Don't Tell Me THAT!

"Mike has been withdrawn lately. When I ask him what's going on, he says he has a lot on his mind. I worry I've done something to make him mad."

You might conclude that Sue would be very relieved if Mike would just tell her what's going on. After all, most of us would rather know than live in uncertainty. Well, that depends.

Mike may be thinking about changing careers, re-locating away from their families, talking about the infrequency of sex in their relationship, feeling depressed, or other changes. While Sue proclaims she wants to know, how will she respond when Mike starts to open up?

If Sue wants Mike to avoid talking to her about topics that will affect both of them, all she has to do is not listen and begin reacting, "How can you even think about moving the kids and me away from our families?"

If she can take a deep breath and appreciate how challenging it is for Mike to open up, she might respond differently. "It sounds as though you are worried about how we're going to be able to send the kids to college and retire if we stay in such a high cost-of-living area. I imagine it would be hard for you to leave your family, too." This kind of "listening resiliency" invites and encourages more conversations between them.

User Friendly Messages

"I never realized all the ways my negative beliefs held me back. Now when I hear those old self-critical comments, I treat them as spam. Today I have much more effective messages for myself. I've developed a great spam filter!"

Some people have been well-trained to be highly self-critical. Parents and other important people in their lives may have said some of the following:

"You'll never amount to anything. You won't ever have any friends. If you'd just study harder like your brother/sister, you wouldn't be coming home with B's."

It doesn't take too many of these angry, hurtful statements to do serious damage. Fortunately, there are effective tools to identify these messages and replace them with supportive, reality based messages. Once people develop the skills to upgrade their internal software, they feel more confident and motivated to tackle challenges and succeed.

Love Those Differences!

A colleague and I were discussing marriages, and he humorously commented, "My wife and I are SO different. When I want to get something for my her, I choose something I wouldn't like, and she loves it!"

Recognizing and working through differences is an important skill in a couples relationship. It is not unusual for one person in the relationship to have a more relaxed attitude toward life and take things as they come while another person has a stronger need for a plan and goals. One wants to be spontaneous and another wants to get "the list" done before having fun or taking breaks.

Discovering that some of these differences are "normal" and finding new ways to navigate through them can significantly reduce stress. As each partner learns to appreciate the other's differences as strengths, both can develop a more satisfying and closer relationship.

Playing Doubles

When couples come in for counseling, they are often fighting over and over about the same issues without any resolution. Each is complaining about and wanting the other person to change.

Clearly, these couples are playing an ineffective "singles' tennis game." Both are often competitive with their partner about who is wrong or the "most wrong." They spend most of their time and energy trying to figure out how to "get through to their partner."

The first step is to stop blaming their partner that the tennis game is going badly. The second step is to be willing to see what their contribution (notice I did not say fault) is and experiment with more effective ways to communicate and relate. Then they can build competency in a wide variety of couple relationship skills.

Often I will suggest they might even want to try "doubles." They can use the best of each of their strengths, discuss and support their vulnerabilities, and have more fun playing together. Talk about synergy!