The "Mad At You" Mantra

"I am really MAD AT YOU!"

All couples fight.  It is how you fight that determines whether you will ellicit a collaborative response from your partner...or an adversarial one.

Psychologist John Gottman calls "I'm mad at you" a harsh startup - a sure fire guarantee that your partner will meet your complaints with counter blaming or defensiveness.  Frustrating blame/defensive cycles can go round and round and go nowhere, wasting tons of energy.

So I came up with a 3 word  "Mad At You" Mantra.   The next time you find yourself submerged in upset, repeat this three word phrase to yourself, several times - Mad, Sad, Scared.  Faster... Mad, Sad, Scared.  Mad, Sad, Scared.  Say it all like one word, let each word glide into the next...MadSadScared.

This quick-to-remember mantra will help you:

• calm yourself down
• resist the urge to be overreactive
• help your thinking mind catch up with your emotional mind
• reach deeper for your primary feelings underneath your frustration. 

Anger is always a secondary feeling, a reaction to a more vulnerable feeling.  The "Mad At You" Mantra will enable you to reveal more of what you long for with your parnter...and what scares you.

"I get so mad when I see/hear/sense you ____________________________."

"I get sad because I feel __________________ (hurt, disconnected, neglected, unimportant)."

"On a deeper level, I get scared because I feel ________________ (alone, overwhelmed, inadequate)."

Everyone is continually having some sort of upset feelings - pangs of anxiety, disappointments, twinges of abandonment, waves of insecurity.

With your "Mad At You" Mantra you can use your upset to reach out to your partner rather than as an occasion for fighting or withdrawal.