Dr Guy Winch - Upgrade Your Life 2019

[Music] [Applause] but yesterday dr. Wendt shared a simple but revolutionary idea and that is that we care for our psychological health with the same diligence and the same commitment that we do things like our dental hygiene and also Sam shared yesterday guy has a specialized practice where he looks at relationships and the family system so he's going to be speaking today about intimacy and resolving not creating conflict so please welcome dr. Kai winch are we gonna be dancing hello again you have a casual conversation in which you mentioned you've got the giggles at a Broadway show and the next thing you know alright so I'm learning a lot today already so I want to start this way psychology has been a science for over a hundred years already and when it started out after Freud and all of that was done and there was behaviorism people thought wow we're gonna be able to predict human behavior we're gonna be able to really predict what people are going to do and the idea was if we're going to predict what someone's going to do if let's say a criminal who's up for parole what's the likelihood of them offending again right so will they or won't they so for a prediction to be useful it has to be more than a 50-50 chance because otherwise it's not useful then that hope never materialised psychologists are rarely called upon to predict what people are going to do because we can't we're not much better than a 50-50 chance because human behavior is very complex so we can't really do that now sometimes we can do a little bit better we might let's say predict with a 60% likelihood that that criminal will offend but really what what judge is going to make a decision based at 60 percent likelihood it's just not good enough now in hindsight with great if you want us to explain why somebody did something they already did oh we're good to go but to predict forward that we really we really can't do but there's an exception to that rule and it's a whopper there is one form of human behavior we can predict with accuracies of over 94% 94% that's incredibly accurate and what does that behavior we're predicting well if you if you looked at your program in no doubt have noticed this is about relationships and that behavior is a divorce couples therapists and trained researchers about couples can look at a few minutes of a couple interact and predict with accuracies of over 94% whether that couple is going to stay together and we can also predict whether they're going to be happy in their relationship so that's quite incredible because we can't do that with any other form of human behavior so what is it we see there when we're looking at a cup of interact what is it we're seeing that tells us with such certainty that they're going to stay together or not what is it they're doing that indicates that what is it they're not doing perhaps that indicates that and today I'm gonna give you the answer to those questions and to that issue and I'll tell you some of the secrets the tools of the trade of how we do that now these are not secrets like you know I'm divulging something of the secret therapy guild or something I'm not my life isn't in danger for saying these things these are just things people don't know and in that sense they're their secrets but the really better news is I won't just be telling you these things but to be able to change your relationships to conform to be able to do the things you want to do for the relationship to last and be happy and not do the things you shouldn't be doing sometimes and a lot of the times it's a small little tweak that you need to change these are not massive changes you need to make and sometimes many of these very small efforts will yield an incredible result so let's get started alright I'm gonna get started with the case study from my practice all names have been changed I'm terrible at coming up with fake names so they're all gonna be like stupid well alright so Ken and Abby that's original so Karen Abby both of their middle thirties came to see came to see me after having a huge fight that almost broke up their marriage for the first time in their 10 years the word divorce was hurled in that argument they were extraordinarily shaken up by it that never happened to them before and they sat in my office they were clearly distraught they have been fighting more and more over the past few months and that fight made them realize they can't go on like this so I said to them tell me about the fight and they looked at one another and they said no usually when couples come because of a fight they want to talk but that's what they come for really it's like going to doctor what hurts no I don't think I'm gonna tell you what hurts for the doctor it makes it a little tricky so I said why it was stupid I'm like calm most fights are no no no it was really really stupid and I'm like now I'm curious so I'm like please tell me what was it about and Ken said it was about where to put the dishrag excuse me and Abby says and she says it like this I'm gonna quote the dishrag you know the dishrag the one you shouldn't hang on the tap where the water comes out and touches it and dribbles all the germs into the cup you're feeling that dishrag and Ken says if you put it in the soap dish it can't dry out and Abbey goes it touches the water when the water comes out and at this point I said like it's very stupid you're right there but that was a very very very stupid argument but the thing is couples always fight about stupid things it's always stupid things