The course behind the book
Most couples who fight keep having the same fight. The subject changes, but the pattern does not: one attacks and the other attacks back, or one attacks and the other withdraws, or both go quiet for days.
Dr. Diane Kramer calls this the Couple’s Vicious Cycle, and after fifty years as a psychologist and marriage counselor she has learned that it rarely stops on its own.
If you have read Toward an Extraordinary Relationship, you know the map: the Vicious Cycle; the Self-Protecting Pattern underneath your part of it, which is the way you react when things get hard; and the Limiting Belief underneath that, an old conclusion about yourself that you have carried since childhood.
The map also shows where the path leads: the Circle of Mutuality, the relationship that grows when two people begin to respond differently. The book shows you the map. The course is where you practice it until it is yours.
It is for anyone in a relationship that keeps landing in the same argument, and for anyone between relationships who wants the next one to go differently. You can take this course alone. Your partner does not have to participate. Change can begin with one person.
What you will be able to do
By the end of this course you will be able to see the argument coming before it starts, stop your own part of it, and calm yourself in the moment instead of reacting. You will know the belief underneath your reaction, and you will have a new one to stand on.
You will be able to say what you actually need in a way your partner can hear, listen to what they need, and work out differences so that neither of you keeps score. The fights get shorter, the repairs get quicker, and the love that has been buried under hurt and blame has room to come back.
If your partner does not change, you will know that too, clearly and without blame, and you will know what to do about it.
Who this course is for
This course is for you if you and your partner keep landing in the same argument, however it starts. It is for you if the silences between you have gotten longer, or if you have stopped bringing things up because you know how it will go.
It is also for you if you are between relationships and want the next one to go differently. You can take this course alone. Your partner does not have to participate, or even know. Change can begin with one person.
What you will learn
To picture the relationship you actually want, your North Star, clearly enough to steer by. To recognize the Vicious Cycle and map your own. To catch the first signs that your old reaction is starting, and to calm yourself in that moment with slow breathing and Stop and Look.
To find your Self-Protecting Pattern and what it does for you. To find the Limiting Belief underneath it and answer it with a Liberating Belief: “I am okay, and I can learn to ___.” To use EASE, a four-step plan for changing your part while it is happening.
To practice the seven skills of Win/Win communication, so that you can say the hard thing and be heard, and work out differences so that neither of you keeps score.
Beverly and Bob, the couple you follow through the course, start out happy and slide into the Cycle the way real couples do. You watch what it takes to climb out.
How the course works
The course is self-paced and online, and you can use it on a computer, a tablet, or a phone. You start when you like, stop when you like, and pick up where you left off.
Every lesson has the same shape. It tells you what you will learn. It teaches one thing, with real people and real conversations. It asks you to write, in your own private journal. You listen to a guided audio visualization, which is where the new response gets practiced in your body, not only understood in your head.
Then the lesson sends you back into your life with an Action Goal: one thing to do before you return. When you come back, the next lesson asks how it went. That is how what you learn on the screen turns into what you do in your kitchen, your office, and your own head.
Most lessons take up to an hour, and most people do one or two a week.
What the lessons cover
- Your North Star: what an extraordinary relationship is, and what it is not
- Tool 1: 4-2-4-2 breathing
- The Couple’s Vicious Cycle: seeing the pattern you keep repeating
- Self-Protecting Patterns: what your part of the Cycle does for you
- Stop and Look: catching your reaction early
- From Limiting Beliefs to Liberating Beliefs
- The seven skills of Win/Win communication
- Skill 1: the ground rules for a Win/Win conversation
- Skill 2: preparing yourself before you talk
- Skill 3: building rapport
- Skill 4: stepping into the other person’s shoes
- Skill 5: dialogue and influence
- Skill 6: detaching for calm in the middle of it
- Skill 7: negotiating so that both of you win
- Putting it all together
What is inside
Fifteen lessons, 180 interactive screens, and ten guided audio visualizations, with real conversations, practice exercises, and workbook pages. An Action Goal at the end of every lesson and an accountability check at the start of the next. Available any time, on any device.
Every course also includes your own Blueprint for Change, a private online journal that only you can see, workbook pages, learning checks and feedback as you go, and the e-book Become Your Own Superhero with Liberating Beliefs.
Live group support
Every learner is welcome in our private Facebook group, Toward an Extraordinary Relationship, open to readers of the book and to everyone enrolled in an Extraordinary Self course.
Each week has one theme and one short question a day, and you can bring your own situation any time. Dr. Diane reads everything and answers most days. Lorraine, who moderates the group, has done this work herself and will be in the conversation with you.
About Dr. Diane
Dr. Diane Ernstoff Kramer, Ph.D., is a psychologist and marriage counselor with fifty years of practice, Professor Emeritus in the State University of New York system, and the founder of Extraordinary Self Programs. She is the author of Toward an Extraordinary Relationship.
She and her late husband Fred built the learning platform these courses run on with the help of Donna Anselmo, Rachel Hazan and Grant Larimer. Dr. Diane wrote the courses herself. They draw on her fifty years of practice, on psychological research, and on NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming, the study of how people who do something well actually do it, so that others can learn it).
Our guarantee
If the course is not what you need, we want to know, and we will make it right. Every course is covered by our satisfaction guarantee; see the Satisfaction Guarantee page for details.
Read the book to see the path. Take the course to walk it.
Readers of Toward an Extraordinary Relationship (the book) will find a discount code for this course in Appendix B of the book.
