A Communication Pattern That Doesn’t Work

You’d be amazed at how much your partner might say to you that you don’t actually hear. You may think you hear it. You might even place bets on how well you hear them. But if I gave you a pop quiz and asked you to repeat what you heard them say, you’d probably fall short. 

How can I be so sure? I see it over and over again when working with couples in therapy or relationship counseling.

When I watch a couple interact and notice all the missed messages, I initially offer some loose but more specific structure to help slow the conversation down. My goal is to help the “receiver” get the message and repeat it back so that the “giver” feels heard. 

Guess what happens 99% of the time? The receiver still misses important parts. 

So we go slower. Many times, I have to limit the giver to saying only one or two sentences at a time, so that the receiver can correctly reflect what they heard. 

One or two sentences at a time. That’s it. When this happens, most couples feel shocked. They feel like they’ve failed a communication test. 

I promise you, this is no failure. It’s an important primal, physiological response to a perceived threat. Unfortunately, this ingrained primal response also gets in the way of intimate connection. 

Below, I’ll help you better understand your communication breakdown as well as give you a structure to practice that might help you make progress on your own. 

What Does Responsible Loving Mean?

Responsible loving represents a conscious deliberate effort to share, hear, pay attention, and understand the other in the face of conflict.

If you’re the partner who’s upset, it means regulating yourself so that you can present your concerns from a functional, mature place.

If you’re the partner receiving the complaint, it means to listen first and respond second. Listen fully first. Respond second. 

It is an active position, not a passive default. 

Most people do not practice responsible loving. We may share and listen, but not with a sense of responsibility toward the task, especially in the face of conflict. 

Instead, we multi-task, defend, assume or interpret, often, all happening before the other person has even finished their thought.

Responsible loving requires you to be present-centered, attentive, and aware. It is intentional, and purposeful, and holds the ultimate goal of finding connection, even amongst differences. 

How Conflict Can Trigger Disconnection

Several factors play into why intimate partners struggle to hear each other. For this article, I’ll share some research from The Gottman Institute that tends to make sense to a lot of the couples that we work with. 

Gottman coined the term “flooding” to represent the physiological changes that can happen when partners try to communicate with each other. 

He explains that one partner can induce defensive behaviors in the other when they approach a conversation or conflict from a place of criticism, contempt, defensiveness, or stonewalling. 

Once you become defensive, your physiology changes.

That means that internally, your heart rate increases, the pace of your breath changes, your pulse increases, your hands might start to sweat, and your face might begin to flush. Your body changes. 

When this happens, your body has entered its natural defensive state of fight, flight, or freeze. In this state, you can no longer really hear what your partner is saying. You may think that you do, but because your physiology shifted, your body is distracted. As a result, you miss important information. 

There are exercises that the giver can do to improve their delivery and decrease the possibility of inducing a defensive response. We have many articles to address this. 

However, as the listener, it’s equally important to work on your own responsible listening skills to help minimize defensive responses.

Slowing down is key for both sharing concerns and receiving them.  

How to Take Accountability and Stay Calm

Whether you’re the giver or receiver, slowing down is essential. This can feel hard to do when emotions run high. 

Whether you’re the giver or receiver, consider what you may need to do to stay calm and tuned in during a challenging conversation.

Some steps to take include:

• Approach the conversation by assuming the good in your partner first
• Strive to connect more than to be right
• Consider your intentions – are they healthy?
• Avoid blame and shame language
• Take a walk beforehand to let go of tension
• Practice deep belly breathing daily
• Make eye contact often when speaking with each other
• Practice conscious breathing throughout the conversation

These steps will help you keep your body in a calm state, open your heart to connection and bring intentionality to your conversation. 

When you create more inner peace and calm on your own, your approach to your partner and your receipt of information will naturally be more peaceful. 

Achieving more inner peace does not mean that you necessarily feel good about a conflict. It does mean that you take responsibility for your own self-regulation so that you can interact from a place of calm instead of a reactive, dysregulated state. 

When More Structure is Needed

It may feel silly at first to follow a script on how to talk about hard things, but let’s face it, most of us haven’t been taught how to create a peaceful resolution. Most of us have either seen our parents or caregivers fight it out, practice the silent treatment, brush problems under the rug, ignore problems or live with lots of tension. 

Scripts like the one below help the giver slow down a lot and also creates lots of room for the receiver to practice responsible listening.

It’s forgiving, in that, if the receiver misses important information, there’s an opportunity for the giver to share it again.

What I appreciate most about the exercise below is that it ultimately leads a couple toward communication that includes responsible listening, empathy, compassion, shared understanding, and meaning-making. 

Practice This Structured Dialogue at Home

In the exercise below, choose a subject that feels difficult to talk about.

If you are the person who has the complaint, follow the cues for “the giver” role.

Your partner will be in “the receiver” role.

Follow the prompts until you’ve completed the exercise.

Once you’ve moved through the entire structure, switch roles.

Now “the receiver” has an opportunity to respond to the complaint, using the same structured dialogue.

Phase 1: Content Reflection

(GIVER) State your concern (try to limit this to 2 sentences at a time)

(RECEIVER) Reflect back what you heard by saying:

“What I heard you say was______” (try to be exact). 

Ask “Is there more?”

(GIVER) Add more if needed (Remember 2 sentences at a time)

Repeat this cycle until the stated concern is complete.

Phase 2: Emotions Reflection

(RECEIVER) Notice if the giver told you how all of this makes them feel. If not, ask them to tell you now.

Giver: Make sure to use language that reflects emotions, not thoughts. Example: This made me feel foolish, disappointed, sad, hurt, angry, unloved, etc.

Once they do, follow the next prompt below.

“I heard you say that all of this makes you feel _______. Did I get that right?”

(GIVER) Confirm or correct the information.

(RECEIVER) If incorrect, try again:

“I heard you say that all of this makes you feel _______” Did I get that right?”

If you’ve been able to complete this part, move on to the next phase.

If not, keep coming back to the prompts above until the giver feels the receiver has heard the information correctly.

Phase 3: Connect with Empathy

(RECEIVER) Think about how your partner said they felt. Now think of a time in your own life when you too might have felt that way. Think of a story that doesn’t involve your partner at all. Maybe it involves another family member or a friend. Think of the details of that story. Once you have it, take a moment to share it with the giver by saying:

“I know that feeling of __________. I felt that way too when __________.” Add as much detail to your story as possible and try to relate to the feelings stated by the giver. 

Phase 4: Connect with Validation

“So, it makes sense to me that you might feel _________ because of (now restate the giver’s concern about the relationship). I understand.” 

(Receiver) Remember that you don’t have to fully agree with your partner’s perspectives.

Your goal here is to really hear them, consider their thoughts and feelings, and ultimately find a way to understand where they’re coming from, even if you don’t fully agree. 

(Giver) Notice how it feels to be heard and understood.

Now, consider that you will switch roles. Can you do the same for your partner’s views?

Conclusion

Loving relationships require that each partner assume responsibility for the health of the relationship. Some of that work is personal and some of it is relational.  Responsible loving is a sign of maturity and ultimately leads to joy, connection, and fulfillment.