I have not read.

Basically, the book returns to Harley's theory of a "Love Bank," where actions that meet the partner's needs cause a positive deposit of "love units" and actions that fail to meet (or even act against) a partner's needs cause a negative withdrawal of them. Harley's solution is simple: maximize the deposits while minimizing the withdrawals.

In other words, do everything you can to make sure that your partner's needs are being met.

Harley breaks the needs into ten categories:

Affection
Sexual Fulfillment
Conversation
Recreational Companionship
Honesty & Openness
Physical Attractiveness
Financial Support
Domestic Support
Family Commitment
Admiration

These needs are covered in great detail in His Needs, Her Needs, but this book provides enough of an overview for the reader to get the idea.

He then goes on to discuss several "Love Busters." These are habits or defense actions which can actually cause massive withdrawals of love units from the Love Bank. These were covered in his Love Busters book. Not having read that book, however, Fall in Love, Stay in Love does an excellent job of explaining them. The five Love Busters addressed are:

Demands
Disrespectful Judgments
Angry Outbursts
Annoying Behaviors
Dishonesty

Clearly, these sort of things can seriously harm a relationship. Harley's process of delving down to the roots of why these different activities happen, why they should be stopped, and how to more productively deal with them, cut to the heart of his program.

He describes how each person has a Giver and a Taker inside of them. The Giver wants to provide for the other person, regardless of the cost to yourself. The Taker wants to provide for yourself, regardless of the cost to the other person. The conflict between these two parts is what causes discord in marriage and -- in Harley's experience as a counselor -- affairs to take place.

In order to stop this conflict, he says, a couple should only do things that they both enthusiastically agree to. This means that neither person gets strong-armed into an activity they don't want to do.

The idea is to minimize resentment and inequality, but it seems that this level of sacrifice could lead to resentment and inequality just as easily as solving it. Obviously, if both people buy into the philosophy equally well, that would probably be the case -- but what if one of them buys into it more, or what if it just flat out takes more to please one of them? Wouldn't the other person eventually grow tired of always agreeing but never being agreed with?

Despite those problems, this does seem like a good program. If you're going to lay out general rules then these seem like the ones to follow, intended to continuously promote love and harmony. They would bring about feelings of unity rather than discord, and that, ultimately, seems as if it's what is needed to save a marriage.

Although I had read His Needs, Her Needs, this book absolutely blew me away. Harley's insight and concepts are absolutely incredible. On the verge of separation, this book literally saved my life as I know it and my marriage.

Just as His Needs, Her Needs presents the concept of the basic different needs and how to meet them, this book delves into the concept of the two types of love in marriage (romantic and caring), three states of mind in marriage (intimacy, conflict and withdrawal), the giver/taker that lies within each of us, and most importantly, how to handle conflict with intelligence and not emotion.

Bottom Line: This book is a must read for anyone who is struggling in their marriage or who feels that their love and relationship is irretreivably broken.

The principles, ideas and concepts presented in this book created a new mindset for me. Before reading it, I felt as though I were incapable and unwilling to work for my marriage. It restored my hope in restoring love and gave me all of the tools to do so.

He's done it again. William Harley has a great track record of putting out relationship books that are honest, insightful and useful. This one definitely fits the bill.

For most couples falling in love is the easy part. Staying in love is a completely different matter. Harley dispenses his typical wisdom into the main reasons marriages fail and what you can do to keep the love ever present. No one needs to fall for the lie that love and passion can't be as present 20, 30 or 40 years into a marriage.

Anyone seriously wanting to keep the romance and passion alive (or revived) in their relationship should definitely take a look at this book AND The RoMANtic's Guide - which I believe is the best tips and idea book to come out in my 30 years of marriage counseling. If every couple read and followed these two books, I'd be out of a job. Which would be a good thing.

Dr. Bradley Sears, Spokane Washington

Willard F. Harley author of Fall in Love, Stay in Love, writes that marriage partners have ten emotional needs.
Here is the problem. Dr. Harley says that a woman's top five emotional needs and a man's top five emotional needs often don't overlap. When you think about it, you then have a problem. To fulfill your spouses' needs you will have to fill needs that aren't that important to you. If your spouse's needs were the same as yours, it would be easy. You would fulfill your own needs while at the same time fulfilling your partner's. If for example, you both had a strong need for conversation, you could talk to your spouse and be satisfying yourself while fulfilling one of your spouse's important emotional needs,
But, if your top five emotional needs are different than the top five emotional needs of your spouse, then you will only fulfill your spouse's emotional needs if you work at it.
Dr. Harley states that when people first date, they have two rules: I will do whatever I can to make you happy and I will avoid doing whatever makes you unhappy. Dr. Harley calls this, I will do whatever I can to make love bank deposits and I will whatever I can to avoid making love bank withdrawals. Sometime later the emphasis changes from I will do what ever makes you happy and avoid anything that makes you unhappy, to I will do whatever makes me happy, and avoid doing whatever makes me unhappy. Follow that second set of rules and you will have marital problems in a fairly short time.
Keeping a proper Love Bank balance requires you to fulfill your spouse's most important emotional needs. That may not be too difficult when you are madly in love. You will then do anything then to make you partner happy and avoid making your spouse unhappy.
But once you are no longer madly in love, it becomes difficult to fulfill needs that really aren't that important to you.
So how do you fulfill needs that if you are not madly in love? The marriage ceremony recognizes that love is not just a feeling, it is also a decision and commitment. You make a vow to love your spouse. That vow recognizes that love is not just a feeling.
Most people then use their commitment to try to make their spouse happy. Some are insightful enough to realize the differing needs and attempt to satisfy those needs. A lot of people stumble blindly when they attempt to make their spouse happy because they do not recognize the inherent problem. His needs are different than her needs. If that difference isn't known, or isn't respected, and if no effort is made to determine what the needs are and the most effective way to meet those needs there is bound to be a lot of pain, a lot of resentment and disappointment.
The magic may magically be gone.
But how do fulfill needs that if you are not madly in love? The first way is commitment. Dr. Harley also has another insight. You don't have to sit down every day and ask, "How will I meet my spouse's needs?"
He points out the importance of habits. It may take two or three months to be comfortable with a new habit, but make the effort and then it becomes effortless.
Build habits, of when you first lie in bed in the morning. to how you eat breakfast together, to how you hug and kiss before leaving for work that all create connections. Build those habits around your spouse's most inmportant emotional needs. By taking the time to develop these habits you will have created habits that sustain romantic love. Dr. Harley's insights can change any marriage. I highly recommend reading his books.

