Couple Support

Tip for Couples: Don’t Fall Into the “Talking Heads” Trap

Don’t you get bored with TV news programs that are all talking heads—no footage from the real world, just two commentators in the newsroom going on and on with their opinions? If you do, then consider this: A lot of marriages are just talking heads, too—ultimately just as unsatisfying as a news broadcast where nothing happens.

I’m not knocking conversation; far from it. Exchanging information, making plans, giving feedback—it all involves talking, and that is fine. But the relationship that is all talk and nothing else loses much and sometimes is in danger of drying up altogether and just blowing away.

Against all-talk marriages, consider relationships in which people are also quiet together—quietly reading together in the same room, with occasional smiles back and forth, or quietly walking through the woods holding hands, or snuggling together in bed before sleep—yes a word or two now and then, but mostly just touching, just being renewed by the basic, direct, simple, root-level meaning of being lovingly in each other’s company—and no need to say anything about it.

If the connection between you and your partner seems shaky sometimes, don’t necessarily go for more talk. You can get a deeper and more reassuring contact through your bodies. Go for the senses. Touch each other.

Make the Relationship Safe for Vulnerability — Yours and Your Partner's

“How much of myself can I bring to this relationship?” “How much can I trust my partner to accept me as I really am?” Many people in relationship ask these questions. Unfortunately, the common answer is — not too much.

In many marriages and couple relationships, it isn’t safe to show that you are afraid, confused, discouraged, lonely or weak. It isn’t safe to let your partner know that you have moments of feeling overwhelmed or that you doubt your ability or, in fact, your worth.

People in such relationships put a lot of energy into not being vulnerable.  Instead of being open, they are circumspect and careful about what they share. Needless to say, when people lack the trust to show vulnerability, the relationship suffers; it becomes less warm, less spontaneous — and less real than it otherwise would be.

In your relationship, how safe is it for you and your partner to show vulnerability?

If you want to make it safe for you and your partner to be more real and more spontaneous with each other, here are some steps that you can take:

* Acknowledge your own areas of vulnerability — to yourself. Hopefully, being fully acquainted with your own vulnerability will make you more accepting of your partner’s.

* Go first; set an example of openness. Experiment with being less defended yourself. For example, apologize when you are wrong. Be more ready to acknowledge when your partner has a better idea than you have.

* Be alert for undefended moments when your partner risks dropping his/her guard with you. Treat such moments with warmth and gentleness, and they will likely increase. (Treat them harshly, and you may wait a long time for your partner to be open with you again.)

* The more you acknowledge your own sensitivity to being hurt, the more alert you will be to the possibility of hurting your partner. When you do, be ready to apologize.

Small steps such as these will make it more safe for both you and your partner to be yourselves in the relationship.

Pressure or Persuasion to Change Your Partner?

There is something that you want your partner to change, and you really mean  it. Okay, but before you approach that person, you ought to ask yourself two questions: 1) What outcome am I looking for? 2) Is my method going to be pressure or persuasion? Concerning outcome, if you don’t know where you want to go, you are not likely to get there. Concerning method, pressure and persuasion don’t mix well. Each has its own advantages and disadvantages. If you try to use both, you are likely to lose the effectiveness of each.

If you are upset with your partner, your intentions are probably limited to either 1) relieving your frustration by unloading on your partner or 2) getting your partner to change — stop doing something s/he is doing or start doing something that s/he is not doing. If you try to get your partner to change while also venting your frustration, you will probably encounter a resentful spouse who won’t change, no matter what s/he may say to the contrary.

There are problems with pressure as your method for getting your partner to change: Pressure and frustration go together well. Pressure is the method you are likely to use if you are already very frustrated. In your frustration, you are likely to come on with force and heat, as a result of which your partner will probably either to refuse to do what you want or agree but not follow through (passive resistance). Even if you do accomplish your purpose, with pressure harmony between you and your partner will almost certainly decrease.

On the other hand, if your method is persuasion and you want to succeed, you will have to work with your partner’s needs and priorities, and an increase in harmony, rather than a decrease, will be likely to result.

When you use pressure, you work against your partner’s resistance. With persuasion you work with your partner’s needs and wishes. It’s clear which approach is going to benefit the relationship more.

Marriage Tip: Do What Feeds Your Relationship — Regularly

Are you married? If you are, here’s a question for you: What keeps the marriage going? Maybe you say habit, or fear, or necessity (I don’t have the money to leave.) Maybe it’s principle (It’s against your religion to leave). Maybe it’s convenience. On the other hand, perhaps mutual love sustains your marriage. Let’s look closely at that possibility.

If what sustains your marriage is your love for each other, then it is almost certain that built into the fabric of your relationship are regular moments of special connection - moments of sharing, affection, intimacy, understanding and support. If you are lucky, these moments of special connection happen daily.

If they happen less often, perhaps because of work or physical separation from each other, they at least happen often enough to feed the relationship and remind each of you of the other person’s devotion and the pleasure and meaning that you share.

If you and your partner are striving to build a closer relationship, take a tip from couples that are already doing well: Deliberately design some moments of special connection, then make sure they occur regularly. Schedule them into your daily or weekly life, if you have to.

