The Secret Power of COMPLAINING!
Complaining isn't the first thing that comes to mind when I consider what makes for great relationships, but what I learned this week from the Gottman Institute may have just changed my mind!
It comes down to the difference between complaining and criticism.
Criticism, the way they used it, means when you criticize your partner personally. This usually comes with an "always" or "never" attached to it, or makes a statement about who they are. "You're so lazy," "You always put yourself first," "You never really loved me," are all criticisms.
A complaint, in this definition, is different because it is sharing your negative feelings about a situation. "I hate when I clean the kitchen only to come back and see it dirty again!" "I'm so sad that we don't seem to spend much time together anymore!" "Your coming home late every night is ruining this relationship!" could all be examples of complaints.
These latter examples are much different than the ideal I was taught in compassionate communication class. In that realm of study, the best practice is to make a request. Some folks even feel like voicing a complaint is somehow bringing "negative energy" into the relationship. I think that working on how to make a request should still be the gold standard in mature intimate relationships, BUT we should recognize that it is an ideal that is going to be difficult for most of us most days.
To take the issues that make us most upset and walk ourselves through a self-soothing process, bring the prefrontal cortex back online, empathize with how our partner is going to hear us, and then frame our request in words they can understand is a BIG ASK. It would be easier to just complain!
Making an empathetic request can be so difficult that we fail to say anything at all, and here's why complaining is important - when couples don't complain enough, they turn to criticism.
Once criticism or contempt erupt, your partner has almost no chance of not taking it personally - you've made it personal. The downstream effects are that the sense of closeness in the relationship gradually erodes the more these kind of interactions occur.
It can all too easily become a self-reinforcing cycle, where one partner uses contempt and the other uses stonewalling, so the first one then turns up the volume even more. All of this might have been avoided with a little more COMPLAINING!
The challenge with complaining is that obviously it too can be heard as an attack - it really can bring more "negative vibes" to the relationship - but there's also a CHANCE that your partner can hear the real need being expressed in the complaint. It's not quite a NonViolent Communication-worthy "Request", but it's also not gone all the way to a critical attack on their character.
With a complaint, it's possible that you'll actually generate empathy in a receptive partner. It's not guaranteed, but it's certainly a step up from the two bad choices of silence or violence.
So consider this your permission to whine and moan a LOT more than you're doing already. I've tried it recently and it's working out SURPRISINGLY WELL! Of course, your partner needs training in how to hear you, and there are even better techniques to employ as we gain skill, but this counter-intuitive method might be just the hack your intimacy needs to go to the next level!
If you want to train further in the fine art of compassionate communication, that's the focus of this week's class in "Conscious Relationship Essentials". Class one is already archived for your viewing convenience, and class two is live on Thursday eve. You retain access to the recorded videos for one year and will receive insight-generating practices to try in each class! Hope to see you there!
