Saved Marriage on the Brink of Divorce and Reclaimed Intimacy Through Vulnerability

It's really hard to explain Transformative Listening. Even in the beginning, we're like, "We don't know why we feel better," [laughs] and we're interacting better. Like, we're trying to figure out and understand why it's helping so much, and I think what it does is it allows us to learn more about each other in a non-confrontational way. I can really hear why she's behaving the way she is instead of responding defensively and continuing the negative cycles that weren't working for us. My name is Christina. I live in the Bay Area, California, and I am a high school teacher, and then I also teach dance on the side to adults, which I absolutely love. My name's Robert. I also live in the Bay Area. I'm a retired tech CEO. Well, we were on the brink of divorce. Transformative Listening was our Hail Mary. Mm. We had tried a lot of things and had been in a pretty unhealthy relationship for, like, five and a half years before we found Transformative Listening. We had multiple couples therapists. We read all the books, but we, we really... We knew deep down that we loved each other and weren't ready to give up even though it was pretty destructive. Yeah, we definitely had read all the books, but for where we were at, it was too late for those to really to work. Yeah. So we were in a pattern where we would use couples therapy just basically to argue. When we got into this negative spiral, it just started adding up. We would typically end a couples therapy session madder than we were before at the time. We were really in a vulnerable place, too, 'cause we had- Ex- exactly ... separated. We were on the verge of divorce, so we were... We were hesitant- Yeah ... and we kinda, you know, he had to, like, put a little, "How about we'll just do the weekend?" You know, [laughs] "Just pay for that. We'll just do the weekend. See how you feel after that." And we started to see the results. It's like rewiring your emotions to, like, not... Like, our brains are trained to see each other as the enemy because all the hurts, right? Mm-hmm. So when one hurt happens, all the other hurts that happened in the past come up and you're like, "Okay, well, you're definitely the enemy. I'm right, and I have years and years to prove why I'm right and why you're the enemy." And what Transformative Listening, I feel like, did is it came in and it was like, "Don't tell me about who left their dish on the sink. Let's talk about how you feel right now." So it forces you to kinda be vulnerable in a way that it reminds the other person who they married and why we fell in love to begin with. You know, we still have our moments. We still have ways to go. Yeah. [laughs] Way... Exactly. It's only been a few months. We've got a long- But- ... ways to go. [laughs] But it's been very promising and given us hope, and- Yeah ... things are much better than they were, you know, six months ago, four months ago. We're well beyond where we thought we'd ever get, [laughs] I think- Yeah ... from a few months ago. We both didn't really... We're like, "What happened?" [laughs] [laughs] We're feeling... We're a lot better. We're interacting better, and we don't really know exactly what happened. [laughs] It didn't just work on u- us, it worked on me. Like, I got rid of my therapist because I was getting more out of working with Ilya as a couple than I ever got with my therapist, and it helped improve other relationships around me as I learned- Mm ... more about myself. Since starting Transformative Listening, I definitely feel, and I see glimpses and have days where it feels like the honeymoon stage again, and it feels really intimate, and it feels like we are just so together and one, and I had already written that off. So it's been pretty, pretty powerful on the levels of connection and intimacy, and it's made us better parents. It's made me a better teacher. It's made me a better friend. It's just helped in all areas of my life, and it's really helped me heal myself and my own wounds and trauma that I've been carrying around. If you're thinking about Transformative Listening, you should 100% just jump in and do it. It will save your marriage. It will help you as a person and in all of your relationships. Yeah, I would say if you're on the fence or thinking about it, definitely do the breakout session, the introductory one-week thing where he kinda introduces you to it and allows you to kind of experience it. But yeah, give it a shot. Ilya and Julia are the most compassionate people I've ever met and can carry and hold so much space in their heart for love. They've just created something really beautiful, and I'm so glad they're sharing it with the world.