You and your spouse figure out together the sorts of easily accessible experiences that feed your relationship. Get clear on the elements of such experiences. E.g., one couple might say that the elements were sitting together + occasionally touching each other + taking turns talking and listening about each other’s concerns - but no talking about problems and no criticizing each other.

Call these “nutritious experiences;” they keep the relationship alive. Once you have one or two such experiences figured out, make sure they happen regularly. Stage them if you have to. Carrying them out may be awkward in the beginning but satisfying and eventually easy and natural as the relationship grows stronger and more satisfying.

Tip for Couples: If You Want to Stay Together, Avoid Hopeless Talk

Here is something obvious that is still worth saying: If you want your relationship to succeed, stay away from doing or saying anything that would leave you or your partner feeling hopeless about being together. By definition, hopelessness is the end—right? There is no where to go from hopeless—except out. Nevertheless, a lot of couples push each other toward hopelessness. Do they know what they’re doing?

For example, you are flirting with hopelessness if you chronically complain about things that can’t be changed, especially about your partner’s character or personality or things your partner did long ago that hurt or infuriated you. You want hopeless? Complain to your wife that you should have married the other girl and not her. Complain to your husband that you should never have let him buy that condo, and when he says, “What can we do to make up for it now?” say “Nothing.”

Complaining is not the problem. The problem is complaining when you offer no remedy—i.e., you leave your partner nowhere to go but into hopeless—or indifference, which is definitely not good either.

If you need to complain about his old affair, do so in terms of something that could be helped, e.g., the insecurity about his love that you still feel occasionally. And if he says, “What can I do to help?” have something in mind—not deadly nothing. Instead you could say, “Be very loving to me today; it helps.”

When you provide a remedy, you help your partner—and yourself—feel hopeful: We can forgive each other; we can go forward; we have reason to stay together.

You Are a Character in a Domestic Play

Think of your marriage as a stage play, currently in performance—at your house. And why not? Like any play, yours has a story line. It has scenes with dialogue and at least some degree of dramatic interest. Plus it has characters and actors to play those characters—you and your partner.

Don’t be put off by the reference to “actors.” I don’t mean insincere or dishonest - like “just acting, just pretending.” I mean in a role, in the sense that an actor is in a role, one of a number of roles s/he has probably played her/his acting career—just like you have been in many roles and, in fact, are in quite a few right now—in addition to husband or wife, probably also friend, mother or father, son or daughter, employee or employer, colleague—and others.

In each of your roles you behave at least somewhat differently than in other roles. Some of your roles presumably you like, and some you don’t. So while thinking of your marriage or couple relationship as a play, here are some questions to consider.

*Do this one with your partner: If your relationship “play” was a real play and it was in performance at a theater near you, would you attend? Why and why not? If you were the play’s author and you could change the characters somewhat and possibly write in a new scene or two—to make the play more interesting, dramatic or agreeable, what changes would you make?

*Of the various roles you play in your life right now, what is one that has elements that you wish were part of your couple-relationship role? Consider what it would take to bring the best of a different role into your life with your partner. See if your partner would cooperate with your doing just that.

Couples - Save Your Relationship from General Distraction

Do you know about General Distraction? It is an often overlooked malady that infects most of our lives. Why overlooked? Because we are generally too distracted to notice how distracted we are. Hence General Distraction. We are simply pulled in too many directions — yanked around  by myriad competing demands on our attention. The result is that little in our lives gets the attention it really needs. And that definitely goes for life with our partner.

Like any supposedly growing thing, marriage requires regular feeding for it to do well. Focused positive attention is what makes relationships thrive.

Here is a simple, easy way to combat General Distraction and easily give your relationship the attention it deserves. Do this exercise with your partner:

• Each of you ask your partner, “In a couple of words, tell me how you would most like to be treated by me.” (Expect to hear answers such as - “affectionately,” “with interest,” “sympathetically,” “with respect,” “positively.”

• Once you find out the quality that your partner most wants you to show toward him/her, ask what, for example, you would be doing when you were approaching your partner with respect, interest, good humor, etc.

• With your partner’s help, develop a variety of ways that you could act toward your partner in what your partner tells you would matter a lot to her/him.

• Now the “doing it” part: Each day pick one way in which you will give your partner your focused attention, showing respect, affection, friendliness or whatever else that person wants from you. Your gift to your partner - once every day; that’s all - just once.

Relationship Tip: Deliver All Your Complaints At Once

Chronic complaining is really hard on a relationship. Sometimes it’s the sheer number of complaints that weighs a relationship down. But often it’s not the number; it’s the way that the complaints dribble in all day long.

It starts with the “first thing in the morning” complaint — about having slept badly, then 20 minutes later the complaint about “not even having time for breakfast, damn it” Just before going out the door, it’s a complaint with a wretched sigh — “My God, how am I going to endure that idiot working next to me all day long.

The dribble of complaints resumes with crossing the threshold at the end of the work day: “You won’t believe the traffic; I thought I’d spend the night trying to get home.” Then complaints during the evening: the mess the kids make, “How can you watch those dumb TV programs night after night ,“ ending with something about “What have I got to look for tomorrow? Nothing.”

I hope I exaggerate; about some relationships - I know that I don’t exaggerate.

