FACET Topics: Communication

"I know you believe you understand what you think I said,
but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant."
— SOURCE UNKNOWN

At this point in FACET it has to be clear that underlying every topic is the ability to communicate effectively.. It is an important skill that the couple must continually work on throughout their marriage. This section begins by asking each person to think about what they learned in their childhood home about communication. What tools are they coming into the marriage with? Then it addresses how they think they communicate currently, what good communication consists of and what their opinions are about the need for good communication. This section hopes to raise to consciousness some unspoken beliefs each one has about how communication is handled between them, how much communication is necessary, and what each one hopes to do about couple communication going forward.

Additional Questions to assist the conversation:

• What structures will we place within our daily/weekly lives to ensure we keep our communication open and growing?

• What helps me to communicate better?

• What makes it more difficult for me to communicate?

• How can we assist each other in our on-going commitment to communicate well?

• How does our communication pattern differ from the one each of us learned as children?