ABSTRACT
Change is ever-present throughout the counseling process. From the beginning, counselors ask couples to experiment with new relationship behavior. With this model alone, counselors challenge participants by blocking old interactional patterns, facilitating congruent communication, and fostering responsive and vulnerable exchanges. Asking participants to change is not new at this point of the counseling process. Helping couples change at the request of their partners, though, is new territory. Until this point, all opportunities for change have been introduced and directed by the counselor and rely on the openness, perseverance, and dedication of the participants. In this chapter, facilitating relationship change is tied to the couple’s ability to share responsibility and model transformation. This type of change is done explicitly in the service of one’s partner. Changing in the service of another is an admirable act requiring humility, reflection, and commitment. In this chapter, we’ll begin with reframing conflict for couples and then move on to acts of sharing responsibility, evaluating expectations for change, adjusting behavior, and modeling transformation. Here’s to helping couples form new paths through their conflicts that initiate opportunities for change and mending.
