Do you long for a better relationship with your partner? Do you avoid bringing up certain subjects because you’re tired of yet another argument?
Let me let you in on a secret. You don’t need your spouse to change before your marriage can get better. You, right now, have the power to turn your conflicts around. It’s a very simple recipe. There are only two ingredients:
- A dogged commitment to making sure both you and your partner get your needs met
- The faith to keep trying
A Commitment to Meeting Your Partner’s Needs
The fastest way to stop a fight is to convince your partner that you are truly on his or her side. When you show that you care about your partner’s feelings and are committed to fighting for what s/he needs, your partner will calm down and start working together with you. How do you convince your partner? With reckless abandon.
- Apologize early and often.
- Notice and mend hurt feelings right away.
- Seek to understand your partner’s feelings and needs.
- Reassure your partner that his/her needs matter to you.
This is love. It’s loving your partner as yourself. It’s loving your partner even when s/he treats you like an enemy. This kind of love never fails.
Why This Kind of Love Works
Your partner enters fight-or-flight mode when s/he feels threatened. The part of the brain that makes rational decisions (the prefrontal cortex) gets hijacked, and it’s hard for your partner to think cooperatively. That’s when the arguing or distancing starts.
When you do whatever it takes to show your partner that you are a source of comfort, not a threat, your partner physiologically calms down and becomes able to think clearly again. This frees the two of you to hear God’s guidance, access your joint creativity, and figure out a solution that will meet both your needs.
The Power of an Apology
This commitment to caring for a person’s feelings and needs is so powerful that it’s the backbone of psychotherapy. In fact, research has shown that the quality of relationship between a therapist and a client is the single most important factor that predicts how effective the therapy will be. My first and foremost goal in any interaction with a therapy client is to be safe for him or her and to repair rifts in the relationship right away.
I witnessed the dramatic power of this stance in one of my first jobs as a therapist. I was a community-based mental health provider at the time, visiting clients in their homes and schools to provide behavioral support and therapy. Sometimes, due to traffic and unforeseen factors, I would run behind schedule. I always called ahead to alert the next client, and most people did not mind since they were already in their own homes with plenty to do.
However, one child client of mine minded very much! The first time I was late, the child refused to see me at all. I consulted my supervisor, who told me to apologize profusely and to voice the child’s hurt feelings. The next time I visited, the child once again refused to talk to me or even to face me. “I really hurt you,” I said. “I am so sorry. I really, really messed up. You’re really mad at me. I must have done something awful.” As I kept going, I saw the child slowly turn toward me and begin to approach me. At last the child spoke; and we were able to repair the breach in our relationship. I was amazed that something so simple could literally create a 180-degree turn in our relationship. The child did not need my explanations or excuses. The child simply needed to know that I understood how badly I had hurt him and that I was deeply sorry.
Most of us feel young and vulnerable like a child when we are hurt. When your partner acts angrily or defensively, treat your partner as a young child in need of comfort. Offer the empathy and apology that s/he longs to hear.
The Faith to Keep Trying
The cure for conflict is similar to the cure for Naaman the leper in the Bible. It’s very simple, but it does require some humility and some faith. I’m not talking about an abstract faith in God, or the faith that God will finally change your partner for the better.
This is the kind of faith that’s required:
- Faith that God will provide a way for both of you to get your needs adequately met, even when your needs seem diametrically opposed.
- Faith to keep going when it takes longer to reassure your partner than you think it should (and it almost always takes longer!)
When your partner throws angry barbs at you, it is easy for your faith to waver. You will feel an intense temptation to switch to a protective or reactive stance, instead of staying in the place of loving reassurance. You may fear that your partner will use your apologies against you. You may fear that you’ll never be able to reach your partner’s heart. You may fear that it’s impossible for your partner’s needs to be met without compromising your own needs. These are just fears. Take a deep breath and focus on the truth:
- God loves you both.
- He is able to provide for you abundantly.
- Your partner is capable of coming out of fight-or-flight behavior.
- Love never fails.
Of course, it is appropriate and wise to monitor your own needs, to ask gently for your partner to speak more kindly to you, and to take a time-out when you or your partner needs to calm down. But you must not give up. Grab the bull by the horns and hang on! When you doggedly persevere and finally taste the success of taming the fight, your faith will grow. You will feel less threatened in the future by your partner’s angry jabs because you’ll know how to calm him/her down. It gets easier and quicker each time you try it.
Just as my supervisor gave me ideas of what to say to repair my relationship with my client, I’ve compiled a list of simple things to say to help you turn your fights around. You can print it out and hang it on your refrigerator if you need a reminder. Please subscribe below if you want to receive the free cheat sheet.
If you’d like even more ideas, there’s a set of flash cards you can use with your partner. Each card has a statement that helps in relationship repair, and the back of each card has “field notes” to explain how to use the statement. You can look through the cards with your partner to talk about how you’re both feeling about your conflicts, or just hand your partner one of the cards if you don’t have the words to speak.
Don’t Give In or Give Up
Apologizing and seeking to meet your partner’s needs is not the same thing as giving in or giving up your own needs. The only thing you need to sacrifice is a little bit of pride. If you let your partner win at your expense, it will only breed resentment inside of you. Remember that your commitment is to finding a way for both of you to win. This may take a lot of soul-searching to understand each other’s points of view. It may also take a lot of creativity. The working solution might even require both of you to grow new skills. But when you make a firm commitment to this win-win stance and do whatever it takes to reassure your partner of your good intent, you will not fail to turn your conflicts into opportunities to grow closer and to gain a deeper respect for one another.
Why It’s Time to Level Up
Don’t wait until your partner deserves it before you love him or her in this way. If God waited until we deserved it before He loved us, we’d all go to hell. And that is exactly where tit-for-tat relationships end up: relational hell. Commit to this win-win stance because it will benefit you. Do it because it’s the only way out of the ugly fight-or-flight dance. Like a Chinese finger trap, the more you pull for what you want, the more stuck the conflict will be. But conversely when you first reassure your partner that you care deeply about what s/he wants, you turn your partner back into your teammate; and together you will succeed in finding a way to get your needs met, too.
One Final Note
While it never hurts to give this kind of love to others, if your partner has been physically violent toward you, these tools are not enough. The first step is to get outside help. STAND is a great resource for families facing domestic violence. They can connect you to free support groups as well as provide 24-hour support through their crisis line. The book Why Does He Do That? by Lundy Bancroft is another a good resource for understanding what’s going on. It’s also a good idea to reach out for individual therapy.
You are not alone. I am confident that as you reach out, you will figure out the next step you need to take.
May you live deeply and love deeply, friend!
Related Posts
If you’re interested in reading more about marriage, check out my post about the four promises that help you build a secure attachment or take the Marriage Fitness Test to learn about common behaviors that put marriages at risk. If secrets and shame have been holding you back, check out my post on secrets, shame, and hope.
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