Shared Contributions
- posted: Jan. 15, 2025
Liza Johnston, LPC, NCC, MS • Contact Liza • relatecounseling.com • @relatecounsel
Shared Contributions
This is the third in a series of blog posts centered on addressing conflict with your partner.
Once you and your partner have begun to understand the “third story,” the story that includes both your perspectives on a conflict, what happens next in a difficult conversation? For me, my mind goes to thinking “I am right” and trying to list why I am right; however, this inevitably leads to feeling virtuous myself while my partner is left steaming or shut down. This feeling of being “right” might seem to boost me, but it really makes me feel sick because I am so distant from my partner and feeling all alone.
The question of “What happened?” (what just lead to this anger with each other) which my partner and I grope to answer usually has us both defending our own thinking and actions. When we try on our own to understand what happened, we tend to defend ourselves and turn toward blame for the other. We can think that we are in the “right,” that we know the intentions of our partner, and that they are in the “wrong.”
Blaming only looks back to the past; it labels and criticizes. Instead of focusing on blame and judgement, we can look instead for our shared contributions. Focusing on joint contributions leads to understanding and a positive movement towards the future. One goal of this path is to discuss how our actions interacted to produce this conflict and how we can interact for a better outcome in the future.
We can call out our own less than helpful behavior (“I wasn’t sure how to bring this up. I wish I had done it sooner. I’ve been acting resentful and kinda mean cause you don’t talk at dinner time. I feel that I have to do all the work to make dinner interesting. I wish I had talked to you about this instead of just being mean and hinting to you and wanting you to figure it out.”)
We can also make suggestions for how we both might change our behavior in order to contribute to less conflict. “Maybe if you told us at the dinner table one interesting tidbit about your day, I would feel more aware of you, and the kids and I could focus on you for a moment. That would be nice for us. I could work on listening more.”
When I can admit my own contribution to a conflict, I end up feeling relieved and feeling warm to my partner. My body relaxes and I feel we can move forward. What a wonderful sensation!
The blogs in this series are based on the content from
Difficult Conversations by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton and Sheila Heen.
- posted: Jan. 15, 2025
Liza Johnston, LPC, NCC, MS • Contact Liza • relatecounseling.com • @relatecounsel
Shared Contributions
This is the third in a series of blog posts centered on addressing conflict with your partner.
Once you and your partner have begun to understand the “third story,” the story that includes both your perspectives on a conflict, what happens next in a difficult conversation? For me, my mind goes to thinking “I am right” and trying to list why I am right; however, this inevitably leads to feeling virtuous myself while my partner is left steaming or shut down. This feeling of being “right” might seem to boost me, but it really makes me feel sick because I am so distant from my partner and feeling all alone.
The question of “What happened?” (what just lead to this anger with each other) which my partner and I grope to answer usually has us both defending our own thinking and actions. When we try on our own to understand what happened, we tend to defend ourselves and turn toward blame for the other. We can think that we are in the “right,” that we know the intentions of our partner, and that they are in the “wrong.”
Blaming only looks back to the past; it labels and criticizes. Instead of focusing on blame and judgement, we can look instead for our shared contributions. Focusing on joint contributions leads to understanding and a positive movement towards the future. One goal of this path is to discuss how our actions interacted to produce this conflict and how we can interact for a better outcome in the future.
We can call out our own less than helpful behavior (“I wasn’t sure how to bring this up. I wish I had done it sooner. I’ve been acting resentful and kinda mean cause you don’t talk at dinner time. I feel that I have to do all the work to make dinner interesting. I wish I had talked to you about this instead of just being mean and hinting to you and wanting you to figure it out.”)
We can also make suggestions for how we both might change our behavior in order to contribute to less conflict. “Maybe if you told us at the dinner table one interesting tidbit about your day, I would feel more aware of you, and the kids and I could focus on you for a moment. That would be nice for us. I could work on listening more.”
When I can admit my own contribution to a conflict, I end up feeling relieved and feeling warm to my partner. My body relaxes and I feel we can move forward. What a wonderful sensation!
The blogs in this series are based on the content from
Difficult Conversations by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton and Sheila Heen.
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