Relationship Rescue
Are you in your forties and older and have a series of failed relationships trailing behind you? Do you look at happily married or mated couples and wonder what their key to happiness is and why that key has evaded you? Perhaps you look at married and happily-mated couples with ambivalence. You feel lonely sometimes and a certain yearning for that kind of connection, and yet, intimate relationships feel like a trap to you---something that part of you wants to run from as quickly as possible. Perhaps you also see married couples who look bored; you know, those couples who sit through an entire meal at a restaurant barely speaking to each other. You certainly don’t want to be in one of those! And yet, you don’t want to spend your old age lonely and alone; you don’t even like feeling lonely and alone at this stage of your life!
Relationship rescue is on the way! In Pat Webster and Marty Groder’s book Winning at Love, the authors discuss problems in establishing and maintaining successful relationships and then spell out ways to address these problems. Relationship rescue begins first with an examination of your relationship with yourself. Many people who feel ambivalent about intimate relationships are alpha. What is an alpha?
Alpha designates “the first” and we first started designating this to the leaders of animal packs, such as wolves. Approximately 40% of all males and females are alphas. The alpha is usually the strongest and the bravest, the leader of the pack. They possess such attributes as dominance, confidence, and a take-charge attitude. The alpha has a high level of self-directedness, as they doggedly go about their goals. Alphas are usually aggressive, competitive high achievers, with a strong sense of mission and can be bold, creative innovative thinkers. Often highly successful in the world, the alpha’s traits of persistence, tenacity, determination and steadfastness help them to achieve their goals.
However, when it comes to taking steps in a relationship that would make the relationship be more loving and healthy, the very traits that make alphas successful in the world can prevent a healthy relationship. Even if eighty percent of what an alpha does is really good for the relationship, the twenty percent that he or she does out of their alpha attitude and behavior is enough to blow up the relationship. Alphas often put their profession or career ahead of their intimate relationship, they can expect of others the same high standards that they expect of themselves, they can impose their driven nature onto others and they can come across as critical and opinionated.
Alphas often don’t realize that part of relationship rescue has to do with addressing the problems particular to their being an alpha. While Winning at Love is a good handbook for every couple, it is unique in that it also addresses problems specific to the alpha and specific to relationships in which one or both members are alpha.
Tools and skills for relationship rescue are laid out in a step-by-step fashion that is easy to understand, much like a how-to-fix-your lawnmower manual. This book is entertaining and humorous. Unlike other relationship self-help books that couch relationship problems as “failure to communicate”, this book brilliantly categorizes relationship problems into four simple categories, with relationship rescue in the form of understanding these problems and easy-to-understand steps in addressing these problems.
This book is a must for any couple in need of relationship rescue, and especially for those relationships in which one or both partners are alpha.
Need a relationship rescue? Get your copy of Winning at Love today!
