Good News / Fireproof #4 / CNN Pick/ NY Times Pick/ 7 Desires/ PREP Research/Contest/Foccus/ Match - 9/29/08

[Smartmarriages]

Some good news on this black Monday.....diane

- FIREPROOF #3 
- TO IMPROVE YOUR MARRIAGE: BE QUIET
- SEPTEMBER SONGS HONORED!!
- THE SEVEN DESIRES OF EVERY HEART
- PREP: RESEARCH ON TEACHING PREP TO INMATES
- A CONTEST
- FIRST PERSON ACCOUNT: PRE-MARRIAGE EDUCATION
- MAKING SENSE OF MODERN MARRIAGE

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 - FIREPROOF #3 

I've heard from MANY of you who managed to see Fireproof this weekend and
from the producers who are excited that it's the #4 movie across the country
- even though it opened in many fewer theaters than the usual release.  Some
wrote to share their hope that this is not just a "first-weekend,
church-sponsored" phenomenon and that this marriage-strengthening movie can
continue to hold its own and ask that you spread the word to your neighbors.
Also, one email said that if anyone missed the presidential debate, as he
did to attend a Fireproof fundraising community marriage event, the entire
debate will be aired tonight at 11pm on CNN. -d

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-  TO IMPROVE YOUR MARRIAGE: BE QUIET

Pretty Cool!!  CNN featured a 2007 article from O Magazine on their home
page which means hundreds of thousands saw it and were helped.  The article
features the Pat Love/Steven Stosny book, How to Improve Your Marriage
Without Talking About It. Their session of the same title was THE most
popular workshop at the San Francisco Smart Marriages Conference......which
means CNN has a good nose for what's hot and helpful when it comes to
marriage advice.  A good moral of the story is that articles have legs  ­
their impact marches on.

Read the article here on CNN:
http://tinyurl.com/4rb46l

Order the recording of the session at
http://www.iplaybacksmartmarriages.com/
Or at 800-241-7785 
> 757-501
> Improve Your Marriage Without Talking About It!
> Pat Love, EdD, Steven Stosny, PhD
> Learn an approach that combines brain research and a set of brief behaviors
> guaranteed to strengthen marriage. Best of all, men can do it without feeling
> they have to behave like women.

Order the book, here:
http://www.smartmarriages.com/app/Media.Booklist

#########################################
- SEPTEMBER SONGS HONORED!!
This weeks' New York Times Book Review Editors recommend 9 books - just nine
books out of the thousands published each week.  Maggie Scarf's September
Songs was one of the nine!   They print a sentence about each recommendation
and of September Songs they say:  "Discreet interviews with longtime
partners reveal much optimism and a sense of well being."  And, we have her
in Orlando!  Order the book at:
http://www.smartmarriages.com/app/Media.Booklist    - diane
  
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-  THE SEVEN DESIRES OF EVERY HEART

Mark and Debra Laaser have a new book:

The Seven Desires of Every Heart.
Using stories and straightforward observations, they examine seven desires
we all share, and illustrate how understanding those desires can enhance our
relationships and enrich our lives.

The Laasers will be training Seven Desires seminar leaders and will have
workbooks and other teaching material available at their Orlando Smart
Marriages Conference Exhibit.

Mark is consistently one of the highest rated presenters at Smart Marriages
in keynotes, workshops and his annual Training Institute on Sex and Porn
Addiction.  Debra will join him as a Smart Marriages presenter in Orlando.
Debra also released her own new book earlier this year: Shattered Vows: Hope
and Healing for Women Who Have Been Sexually Betrayed
 
Order all their books at:
http://www.smartmarriages.com/app/Media.Booklist

##############################################

- PREP: RESEARCH ON TEACHING PREP TO INMATES

Diane, 
You called attentions last week to the importance of teaching marriage
education to individuals and cited prisons as an important setting for this
work.  Here's research from the journal Family Process on teaching the PREP
program to inmates. I found it on redOrbit.com.   I've been frustrated in
trying to get access to journal articles in the past so you want to point
out redOrbit to the list.  It's for those interested in science and it makes
the full text of articles like this available.
Ron

> Participants reported substantial gains in all variables and in overall
> satisfaction with their relationship after completing the program, regardless
> of their gender and racial/ethnic background.

- PREP Inside and Out: Marriage Education for Inmates
28 September 2008

By Einhorn, Lindsey Williams, Tamara; Stanley, Scott; Wunderlin, Nicole;
Markman, Howard; Eason, Joanne

Although research has demonstrated that marriage education has positive
effects on relationship quality, little is known about how such services
impact relationships where one partner is incarcerated. The current study
implemented an adapted version of the Prevention and Relationship
Enhancement Program (PREP Inside and Out) for inmates in Oklahoma
correctional facilities. Inmates, with or without their partners,
participated in the 12-hour program. The impact of the program was
investigated on a range of relationship variables including satisfaction
with relationship, dedication, confidence, communication skills, friendship,
and negative interactions as reported by the inmate partner. Participants
reported substantial gains in all variables and in overall satisfaction with
their relationship after completing the program, regardless of their gender
and racial/ethnic background. Implications for future marriage education
programs and research in prisons are discussed. Keywords: Couples;
Prevention; Incarceration; Prison; Education; Marriage