dishrag actually to me took the cake but nonetheless it's it's usually it's usually it's stupid stuff no one as I said no one ever you know comes in it goes those are your thoughts about geopolitical stability and world peace I'm out that doesn't happen it's it's dishrags you know it's the wet towels on the floor it's like it's that stuff so I'm gonna ask you what do you think couples fight about most what are the topics who wants to throw out some ideas money number one not in order but like that's one of the top kids yes so sorry but it's your fault anyway so now I can number two and what was the other one second chores I thought you said nap tools which was actually the correct answer so I'm gonna go with that and now it used to be those three and now there's a fourth anyone no screens little screens with numbers on them bones tablets laptops screens number you know that used to be nowhere and now it's like whoof right up in the middle and in fact this research about the screens there's research that showed that cell phone use is such an interference in relationships that there studies that show that it causes real feelings of depression it lowers life satisfaction they call it techno fear ins in other words it's literally something that can disrupt and why it's so disruptive is that when you're at home with your partner and you're talking and suddenly you're on your phone the message you're giving is this is more important than you or than our conversation or if we sitting over having dinner and then suddenly you're doing this it's like oh this is much more interesting I'm sorry whatever you were saying this is more interesting there's no way you can be with someone and it's not just about relationship this is friendships whoever whoever you're with in a one-on-one in a group setting if you're on your phone if you're looking at your phone the message you're giving is this is more important it's insulting globally so I'm just pointing that out that's that's number four in terms of that so one tweak you can already do to upgrade your relationship and Karl spoke about this yesterday and probably a lot of people gonna mention it it's really important is have rules about when phones phone usage is allowed have zones which are phone free have times which are phone free and my suggestion cause yesterday spoke about family dinners so much research but how important that is no phones at family dinners leave them out leave them out of the bedroom anyway so that's that's one thing so what couples argue about tells us nothing about their relationship it is not what couples argue about that makes a difference it's how they argue that matters how they argue how couples deal with conflict tells us everything we need to know about the relationship how long they'll be together whether they'll be happy so what is it we're really looking at when we look at how a couple argues what is it we're looking to see when we're looking at how they deal with conflict in general do they get defensive the minute someone starts speaking the other one gets really defensive do they use name-calling put downs do they raise their voice and escalate or do they just completely shut and stop communicating how to argue is what couples need to learn how to do because if you do that right then you do the relationship right now in my many years of experience of doing this over 20 years of doing couples therapy one of the most unfortunate things I find is that there are one there's one very preventable disconnect that happens when couples are arguing you feel in this argument if you've been in this moment you'll have I'm sure that you're arguing about something and the other person isn't listening to you they're not addressing what you're saying they're arguing but it's as if they're not listening and they're not because the most common thing that happens in arguments is that couples are actually arguing about something that sounds the same but it's two different arguments they're having so one of them is arguing this thing and the other one is arguing that thing and they're not addressing one another they believe they're arguing about the same thing but in fact they're not for example one person is arguing about whether they should go on vacation to point a or point B and the other one is arguing about why they don't get to make decisions enough in the relationship it can sound like it's the same argument but it's different and I'll give you an example I'll redo some lines of an argument and let's see if you can tell what they're arguing about or if they're arguing about the same thing okay husband says I haven't seen my parents in a month the wife says but your mother is always so rude to me husband says but she's my mother I want to see her and the wife says she makes me feel bad in my own house husband says I don't make a stink when your parents come to visit and on it goes they're having two separate arguments the husband is arguing about the fact that he wants his parents to come to visit the white is trying to have a discussion about what happens when his parents come to visit it sounds to them like they're having the same argument but they're not either they're gonna talk in parallel lines and know and they're gonna feel very frustrated because they're actually not addressing the other ones concern that argument can really escalate because it gets really frustrating then no one's listening to you and then that is extraordinarily common and I sit in therapy with couples all the time and I pause and I do the thing that