Test Your "Dumb Fight Prevention" Skills

There is no such thing as an authentic, conflict-free relationship.  

However, many of us are afraid to acknowledge frustration or anger because we are afraid it will jeopardize or end the relationship.

Conflict is acutualy necessary in order for your relationship to deepen, strengthen, and evolve.

However if you do not know how to fight with your RIGHT brain, your emotional brain, you may have some problems with DUMB fights.

Take this test to measure your emotional "smarts":

Part 1 - Regulating

1.      I use both negative and positive feelings as a guide to understanding myself.

2.      I can recognize how my judgments about my partner make me feel worse. 

3.      I recognize that I react when I feel misunderstood, judged, or not supported.

4.      I am good at reminding myself that anger is always secondary to a feeling of vulnerability.

5.      When I am upset I can pause, breathe, notice what is happening inside.

6.      I recognize that my perceptions are sometimes blurred by old memories and hurts.

7.      I am good at resisting the urge to attack or withdraw.

Part 2 - Revealing

1.      I believe that the purpose of our relationship is to depend on each other.

2.      I am not afraid to show my vulnerability to my partner.

3.      I find it easy to trust my partner.

4.      I am not uncomfortable revealing insecurities to my partner

5.      I talk openly, sharing almost everything with my partner.

6.      I turn to my partner for support, understanding, and validation.

7.      I like the way we talk through our differences.

Step 3 - Responding

1.      I am conscious that my tone, facial expressions and gestures speak louder than my words.

2.      I see myself as sensitive and responsive to my partner’s emotions

3.      I always try to listen with curiosity to my partner’s points and not judge

4.      I am good at hearing my partner’s pain underneath any anger.

5.      I know how to soothe and comfort my partner’s pain

6.      We regularly hold each other when one of us is upset.

7.      I can feel close to my partner even when we disagree.

Step 4 - Repairing

1.      I have no trouble forgiving my partner.

2.      I have no trouble apologizing.

3.      I believe we are supposed to learn as a couple from our mistakes

4.      I can use humor as a way to reconnect with my partner.

5.      I understand that sometimes forgiveness is less an event and more a process.

6.      I know in my heart my partner has good intentions and would never hurt me on purpose.

7.      I would rather be happy than be “right.”

Add up how many statements you can answer "True."
Score as follows:

28 – 22                 Emotionally Competent - Congrats!

21 and below        Dumb Fight WARNING

It is estimated that only one third of us are emotionally "literate."  The remaining  two thirds of us could use Dumb Fight Prevention Training.

There are four steps to learning how to fight with your RIGHT brain.  Stay tuned for more tools and tips  to Regulate, Reveal, Respond, and Repair.

Can Couples Counseling Be Funny?

When people are laughing, they're generally not killing each other.  ~Alan Alda

 Did you hear this one? How many couple’s counselors does it take to save a relationship? Three. Two to change careers waiting for couples to show up and one to be there when they do.

O-k… I know I am no comedian but I also know that couples counseling is in serious need of a public relations makeover.

A survey of divorced couples shows that only 1% had even sought help from a marriage counselor. Another study found that the average distressed couple waits 6 years before making a call to a relationship professional.

People wouldn’t wait 6 minutes to relieve the pain of a broken arm, but couples will wait six years to treat a broken marriage because they THINK they’ve failed!  Waiting 6 years can spell romantic suicide for couples in moderate to severe distress. Six years of frustration, six years of emotional disconnection, six years of hopelessness and helplessness.  What a waste of time, emotions, and – in the end – attorney fees.

So, what is the public relations problem that leads distressed couples to NOT think of counseling?

People avoid going to a marriage counselor like they dread going to a dentist for a root canal.  "It will be awful!  Painful.  Scary!"  "I'm going to get psychoanalyzed"  "You're going to tell we are hopeless."    "You are going to side with my spouse."  "Any couple who needs counseling is doomed."

Ok, first of all marital distress is not about failure or lousy partners so much as it stems from lousy emotional connections.  And most of us have trouble dealing with emotions when the stakes are high. 

Couples counseling is no day at the beach, but that doesn’t mean it can’t utilize playfulness and humor for therapuetic purposes!

Frankly, I think the most important tool a couples counselor should use is a sense of humor.  The humor says, "We are all in this together.  Conflict is normal.  And conflict can make your relationship stronger.  I can teach you how.  Now take a deep breath and relax."

There are lots of reasons why humor is so powerful in therapy.  Humor softens tension.  Humor invokes a more gentle and playful mood for a couple, it really brings out the original "we."  Humor enables clients  to shift from the "reactor" to the "observer" in their drama and thus is a very powerful mindfulness tool.  Humor in couples counseling sessions is an immediate state changer and help de-escalate conflict.   Laughter actually influences both sides of the brain, our emotional mind and our thinking mind. Humor is a wonderful tool for couples to use to get their messages across to one another without resistance.   And, we all learn more when we are having fun.

