The Marriage Relationship and The Doctrine of the Wife Volume 11 Theistic Psychology: The Scientific Knowledge of God Extracted From the Correspondential Sense of Sacred Scripture Volume 11 by Dr. Leon James, Professor of Psychology, University of Hawaii

Dr. Leon James
Professor of Psychology
University of Hawaii
Published on the Web in 2004
Latest Update: 2007

The Marriage Relationship and
The Doctrine of the Wife

The quotations from Swedenborg's book on marriage are from:
Swedenborg, Emanuel. (1768) Wisdom's Delight in Marriage ("Conjugial") Love: Followed by Insanity’s Pleasure in Promiscuous Love (abbreviated: Conjugial Love (CL) and Marriage Love). Available online at:
www.swedenborgdigitallibrary.org/contets/cltc.html

The "model" in marriage refers to the philosophical belief system of each partners. I have identified three models that are aligned progressively from the early phase of male dominance to the later phase of equity to the final phase of unity. With few exceptions, every marriage starts with the male dominance model which both partners come with based on their cultural background and upbringing. There are couples who appear intellectually opposed to the male dominance model, and see themselves as following the equity or equality model. Dr. Laura Schlessinger's ideal model of marriage is the male dominance model. The popularity of the book indicates that this is the model that many American men are most attracted. Dr. Laura Schlessinger's advice to wives is to allow the husband to remain in the illusion of the male dominance model, and to take actual charge of the relationship. Dr. Laura Schlessinger says that it is the woman who has the real power, because she understands relationships and what's going on with the husband, while the husband is clueless because he is "simple" in mentality. This point of view is the male dominance model.

We will examine what she writes and how she expresses the male dominance model as the ideal for couples to follow. I will point out the assumptions that show her belief in the male dominance model. To be able to bring this out, I will contrast the male dominance model with the equity and unity models. I will try to show that the dominance model is an external phase of the marriage relationship, and that the partners need to progress to further phases in order to make the marriage more internal, involving spiritual loves that are permanent. The equity model is a belief system that couples use to leave behind the male dominance model, on their way to the unity model, which is the true internal marriage of conjugial love. If the marriage partners both enter this unity model phase before passing on, they will be in heaven together to eternity, growing endlessly more interior into the human potential.

The wife can enter into conjugial love more easily than the husband, and if her husband is unwilling to follow her into that phase, she will be in heaven with another mind, her true soul mate who is willing to follow her to her heaven or perfect happiness. The husband who is unwilling to enter the unity phase with any woman, even after arriving in the world of spirits, cannot enter the heaven of his mind, but slips down into his own hell, created by his rejection of rational consciousness and true spirituality. The unity model of marriage is a spiritual and celestial model that represents the relationship of marriage in the heavens. It is described in the book of the Writings known as Conjugial Love (1768).

A wife's heaven is the state of mind she is in where her husband is present with her and united mentally as one. In other words the functioning of her mental organs is dependent on the reciprocal functioning of his mental organs in such a way that they can form a one or unity. And yet absolutely nothing in the wife is like anything in the husband for there is a perfect and total differentiation of all units in mental organics and hence in physical. This reciprocal relationship of differentiation and unity, is like the relationship between the heart and the lungs.

The body's blood circulation and heart correspond to the affective organ in the mind and the lungs and pulmonary system correspond to the cognitive organ. The affective and cognitive organs in the mind work together in synergy, like the heart and lungs in the body. They are two systems that are completely differentiated from each other, each having a structure that is different in all aspects from the other. The differential structure of each organ allows them to serve their own unique function. Neither alone can support the operation of the muscles and sensory nervous system, but together the structural parts interconnect and act appropriately according to the function they each must meet. Together, or in unity of function, they allow the muscles and senses to be alive in their operation.

Marriage is similarly a synergy of the husband and wife operating together through their differentiated structures, to create a unity of minds that allows the two independent people to form a conjugial couple, conjoined internally to eternity and developing together their progressive perfection.