Here’s an idea. It sounds weird, but I’m serious: You and your partner make a pact. Every evening (say) you will set aside 10 minutes for “focused complaining.” You each get five minutes each. Save up all your complaints during the day. Write them in your Complaint Journal but don’t say a single one until your five minute Complaint Time. Then complain away.

Your partner should stand by and provide a sympathetic echo to your complaints. To the “you won’t believe the traffic” complaint, your partner might say (with energy and sincerity) “That must have been TERRIBLE when all you wanted was to get home!”

Try it. The benefits will become clear very quickly.

Tip for Couples: Make It Easy to Ask

If you want something from your partner, you ask for it. Easy, right? Apparently not, because lots of people who want, never do ask. Instead they sulk, get angry about not receiving what they never bothered to ask for or do for themselves but resent it. What is this not-asking behavior about?

Here are some possibilities: 1) Asking, explaining yourself, maybe discussing the matter, getting an answer and then sometimes enduring a “no” response is what you have to put up elsewhere in life. Some people figure that when you are a couple you shouldn’t have to ask. “You should know what I need” is what is often said.

2) The “I’d rather do it myself than have to ask you” attitude is likely to be held by people who have an antipathy to being either assertive or dependent. Asking straight on for what you want or need does carry a message of self-acceptance and self-valuing – assertive attitudes that, for a variety of reasons, some people can’t manage.

For some, asking – which acknowledges a desire or a need – puts them too close to dependency, which – again for a variety of reasons – they may fear admitting.

When you do want something from your partner and yet won’t say so, you do go without and that does set you up for resentment. In couple relationships people do tend to communicate their resentment – if not in words, then through body language or a display of feelings.

Here is a classic “everybody loses” situation. The partner who wanted goes without. The partner who “didn’t know that you wanted” gets punished for not providing.

A better way: Work it out with your partner so that either of you can ask for what you want, the other person is allowed to say no if that is where s/he is at, and you both agree to respect that right in each other.

Big Relationship Problem: One-Sided "Fights"

Most couple fights are not fights at all; they're one-sided shout fests. Lots of thunder and lightning may be going on, but these "battles" are more displays of shared pain and hopelessness than anything else.

The noisy partner has lost any hope of getting what s/he wants which, more than anything else, is engagement. S/he is typically beyond much caring about what she says or how she says it. S/he doesn't expect to succeed at communication. She settles instead for angry self-expression.

The partner who is the target doesn't respond, because doing so will only make matters worse. What s/he says won't be respected, s/he feels, and the saying of it will only incense the other partner more. S/he just sits there and takes it, knowing that no matter how awful the harangue, it will eventually come to an end.

Very sad: The partner who wants contact gets none. The partner who hates conflict has no end of it.

Now a real dispute –where both people let off steam, get to say where they're at and get listened to and taken seriously –that's another story entirely.

Is it possible to have an argument that doesn't make matters worse and actually feels good? Definitely yes. Read next week's blog entry.

Marriage Tip: When There's a Problem Somebody Own It

The first step in solving a relationship problem is to decide who has it. People will say, "There"s a problem here."  No there isn't. Either I have the problem, or you have the problem, or we have the problem. It's somebody's problem, and avoiding naming it as mine, yours or ours only prevents the problem getting solved.

People who are intent on avoiding conflict at all cost will often be reluctant to say "I have a problem" when the implication is - my problem is with you, and I want you to change something. Folks who have difficulty being assertive are also unlikely to own their problem and be clear about it.

Saying "You have the problem,"  means " it's your problem and not mine. Being this clear about boundaries (me on one side, you and your problem on the other side) is difficult for many of us, particularly if we expect ourselves to be loving and helpful all the time. Saying or even implying "It's not my problem"  sounds uncaring, even when it isn't meant to be at all.

Actually, if it is either my problem or your problem, we need to deal with it ourselves and not expect the other person to rescue us from what is our own responsibility. On the other hand, it's fine to ask your partner to help with your problem, as long as you own that it is yours, and your partner is free to refuse if s/he doesn't want to help

In many cases, if the problem is my problem with you, your problem with me or otherwise truly a shared problem, then the best route is to name it as "our problem."  A good rule is that if either of us has a problem with the other, it is definitely a shared problem " definitely our problem. To do otherwise is basically to refuse any responsibility for what is obviously a problem within our relationship. Not a good idea.

Marriage Tip: Avoid Triggering Your Partner’s Anger

You know what a trigger is - it’s the part of the gun that, when you squeeze it, the gun goes off. BOOM. Relationship triggers work the same way. You or your partner does something (the trigger) that predictably gets the other person angry, and s/he explodes.

The trigger could be a subject (e.g., her criticism of his mother) or a manner of speaking (e.g., his accusatory finger while he criticizes her). It could be a matter of timing (e.g., her waking him up in the middle of the night – to talk). Or it could be all sorts of other behavior that one partner has clearly said, “Please don’t do that any more,” and the other partner has gone ahead and done it – way more than once.

The partner being “shot at” understandably concludes – you either can’t or won’t learn, you are deliberately looking for a fight, or you just like to torment me. Whichever it is, s/he feels very much disrespected, and the relationship suffers.

