Imagine two different marriages. In the first, the couple has a whole plate they handle with care. This couple communicates, cooperates, and compromises well. They show attention, care, reasonableness, and flexibility in their interactions. Each of them perceives that their feelings are respected, understood, validated, and empathized with. Each of them strives to meet the other’s expressed needs and listens readily with good intent when the other says his/her needs have not been met. The second couple has a badly cracked plate. Every day they squabble testily about who broke the plate and how to mend it. They virtually never agree and they typically go to bed believing the other is wrong and harboring resentment. At times the resentments blow up into full-fledged arguments with fault-finding, name-calling, and ultimatums. When you are working with a couple feel free to use this metaphor to help the cracked-plate couple decide to be more like the whole-plate couple and learn how.
