4 Ways to Transform Your Relationship—Expert Tips to Heal Pain Points and Deepen Intimacy
Episode Notes
Do you want to learn how to strengthen your relationship over time?
Do you want to have better communication and deeper intimacy with your partner?
In this very honest episode, you'll learn strategies from top marriage & relationship experts combined with Biblical wisdom to work through pain paints, set realistic expectations, and practice constructive conversations with your partner.
Here’s what we cover:
1. The most important way to improve your relationship
2. How to identify bad advice vs. a helpful confidant
3. Naming paint points in a healthy way
4. 3 ways to frame a relational pain point
5. The 4 most destructive qualities to a relationship
6. The 4 most important skills to a vital long-term relationship
Find a full transcript and list of resources from this episode here.
Do you have questions for Dr. Alison? Leave them here.
Additional Resources:
- Boundaries For Your Soul, The Best of You, and I Shouldn’t Feel This Way by Dr. Alison Cook
- “It takes two people to create a pattern, but only one to change it” –Esther Perel
- Matthew 7:5
- Episode 1: What Is Narcissism Really?
- Episode 2: What Should I Know About Gaslighting?
- dralisoncook.com/podcast
- The Four Horseman The Gottman Institute
- Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples by Harville Hendrix, PhD
Related Episodes:
- Episode 105: 4 Lies We Tell, the Mental Health Benefits of Honesty, & How to Stop Lying In Your Relationships
- Episode 89: When A Relationship Has to Change—How to Tolerate Discomfort, Face an Attachment Void, & Resource Yourself
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Music by Andy Luiten/Sound editing by Kelly Kramarik
© 2024 Alison Cook. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please do not copy or share the contents of this webpage without permission from the author. While Dr. Cook is a counselor, the content of this podcast and any of the products provided by Dr. Cook are not specific counseling advice nor are they a substitute for individual counseling. The content and products provided on this podcast are for informational purposes only.
Transcript:
Alison: Hey everyone, and welcome back to this week's episode of The Best of You Podcast. I am glad you're here this week. I'm glad you've been joining me for this series, “Therapists on Therapy”. I've enjoyed getting to know some other therapists and their work and bringing some of those resources to you.
I'm glad you're choosing to spend these next few minutes with me. I really cherish these times when I get to come on and speak directly to you. It feels like there's a genuine connection between us. I don't know how exactly that works, except I believe it's somehow by the power of God's Spirit that there's a way in which he enables us to connect through these airwaves and really join together.
I'm grateful to know that many of you out there are really leaning into this healing work of bringing more goodness, more wholeness, more healing, more beauty, more joy into this world. It buoys me up. It gives me much hope and encourages me. So thank you for being here with me. I'm prayerful as I prepare for these episodes, especially these solo episodes.
I really try to think about what I've been noticing are some pain points in the world around me and the folks that I'm talking with in myself, in my spirit. I pray through what I think God wants me to add into the conversation. I always get much out of preparing for these episodes and it truly feels like we're coming together to learn and grow and become more whole and more fruitful and bring more healing into the world together.
So thank you again for being here. Thank you for your questions, for your notes, for your emails. I always appreciate hearing from you. You can find the link to The Best of You Podcast question form in the show notes for this episode. Cindy, my media coordinator, and I will take some time to answer your questions in an upcoming episode.
We really want to hear from you. We're grateful that you're engaged in this work. So for today's episode, we're going to be talking about relationship pain points, primarily within the context of marriage or intimate or dating relationships, any committed relationship where you're trying to stay in it with someone over the long haul. But this episode is also for you if you're not in a committed relationship.
Maybe you're single, maybe you're recently out of a relationship–I promise you that these strategies and tips that we're going to talk about today also apply to you because they really apply to everyone in any long term relationship where you want to have a healthy, vibrant relationship over time.
Every single one of the books that I've written, Boundaries For Your Soul, The Best of You, and I Shouldn’t Feel This Way, all of these books include chapters with strategies for relationships. In Boundaries for Your Soul, We talk about dealing with the challenging part of a significant other or loved one.