#########################################
- A CONTEST

Bet someone can come up with some winning marriage-strengthening ideas:

http://www.project10tothe100.com/how_it_works.html

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- FIRST PERSON ACCOUNT: PRE-MARRIAGE EDUCATION

This gives us an inside perspective on what the premarital inventory
experience is like for a young engaged couple.   At the Orlando Smart
Marriages Conference you'll be able train & certify to administer the Foccus
and PREPARE inventories in the pre and post conference institutes.  This
first-person account (learning to recognize each others differences,
allowing for some separate vacations, etc) also reminds me to recommend the
Ellen Bader workshop on working with couples around issues of
DIFFERENTIATION - a concept as important as, and that provides the balance
to, attachment theory.  I highly recommend listening to this one. - diane

> listen to the download for only $9.95 or order on CD for $15.95 at
 http://www.iplaybacksmartmarriages.com/
Or at 800-241-7785 

> Order #757-404 
> Marriage Vitality
> Ellyn Bader, PhD
> Spouses crave intimacy; yet fear intensity. They crave love; yet don't know
> how to be giving. Teach key attachment and differentiation principles to help
> couples achieve loving teamwork.

------------------------------------
COLUMN: Marriage planning with our priest ...
Gretna Breeze (Omaha)
By: Emily Kampschneider
09/28/2008

So, wedding plans are going well. Vendors for the city auditorium in my
hometown, flowers, caterer, bar and decorations have been booked for the May
2 celebration.

My fiancé and I are now meeting with a family priest for the pre-marriage
education course for our Catholic wedding. Father Ortmeier is my mother's
cousin who serves in Lyons, Neb., 30 miles north of Fremont, and we meet him
there.

My fiancé and I each completed the FOCCUS inventory survey in July. It's a
Catholic requirement to prepare for marriage in the church. We responded
agree, disagree or undecided to more than 160 statements. Those answers were
mailed to Father Ortmeier so we could go over every single one again, and
ask and answer more questions with more discussion.

Of the 15 categories of topics, such as religion, finances, child rearing,
relationships and friends, we scored 100 percent on four of them. Pretty
good, we thought.

In the two meetings, we've gone through six categories and we're having a
blast. We laugh a lot.

One statement was about gambling. Before we even started the questions, my
fiancé and I were chuckling. I really enjoy playing blackjack and my fiancé
knows it, but we also know how to limit ourselves. So seeing it on the
FOCCUS was unexpected.

Father Ortmeier didn't mind at all. He says, Emily, your own family gambles
so it's not a big deal. Just know your limits and don't bet the farm.

We also discussed each other's annoying habits. Yes, that was a direct
statement in the FOCCUS: some of my future spouses habits are annoying. We
both circled agreed. I found it annoying that my fiancé sometimes drives in
circles in a parking lot to find the perfect spot or a spot that is far away
from any other vehicles so his vehicle does not get hit.

He found me sometimes careless. That doesn't surprise me because he is an
engineer and I, the creative one, can be scatterbrained. I try to do too
many things at once. Yet, he also said he loves me because I'm so organized
and I plan ahead. At least he admits he understands how I am and accepts
that.

All in all, we have talked about a few key points I wanted to share. There
are many, many young families in Gretna and, some wives and husbands may
have gotten so caught up in their children and families that they may have
forgotten about their marriage.

Communication is so very obvious and important, but what about simply
spending time with each other? My fiancé tends to work more hours than I and
sometimes I don't see him until the sun has set. Father Ortmeier says try to
spend at least 15 minutes a day together in conversation or in a big bear
hug. Or, a couple can plan a date night or go out to dinner alone or simply
stay at home and watch a television show together each week.

Another idea: share and respect each other's hobbies. My fiancé and I both
golf and this summer we were on a co-ed couples best ball league on Friday
nights. That was so fun because we both enjoy the sport, got to be outside
and competed on the same team.

At the same time, I love to travel. Father Ortmeier asked him if he minded
me going to places on my own. He said no, as long as I didn't go very often,
like once a month, on my own.

My fiancé has several interests, but the most important is camping with his
buddies for one week during the summer in the Black Hills of South Dakota. I
don't mind because friends are important. Point being that we each have
special interests and yet enjoy a few of the same activities.

So far, we've learned communication and understanding is above everything.

####################################
- MAKING SENSE OF MODERN MARRIAGE

Hmmmmm......I think this article might better be titled "When You've Given
Up Ever Making Sense of Modern Marriage" then you can take this alternative
route and let your community find and vet your match and skip the premarital
inventory.  I know this is a bit frivolous but on this black Monday, figure
a bit of frivolity is needed and also, I guess the good news is these folks
still very much want to get married.  - diane

Making sense of modern marriage
You've got your marriage at first sight, your bigamists and your commuter
marriage . . .
 
Robin Summerfield
Calgary Herald (Canada)
September 26, 2008

On Oct. 30, two strangers will meet for a blind date in Calgary.

Neither one will know what the other looks like, but they'll both be easy to
spot in the crowd.

