Suzanne Duncan Imago Therapy

18/03/2023

22/07/2020

22/07/2020

This guide for couples is the foundational text that introduces you to Imago Relationship Therapy. It opens up a whole new context in which you may gain new insights into yourself, your history and relationships. Do yourself a favour and take the time to read it!

11/07/2020

Step 1: Hedy says that we can strengthen our relationship by acknowledging a basic principle. It is knowing that conflict is your friend! It is an opportunity and an invitation to grow and to become more mature. Conflict is the edge of growth where both of us arrive - and that is where we do not yet know what to do. It is a knock at the door that says - you can grow!
Step 2: Crossing the bridge. Conflict is an invitation to each partner to understand and empathise with each of their childhood stories that underpins the conflict. Apply the 90%/10% formula: When there is conflict, 10% of the energy of the conflict is in the present between you and I, whereas 90% of the energy has its roots in the past, in our childhood. If 90% of the energy was not caught in childhood we would have 100% of the energy to deal with the situation in a creative and adult way. What is the story I still need to tell my partner?
Step 3: Encounter: Human essence to human essence. It takes courage to be connected.
Hedy Schleifer is an internationally known psychotherapist, trainer, relationship coach, workshop presenter and motivational speaker.

27/12/2019

Suzanne Duncan's counseling practice.

25/10/2018

06/06/2018

The quality of your relationship today is as meaningful as you co-created it in the present moment.

04/03/2018

23/02/2018

You're infatuated with each other, you're hanging on every text message, you're daydreaming about your future together as a couple, so you decide to commit to the relationship and all hell breaks loose.
This is the power struggle! You've spent your whole courtship imagining how your partner's going to complete you and now that you've committed you want to turn that fantasy into reality. The problem is, we don't get into relationships to complete the other person, we get into relationships to complete ourselves!
That's right, and this power struggle went down with Mike and I big time. You know, as I said earlier, Mike is a little bit more detached or more aloof, and that was something that attracted to me to him initially because that was kind of what I was familiar with in my childhood. But once I decided to commit it really infuriated me, and I wanted him to change and make me feel better, that would heal me somehow, and you know also I think I'm can be co-dependent and I can be not as good at setting boundaries and had doing healthy detachment, so he mirrored for me a part of myself that I'd buried inside, that was uncomfortable to look at. Another example this power struggle was around Mike being the spiritual leader in our relationship. I really wanted him to, you know, set the moral code and kind of be this, you know, steady presence. It was something I didn't have in my childhood and I saw that in him, but he didn't take it to where I wanted him to. And so that again angered me and created this power struggle that we had throughout our relationship.
Early on in our relationship Genevieve had a lot of indecisiveness about us, and that mirrored for me a lot of things that I experienced while growing up, a lot of what I saw in my family. Also a lot of what I saw in myself, and for years before we met, I was trying to get rid of my indecisiveness and be a more decisive person, and so when I saw it in you it was really frustrating and agitating, yeah! And then also Genevieve was a fairly conservative gal when we met, but she had these sparks of adventure and creativity and art, but then she would talk about a suburb she liked to live in and a more traditional domesticated lifestyle and it just bent me all out of shape, and we would argue a lot about that and polarize each other around that topic.
The thing about these power struggles is a lot of these are subconscious, you know, kind of old primal drives and so we're not usually conscious and really clear about what we need and communicate it in healthy ways. A lot of it comes out passive-aggressively through arguments and ultimatums, and just unhealthy ways.
Why don't we just ask each other for what we want. That would make a lot more sense. If the woman needs more s*x in the relationship or if the man needs more intimacy, it's possible right, it would make perfect sense for them just to ask for it! Harville Hendricks, the author of Getting the love you want, ties it back to our early infancy. When a baby needs something they don't smile and coo at their parents, instead they wail and their parents anticipate what they want and they give it to them. And so, when we act this out as adults with hostility and anger and passive aggressiveness it's kind of this return to infancy. It's adult wailing!
That's right. Harville Hendrix breaks down this power struggle into five stages and they're the same stages of grief - shock (disbelief), anger, bargaining, denial and acceptance. We had all these stages. They weren't necessarily linear but, for example, one of the stages was bargaining. My bargain with Mike was if he read the Bible every day with me then I would commit. For him it was if I chose to live in a particular neighbourhood that was more urban, than he'd commit. So we definitely danced with a lot of these reasons.
We did. There was denial for sure. There was despair. Towards the peak of our engagement there was real despair, and despair is where 50% of couples split. That's our 50% divorce rate in this nation (USA).
Harville Hendrix talks about other couples that choose to lead parallel lives in their marriages and that's where they stay in the marriage but they're not connected and they look outside the marriage for their fulfilment.
Only 5%, according to Hendrix, actually choose to walk through the power struggle, get the support they need and create a conscious relationship, which is ultimately very rewarding and healing for both partners. That's what we are going to talk about, and that is what we're talking about. One of the first steps of really making a conscious relationship is deciding to close your exits, and that's something that we're going to unpack in the next video, so stay tuned!

