Don’t Like His Behavior? 3 Simple Steps to Change It
Three simple steps to bringing up something your partner has done that you don’t like in a way that strengthens instead of weakens your relationship.
All of us, when we meet someone special are gonna have a moment where that person does something we don’t like, and at that moment we are either gonna have a reaction that hurts, or helps our relationship. That destroys or builds. This will depend on the meaning we give to what someone else has done, and the most dangerous meanings tend to be the ones we rush to from a place of insecurity, or fear, or vulnerability. When we think we've been wronged. And when we think we’ve been wronged, we tend to ascribe the worst motive to what someone has done, but there’s something I want you to remember in a moment like this. There’s a philosophical principle called, Hanlon’s Razor.
Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.
Now what this means is sometimes we attribute the worst intentions to someone’s actions. When really what we're encountering is a form of stupidity, or ignorance, or thoughtlessness. When someone does something that hurts us, very often, it wasn’t that they were trying to hurt us. They just weren't really thinking. And you may say, 'That's still bad...' And that may be true, but it's not as bad. See different meanings have different emotional intensity. 'They are trying to hurt me!' 'They don't care about me!' 'They don't think I'm worthy!' 'They don't love me!' Those have a very strong emotional intensity. 'They weren't really thinking...' Less so. And in any case, our first reaction to something is us just guessing at it. We’re making a decision based on a story we’ve constructed in our minds, not on the reality of what’s actually going on. So here are three simple steps that you can use any time you wanna bring up something you're not happy about that will strengthen instead of weakening your relationship.
The first is simply to slow down.
I’m far more likely to regret my quick reactions, than the one’s I take a moment to consider, and that doesn’t mean not saying anything, but think about it this way. If your conclusion is right, then it will still be right five minutes from now, or an hour from now, or tonight when you see your partner, but if you rush your reaction that can be something that you’ll easily regret.
Phone a friend.
Phone the friend in your life that is objective. That is measured in his, or her response to situations. Not the person who’s immediately gonna back you up. Don’t call that type of friend. Here’s the friend you need. The one that doesn’t simply buy your story. The one that knows you well enough that they can tell you when they think that you’re going overboard. When you’re falling prey to your normal patterns. They can check you. They're not afraid to check you, and be like, 'You know what?' 'You're overreacting here.' Or, 'Just take a beat.' 'You know, I think you should go in a little calmer,' 'and talk like this...' They can help you navigate the emotional storm you're in. 'Cause, guess what? When you're upset, when you're angry, when you're too close to something... You're drunk, and you need to talk to a sober person, but not just any sober person, a wise sober person.
Use charming candor.
When we feel wronged, we often go to one of two places. We either immediately as a reflex get aggressive and serious, and angry, or we get passive-aggressive, and someone has to draw out of us what's wrong, 'cause they know our energy has changed, but they don't know why, and so we're building up to the moment where we're gonna unleash all of this truth on them. There is a space to come to people in a much more relaxed way, and I call it charming candor, because it allows you to be candid, but at the same time maintain your charming, warm demeanor. Like if you’re dating a guy, and for the last two or three dates you’ve gone over to his side of town, and the next date he tries to set up, he says, ‘Hey! Wanna come to this bar near me?’ And it’s on his side of town again… You don’t have to set up a time for a serious conversation with him to talk about it. Instead, you can just text him back. 'Your turn to come to me, lazy!' That is charming candor because you're being playful. You're not being over-serious, but you are pointing out that you want him to come to you. You're putting the light on the situation. And you may say, ‘But it’s disrespectful’ ‘that he’s asking me to come to his side of town again.’ Okay, if your playful little jab doesn’t create a change in behavior, now you can have a more serious conversation, but it doesn’t have to go straight to serious. Sometimes being playful, but speaking the truth puts something on someone’s radar in a way that that’s enough. They have an awareness now, and they can adjust.
I’m passionate about this subject because I’m interested in the truth of relationships. Not the way we want them to be. Not the way they are on a Hallmark card. Not the way they are in a movie, but the way they really are, and what I’ve learned is one of the harsh truths about relationships is that if we continuously have the wrong reaction to things… The wrong reaction can cost us the right person. Now yes, the right person, the right relationship, the right love can take a lot of damage, right? It’s not fickle. It’s not brittle. You can do a lot wrong with the right relationship, and still hold on to it, but A: That doesn’t mean it will thrive, and B: It doesn’t mean that sustained injury to a relationship over time won’t eventually be the death of it. Our actions, our reactions matter, and if you take one thing from this article. I want it to be that in moments when you feel vulnerable, or threatened, or insecure, or wronged you take a moment to really assess whether your reaction is coming from your own insecurities, your own demons, your own scars, or whether it’s genuinely a reaction to the reality of the situation. And the only way that we’ll know more about what the reality of the situation actually is, and be able to use that information to have a more positive, productive conversation with our partner is to react more consciously and communicate more confidently.