I have a big red ball of blame in my office.  It’s about 20 inches across and has “Big Ball of Blame” written across it. When a new couple walks into my office, I often see a little smile cross their faces when they see it. I mean, who doesn’t have a festering ball of blame somewhere in their relationship. They get it. And they also get that I may approach all this a little differently. 

When a person gets into a blaming rant in a session, I make them hold the “Big Ball of Blame” for a minute. Or I place the ball between the couple and point to it saying, "Your partner is not the problem.  It's this blaming defensive cycle that is the problem...this "thing" is what is coming in between the two of you."  This helps a couple shift from their "you verses me" adversarial perspective to a more collaborative, "Us verses the problem" stance. 

I also have a pair of foam swords leaning up against the wall in my office. When new couples spy the swords, you usually see the glint in their eyes as they ask, "When can we play with the swords."  And, if the other partner laughs, its a very good sign!  If a couple can still play together, they still have great passion potential.  

I use the swords also when I demonstrate how they are pushing each other, rather than doing what they truly want which is to pull each other closer.  I ask couples, "what does it feel like to ask for love with a weapon in your hands?"  When a couple gets into a “Dumb Fight” – conflict that is mindless and unproductive – I give them an opportunity to experience their negative dumb fight “duels” in a whole new way. Trust me. They get it!

I am suggesting that the Couples Counseling Industry launch a new media campaign emphasizing the four potential benefits for clients:

1)   Counseling will help you feel "normal"-  Society has the crazy idea that “happy couples don’t fight.” That’s unrealistic as it can get and knowing it’s not true can be an enormous relief.
2)    Counseling will inspire  hope - when couple can look at their struggles in different context – as a lousy connection instead of a lousy partner problem – couples feel empowered.
3)  Counseling provides you with solutions and tools - conflict may be unavoidable, but dumb fights – mindless conflict – is totally optional. Dumb Fight prevention skills are very teachable. 
4)    Counseling that employs a sense of humor can actually be FUN -  I have many couples who tell me that they enjoy coming to sessions for the insight, the bonding, and the psychological release of laughter.  

One of my favorite quotes is from American philosopher Jean Houston, "At the height of laughter, the universe is flung into a kaleidoscope of new possibilities. 

How To Talk To Your Honey About Money

   

Financial stress is named as one of the primary reasons for divorce.  Money is second only to infidelity as the most popular cause of marital breakup.

           

Did you know that couples spend 80 per cent of their  waking hours earning money, spending money or thinking about money?  No wonder the topic of money pushes so many emotional buttons.

Do any of these top 5 money arguments sound familiar to you:

1. spending verses saving, 
2. credit card debt,
3.  keeping secrets, 
4. sharing power and decision making and 
5. whether or not to have joint or separate bank accounts

It is also not surprising that conflicts over money can lead into some nasty dumb fights.  The "dumb" fight is really not just about dollars and cents.  Couples are struggling with topics that they don't even know how to name.  For example, money is a symbol that maybe represents core values – how much do you live in the “now” and how much do you plan for the future.  Money can represent life dreams.  Money can represent success and self esteem.  Money represents a safety net and psychological security for many.  How do you feel connected to a partner who doesn't seem to want you to feel safe?

Differences in marriage are natural and conflict over finances is normal.  Spenders marry savers, dreamers marry planners, avoiders marry worriers.   These differences become what John Gottman calls  "perpetual problems," because they are not solveble, rather they need to be managed.  Perpetual problems always stem from personality differences, qualities about your partner that you are never going to change.

Try to see conflict over money as an opportunity to deepen and expand your partnership.  You can  understand each other more deeply, accept each other more completely and learn to share power and decision-making if you can fight "smart."

Fighting "smart" is:

    

• ·         Knowing how to calm down or take a break when you loose your cool

• ·         Understanding your emotions and be willing to reveal them truthfully

• ·         Listening to your partner in 3 ways – with your ears, your head, and your heart

• ·         Looking  for solutions that feel like win-win

You don't have to wait for a dumb fight to talk about money. Talk about what money means to each partner - love, security, status,  freedom, empowerment to reach goals?    Write a financial mission statement for the "we."  Share with one another your financial dreams and goals. 

Relationship success is not always about solving the differences, so much as managing the differences.  

Are You Mindful or Mind-less In Your Relationship?

Let's face it, most of us have mindless relationships.  That's not a slam on your ability to experience love, happiness or harmony.  Mindless isn't who you are, its how you conduct your relationship, the process you use to relate emotionally to your partner.

It may or may not be a surprise to you that we are ruled by our emotional minds in the heat of conflict.  And this is not some new age speculation.  There is more and more research showing that these two distinct parts of the brain - the emotional mind and the logical mind - hold tremendous sway over how we behave.