23/02/2018

You hear it time and time again. You're acting just like my mother! I don't need two fathers, thank you very much! I feel so alone in this relationship, just like I felt when I was a child. According to marriage psychologist, Harville Hendrix, it is actually quite common for people to go out and look for a mate who has both the positive and the negative characteristic traits of their caregivers. What Hendrix found is that we end up with people who especially have those negative characteristics. In fact it's so widespread that he coined a term for it. He called it the "Imago Match." It's like this. Imago (I-mah-go) means 'image' in Latin. The image of our caregivers is burned into our subconscious and we're going out into the world seeking it. Which is totally bizarre. If you came from an overbearing household that's the last thing you would want to find in a mate. You would look for somebody who gave you plenty of freedom and space. But unfortunately the exact opposite is usually what happens. You find a partner, that again, is controlling and overbearing, and you recreate the same environment you had when you were a child. Now why on earth would you do this? Well, first of all, it's not our conscious minds that are at play here - it's the unconscious. Most of the time we don't even realize what we're doing until we wake up one day and we find ourselves in a relationship that's a lot like our parents relationships. And that's exactly what happened to Mike and I.
Mike is my imago match! Did you ever have a type? My friends used to always make fun of me, that I had the sensitive ponytail type (of partner) and, you know, Mike was definitely the sensitive ponytail man. He's creative, he's artistic, and you know, I was always drawn to that - it reminded me a lot of my father. They were very interested in lots of different things and had a lot of really provocative ideas. Also like my father though, Mike can be critical and very particular about things and so being around him felt comfortable because it was something that I knew as a child. Mike is also withdrawn emotionally. He's more an introverted personality and he can keep to himself and be quiet. He needs a lot of solitude and that reminded me a lot of my mom. She was hard to get to know. You didn't really know what she was really feeling inside and so Mike really reminded me of her in that regard. Also like my mom, Mike is loyal and committed. He's steady and he's consistent and that really reminded me of my mom when I was growing up. It was actually very comforting to have that quality in Mike.
Genevieve is my imago match. When we first met she struck me as charismatic and dynamic and exciting and that's a lot like my dad. When I was growing up my dad was the man. Genevieve also shares a bit of his temperament which is to say that she can have a bit of a temper and she can also be a bit bossy and that is like my dad. My dad was my boss when I was growing up at the family business. Genevieve is also a good girl. She's a Christian. She's fairly conservative and that's a lot like my mom. Genevieve can also be a bit of a martyr saddled with work and duty. She just takes a lot on and that's a lot like my mom who was a single working parent.
It may seem maddening to be in a relationship with someone who resembles your caregivers, but it actually provides a tremendous opportunity for healing for both of you. That is something that we will cover in the upcoming video on this relationship series, so stay tuned!