An intensive 3-hour training in couples therapy.
Spouses and partners also welcome

Love Cycles, Fear Cycles: The Essence
of  Couples Therapy

A scientifically-proven common factor
in all successful couples therapy

Dr. David & Deborah Woodsfellow
Friday September 8th
10 a.m. - 1 p.m.

Many people come to us hoping we can save their marriage. They’re usually stuck in a very hurtful Fear Cycle that they can’t stop, no matter how hard they try. Our ability to see, understand and change these cycles into Love Cycles is a common factor in all successful couples therapy. In my opinion, this is the essence of couples therapy. 

Harville Hendrix calls them power struggles, John Gottman and Sue Johnson call them negative cycles, Terry Real calls them the stance-stance dance. Each approach has a method for changing negative cycles. Research has proven that this is an essential task in couples therapy -- changing the couple's fear cycle. These “perfect storms” are the worst possible combination of each person’s core vulnerability and each person’s chronic defense.

This workshop presents an extremely user-friendly model for understanding and diagramming these cycles. The model is interesting, insight-producing and easy-to-remember. Clients like it, and find it easy to understand. It clarifies what they need to change. For some people, seeing their negative cycle this clearly can be life-altering. Therapists like it because it's so easy to use, even in the midst of a fast-moving session.

This workshop is appropriate for couples therapists and individual therapists.  It is also appropriate for therapists' life-partners.  You might want your partner to learn this model together with you, so that you can both apply these principles to your own relationship.  

In time, every couple finds their own negative cycle - the worst possible combination of their two issues.  In these cycles, things worsen quickly.  Each person threatens the other. Again and again and again. This loop leaves issues unresolved and both people feeling frustrated and hurt. 

For instance, if Jill's vulnerability were feeling intimidated, and Jack's vulnerability were feeling abandoned, their cycle might go like this:

Jack feels abandoned. 
So he gets angry in protest.  
So Jill feels intimidated. 
So she withdraws in fear.  
So Jack feels more abandoned. 
So he gets angrier.
So Jill feels more intimidated.
So she withdraws more.
Etc. 

Understanding this kind of fear cycle is essential to interrupting it, changing it back to a love cycle, and saving the marriage. In this workshop, we'll teach you a new way to do it. The love cycle that Jack and Jill need is something like:

Jack feels nurtured.
So he is calm and kind.
So Jill feels safe.
So she is present.
So Jack feels nurtured.
Etc.

When we can help this happen, it's a wonderful thing.

In this workshop you will learn how to
- State a common factor in all successful couples therapy
- Explain what Hendrix, Gottman, Johnson and Real have in common
- Diagram your clients' fear cycles
- Describe the cycles in your own relationship
 - Turn fear cycles to love cycles

This training is for psychologists, social workers, counselors, and marriage and family therapists. The instructional level is advanced.

There is no commercial support for this CE program, this presentation, or this instructor

David Woodsfellow, PhD is a licensed psychologist whose practice is 100% couples therapy.  He has been doing therapy for 25 years and seeing 100% couples for 20 years.  David was educated at Harvard, Antioch, UC Santa Barbara, Georgia State, and UCLA Medical School.  He has been personally trained by Harville Hendrix, John Gray, John Gottman, Terry Real, and Sue Johnson. 

Deborah Woodsfellow, MPH is a relationship coach who works with couples and individuals.  Deborah has also been managing The Woodsfellow Institute for 10 years and has co-led workshops with David for 15 years.  Deborah was educated at Emory University.  She also has been personally trained by Harville Hendrix, John Gray, John Gottman, Terry Real, and Sue Johnson.

The Woodsfellow Institute for Couples Therapy is approved by The American Psychological Association to sponsor continuing education for psychologists.  The  Woodsfellow Institute for Couples Therapy maintains responsibility for this program and its content.