But, even more important, there's more and more evidence that we can consciously take control and ensure that in times of stress, we can step back and observe our thoughts, body sensations, and feelings, without identifying with them.  This enhances our ability to respond to relationship conflict rather than react.

Practicing mindfulness helps us slow down our emotional process, regulate our reactivity and communicate more openly, less defensively, and listen to our partner with greater presence of mind.  Mindfulness exercises include techniques to help you calm you mind, slow your breathing, and clarify your feelings.  You can learn exercises to send out loving kindness to your partner, attune to their hurts, and practice forgiveness.   

Mindfulness is not just a process to work through difficult feelings and relationship conflict.   Mindfulness is also an outcome. Mindfulness will change who you are as a person.   Practicing mindfulness on a regular basis will make you less judgmental, more accepting, more open, more flexible, more trusting.  You will learn to see yourself, your partner, and events in your life in a new perspective, with greater clarity, depth, and wisdom.

Mindfulness practice cultivates qualities like gratitude, gentleness, generosity and empathy.  All of these qualities are crucial for long term relationship success.  These emotional qualities will enable you to "fight smart" with your partner.  These qualities enable you to simultaneously be an authentic "me" and a closely connected "we."

As an experiment, close your eyes, and simply notice what your mind is doing.   Stay on the lookout for any thoughts or images.  You may notice your mind is quite busy. 

Imagine that you can watch your thoughts like you can watch clouds floating by.  Or actors walking on and off stage.  Or fish  swimming in a tank. You can watch your thoughts come and and watch them go. And, not get tangled up in the thinking.

Notice where your thoughts seem to be located - are they out in front of you, above you, behind you, to one side of you, or within you.  Just like a friendly scientist, observe with curiosity and alert attention.

 

Notice that there are really two of you doing this exercise! One part of you is doing the planning, thinking, remembering.  But there is a second YOU that is the observer, "the friendly scientist," who is noticing the thinking without reactivity or judgment.  

That is the OBSERVER YOU and I will help you cultivate this quality more in the next few weeks so that, at the very least, you will be mindful enough to be able to say, " Honey, let's not have another dumb fight."

Develop An Attitude of Gratitude

Practicing gratitude may be the fastest single pathway to happiness, health, and success in your love life.

According to a study conducted by positive psychologist and mindfulness expert, Dr. Henry Emmons, PhD,  people who kept a gratitude journal for just 3 weeks measured 25% higher on life satisfaction after wards. Research participants who became more mindful of gratitude, exercised more, drank alcohol less, and were describe by their families and friends as generally nicer to be around.   

Developing a habit of noticing what you appreciate about your partner can be a very powerful "dumb fight" prevention tool. As you probably know, relationships go through various stages.  It is normal for a couple to  evolve  from feeling "blissed" (and idealizing their  partners) to feeling “pissed” and viewing their partners as  problematic.    Conflict is unavoidable because it is an integral part of the relationship maturation process.  On the other hand, mindless mayhem, the dumb fight duels that many couples engage in, is totally unneccessary. 

Dan Wile, one of my favorite relationship sages, famously said, "When choosing a long-term partner, you will inevitably be choosing a particular set of unsolvable problems that you’ll be grappling with for the next ten, twenty or fifty years."   I think he is suggesting that couples need to accept that aggravation is going to happen.  Remember, it is not a lousy partner but a lousy connection that is the cause of marital distress.

Relationship success actually depends on the ratio of positive to "disappointing."  Couples can  fight like hell and still be strong as long as the ratio of positive to negative is at least 5 to 1.  What this means is that you should like your partner 5 times more than you dislike your partner.  And, there will be times in your relationship that will require some self discipline and attention.  

Being mindful of what you appreciate, value, and cherish can help you in a multitude of ways:

• you will become less judgmental
• you will increase your satisfaction
• appreciation will increase flexibility and acceptance
• you will be able to let go of  gripes
• it enhances your trust
• appreciation will soften you emotionally, make you more kind
• increase your motivation to be generous
• make you more empathic

Every day. remind yourself to notice and record at least three things you appreciate about your partner.   Keep a log.  The qualities don’t have to be big things; they can be tiny. It might be the way he smiles, or the sound of her laughter.

Pay attention and note how your partner enhances your life.  Daily things.  Again, they don’t have to be big things. It might be the simple fact that she goes to work to earn money to help pay for some of the things you enjoy having. Or the simple pleasure of having someone to talk to over dinner. Or the feeling of added security you have when you’re not alone.

If you find yourself having more than your fair share of dumb fights with your partner, it is good to remember what qualities attracted you to your partner in the first place.  What personal qualities did you most admire about him/ her?  In all likelihood, those strengths and qualities are still there today, you just have to pay attention and look for them.