The problems in marriage today are many. Why are there problems with marriage? It is a creation by God to bring about the perfect happiness of two human beings to eternity in heaven. This creation is perfect and there are no problems with it. The perfection of marriage cannot be created by God apart from a man and a woman born on some earth in the natural world within some culture and society. The perfection of marriage is this: That it a process of growing into a conjugial couple. Two independent individuals, a man and a woman, regardless of culture or personality, regardless of physical size or mental ability, can start the process of growing progressively more and more into a unity, and this to eternity. This independent self-motivated progressive growth is necessary for our happiness and joy to be as much as we can take every day to eternity. Marriage is a perfect creation because it leads to this perfect state of human life. No other mechanism than marriage is given in Divine revelation for achieving the perfection of eternity.

It has also been revealed that the perfection of marriage is a spiritual phenomenon, not natural. Natural marriages which are external without the spiritual within it, are not perfect, and in fact external marriages have many sad and self-destructive characteristics. The power and perfection of marriage is achieved only when the spiritual marriage is also operative within the minds of the husband and wife. The spiritual marriage is called "the marriage of good and truth." This spiritual marriage is the very basis and foundation of regeneration and salvation, that is, of spiritual development towards the perfection of eternity in heaven. The marriage of good and truth is called most holy in the Writings because Divine Good is the same as Divine Love, and Divine Truth is the same as Divine Wisdom, and these are most holy because God Himself in Essence and Form.

It has been revealed that in the Divine-Human there is a most holy marriage of Divine Love and Divine Truth. Infinite love and infinite truth in God make a one, a unity. Nothing about love is like anything about truth, just as nothing about the affective organ is like anything in the cognitive organ. Or again: nothing about a feeling is like anything about a thought. And again: nothing about a woman is like anything in a man. There must be this absolute duality between the elements of the two parts that unite into a perfect oneness. There cannot be a oneness between God and a human being because they are of different substances, God infinite and uncreate, a human being finite and created. The creator cannot become one with the created--this would be a rational impossibility. If it were to happen, the duality between Creator and created would disappear, and neither created nor Creator could then continue to exist.

The total differentiation between man and woman is a representative correspondence of the total differentiation between love and truth in God. The marriage of good and truth in the Divine-Human is the source of perfection of the marriage of a man and a woman, and the source of perfection of the regeneration of an individual's affective and cognitive life. Spiritual development of the individual is the progressive perfection of the marriage in his mind between the will and the understanding, that is, between the operations of the affective organ and those of the cognitive organ. When the affective and cognitive organs are joined by synergy into a unity, the individual is being regenerated, the individual grows spiritually and is made ready for conjugial love. The regenerating husband and the regenerating wife then grow together in the internal spiritual portion of the marriage process.

The earliest generations on this earth are called in the Writings "the Most Ancient Church" or the "Adamic Church." Swedenborg visited them in their heavens where they have lived in conjugial love for many thousands of years, though they themselves have no sense of time or history. They were born on this earth with a celestial mind and they had the ability to communicate directly with those who preceded them in the spiritual world. They entered into the perfect marriage process without resistance or opposition. They were incapable of thinking about non-exclusive relationship or sexuality. When Swedenborg started telling them about the commonness of adultery, infidelity, and promiscuity on this earth in modern times, they were so horrified they could not bear to think about it, and refused to hear any details.

But the celestial mind which was first created on this planet was not complete in its ultimate evolution and perfection. The very fact that they could not contemplate or imagine infidelity or promiscuity created a certain weakness, a certain lack of perfection. They had the wisdom based on the innocence of childhood, but they lacked the wisdom based on the innocence of old age. One symptom of this was the fact that they typically passed on in their early thirties, which was wonderful because their physical bodies did not deteriorate and they were spared the sickness of older ages. But because they lacked the wisdom that develops in old age, their happiness in heaven could not be as great as it would become later, as the generations on earth evolved and become more and more scientific and rational.

