Created for Connection

2-day marriage workshop for Christian couples

Registration coming soon

Do you feel dissatisfied, like God desires more oneness for your marriage than you currently have?

Do you and your spouse feel stuck in predictable patterns of distance or conflict?

Do you strive for less conflict and more connection with your spouse but still find yourself automatically reacting in a way that creates more distance and hurt (defensiveness, criticism, blaming, shutting down, yelling, etc.)?

Are there places of tension in your marriage or difficult topics that you can’t talk about productively?

Do old hurts keep getting brought up in new arguments?

Do you desire to experience more of God’s love and presence in your marriage and home?

This faith-based, intensive marriage workshop is designed to strengthen, enhance, or repair your relationship depending on the state it’s in.

Upcoming Events

  • When

    Exact dates TBD

    Friday 5:30-9:30

    Saturday 8:30-4:30

  • Where

    Location TBD

  • Cost

    $350 per couple

    + taxes and fees

Event Registration Coming Soon

“A deep sense of love and belonging is an irreducible need of all people. We are biologically, cognitively, physically, and spiritually wired to love, to be loved, and to belong. When those needs are not met, we don’t function as we were meant to. We break. We fall apart. We numb. We ache. We hurt others. We get sick.”

— Brené Brown

Created for Connection : A Marriage Workshop for Christian Couples

Created for Connection is based in the truth that God is relational in nature as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and that we are created in His image. We were made to exist in relationship with Him and others. We are dependent on God with a built-in desire to belong and be loved by Him. The Bible constantly refers to God as our rock, fortress, refuge (Psalm 18:2), strength, and help (Psalm 46:1). He is our perfect and ultimate “secure base.” A secure base is a scientific term for a relationship that provides a safe foundation from which we can confidently navigate our lives and take risks while knowing we can return for comfort and protection whenever needed.

This workshop combines gospel truth and scripture with recent research in Attachment Theory and Emotionally Focused Therapy to bring couples a practical roadmap to discover the connection we were created to experience.

God is referred to in the Bible as a father, friend, and a bridegroom (2 Corinthians 6:18, John 15:15, Isaiah 61:10). Our relationships on this earth point to our most significant relationship. In addition to being a symbol, they were designed to comfort and strengthen us. Although they are imperfect, other people (parents, spouses, and fellow followers of Christ) can provide additional “secure bases” for us to thrive from. After creating the world and the first man, God observed his creations and said that it was good. However, He said it was not good for man to be alone (Genesis 2:18), so he made the first female. Our longing for connection with another human was present even before sin and imperfection entered the world, and God desired that Adam had someone to fulfill that longing. To create closeness in our relationships, we must first acknowledge that we are dependent on others for connection, friendship, belonging, and a sense of safety. Research even shows that the quality and strength of our emotional bonds with others (beginning with our parents in infancy) impacts our mental and physical health and the way we relate to others in the future. God designed us to need each other and he built in people for us to cling to in marriage, families, and the church.

Sadly, in this fallen world, many of us feel alone in our marriages rather than being encouraged by and connected to this loved one. As Christians, we know the covenant is the most important part of marriage as it symbolizes Christ’s sacrificial love for us. However, if our marriages are to reflect Christ’s sacrifice well, we must strive for more than simply not getting divorced. Our relationship should also be characterized by gentleness, patience, eagerness for unity, (Ephesians 4:1-3), tenderheartedness, kindness, forgiveness (Ephesians 4:32), nourishing and cherishing one another (Ephesians 5:28-29) holding fast to our spouse (Matthew 19:5), and delighting in them (Psalms 5:19), and loving each other as Christ loved the church (Ephesians 5:25). This might feel close to impossible for some of us who are in relationships where we feel so stuck and alone. In this workshop, we will help you simultaneously find deeper connection and exemplify these Christ-like qualities. We want to help you better fulfill God’s intended purpose for your marriage–both as a symbol of Christ and as help and comfort in this difficult life.

Our purpose at Created for Connection is to encourage Christians to, first, more deeply pursue a relationship with God and, then, love each other more deeply so that we may have many “secure bases” and “safe havens” to live from courageously and confidently. True confidence comes not from our abilities, but from the assurance that when we need others, they will be there for us. This workshop aims to cultivate healthy dependence on God and others. We will walk through structured conversations where spouses take risks and open their hearts with the goal of deepening the relationship, coming close to one another, and providing each other the companionship that God created us to experience.

This workshop is based on the Christian version of Sue Johnson’s bestselling book Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love. It is recommended (but not required) to purchase and read Created for Connection before attending the workshop. Even just reading the first few chapters beforehand would be helpful. You will also likely want to reference the book after you complete the workshop and continue to put what you’ve learned into practice.

  • Many marriage workshops and books take a top-down approach. They give couples great tools that are stored in the frontal lobe of the brain (for example, learning each other’s love languages or learning coping skills to calm oneself in an argument). Unfortunately, when emotions flood our nervous systems and we get stuck in negative cycles of interaction, knowledge stored in our frontal lobe (communication skills or other tools) is less accessible to us. This leads couples to be unsuccessful in applying what they’ve learned and often feel frustrated with themselves. 


    As EFT therapists, we use a bottom-up approach where we slow down and make sense of the unconscious, emotional processes happening during moments of disconnection and conflict and then use what we learn about ourselves to create deep intimacy.