I'm gonna suggest here's one thing I'd like you to really make a note of it because it's important when you are in an argument with your partner truly even with a friend and you have that feeling of what they're just really not listening here's what you do a timeout you call a timeout you take a piece of paper or your phone and then number one you write down each of you what it is you think you are giving about define it be specific so it's not money that's let's say you know that's too general it's that I'm annoyed that we agreed to cut spending and you purchased this thing without telling me and the other one might write I'm annoyed that you trying to control what I purchase when I don't try to control what you're purchasing not the classic example of an argument that's gonna go this way and go on and on because actually not arguing about the same thing so when that happens write down number 1 what you think you're arguing about number 2 what you think your partner is arguing about and then when you're done switch notes and if it's indeed two similar but slightly different things two separate discussions decide okay let's discuss this first and then we'll discuss this and that will save a lot of time because a lot of these arguments are actually not arguments they're not disagreements they're just miscommunications misunderstandings and it's a shame but those are a huge percentage of coupl conflict and they're the ones that often escalate because there's a fundamental misunderstanding about what you're talking about so the real reason most arguments go badly with couples happens at the starting gate and that is the first person who brought up the issue did not do it correctly they did not bring up their complaint correctly we know that if I ask most people some people sometimes my wife really annoyed me this happened did you tell her yeah why not it'll start an argument in other words most people are more likely to complain about their spouse to a friend to the barber to the bartender to a stranger in the locker room at the gym then they are to address it to their partner this is just true and the good reason for it is we just don't start an argument I have conflict the problem is when you don't voice these things then you accumulate a lot of resentment and a lot of frustration and then when you finally decide to talk about it [Music] everything comes out it comes out extraordinarily harshly we call it the kitchen sink everything goes into the argument the dish rags the kitchen sink the towel on the floor everything that went bad it all comes up that never goes well so being able to voice complaints to a partner when we have them is crucial and when I say voice them I mean productively usefully that is how couples make course corrections which are necessary all the time now my first book is called the squeaky wheel and it's about the psychology of complaining and I wanted to write it because I noticed in my practice that there was something very wrong in how we think about complaints we have such a defeatist attitude in part because we think it's not going to go well why speak up and so I went to the library I said and I read the journals and I realized wow there's good research here and I know how to do it well let me write a book about that so I approached an agent and I said to her I there is no book out there which there wasn't about the psychology of complaining and I would be the perfect person to write it and she looked at me and she said because you're Jewish and I said because I'm a psychologist now she said this because she's Jewish and she thought were Jews the biggest complainers but when we try to sell the book internationally then the who the Koreans were the first the Korean editors go oh we love this Koreans are the biggest complainers and the Chinese editors say oh we're going to take it these are the biggest complainers and then the Polish said no no no poles are the biggest complainers everyone thought they have some kind of monopoly on complaining everyone's like oh we are such complainers well yeah we all we all are doesn't matter where we're from we all are it's not a Jewish thing it's not a Polish things or an Australian thing we are all very prolific complainers in addition to being prolific we suck at it we're terrible at it the research shows that on average for example if you buy something and you're not pleased with it 95 percent of people will not complain to the company about the product because they think it'll be too time-consuming and too frustrating instead they will tell an average of 16 people about how upset they are with a product spending way too much time getting really aggravated and certainly getting no result because that's a better approach so the idea is we do not know how to complain effectively and this is especially true in relationships so I'm going to ask you to think back to a time as recent as you want that you voiced a complaint to your partner so I'll give you a second to think of it think of something that you you know you had this that those three words that you know every person hates it's poor sorry for words we need to talk like that's never an appetizing evening for anyone right but think back to the last time you know you had We Need to Talk and think about what the complaint was for a minute just you really have it clear in your mind all right by show of hands how many of you thought through carefully what you were going to say before you brought it up okay that's not a lot of those people who raised their hands how many of you thought through carefully beforehand what the result was that you were trying to get okay so that's five six seven people that's there we are you see there's the issue now when I say two people in a session oh and I brought this up and right okay great what what were you trying to achieve I don't know all right what could your partner have done or responded in a way that would be satisfying I don't know I just wanted to say it well there we are that's why arguments happen right because there's no even there's no if you don't have a goal there's no exit ramp if you know like reach the goal argument done you know ding-ding-ding flag but if there's none of that it just keeps going so even the most basic step of actually thinking through what are going to achieve here we don't do that it's the first thing you have to do when you have a complaint ask yourself what are you trying to get what do you want what do you want from them if you don't know what you want from them they're not going to know what they want or what they should do so that's the first thing maybe you want just an admission of oh I'm sorry I didn't realize or a recognition of wrongdoing maybe you want to make up maybe want to promise maybe you want them to you know like south thumping their chest until I'm so sorry whatever it is figure out what you want now I'm gonna use an example here's another incident specific incident this one happened just a couple of weeks ago because I'm gonna tell you how to formulate these complaints but let's look at a specific incident Joe and Cindy will call this couple all right all right here's how they described the argument and I'm gonna read what they said Joe you knew I was really looking forward to seeing this film and you knew we had to leave by five o'clock he says to his wife but you just didn't care I came looking for you at 5:00 and you were on your laptop working away clueless about the Cindy says I was doing that report for work and you knew it was important and then she turns to me and she said I immediately close the laptop when Joe came in immediately the second he came in but he just lost it and started yelling and joe said because he weren't ready and Cindy said I closed the laptop I was ready and joe said you weren't ready and I said to Joe excuse me what makes you so convinced she wasn't ready and Joe said she was naked alright convincing very convincing so I look at Cindy because now I'm an idiot and she said well I just had to throw on some clothes it takes two minutes and joe said it took 20 insane he said because you kept yelling at me so I couldn't do it typical argument except the nakedness so for Joe Cindy's lateness was a huge issue and it always caused these big arguments and it's one of those questions you have to ask because couples usually have repetitive arguments like I call them the greatest hits the themes they keep arguing about and how can you have an argument 30 times and still not figure it out how could he possibly like keep going around around oh let's have this one again and everyone's bored by it they can script each other's responses and then they'll just huff and sleep in different rooms so obviously we need to figure out how to resolve these things so what I said to Joe is like what did you want to achieve by having that argument and she said I don't know of course cuz he hadn't thought about it and then finally said you know what I want I want to figure out a way that I don't have to get so stressed out whenever we have to go somewhere because she is gonna be late okay specific go now we have something to work with and when I asked him okay had you thought about that ahead of time would you have approached Cindy the same way he said no he said good how would you have approached her and this is what the essence of it is about he said I don't know because I don't want the confrontation now here's one problem and complaint is the content of sorts confrontation sounds like a fistfight it's not a fistfight but is it a tense moment when someone's telling you that they're not pleased with something you did yes miss we can call it a confrontation it's a small one but you can't get around that the idea is to keep it contained keep it a small confrontation so the trick in voicing a complaint to your partner the trick is to voice it in such a way that they get very the least defensive as they can get that they don't get terribly defensive that doesn't feel like a like a confrontation right off the bat and the way to do that is to use a simple formula I call it the complaint sandwich it's a formula some of you know but the devil is in the details of this the complaint sandwich has two positive statements and a complaint in the middle and those are important let's go through it the first positive statement I call it the ear opener and the goal of it is to let the person know that something's coming in a way that doesn't make them too defensive so it opens their ears so it has to be a positive statement right now sometimes I'll say to a couple or I'll say it in this case it was Joe I said so if you were gonna start with a positive statement what would it be and he said I like the way you did your fingernails okay there's nothing to do with what you're talking about so that doesn't quite work the positive stick so a positive statement might be something like you know I really look forward to our date night or I have such a good time going to the movies with you simple if you're Cindy at that point you like your antenna are up you know something's coming but