The concepts are fairly basic, but as far as I can tell, most new couples (most people) don't know them. They have bought into the idea that you can only make yourself happy, so why should you meet your spouse's needs if you don't feel like it? Or they are trying to meet their spouse's needs, but instead are doing things that would meet their own needs because they don't get that their spouse needs different things. And most people really have no idea about avoiding love busters. I yelled at my husband a lot when we were first married. I felt that it is better to express feelings. It is, but not by yelling! That never once made things better.

I like this book much better than His Needs, Her Needs, because it is much less gender-role stereotyped.

"Fall in Love, Stay in Love" puts in a pretty good nutshell all of the major points that Dr. Willard Harley draws out in his earlier publications like "His Needs, Her Needs" and "Love Busters;" and as described in many of the first eight reviews that are already here on Amazon.com.

Dr Harley's work can be both refreshing and a rude awakening (as "A Reader" discovered) because Dr Harley is one of the few marriage counselors who is actually...successful! And consistently successful. He is also unlike some of the more well-known marriage counselor/authors in that he has not failed multiply in his own marriages. He has only been married once and that marriage is still going strong. Unfortunately for us, this means that he, like anyone else after 43+ years of marriage(!), probably will not be among us many more decades.

Thus, Dr Harley's premises may also be shocking because they are against the grain of many of the not so successful, but very popular marriage counselor/authors. Dr Harley's premises are clearly against very popular notions that attack traditional marriage. Those popularized notions and activities include cohabitation, pre-marital sex, every other fornication and several forms of independent behavior (one of the "Love Busters"). Hence, he and his concepts are successful and most of the others' concepts are not.

Have no fear. Though this book can be shocking (as again, "A Reader" discovered), it is only a "nutshell" of Dr Harley's work. He continues to be a great champion of marriages, improving many and saving at least ten thousand. That is news that the media at large should broadcast. It probably will not because successful marriage notions are not popular in a society that is less and less capable of sustaining marriages; and more and more apt to attack them. Dr Harley's website www.marriagebuilders.com provides all of the material in all of his books online, for FREE (as if you couldn't just go to the library to check out the materials). Some information is too good not to give away for free. He has been such a champion of marriages, that of course, his own counseling is nearly impossibly booked. So he tries to work only with couples whose marriages look the most impossible to save! He saves them (it's not easy but neither is marriage itself--a commitment to "extraordinary care for your spouse," and the stipulation is that you do what Dr Harley outlines), or you get your money back. That's his guarantee for his workshops and seminars too.

If your own marriage has made some terrible turns, Dr Harley's work can pull you out of those turns, even affairs.

So have no fear for more reasons. His seminars and materials are available for everyone. His kids, his kids' families (100% successful marriages on the first tries) and great associates are carrying-on the torch very well. The materials and counseling pick-up where the books might merely make a beachhead and not go far enough. They work on the same premises nevertheless. Moreover, the marriagebuilders website has a forum function where you can look at many others' anonymous questions and Harley's feedback to tackle things that the books do not.

"Dear Abby" type advice columnists and separation advocates should step aside. They are cop-outs that do not know and do not care how to help peoples' marriages succeed. They too quickly advocate separation for the dumbest reasons.

My marital relationship is the most important relationship in my life. While my husband and I have always loved each other, we would occasionally experience some painful bumps in the road of our marital bliss.

I have read dozens and dozens of books on marriage. My husband read several with me. There were helpful suggestions, but nothing earth shattering. This book changed all that. Our marriage is the best that it's ever been and we are happier than we were on our honeymoon.

IMO, this is the best book on marriage that exists, and I've read most of them. You must both be willing to change, but if you are willing to do that, then you can have the marriage you always dreamed was possible. I will never again need another book on marriage.

Fall In Love, Stay In Love is a great book for soon-to-be-marrieds, newlyweds, or experienced spouses. The chapters are short, well-organized, and concise which is encouraging if you have a reluctant spouse or if you are the reluctant spouse. The first few chapters are slow but build a tremendous foundation for the second half. Dr. Harley does not use a lot of psychological babble, but rather he explains things through easy to understand examples and concepts. It is amazingly and simplistically written.

While this book handles the topic of marriage in a comprehensive way, it does not handle lots of issues that are sometimes problematic. Topics like children and a spouse's family of origin, major factors in marriage, are not discussed. So, if you and your spouse have some serious problems, this book may only be a supplement to other works or to professional counseling. Nevertheless, if your marriage is in need of major repairs or just needs a tune-up, this book is definitely worth the purchase.

Wonderful. Best book I've ever read on the subject of how to keep your marriage alive and well.

Give the author of this book a bonus for sharing his insights and sparing us thousands in counseling sessions... Great book!!!