In The Best of You, I talk about how you can begin to use your voice in relationships with very specific scripts and strategies for learning how to use your voice and speak up in a relationship. In today's episode, we're going to use the framework that I teach you in I Shouldn’t Feel This Way, the “name, frame, brave” framework, and apply it to the context of pain points within an intimate relationship.
Those books are such helpful resources if you want to go deeper, if you want to go further in your relationships. All of what I'm going to teach you today is embedded in those resources. If you've been listening for a while, my area of specialty is to combine the best of science and psychology with the best of faith-based wisdom.
I've really scoured the marketplace for some of the top marriage and relationship experts. Experts out there many of whom are not necessarily Christian by background, but they bring such incredible insight into the realities of relationships. In today's episode, I'm going to introduce you to some of those people whose work has influenced me and how I've integrated their work from a faith perspective.
To start out, I'm going to start with a quote by a woman who I think is brilliant at helping us understand that our deepest desire is for intimacy. This quote by Esther Perel, esteemed psychotherapist and bestselling author, really anchors this entire episode. She says this, “it takes two people to create a pattern, but only one to change it”.
I want you to hear that from me today. Whatever you're struggling with, whatever pain point you're dealing with in your relationship, it took two people to create that. A hundred percent that is true. Also, it only takes one to change it. What that means is, you have some power to change your relationship. It's not only up to you, but there's a good part of it that is up to you.
Today we're going to focus on what you can do to show up with your loved one more effectively. What is in your control? Because there's a lot that isn't in your control, but there are some things that are in your control. That's what we're going to focus on in today's episode. Change in your relationships starts inside of you, and I'm gonna unpack what I mean by that because I don't mean that it's only up to you.
I mean that if you really want to change your relationship, you've got to start by looking at yourself first. Jesus says it this way: Matthew 7:5, take the plank out of your own eye first. Is there anything inside of you, any method or strategy or process that you could change inside of you that might shift a dynamic inside of your relationship?
In the context of what Esther Perel is saying and what Jesus is saying, what we're trying to do today is take a look at what's on our side of the street. What do we have control over? What dynamics are we participating in, in an unhealthy way? Where are we not articulating what we actually need and want out of the relationship? Where are we avoiding a hard conversation? Where are we participating in an angry, defensive, critical, or toxic dynamic?
What can we take control of? What is in our power to change? Look at yourself, look at your own dynamics, look at your own needs, look at your own patterns. If you do that work, first, I promise you, you will have more successful outcomes when it is time to communicate and enter into the hard conversations with your loved one.
Here's the thing. Even if you end up realizing, I'm in a toxic relationship, this is untenable. This is unsustainable. If you've done your own work and you arrive at that conclusion, you will have much more clarity about the decisions that you end up making. This is the work. This is how you change your relationships. Any step toward change and transformation will start inside of you.
Now, listen, if you're with someone who is demonstrating toxic patterns of behaviors, please go back and listen to episode one on narcissism and episode two on gaslighting. Go to my website, dralisoncook.com/podcast and do a search. There's a search bar for toxic behaviors.
If you are in a relationship with someone who is consistently demonstrating abusive or toxic patterns of behavior over time, you are going to brave a different path than someone who's in a mostly healthy relationship that has hit a rough patch or a pain point.
Okay. So those episodes are there for those of you who are wondering about that, but regardless of the nature of the pain point in your relationship, the change is going to start when you look deep inside yourself first. You can name, frame, and brave your way into a healthier relationship.
Number one, I want you to name what's hard. This is work you do inside of you you can get really honest with yourself, with God, maybe with a trusted advisor. What is the pain point within your marriage, within your intimate relationship?
This is not the time to be empathetic or try to get into their perspective. This is your opportunity to get really honest with yourself. This is what hurts me. This is what's hard. He doesn't understand this about me. I feel criticized in this specific situation. I feel alone in this area of our relationship. I feel hurt and I can't stop feeling this way.
This is your opportunity to really get specific about what's hard. For this specific pain point that you're feeling, name what's hard. Start with yourself. What do you feel? What emotions are stirred up and what is the specific set of circumstances that stirs up that pain point? Is it when you talk about a specific season in your marriage?
