Social Media Love Story

Have you ever found yourself in an argument that wasn’t going anywhere? This conscious relationship tip from Katie & Gay Hendricks not only teaches us how to avoid arguments, but shows us that telling the truth is about more than just answering questions honestly. It’s about being open & honest with our truest, deepest emotions & feelings.

Here is the third of the seven big discoveries that we made that really allow relationships to thrive.
Here’s the principle:

Relationships thrive in a climate of absolute honesty where there are no hidden feelings or things that are unsaid.

Relationships also thrive when you can listen to the other person free of “listening filters” like:

• listening to fix them
• listening to make them wrong
• listening to criticize them

A filter that we discovered that works a lot better than those filters is shifting to curiosity: just listening for what it is that your partner really wants with curiosity.

Before we shifted to that, one of the things that used to happen was that we misunderstood the power of telling the truth and I thought that telling the truth was really airing my own opinion for example:

“you know, you made me mad. I was fine till you said that and that really made me mad.”
“Well, you know what I think you got that exactly backwards because you’re the one that makes you mad not me”
“oh! Really, and you have that on what kind of authority.”
“Well that’s just the way the universal truth is.”
“Ohh I see, I see. so the truth is you know you’re a Jerk, you know that’s the truth and not only is  that the truth but I have lots of other people who agree with me.”
“All those lady friends of yours that you run around with, i guess those would be the ones…”
“yeah! That’s right! That’s right!!”
“Aha!”
“I’ve taken a pole.”
“And how many successful relationships do all of those people have by the way?”
“Well, I… I… I…”

So, so we had this thing going where where we didn’t understand that what you really need to do is speak the un-arguable truth.

The truth is about saying things that really can’t be argued with. So what we learned to do was speak what we called microscopic truth where we would say something like:

“I feel angry right now and I feel the urge to blame you,”
“Mmm I..I feel sad and I don’t really know why I’m sad”
“Well, I feel scared that I’m not going to be able to figure out how to be close with you.”

What we found when we said those things you might think that that would create distance but what it did was create intimacy, connection and allowed us to solve the problems really quickly.

So, we have a list of the most powerful communications that you can make that allow you to create that kind of intimacy when you are wanting to make the shift to speaking honestly to people you care about. These are some things that would really make a big difference.

The one I just mentioned “I’m scared that…” That’s really a good one because we found that underneath a lot of things people are angry about, but what they really are is afraid of something. So if you are criticizing your partner and you’re really angry, one thing you might say is that “you know I’m scared that I don’t know how to get close to you right now.”

The important thing is to say something that can’t be argued about. Why so many arguments’s happen in the world is because people speak arguably to each other. When people say something like “I’m scared that…” it opens up a heart connection right away and then other kinds of connections can happen really easily.

The second one that we find is really valuable is the sentence: “Even though I’m convinced I’m right, I could be wrong about…” and in your relationships being able to actually let go of being right and open up to another possibility makes a huge difference in creating a thriving relationship.

Another one would be “I think I hear you saying…” and just try out what you think you’re hearing the person saying. If it’s right they’ll say “yeah! That’s what I’m saying” or if it’s wrong they’ll say “No, what I’m really saying is something else.” In any case what you’re doing there is you’re saying “I think I here you saying”, not that “I hear you saying” or “You’re saying…”

The moments when you can get into that unarguable state and speak from that, that’s when the real magic occurs. And the magic is that you could stop arguments but you also increase vitality both in yourself and between you.

So, we have been living in discovery for many many years now where I keep finding out new things about you and deepening our relationship while keeping it fresh. What a great thing for your close relationships.

See larger image Conscious Loving: The Journey to Co-Commitment (Paperback) By (author) Gay Hendricks, Kathlyn Hendricks List Price: $16.00 USD New From: $8.91 In Stock Used from: $0.01 In Stock Release date January 1, 1992.