An Interview with Ariel & Shya Kane

How To Have A Match Made in Heaven is an enticing title that invites readers who desire healthy, satisfying, thriving relationships, to learn new skills that could lead them to that outcome. This book is the follow-up to How To Create a Magical Relationship penned by the three -decades-as-a-couple, Ariel and Shya Kane. They refer to themselves as ‘Catalysts For Spontaneous Trans-formation’ which is indeed preferable to long, arduous and daunting growth. The book is filled with first person interviews with individuals and couples with whom the Kanes have worked over the years in their practice. Renaissance people, Ariel and Shya offer regular seminars, host a radio show called Being Here, write a blog entitled Transformational Moments and have an email support offering called The Excellence Club.

Coming as we are into relationships takes courage, and the clients whose stories are told in this book, that belongs on the shelf of any professional who assist couples in enhancing their partnership, are courageous indeed.

Wisdom: What prompted you to write this book and what would you like to see it do in the world?

Shya: Marilyn McGuire is a lady who runs the Nautilus Book Awards. In 2007, our earlier relationship book…

Ariel: ...How To Create A Magical Relationship With Three Simple Ideas That Will Instantaneously Transform Your Love Life...

Shya: ...was the gold medal winner of the Nautilus Book Awards and they haven’t awarded another gold medal in the relationships category since, because they felt nothing came close to how great that book was. She asked us to write another book on relationships for people who were in relationships already that were good and how to have them be better. It was for people who were dating….

Ariel: ...and not necessarily for young folks. Young folks tend to look for relationship books, but this was to be for people who were middle aged who wanted to start over and didn’t know where to start and were frustrated. That put a little bee in our bonnet.

Shya: That’s what drove us to write this book. What really drove us to write the book was that we do a video subscription series through the internet…

Ariel: ...called The Premium Excellence Club...

Shya: ...where people get a video of us working with people, either couples or single people, every week in their inbox. We watched a video that we did with a lady in Germany and it was such a profound moment, where the whole schematic for how she was living her life became available and apparent to us, that we realized this was the basis for a book.

Ariel: Having seen Christiana and her way of relating not only to her husband, but her father, and how it had a trickle- down effect on her relationship, and her courage in being willing to be vulnerable enough to share that with the world, and the profound nature of watching her face as it unfolded and she discovered new possibilities. We realized we could share the story in a stand-alone piece itself in the book, but we could also link to the video itself, so that those with the capability to watch videos could not only read about it, but see and directly experience those aha moments when a person’s life transforms. When you see it, you can have it for yourself.

Wisdom: That was one of my favorite stories. She was the one who gave her children Jewish names to get back at her father for being a Nazi.

Shya: She was punishing her father and in fact, was punishing herself and everyone else in her life.

Wisdom: What would you say is the single biggest challenge people face when relating with a prospective partner?

Ariel: Trying to get somewhere. I think it’s a challenge for people. It’s both the past and the future…the past because lots of people come into a dating scenario and they’re not just….right now, we’re having a date with you, Edie. For most people, it’s like they have all the histories of all the interviews they’ve ever done, to use this analogy. They don’t just sit across from somebody. They have the "last one they did, that didn’t work and I don’t want it to be like that…" and all the history, and then there is the future where most people don’t tell themselves the truth that they’re not just dating, they’re driving forward to have a relationship. It corrupts the moment. They’re not allowed to have some fun.

Wisdom: For some it is about making something happen rather than allowing it?

Shya: Yes, I would say that’s a good summary.

Wisdom: Would it be different for long term committed or married couples?

Shya: The most important thing is listening. Most of us don’t really listen to one another. We think we already know what the other person is going to say. How much different could what they are going to say be from what they said the day before that or the day before that? That’s why relationships end; because people actually stop being with each other and actually taking the time to hear what they are saying without disagreeing or arguing.

Ariel: It really doesn’t matter if you have the concept, "I’m a good listener." What really matters is moment to moment, letting go what you have to say listening to my partner, my husband my lover…by the way, July 29th is 30 years from our first date.

Wisdom: Mazel Tov!

Shya: And it gets better.

Wisdom: What are you going to do that’s even more special than what you already do every day?

Shya: We’ll be working.

Ariel: We’re going to be doing a creativity and intuition workshop. We have people coming from all over the world; from Hong Kong, a lady we haven’t met from Switzerland, from Germany, from California, some local people. I’m really excited to be doing that course. Sharing that day with them can only be awesome.

Wisdom: So you’ll be celebrating by doing what you do best, modeling how to love. How do our family patterns impact on our current interactions?

Shya: Unless you become aware that you have family patterns, they impact dramatically. If you become aware of them and don’t resist them, but just notice them, that’s the most important thing. Then you start to get control of your own life. Anything you resist dominates your life. If you are in resistance to your family patterns, it’s a guarantee you will keep them in place. If you notice them and don’t judge yourself for having them, but just include them as part of the fabric of your life, then you can have a life.

Ariel: We have a whole chapter in there called You’re Not the Story of Your Life with Candice who is a lovely woman who talked about how her family imploded when her mother left with another man and deserted the family. It’s really wonderful that she saw that her idea of how that was put together impacted her ability to love her husband. It’s really wonderful now. They’re just a few weeks from having their first child. They are so in love. That family pattern is not replaying. She’s not resisting it. She’s living her life.