The split-brain race that succeeded the celestial mind is called the spiritual race. We are part of this race. Although we are born with inherited evil in our natural mind, we have been given the mechanism by which we can cleanse ourselves from this inheritance. This cleansing process is called regeneration and it takes a life time to achieve. The lifespan of people gradually increased from ancient to modern times and today, we have hundreds of millions of people in every generation that reach old age, giving the human mind on earth the opportunity to develop still further. The wisdom we acquire in old age, when based on Divine revelation, is higher than the wisdom we acquire when younger. By living to a ripe old age our generation has infused new higher wisdom into the conglomerate of the human mind called the Grand Human (see Section xx), which includes the most ancient civilizations that are now alive in their heavens.

There is thus a mutual and interdependent connectivity between all the generations that have ever been born on this and other planets, who are all in the spiritual world in eternity, either in heaven or in hell. The process that creates this Grand Perfection of the human race is unity at all levels, of couples, societies, generations, and worlds. And the unity at all the levels rests on the unity of its constituent level, which is that of the couple. Hence the marriage of a man and a woman is the foundation for the universe and its endless future. These details indicate to you that the sanctity of marriage and sexuality is not merely a moral and religious issue. People have rebelled against morality and religion, claiming freedom from persuasion, dogma, or norm. But people cannot rebel in freedom when they understand rationally why sexual behavior is the foundation of their future and that of the universe.

When you engage in a sexual act, either physically overt or mentally covert, you are on the stage of history and evolution. Sex is not a private act, except in its external physical dimensions. The sex act, physical or mental, is the foundation of the universe. You contribute to this foundation, or you attack it. You attack it by doing or thinking as you please even if it's against the order of reality as revealed by God to the human race. You thereby influence the evolution of the entire human race. A single promiscuous thought that you enjoy and accept as legitimate for you to enjoy, initiates counter-evolutionary forces that add themselves to similar acts by others, and join with them to create a river of counter-evolution or devolvement that eventually creates a human hell in the mind where many are entrapped forever.

Similarly, every time you resist a promiscuous thought or act because you understand its universal consequences, you are evolving the human mind to its progressive perfection--your own mind and the mind of all others who are progressing similarly. Resisting a promiscuous thought and refusing to accept it as legitimate, is called a chaste act. Your chaste act adds itself to all your chaste acts to set you on the road to conjugial love. Furthermore, your chaste acts add themselves to the chaste acts of others who are regenerating, and together they form a river of evolution that creates an ever deeper and more perfect heaven in our mind and in the Grand Human.

When you take this scientific perspective on chastity, sexuality, and marriage, you free yourself from the rebelliousness we feel when told dogmatically or moralistically, that fornication and masturbation will be punished by hell. The rational understanding of it frees you from having to rebel against something obscure and religiously mystical or arbitrary.

The progression of marriage from the male dominance model, to the equity model, and finally to the unity model needs to be examined scientifically and understood rationally. The forces of resistance and opposition we feel in our spiritual progression of marriage are to be analyzed, identified, and neutralized by means of rational arguments and proofs.

2. A wife is the love of that wisdom, that is, a love of the wisdom that comes from love in the husband.

3. If a man loves his own wisdom, he becomes a fool. Instead it is the wife who becomes the love of that wisdom, and consequently, that wisdom is implanted in her and appropriated to her.

4. To remain wise, the man cannot love his own wisdom, and consequently that wisdom is not implanted in him, and is not appropriated to him. That wisdom cannot exist or endure in him, for if it does, the man can’t help but love his own wisdom, and consequently he loses it by becoming foolish.

5. Therefore the only way a man can become wise and grow wiser, is to love his wife's wisdom more than his own. She has this wisdom in her because she is the love of her husband's wisdom, the wisdom that comes from the love of wisdom in him. Both wisdom and love come from God and are God in them.

