Our Process
The Love Trials are a unique form of mediation that helps people open their eyes and gain the self-awareness necessary to change how they relate to one another and create an understanding that will withstand the test of time.
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​Our process ​filters out the emotions to define what each wants, take responsibility for their words and actions and find the courage to decide, without any regrets.
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​​​​​​Our process involves three Stages.
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Stages One and Two are fact-driven inquiries aimed at helping us step into and walk a mile in each of your shoes. ​​​​
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Stages One and Two are done independently to ensure each person's confidentiality.
Stage Three represents the heart of The Love Trials, where everything comes together. Stage Three is done in person and marks the only time that people will talk face-to-face in our process.
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​​We discuss more about each Stage below.
Stage One - Who Are You?
Stage One is devoted to fact gathering and understanding each person’s unique perspectives.
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The scope and breadth of topics discussed in Stage One will help you step back to reflect on the entirety of your life and your many experiences, both pleasant and unpleasant, to see them as a complete story.
While a therapist can help you understand how your childhood and trauma shaped your life, Stage One helps you acknowledge the choices you have made and their consequences.
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At the end of Stage One, people often experience a tremendous weight lifted from them. Their shoulders, chest and back feel lighter. It is a natural consequence of feeling seen, heard, and understood in the way we do it at The Love Trials.
​The First Stage takes anywhere between three to five hours. It is conducted via Zoom or Google Meets to ensure that it is convenient, flexible and ensures your privacy and comfort.
Stage Two - Hidden Connections
The second Stage explores the various dynamics in your life and how they fit together. We will be examining how the underlying beliefs, values and fears that have not only guided your life, but that also shaped the way in which you have participated in the relationship. You will also develop clarity about what you want for yourself and your life.  The starting point of the second Stage is our proprietary questionnaire. Most of our questions call for answers on a scale of 1-10. There are two key benefits. ​​​First and foremost, numerical answers help quantify various aspects of a relationship that are difficult to do with open-ended questions. ​ For example, while you may fully trust your spouse with your child's well-being, your answer may differ if asked how much you trust your spouse to instill into that child your personal values if you passed away prematurely. The numbers capture that difference. Using our proprietary algorithm to compare such differences across the many categories of your relationship offers keen insights into relationship dynamics that are difficult to capture thru dialogue alone. And second, numbers help to significantly reduce the anxiety—and the fear of judgment—that often arises when answering open-ended questions about their relationship. ​​​​The connection that we create with you in the first two Stages establishes the foundation for Stage Three and one of the most powerful forms of support we offer: being able to put words onto difficult emotions and knotty feelings that you have been experiencing but were unable to voice yourself. The Second Stage takes approximately four to five hours and is also conducted via Zoom or Google Meets to ensure that it is convenient, flexible and ensures your privacy and comfort.
Stage Three - The Main Event
Stage Three of The Love Trials brings everything together. The effort, exploration and self-reflection done separately in Stages One and Two enables each of you to come together in Stage Three with new perspectives about yourselves and each other.
By the end of Stage Three, you will not only have let go of a lot of the pain of the past, you both will decide what you want for yourselves and your relationship going forward. And for existing couples, you both will have develop a whole new understanding of the heaviness weighing down your relationship. ​
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Stage Three aims to create a space for honest yet productive dialogue between the two of you in order to engage in the difficult conversations that must be had.​
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The Third Stage takes, at minimum, a half-day. Most couples choose to reserve a full-day to ensure they have adequate time to address the necessary issues.
Clearing the Air
In Stage Three, we first deal with the negative emotions people have about the other. After all, you cannot hear what your partner is saying if you are constantly reacting.
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We clear the air by calling out the many elephants in the room and by putting neutral words to emotions steeped in hurt or anger. It's natural to feel relief when we express out loud what we have been feeling inside. ​
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Though challenging at first, the exercise helps bring about a remarkable transition in how people relate to one another. But this is just the beginning.
The "Relationship Accounting"
Everything done within The Love Trials was designed to lead up to the Relationship Accounting. In this process, each person taking ownership for how each has contributed to the relationship breakdowns in the past. While the ego is rarely a fan, the process is incredibly healing for our heart, mind and spirit. There are two aspects to the accounting: owning what you did and learning about the impact on the other person. The combination of taking ownership with opening your mind and heart to learning about how you impacted the other person helps people take huge strides towards healing. RoSho, who leads Stage Three, will stand side-by-side with you as you gather the courage to see yourself in the mirror, as you are. You will have the confidence knowing that he has not only does this himself, he has helped many people through this very same process. It is perfectly natural to resist taking ownership of our actions. After all, many aspects of our lives depend on us being right. But as we take each small step together, we realize it is no where as scary and difficult as we may have imagined. We realize that we are still alive, our egos are still intact, and we actually feel better. Indeed, people experience a profound wholesomeness after having taken accountability and feel empowered to create a life they want. To hear the other person take ownership of what they did and then acknowledge what your experienced as a result often leads to an outburst of tears, allowing each person to feel both validated and vindicated.
The Decision Point
With the courage and confidence that naturally comes from going through the Relationship Accounting, we will support each of you as you collectively explore what each person wants. We will be putting all options on the table for the future of the relationship. By this point in the process, people often discover new aspects of themselves and their partner that they did not know before. They can see how their old ways of being created the relationship problems they experienced. Possibilities open up that were not available before because people were holding on to so much anger and bitterness towards themselves and each other. For some couples, the heaviness was getting in the way of the deep love and affection that they still have for one another. These couples often end up falling back in love during the Third Stage. For other couples, the heaviness is evidence that they were trying to force togetherness, when they are better off separate. They begin accepting a new reality that they will soon be living their lives on their own terms. Without the anger and pain, they can be kinder to each other. And for couples who have already separated and are now co-parenting, they can let go of the anger and resentment of the past, knowing that the most difficult part is behind them. They begin discovering new, more productive ways of relating to one another. Either way, we will be there with you as you have an honest discussion about what each of you wants for the future and which direction of the relationship best aligns with the best of you. The many eye-opening experiences that people have throughout the process inspire us to help as many couples as we possibly can.