How to Stop Complaining and Getting Your Needs Met

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Do you often complain to others about your partner? Or do you constantly tell your partner that their behaviours are dissatisfying to you? Do these complaints help your relationship and get you what you want?

Complaining can be satisfying but is not likely to achieve anything, in particular if you talk to a person who is not the source of the complaint and cannot do anything about this, i.e. a friend.

Complaints are usually caused by the behaviour of the other person that troubles you. Often the complaint is about a behaviour that is seemingly innocuous to the person who is at the receiving end of the complaint.  However, frequent complaints about the same set of behaviours in the partner, often have long roots. They tend to relate to a deeper underlying fear: for example, a fear that your partner does not care about you or not love you enough.

Complaining to others is often a proxy way of addressing your frustration: you raise your frustration in a 'safe' way by talking to a friend rather than to the person who caused you the frustration. This way you avoid a 'confrontation' or conflict with your partner that you perceive as dangerous.  

Conversely, you might be someone who readily raises all their frustrations with the partner in a continuous litany of wrong doing. 

Both scenarios  help us to vent our frustrations but in the long run do not facilitate the desired change you crave for. The person you need to talk to, is the person whose behaviour is troubling you. How you go about doing this, is crucial. In this podcast we talk about ways of addressing frustrations with your partner, that actually get you the change in behaviour that you want to achieve.

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Struggling with a lot of conflict and arguments in your relationship? Learn about communicating effectively and addressing common relationship problems in our Stop Arguing, Start Loving mini course:  https://therelationshipmaze.com/relationshipconflictvsl2.

Learn everything you always wanted to know about building and maintaining  loving relationships in our comprehensive course The Relationship Maze, starting with understanding yourself in relationships to understanding your partner and understanding what makes for a successful relationsh

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Struggling with a lot of conflict and arguments in your relationship? Learn about communicating effectively and addressing common relationship problems in our Stop Arguing, Start Loving mini course.

Learn everything you always wanted to know about building and maintaining loving relationships in our comprehensive course The Relationship Maze, starting with understanding yourself in relationships to understanding your partner and understanding what makes for a successful relationship. We look at common causes of relationship problems and offer solutions. Learn how to address relationship problems and questions without breaking up.