Michael & Penny · couples work

Your marriage can be the best thing in your life.

Most people never find out. We were twenty years in before we did.

We know how we got there, and we know how to help you get there.

Life is full of ordinary moments. You want these ordinary moments to be special moments. Not just on holidays, birthdays and anniversaries.

A couple walking home together at dusk, painted in watercolour

The long way home

A couple cooking dinner side by side, painted in watercolour

A Tuesday, nothing special

One partner rubbing the other’s shoulders in an armchair, painted in watercolour

Ten minutes, no reason

A couple dancing together in their living room, painted in watercolour

The kitchen radio, still going

Moment 1 of 4

A marriage where hundreds of “ordinary moments” are special moments.

Free · live on Zoom · every Thursday

The way you used to look at each other has not gone anywhere. Something small has been covering it. Give us an hour and we will show you what it is.

Save my free seat

Thursdays at 7 PM ET. Next one October 29.

Rather write to us first? Tell us what is going on. We read every message ourselves.

We say marriage because it is ours. Married or not, together ten years or fifty, the work is the same.

You do not need your partner on board to start. Come alone if that is where you are.

Why couples come to us

Nothing is bad enough to leave over. It is also not the love story you dreamed of. That is exactly the problem.

There is no crisis. Nobody is packing. You have been together a long time and you are staying, and that was never really in question. What is in question is whether this is as good as it gets.

You wonder, quietly, whether you made a mistake.

You are growing, and he is not. Or you are growing in different directions.

He is more married to his work than to you.

Or none of that. You are doing well, and you want it to be extraordinary.

The thought that you might be able to do better is not a decision.

It is a part of you that has been waiting a long time to be heard. Most people who have that thought have had it for years and done nothing about it, because it was never really about leaving. We listen to that voice instead of arguing with it. It usually turns out to be asking for something you can actually have.

Who you would be working with

We needed this ourselves first.

We were twenty years in, during COVID, when we admitted that something was missing. We did this work on ourselves before we ever did it with anyone else. We got engaged that year, married a few months later, and twenty-five years in it is still getting better.

Michael is Rabbi Trachtman, an ordained rabbi with decades of pastoral experience with couples and families. Penny is Dr. Penny Gold, an ordained Shamanic Minister and a licensed clinical psychologist since 1991, with thirty-five years of work with couples, with trauma, and with the hardest cases a clinician sees. What we do here is informed by all of it.

Our method is called Relationship Alchemy. It is spiritual guidance, coaching and counsel, and nothing in it asks you to believe anything.

More about the two of us

Where to start

Start free, and go as deep as you want.

Free · every Thursday · 7 PM ET on Zoom

Reconnect With Your Beloved: Live

An hour with the two of us, live, with time for your questions. Come together, or come on your own if that is easier. Next one October 29.

Save my free seat

Free · no obligation

A first conversation

Tell us what is going on in your relationship and what you would like to be different. One of us writes back. Nothing gets pushed at you, and you can stop there.

Write to us

February 7 to 13, 2027 · Costa Rica

The Relationship Alchemy Couples Retreat

Reignite the Spark

Seven days for eight couples in the cloud forest at Verdesana. The deep version of the work, and the one people tell us they wish they had done years earlier.

Find out more about the retreat

"We kissed like we haven't kissed in so long."

Steve & Jenny · together over 20 years

"A complete 180 degree shift. It is like being in a different relationship."

Kathryn W.

These couples came to a weekend retreat with us. Nobody was paid, and nobody was asked to say anything in particular. Watch them tell it themselves

Your marriage can be the best thing in your life.

Nothing is bad enough to leave over. It is also not the love story you dreamed of. That is exactly the problem.

We are not here to help you tolerate your marriage.

We needed this ourselves first.

Start free, and go as deep as you want.

Start with one Thursday.