Emotional Infidelity: How to Affair-Proof Your Marriage and 10 Other Secrets to a Great Relationship

M. Gary Neuman correctly states the importance of maintaining strong emotional connections with your spouse. Diluting this dialogue naturally reduces the bond with your spouse. When a couple successfully establishes trust and learns to understand the work necessary to develop good communication, they will have a "talking tool" good for a lifetime. It will work to cut through the most difficult and best of life's future. It will overcome the natural failings of man (yes, including the various forms of infidelity cited by the author).

Dalai Lama and Howard C Cutler, MD (The Art of Happiness), pg 102-3, "I think if one is seeking to build a truly satisfying relationship, the best way of bringing this about is to get to know the deeper nature of the person and relate to ...her on that level, instead of merely on the basis of superficial characteristics."

The problem that I have with Gary Neuman in his view of the marriage and his restrictions on interpersonal relationships between the opposite sex is his limitation on emotional intimacy. He views your spouse as possessing the exclusive domain for (emotional) interpersonal interaction. This creates a self-centered couple, attempting to protect their relationship with emotional isolation.

Bring to mind the friends that you have touched on an emotional level, and changed your lives for the better. How can you bring Mr. Neuman's rule-set to this emotional interchange?

The possibility is real that a friendship with the opposite sex might, in fact, compete for your energy normally directed to your spouse. Creating a solution that is the rule-set (proposed by Neuman) to contain and limit this "competing"dialgue will not prevent the risk of emotional infidelity.

Character and maturity recognizes the sexual and emotional attractions that exists between the sexes. Daily life does not insulate us from emotional and physical temptations. We are connected more closely than at any time in history. What would be the rationale, person to person, for denying emotional access when dialgue compels closeness?

Another way of looking at my point might be to stand at the window inside of your home. You know how important emtional life is in developing a healthy relationship with your spouse. Now look outside the window. Why should the world outside your window be so threatening to your marriage simply because of the possibility that a deep emotional thread might run through certain relationships between the you and opposite sex? Can your brain really separate logic and emotion so precisely? If it could, our workplaces will have reached a new level of depersonalization unfit for my wife's growth outside of the home.


from a professional point of view   April 24, 2002
48 out of 53 found this review helpful

As a marital therapsit I've found this book to be of exceptional help with my marital patients. It's unusual in how it offers clear direction for a marriage at any stage. I've found it useful to help couples create clear daily goals for their marriage, learn how their parents' marriage has affected them, and how to create a great deal of passion. The book offers such creative activities which I have my patients work on together. There's a great chapter on sex also. It really helps couples focus in on the deeper meaning of sex and has some straightforward advice that every couple must know.
I've found the book great for my patients also because of the stories which really bring the ideas to life and make it a quick read. There are so many books that seem to preach but this one seems to offer a conversation with you. The author seems to have purposely created a book that helps a couple think together and create something unique for themselves.
Most of all, the book is not afraid to tell it like it is. Neuman makes us think about the energy we have to give to our spouse and how much of it goes quickly to the wrong places. He has an especially great piece on accepting our spouse's flaws called "the Mona Lisa was no size two," where he really makes you think about how society has brainwashed us into certain beliefs about our spouses.
I don't usually take the time to write reviews but this is something exceptional that can really help a lot of people. I'll keep buying it for my patients.


Emotional Infidelity: Now your spouse owns your mind as well?   August 20, 2005
Serena BlackCat
39 out of 60 found this review helpful

I think this book promotes an unhealthy expectation of marriage. The author's only defense is to keep repeating "Why are you so defensive?" when he mentions his ideas. As a married woman, I think it is important for couples to have space, other friends, and the freedom to enjoy life in whatever way makes them happy. This does not take energy away from a marriage- it gives more energy to it.
He says that you shouldn't joke or ask advice or basically have any conversations with anyone of the opposite sex because you should be saving all your conversations for your spouse. Well maybe my spouse doesn't get those kinds of jokes or doesn't know the subject I'm asking about. I'm supposed to deny those parts of me. I'm supposed to have a boring time at work and not talk to anyone. He must be a pretty dull person to not have enough conversation for more than one person, because I can talk to a coworker, and (gasp) I can still have a conversation with my husband when I get home!
Let's say you like to play chess and your spouse does not. Are you supposed to give up playing chess, or is it so horrible to play chess with someone outside your marriage? You won't be able to get your spouse to be everything you want, and it's not good to believe that you can change someone into what you want.
I do have friends outside my marriage. I even have male friends. My husband does not care. You know why? Because he's not pathetically insecure like this author. It's not wrong to have coffee with a coworker. I think it's more wrong to be so controlling that you find a cup of coffee to be a betrayal. It is immature to think that every time you smile at someone it could lead to an affair, or that you can relate to your spouse in every way and don't need anyone else.
The idea that spending time with someone else takes energy away? That sounds a little cultish to me, as if you have to focus 100 percent of your time and attention. You're having marital problems, so the solution is to stop having friends or pleasant conversations with coworkers? That's supposed to make you happier? I suppose he thinks if two people don't get along, you should lock them in a room together and suddenly they'll be in harmony. I don't think so! They'll probably be ready to kill each other! Maybe it works for him, but I don't think it's anywhere near working for every couple. For many it will be forcing something that just doesn't fit.
I think that if you shut yourself off from the world, you may be more likely to want out. You could feel more isolated and if it doesn't work out, you won't have anyone to turn to. I think this book also gives fuel to anyone with pathological jealousy.
He even admits that he doesn't shake hands with other women. He says he is a rabbi, but he sounds like he'd be more comfortable in an Islamic Fundamentalist society where men and women are kept separate.


Reality check please..   October 31, 2002
36 out of 58 found this review helpful

Somewhere near the front of the book, Mr. Neuman proudly discusses how he keeps his own marriage safe and sanctified by never doing more with a woman he encounters or works with than shaking her hand (and he avoids that if possible). No conversation, no friendship, no comradery. I thought his advice to do no more than shake the hands of your opposite-sex coworkers to be very unrealistic, with much of the rest of the advice. If the only way to "save" your marriage is to avoid 50% of the population & workforce, you and your marriage are WEAK!


Look for other sources--   August 5, 2005
K. DeVitto (Chelsea, MA United States)
22 out of 38 found this review helpful

M. Gary Neuman puts fear in the hearts of my married people. His notion that emotional infidelity is more dangerous than a sexual affair because everyone wants emotional attachments, is more a scare tactic rather than good advice.

If you look at his rules, then anyone who has an emotional attachment outside of marriage is guilty of infidelity. Best-friends, close siblings, parents, children from a previous marriage, could all fall into these rules. You could have an emotional affair with your mother or your best friend.

Instead of focusing on real issues that cause "jealousy" Neuman blatantly says that we should avoid and be on guard for those people who might even want a friendship.

This whole concept is wrong.

There are better books and better sources to read