6. It follows from these connected propositions that the DoW (Doctrine of the Wife) is consistent with the letter of CL in these Numbers. The DoW says that in order for a husband to regenerate and be able to receive conjugial love from the Lord through his wife, he must learn to love his wife's wisdom more than his own (see Section 11.4).

Research confirms that most couples report experiencing oppositional or negative feelings and acting upon them by exploiting, abusing, or injuring their partner. Physical and mental abuse is practiced by men far more than by women in the majority of societies and cultures. When people reason under the influence of exploitative motivations, they tend to misinterpret the intentions of their partner and tend to use stereotyped, inaccurate, and prejudiced thinking. Our verbal behavior will reflect this style of biased thinking. So will our actions.

There is an advantage in gaining control over our gender behavior in the three domains--affective, cognitive, and sensorimotor. We can avoid those cultural and psychological traits and habits that interfere with adaptive, successful long term gender relationships. The benefits of a stable successful long term gender partnership are extremely attractive. We will explore a particular principle in gender relationship called the conjoint self.

Gender behavior in marriage is defined along three interacting domains called the individual's threefold self. The individual's affective self operates the feelings and motivations we maintain in dating or marriage relationships. The cognitive self operates the thinking and reasoning we do in these relationships. The individual's sensorimotor self operates the sensations, perceptions, and motor acts we perform in gender relationships. The category of "motor acts" includes overt verbal behavior (discourse, talk) and non-linguistic behaviors (expressions, appearance, style). Be aware however that motor acts and talking occur not from themselves but from cognitive acts (our thinking and lifestyle philosophy), and these in turn occur from our affective acts, which are motivations and needs that guide our thinking towards goals. Sensorimotor acts, cognitive acts, and affective acts form a perfect synergy between feelings, thoughts, and actions. This is called the threefold self.

In other words, each of us is involved in gender relationships in which we operate along three interconnected domains of behavior. The deepest and most determinative is the affective operation in which we maintain selected motivations and desires in accordance with our primary needs and satisfactions. The affective operations in our mind are the most determinative because they select and guide the other two domains. Affective operations guide and influence the direction of operations in the cognitive self, so that what we think or how we justify things cognitively, is selective and responsive to our affective motives. We entertain a way of thinking that will support and promote our motivations and feelings. Our cognitive behavior adjusts itself to support our affective behavior. The affective and the cognitive domains together select and determine the overt sensorimotor behavior of our overt actions, appearance, words, and styles. What we do and say (=overt gender behavior) is the result of what we think, which is the result of how we feel (what motivates us).

Note that we are often more aware of what we think than of how we feel (or what motivates us). In relationships between a man and a woman, women tend to be more aware of their own feelings and motivations than men are aware of their own feelings and motivations. This is because women are more motivated to spend time and focus figuring out how they really feel or what they really want. Women tend also to be more aware of the man's feelings and motivations than the men are of their own feelings and motivations. However, this does not mean that men have less feelings than women, as it is sometimes misrepresented in gender stereotyped thinking.

Note well this principle: Both men and women have the same amount of feelings and emotions. This fact can be observed when you analyze how men behave and react to things moment by moment--with surprise, or with anger, or being pleased or displeased, feeling like talking or feeling like keeping quiet, being in a good mood or bad, getting excited when telling a story, picking a fight, feeling resentful, liking something, appreciating something, feeling happy about something, etc. These observations prove that men equally with women have feelings and react with emotions all the time.

Emotional reactions and feeling motivations are a necessary part of all thinking and acting. It is not possible to act and react in a conversation or interaction without feelings and motivations being present all the time, and every instant. Nevertheless there are differences between men and women as to how aware or conscious they are of their own feelings and emotions from moment to moment, or of the emotions of the partner. Women tend to specialize in becoming aware of feelings and emotions of their partner. They are motivated to practice more than men in focusing consciously on feelings in gender relationships.