Is it when you talk about your kids? Is it when you talk about work or vocation? Is it when you talk about a dream that you have? Is it that you're not talking enough or at all about things that matter to you? What is that pain point that's making you feel hurt?
Name that honestly. At this point, we don't have to analyze it. We don't have to try to understand their perspective on it. You don't have to try to justify it, or even feel guilty for feeling the way that you feel. This is a pain point that you're feeling. You're naming what's hard. You're naming what's true for you in this moment without claiming that you understand the whole truth of what's going on in this situation.
When you name what's hard, honestly, with yourself and with God, there's humility in it. You might even say, I don't want to feel this way, but I do feel this way. You're getting really honest with yourself when you name what's hard about a person that you love, about a person you're committed to, about a person you're doing life with every single day.
It can be scary to name what's hard. In that situation, you don't want to feel that way. I want to give you permission, in the privacy of your own journal, in the privacy of your own prayer time, to talk to God about it, to talk to a trusted advisor about it. Someone who will honor your relationship, not someone who's going to rip apart that other person. That's not what we're after when we're naming what's hard.
Please hear me say that. Be careful who you confide in when you're naming what's hard about someone you love. Can that person validate what you're feeling without tearing down the relationship or that other person that you love? That's a special kind of confidant. You want that person to honor what's hard while still honoring your devotion, your commitment to that other person.
Someone who won't come to you with an agenda about what they think you should do in the relationship, but someone who can be objective. Someone who can be empathetic, someone who can honor you and say, I don't know how to help you, but I get that what you're feeling is real.
We know we have that person in God. We know we have that person in Jesus. He comes into the hardest pain points of our relationships, where the person we love the most, the person who is supposed to get us, the person who was supposed to love everything about us, has let us down, has hurt us or disappointed us. Jesus comes into those moments and says, I get it.
I get that you're disappointed. I see it. The beauty of Jesus is that he also completely understands that other person. So he stands in the gap there and says, I can hold it. I can hold the honesty of what you feel at this moment. I can step in here and show up for you in a way that this other person can't right now.
It's powerful when you can name what's hard to Jesus with the power of the Holy Spirit. It's also an exercise in what psychologists call differentiation. You're differentiating from that other person. You're saying, I love this person. Also, in this moment, I'm separate from them. I'm different from them. I'm seeing this thing differently from how they're seeing it.
It's breaking my heart, God, because I want this person to get me, but they're not getting me here. I can hold two things in this moment. I can hold the validity of what I'm feeling, even as I can hold the heartbreak that this person I love isn't getting it in the way that I wish that they would.
God steps into those moments with us and something powerful happens when we name what's hard with God or with someone who can hold up the mirror of God for us. In those moments, do not be afraid to name what's hard in the privacy of your own soul with a God who loves you, who is for you, who doesn't gaslight, bypass, or deny the reality that sometimes other people, even the person you love the most, doesn't get you.
It's hard, and God doesn't deny that reality. That's number one in this process of transforming your relationships. It's learning to differentiate enough from that other person to be able to name what's hard, honestly, while simultaneously honoring that you care about the relationship. You wouldn't be hurt by this other person if you didn’t care.
So you can honor both of those things with God buffering you, holding you, helping you understand yourself well, before you even get to the point of trying to do something or to instigate a change in your relationship. We don't even know the circumstances yet.
That leads us to number two. I want you to frame your reality. Again, you're not yet going to the other person. You're still doing this in the quiet of your own soul with God, with that trusted advisor. You're trying to get to the root of the problem. When you frame it, you're trying to understand key questions. I go through the “frame” acronym in detail in chapter three of I Shouldn’t Feel This Way.
You can get the first three chapters of I Shouldn’t Feel This Way for free on my website, but I'm going to quickly go through it now. F: What are the facts? What actually happened? Not what I feel about what's happened, but what are the facts about what has happened? Are the facts that there's something that my spouse or my loved one does that is really objectively hurtful? They're hurting me. Maybe they're even hurting other people. That's the fact. So what are the facts?
