Life Couples Retreats and Training FAQ

In an atmosphere of love, discovery, and adventure we inspire and empower couples to achieve excellence.

Questions

• What are some of the Institute's feelings and beliefs about marriage that help guide the LIFE Couples Retreats and Trainings?
• Who should consider attending a LIFE Couples Retreat and Training?
• How would you describe a "Couple of Excellence?" What traits would they exhibit?
• What are some of the skills and experiences brought to the Training by LIFE staff members?
• What is the general size and make-up of a LIFE Couples Retreat?
• Where are the LIFE Couples Retreats held?
• What does a LIFE Couples Retreat look like?
• How does the post-retreat coaching work?
• All of your trainings seem to pay significant attention to what you refer to as "The Four Areas of Need." Why is that?

Answers

Q: What are some of the Institute's feelings and beliefs about marriage that help guide the LIFE Couples Retreats and Trainings?

A: We believe that there is no more sacred and important relationship on earth than that of a man and woman who have made the vows and commitments associated with marriage. Their responsibility to one another as husband and wife is enormous. When the roles of parents are added to the marriage relationship, even greater opportunities and challenges are realized.

A committed and loving marriage imbues all of life with a wonder and sense of warmth and security that is available to such a degree in no other relationship or endeavor. We believe that all committed couples have the right and the responsibility to build such a marriage.

Q: Who should consider attending a LIFE Couples Retreat and Training?

A: Any married and committed couple looking to take their marriage to the next level of love, trust, and effectiveness can benefit from one of our trainings. Each couple will, to a certain extent, customize the training to their own specific needs.

One of the keys to the training is the marriage assessment done for each couple. Using professional and internationally recognized tools and processes this assessment begins before the retreat and continues throughout the training, giving each couple a clearer view of themselves, their partner, and the relationship. With a greater clarity of purpose each couple can then help their coach and facilitator shape their retreat to best fit the needs of the couple. Even as couples participate in group discussions and learning processes, enjoying the company of other married people, each is on their own unique journey.

We do ask that both partners be committed to the training and to working to achieve positive results.

Q: How would you describe a "Couple of Excellence?" What traits would they exhibit?

A: Every marriage is a work in progress with new lessons to learn and goals to achieve till the end of our lives. But a couple of excellence will have achieved, or be honorably striving for the following traits and characteristics:

• In addition to having their own individual goals and pursuits, the couple will share a vision of the future and will be working together towards marriage and family goals.
• The partners will view one another as individuals worthy of respect and love, to be treated with care and even a form of "familiar dignity."
• They are unfailingly kind to one another. They never practice any form of physical, verbal, or emotional abuse. Never.
• They are aware of one another's worthy and legitimate needs and strive to help fulfill those needs. Without ignoring their own needs, they are focused on the comfort and well-being of their partner.
• There is complete trust in the relationship.
• They share their feelings and thoughts openly, trusting that their partner will be tender with their heart and feelings.
• The marriage relationship is preeminent. No other relationship or endeavor is allowed to supercede it.
• They are spontaneous and have fun together.
• In intimacy they find tenderness, warmth, and security.
• The partners have no inherent need to be right. They are open to possibilities and to the viewpoint of the other person.
• Neither partner has the need to control the other or the relationship.

Q: What are some of the skills and experiences brought to the Training by LIFE staff members?

A: LIFE is made up of families that have experienced the highest exhilarations of family relationships and that have not been immune to the pain that comes in this, the highest stake endeavor any of us will ever be involved in.

We have been on a quest for many years to identify the dynamics that exist in marriages and how those dynamics can be recognized and managed to help lead this crucial relationship to success. We have worked with many families, couples, and individuals through trainings and seminars and have developed a reservoir of experience and skill sets that help us deliver fun and effective trainings that can transform marriages and families.

Chief facilitators at all couples retreats are Gerry and Margo Dye, owners of the Life Institute for Family Excellence. They and the support staff bring extensive and relevant experience and training to all LIFE trainings, including the Couples Retreats.

Some specific skills, experience, and resources possessed by our staff:

1. Certified professional Mediator
2. University Degrees and Certifications in Youth Leadership and Recreation
3. Licensed nurse specializing in mental/emotional health care
4. Staff members with professional staff experience at Boys and Girls Clubs of America
5. Staff member with staff experience from the Family Crisis Center
6. Certified Bio-Feedback specialist
7. All staff members are Certified and/or experienced and approved staff from other internationally recognized training programs (family, marriage, individual, and professional)
8. Authors in the area of family and marriage health and recovery
9. Experienced facilitators in relationship dynamics.

Q: What is the general size and make-up of a LIFE Couples Retreat?