The partner given to pulling the trigger needs to find out why s/he behaves this way. Assuming that there is a grievance behind this uncaring behavior s/he needs to bring the grievance up straight on, rather than continue with actions that cause trouble and solve nothing.

Success in stopping the provocative, “trigger-happy” behavior will have much to do with whether or not the other partner allows an alternative way of expressing displeasure. We all need to be heard, and when partners listen respectfully to each other, trigger behavior usually doesn’t occur.

Cooperative and Competitive Conversations Don't Mix Well

Cooperative conversations are quite different from competitive ones. Many people - men probably more than women - don't get this distinction.

In a cooperative conversation partners set out to accomplish something together - explore a topic together, solve a problem together, plan something together. “Together” is the focal word here. In addition to achieving something, the intent in a cooperative conversation is to experience being together.

A cooperative conversation is a “we” experience.

A competitive conversation is an “I” experience - more exactly an “I vs you” experience, in which the aim is to win, to prove oneself smarter, faster, more logical or possessed of a better memory than the other person.

In our society, male conversation tends to be more competitive and female conversation more cooperative. Unhappiness is when he and she set out to talk together and succeed only in frustrating each other. She wants the back and forth pleasure of being together and he sees it as a who-is-right conversation.

In our competitive world, there are lots more “I” conversations than “we” ones. So here are a couple of suggestions for developing “we talk:”

* Rule: You can't present your opinion unless you have asked your partner at least two searching questions about what s/he has just said.

* Rule: Each subsequent statement after the first one must begin with “yes and…,” thus insuring that every statement builds upon the one that came before it.

Can You Enjoy What You've Got?

In my counseling practice, I look for what is working right in the relationships I see - partly to offset the tendency, especially of couples at the beginning of counseling, to notice only what is wrong. I find that nearly every couple has a behavior range within which they operate successfully.

Maybe it's getting dinner on the table, talking about the kids, building a play house in the backyard, doing Christmas with the grandparents or laughing at silly movies together. Whatever it is, they do it together, and it works.

Years ago some theatre critic, writing about an actress' performance, said that she had a expressive range from A to B. Maybe in your view that about sums it up for your marriage - A to B with an occasional C every month or so.

If you are like many people in a ho-hum relationship, you don't celebrate what you've got. You complain about all the good stuff that isn't there and perhaps never was. Your complaining could be a serious mistake, if it means that the relationship never grows beyond its present limitations.

On the other hand, if you can sincerely and frequently celebrate what you've got with spoken appreciations and other expressions of positive notice, you may begin to get more.

Trying to change means risking the possibility of failure. Many people would rather endure the complaints of an unhappy partner than risk failure, especially if they expect to fail - as people tend to do when all they hear about is their inadequacy.

On the other hand, if you make a habit of celebrating what you have as a couple that is working well, you may provide your partner - and yourself - with the security and confidence to venture more.

Adding new dimensions to a partially successful but limited relationship is almost certainly going to succeed better than condemning what you've got by finding fault with it constantly.

What Does It Mean to Love Yourself?

It used to be that when people said you ought to love yourself I got this disgusting, narcissistic image of someone stroking himself and murmuring “you’re some swell guy” under his breath. So much for loving yourself. It was only later that I came to realize that, indeed, you can’t love anyone else unless you also love yourself.

Loving yourself, as I understand it, means behaving toward yourself somewhere between the way you would behave toward a good friend and toward a child you loved, whom you wanted to grow up to be strong and self-respecting.

Although you wouldn’t always like their behavior, you’d accept your friend and the child as fundamentally good people. You would encourage them in their endeavors, take pleasure in their successes and come to their aid when they became discouraged.

You would not judge them harshly nor condemn them. You would not insult nor degrade them, nor otherwise lead them to feel that they were worthless or a failure. In short, you would be a good friend to your friend and a encouraging, supportive parent figure to the child.

Treat yourself the same way, and – at least in my view – you will be loving yourself. And all without even a touch of narcissism.

Do You Prefer Rage or Effectiveness When You Are Upset in Your Marriage?

You know the kind of anger that fumes silently for a long time and then explodes in a big, noisy flash? You yell, you say things that later on you wish you hadn’t. You get completely unhinged. The more you talk, the larger grows your anger – until you are spent and fall silent. Your explosion is good for releasing energy, but as a device for getting something changed, it’s not so good. Here is a better way:

Confront the fact that you don’t yet give yourself permission to tell what is bothering you when you first get upset. That is why you let your anger build up until you “can’t help yourself” and have to speak.

There probably are a few “shoulds” and “shouldn’ts” about speaking up or showing anger that will have to be confronted, as well as a possible fear of the consequences of talking straight that you will need to explore with your partner. (“Would you rather that I share what is on my mind at the time or store things up until I am full of rage and explode at you?”)

You may look quite awesome and feel temporarily powerful when finally you explode and all your anger and resentment come rushing out. Realize that you will be trading all that in for a much less dramatic and controlled effectiveness, when you give yourself permission to just speak up. No huge explosion.  just a measured “Something is going on right now that I need to talk about.”

Make sure that you would rather be effective and get something you don’t like changed than roar but get nothing changed. Once that is clear, you can be on your way to making relationship changes that will work for you – and maybe your partner as well.