R: You might look at the roots. When did it start? How long has it been going on? You might ask yourself, what have you tried in the past? Have you tried talking about it? Have you tried bringing it up? What happened? What worked? What didn't work? What have you tried that time and time again doesn't work to bring change?
Then we get to M. What are the messages that you're telling yourself about this? It is important to look at the messages inside your own mind. Are you telling yourself it'll never change? Are you telling yourself that it's your fault? That if you'd done things differently, this never would have happened? Are you shaming yourself? Are you really judgmental of your loved one?
Do you hear a critical voice in your head about the other person? It's all their fault. If they weren't selfish, if they ever thought about someone other than themselves…Now, listen, even if there's some truth to that, harboring an attitude of judgment and criticism never leads to change. If you're looking at facts and going, the facts are I'm dealing with a very selfish person. That's a fact.
You can honor that fact from a healthy distance without feeling deep-seated contempt, criticism, or judgment for that other person. John Gottman talks about the four horsemen that kill relationships. One of them is criticism, and the biggest one is contempt. You cannot heal a relationship when you're feeling contempt for that other person.
So if you notice in your mind, either self-shaming, self-blaming, or self-contempt, that's not going to help you brave a new path. Or if you're noticing deeply critical, contemptuous, judgmental feelings toward your loved one, that's also not going to help you brave a new path.
Honestly, where we're shaming and condemning ourselves is very close to where we're also going to be shaming and condemning our loved one. In the words of Jesus, we tend to do unto others as we do unto ourselves. Where there is self-hatred, self-blame, and self-contempt, there tends to also be hatred, blame, and contempt of our loved ones.
Can we face that honestly inside of ourselves? Say, man, I've got to start learning how to be a little kinder to myself through this pain point in my relationship. You know what? Maybe that little bit of self-compassion that you start to offer yourself might open up a tiny window of compassion toward this other person that you love.
Maybe they're also not able to do any better than what they're doing right now. Doesn't mean you have to move right into empathy. It means that right now, I might need to frame where I am in this relationship as, oh my goodness, a part of this tangled up knot is that I don't like myself very much in this.
The bravest thing I could do in this relationship is first work on healing that shame inside of me, so that I can strengthen my resilience. I can strengthen my reserves. I can start to show up more genuinely, more authentically, with more inner core strength in my relationship.
Okay. So you need to notice, what are those mental messages that you're telling yourself. As you frame what's going on in the specific pain point of your relationship, you look at the facts, you look at the roots, you audit what you've done and tried, and what has worked and what hasn't worked. You really examine those internal messages that you tell yourself.
You really look at what you're believing about yourself and about your loved one. Then I want you to create what I call “a holy reframe”, that accounts for the whole truth of the situation. It gets at the larger frame, and that larger frame is what's gonna help you figure out the brave steps you need to take.
Here are some examples of three different frameworks you might arrive at as you frame your situation. Number one. Is it a toxic dynamic? In other words, is it a co-created dynamic where there's a specific pattern of relating that you both contribute to? Maybe it's around household chores. Let's use that as an example.
Maybe you feel really resentful. You believe that you're doing everything around the house, that your spouse isn't doing anything to help. Whenever you bring that up, they feel criticized and underappreciated. They get defensive and you get really critical.
Maybe a part of you pipes in, a kind of a lawyerly part of you, that pipes up and presents all the data that proves that you are in fact the one doing way more of the household chores. By golly, you are right. You've won the argument. They're completely mad. They're now stonewalling you because they feel completely rejected, completely criticized, completely shut down, completely undervalued.
Both of you together in that moment have created a worse situation instead of approaching a legitimate pain point–household chores. It’s a very legitimate pain point in many relationships and many marriages with a toxic dynamic. If you're framing it that way, you've got to wrestle with the fact that okay, there's a toxic pattern here. The brave step is going to be, what's my part in that? How do I change how I show up in that pattern in that situation?
Number two, you might frame your particular pain point as something that hurts, but can't be changed. What I mean by that is maybe the other person has a trait or a habit or a set of beliefs that is really hard for you. But it's probably not going to change.
