Should you stay or should you go?

“Opposites attract,” they say, but similarities are more likely to keep a couple together through difficult times.

I’m beyond relieved my husband is thorough when it comes to filing our taxes, or planning for our retirement. I simply don’t have the patience to figure all of that out. On the other hand, he’s been known to appreciate my insights into interpersonal relationships. 

Alas, our diversity also provides more room for friction.  

We know relationships are work,
but how much work is too much work? 

So fights happen. Maybe you have the best intentions, but didn’t think of all the ways your comments could be misunderstood. Maybe you were disengaged or distracted, and accidentally hurt your partner’s feelings. Maybe it’s just one of those days where everything goes wrong. I've come to realize that

relationships feel like too much work when you’re doing the best you can, and there’s still resentment, accusations, and misunderstandings.

The new, different things that once attracted us to our partners often end up annoying the hell out of us. You know the feeling when you just can’t seem to get on the same page? This is more likely to happen during periods of heightened stress (like quarantining in a pandemic). Everyone’s fuse is shorter, and it's easy to make assumptions about behavior that doesn't correspond to the intentions. 

If these disagreements become habitual (“you said xyz” - “but that’s not what I meant”), it may indicate that the underlying trust is eroding. Once we think our partner is saying or doing something “on purpose”, ie to cause us harm, it’s hard to get back into a more loving mindset again.

People in stable, supportive relationships trust that their partner is on their side, not out to get them or compete with them. 

Much like “the universe is conspiring in my favor”, try assuming a "supportive bias" from your partner. 

For me, that's where Personality Type knowledge comes in. It has been the most effective tool in my 15-year relationship. 

Over the years, my husband and I have learned to incorporate personality type (= value-neutral) language to describe our different points-of-view. Our Types inform how we make meaning of life, which expectations we carry, and how we interpret the behaviors we observe. 

What does that look like?

He has preferences for INTP (Introversion, Intuiting, Thinking, Perceiving), and I have ENFJ preferences (Extraversion, Intuiting, Feeling, Judging). He's also Spanish and I'm German, so we have a lot of room for friction, but let's just look at one thing: 

Thanks to Type, we know that the thing he’s great at and loves doing (introverted Thinking = analyzing) is the thing that stresses me out, and the thing that I can’t not do (extraverted Feeling = connecting, empathizing) is the thing that stresses him out. 

For example, he used to insist that he doesn’t have any emotions. I took that as a challenge to prove him wrong and point out all the emotional things he was doing. Boyfriend’s shutters went down faster than you could say “robot”. 

I, on the other hand, think all emotions are valid. I let them move through me with gusto. I have this image of them sitting around a table and talking things out. If one of them gets suppressed, I know it's still there, bubbling under the surface. When I start having imaginary arguments in my head, that's usually a good sign I should acknowledge some anger, fear, or sadness out loud. Whatever the emotion, better to deal with it while it’s at the table, and listen to what it's trying to communicate. 

All that to say that, if I’m sad - or if I see someone else be sad, or there's an unfair thing happening anywhere near me - I get upset. I’ve been upset and crying a lot over the years, which has always been very uncomfortable for my man. His knee-jerk reactions used to be to try and get me to smile, or remove himself from the situation. The first invalidated my experience, the second left me feeling abandoned. 

I now understand his INTP wiring enough to know he’s not shutting me down or shutting me out. He isn't being harsh or unloving "on purpose". His brain can't analyze my reactions, because they're subjective to me, not objectively logical to him. I understand that his reaction has nothing to do with me or my worth. And that means I don't have to feel misunderstood or abandoned. 

He now understands my ENFJ wiring enough to know that my emotions are fluid (not just liquid tears, but also passing). To solve the problem, "Doris cries, now what?", he only has to hug me, not fix me. More importantly, my emotions don't have to make sense to him. That may still bug the shit out of him, but he knows I'm just expressing my empathy and desire to feel connected. And that takes the pressure off him. 

To me, that's what celebrating and appreciating differences in a marriage is about: you don't have to be the same. You don't have to always agree. You may not even have to "get them". 

You do have to let your partner be who they are, so both of you can show up fully for each other. 

Here's the dirty little secret: another thing that makes marriage feel like a lot of work is trying to pretzel-bend my partner into someone he's not. Once I let go of that urge to control, and the image I had of how it should be, our relationship took a deep breath, and started stretching and growing naturally. 

Resource

This model is also known as the "Ladder of Inference" or "Ladder of Assumptions".

Starting at the bottom rung, it breaks down step by step what tends to happen in our minds when we see something, interpret it, and how those interpretations affect our behavior. 

Here's the example I described.

"Before" refers to not having self- or Type awareness. The "I'll cry harder" action is a short way of saying "well, I didn't get the reaction I wanted, so I guess I'll have to dial it up for next time." You can imagine how pre-loaded the steps become when the cycle starts over again. 

"After" refers to using Type knowledge to reframe the experience with more constructive interpretations.

The first few times you try this, it's probably going to feel a little clunky or forced, but with practice, it'll get a lot easier. Obviously, the human experience is more nuanced and doesn't always fit neatly into steps, but it's a good place to start. ;-) 

Download your own Mental Gymnastics worksheet here.