you're not you know in battle mode so the first slice of bread is the ear opener the meat of the complaint sandwich is the actual complaint all your requests for redress for you know for a responsive kind the meat should be lean as lean as possible it's a single incident it's a single principle you do not need to take a running start from 1993 about all the times the offense happened because if your point is lateness it doesn't matter she was late 205 times your point is made equal when you say your right now and that's much easier to hear so the meat should be leaned no greatest hits with that here it would be look I know you try to be on time but it's really frustrating when I think we're gonna be late to the movies or I get stressed out when I see you're not ready even if you're just two minutes away from being ready and it takes me a while to calm down so I don't quite enjoy the first part of the evening because I'm still coming down that's easy to understand it's easy to hear right so lean meat and the next slice of bread the last one I call the digestive that's the spoonful of sugar that makes the message go down and then point here it's the message to your partner that if they respond in a way that you're asking them to things would be good because it's that promise of things will be good at the end that will motivate someone to respond to what you want to give you what you want because you're telling them if you do things will be cool so that's much more motivating then you're a bad person and even if you fix it I'll still be mad which is kind of this text we usually kind of the subtext we usually communicate so that has to end positively so Joe could say if we could come up with a strategy so that you are ready on time and we have a date night it would make me really happy or it would mean a lot if you could set a reminder on your phone it's a specific ask if you could set a reminder on your phone when we have a date night so you're ready on time that would mean a lot to me so how much easier would it be for Cindy to respond if that's what joe said it's so much easier to hear now a couple of condiments for your sandwich number one town keep the tone civil if the tone is too sharp or if you're too angry what people pay attention to is the tone not the message so you might be saying something important and all they're hearing oh she is so angry then look I read his ears get when he gets angry like and then it's a little twitch he gets in his eye really he's just so furious that's what's going on in Cindy's head and he's not listening to what Joe saying so tone calm and civil number two only one complaint discussion only one incident per complaint lean meat and number three be as specific as possible people will respond when there's something specific they can do like this thing about set your phone with reminders is terribly specific it's much easier to say yeah I can do that so be as specific as possible with what you're asking now having to do that sounds simple right I mean the the formula is simple here's the problem you are frustrated in that moment you're angry in that moment you have to contain that and that's not easy to do you have to kind of take a deep breath maybe a few minutes of meditation truly I'm not joking and calm yourself so that you can deliver that correctly the problem is it is not gonna be as viscerally satisfying as yelling or as just dumping out or as just venting or just doing all the run-through of the greatest hits it just feels much better to do that in the moment it doesn't get you what you want it causes an argument and it makes for a shitty marriage but it feels great in that moment we have to be adults and take the less satisfying in the short-term route and the more satisfying in a long-term route so get a handle on yourself take a deep breath and voice it well it takes some planning it takes some thinking to strategize how you're going to do the complaint sandwich but do it it takes 5-10 minutes but it will make for really productive discussions now that is the easier part of the equation the more complicated part of the equation is not how to voice a complaint it's how to receive one because we're gonna get naturally defensive we've just been told we've done something wrong now I asked you earlier to think of a time when you had a complaint to your partner can you bring that thing up again there is something all of you wanted in that moment that's the same no matter what your complaint was there is one thing you really wanted from your partner that you probably didn't even realize that you wanted and it's the same thing you all wanted the same thing and that is to feel understood when we're frustrated when we're angry we want a partner to get it primarily even more than we want them to say yes we'll not be late and we'll fix this and we'll fix that we want to know they get it it's called validation emotional validation it is super important now when we are upset and let's say I'm upset an I vent to a friend or if you vent it to a friend about something if you went on and on for 20 minutes about how angry this was and how upset you were and then this happened and this happened and this happen and they listen and they go and you finish and then they go bummer it doesn't it's not satisfying it doesn't do much for you you're like that's it the ingredient we're looking for is not just that they get it but they convey it we have to know they get it so nodding and going bummer doesn't do it the tricky part is actually conveying that you get it that's the