Maybe you married someone who is really adventurous and creative and takes you on all these adventures, but they're not very responsible around the house or they tend to show up late for things. Or maybe you married an exceptional problem solver or somebody who's really steady and really disciplined, but they're not great at showing empathy.
They don't know how to validate your emotional experiences. Part of your relationship can at times feel lonely. Maybe it's a habit that they have. Maybe they work a lot and you wish they would relax more. Maybe they relax too much and you wish they would work harder. You begin to realize, the pain point in my relationship is related to something about this person that's probably not going to change. That framing will lead you to brave a different path.
Then lastly, as you frame your pain point, you may begin to notice that a lot of it is your own communication style. Maybe you don't even know what the other person thinks or what their beliefs are, how they would respond or how they would change, because you haven't actually figured out how to speak up for what you actually need, what you actually want, what you actually dream of for your relationship.
Or what you're worried about, or what you're concerned about, or what you fear or where you're feeling left out or where you're feeling lonely, but you haven't actually figured out how to talk about. Your brave path is going to be a little bit different in terms of how you frame it. The bottom line is this: when you do the work of naming the pain point, getting really clear about what it is and framing it and understanding the bigger picture, the deeper context of what's happening, when you're really honest with yourself and with God, when you've done the work, I promise you, you will set yourself up much better for when it's time to take action.
This leads us to braving. You've done the work, so much of the work inside yourself. You've named what's hard. You've framed your reality. You understand the bigger picture. Now it's time to brave a new path. I cover this acronym BRAVE in chapter five. There are dozens of strategies and tools and tips in that book, but I'm going to lay out four key strategies specifically related to pain points in your relationship.
As we close out this episode today, here's the thing: no matter how you've framed your pain point, no matter what's going on in your specific relationship, I want you to bear in mind those four horsemen that John Gottman identifies those four destructive forces that never lead to good in a relationship.
That's criticism, contempt, defensiveness, and what he calls stonewalling, which is sort of this extreme avoidance where you almost physiologically shut down. You don't want to deal with anything. Any of those four horsemen won't help you brave a healthier path forward.
Instead, when you think about braving, I want you to think about braving any and all of these four antidotes, the four constructive forces, the four healing forces, the four helpful ways to build more health, more vibrancy, more vitality into your relationship. The first one Gottman calls self-soothing. Learn how to soothe yourself through some of those rough patches, especially in your communication.
This requires the skill of differentiation, learning to differentiate out from some of those painful dynamics, where let's say you tend to get defensive or maybe you tend to get critical, whatever it is that you've identified, you're setting aside, first and foremost, your need to win, your need to change the other person. Instead, you're going to brave the path of shifting your part in that dynamic.
You're going to practice not doing anything in this first step to change your loved one, not doing anything to change your partner. You're going to practice this differentiation and this internal self-soothing. What is it like inside my own body to notice that impulse, to get defensive, to spiral, to criticize, to get reactive? What if I take a deep breath and ground myself inside my own body?
I differentiate. I notice, man, what they're saying right now really activates me. I really want to defend myself. I really want to argue. I really want to criticize and show them where they're wrong, but instead I'm going to brave the path of self-soothing. I'm not going to gaslight myself. I'm not going to be a martyr. Instead I'm braving the path of self-soothing.
I'm taking a deep breath. I'm not going to engage in what they're saying. I'm going to breathe. I'm going to notice what I feel inside. This is hard. This hurts. This makes me feel criticized. I wanted to defend myself, but I'm going to breathe. I'm going to witness what that feels like. God sees it with me in this moment. You're not gaslighting yourself. You're soothing yourself.
You're staying with yourself. You're maybe not saying anything to that other person. You're breathing. You're shifting how you show up in this specific pain point. Remember that quote from the episode's beginning: it takes two people to create a pattern and one person to change it.