Shya: Most people get lost in resisting where they came from and resisting their family, so they’re not just living their life. They’re living NOT the family’s life. They’re not going to be like them. That dictates how they could possibly be for the rest of their lives because in the decision not to be like their family, they become just like them in the opposite. The way they are being in life is formed by what they are saying no to. The game is to say yes to your life, including where you came from, rather than trying to get away from it.

Wisdom: Ideas for reframing family issues?

Shya: Even in your question ‘reframing your family issues’, it’s an issue.

Ariel: That means you have to do something with it and it is definitely a psychological approach that most people have. What we’re talking about is simple awareness without doing anything about what you see.

Shya: And not trying to get away from something, because anything you are trying to get away from, you get stuck to. What you resist persists.

Ariel: It’s more that historical family issues become irrelevant.

Shya: When you get into the current moment of your life, the past loses power over you and anything you have been resisting falls away. Our culture is so forward thinking, trying to get somewhere. Progress is our most important product. Maybe getting here would be our most important product so we can experience our lives moment to moment, rather than trying to get to what we think will be better than what we have in the current moment.

Wisdom: Is it about being present in the here and now, knowing that the future is going to unfold?

Shya: Exactly, Unfolding is a moment of NOW, so your future never gets here. It’s just that the moment keeps unfolding.

Wisdom: How can we encourage deeper intimacy in our relationships? Does it begin with intimacy with ourselves?

Ariel: Absolutely. We have that whole section in the beginning of the book about how kindness begins with you and intimacy begins with you. Shya and I were taking a walk the other day on one of our dates and we were standing on a bridge looking over to see if we could see fish. It’s one of the things we like to do. We realized the concept of how important it is to be kind to yourself, is really a radical idea. People are generally looking to fix and change.

Shya: It’s about whatever you do; it’s never good enough in your thoughts.

Ariel: If people see themselves have a negative thought, they try to make it positive. It puts such a stress. If you could just see how you are and have a sense of humor about it …

Shya: ...and being ok the way you are, then you have the space for other people to be the way they are. If you don’t have the space to be the way you are, then you’ll find fault with everybody else and then it’s really difficult to have a relationship when you’re picking apart a person’s way of being, the same way you pick apart your own way of being.

Ariel: One of the first videos in the book is with Stephanie where she said to Shya "Oh you tripped. You can’t be so enlightened." She picked on other people. Stephanie is a lovely, lovely lady and after that conversation, she found a man; her boyfriend is just the sweetest man and they have a great relationship. This being kind to herself set the stage for her to find a person whom she was really compatible with. Just as an aside, one of the things we are doing coming in October…we’re going to do a couple of radio show episodes called Where Are They Now, or something to that effect because so much has happened for the people in this book out of these videos and conversations.

Wisdom: When did you start writing the book?

Ariel: I think we started writing it in earnest about a year ago. There are pieces that we pulled from writings that we’ve done over time.

Wisdom: A lot has transpired in their lives in that time.

Shya: That’s one of the hallmarks of transformation. A lot happens in a short period of time and it’s not a directed lot happening. It’s not like you set a goal to lose weight or be better at something. It’s like your whole life becomes better in all aspects..360 and not predictable.

Wisdom: Can you think of any clients or situations that have been resistant to these ideas that you put forth where folks just dig in their heels and cling to their entrenched beliefs?

Ariel: Our approach absolutely does not work if someone wants to be right and that their partner is wrong. If you’re determined to be right, that they are the problem and you want other people to know what they are doing wrong…

Shya: ...or that they are the source of your discomfort.

Ariel: We talk in the book about being 100% responsible for the health of your relationship, not 50/50 and the more you are willing to be responsible for yourself…and we’re not talking blame, if you want to be right…

Shya: it doesn’t support relationship.

Wisdom: There was a chapter about a young Indian woman who was angry with her partner for not doing the dishes and no matter what you said, in her mind, he was wrong. He shoulda done the dishes.

Shya: That’s right.

Ariel: As far as I know, they broke up and she moved to India. I sometimes think when you can’t see your way clear to let go of that vendetta, sometimes that’s just masking that you are in a relationship that doesn’t work for you and you need to get out. We’re still really good friends with her and I think she’s doing quite well in her life and it’s obvious that relationship was not working.

Wisdom: How about the Surrender vs. Succumb dynamic?

Ariel: There is a section in the book called Ariel At Crossroads. Because I can actually let go and support Shya, in this case making a left turn as opposed to a right, rather than holding on to how I thought I wanted it, I actually think it makes a strong and powerful, independent woman. Because I have the ability to surrender, I can recognize when something doesn’t work for me and then we don’t do it that way.

Wisdom: So is it about areas of agreement between you?

Ariel: Yes! It really isn’t about areas of finding a yes…

Shya: Our life just is a yes to just about everything. It’s not like we have to find an area of yes…we are yes.

Ariel: We would be hard pressed to find an area of no.

www.matchmadeinheavenbook.com