One will be wearing a long white gown and the other will be in a tuxedo.

They will meet at the end of the aisle, exchange "I dos," sign a legal
document and then have some face time at the reception.

Billed as a "social experiment" to test the love-is-blind theory, Two
Strangers and a Wedding is the work of local radio station Energy 101.5,
which will award the would-be bride and groom two year-long car leases and
pack them off for a honeymoon in Australia worth $27,000.

"It's either crazy or brilliant," says Calgary psychologist and marriage
therapist Sheldon Walker, one of four experts plus two polygraph technicians
who have all signed on to help manage the social experiment that looks
suspiciously like a contest.

It's modelled after similar contests held around the world, including the
United States, Australia and the United Kingdom. Some marriages were
successful and some failed, including one that ended in divorce after a
week. However, the bride and groom from a New Zealand match-up in 1999 are
apparently still together and now have two boys.

This morning, the Calgary station will announce the chosen bride, who has
been whittled from a field of 52 applicants. During the next few weeks, a
roster of would-be grooms will be interviewed, put through psychological
testing, provide HIV-test results and submit to a police background check,
among other tests. The bride-to-be has endured similar rigours. The field
will be narrowed to five grooms by Oct. 17.

After that day, the bride can get into the act. She will be able to contact
the prospective grooms but never see them. The bride's parents, best friend
and the experts will help her make the final choice. And it all should wrap
up on Oct. 30 with a wedding ceremony, a.k.a. the first date, held at Canada
Olympic Park.

Forget romance. This a seriously officious process.

Come to think of it, perhaps we all should let the professionals put our
suitors through this kind of screening before we march down the aisle,
especially considering Canada's divorce rate, currently running about 40 per
cent. (The U.S. rate takes the wedding cake at 50 per cent.)

Yet, on sober second thought, the whole idea of getting hitched to an
complete stranger seems awfully dumb, no matter who's vetting the bride and
groom.

It's scary enough legally binding yourself to a person you've actually met,
had sex with, sorted laundry with and nursed through the flu.

So why, in the name of Zsa Zsa Gabor (nine marriages and counting), would
you marry an unknown person?

Walker, who's been in a 25-year relationship himself, says there are merits
to the eight-week-long experiment.

While the contest is "highly risky and highly unconventional," if nothing
else it gets people talking about how to meet their match, and how to make
connections in Calgary, Walker says.

He hears it all the time: It's so hard to meet people in Calgary, unless
you're a drinker and into the bar scene.

The potential brides-to-be that Walker has screened are bright, smart,
gutsy, talented women who all say it's so hard to meet men in Calgary. The
grooms in this matchup contest have yet to weigh in.

It's true: it's a jungle out there and it's hard to find a George or a Jane
in that jungle.

Think of this experiment as the modern-day equivalent of an arranged
marriage.

Or as Walker says, it's an "old-fashioned match-making process" where
others, usually family members, put one and one together.

That fix-up strategy might have been useful to the unnamed Calgary woman who
hitched her wagon to a fella who, it's alleged, already had a wife in
Ontario or Quebec.

Earlier this week, he was charged with bigamy, among other offences. It
still needs be sorted in court, but it's believed the 54-year-old suspect
used fake ID to marry the local woman and to also evade support payments for
two children he sired in Central Canada.

With that double-ring groom in mind, it must be asked: when it comes to
modern marriage, isn't one spouse enough?

Marriage has never been an easy proposition.

It takes lots of work, all the experts shout. Talk, talk, talk, they say.

This is top of mind as other married couples navigate an increasingly
popular form of modern relationship, the commuter marriage.

It's also called have your cake (50 per cent property rights) and eat it too
(live like a single person, minus the dating).

In a commuter marriage, the husband and wife live in separate cities,
provinces or even countries. Given e-mail, webcams, text-messaging and great
long-distance phone plans, this permutation of marriage is doable, if less
than perfect. Nothing can replace face-to-face, and hands-on (giddy-up)
contact.

In the U.S. in 2005, an estimated 3.5 million married folk lived apart for
reasons other than "marital discord," the Center for the Study of
Long-Distance Relationships reports. That number represents a 30 per cent
increase between 2000 and 2005. Using the 10 per cent population guideline
for Canada, it's safe to bet about 350,000 married couples live apart in our
country.

It's not ideal, but sometimes it's necessary. Careers, promotions or a sick
family member keep the couple apart.

"It's not a good idea because it raises so many issues," offers Walker, who
says he has many clients living in long-distance wedlock.

He has three rules when it comes to commuter marriages:

- Have a schedule for regular contact.

- Put a time limit on how long you'll live apart, have a big-picture plan
and re-evaluate the situation yearly.

- Tell your partner who you spend time with, before they ask.

That third, and most important rule will ward off jealousy, he says.

Being separated from one's true love pales when viewed with a macro lens.
When it comes to modern marriage mash-ups, it could be much worse, after
all.

The spouse -- one you've only just met and married through a wacky radio
contest -- could be a bigamist far, far away on the other side of the world,
trying to sweet-talk another innocent person into marriage.

And given all the crazy conjugal unions these days, it just could happen.

© The Calgary Herald 2008

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