This difference in the skill of gender perceptiveness between a man and a woman creates an active gender dynamic in which the woman is motivated to prod her man to become more aware of his and her feelings and motivations. The man tends to resist this "affective prodding" and finds it unpleasant and objectionable. This creates a constant strain on the developing relationship. The woman feels that the man doesn't want to "commit" and is resisting the process of conjunction, thereby maintaining the couple in a state of division and conflict which is not totally satisfying to the woman.

Both men and women can gain understanding of the initial oppositeness between the sexes--women striving to conjoin, men resisting the process. The analysis of how men and women talk to each other reveals this dynamic opposition between men and women, as exemplified in the studies reported in our textbook by Deborah Tannen--Gender and Discourse. Analyzing verbal interactions between men and women is a powerful method for bringing out the differences between how they use talk to either oppose each other or to gain deeper intimacy and mutual support.

The views of "Dr. Laura" in her book The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands presents the point of view that men are in general "simpler creatures" than women, and that a wife needs to treat her husband in a certain way in order to keep him happy and well functioning. This is a different model of marriage than the unity model because it establishes an unequal status between men and women. This point of view puts less of responsibility on the men and more on the women. The wife is told to adjust to this unequal status rather than seek equality or unity.

The individual's threefold self in gender relationships is a joint product of biology, socialization, culture, and spiritual make up. As children we acquire the relationship style of our parents, other adults, and the media (TV, movies, songs, magazines, cartoons, commercials). By the time we begin adolescent or adult relationships, we have been exposed to years of stereotyped gender behaviors in all three domains of the threefold self:

(a) exploitative feelings towards the "opposite" sex (affective self),

(b) sexist thoughts that stereotype the other gender (cognitive self),

(c) injurious or hostile actions and words against the partner (sensorimotor self).

These affective, cognitive, and sensorimotor patterns of stereotyped gender behavior create an atmosphere of discord and conflict even as the partners strive to love each other and become a functioning and satisfying unit.

11.3.1.1 Mental Anatomy of Women and Men

The expression "mental anatomy" at first sounds like a metaphor about the mind. We are used to hearing about the anatomy of the physical body. But regarding the mind, it is common for us to imagine that it either doesn't exist, or if it does exist, it is something gaseous or transparent, not solid, just as "a spirit" or "departed person," is often portrayed in literature or television. But we are also familiar with the portrayal of angels who appear on earth and have physical bodies while they are here. But we imagine that after they return to "heaven," they no longer have a real body for being married. We all have been exposed to the various fantasies or imaginings that people have about the afterlife, including our own. This is why it is essential that we stick with the facts and the actual observations. Swedenborg was the only scientist in history who was allowed by God to be conscious in his spiritual mind before resuscitation, and therefore he is the only scientist in the history of the world who can give us factual information about the spiritual world of the afterlife in eternity. This is looking at the Swedenborg Reports with the positive bias in science perspective.

It is fascinating to discover what married couples are like when they reach the heavens in their mind. Swedenborg's observations of the relationship between husbands and wives in heaven give us factual information about the future we can have in our immortality after we are no longer connected to the physical world. People who find their way into the heavens of their mind, are married, to symbolize and reflect their mental unity. Amazingly, when Swedenborg saw a conjugial couple from a distance, he saw but one person walking or standing. But when he came nearer to the couple, they were a husband wife (see Section xx). The fact that they appear as one person is an outward representation of their inward mental unity.

From Swedenborg's description of the difference between men and women, I constructed various visual charts to picture their mental anatomy. By studying the details pictured in somewhat different way, it might be easier for you to gain a more detailed knowledge and understanding of how men and women differ in their spiritual anatomy. Remember: spiritual = afterlife of eternity. So the anatomical difference between the mind of men and women remains forever to distinguish them from birth to eternity.

