“Every master was once a disaster.”
—T. Harv Ekert, Author and Motivational Speaker
I’ve been known by many as the world’s most trusted intimacy expert for the past fifteen years, but I started out as an unhappy wife. Everything in my marriage was a mess. My husband John was distant and avoided spending time with me. I was responsible for everything in our household because he couldn’t seem to accomplish even the simplest tasks. We had a lot of big fights, with silent cold wars in between. I was seriously considering divorce.
We went to marriage counseling, which only made things worse. But we kept going anyway, because I couldn’t think of anything else to do.
We barely survived marriage counseling. It put us under more stress—not less.
Here’s an example. One of the things that our counselor—let’s call her Nicole—recommended was that John take a six-month break from working because he hated his job so much. It would be like a sabbatical, except with no promise that his job would still be there when he returned. I would support us both in the interim.
I objected to this idea on the basis that it would be hard for us to get by without John’s income. Nicole looked at me reproachfully and said, “This isn’t just about money. Who do you think he is, Santa Claus?”
Of course I didn’t want John to be miserable at work, and we wanted to do what she suggested since we were paying her for advice on how to improve our marriage. So I’m embarrassed to admit that we went along with her stupid plan. That’s how desperate we both felt.
As you can probably imagine, it didn’t go well. And it wasn’t just the financial stress of the lost income that caused the pain, although that was definitely a big part of it. The bigger issue was the way it exacerbated the very problems we’d sought marriage counseling for in the first place.
At the time, I was already suffering from a superiority complex, thinking I was smarter, more responsible, and more practical than John, to the point that I had to do everything—from paying bills to making sure our cars were maintained to setting up our dental appointments. With John on “sabbatical,” I became the sole breadwinner too, while John took time to contemplate his navel. I didn’t realize it then, but John was already feeling emasculated by my constant nitpicking, critical comments, and disrespectful tone, and not contributing financially only magnified that feeling.
Within the first month of this arrangement, I was in such terror about our finances—not to mention thoroughly resentful that John was spending his time relaxing while I did everything—that I insisted we end the experiment immediately and he get a job. I raged at him every few days when he didn’t find a job right away. Naturally he resented me more than ever for being so controlling and oppressive, but I didn’t know how to stop.
Desperate for anything to help my marriage, I got the idea of asking women who had been married a long time for their secrets. I decided to talk to women who had been married at least fifteen years, because when you’ve been married for six years and you’re miserable, fifteen years seems like a lifetime.
I was in for a real shock. What these women told me was so contrary to what I thought I knew about relationships that it just didn’t make any sense. Still, I was willing to try anything to avoid the cost, pain, and embarrassment of a divorce, so I decided to give their suggestions a go. When some of those seemingly crazy suggestions worked, I kept doing them.
It took a lot of practice to figure it all out, and I made some mistakes along the way, but I ended up with six core skills that greatly improved the happiness and connection between John and myself. I call these the Six Intimacy Skills. When I stuck to these skills, my marriage improved dramatically. John became much more thoughtful, and he started taking more initiative—from taking me out to dinner to deciding to stain the deck. He was also doing the dishes without me having to ask him six times—or at all. He wasn’t watching much TV or looking as depressed and dejected. He even started his own successful business and took over handling the household bills so I didn’t have to worry about them.
I knew that the Six Intimacy Skills were working because we were laughing together again, and holding hands, and enjoying physical intimacy like we hadn’t for years.
Next I enlisted some of my girlfriends to try the Six Intimacy Skills. We met regularly in my living room to encourage one another. Our mission was to restore our marriages to their original glory—to get back the excitement, fun, and passion we’d all experienced in the beginning. I wasn’t sure if the skills I’d discovered would work for them too, but it didn’t take long to find out. My friends showed up with romantic stories about their relationships and even breakthroughs in their finances. One husband got a raise, another won a sales contest and took his wife on a trip, and another painted the family room that they’d been bickering about for months. The way my friends felt and the things they shared about their husbands made it clear that the intimacy skills had greatly improved their relationships.
All the women noticed that their husbands were becoming more romantic and thoughtful. We all felt more desired and attractive. Our husbands were more attentive to the kids and were helping out around the house more. They seemed happier, and we were too. We couldn’t believe the transformation. It was like we had figured out a way to turn the clock back to the beginning of our relationships, when everything was exciting and we felt adored all the time.
Word spread. Dozens, then hundreds, then thousands of women came to me for help. I showed them the Six Intimacy Skills, and the results were always the same. When a wife learned and practiced the skills, her relationship improved dramatically in about two weeks. Women often tell me they feel like they have a new husband. But of course, he isn’t the one who changed—she is, which causes him to respond to her differently.
