63: Dan Wile - How Collaboration Creates Intimacy
How do you foster intimacy, even when you're fighting? The recipe for a successful relationship involves learning how to collaborate even when things aren't going well. And once you learn how to do that, you'll find that opportunities to create intimacy are abundant in your relationship. It's the magic that happens when you're willing to work together no matter what's going on. In today's episode, we're talking to Dan Wile, the creator of Collaborative Couples Therapy. Along with seeing clients and conducting intensives for couples, Dan Wile trains therapists in Collaborative Couples Therapy, and his work is recommended by John Gottman as an embodiment of the principles recommended through his research and practice.
Here are the details on what we cover:
Create a loving conversation: Many couples struggle to communicate their way through conflict- so often resorting to withdrawing or fighting. Collaborative couple’s therapy helps couples learn to reach out to one another in difficult moments and around difficult topics so that they may create a loving conversation out of whatever it is they are going through. Through collaboration conflict can become intimate exchange.
Self-reinforcing cycles: Dan Wile explains that many couples too easily find “themselves in an adversarial or withdrawn cycle without knowing how they got into it, not wanting to be in it, and not knowing how to get out of it”. Here are the 3 self-reinforcing cycles he identifies:Adversarial: Speaking from anger often begins a vicious cycle. When we speak from a charged place we often have a threatening tone, and we enter into either attack mode or defense mode. Biochemicals are released, and the sympathetic nervous system is leading the way, thus making us speak before we think. We make accusations that put our partner on the defensive and vice-versa, therefore reinforcing the intensity and increasing escalation.
Withdrawn cycle: Another common reaction to conflict is the withdrawal cycle. This is when one partner, or both, use extreme cautiousness and avoid saying anything evocative. While this may seem like a safer strategy at first it is dangerous as it leads to mutual withdrawal, intense distancing, and a devitalization of the relationship.
Empathic Cycle: Both the adversarial and withdrawal cycles can be shifted to a loving cycle through empathy. One partner must take a step out of their “i’m right, you are wrong” stance, and step towards their partner. When one partner acknowledges the otherness, or speaks for the ‘we’, they offer a moment of reconnection and an opportunity for repair. This can sound and look a lot of ways, for example “Wow- you seem to have a point, even if I do not agree I want to understand you more”, or “you know, I think I am saying a lot of things that I do not really mean right now because I am very angry”, or “even though this is really messy I am proud of us for trying to work through this difficult conversation because the topic is so important to us both”, or “I’m getting really upset because this is something I really care about, and I know you do too- I’m feeling like things are at stake and I’m feeling vulnerable”. Confessions such as these often helps the other partner acknowledge what is happening for them as well, and thus the couple finds themselves talking about the angry/frustration/sadness, rather than from it.
The “We need to talk” talk. There is a common pattern in which one partner will seek out the other and say something like “we need to have a talk”. This languaging gets registered as “I have a complaint” or “you did something wrong” and immediately the conversation is derailed into a conflict as the one partner goes into defense or withdraw mode. If you are the one initiating the conversation try to:None of these strategies end up helping us get to the core of the issue. Instead they distract us into a further place of disconnection not only from ourselves, but from our partner. If finding empathy with yourself is very difficult, you can try to imagine looking at your own struggle as if it was your friend’s- what would you say to that friend? Find resources and ways that help you come back to a centered place of compassion for yourself so that you can re-find your voice and speak for your vulnerabilities.
Allow love in: While it is widely believed that you cannot love another until you love yourself, it is simultaneously true that you can learn to love yourself deeper and better if and when you feel loved by another person. As you increase your own sense of empathy for yourself, find ways to allow your partner to show up for you. This can be facilitated by sharing your struggle. By offering your partner a window into your tender places you invoke their sense of curiosity, their desire to support you, and their ability to help facilitate a warm nurturing environment for you to better step out of yourself and discover more of what you are truly feeling. A relationship is how you deal with difficult moments. Healthy vibrant relationships are not devoid of difficulty, rather they have the capacity to find intimacy and connection through struggle. Work with yourself and your partner to get to the source of your feelings and speak about the deepest parts. As you do you'll help yourself and your partner get out of a triggered state, and into a compassionate and empathic place in which you are both more resourceful, creative, connected, and where you can actually repair! Resources: Read Daniel Wile’s book After the Honeymoon: How Conflict Can Improve your Relationship Find out more about Dan’s work and workshops www.neilsattin.com/wile Visit to download the show guide, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the show guide to this episode with Aubrey Fuller. Our Relationship Alive Community on Facebook Amazing intro/outro music graciously provided courtesy of:The Railsplitters - Check them Out
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