This diagram is from an article I wrote on "spiritual genes in marriage" and is available here: www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy/instructor/gloss/dow2.html

Spiritual Gender Genes

dowfig1.gif (5308 bytes)

dowfig2.gif (8222 bytes)

The following diagram is from an article on "The Spiritual Psychobiology of Marriage" and is available here:

www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy/instructor/gloss/dow1.html#biology

The diagram immediately above shows the two phases or stages of marriage. Initially, the man's consciousness of externalizing truth, which is the truth he knows, conjoins itself with the wife's externalizing good. That is the wife's externalizing affections conjoin with the husband's externalizing cognitions. Thus they form an externalizing marriage or bond. It is externalizing because the man's truth and the wife's affections are both in the externalizing or lower degrees of their consciousness. However, if the two partners continue to grow together and conjoin more deeply within, then they enter phase 2 which is an internal union or conjunction. Now their internalizing parts are conjoined or united--the man's internalizing good and the woman's internalizing truth. Now for the first time the man becomes truly a husband and the woman truly a wife.

Quoting from the Writings Sacred Scripture:

AC 725. That by "male and female" are signified truths and goods, is evident from what has been said and shown before, namely, that "man" and "male" signify truth, and "wife" and "female" good. But "male and female" are predicated of things of the understanding, and "man and wife" of things of the will, for the reason that marriage is represented by man and wife, and not so much by male and female. For truth can never of itself enter into marriage with good, but good can with truth; because there is no truth which is not produced from good and thus coupled with good. If you withdraw good from truth, nothing whatever remains but words. (AC 725)

AC 718. That by "man and wife" is signified that the truths were conjoined with goods, is evident from the signification of "man" as being truth, which is of the understanding, and from the signification of "wife" as being good, which is of the will (concerning which before), and also from the fact that man has not the least of thought, nor the least of affection and action, in which there is not a kind of marriage of the understanding and the will. Without a kind of marriage, nothing ever exists or is produced. In the very organic forms of man, both composite and simple, and even in the most simple, there is a passive and an active, which, if they were not coupled as in a marriage, like that of man and wife, could not even be there, still less produce anything, and the case is the same throughout universal nature. These incessant marriages derive their source and origin from the heavenly marriage; and thereby there is impressed upon everything in universal nature, both animate and inanimate, an idea of the Lord's kingdom. (AC 718)

In the diagram below, the same process is portrayed. The externalizing union in stage 1 is shown to bond the man's externalizing truth to the wife's externalizing good. This is not so much a true union as a partnership since it resides in externalizing (or lower) parts of the consciousness. Husband and wife as partners are adjoined to each other by externalizing natural life and family, but they are not yet conjoined from within by inner or spiritual life. But in stage 2, the husband's internalizing good is conjoined to the wife's internalizing truth. Now the marriage consists of his affections covered over with her truths. This is a true conjunction or union because it resides in the higher or internalizing regions of their consciousness and life. Only when this stage of internal conjunction is achieved can they be regenerated into a heavenly marriage and live together in eternity.

Couples who do not progress to an internal union of minds or spirits remain separated in their internals, and when they meet again in the other life, they live with one another again for a brief period. They then can become aware of each other's internal character and disposition, and these separate them. Each is then given another partner with whom they can enter into an internal marriage in heaven. But this happens only when both have been regenerated while still in the physical body. If they are unsuitable to each other by internal disposition or genius and separate, the one who is regenerate goes to heaven with the newly given conjugial partner or soul mate, while the other who is not regenerated goes to hell where they enter into an infernal concubinage with a partner. These infernal marriages are purely externalizing and both partners are "devils" who hate each other's guts yet are forced to endure each other in a marriage made in hell.

Research and personal observation confirm that most couples report experiencing oppositional or negative feelings, and at times acting upon them by exploiting, abusing, or injuring their partner. When couples have a disagreement or fight, physical and mental abuse is practiced by men more than by women in the majority of societies and cultures. When people reason under the influence of exploitative motivations, they tend to misinterpret the intentions of their partner and tend to use stereotyped, inaccurate, and prejudiced thinking. Our verbal behavior will reflect this style of biased thinking. So will our other actions.

