Welcome to the first 2006 issue of our newsletter. This month we have some thoughts on marriage as a form of mutual disturbance – and is it all right to deliberately disturb your partner in the interest of that person’s growth? We also have observations on the virtues of humility, occasioned by my poor performance in Spanish class.

We include an article of mine, new to the site, on imbalance in communication and ways of correcting it and a Relationship Tip, also with suggestions on the importance of taking care of yourself, even in the best of relationships.

In the future, we will hopefully include readers’ comments and experiences. You can help that cause by writing us, in response to the questions and issues raised in this issue, at newsletter @marriagesupport.com.

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One Always Speaks, the Other Always Listens
In the most familiar of all patterns of couple communication imbalance, one partner does nearly all the talking and the other nearly all the listening. Few couples like this pattern.

Even those for whom this has been “the way we are” for a long time, resent the pattern. The one who does all the speaking doesn’t acquire skills in listening. Because the “always listening” partner tuned out long ago, the “always talking” partner usually feels unappreciated.

Correspondingly, the “always listening” partner suffers from atrophied speaking skills, if not in other relationships, certainly in this one. As the non-talker, he is also typically the non- asserter, having surrendered his desires and points of view, along with his right to speak.

Both are lonely in the relationship, because fundamentally they don’t connect.

This familiar pattern of one-way speech often begins with a misunderstanding. Assuming that the silent partner is the husband, originally he said nothing when she stopped talking, because he thought that she wasn’t really finished speaking.

Actually, she was finished. However, when he didn’t respond, she resumed. She interpreted his silence to mean that he didn’t understand her. So she delivered the same message a second time. Then, when he was still silent, she tried a third time, elaborating and adding examples. He remained silent, thinking, “I guess she still needs to talk.”

He never said, “Are you finished now?” She never asked, “Are you silent because you don’t understand what I am saying?” Before long, what began as a misunderstanding became a habit: She did more and more of the talking, until basically she was doing it all. He waited silently for her to finish and then returned to whatever he had been doing before she started her monologue.

Quite likely she was naturally more the extroverted talker and he more the introverted listener. But because they didn’t talk, what could have been a minor difference of personality became instead two people unhappily bound in their respective roles: The more she talked, the less he said anything. And the silenter he became, the more she filled the strained silence with her own words.

Typically, he did speak up at some point – perhaps on something that he felt urgent about. But her resentment had become so great that probably she cut him off or took the conversational ball quickly away from him. Her behavior confirmed the view that, by this time, he had developed: There was no sense in trying to talk to her. She was a better talker than he and would always win.

Clearly, this couple needs to have a “meta conversation” - a conversation about their lack of conversation. Such a conversation is only possible if both partners approach it in a nonjudgmental manner – avoiding argument, and going instead for open sharing.

Most couples can benefit from talking together about their communcation. Consider such a conversation with your partner.

Suggestions:

1. Ask each other: Fundamentally, how do you feel about the way we communicate with each other? Afterward ask, when is it good? When is it not good? At the end ask, Did you feel safe having this conversation?
2. If your relationship suffers from a “talking/listening imbalance,” follow this approach: The silent partner comes up with an interest or concern that he is willing to talk about to the other person. They agree that basically he will talk and she will listen. In preparation, he gets his thoughts in order, and she assumes the “interested and receptive” stance of good listening.
3. In the future, when either one brings up an important topic for discussion, they delay the discussion for a day, during which each person gets together the points that she or he wants to make. They take turns being the one to open the discussion.
4. Try practicing the “she said/he said” rhythm of conversational speech. Sit opposite each other. The speaker holds a pillow and tosses it to the listener when he or she is finished. The listener must then speak and toss the pillow back. The pillow in motion is used to teach the rhythm of regularly alternating speech.

Copyright © 2006 Dr. David Sanford/Promising Partnerships, Inc. All rights reserved.

For permission to quote from or duplicate this article, please write permission@marriagesupport.com.

Do you want to read further? See the marriagesupport.com article collection on Communication Problems.

Take Good Care of Yourself in Marriage

“I have to take care of myself in this marriage.” The statement suggests a hostile relationship, in which if I don’t take care of myself, my partner is going to abuse me or take advantage of me.

Yes, clearly there are relationships in which you do have to take care of yourself in the sense suggested. However, the advice to take care of yourself applies equally well to healthy relationships. Here is how.

In a healthy relationship, “taking good care of yourself” often means setting limits to the demands of others so that you have sufficient time and space to know what your own needs actually are (“time for myself,” “space for myself.”)

It means finding meaning for yourself outside the relationship – like friends and activities you enjoy. It means refusing to dump on yourself for mistakes or inadequacies and instead being your own “friendly witness” to your positive qualities and the good things that you do.

Okay, it’s important to take good care of yourself in a marriage or any couple relationship – but how much? Enough so that you don’t find yourself depending on your partner to provide you with what you ought to be providing yourself but either refuse to do so or can’t.

That’s the “don’t ask someone to do for you what you should be doing for yourself” answer. It is good advice, but it doesn’t help us distinguish between what caring partners ought to be doing for each other and what is the responsibility of each to do for himself or herself.

I think it comes down to this: In the areas of meaning, affection, interest and value, we are fundamentally responsible for our own needs. All of our needs? No. If we were able to meet all of them, we would be independent – even of the need for a partner.

We need to be responsible for our own needs to balance the tendency of most of us to assume, in a committed relationship, that our partner will take care of our needs. If we marry with that assumption, we may well also find that our spouse has the same assumption as ours. With two needy people, who will do the giving?

You burden a relationship with your needs when, rightly or wrongly, you ask more of your partner than your partner is able or willing to give. Your partner may start out willing, but if what she or he gives you is not enough and you find fault, you influence your partner to give less, not more. Such is not your intention, but it almost always works that way.

Healthy relationships of equals are not based on need but on mutual interest and appreciation. There is a lot of room in such a relationship for interdependence - two people out of love to look out for each other’s well being.

I’ve got to look out for myself in our relationship, not because you make me but because, with you doing the same, that is the way to keep us healthy.

Activity

1. Do you think that your partner feels burdened by needs of yours that your partner thinks you should be meeting yourself? List your assumptions. Then share them with your partner. Find out of you are right.
2. Do you think that your partner wishes that you brought more of your needs to the relationship – that you are in fact too independent, in your partner’s view? Find out of you are right. List your assumptions. Then share them with your partner.
3. In what areas of your life do you know that you need to take better care of yourself? What have been the consequences for your relationship of your under-caring for yourself in these areas?