Structured Relationship Theory: Nothing Less Would Have Sufficed

by Michael Holler

This book is about human relationships, and how to structure them so that they function well. Why relationships? Because we are group animals, and everything we do is based on interacting in relationships with other people. How well we relate to them also depends on how well we relate to ourselves. Why "structured?" The concept of putting a structure to this is the heart and soul of this book. We tend to flounder around, using whatever was taught to us by our family, growing up – much of which is totally dysfunctional – and trying to figure things out as we go along. And, since children tend to do what they see, we are left with the legacy of executing whatever template of relationship was presented to us by our family of origin. The purpose of this book is to provide a foundation and conceptual model, along with working mechanisms, that can be clearly implemented to restructure and improve relationships, including the relationship with self, with the purpose of initiating and instituting dialogues of negotiation toward the eventual goal of consciously aware consent. The book is designed to work on two 1) For individuals who want to improve their relationship skills and 2) For clinicians who want to improve their practice of psychotherapy with people in relationships (which is pretty much everybody). Much of the recent research has given us a lot of information on what makes relationships work in couplehood. However, there are many other types of relationships than strictly vanilla couples. This book is an attempt to address relationships in a broader context. Thus, the skills involved in couples’ relationships are addressed as well as parenting, friendships, family, alternative lifestyles, LGBTQIA+, polyamory, ethical non-monogamy and others. In this book the author has set out to provide relationship tools, which provide an actual structure to making relationships work. The relationship tools included in this book are very easy to implement. The author has utilized principles, such as using transactional analysis as a basic foundation to build relationship skills on. Reducing and eliminating games in relationships is another theme addressed here. Foundational theme of this book is what the author calls the 3 C's of Choice, Consent, and Contract. The author has also included examples in the form of stories and foundational skills based in simple, easy-to-understand concepts in order to provide a basis for making relationships work. The author has observed that utilizing an initial psycho-educational jumpstart process of teaching simple relationship skills and tools, that are easy to teach and simple for clients to implement, can have an extremely powerful impact on how successful relationship therapy can be, to keep clients engaged, encouraged and empowered, and to minimize the extent to which relationship therapy can damage relationships. In thirty-six years of counseling practice, the author has found that most people – lay people and clinicians – have trouble focusing on making dysfunctional relationships better and fixing damaged relationships. The author has found that often, even if people get better in therapy with regard to their relationships, they're not quite sure how they got there. This book attempts to provide a guideline and the directing structure that people can walk away with and know exactly how they got better. This enables them to continue to utilize the tools for the rest of their lives.

325 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 26, 2023

Reviews

[javier burga · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author points out descriptive ways to overcome typical struggles in our relationships, showcasing interesting theories and presenting good examples with direct, straightforward language.

Sometimes, all we need is to review (and put into practice) these simple concepts to make significant improvements in our relationships.