It depends.
Getting the Love You Want weekend workshops:
1. The workshop is a good way for couples to learn information and skills to help them at the beginning of a marriage or relationship or to enrich and make even better one that is good. These couples want education and enrichment and don’t need counseling.
The good thing about a Getting the Love You Want workshop is that it is a great way to do a lot of work and get information and tools very quickly.
2. Couples in crisis often do better to do the workshop to get some momentum going in a positive direction, even if they continue in counseling.
3. For some couples, it is hard to schedule regular sessions together.
4. It can be less costly in the long-run.
5. Although you are not required to share with anyone in the group besides your own partner, some people do comment and ask questions. Couples have remarked that it was helpful to them to see that other couples experience similar issues.
Couples consistently like the workshop (even ones who are dragged to it) and find it useful. We typically have couples ranging from good or new relationships to last ditch efforts to save the marriage or relationship and everything in between. We sometimes have couples who do not want to repair the relationship but want to learn skills and tools to be better parents after a divorce.
However, wherever you are in your marriage or relationship, if you don’t use what you learn, you will go back to your old and familiar ways – even ones that don’t work very well. And that is true in counseling as well. YOU are the ones who have to take what you learn and apply it, no matter which way you get help or enrichment.
Private Counseling in a Therapist’s Office:
The good thing about private counseling is that because it is done over time, you have an opportunity to practice in-between sessions and clarify with the counselor when you get stuck. You also get one on one help. With counseling, I think it is helpful to look at working hard and regularly for a 3 month period. During that time some couples come weekly, bi-weekly, or in some other time frame. I personally like to have 3-4 sessions fairly close together, then spread them out more and more so that the couple is using what they are learning at home. I do not believe in keeping people in counseling forever. In my view, you are either going to do the work or not. If you are not going to work hard when you are investing the time and money in counseling, you are not likely going to do by just extending the time you are in counseling.
Both private counseling and the Getting the Love You Want workshops are effective. Some couples do one and not the other. Some couples do both. Some couples go to the workshop and decide they want just a few sessions of private coaching on the tools.
The main thing is that you get the information, tools and skills you need to create a better marriage or relationship in a relatively short period of time.
If there has been a major crisis like an affair, counseling can take longer because so much damage to the marriage/relationship and trust happens. And that is true, even if you attend the workshop.
If there are addictions, it is essential that the person with the addictive behavior get help for that as well as marriage or relationship counseling. Otherwise the addictive behavior will undermine the work you are doing as a couple. I require that the person is actively getting help for the addiction or that he or she has already participated in some recovery program.
If you are already working with a therapist, ask about going to the workshop. It often helps couples in therapy move along more quickly. A number of therapists often suggest it to their couples and then continue working with them after the workshop.
If you have any other questions, let me know.
