Mindful Relationship Habits

25 Practices for Couples to Enhance Intimacy, Nurture Closeness, and Grow a Deeper Connection

By: Barrie Davenport, S.J. Scott

Narrated by: Amy Barron Smolinski

Length: 6 hrs and 7 mins

Publisher's Summary

Feel disconnected from your spouse or partner? Struggle to keep your relationship fresh? Worried that everything will end in heartbreak?

It's easy to fall in love. The challenging part is keeping that spark alive while you and your partner deal with "the real world."

Your relationship can often seem less urgent than the day-to-day emergencies that you deal with - your job, finances, children, and that to-do list full of chores. They all demand your immediate attention. So how do you find the time to nurture your love and intimacy? 

What often gets lost in the shuffle is the love you share with your partner. Maybe you've neglected some of the positive habits you adopted when you were dating to win over your love partner. Or perhaps all of your conversations seem to end in arguments? Or worse, you might occasionally wonder if your relationship is even worth salvaging.

The solution: Build mindful relationship habits: If you want to build a deeper connection with your spouse or partner, then one solution is to build "mindful relationship habits." 

In a mindful relationship, you are intentional about all your choices and interactions with your partner. You become more proactive in responding to each other's needs and less reactive to the challenges that often arise. You evolve to a higher level of interaction with one another.

In Mindful Relationship Habits, Wall Street Journal best-selling authors S. J. Scott and Barrie Davenport show you how to have a more mindful relationship by applying 25 specific practices. These habits will help you be more present with one another, communicate better, avoid divisive arguments, and understand how to respond to one another's needs in a more loving, empathic, and conscious way.

With the relationship advice outlined in this audiobook, you will get insights and lessons learned from a variety of relationship and mindfulness experts - all backed by scientific research.

Each habit presented offers a clear explanation of why it's valuable to the health of your relationship and instructions on how to make the habit a natural part of your interactions with your partner.

©2018 S.J. Scott, Barrie Davenport (P)2018 S.J. Scott, Barrie Davenport

Middle School Etiquette

While I appreciated the content and the intentions behind the writing, the language and presentation irritated me. It was the ultimate compliment sandwich - compliment, lettuce, Tommy, constructive criticism, mustard and compliment. I could hear the narrator as a nagging, nail on chalk board cringe. By the end of the book, I felt everyone got a gold ribbon for participation. Again good intentions and workable ‘lists’, just not my cup of tea.

Great Info for my Marriage

This is a great book to walk through with my wife and has enhanced our marriage.

Would rate at 4.5, but my phone didn't allow it.

This is a great book! It is very practical and applicable to life. I really liked that it wasn't just filled with concepts, but it included steps and ideas on how to approach your significant other in each step. It is practical and easy to follow. My boyfriend has also been enjoying the book and wants to implement the techniques. He is excited to meet to talk about our couple goals. It makes sense to work on this as well as our other life goals. I would definitely recommend this book to my family and friends, and think more people would benefit from working on their intimate relationship.
I got a free copy of the audio book for an honest review.

Superb practical Guide to Relationship

Very Useful psychological approaches, that reveal most of the problems in communication.
The only challenging part is to convince your Partner to listen it. Otherwise everything is almost useless.

simple steps

great list to go by , second reading , I still wear my rubber band

Excellent

I wasn't looking for a book to improve my relationship, but rather to keep it as great as it is now. I did find some areas that we could improve, but a lot of awareness on what we need to keep doing, or "do better". I really enjoyed this book and consider it a valuable resource. I will be listening to it again, and find a way for my husband to listen to it with me chapter by chapter and discuss it.

Informative, resourceful, but discipline is needed

The book is a good collection of valuable ideas and advices on how to improve your relationship. It refers to several reputable authoritative studies in this field (e.g. John Gottman, Gary Chapman, Harville Hendrix), convenient for further research. This gives us a big picture at a quick glance on ingredient of good relationship (i.e. 25 habits). Yet, if you have read famous books of mentioned authors, several parts of this book would be repetitive to what you have read already.

The book suggests steps to follow to build mindful relationship, e.g. having mutual relationship goals, practice acceptance of your partners, connect and engage daily, create shared ritual, becoming an expert on your partner, develop active listening.

Despite the book being informative, its practicality depends on each individual. Detailed several steps are to be followed to establish new habits, e.g. 9 steps to initiate productive conflict. For example, habit # 20 manage your anger constructively, personally I think there are so many steps to follow, e.g. analyze situation calmly, examine deeper emotion why you are angry, remind yourself o what you want, all such steps may not be practical as those who could follow would not have needed the book, to begin with. If there are lesser steps to think of at the middle of the heat of argument, it could be more practical, e.g. notice the "repair attempt" of your partner, if any (as John Gottman suggested), and acknowledge that, and it signals possibility to reconnect.

Not the best

I was disappointed in this audible book and did not feel it was as helpful as I hoped it would be. Narrator was drab and uninteresting.

great help

loved it. helped to communicate better with my spouse. lots of good ideas for communication

S.J. Scott is a very insightful author!

I love S.J. Scott's books. He always has very concise, helpful and actionable advice. This audiobook is packed with great advice for relationship! I definitely recommend it! Be ready to take down notes!

I was given a free copy of this audiobook in exchange for a review.

Drivel

This book uses mindfulness as a catchphrase, but I seriously doubt the authors have any clear idea about what mindfulness is.

Occasionally there is a little bit of interesting or useful information, but it's hidden in a morass of unhelpful, counter mindful dross.

Shortsighted, jargon filled, unremitting dull.

Amazing

This book is so helpful and the content is both easy to understand and also put into practice. Would definitely recommend.