Find the Bad Couple Routines and Change Them

We humans are creatures of habit. Look at our marriages and partner relationships. Couples mostly relate in standard patterns or routines. Some of these routines are neutral, like those that begin the typical work day. Some are positive, like comfortable, satisfying sex. And some are really negative and damage our relationships. The neutral routines are useful. The positive routines are satisfying. The negative routines serve no healthy purpose. We should understand how they work and get rid of them.

Consider the standard "Ruth is unhappy with Ben" routine. Ruth complains harshly to Ben. Ben feels hurt but says nothing. Frustrated by Ben’s silence, Ruth complains more loudly. Ben hurts more but endures in silence. When his only escape is to say something, Ben says, "You are right Ruth – whatever you say. I’m guilty."

This sad routine ends with Ruth stomping off angrily. Afterward, neither speaks to the other - sometimes for days.

A change in either partner’s behavior changes the routine. Ruth would interrupt the routine if she stopped her harangue and asked Ben what she could do that would inspire him to speak. Alternately, Ben could tell Ruth that her manner of speaking hurt him. He could agree to discuss her complaint if she were to speak differently.

Achieving satisfaction with each other would allow Ruth and Ben to look together at their unhappy routine in a cooperative, uncritical way, following this useful pattern: When you do X, I feel Y and respond Z. A better way would be if we…

Be Upset with Your Partner – But No Self-Righteousness

If you have been holding in a big complaint for a long time and finally have found the courage to tell you partner, go for it. Let’r rip. Otherwise, maybe you ought to be a little bit suspicious of your own outrage.

If you have a well-articulated, well-practiced sense of outrage., if expressing it sounds like you are making a speech, if your outrage increases as you go along, if – secretly – you are enjoying yourself as you lay into your partner, then quite possibly you have entered the zone of self-righteousness and probably ought not to be there.

Behind most relationship complaints lies a situation for which each partner has at least partial responsibility. The more righteously indignant you get about your partner’s behavior, the less you are able to see your part. If you can’t see your part or see it only partially and poorly, you then you will be at a loss to help prevent a reoccurrence.

If you think that it is all your partner’s fault and it isn’t, then the responsibility for preventing a reoccurrence falls entirely to your partner. And if your partner knows that it isn’t all him or her, your partner’s motivation to stop whatever is going on – without your cooperation – won’t be very great.

Then round and round you go.

On the other hand, if you climb off your high horse and get clear about your responsibility before you nail your partner for his (or hers), you are going to succeed much better.

What you say to your partner might go something like this, "I know that I am partly responsible for what happened last night – and I am willing to have you say what you think my responsibility is. At the same time, really I am furious at you for what you said to me in front of our friends. I want you to own up to hurting me. Will you do that – as well as complain to me about my part?"

Some Subjects Need An Up Close Treatment

         

Some subjects – like your sexual relationship – demand an up close treatment. "Up close" means familiar, fundamentally accepting, trusting, open, flexible. "Up close" is the opposite of "distant," which is out of touch, unfriendly, distrustful, relatively closed and rigid.

If you can help it, you don’t want to discuss any of the big subjects from a distant place. You are not going to do well if you and your partner talk about money, raising the kids, your unhappiness, affection, sex and similar "sensitive" topics when you are feeling really distant from each other.

Your mutual distrust and out-of-touchness is bound to interfere. You won’t be sympathetic to the other person’s point of view. (In fact, you may not even listen to it.) You will probably push your own views in an antagonistic and rigid way. And the subject itself will probably end up a distant second to your complaints about each other.

Is there something that you and your partner really need to talk about? Are you worried that it won’t go well? Yes? Then first do your best to move the relationship from distant to relatively up close.

How? Spend some time – a few days even – being mutually generous and understanding before you talk. And when you do sit down to explore the subject, reassure each other that you will listen sympathetically and treat what each other says with respect.

Marital Unhappiness – When the Way He Sees His Wife Has Little in Common with the Way She Sees Herself

When I’m working with a couple, I sometimes find it helpful to meet with each partner alone for a session. I often find that the way they see themselves does not match with the way they are seen by the other person – so much so sometimes that I want to get them together and say, “Let me introduce you to each other.”

An example: I remember a session with a woman who complained bitterly about her husband’s coldness to her. She told of missing simple affection and cuddling together in the evening. She cried while confessing that sometimes she wanted to be held and comforted and felt so lonely and abandoned when this never happened.

Clearly this was a woman who was in touch with her need for basic physical connection with her spouse and saw herself as soft and vulnerable. On the other hand, her husband, during his individual session, described his wife as “sharp” and “accusatory.” He claimed that she regularly interrogated him. Never once did he even hint at softness or vulnerability.

What was going on? Quite possibly the wife was all that both she and her husband said about her. She did want affection and at times comforting, and she was sometimes sharp and accusatory (especially, perhaps, after she didn’t get the affection she needed but did a poor job of asking for).

And undoubtedly, because of their individual past experiences, she more noticed her vulnerability and need and he more noticed her sharpness and aggressiveness.

