ERP 131: How Kindness Can Strengthen Your Love – Part Five

In ERP 125: How Kindness Can Strengthen Your Love – Part One, I talked about the article, titled “Masters Of Love,” by Emily Esfahani Smith

The article discussed the key to lasting relationships comes down to kindness and generosity. Based on the research of Gottman and others, “kindness (along with emotional stability) is the most important predictor of satisfaction and stability in a marriage.”

(Please listen to the podcast episode or read the transcript to hear explanations, stories and examples.)

If you are interested in practicing more kindness in your relationship to strengthen your love, download this free pdf. The goal is to choose one kindness action or gesture a day for 25 days.

In relationship, people want to feel heard, understood, respected, and validated. This is especially true during conflict or a difference of opinion. Often partners will go around and around explaining themselves over and over in an attempt to feel understood. When they don’t feel heard and understood, voices raise, conflict escalates and disconnect increases.

Amazing shifts occur when partners can take the time to not only hear their partner’s words, but truly listen... not only comprehend their partner’s issue, but to understand it deeply.

You do not have to agree with your partner to understand and entertain their perspective.

A big key in being able to put yourself in your partner’s shoes is to slow down. So often, we feel a sense of urgency and we want to rush through the conflict as quickly as possible. However, this generally causes more problems.

When partners can see the validity in each other’s experience, they begin to work together and their conflictual dynamic dramatically improves. Letting your partner know that you get why they feel the way they do or how their perspective makes sense (even if you don’t agree) helps them feel seen, heard, acknowledged and respected.

When both partners feel understood, acknowledged, and respected, they can collaborate more easily to work towards creative solutions.

If you need more practice with this, consider checking out this article or some of my podcasts about conflict.

Offer sincere empathy when you take your partner’s perspective. When you imagine what it is like for them as they describe their experience, attune to their emotional world. Try to understand what they have been feeling or better yet imagine what you would feel if you were in the same scenario, exactly as they described it.

Brené Brown has done so much to teach us about the power of empathy and human connection. I still recommend her TED Talks and RSA animated shorts (see below for links).

Empathy can be conveyed in a few simple words or even through your nonverbal expressions and gestures (i.e. body posture and facial expressions).

The goal is to be present with your partner’s pain and not turn away. Be willing to “feel with” your partner.

Empathy helps people feel accepted and connected, rather than feeling shame and alone. A little bit of empathy can go a long way in building an emotional bond and sense of togetherness.

Apologies are where we acknowledge how our ways have impacted our partner and maybe even admit fault. Yet, many people have a hard time getting to this place because they feel defensive and protective. Apologies are easier when we drop the ball. We know we messed up and we can easily apologize. An apology is much harder when you had no intention to hurt your partner. Even harder still is apologizing when you feel that your actions were justified. In this case, it may be an apology for a specific part of the interaction.

• “I am sorry I reacted.”
• “I am sorry I got defensive.”
• “I am sorry I hurt your feelings.”

As I mentioned before, negative emotions carry a lot of weight. Hence, this is why John Gottman recommends the 5 to 1 ratio of positive to negative interactions, as it takes 5 positives to counteract the 1 negative interaction.

In the business sector, it is common for customer service representatives to get more negative feedback than positive. Generally, people will complain about a concern, but they will not comment about their positive experiences. This is also true in relation...