During the Christmas holidays I wrenched my right foot. I slid on the tile as I was rushing to answer the phone. To break my fall, I lurched my foot forward and strained some tendons. It hurt. I did the “Rest Ice Compress Elevate” thing for about 15 minutes 15 minutes and was soon up and about. But it hurt and I couldn’t help but limp. Larry’s words of advice to me were: “Stay off your feet. You will obey me.”

I laughed, which is healing in itself. I never vowed to obey you, I declared. He repeated. “You will obey me. You will stay off your foot.” I couldn’t stop laughing at the ridiculousness of his injunction to obey him, but I got the message that he wanted me to stop running around and rest my foot. Alright, alright, I said. I will choose to obey you!

Love, honor and obey seem like quaint wedding vows by today’s standards. The word “obey” was quaint when I married Larry 26 years ago. In a marriage based on equality, obeying should not be an issue. Obeying implies subjugating oneself to the will of the other. Who wants to have a marriage based on subjugating of any kind? But the word obey comes from the Latin word “oboedire” which means “to hear.”

Hearing your mate is an essential ingredient of living a long happy life together. By hearing, I mean not only paying attention to the words they use, but also paying attention to their tone, mood, body language, and facial expressions, all of which give clues to the meta-message that they’re trying to communicate. According to some sources, language is only 7% of communication. The other 93% is comprised of the things I mentioned before. The same word can convey entirely different meanings. A good example is the word “really.” Really can be a question. Really can indicate disbelief; really can indicate surprise. It can also indicate sarcasm. Each use of the word really carries with it a different inflection so that the person who hears the word knows exactly what the other person means.

So when Larry told me to obey him by staying off my feet, I knew he meant “I love you and I care about you and I don’t want you to hurt yourself.” I knew he meant that because over the years I’ve learned to hear the real message behind Larry’s words.

It’s not always convenient to take the time to hear your mate. Self-absorption is an adaptive response to the pressures of our early 21st century lifestyle. But as I’ve written before, in a long-term relationship, your mate’s needs have to be as important to you as yours are. To really hear means that you stop whatever you’re doing; stop your mind-chatter and focus on your mate. Breathe deeply in and out of your heart center. Stay with your breathing. As you do that, your filters will dissolve and you’re ability to empathically connect, which is the result of authentic hearing, will expand.

We have the capacity to feel what someone else is feeling. Our brains have mirror neurons, which react to another person’s mood. Neuro-imaging techniques show that our brains will mirror what another person is feeling, especially if that person is close to you. But to empathize means we have to get out of ourselves and open ourselves to another.

Marriage or mate-ship vows should contain a statement like:

I freely and totally choose to obey you because I will freely and totally hear you with my brain, my body, my heart and my soul. I may not acquiesce to your request, but I will hear it and I will take it in and I will process it. I will attend to the need under your request., and if I can meet that need, I will. If I can’t, I will work with you to have that need satisfied.”

By choosing to obey your mate, meaning by choosing to hear your mate, your whole life will be more satisfying. Your mate will be your empathic companion.