These two needed to have a problem-solving conversation, free from mutual accusation and defensiveness. The discussion might have begun with the wife saying to her husband,  “The way I want to be seen is not the way that you see me. What can we do about it?”   

To Learn New Relationship Skills - Drop the Anger

To Learn New Relationship Skills - Drop the Anger

Many marital problems can be traced to the absence of much needed relationship skills. When couples set out to learn the skills they need, they often face a formidable obstacle – the accumulated anger and resentment of one or both partners.

Take the couple that needs to learn how to have an intimate conversation with an open, easy sharing of feelings. Typically the wife shares feelings with her women friends all the time, and the husband never shares them with anyone. At first glance it looks as if all the learning is going to be his.

The husband may well be willing to learn and might well succeed, except that he goes into the task tense, resentful and convinced that all he will get from his efforts is another scolding from his wife - the worst possible conditions for learning.

The wife has wanted non-sexual intimacy with her husband for a long time and, in her view, has never had it. She is openly and vocally angry. Unfortunately, her anger makes it very unlikely that she will get the intimate sharing that she wants so much.

Theirs is the pattern of the angry, scolding “school marm” wife and the sullen, resentful “dumb student” husband. If they are going to succeed they need to set aside the heavy load of dark feelings that they both carry and approach the task at hand simply as learning something new.

The husband’s work involves a new attunement to feelings and the language to describe them. The wife’s work involves learning to encourage and support – plus taking a chance on expressing the tender, vulnerable feelings that her long-standing outraged anger has shielded her from.

In Marriage, to Change Your Behavior Try Curiosity Rather Than Self-Blame

When your behavior toward your partner falls way short of your own standards, instead of berating yourself – try curiosity. Ask yourself, “Why do I act this way and when? What does my behavior say about my needs and my fears?” Ironically, when you skip self-judgment and go for curiosity instead, the information you get may actually help you change.

Many of us have the habit of self-justification. If our spouse criticizes us, we feel compelled to answer. We’ve got to explain ourselves, set the record straight, correct our partner’s misperception – that sort of thing.

Here’s a typical example. The wife says, “I wish that you had loaded the dishwasher last night before you went to bed.” The husband responds, “Yes, but did you see that I picked up the kids’ mess in the living room?”

If, like me, you are given to this kind of “explaining my side” self-justification, what do you figure it’s about? When I look into my own behavior, I detect a residue of the old shame that I used to feel when my parents criticized me.  Rather than just let it be, I have to respond – or at least I used to.

Recently, I’ve been experimenting with not saying anything. That’s no improvement, if I’m still responding – but in my head, although not out loud. An alternative, which I am exploring is to deliberately focus on my wife (e.g., sympathizing with the experience of hers that led to the criticism.) Doing so takes the focus off me and makes it easier to skip the self-justification.

Try this “self-inquiry” process yourself. Get interested in understanding your own behavior. Then experiment with modifying it. You may find that this is a much better approach than blaming yourself and feeling bad.

Think “Soft Moments” and “Hard Moments”

“Soft” and “hard” are useful distinctions for understanding – and improving – your relationship. “Soft” is open, accessible, cooperative, friendly, gentle, vulnerable. “Hard” is closed, remote, combative, unfriendly, harsh.

Most likely you and your partner – in personality and mood - are each mixtures of hard and soft. Your behavior toward each other is sometimes hard and sometimes soft.

An always-soft somebody would be always present in a “whatever you want” sort of way – having little separateness, lacking in boundaries, unprotected. An always-hard somebody would scarcely be in relationship – all separateness, all rigid “I” – no “I’m available” to relate to.

Troubled relationships are frequently hardened ones. Partners, having hurt each other a lot, have learned to hide their softness and vulnerability from each other. These couples are mostly either remote from each other (“Staying separate is the best way to stay safe”) or harsh and combative (“Anticipating attack and ready to defend yourself is the best way to stay safe”).

Here are some tips for making your relationship more safe for softness – i.e., more open, more friendly – more loving:

• Nurture your own vulnerability so that you don’t have to be hard and harsh when you are with your partner. E.g., stay separate and seek rest when you are exhausted.
• Be sympathetically aware of your partner’s vulnerable areas and avoid behavior that threatens them unnecessarily
• Become aware of the pattern in which one of you, perhaps inadvertently, says something that hurts the other person, who immediately closes up and becomes defensive and combative.
• Be sensitive to those communication moments in which your partner is relatively soft, open and reaching out to you. At such moments do your best to do nothing that would cause your partner to shut down. See how long the openness beween you can continue.

What are your tips for couple communication that stays soft and open? Please comment.

Everything Works Better When You’re Connected

Connecting with mutual satisfaction every day can keep you close and take very little time. It’s hard to solve problems, surmount difficulties even remember that you like each other – when you are not connected.

What does it take to stay connected? Start the day holding each other and talking softly in bed. Hang out together talking over coffee for a few minutes after dinner – and look at each other. Hug each other for longer than a perfunctory few seconds; add loving words. Phone home during the day – “Just called to see how you’re doing.”

In terms of time and energy, this is small stuff. It doesn’t take a cruise ship vacation to stay connected. What it takes is remembering to connect in some “I’m here with you” way every day, and being present when you are doing it.

