couple relationships: turn and be kind!
“Let me be your electric meter/I will not run out/let me be the electric heater/you get cold without”
-John Cooper Clark
“I swear if you existed, I’d divorce you”, rasps Martha (played by Elizabeth Taylor) to George (played by Richard Burton) in the film of Edward Albee’s play Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf[1]. The savage interplay between husband and wife-a pattern of viscous point-scoring cat and dog behaviour-in the film is a painful study of an intimacy dark and almost wholly negative, yet still deeply intimate; this couple know each other inside out enough to push every button going. And they do.
Its often remarked that every couple relationship goes through its stage of power and control. As the relationship develops, roles and identities change, so too individuals change in relationships, influenced as they are by a host of external events such as work stress, childbirth, loss of parents and many more.
Trying to retain a sense of personal power and agency is one thing, but-like Martha and George-it can slide into and habitually remain a cycle of dominance and contempt.
Marriages fail, people have affairs, and figures suggest that the only reason marital breakup might be lessening is because more people are choosing to live together unmarried[2].
How, in our couple relationships, might we best ensure we stay together?
John Gottman, of the Gottman Institute[3] in 1990 held a couples retreat for 130 couples and discovered something quite profound. Every time couples attempted to communicate with each other (Gottman called this a “bid”) they would respond in three ways: they would turn away from each other, turn against each other or turn towards each other. Let’s look at some examples of each:
One partner begins to communicate (makes a bid) with the other one
- Turn away: the other partner walks out the room, raises the volume on the TV, shrugs their shoulders
- Turn against: the other partner ridicules or shows contempt (Gottman suggests that showing contempt for the other in a couple relationship might be a clear predictor that it will end)
- Turn towards: the other partner responds by giving their partner attention
The latter response, turning towards, is the best predictor of success, Gottman suggests, in a couple relationship.
And yet, there is a caveat, or at least two points to be made about this turning towards. It does not need to do done with agreement-an interesting observation since most of us might think agreement must be made; and it is better done with kindness. Diane Gehart in Mindfulness and Acceptance in Couple and Family Therapy also stresses the importance of kindness in couple relationships; the research of Wachs and Cordova[4] similarly suggest mindful kindness “confers specific benefits in the context of intimate relationships” (ibid). Furthermore, the neural roads that once were rickety little tracks but over time grow into superhighways in our brains need time to fire in a different direction; in other words, if we want to change it requires dedication and patience upon experiencing setbacks. That’s why lasting change can often be facilitated best with an experienced couple therapist.
Pausing, taking a breath and turning towards a partner with kindness, working not just to understand the roots of our past issues, the stage we are present at within our individual and couple lives, all of these things form a solid foundation of good couple therapy and good couple connection.
But perhaps turning towards our partners with kindness replaces a vicious cycle of habits with a more virtuous one over time.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mk8QkYgz8QM
[2] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/12011714/Divorce-rate-at-lowest-level-in-40-years-after-cohabitation-revolution.html
[4] http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.501.4449&rep=rep1&type=pdf