    We will do this in three main steps with a conversational style: 

    1) Learn about what happens instantly in our body and mind that lead us to react in ways we wish we wouldn’t.

    2) Uncover your deepest fears and longings that drive the emotions and behaviors that are causing your marriage distress and disconnection.

    3) Share what you learn about yourself to invite your spouse to know you on a deeper level, come close to you in your pain, and fulfil some of your longings for love and connection.

  • Created for Connection heals and enriches marriages by helping spouses become more emotionally accessible, engaged, and responsive. These are essential for an intimate relationship with both God and others. Our emotions are God-given and give us useful information about our deepest desires and fears, our most impactful experiences, and our relationships.

    In our relationship with God, emotional vulnerability allows us to display deep trust in Him, more intimately express our faith and devotion, ask for things from Him, and come close to Him as our father and friend. Emotional vulnerability also enables us to know our spouse and be known by them, connect, and find forgiveness and healing.

    We know this can be difficult and even scary, especially if you’ve been hurt by your spouse or others. In this workshop, you will be encouraged to take emotional risks with your spouse–to open up to them about your deepest fears and longings and then ask them to reassure you of their love and hold you tight in your sadness, fear, and pain.

    • The workshop is highly experiential. This means you won’t just learn and take notes, you’ll get to experience a new way of interacting and practice having vulnerable, connected conversations with your spouse in private.


    • While this is not therapy, there will be two trained Emotionally-Focused therapists available to help you upon request when your negative pattern (or cycle) threatens to take over and you get stuck.


    • The group is small to ensure couples are able to get the assistance they need from the facilitators. This group will be limited to 12-14 couples.

    • There is absolutely no requirement to share with the group, but time will be provided to discuss the new things you’re learning and practicing.

Registration Coming Soon

What will we actually do?

The workshop will begin with a review of what the Bible teaches us about emotional intimacy and vulnerability, viewing God as our ultimate“secure base”, and the purpose of marriage. Then we will discuss the research and science of emotional bonding and attachment theory. This will help you make sense of the cycles of disconnection that couples often experience.

We will then walk through the following 7 conversations. These each capture significant moments in a relationship where we can either fall into disconnection or engage vulnerably.  For each conversation, we will teach, see an example, and then give you time to practice with the help of our facilitators upon request.

  1. Recognizing The “Demon Dialogues” – Identify destructive patterns that arise when we are angry, hurt, or scared that can be hard to spot and keep you stuck and disconnected.

  2. Finding the Raw Spots – Identify raw spots (things you react to seemingly disproportionately) and begin to make sense of your own and your partner’s emotions and longings.

  3. Revisiting a Rocky Moment – Learn how to talk about hurts. Repair rifts in your relationship.

  4. Hold Me Tight – Engaging and Connecting – Share vulnerably, ask for your partner to come close, and develop deeper understanding and connection.

  5. Forgiving Injuries – Learn how to repair and forgive emotional injuries

  6. Bonding through Sex and Touch – Deepen your emotional and physical connection.

  7. Keeping the Love Alive - Make a plan for continued deeper connection.

Meet the Facilitators

These are the counselors that will be teaching and assisting you through the 7 conversations.

  • Abby is a Marriage and Family Therapist and trained Emotionally Focused Therapist working with couples in Greenville, SC. She has been married for 4 years and has her second child on the way. She loves enjoying this beautiful earth God created and thrives in deep conversations with others.

  • Kirk is a Professional Counselor living and working in East Tennessee. He is also a trained Emotionally Focused Therapist and excited to be joining Abby (his oldest daughter) to co-facilitate these workshops in Greenville.

FAQs

  • This workshop is for relationships all the way from engaged couples to couples who have been married for 40+ years.

    These conversations are applicable to any struggle: miscommunication, distance, conflict, life stressors and transitions, and more. Very occassionally we find that a couple would do better in couples therapy than in a workshop setting. This usually consists of couples where someone is actively engaged in an affair, domestic violence, or addiction. After registering, we will schedule a 20 minute screening call with both of you to ensure you are well suited for the workshop (most couples are). You will be refunded the full amount paid if we determine the workshop is not a good fit.

  • To keep the cost of the workshop reasonable, we do not provide meals. There will be an hour long lunch break on Saturday.

    Snacks and water will be provided for you throughout both days.

  • As facilitators and EFT therapists, we are trained to help you slow down what’s happening in your body, make sense of it, and share it with your partner. Your anger is filled with hope of a deeper connection with this person you love so dearly. Anger doesn’t scare us and we’ll be there to help you understand it and navigate it well.

  • This is extremely common and nothing to be ashamed of. Our culture and our flesh have been working against most of us our entire lives. Whether we shut down or get angry and critical, we are all struggling to talk about what’s really going on inside of us during periods of disconnection. The facilitators’ job is to gently guide you into more vulnerability with your spouse, even when you’re not sure how to do that.

    We hope this workshop will help you better understand your tendency to shut down (as well as your spouses’s often unhelpful attempts to get you to open up) and that you both realize there’s a better way that you can be really successful with.

  • Group discussion is only a small part of this workshop and is not required.

  • Each couple will be seated at their own table with some distance from other couples. We will also utilize white noise machines and/or music to give the sense of greater privacy while in a room with other people.

  • Cancelation and refund policy will be uploaded here soon.

Feel free to reach out.

If you have any questions or concerns, Abby would love to hear from you. You can expect a repsonse within 2 business days.