A: Generally between three and five couples will participate in a retreat. These numbers provide some critical mass in terms of the energy of the group and provide a good base for some of the training activities in which we will engage, while still leaving plenty of opportunity and privacy for couples as they create their own relationship and marriage plan. These relatively small numbers also ensure that each couple will have sufficient one-on-one time with staff facilitators.

On the staff side a married staff couple will serve as the chief facilitators of the training. There will also be sufficient support staff to see to the needs of the guests, and to help create an environment in which the objectives of the Retreat can be met.

Q: Where are the LIFE Couples Retreats held?

A: Most LIFE Family Trainings and Youth Trainings take place at one of our owned cabin facilities in Utah. In the case of Couples Retreats we have greater flexibility to choose other locations. While Retreats might be held at one of our cabins, we will also often choose a location such as San Diego, San Francisco, or Jackson Hole, Wyoming among others.

Thus many of the activities surrounding the training will take on the character of the training location. Sailboats and wave runners might be the order of the day in one location while art museums and the symphony might be some of the activities of choice in another. At times there can be healthy doses of each. The key to remember is that every activity is integrated into the training with couples sharpening skills and internalizing concepts even as they have the time of their lives.

Q: What does a LIFE Couples Retreat look like?

A: Location and the make-up of the participating couples will help shape the look and feel of a specific retreat, but there are some common threads to point to:

• It will take place somewhere beautiful and enjoyable to be. Accommodations will be comfortable and will help foster an environment of intimacy, trust, fun, and growth.
• There will be teaching/learning activities within the full group, in smaller discussion groups, and in couple-to-facilitator sessions. You will have the opportunity to form friendships with staff and other couples that will benefit you now and in the future.
• There will be segments of experiential training which will help engender powerful feelings and a degree of clarity that you may have never before experienced.
• There will be many appropriately fun and relaxing activities that you might look forward to on any great vacation. These activities will serve the additional purpose of helping teach and internalize sound marriage principles that are being taught and learned.
• There will often be a guest speaker drawn from the field of the Marriage and Family sciences that will spend significant time with us.
• There will be some pleasant but demanding work involved as couples stretch themselves in communicating, appropriately sharing, creating their Couple Mission Statement and their Marriage Plan. This "work" will likely bring the best return-on-investment that you have ever received.

Q: How does the post-retreat coaching work?

A: The free post-training coaching offered as part of all LIFE Trainings truly sets us apart from any other training organization. You may have experienced initial feelings of commitment and euphoria as you have made resolutions or completed a training or course in the past. You may have also had the experience of seeing the positive feelings and commitment melt away as you were faced with real life and its inertia.

The post-training coaching is all about assisting our couples through those crucial weeks following the training when they are working on implementing their plans and strengthening their commitments. It is not uncommon during those weeks to feel the pull of old comfort zones and habits, and many couples report that the encouragement and the continued sense of accountability they receive from their coach has been a key to their long-term success.

Your coaches will be the facilitators that served you during the training retreat, so you can be assured that they will be well aware of your and your partner's goals and commitments, and will know of your areas of strength as well as your concerns.

On a weekly basis the couple will join their coach(s) on a phone call to discuss progress, address concerns, and celebrate victories. The coach will help identify road blocks to progress and assist the couple in working their way through those areas and to the higher ground.

Q- All of your trainings seem to pay significant attention to what you refer to as "The Four Areas of Need." Why is that?

A: We do indeed use this needs concept extensively in our trainings. We choose to do so for a number of reasons, including:

• Virtually all legitimate researchers, counselors, therapists, etc. agree that needs drive human behavior, and that every human has legitimate needs that, if not appropriately met, can lead to personal and family dysfunction. Conversely, when those needs are met, the result is happiness and fulfillment.
• As people become aware of those needs and can recognize them as legitimate and OK to have and express, they are more able to manage themselves and their relationships in ways that will help honorably meet those needs.
• Dividing the needs up into four areas simplifies the teaching and learning processes and helps students carefully evaluate their lives, section by section, as they come to better understand themselves and others.

The Four Areas of Need are Physical, Mental, Emotional, and Spiritual. Certainly different experts might apply somewhat different names to the individual areas, but these seem to resonate most effectively with the people whom we train. The needs might run from simple physical nutritional realities to the more complex emotional needs of affirmation and acceptance.

Much of our training is directed at helping families, couples, and youth to identify their own legitimate needs and to finding the most appropriate ways to communicate and fulfill the needs. We also assist people to become more sensitive to the needs of others.

Obviously the world has in many ways muddied the waters of true needs, confusing them with appetites and desires, itches to be scratched. As a result more and more people are continually pursuing what the world says they should want, but never finding true satisfaction and fulfillment from it.