Wedding Blog

The Seven Principles of a Highly Effective Marriage
By: John Gottman
Part I

I really loved reading all of your responses and comments on the book so far. There were so many sweet stories from early in your relationships that are so fun to read now. I’m seriously jealous that Bear Cub has stayed in a tree house cabin, and just smiled reading all the romantic stories from the moment you just knew your SO was the one.

Continuing on with the book club, here is the next recap of the next few chapters in the book.

Chapter 5: Principle 3: Turn Toward Each Other Instead of Away

This principle is basically about those little moments, subtle acts, and quick exchanges that show so much love and affection. These small moments are part of what Gottman says a happy marriage is made of because the couple is turning towards each other and are connecting. In an unhappy marriage, these moments and exchanges are rare.

Hollywood has dramatically distorted our notions of romance and what makes passion burn. Watching Humphrey Bogart gather teary-eyed Ingrid Bergman into his arms may make your heart pound, but real-life romance is fueled by a far more humdrum approach to staying connected. It is kept alive each time you let your spouse know he or she is valued during the grind of everyday life.

There are many moments where you can choose to turn toward each other or away. These moments add up to create an “emotional bank account” that can serve as a cushion or support when times get rough, you are dealing with conflict and stress, or are feeling distant. It helps to “maintain a positive sense of each other and [your] marriage even during hard times.”

Chapter 6: Principle 4: Let Your Partner Influence You

Writing this chapter Gottman pointed a lot of the discussion towards men, not to say that women don’t have the same issue, but he sees that it is commonly harder for men to be influenced by their partner than the other way around. Statistically speaking, men who allow their wives to influence them have happier marriages and are less likely to divorce. What does “influence” mean? It doesn’t mean you let the other person rule your life, but there is respect, power sharing and making decisions together.

When you do not allow influence, that is when there is room for the four horsemen to come in. Instead of acknowledging and respecting feelings, there is a drowning out, or “obliterating her point of view”, which is the opposite of this principle.

Some people will argue that this principle conflicts with their spiritual values or religious beliefs because men are supposed to be in control of their marriage, and also their wives. However, this is not the case. “All spiritual views of life are consistent with loving and honoring your spouse.” Would you want to make a decision where the other person feels disrespected? Probably not; that is why it is important to talk and learn how to convey honor and respect. Influence does not mean control.

Accepting influence is a skill in addition to being an attitude. If despite plenty of effort there is still difficulty accepting influence, then perhaps at the root of it there is an unsolvable problem. In marriage there are unsolvable and solvable problems. That is okay. Let’s look at this more in the next chapter.

Chapter 7: The Two Kinds of Marital Conflict

All marital conflicts fall into 1 of 2 categories: Either the problem can be resolved (solvable), or it is perpetual (unsolvable).

Perpetual Problems
69% of all marital conflict falls in this category! This means that those issues you are arguing about now will likely be the same issues 15 years from now. However, “despite what many therapist tell you, you don’t have to resolve your major marital conflicts for your marriage to thrive”. While you may never love dealing and arguing with these problems, you will develop skills to cope with them and learn to avoid situations that can help you deal. Dan Wile said, “When choosing a long-term partner… you will inevitably be choosing a particular set of unsolvable problems that you’ll be grappling with for the next ten, twenty or fifty years.”

In unstable marriages, these perpetual problems will be what ends the marriage because there is continually “gridlock”.

Signs of Gridlock:

• The conflict makes you feel rejected by your partner.
• You keep talking about it but make no headway.
• You become entrenched in your positions and are unwilling to budge.
• When you discuss the subject, you end up feeling more frustrated and hurt.
• Your conversations about the problem are devoid of humor, amusement, or affection.
• You become even more unbudgeable over time, which leads you to vilify each other during these conversations.
• This vilification makes you all the more rooted in your position and polarized, more extreme in your view, and all the less willing compromise.
• Eventually you disengage from each other emotionally.

In the next post, we will talk about Principle 6, which addresses how to deal with gridlock.

Solvable Problems

While solvable problems may sound more simple, they still have the potential of causing lots of pain and conflict in a relationship. When the problem is causing this much pain, it means the couple has not mastered a technique to solve it. Principle 5 will talk about how to handle this problem directly, and that will be a part of the next post as well.

How do you recognize a solvable problem, though? The first way to recognize one is that a solvable problem is less gut-wrenching, intense, and painful than a perpetual problem in gridlock. There is no underlying conflict for the problem, so the focus is on a particular situation or dilemma.

My thoughts and reflections:

I think Gottman’s point of the difference between Hollywood romance and what romance truly consists of, is such an important idea. I definitely have fallen guilty to wanting those ’sweep you off your feet’ moments that I love to watch in chick flicks. I don’t know about others, but that is not how Mr. Ducky’s and my relationship works. We don’t get all dressed up and fly away in a helicopter over a beautiful sunset to see the newest opera (a la Pretty Woman), and we definitely didn’t have a romantic candlelit dinner following a whirlwind romance where we fell in love within days, despite the craziest circumstances. What do we have? Well, we like to cook together, we tend to giggle and laugh about things that make no sense to anyone else, we are super excited to watch 24 and LOST together every week (so sad it is over), and the closest we get to a classic fairytale romance is when we go to Disneyland with our passes and walk under the castle to get to Splash Mountain. Romance for us is in the small gestures, like when Mr. Ducky gave me a card at 11:00PM at night after I finished my last graduate course, just to say he was proud, or when I leave a Post-It on Mr. Ducky’s computer, just to say I love him. And of course, I wouldn’t say no to a helicopter ride to go see an opera, but I know that those things are not what make us a couple. There is a greater foundation that we have been building upon for a long time.

Mr. Ducky and I turn toward each other, but I think I can be more conscious of doing it more often. In the conference I went to, Gottman spoke about “sliding door moments”. Have you seen the movie Sliding Doors with Gwenyth Paltrow? Basically, it shows the two different outcomes of her life had she made a train and then had she missed the train. While things may not be as dramatically different as in the movie, there is still a different outcome for everything based on whether or not you decide to turn toward your spouse. For instance, you are on your way out with girlfriends and you notice your partner seems kind of down and tired. Do you stop and have a conversation to see what is wrong? Or do you figure that you will talk about it after you get home, since you are already running late? First, neither choice is wrong. However, if you continuously choose the latter option and don’t turn toward your spouse to engage, you may miss out on some relationship building.

I think that I could be more conscious in looking for more opportunities to turn toward Mr. Ducky. What else can I do for him that will be an act of love, even if it is a brief moment and doesn’t take time? Maybe it’s as simple as sending a text message of encouragement when I know he’s had a long day at work.

I was really surprised to read the statistic that 69% of marital problems are unsolvable. However, I thought it was a good idea to reflect on our relationship and distinguish between the solvable and unsolvable problems so that we can better deal with them.

What stands out to you from these chapters? Can you relate?

Also, head over the book club boards and start some of your own threads with questions or thoughts, or simply join the discussion on preexisting threads.