An Appreciation a day keeps the Therapist away!

Our workshop students love doing our style of appreciation because of its simplicity, ease and power to dramatically improve how couples felt about each other – and themselves.

Appreciations can be tricky; done casually, they can ‘turn off’ the recipient instead of making them feel good and experience a deepened connection with you – just the opposite of what you might have intended. Done right they can transform how you and your partner experience each other and significantly deepen a life-long connection between yourselves.

How can an Appreciation turn into a ‘Turn-Off”? Marshall Rosenberg, the creator of Non-Violent Communication, would frequently be approached by a student of his who would say “…Marshall, you’re so wonderful! I love your work”! To which he would then have to say “Really?! Well, why is that”? To begin to understand why the student felt so appreciative, Marshall would have to stop, question and work to be able to take in what the appreciation was meant to express.

Can you sense how vague the student’s appreciation is? And how challenging it could be for a listener to understand what is meant when you don’t have a sense of why the speaker is being so effusive? Indeed. It’s not concrete; we either must make something up – or fake it – “Thanks” comes out of our mouth and the conversation heads into disconnect with the uncomfortableness of it all. Icky. Not at all what either person might have wanted.

Now let’s try a more productive appreciation between, say, Mary and Frank; “Frank, do you have a moment? Yes? Oh, good; – I was dreading returning home to the sink full of dirty dishes I left this morning, so when I came in and saw everything cleaned, dried and put away, I was soooo relieved! Thank you! You really took a load off my mind!”

Can you identify what was done (dishes washed, dried and put away by Frank), and how Mary felt (dread before and relief after coming home)? Yes! And notice Mary also checked if this was a good time before launching into her appreciation? How do you think their mutual connection was after this exchange?

Dee and I were surprised and delighted by our workshop students consistently reporting that the simple appreciation exercise we teach was so powerfully connecting to them. Done daily over a period of 60 or more days, neuroscience shows we develop new appreciation pathways in our brains. These new pathways then become prioritized over other, older, less appreciative [even negative] pathways, literally changing our relational experience of each other.

Do the appreciation exercise below once a day for a month and see if you notice a shift toward greater connection and ease with your partner. Then consider continuing as a part of your regular, on-going relational routine.

To Summarize: The 3 keys to having appreciations work in your life are:

1: Being specific about what the other did that made you appreciative, and

2: Saying how what they did made you feel – How what was done impacted you.

3: Sharing an appreciation with each other daily.

Note: This type of appreciation of the other is not reflected back; allow what was said to settle inside and be taken in. You can, of course, thank your partner! Also, if you or your partner are having difficulty in identifying the kind of feeling or value that’s coming up, refer to these RESOURCES FROM THE CENTER FOR NON-VIOLENT COMMUNICATION:

LIST OF FEELINGS: https://www.cnvc.org/sites/default/files/feelings_inventory_0.pdf
LIST OF VALUES OR NEEDS: https://www.cnvc.org/sites/default/files/needs_inventory_0.pdf