If you are like most of us, what you need are basic – in the body, in the heart - ways of connecting – ways that allow you to feel, “Now I remember you. You’re the one who cares about me.”

What are your favorite ways of connecting with your partner? Please comment.

If It Isn’t Working - Stop

It’s amazing how willing most of us are to keep trying an approach with our partner that isn’t working. The less it’s working, the more determined we are to keep at it until it does.

I have a key that I think ought to unlock a certain door. It doesn’t. I may try that key a couple times, but then I will stop – recognizing that it’s the wrong key. It isn’t going to work.

On the other hand, when the method I’m using to get my partner to open up fails repeatedly, do I stop and try another approach? No, I stick with the key that won’t open the door – and watch things get worse and worse.

Try a different approach. If it is the right approach, it will work. Or it may work because of the novelty effect alone: The fact that it is so diffrerent from your customary approach may be all that is needed.

And it may be that your approach doesn’t work, but it’s not working may provide you with new information and lead you in a direction that does work.

On the other hand, you don’t want to abandon an approach until you have given it a fair chance. How long is a fair chance? When do you know when it’s time to quit and try something different?

Here are some guidelines:

• Stop the approach that you are using when you are no longer thinking clearly. If you are getting increasingly furious or desperate, do nothing until you are in possession of yourself again.
• Stop what you are doing if your partner is getting furious or desperate.
• Stop if your partner has clearly said no and you are beginning to behave coercively.
• Stop if it becomes clear that, although your partner might give in, the consequences for the relationship will be worse than if you had stopped earlier.
• Stop when you are bored or really discouraged. What you are doing has failed. The fact that you don’t know what would succeed better is no reason to keep this approach going. There are benefits to simple surrender. Good changes can come about without your making them happen.

Expectations Make Change Easier - or Much Harder

When you are seeking a better relationship, expectations can be either an obstacle or an advantage. Which it is depends on your expectations. Do your expectations about your partner support positive change or undermine it?

In our relationships, most of us don't like many surprises, especially negative ones. Rather than leave ourselves open to surprises that might be unsettling or hurtful, at a certain point we reach conclusions - about our spouse and our marriage, for example. We then form expectations based on those conclusions.

If we were to conclude - my spouse is a selfish person, we would expect selfish behavior from that person and we would almost certainly find it (while overlooking instances of generosity).

What we experience is, to a large extent, determined by our expectations. We find what we expect to find.

If you are so fortunate that your expectations of your partner are mostly all positive, then that person's positive behavior will stand out for you. His or her negative behavior will quite likely either be overlooked or given an innocent explanation. (“She's just having a hard day.”)

On the other hand, if you and your partner set out to improve the relationship and you come to that task with a predominantly negative view of the other person, change is likely to be slow in coming - unless you are determined to abandon old conclusions and teach yourself to notice his or her positive behavior (some of which was  there in the past - guaranteed).

Scrutinize your expectations. Are they working for you, or should you work to let them go?

If You Fight First Identify Yourself

If you and your partner are going to fight, at least identify yourself – not your name nor the fact that you are upset. What does need to be shared is where you are coming from – principally your feelings – named and explained.

Consider this example: “Before we got married, you assured me that you wanted to have children. Now you are expressing doubts. The way you talk leaves me feeling scared and insecure and very upset with you – like you are breaking a solemn promise to me.”

The person who makes this statement has clearly emphasized what is bothering her and been articulate about it. Her controlled behavior gives her partner no excuse for dodging the issue and focusing on her delivery instead. He may refuse to talk straight with her anyway. However, if she lets her fear take control and rants and raves at her partner, guaranteed – the main issue will not get discussed.

If you want to be heard and understood, you have to be in control of yourself and able to describe your experience when you speak.

Yes, you will lose the possible benefit of spontaneous rage carrying you into battle against your reluctance to fight. Yes, figuring out where you are coming from and how to put it into words may take some time and be challenging for you.

However, when you do speak, it will be with the authority and self-respect of someone who has worked to master himself. It will also provide you with probably your best chance of being heard.

Partners Who Won’t Accept Compliments

Compliments can do wonders for a relationship – when they are offered – and accepted. The problem is often with acceptance. Some partners don’t like compliments and won’t accept them.

Sometimes the refusal is outright. More often it’s a discount (“I didn’t do anything.”) I spent January in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, in part working on the Couples Vacation Intensives program I’ve started. There the common response to even a compliment is “De nada,” which loosely translates “It’s nothing.”

A cultural discount. It makes me want to say, “No. Don’t tell me it’s nothing. If it was nothing, I wouldn’t have bothered to thank you. It’s not nothing. It’s something: You did me a favor. You were helpful. I appreciated it. What you did made a difference to me. So don’t tell me it’s nothing.”

The point is - if only in acknowledgment of my experience, say thank you. Accept my appreciation for what you did. Don’t dismiss it with “It’s nothing.” (Tip: With the partner who is inclined to reject compliments, say – do it for me, so that I can have the pleasure of my gift being accepted.)

What’s going on here with the refusal to accept compliments or appreciation of any kind? To me, it’s like some people’s refusal to acknowledge Christmas or celebrate their birthday – in some cases a defense against the pain that still lingers from awful Christmases or no-present birthdays: If I don’t even acknowledge the holiday, I won’t have to hurt about it.