There is an advantage in gaining control over our gender behavior in the three domains--affective, cognitive, and sensorimotor. We can avoid those cultural and psychological traits and habits that interfere with adaptive, successful long term marriage relationships. The benefits of a stable successful long term partnership are extremely attractive. We will explore a particular principle in marriage relationship called the conjoint self.

According to the "unity" model of marriage, the perfection of unity in a marriage increases through differentiation and reciprocity of behavior in the threefold self of the two partners, and is a spiritual union that lasts to eternity. In a unity marriage, the husband and wife develop a conjoint self, while their former individual self recedes into the background and no longer operates.

The unity marriage is not achieved by promise or desire alone. There are developmental levels of unity that married partners must go through with each other, like a growth process that takes many years of dedicated effort. The "conjoint self" refers to a husband and wife who have achieved unity at all levels of the threefold self (as explained below). Each individual has been changed, dropping off some traits and acquiring new ones that can fit together. This is called growing together in reciprocity. The husband has to abandon some traits he cherished since childhood because these habits caused opposition and disunity. The wife has to abandon some traits that she perceives do not fit with her husband's character. Both have to acquire new traits that could fit together as a unit. The old traits that were abandoned and the new traits that were acquired consist of sensorimotor, cognitive, and affective traits in the threefold self. That is: habits of external activities, habits of thinking, and habits of internal feeling.

Levels of unity are ordered from external to more and more interior unity, as will be explained below. For instance, an external level of unity between marital partners involves their sensorimotor portion of the threefold self. They like and enjoy to do things together like dancing, touching each other, partying, camping, watching movies, eating out, driving, talking about their favorite topics, and so on. These overt "external" activities involve sensory and motor interactions, including verbal, which is an overt motor activity. Of course every sensorimotor activity involves thinking and feeling but these cognitive and affective operations are not visible, and the focus of the two partners at this stage is on the external activity of the other. There is less focus or concern on what the other is thinking or feeling.

Note that these joint external activities do not necessarily mean that the two partners are in agreement with each other's way of thinking, each other's attitudes, or feelings and motivations. The cognitive and affective self of each partner may not be in agreement, and they may even be competitive or hostile to the other. What is on the inside that is not visible (affective and cognitive self) may be in opposition and even hatred against the partner, while what shows on the outside--the sensory-motor activity, may appear harmonious and compatible. This underlying disagreement or dislike becomes visible when there is an overt fight during which the two partners show their anger, resentment, and disrespect for one other. Afterwards they make up, and the cognitive disrespect and affective dislike recede again into the underlying invisible state, lurking there, until the next fight at which time the abuse and disrespect come out again.

There is therefore a first level of the conjoint self, and this is external, involving sensorimotor reciprocity and joint achievement, without necessarily there being an interior agreement and respect for the partner. Women, more than men, tend to experience this external phase of the relationship as unsatisfactory, painful, and injurious. Women often have to bond with other women to support and reassure each other during this phase of disharmony with their husband or partner.

Men tend to bond with other men by complaining about women and speaking about them with disrespect. They also keep secrets from their women and do things they want to hide from them. Men do this in order to obtain sexual favors. This deception is a method of exploiting women and dehumanizing them. At this external level of unity, men feel more comfortable than women because they exercise more control in the relationship. Men tend to resist closer, more intimate relationship phases, in order to m

Theistic Psychology: The Scientific Knowledge of God Extracted from the Correspondential Sense of Sacred Scripture

The Marriage Relationship and The Doctrine of the Wife

Spiritual Gender Genes

Theistic Psychology:
The Scientific Knowledge of God
Extracted from the
Correspondential Sense of Sacred Scripture

The Marriage Relationship and
The Doctrine of the Wife