difficult part so and it's very very cathartic when somebody does that for you now conveying that in kind of emotional validation is actually tricky for one reason if I'm telling you that when your partner is angry with you the message you have to give them is I understand why you're angry I agree that you should feel angry in this situation and I'm completely with you and why you're so angry that feels like a dangerous things to do if they're angry at me and I'm telling them you're completely right to be angry I'm just pouring fuel on the fire but emotional validation has a paradoxical effect it actually douses the flame because when someone looks at you when you're angry and you go on and on and on about what's frustrating you or upsetting you and they look at you and they go I totally get it that you would feel this way and this and this and this and this it feels great here's let's go back to the complaint and I'll give you an example so Cindy is working on a project Joe comes in and go you know you're not ready this is she's all up you know he's very upset he's yelling at her now for her to turn around and validate his emotions feels very very dangerous but here's what Cindy could have said she said actually that was here right I totally get how frustrating it is when you're looking forward to a date night and it comes time to leave and I'm not ready and I'm busy with something else and it must look as if our date night it's not important to me at all and it must look like I'm not prioritizing it at all it must be a stretch especially frustrating and stressful because I've done that a lot in the part so I totally get how annoyed you are and how frustrated you are that sounds like a lot to ask of Cindy because she's actually admitting sounds like that she's wrong that he has every right to be angry with her in fact you didn't admit she was wrong at all and she has a good counter but what she did do is validate why Joe is upset so you have to do it from the other person's point of view from the other person's perspective you have to get them to feel like yeah because if Joe sitting there and said he says that he goes yeah that's right she gets it and there's a release an exhale that comes with that his temper already goes down but it's difficult to do why that's not admitting that you're wrong is because it's not because what Cindy then went on to say was the following remember she said it must seem like a date night isn't important what she went on to say is but if you remember Joe I told you this morning I might have to reschedule a date night because of my work project and I considered doing that because I was so behind but I knew her not sure looking forward to seeing that film so I showered early I did my makeup I did my hair I laid out my clothes and I just sat at the laptop and tried to get as much work than as possible before we were leaving because I knew how important that was even though I'd have to stay up late when we got home so that's why I was still working it's a good defense so validating Joe's emotions didn't take away Cindy's argument didn't mean she's actually guilty now imagine how easy it must be for Joe to listen to that and feel like oh hey she does care she was being thoughtful she wasn't being dismissive right so if you take all the arguments you've had with your partner and you combine them with a complaint sandwich and a response of emotional validation what would they do to the tone of conflict in your home it would lower it drastically it would convey a feeling of caring like you can be angry with me but I still care about you and I'm gonna show you that because I'm gonna show you that I get why you're angry even if I have a really good excuse and if you want to voice something that's important I'll listen and I'll try and validate what's important and then we can have a productive discussion about what to do so this complaint sandwich is a bit artificial because it has to slow you down and emotion validation slows down your natural response of punch and counter punch but that's what makes for how to do productive conflict and when people are looking at couples and how they argue the couples that can do it in this kind of way that have a clear communication that don't break up all the past that have these nice statements on either side to really balance out what they're saying and the ones in which emotional validation happens and people are like really acknowledging the other person's feelings those couples go on to have really long relationships and really happy marriages so it's a tweak it's a slightly tricky tweak because it goes against our natural instinct of how we fight but if you adopt it and if you especially if both members of the couple adopted it is the most powerful way that you can reduce conflict within the home one more thing goes with that though you can probably have 30 things you can complain to your spouse about on a given day this raggin on so be careful be choice for the balance we strive for is 80/20 have you heard of the 80/20 ratio 80/20 meaning 80% of your communications have to be positive or neutral only 20% have to be negative or directive it's true in terms of parenting as well with kids 80% positive neutral 20% directive or negative so using the complaint sandwich using emotional validation are super super important for reducing conflict and couples who can do it and it will take practice right so here's one exercise for you to do later write down the complaint you had to your partner that I asked you to think about and