Also, some people find more control and, therefore, less risk in giving than in receiving. If I am on the receiving end of your praise or appreciation, I might be really moved by what you say. I might get choked up. Then what? Safer for there to be no compliments or at least to always be the one who hands them out.

Okay. But when two people have pledged to work together for a more positive relationship, then part of that working together needs to involve compliments – in part overcoming the reluctance to be “sappy” and give compliments freely and being willing to stand still, take them– and actually feel “I am being given to.”

Related reading: The article collection on Appreciation at marriagesupport.com.

Appreciations Really Matter

Appreciations really matter. Experiment for yourself: In relationships, you get more of whatever you notice. If you restrict noticing your partner to what you don’t like, guaranteed – you will gain more reason to complain and criticize.

On the other hand, if you discipline yourself to notice your partner’s kindness, generosity or helpfulness, the relationship will become more positive and in that way - improve.

If your partner is deliberately trying to be helpful, appreciations communicate that she is succeeding. If she is “only doing her job,” your saying thank you adds a new dimension to routine: “It may be what you just do, but I’m telling you – it means something to me that you do it.”

How do you appreciate? Well, for sure you say “thank you.” If your relationship is just beginning to turn toward the light after being really dark and negative for a while, anything more than a simple “thank you” may seem fake.

However, once “thank you” becomes part of your relationship vocabulary once more, go further – of course name what your partner did that you appreciate. Then add what it meant to you and how you felt. “When I came home and you had already started dinner, I felt really cared for. It was almost like you already knew that I had had a tough day. Thank you.”

Some partners would love that statement. Others would be out the door before you had finished. We’ll consider them in the next post.

In terms of appreciation, how would you characterize your relationship?

With Your Partner, Be Someone You Respect

In successful marriages, people get to like themselves and each other. The husband has a “place” in the marriage that he is glad to occupy - a role or roles where he gets to be a person he respects and enjoys being. The wife has the same experience.

Perhaps, she likes to exercise initiative - to come up with interesting activities to do with her partner. In this relationship, she gets to do that. Her husband does more that passively make room for her initiatives. He appreciates her being that way. He often follows her lead in the activities that she suggests. In behavioral language, he rewards her for being whom she likes to be.

The fact that each has a place in the relationship that is favored both by themselves and by their partner means that tolerating the inevitable roles that they would rather not occupy becomes easier.

Conversely, when there is no place in the marriage for a “me” that I can respect and that is appreciated by my partner – then, of course, I don’t want to be there. I may stay, but if I do it will be with resentment and perhaps also the sense that I am betraying myself.

If you want your relationship to succeed, make sure to provide a place in your life – and in your heart – for some of the skills and sensibilities that your partner values in herself or himself.

Make sure, too, that you take the initiative in seeing to it that, in ways that matter to you, you get to be some significant part of the person you also want to be.

How to Succeed in Marriage - Cooperatively

In marriage, for one of us to succeed, the other has to succeed, too. That's something that couples who have mastered living together cooperatively fully understand. It's also a relationship lesson that some people never grasp.

Many years ago, when I was a sixth-grade public-school teacher, I used an exercise with my students that beautifully points up the difference between those who get it and those who don't .

In case you ever want to try the exercise with kids (or adults?), it goes this way: Assuming you're working with a group of 10 kids, you make 10 identical simple puzzles out of cardboard - maybe 12 pieces/puzzle. When you are finished, you take those 10 identical puzzles and mix them all up. You put an identical number of randomly-chosen puzzle pieces in 10 envelopes and give each kid an envelope.

None of the kids can assemble the puzzle with the pieces that s/he has received, since the puzzles were all mixed up. To complete the puzzle, each kid needs some different pieces. There are rules: You can't speak. You can't take, and you can't ask for what you need. In fact, you can't get anything for yourself. Instead, you have to give other people the pieces that they need. And when the others that you are giving to notice your need and respond, you get your puzzle completed.

When everybody works together, everybody gets the pieces s/he needs, and all the puzzles get assembled - because each person focuses not on "what I need" but on "what you need."

In my experience, most kids relatively easily learned to focus on others' needs rather than their own. Some kids couldn't do it, however: Prohibited from asking, demanding, or taking, they simply sat there. Completing the loop - meeting my needs by attending to yours - was beyond them.

Sometimes I think I met some of those kids later on in my couples counseling practice.

Boring Relationship? Routine Creep May Be at Fault

Has your relationship lost its vitality? Is it boring? If so, it may suffer from Routine Creep – too many routines occupying too much of your lives and the relationship, too much predictability and too little spontaneity.

Personally I like routine in many areas of my life. I start the day the same way almost every morning and follow the same routine at bedtime. I am in many ways a creature of routine, a fact that I suspect endears me to my cat, Rufus, who is also very much a creature of routine.

Following routines gives both Rufus and me a level of secure predictability in our lives. If I forget wake-up time in the morning, Rufus is almost certain to remember and make sure that I don’t oversleep.

Routine saves time and attention. Anything that’s the same way every day can be done on automatic pilot. That’s the benefit of routine and the danger – where marriages and couple relationships are concerned. Con't.