You might practice saying different scripts in that moment. Maybe you say nothing. Maybe you let your partner know what you're doing. Listen, I'm trying to show up in a different way. So I'm slowing myself down. I want to be healthier. This topic is hard for me. I might need a minute. I might not respond right away. Maybe I'll get back to you later. Maybe I'll get back to you tomorrow.
Regardless of whether you say something or you really soothe yourself through it, you're relinquishing a need to be right, a need to criticize, a need to defend, and you're changing the dynamic in your relationship. I'm telling you right now, if you shift how you show up in that dynamic, if you learn to differentiate and be with yourself and relinquish those and relinquish that critical defensive posture, it will change things in your relationship.
They'll have to reckon with it. You're creating a growth opportunity by simply shifting how you show up. They're going to have to figure out how to show up differently. It's extremely powerful. It might buy you a little more peace of mind. You know what? I can't change them fundamentally. I can't stop them from doing this, but I can be different.
I can care for myself through this and release my need to be right in this particular set of circumstances. It's a really powerful move and it leads into number two, what Gottman calls personal responsibility. As you shift how you're showing up with them, you're taking responsibility for your own self. It's really empowering and feels great inside when you see, man, I can engage this differently.
I don't have to participate in this old pattern. I can do something differently. That feels really good inside of you. There's some intrinsic reward in noticing that you can change how you show up, regardless of what they're doing, that you can shift out of a critical mindset, that you can shift out of defensiveness, out of argumentation, out of criticism.
You can shift from trying to point out what they need to do, to thinking, this is what I can do in this situation. I can remove myself. I can soothe myself. I can change something about how I show up. I can shift out of avoidance, which is shutting myself down, and instead find constructive ways to take care of myself.
You stop focusing on the work that they need to do and stay very present to your own growth and your own healing. And you see what happens. Some of this has to do with shifting your expectations for the relationship. Harville Hendrix has this quote that I think is really helpful in his book, Getting the Love You Want.
He talks about how sometimes we have to relinquish our need to be right in our relationships. Even when we're right about the growth that our partner or significant other needs to take in their lives, he says, do you want to be right? Or do you want to be in a relationship? Because you can't always have both.
When you're learning to differentiate, to self-soothe, to take responsibility for your own growth first, you're honoring that reality that you're not always going to get your partner to see what you want them to see in key moments. You're letting go of that and you're surrendering that to God and you're saying, God, you know that better than I do.
In this moment and in this particular season, and in this particular pain point of our relationship, I'm gonna focus on what I can do, on the invitation to grow in my own life because I actually wanna be in relationship. And how I stay in relationship in this moment is to work on myself and work on breathing through this particular dynamic and learning to shift how I show up.
I'm not being a doormat. I am exercising power when I do that. You're exercising power in a constructive way. This leads to number three, what Gottman calls the gentle startup. Some of you may need to raise a hard conversation. Your growth curve might be, I need to start speaking up for what I need or for what I long for out of my relationship. That may be your brave step as you're differentiating.
You’re self-soothing as you're taking responsibility for what's yours to take responsibility for. You may need to also practice a general startup where you do raise a concern. You do raise something in the relationship, but there's a skill. There's a way to do it. Both Gottman and Hendricks emphasize the importance of being positive when we raise something in a relationship.
Again, eradicating that critical posture. Criticism is never helpful in an intimate relationship. That's why it's important to do this work inside of yourself first. So if you do decide you need to practice a general startup and you decide you might want to have what I call a negotiation conversation where you want to negotiate for something a little bit different in your relationship, it is important to begin with the positive.
In The Best of You, I lay out detailed scripts and exercises for identifying inside yourself first, what is the positive thing that you're wanting? I call it the deepest longing. You're not going to that person with, I want you to change this, or I want you to do this. Instead, you're going to frame it positively and pragmatically.
You're not going to go to them with the problem. You're going to go to them with your deeper longing. Man, here's what I love about us. Here's what I long for. You're going to cast a vision, that's presumably something they would want too. I long for us to share more activities together. I long for us to create more time to connect in deeper conversation. I long for us to talk more about parenting together.