then write down later and if you want to come to me and say how is this although it's not too many of you will give you notes on how to but write down how you would phrase it in the complaint sandwich form and then for the sake of argument write down how you would respond to it with emotional validation and you'll see ooh seems simple it actually takes some thought some planning but practice it in writing in this example so you can get a taste of it right super important so that's what reduces conflicts but what makes couples happy what are the things that couples do that make for a happy relationship and here again it's about the small stuff there is something called bids bids are small gestures couples make to one another to connect or for closeness a bit can be you're sitting you're both working on your laptop's and one of them looks up and goes oh look what a pretty bird is on the windowsill now you're in the middle of an email and a very tricky sentence do you say just a minute or do you say I'm busy I told you I'm busy or do you look up and go oh yeah that's very pretty it's a tiny moment but those moments are the ones that makes for happy marriages that slice of tiny tiny response to a positive bid is what makes these are happy couples right there they know right like you you respond to that and just by the number of times you use the word cuddle in your talk I know they're happy so because there was a lot of cuddling going but these bids are hugely important they're the most overlooked part of relationships these tiny moments they can come in a way that you're reducing conflict right like a couple might be arguing because their teenage kid came home smelling of cigarette smoke and in the middle of the argument about what to do one says remember we met when we were still teenagers now if the other person says what's that got to do with it Sam is deter missing the bid if you pause me I can go we were almost his age when we met suddenly all the tension goes down and I noticed that with couples in in the middle of an argument bids will come all the time in small ways and get missed these exit ramps to arguments are there you have to attune yourself to them so you can take them and so responding to bids is a really really important thing bids can be you pause the television when you're watching something and you turn to your partner and you say hey Jim I'm at that time that we went skiing and such and such or you just take the hand when you're walking somewhere oh you just text them sorry did you text in the middle didn't you just text them a kiss thinking of you tiny small moments I'm going to give another one a lot of time is the men in in my practice will say to me like you know just so much work to get my wife to be pleased with me and I'm like it's usually not here's one thing you can do that's gonna make a lot of women happy on a small on a regular basis when there's a holiday when there's Valentine's Day when there's a birthday when there's an N of sorry get a card now I'm not saying this to the card industry but a lot of times a card and don't use the sentiment in the card write something take 10 minutes to write something because what I hear and this is this is really true is a couple comes and they're argue he was terrible on Valentine's Day I bought you flowers he'll say because you did I didn't find out till the next day because he came home smashed him on the kitchen sink and walked away like I'm sorry did you buy her flowers yes did you give her the flowers you bought her she saw them unless you could see them in the store they don't you know like just make the gesture like do something that's personal small moments make for a big big difference so the conflict is one thing the small bids and paying attention to them is another my suggestion put out three bids a day to your partner if they don't respond to them alert them especially if both of you are here or you can communicate that to your partner three small bids a day it can be as small as kiss hello kiss could kiss goodbye when you're leaving and coming when somebody comes home and the other person is home greet them don't let them come and like make it so that you are welcomed small things like that is what saves marriages a lot of the time it's not a big overhaul it's small tweaks in conflict and it's small tweaks in positive positive bids now there's one other thing I want to cover and this story starts in the 1960s and this is when America and the Soviet Union were in a Cold War and in a space race and they were starting to send astronauts up into space and something really interesting happened with the American and the Soviet astronauts they both had a really similar experience being up in space looking down at the earth changed their perspective entirely and even though they were in a cold war and much to the chagrin of the Soviets and the Americans they would come back and say things like it made us realize that we are all on one planet that we are all people that we all share this earth not what the Americans or the Soviets wanted to hear from their astronauts you know with the kumbaya and the hand-holding but both Soviets and American astronauts had a real change of perspective when they came back when they came when they were in space and after they came back now some of you might be thinking does he want us to marry an astronaut but what's he saying this for a change of perspective is super important and the one I want you to adopt and a shift in perspective is always a shift you have to really change your