It took me a lot of years, a lot of hard work, and a lot of trial and error to figure all of this out. Now I share all my knowledge through books, coaching, and training. I coach women who are married, women who want to be married, and women who want to learn these skills well before they get married (like I wish I had!) because I’m on a mission to end world divorce. I created an international coaching company in support of my mission to teach these skills to as many women as I can, either privately or in groups. I hold retreats where women learn to transform their relationships in just three days.
I wrote this book and created the companion website skillsforlove.com to provide every woman with a practical, step-by-step guide to an inspiring, fortifying, magical relationship, based on my sixteen years of experiencing just that.
I’ve poured my heart and soul into this book. It’s guaranteed to make you happy and help you have the kind of marriage you’ve always wanted, even if your relationship has been broken for a long time. These skills have worked for more than 150,000 women in twenty-seven countries and sixteen languages. They’ll work for you too! And the good news is that they’re fun practices, like taking naps, hanging out with your girlfriends, thinking about what you want, and getting special treatment. But just because they’re fun doesn’t mean they won’t bring about a big transformation—they absolutely will. You’ll return to being the Goddess of Fun and Light, just like you were when you first fell in love.
If your inner skeptic is rolling her eyes, I get it. I still remember thinking how impossible it would be for my relationship to ever become acceptable, much less amazing. But don’t just take my word that the Six Intimacy Skills work. Try out some of the suggestions the way you would try on a coat at the store. Do some experiments with the skills. See how you feel when you try them and how your husband responds to you. I guarantee you’ll be amazed.
Imagine if you knew how to turn the clock back to the beginning of your relationship, when you respected your husband so much and felt so adored.
What if you could be completely authentic and also inspire him to want to help you with the things you want most? How would your life change if just expressing your desires made your husband eagerly look for ways to fulfill them?
All of that is possible, because you have the most power in your relationship. All women do. When you apply the suggestions in this book, the natural consequences will be that your relationship becomes more passionate, playful, and peaceful. The ideas you’re going to learn may seem pretty crazy to you at first, just like they did to me. This is not the usual relationship mumbo-jumbo, like “schedule a date night once a week,” “learn to communicate better,” or “go to couples counseling.”
In fact, that kind of advice nearly drove me over the edge and into the divorce lawyer’s office. It still makes me crazy to hear those kinds of platitudes repeated over and over again, especially from credible-seeming sources (I’m looking at you, Dr. Phil McGraw, Dr. John Gottman, and the Wall Street Journal). I still remember how messed up John and I got from trying to follow conventional wisdom and how frustrating and pointless it all was. Now that I’ve worked with thousands of women to improve their marriages, I can assure you—those kinds of suggestions just don’t work. I’ll explain why later in this book, but for the moment let me just reiterate: If you hear someone saying those kinds of things, run in the other direction. I’m sure they mean well, but if conventional wisdom and marriage counseling worked, we wouldn’t have so many divorces, and I wouldn’t have so many marriage counselors reaching out to me for help. As strange as it sounds, many counselors admit they simply aren’t well-trained in the area of couples counseling as part of their education.
If you feel like you’ve been trying really hard to improve your relationship and it’s not working, maybe the problem was never you, or your husband, or the two of you as a couple. Maybe the problem is that nobody ever taught you the skills you need to make things work. With this book, you are holding those skills in your hands, and you’ll be able to start using them today. You’re on your way to feeling desired, cherished, and adored for life.
Once you learn the Six Intimacy Skills, you will no longer want to go to marriage counseling because you will no longer be suffering in your relationship. No matter how many years you’ve been struggling, you can stop now. In fact, letting go of the struggle will be one of the keys to seeing your husband’s face light up when you walk in the room again, or having him ask you what errands or housework he can help with before the party, or seeing him taking care of that roof leak right away, instead of turning to you and saying, “What should we do?”
I can’t imagine my life without the Six Intimacy Skills now, because I enjoy feeling deeply loved, desired, and cherished. And these skills gave me so much more than just a gratifying relationship: I also regained my dignity and confidence. The skills helped me learn how to be happier and to nurture my talents. I have been able to accomplish some pretty wonderful things, like landing on the New York Times bestseller list, appearing on national television shows, and hearing from thousands of amazing women who have thanked me for saving their marriages. I’m also less anxious, and I have a better connection with my family, friends, and coworkers too. In other words: There was a huge payoff in every area of my life for practicing a few skills, all because I didn’t want to get divorced or be miserable anymore.
You’ll experience the same kinds of benefits once you incorporate the Six Intimacy Skills into your life.