You're going to frame it in the positive. This is the gentle startup. Here's what I love and here's what I long for even more of. You're also going to give them practical ways that you think that could happen, where you've spent some time considering realistic steps you could take to achieve this vision that you have for both of you.
Here's the difference. It's the difference between going to your spouse and saying, I am frustrated that you never help out with the kids, which is immediately putting them on the defense, and instead going to them from the positive place of saying, man, you know, I would love for us to be on the same page with parenting and life is busy for both of us. What would you think about meeting once a week to talk through some parenting challenges?
Or what would you think about engaging a professional once a month as a place where we could talk through some of these challenges together? It would mean so much to me if we could do that together. You're framing it in the positive versus from a critical place.
Or instead of going to your partner and saying, you never listened to me or you never help around the house, or we never go on dates anymore, instead, you're going to them and saying, man, I miss you. I love spending time with you. Could we do something this week? I'd love to play tennis or go out on a couple's date. What do you think?
Or I'd love to explore the Enneagram together. What would you think about listening to some podcasts together? You're coming from a place inside of yourself where you've soothed your own disappointments and you're not laying those at the feet of your spouse.
You've soothed yourself. You've differentiated. You've done your own work, you've taken responsibility for what you really love. Then, you're creating a moment for a gentle startup with your spouse. What if we try something new together? You're meeting them at a place that's practical for the two of you.
You're not asking for too much, but you're not also asking for too little. You're proposing something realistic that sets you on a path for a new adventure together. You're stating your longing and a pragmatic path toward getting that need met in a way that works for both of you.
The bottom line is that you're not leading from a place of emotional reactivity. You're leading from a calm, clear place inside, that allows you to lead with creativity and playfulness and even confidence, where you're like, why wouldn't you want to do this with me? This will be really cool for us. This will be really fun for us. You're giving your relationship a fighting chance to rise to a better place.
Finally, this gets to Gottman's fourth antidote: you're building a culture of appreciation and a culture of friendship, which entails recognizing the legitimate limits of any relationship. You're not asking that person to change on a dime. You're not asking them to be someone they're not. You're considering your needs. You're considering who they are, and then you're braving a path toward more friendship, toward more connection.
One brave step at a time. Where are the overlapping points of connection? Where do we overlap? You're not asking them to meet all your needs. You're asking them to join you In creating a culture of friendship and a culture of appreciation. It's powerful, your understanding that there are two key ingredients in any relationship.
There's your togetherness and your autonomy, and you're releasing your need to have all your needs met. That's your autonomy. There are some needs you can get met from God and from other friendships, but you're really focusing on that area of overlap, that area of togetherness as being one character primarily by friendship and by appreciation. That's so powerful.
When you really focus on fanning the flames of friendship, what are the areas we do agree on? What are the activities we do enjoy? What do I genuinely and legitimately appreciate about this person? Why am I deeply grateful that this person is in my life? What keeps me going in this relationship?
And really doubling down on that. Here's where we shine. Let's go all in with that. Then I can continue over time to do this work of releasing the areas where I'm not going to get my needs met, where there is some hurt, where I can soothe myself through that, and it takes you into a deeper relationship with God, into deeper relationships with others.
It becomes this dance of growing deeper with your loved one, and also simultaneously going deeper into your own work with God and going deeper into relationships with other people, and you begin to tap into this virtuous cycle of love and of healing. It's the place where growth happens. You're changing. You're becoming a better, healthier person.
You're creating more opportunities for more health and for more wholeness in your relationship, and you will start to notice change. You'll start to feel what hope feels like, because we know as we go back to that pain point, suffering is a part of every relationship.
But suffering, when suffered wisely, produces perseverance, which is that differentiation, that self-soothing, and that perseverance produces character, which is the dexterity and the agility to understand when you need to sit on your wisdom, when you need to soothe yourself versus be right, which is that courageous conversation rooted in love and a vision for who you are at your best in your relationship.
Character produces hope–glimpses of the goodness and the beauty and the joy of a healthy and always healing relationship. This is the virtuous cycle of love that God wants to pour out on each and every one of us as we engage this of healing ourselves and showing up in a healed and whole way within the context of our most intimate relationships.