Ribbons of transparent rainbow colors, almost like stained glass

awesome relationships

Couture Coupling

When I hear most people talk about relationships, directly or in media, I feel sad at all the loneliness and frustration out there. Older generations tell us that all marriages have ups and downs and people my age and younger say that no one knows how to be really happy. This is not true! Relationships do not have to be this way!

For more than 21 years, my husband Paul and I have not had one bad day together. Not one day. Of course we have conflicts and disagreements. But we’ve always approached them as a team. To stay this connected, we: resolve our conflicts, collaborate when we disagree, express our feelings that day so we always go to sleep feeling happy with each other. We’ve created our own terminology and method, and we’ve been taking notes!

I’m thrilled that we are now able to share more than 20 years of happiness making insights! Given our track record, we decided to combine my clinical expertise and his narrative expertise to talk about how we do this.

Couture Coupling” means setting up your relationship to be designed and tailored to fit you. The specifics of what make us happy might not work for you. But our method is based on collaboration, curiosity, and creativity, which we will explain how to apply.

We are working on a series about how we have (naturally) applied what we learned from philosophy to our relationship. This includes topics like: valuing being wrong, liking when the other person disagrees, and doubting our own assumptions. Think of it as mixing deep emotions with relational logic, and ending up with coziness and passion.

Aurit and Paul, cheek to cheek with big, warm smiles and grass behind them. On left, Paul is light-skinned with long, loose honey-blond curls and blue eyes. On right, Aurit has dark curly hair, light olive skin, hazel eyes, glasses and a red dress..

Aurit & Paul: Our story, in brief

Paul and I met at the University of Pennsylvania when we were both students at a philosophy club. A year later, in 2002, I propositioned him for a kiss (ridiculous story for another time) and needless to say it was the best decision of my life!

I’m quite obsessed with Paul, and he is my favorite topic of conversation. I experience him as a daily miracle. He says I am the center of his universe.

Our relationship is hard to describe in brief, but even strangers comment on our connection. It’s been an ongoing slumber party, a perfectly temperatured bath, and an engaging receptive place to play, snuggle, and explore the world. The more time goes on, the more and more I feel both younger and distilled to my essence. It is hard to explain because English doesn’t have great words to describe enduring, consistent, passionate, fun, and powerful love. So Paul and I have created our own private language, which we’ll be explaining.

This slumber party has thrived even when circumstances threw hard things our way, including long distance marriage and years of cancer treatments. We are a well loved-up team. I’m literally lying on him as I type this.

You can expect to see Paul joining me on screen as well as sometimes off camera to focus or sharpen what I am saying!