![]() Re-romanticizing your marriage or romantic relationship with things like giving gifts, surprising your partner, or through other displays of appreciation for one another.Reimagining your partner as a child who is wounded.It helps manage expectations, clarify reactions and engage with intention rather than reactivity.” Talkspace therapist Amy Cirbus PhD, LMHC, LPC 5 core principles of imago relationship therapy Taking the time to understand how we engage with our partners and why, can help provide an understanding that leads to deeper connection and satisfaction. However, as we enter into relationships with intimate partners, we often don’t dedicate enough time to understanding why we want what we want, what we need and expect from our partners. As we grow and develop a sense of our own identity we come to know who we are as individuals outside of our parents. For most of us, we come to understand who we are through our parents. “How we see ourselves begins with how we understand who we are through others’ eyes. Then, we can fulfill the qualities that we either got or weren’t allowed to express during our childhood. ![]() We associate both the negative and the positive interactions we had with our parents as things we need in adult relationships. The theory behind imago is that because emotional and psychological experiences with our parents are so impactful, we unconsciously seek out people in our adult life who are similar in order to fulfill our imago. Throughout every interaction, you developed patterns - you can think of them as survival patterns - designed to ensure you got the love you needed and that you were safe. Those early relationships create an individualized understanding of what real love is. It’s based on interactions you had early in life, generally with your parents or other caretakers. The basic foundation of imago therapy is that the best form of therapy is when relationships focus on mutual healing. For example, if we’re repeatedly criticized as children, we may become extremely sensitive to critique in our adult relationships. Imago, the Latin word for image, refers to our familiar unconscious image of real love.
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