A Marriage Of Equals

Negotiating collaboratively in your committed relationship is a new way to achieve individual and marital goals, to resolve differences equitably, to manage conflicts, to create and sustain a satisfying sex life, to figure out where you stand on fidelity, to think about having and caring for kids, and to have committed careers and a satisfying family life. Negotiating collaboratively supports you and your partner seeing yourselves simultaneously as individuals and as a couple—enhances the sense of “being in this together” while also having individual life plans. Negotiating collaboratively supports valuing each other as individuals before seeing each other as husband and wife, and allows modern couples to challenge old gender trappings that can undermine the achievement of balance in a committed relationship. Straightforward and accessible, A Marriage of Equals offers couples a road map for how to negotiate collaboratively around the most essential aspects of a committed relationship—and, in doing so, create the equitable marriage they long for.

Risking everything...for love! Having struggled so hard to become a successful business owner, Jamaica-born Psyche Winthrop-Abeni has no interest in relinquishing her freedom or property to a husband. But when gentleman Will Barclay comes to her aid, their intense connection tempts her into a thrillingly passionate, temporary affair! It's the perfect arrangement...until Will feels honour-bound to propose. His offer is one she'd never dared to dream of, but can she trust Will enough to take the risk?

Learn how to successfully negotiate conflicts and deepen our most intimate relationships in this practical and thoughtful guide by an experienced Buddhist teacher, psychotherapist, and couples counselor. A committed relationship, as most people see it today, is a partnership of equals who share values and goals, a team united by love and dedicated to each other’s growth on every level. This contemporary model for coupledom requires real intention and work, and, more often than not, the traditional archetypes of relationships experienced by our parents and grandparents fail us or seem irrelevant. Utilizing the wisdom of her years of personal and professional practice, Young-Eisendrath dismantles our idealized projections about love, while revealing how mindfulness and communication can help us identify and honor the differences with our partners and strengthen our bonds. These practical and time-tested guidelines are rooted in sound understanding of modern psychology and offer concrete ideas and the necessary tools to reinforce and reinvigorate our deepest relationships.

"...any couple contemplating marriage or reevaluating an existing one will find powerful information and encouragement here for a true marriage of minds." -- Kirkus Reviews "Pepper Schwartz is remarkable. She explains to us the possibilities for relationships that remain for so many a fantasy. This book is a necessity for anyone who wants to understand how partnerships work but more importantly wants to really love." -- Wendy Wasserstein, Playwright: author of Isn't It Romantic?, The Heidi Chronicles, and The Sisters Rosensweig

In her study of the married couple as the smallest political unit, Phyllis Rose uses the marriages of five Victorian writers who wrote about their own lives with unusual candor: Charles Dickens, John Ruskin, Thomas Carlyle, John Stuart Mill, and George Eliot--née Marian Evans.

Marriage, for Equals: The Successful Joint (Ad)Ventures of Well-Educated Couples pulls back the curtain on a number of dangerously misleading messages promoted in the media and popular press that encourage us to commit to ticking-time-bomb relationships. In addition to revealing the telltale signs of doomed relationships, this book also describes a form of marriage that is highly successful and deeply rewarding to many of the smartest women in this generation. To profile these relationships, Marriage for Equals draws from a poll of more than 1200 women, mostly Harvard graduates and their equally capable friends, who are working to create truly equal partnerships. The end result is a guidebook to a marriage of equals that offers a blunt, bold, and refreshingly truthful approach about what it takes to create and sustain an exceptional partnership. "With a combination of research, clinical insight, and plain good sense, author Shauna Springer sorts out the state of romantic love today, bursting more than a few myths in the process. For anyone confused about intimate relationships, this book offers a clear, highly readable, and entertaining road map." -- Dr. Benjamin Karney, Professor of Psychology, UCLA "A fresh look at love and marriage, stripping away the fantasies and revealing the realities, this book should be read by every person who is (or hopes to be) in love and/or married. While grounded in research, the concepts are presented in common sense terms and are presented in a way that is both entertaining and enlightening. I wholeheartedly recommend it." -- Peggy Vaughan, Author and Host of DearPeggy.com "The best predictor of well-being is a healthy and happy relationship. By drawing on clinical experience and solid research, this wonderful book can help you realize your potential for well-being--and love." --Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar, Author of Being Happy Shauna Springer, Ph.D., earned her undergraduate degree in English Literature from Harvard University and her doctoral degree in Counseling Psychology from the University of Florida. She has particular expertise in marital counseling, stressor effects on marriage, trauma recovery, and women's issues.

Nathaniel Fleming, veteran of Waterloo, falls in love with his Major's spinster sister, Harriet. But Nathaniel is not what he seems, and before the wedding, the truth will out... Eleanor Charlotte Fleming, forgotten daughter of a minor baronet, stakes her life on a deception and makes her name--if not her fortune--on the battlefield. Her war at an end, she returns to England as Captain Nathaniel Fleming and wants nothing more than peace, quiet, and the company of horses. Instead, Captain Fleming meets Harriet. Harriet has averted the calamity of matrimony for a decade, cares little for the cut of her gowns, and is really rather clever. Falling in love is not a turn of the cards either of them expected. Harriet accepts Captain Fleming, but will she accept Eleanor? Along the way, there are ballrooms, stillrooms, mollyhouses, society intrigue, and sundering circumstance.

NAMED ONE OF COSMOPOLITAN'S "15 BEST MARRIAGE BOOKS ALL COUPLES SHOULD READ." An accessible, transformative guide for couples seeking greater love, connection, and intimacy in our modern world Nate and Kaley Klemp were both successful in their careers, consulting for high-powered companies around the world. Their work as mindfulness and leadership experts, however, often fell to the wayside when they came home in the evening, only to end up fighting about fairness in their marriage. They believed in a model where each partner contributed equally and fairness ruled, but, in reality, they were finding that balance near impossible to achieve. From this frustration, they developed the idea of the 80/80 marriage, a new model for balancing career, family, and love. The 80/80 Marriage pushes couples beyond the limited idea of "fairness" toward a new model grounded on radical generosity and shared success, one that calls for each partner to contribute 80 percent to build the strongest possible relationship. Drawing from more than one hundred interviews with couples from all walks of life, stories from business and pop culture, scientific studies, and ancient philosophical insights, husband-and-wife team Nate and Kaley Klemp pinpoint exactly what's not working in modern marriage. Their 80/80 model of marriage provides practical, powerful solutions to transform your relationship and open up space for greater love and connection.