thinking but I want you to think of your couplehood as not involving two people but as being a threesome of a specific kind you are three people in your relationships you are one person you are the other person and you are the relationship the relationship is a separate entity from each of you for one reason the relationship has separate needs than you do one of you might have this need the other one might have that need the relationships needs might be really really different and you need to ask yourself what does the relationship need not what do I need not what do they mean what does the relationship need now let's go back to Ken and Abbie who had the fight about the dishrag here's what was going on with him they both had demanding jobs they had three young kids one of them had cerebral palsy ken worked at home Abbie was a busy executive and they were about to start a renovation on the house because Ken needed a better workspace and they were going to convert the basement into a real workspace and they were going to change the kitchen because Abby loves cooking and they really the kitchen wasn't really conducive to cooking and they were arguing and I said what do you need from one another at this moment and Ken said I need Abby to make time so we can go over the floor plans for building out the basement because he was desperate to have this office and Abby said she needed Ken to supervise since he was home the kitchen renovation she knew it would be disruptive but it would really be useful because she was dying to have that new kitchen here's my question to you that's what Ken wanted that's what Abby needed what did the relationship need anyone I'm just more I can't hear specifically say again did you say okay actually that's the correct answer but again the Cutler's all right but here's the here's the thing what I think if they need it is this is what I said to them I said you have demanding jobs three young kids one with special needs you already overworked and overstressed and your fights are getting so bad you're throwing out the word divorce and your thought is I know let's do construction on our home within our home for three to six months in which we do not have use of the kitchen I said now is the time to do that they were about to start the next week so what their relationship needed was no construction right now and a no TV I didn't say no to you I just said weekend but I'm already but and get your babysitter there and go away they had never had a weekend alone since the first kid was born not one so if you ask yourself what is the relationship needs you come up with a very different answer than you do if you ask what do I need what do you need how do we argue about what we each need the relationship is a third and two in your marriage or your relationship and you have to consider it most because if you do what's right for the relationship by definition you're doing what's right for you intimacy and love and caring are the relationship if you nurture that if you pay attention to that that will flow to you but you literally have to pause and ask what does our relationship need at this juncture what is the what will help the relationship thrive and you will come up with very very different answers than you do if you're just asking about you need you need and what the conflicts are their relationships are partnerships like any partnership it needs a managerial team and you are the managerial team and managerial teams need to have regular meetings regular discussions about the partnership regular talks about how things are going you don't wait until things accumulate to the point where you can't stand them check in on a regular basis what I say to my patients is I travel a lot Here I am now for a week and I always it's a great excuse by the way but I don't use it I used it before I travel that much is have a session without me I'm not there for the session you have one and come with me with notes about what went well and what didn't but have the session have an hour a week an hour a month that you sit and talk about how's it going in our relationship what do we need to address what's tense what's unresolved how can we make it better what does a relationship need have that discussion once a month once every two weeks intense times once a week but be in charge of your relationship it doesn't happen on autopilot you are in a ship and you are captaining the ship together and if you don't have both your hands on the wheel of that ship you'll go on to the rocks it takes both of you to navigate and with both and with many couples they said to me well you know if it was meant to be it'll work out that's BS it is nothing that's meant to be you are in charge of it but be managers managers know that well we have to have management meetings we can't just manage by osmosis so have management meetings look at what the relationship needs because I think that if you use the complaint sandwich if you validate each other's emotions when you're upset or hurt or angry if you respond to small bids and you make them on a regular basis and you constantly communicate to your partner that I see these small things they matter you matter and if you see your relationship as a separate entity that needs to be asked about and cared for all those things will provide you with much much smoother saving you

Channel: A Higher Branch Success Academy

Views: 6,890

Rating: 4.9304347 out of 5

Keywords: #couples

Id: amLHTGhJS8s

Length: 52min 20sec (3140 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 15 2020