Stand in the Fire, They Said. You’ll Feel Alive, They Said.

Wednesday, August 6, 2025. This is for KAM, with regret.

A Reconsideration of David Schnarch’s Passionate Marriage

In 1997, before WiFi was reliable and therapy was something you could get via app, David Schnarch handed us a flamethrower and called it a book.

Passionate Marriage sorta told couples everywhere to stop cuddling, stop clinging, and for God’s sake stop hoping your partner would validate your feelings.

Instead, Schnarch said, try differentiation: self-regulation in the presence of intimacy. Stand in the fire. Be your own person. Then maybe you’ll want to have sex again.

It was electric. It was blistering. It sold a shitload of copies.

But now it’s 2025.

The nervous system has a publicist. Consent is an emerging field of academic study. Therapists are learning about trauma, neurodivergence, and cultural context. And the fire metaphor?

Well, some of us have PTSD, bless your heart.

So maybe it’s time to lovingly take Passionate Marriage, place it on the metaphorical therapist’s coffee table, and say: “Thank you, David. We needed you. But we also need to talk.”

Differentiation: Still Smarter Than a Trust Fall

To be clear: Schnarch’s core ideas still wicked hold up.

He taught that long-term desire doesn’t thrive on closeness alone. It needs tension, self-definition, and a willingness to stop managing your partner’s feelings as if they’re a bonsai tree you overwatered into dormancy.

He gave us permission to say: “I want you, but I don’t need you to like me while I want you.” That’s sexy. That’s adult. That’s also wicked hard.

In a therapy world obsessed with soothing, Schnarch brought the challenge. He told couples:

“Maybe what’s killing your sex life isn’t porn or monogamy or unresolved childhood trauma. Maybe you just haven’t grown up yet.”

That kind of straight talk had existential power.

Especially in the '90s, when most relationship books were asking you to speak each other’s love languages or gaze into each other’s eyes while naming five things you admire.

Schnarch said: Stop merging. Start burning.

But then came trauma science, neurobiology, and—well—the realization that some people burn because their nervous systems were never safe to begin with.

The Nervous System Objects, Your Honor

Schnarch’s mantra—“stand in the fire”—was built on the assumption that discomfort is good for you. That anxiety in intimacy means you’re finally showing up.

And sometimes, that’s true. Unless you have complex trauma. Or neurodivergence. Or a childhood where vulnerability got you hurt. Or a partner who’s accidentally (or not so accidentally) replicating those conditions.

As it turns out, flooding someone’s nervous system is not the same thing as growth. It’s just… flooding.
(Siegel, 2012; van der Kolk, 2014; Porges, 2011)

In modern trauma-informed therapy, we use terms like “window of tolerance,” “co-regulation,” and “somatic safety.”

Schnarch didn’t. His writing often treated dependency like an infection, and discomfort like a necessary rite of passage.

Which is how some therapists wound up pushing clients into exercises that felt less like intimacy and sometimes more like emotional Navy SEAL training.

Attachment Theory Called. It’s Not Clingy. It’s Secure.

Schnarch also took a swing at Attachment Theory, which he sometimes blamed for encouraging regression and emotional fusion.

In his model, true maturity comes from internal self-soothing—being able to stand on your own emotional feet while your partner is… well, being a whole separate person over there.

But more recent research (Mikulincer & Shaver, 2016; Cozolino, 2017) has suggested that Secure Attachment and individuation are not incongruent with one another.

In fact, people who feel safe in relationships are more willing to take risks, speak their truth, and initiate sex—not less.

Securely attached partnerss are better at:

• Saying “no” without disappearing.

• Saying “yes” without overfunctioning.

• Being present without becoming emotionally porous.

That’s not weakness. That’s capacity. And it’s built through relational safety, not running a gauntlet.

Erotic Consent Culture: Not Just a Buzzword

Another area where Schnarch might seem a bit dated is in his approach to sexual discomfort.

David told clients that pushing through resistance—sexual, emotional, spiritual—was part of developing erotic resilience. And sometimes that’s true.

But there’s a fine line between therapeutic challenge and consent bypassing.

Today, we are more inclined to ask:

• Does your body feel safe enough to want?

• Is this edge growth, or is it retraumatization?

• Are we honoring arousal, or bulldozing boundaries?

Modern models like somatic sex therapy and consent-forward intimacy coaching emphasize slowness, choice, and embodiment (Nagoski, 2015; Ogden et al., 2006).

In that context, Schnarch’s “face your partner and breathe through it” approach can sound less like therapy and more like emotional CrossFit.

What Differentiation 2.0 Might Look Like

We don’t need to throw Schnarch out with the bathwater. He was right about a lot of things. But we can also discuss:

• Regulated autonomy: You can be yourself and stay connected.

• Consent-forward sexuality: No pushing past your body’s “no” to prove you’re differentiated.

• Trauma literacy: Knowing when avoidance is immaturity—and when it’s a nervous system doing its job.

• Relational context: Understanding how race, gender, class, and neurotype shape what emotional risk even means.

In short: differentiation shouldn’t be about who can withstand the most discomfort. It should be about who can stay self-aware, self-responsible, and still emotionally reachable when the stakes are high.

Growth Isn’t a Punishment

The late Dr. David Schnarch gave the world a vocabulary for adult eroticism. For that, he deserves real credit.

And in 2025, our understanding of what makes people grow—especially in intimacy—has expanded a bit.

We know now that people don’t reliably change through confrontation and ordeal. They change with less resistance through felt safety, meaningful challenge, and especially reparative connection.

So yes—stand in the fire. But only if:

• You’ve got shoes on.

• You know where the fire exits are.

• And someone’s holding your hand while you do it.

Otherwise, you’re just burning.

Be Well, Stay Kind, and Godspeed.

REFERENCES:

Cozolino, L. (2017). The neuroscience of psychotherapy: Healing the social brain (3rd ed.). W. W. Norton.

Mikulincer, M., & Shaver, P. R. (2016). Attachment in adulthood: Structure, dynamics, and change (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.

Nagoski, E. (2015). Come as you are: The surprising new science that will transform your sex life. Simon & Schuster.

Ogden, P., Minton, K., & Pain, C. (2006). Trauma and the body: A sensorimotor approach to psychotherapy. W. W. Norton.

Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. W. W. Norton.

Schnarch, D. (1997). Passionate marriage: Keeping love and intimacy alive in committed relationships. W. W. Norton.

Siegel, D. J. (2012). The developing mind: How relationships and the brain interact to shape who we are (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.

van der Kolk, B. (2014). The body keeps the score: Brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma. Viking.