Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples [Paperback]

Harville Hendrix (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2001

The bestselling guide to transforming an intimate relationship into a lasting source of love and companionship., with a new foreword and chapter from the author

In Getting the Love You Want, Dr. Harville Hendrix presents the relationship skills that have already helped hundreds of thousands of couples to replace confrontation and criticism with a healing process of mutual growth and support. This extraordinary practical guide describes the revolutionary technique of Imago Relationship Therapy, which combines a number of disciplines--including the behavioral sciences, depth psychology, cognitive therapy, and Gestalt therapy, among others-- to create a program to resolve conflict and renew communication and passion.

Getting the Love You Want describes the three stages of intimate relationships, provides illustrative case studies and gives helpful recommendations to overcome the obstacles in those stages to create a stronger bond between couples. First, he chronicles the stages of most relationships-attraction, romantic love and the power struggle-and suggests ways for partners to identify the conflicts associated with each of them. Then, he explores methods for achieving a "Conscious Marriage," where the early phases of romance are rekindled and confrontation is slowly replaced by growth and support. Finally, Dr. Hendrix incorporates these ideas into a unique therapeutic course, offering a series of proven exercises that lead to insight, resolution and revitalization. Step by step, he describes how to communicate with greater accuracy and sensitivity, how to let go of self-defeating behaviors, and how to focus energy on meeting each partners' needs.

With Getting the Love You Want couples in any stage of a relationship can resolve their conflicts and achieve mutual emotional satisfaction.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

When Harville Hendrix writes about relationships, he discusses them not just as an educator and a therapist, but as a man who has himself been through a failed marriage. Hendrix felt the sting of his divorce intensely because he believed it signaled not only his failure as a husband but also his failure as a couples counselor. Investigating why his marriage dissolved led him to start looking into the psychology of love. Marriage, he ultimately discovered, is the "practice of becoming passionate friends."

As a result of his research, Hendrix created a therapy he calls Imago Relationship Therapy. In it, he combines what he's learned in a number of disciplines, including the behavioral sciences, depth psychology, cognitive therapy, and Gestalt therapy, to name just a few. He expounds upon this approach in Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples. His purpose in writing the book, he says, is "to share with you what I have learned about the psychology of love relationships, and to help you transform your relationship into a lasting source of love and companionship."

Divided into three sections, the book covers "The Unconscious Marriage," which details a marriage in which the remaining desires and behavior of childhood interfere with the current relationship; "The Conscious Marriage," which shows a marriage that fulfils those childhood needs in a positive manner; and a 10-week "course in relationship therapy, " which gives detailed exercises for you and your partner to follow in order to learn how to "replace confrontation and criticism ... with a healing process of mutual growth and support." The text is occasionally dry and technical; however, the information provided is valuable, the case studies are interesting, and the exercises are revealing and helpful. By utilizing his program, Hendrix hopes you too will be able to solve your marital difficulties without the expense of a therapist. --Jenny Brown --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"Getting the Love You Want is a remarkable book--the most incisive and persuasive I have ever read on the knotty problems of marriage relationships."--Ann Roberts, Former President, Rockefeller Family Fund

"Harville Hendrix offers the best program I've seen for using the love/hate energy in marriage to help a couple heal one another and to become whole together."--T. George Harris, Editor-in-Chief, American Health magazine

"This book will help any couple find the love they want hidden under all the concealing confusion of a close and intimate relationship. I have seen these principles in application and they work!"--James A. Hall, M.D.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 303 pages
• Publisher: Holt Paperbacks; First Edition edition (September 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0805068953
• ISBN-13: 978-0805068955
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (181 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #20,732 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Harville Hendrix, Ph.D., a clinical pastoral counselor and co-creator of Imago Relationship Therapy, has more than thirty-five years' experience as an educator, public lecturer, and couples' therapist.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

251 of 277 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the few books that may really change your life, April 9, 2001

By 

SH in Tampa "SPH" (Tampa FL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples (Paperback)

The relationship/self-help book market is booming. When looking for one of these books you are presented with a bewildering array of "experts" and "specialists", each with their pet theories about where men and women come from or what "rules" you should apply to your relationship.

It is rare to find a book written by an author with solid academic credentials and years of clinical practice. This book is one such find.

The book is organized into three parts. In part I, Dr. Hendrix describes the type of relationships most of us have - "Unconscious Marriage". In this section, he details how our childhood experiences, self image and ideals of romantic love combine to create an unstated power struggle between spouses. Often many books stop at this point, assuming that the reader can now go forth and solve their problems. Fortunately Dr. Hendrix continues.

In the second part, he describes what a more fulfilling relationship might look like, the "Conscious Marriage". He describes how to begin with commitment, stop destructive exit patterns, creating a zone of safety, understanding yourself and your partner, how to begin real self growth and containing rage. He closes by providing two examples of marriages that have been transformed by applying these techniques. The exercises and approaches described by Dr. Hendrix are hard. His most meaningful techniques are not quick tricks but require a lot of introspection and self awareness. As he mentions in his book, many couples may require external assistance (we did). However, his techniques provides lasting changes in the way that you interact with your partner.

The final part of the book is a series of exercises that help drive how the major points in each chapter of the preceding two sections. Relevant and helpful, their main point appears to be to draw the reader into applying the theories presented in the book to their own situation. In this respect, they are helpful.

We have tried a number of different books/techniques to help our relationship and we found this one to be the most helpful by orders of magnitude. I hope it works well for others

139 of 157 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Life Changing!!!, February 27, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples (Paperback)

Let me start by saying I am not a self-help book devotee. That said, this book has revolutionized my relationship with my husband and taken it to a new level. BUT... I recommend this book for only those seriously committed to REALLY wanting an honest, soul-fully deep relationship. This is not a quick fix book full of easy answers. If you are looking for a book to tell you how to fix your partner or get them to be what you want them to be, don't buy this book.

To make the concepts in Getting The Love You Want work, it takes a tremendous amount of gut wrenchingly honest introsepction, humility, willingness to do things completely differently, and total selflessness. It's hard work.

But if you do what this book suggests, your life will be forever changed ... in all your relationships. This book has changed my life and enriched it beyond belief. I read the book - my husband didn't. Although he was not a proactive participant in the process, his life has been equally impacted and we are getting all we ever hoped for from each other.

102 of 115 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Worth a Good Look, November 12, 2008

By 

Melody - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples (Paperback)

I looked at this book from a different perspective than most readers. I didn't read it as a person in need of relationship advice. Rather, I read it as a person who has been happily married for 22 years. My question was, how closely did the advice in this book match what I was doing successfully?

A bestseller since 1988, the book is separated into 3 sections:

-the first part talks about how unmet childhood needs can affect your future relationships.

-the second part talks about a marriage that can fulfil your unmet childhood needs in constructive ways.

-lastly, part three is the exercises. Here you'll be taken through a series of exercises that you can do at home that have been actually used in the author's practice. They're easy to do and involve writing.

Well, that's a rough synopsis that should give you a little bit of a feel as to how the book is set up- and what its about.

So how closely did the advice in this book match what I have been doing all this time to create a successful 22-year marriage? Perfectly- both the book and I promote the idea that you have to work at your marriage to make it work!

And perhaps that's the best piece of advice of all: find constructive ways to make you marriage better- and that's one thing this book most certainly succeeds at. Other self-help books I liked include "Finding Happiness in a Frustrating World."