Try This Incredibly Simple, Slightly Dumb Trick If You Want To Make Your Partner See Your Point Of View
We sometimes forget how monumental the smallest things can be.
by The Candidly Team
We all know the danger of letting little things snowball in a relationship.
“He forgot to move the trash bins, therefore, he doesn’t hear me when I ask him things, therefore he isn’t interested in what I say, therefore he never listens, therefore he doesn’t care about me, therefore this relationship is doomed.”
Things of that nature.
That said, there is something very real about the invisibility we can feel in a relationship. But according to relationship researcher Dr. John Gottman, co-founder of The Gottman Institute, a lot of that feeling is fixable. And fixing it isn’t always this big dramatic dissection and overhaul of your entire relationship. It’s actually the little things - teeny, tiny actions that say I’m listening and I like you. As Gottman put it “successful long-term relationships are created through small words, small gestures, and small acts.”
And here is one that could save you from worlds of conflict.
When you’re talking to your partner and you want them to really hear you, in a kind, gentle way, touch their arm.
There’s certainly research to back up the persuasiveness of physical touch, including a study finding that “a touch on the arm enhanced the brain's response to emotional pictures,” which led researchers to conclude that “emotional information presented concurrently with touch may be more motivating.” According to an article on The Gottman Institute, there’s even evidence to show that “holding your partner’s hand during difficult times can sync your heart rate and breathing, and even alleviate pain.”
But the more intuitive reasoning is this:
When you touch the person, you’re opening the door to two things Gottman says are absolutely critical to a healthy, lasting relationship where both partners feel seen and heard:
1) You’re making a bid for connection .
2) You’re “turning towards” them instead of away.
“A bid is any attempt from one partner to another for attention, affirmation, affection, or any other positive connection,” wrote Certified Gottman Therapist Zach Brittle, LMHC. When couples learn to pay attention to each other’s bids, they stop a cycle that can create more distance and contribute to the feeling that each of them is not being understood or valued by the other.
In fact, Gottman’s research shows that couples who stay together longterm turn towards one another 86% of the time, whereas couples who split average about 33%.
So where does physical touch factor into all of this? Well, for starters it signals to the other person that you are on the same team, coming from a soft, open place, what Gottman calls a “gentle startup.” Gottman’s research has shown that you can predict a couple’s likelihood of divorce based on the first three minutes of how they handle a conflict. So you really want to enter into the conversation with softness, in particular avoiding the four horsemen of the relationship apocalypse (you guessed it, another Gottman term).
Here is an example of how any of these four horseman can take hold in an instance as simple as your partner not taking out the trash bins:
Criticism: “I can’t believe you forgot again. You never listen to me when I ask for help.”
Contempt: “You always just think about yourself and leave me to do all the work.”
Defensiveness: “How can you complain? I seriously do everything around here.”
Stonewalling: Dead silence, because you’re too busy icing and ignoring the other person.
In addition to not starting a conversation in full combat mode, when you do something small to establish a warm connection with your partner, like touch their arm, make eye contact, or show you’re willing to take actual time to talk (and also listen when they speak), you’re actually doing something huge. From there, you just have to do 3 things:
Be specific and focus on the issue at hand.
Use “I” statements to show this is not about blame. This is about stating your own positive need that will help you feel supported.
And finally, don’t go on the attack in a way that could trigger the other person.
So, here’s that same trash bin example from above rephrased as a positive need:
“I feel overwhelmed when things get forgotten and I have to do them on my own, and I need to feel like we’re a team who remembers to do things like take out the bins together.”
Now all of this might sound really mundane and specific, but as Gottman constantly points out, a relationship is just millions and millions of tiny interactions, and it’s wild how much difference it makes to choose to do the slightly softer thing. “Trust is built in very small moments, which I call 'sliding door' moments,” said Gottman. “In any interaction, there is a possibility of connecting with your partner or turning away from your partner. One such moment is not important, but if you're always choosing to turn away, then trust erodes in a relationship - very gradually, very slowly.”
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