True story:
Once upon a time a couple goes to a very wise marriage therapist and starts spilling the beans on how terrible their marriage is.
It starts with the husband. The more he talks about his wife and everything she’s doing wrong, the more upset and heated he becomes. Pretty soon, he starts ranting.
“She can’t do anything right! All I ask for is a bit of peace and quiet when I finish work and she comes in and…”
As he continues with his laundry list of her errors (including her laundry skills…), he starts using foul language to describe her and all the mistakes she’s been making. At this point, he’s getting really heated and angry and full-on swearing.
The wise therapist patiently listens with full presence to everything he’s saying.
Then, she listens to the wife…
And the same thing happens!
The wife starts talking about what her partner is doing wrong and quickly gets upset and frustrated that nothing she does or says will change his ways. And the more she talks about him, the more irate she gets, and the more harsh and vulgar her words become.
“He’s not a real man. He doesn’t even…”
Eventually, when they settle down a bit the therapist asks:
“What do you think the real cause of your marriage problems is?”
And the woman responds, “It’s just… we’re bad at communicating. He doesn’t express himself. And he just doesn’t get what I’m saying.
The man concurred. “Yeah, I think bad communication is the real problem.”
The wise therapist chimes in:
“With all due respect sir, and madame… I think you should THANK GOD you have bad communication skills! I mean, if you were eloquent and could really express yourselves well when you’re so upset and full of anger, with all the horrible and hurtful things you have to say, your marriage would have ended in divorce a long time ago!”
Immoral of the story:
Communication is only as pure as the heart that’s expressing itself.
If the heart is full of poison, the tongue will spew out poison.
This doesn’t mean we silence ourselves and shut down completely (a typical guy-response to situations he has feelings around). Instead, it means, you learn to let go of the negative feelings like anger, hurt, sadness and envy… and then express what you really mean clearly, if it’s still required.
Sometimes when the fog of negative feelings lifts, you realise you don’t need to say anything as the situation has resolved itself. Turns out, sometimes when you’re mad, you just aren’t seeing things clearly.
And sometimes, when you’re feeling high and happy again, you can communicate clearly, in a loving way to make the request or observation you want to share with your partner, and it’s no big deal.
If you want your marriage to work in a way where you can easily let go of the anger, frustration and upset inside of yourself, instead of taking it out on your partner, then there are a few key skills that will really serve you.
Discover exactly what they are and how to master them here:
