One Agenda at a Time
You find that you and your partner regularly try to talk about your problems and it ends up spiralling out of control into a full blown screaming match? Would you like to have a civil discussion about what needs to change without it ending up in world war 3? How would being able to stop the escalation into name-calling and finger pointing be? Well it’s a simple as having only 1 agenda on the table at a time. What that means is not bringing your own stuff, thoughts, feelings, emotions, etc to the table when the other person has the floor. Another way of describing it is topping. We all know a topper (no not tosser!!), you say, oh I broke my angle last month & the immediately say oh well I broke both of mine. It shuts us down & we feel unheard & we disengage with the other person. It’s a mastered art not to be a topper however one very much worth the effort.
How it works is, if your partner wants to talk and they say (for example) “the other night when we were at Alice’s place I felt humiliated when you were talking about our sex life.” The key here is to not make it about you, this is how they feel. So an appropriate response would be, “I’m sorry I unset you, that was not my intention, can I do anything to make it better?” Most people don’t do this, they would say something like, “don’t get upset I was only joking” or, “well you tell your friends all the time about what happens in the bedroom.” As soon as you say something like this, it immediately brings your agenda to the table and pushes theirs off. When someone wants to talk about how they feel it is not the time to bring up your feelings, it’s about listening to them and allowing them to speak their truth.
From our own experiences, we know exactly how to turn a discussion into a fight, so why do we do it? Because we want to be heard, at all costs and we take someone saying they are hurt as personal. The only way to stop this is to stop making it about us.
I read a book recently that related the story of a man wanting to kill Buddha because the man’s family and decided to leave the old traditions and ways and study under Buddha. Buddha asked the man if he had people visit him and bring presents, the man say yes. Buddha asked if the man accepted every gift he was given. The man said no, if he didn’t like the gift he rejected it. To that Buddha said, OK I will use your philosophy, you have come to my home with the gift of anger, I do not accept it, will you please go and take your anger with you. It was about the story of no one can make you feel anything unless you allow them too. It was a very pivotal moment for me clarified that I am responsible for what I feel, without blaming anyone else.
So if your partner comes to you and says “I’m bored” they aren’t saying you’re boring or you’re the cause of their being bored, they are just giving you a little insight into their current mood or feelings. If my partner came to me and said they were bored, I’d say “so what are you going to do about it?”
If your partner comes to you and says “I’m sad” they are not saying you are the cause or reason for it, they, again, are just giving you some insight. It is not your job to do anything about it apart from listen to them. The best approach is to say something along the lines of “that’s no good, is there anything you need, like a cuddle?” Taking away how someone feels stops us from connecting with our inner selves and can interfere with out ability to know what we need and how to self-sooth.
It is important that we allow our partners and loved ones to feel and voice how they feel, otherwise they will start to shut down and not tell us what happening for them. This can be the beginning of the end of a lot of relationships.