Critique of His Needs Her Needs, Building an Affair Proof Marriage by Willard F Harley Jr - Book Report/Review Example

 His Needs Her Needs, Building an Affair Proof Marriage ‎ By Willard F. Harley Jr.‎ Introduction: It is a widely accepted fact that most couple who enter in the world of matrimony enter with a hope of living a fairy tale life. They believe there once boy friend/ girl friend would fill all there fantasies and they will live a perfect life right out of a book. But soon as they enter the real and practical life of marriage their dreams and hopes seems to evaporate and they end up blaming each other for their losses. This point arises sooner or later in every married life and this is where this book is helpful. Summary: The theme of the book, as the name also suggests, revolves around ‘affair-proofing’ ones marriage. The author through his experience with couple in counselling is able to point the reasons, and weaknesses which can lead someone to have an affair, and it also suggests and educate its readers on how to prevent this from happening and saving ones marriage. The idea is evolved that affairs ‘just happens’, and the people mostly have affairs with someone their spouses are familiar with, sometimes with friends or family members or even at work, it all starts when your marriage is already in trouble and you find a compassionate and supportive shoulder to cry on. The author promotes that most of these affairs are not a result of physical attraction but it only generates because that person was able to satisfy an ‘unfulfilled need’ (pg: 21). A rather unique and new concept is introduced in this book which is called the ‘Love Bank’. Through this concept Harley tried to educate his readers that in a marriage every spouse has an internal bank of his own which deposits or withdraws its ‘love units’ when his needs are fulfilled or withheld. He wrote an entire chapter (chapter 2) on it elaborating his point on love banking clearly. He further educates his readers that a couple’s love bank is at the fullest just before the start of the marriage, but gradually it declines and even goes bankrupt in extreme cases. The Principle of Harley’s book is his ten basic points on which according to him every marriage stands. According to him it is a classical balance between men and women because there are exactly five basic needs on each side to achieve a perfect balance in a marriage. The writer states his views quite sophistically throughout his entire book and defines his views in details by giving an entire chapter to each of his principle points. He firmly believe that these points are, for men; sexual fulfilment, recreational companionship, attractive spouse, domestic support and admiration, and for women; affection, conversation, honesty and openness, financial support and family commitment. Harley suggest at the very beginning of the book that basic principle of having a happy marriage is fulfilling each other’s basic needs, he writes on pg: 17, ‘Become aware of each other’s emotional needs and learn to meet them.’. Thus these principles bit by bit bring spouses closer and can easily be applicable in venting off any emotional steam that has accumulated over the years. Critique: I enjoyed this book on various point, how it starts with an aura of evoking ‘fear’ in the married couples. How, if they are guilty of not fulfilling the needs of their spouses, they are inching towards disaster, namely extra marital affairs. I also enjoyed the narration of small stories which kept me hooked till the ending, and on many levels it made the book a very relevant one for any reader, the concept and basic principles that are defined which can break or make a marriage are very true to its core and are very viable indeed. The Questionnaire provided after each chapter was a very interesting way of keeping the reader in line, it not only kept the reader glued to it, it also make it all so real to the reader, where reader not only can learn from the book but these questionnaire helps him in questioning himself and correcting his mistakes before he moves on to the other problem. The only thing which bothers me is that it is written from a male perspective, which is of course true since the writer is a man, but to me, at some points, it seems like the writer is trying to ‘justify’ a man’s infidelity rather than stating what is wrong in it. He sometimes fails to clearly narrate the female perspective on a certain topic. For example he suggests that sexual fulfilment is totally a male trade, whereas in reality, women are also very much capable of having strong sexual desires, which are sometimes not met by their spouses, which is completely lacking from the book. His views are all based on the various studies he has carried during his marriage counselling years, and it is quite clearly evident that it is from a different era since a lot has changed on emotional grounds too during all these years. There are lot of instances and anecdotes in the book which are simply too old fashioned to relate to. For example there were about ten pages which narrates how the women wants their men to financialyl support them and how they despise working merely for the reason of paying the basic bills, they would rather be a homemaker then a working women. Women nowadays don’t feel that way; they are competitive and can juggle between home and work quite tactfully. Often, women, wives in this case, earn better than their husbands, so to me in today’s age and time the women’s basic needs doesn’t necessarily comprises of this so called ‘Financial Support’. Conclusion: In my view, I believe this book is really helpful in dealing with the troubles of a married life. This book proclaims the basic problem in every marriage, in every couple, if there is any, is that that the ‘needs’ of men and women are entirely different from the other. A man looks towards a situation with his perspective and a woman with hers, where in fact they should have been looking towards problems with the other person’s perspective. Their aim, their goal should be the same, to achieve peace, harmony, understanding and affection for each other. If their goal is the same, they wouldn’t look at each other but rather they would look in one direction. This book opens the hearts and minds of its readers to communicate, and that’s from where you can start building a better and comfortable relationship with your spouse. Work Cited Willard F. Harley Jr., His Needs, Her Needs: Building an Affair-Proof Marriage. Grand Rapids, MI: Revell. 2011. Print. Read More