Stop The Blame Game - 6 Tips For Couples

Why is it that it is so much easier to blame your partner than to acknowledge your own feelings of fear and insecurity? 

Maybe you are having trouble letting go of old gripes and resentments, lousy partner stories that just won't go away. Or, maybe you are avoiding unpleasant feelings and potential pain.

However, blame begets more blame; criticism and attacks beget defensiveness and counterattacks. An endless negative cycle of causes and consequences, blame and defensiveness will rob your relationship of joy and positivity.  And nothing will ever get done.

You are never going to get anywhere riding the merry-go-round of blame.  Here are 6 tips to jump off this "ride":

1) Claim your moves in the dumb fight cycle.  Look at the diagram above.  Identify:

•  how and when do your "sensitive buttons" get pushed?
• What are your vulnerable feelings (hurt, sad, scared, ashamed) ?
• what do you do when you feel this way (protest, freeze, withdraw, withhold)?

If you are not communicating to reveal, than you most definately are communicating to control your feelings, your partner, and/or the outcome.  Ask your partner to map out the same things.  It is important to highlight the reciprocity in this cycle, how you become reactive with one another.  Doing this exercise as a team works the best.

2) Learn how to translate anger into soft feelings .  Anger is always a cover for a vulnerable feeling.  Communicating with anger pushes your partner, expressing need pulls your partner closer.  

3) Focus on solutions instead of deficits or problems.  Rather than talking about what you want less of, talk about what you want more of. 

3) Learn to catch the cycle early.  Couples usually have just one fight...but they have it over, and over, and over again.  So you will get lots of opportunities to practice.  Learn the following reset buttons:

• Let's take a break and calm down
• Ok, let's start over..."
• I'm sorry..."
• Use humor
• "You make sense..."
• Soothing touch
• "I love you..."

5) See the negative cycle as the enemy.  Instead of me verses you, think us against the problem (the negative cycle).  In impasse, you can ask, "What does the WE need now?"

6) Try to listen with curiosity instead of judgment. The two of you are talking not about facts but about perceptions, feelings.  There is no right or wrong.  

• Listen with your ears to the words
• Listen with your mind to make sense of the ideas
• Listen with your heart to your partners feelings

Developing awareness in the moment, during a dumb fight cycle, will empower you to choose to put connection first - the single, most important strategy for your relationship success. 

Six Good Things Come From Conflict

I've had it with people who say that the way to a happy relationship is to eliminate the conflict.

I've had it with TV ads for dating services that show a deliriously happy couple scientifically matched to make sure they are so compatible that they seemingly will always have that happy smile pasted across their faces (when those faces aren't obscured by a passionate lip-lock).

Couples don't get into trouble because of conflict.  Couples get into trouble because they don't know how to handle their differences with emotional "smarts."  Dumb fights are the bane of a couples existence because they are under-regulated, adversarial, reactive, and repetitive.

Conflict in a relationship is normal because differences are normal.  It is our uniqueness, not just our sameness, that give our relationship excitement, surprise, passion.

Conflict is actually necessary for a relationship to deepen and mature.  Couples who habitually avoid conflict end up growing apart.  Most divorces are caused by this emotional alienation.

Conflict needs to be seen as an opportunity rather than a threat.  Conflict is the opportunity to grow your relationship in 6 important ways:

1. Conflict deepens mutual understanding - in the early stages of your relationship you feel safe enough to reveal your "sameness" but not always your "uniqueness."  It is in Stage 2 of your relationship, after you are emotionally attached, that you begin to reveal your differences.  Genuine intimacy only comes after you know that your partner accepts and values your "uniqueness."
2. Conflict encourages  each partners freedom to be authentic - many of us grow up in homes where it is not okay to be a separate and distinct "self."  However, you cannot have a solid bond as a "we" until you have an authentic "you" and a "me."  Both partners must feel safe, and entitled, to be real.
3. Conflict solidifies your emotional bond - conflict is the opportunity to reveal your most vulnerable feelings and ideas.   To feel safe to share these primary feelings with a partner, to be naked emotionally, is true intimacy (in-to-me-see).
4. Conflict resolution increases resilience to adversity  - research says that relationship success is not so much about good sex or fun times.  Relationship success is about feeling like you have a partner along side you, when times get tough.
5. Conflict is the opportunity to expand the relationship  - Conflict is the opportunity to learn from your partner's unique perspective and then make room in the relationship for both of you to be "right." 
6. Sharing power as a we enables synergy. - Synergy in a relationship is when   1+1= 3.  When two partners are feeling safe with their "uniquenes" they can be most creative as a team.

Thinking every day of a relationship is going to be about great chemisty is not just misleading -- it's downright dangerous to relationships.

Here's the true chemistry of a relationship. One partner is oil. The other partner is water. You can put them together but they will never completely mix. Couples need to embrace their differences. And remember,

Conflict is unavoidable but "dumb fights" are optional.