What is a "Bid for Connection" and How Can It Strengthen Your Relationship?

An emotional bid is an idea observed by marriage researcher John Gottman, and describes an essential element of intimacy in a great relationship: a request to connect. A bid for connection is reaching out to your partner when you want to maintain, enrich, or reestablish the emotional bond you share. A bid could be anything from inviting your partner to join in on a personal hobby or passion, to simply asking, “How was your day?”

The two halves of every bid for connection

After observing countless couples in relationship, and following up with couples years later, Gottman found that for those who stayed happily united, successful emotional bidding occurred 87% of the time. In relationships that eventually ended, or dragged on unhappily, successful emotional bids only occurred about a third of the time.

So what makes a bid for connection “successful”? When you respond to your partner’s bid by turning toward him emotionally, opening yourself up to his attempt to connect, you’ve succeeded together at placing trust and connection at the center of the life you share.

Responding positively to your partner’s emotional bid relates to a crucial element of a good relationship: kindness. An attitude of kindness means that you’re always scanning the emotional landscape for something to feel grateful about. It makes sense that responding kindly to most attempts to connect would make you and your partner feel like united.

You can turn toward your partner during an emotional bid by listening to and engaging with him. If your partner loves gardening, and points out a beautiful garden you pass, it’s an emotional bid to bring you into a part of his world he values. When you respond by taking an interest in the garden too, your relationship benefits.

Emotional bidding and kindness are most difficult—and probably most important—during conflict. If the foundation of your relationship is trust and love, you’ll likely see flashes of intimacy and affection even when you’re at odds, or even angry. If emotional bids aren’t extended, or go unmet over a long period of time, conflicts can instead become defined by criticism and derision—who can hurt the other the most.

Why is emotional bidding important?

When it comes to how safe you feel within your relationship, the quality of the attention you and your partner pay to one another daily matters deeply. It might seem strange that something as small as asking your partner what he’s thinking about will determine how happy your relationship stays over time, but the small things done frequently will make a positive impact on your partnership.

If your partner doesn’t make emotional bids for your affection and attention, or if you fail to respond to his bids, and turn back to whatever you were doing, your connection suffers. Rather than building a strong connection with your partner, disconnection and doubt are fostered. Even though you’re living in a committed relationship, you feel alone.

A bid can be a light touch, or asking your partner if he’s heard about something you saw on the news. You might not even recognize what you’re doing as emotionally powerful—after all, you’re not discussing your deepest feelings, or agreeing on deeply held value systems. In truth, emotional bids are so important because they’re a thermometer reading that answers the question, “How are we doing?”

Couples - How to Approach Those Difficult Conversations

One of the most common problems that drives couples to seek counseling is communication breakdown. It makes sense; broken communication can be really hard to piece back together on your own.

Maybe you and your partner argue frequently, you walk on eggshells to avoid a fight, or the air in your home crackles with tension. Maybe there is a shadow looming over your relationship that neither of you is eager to acknowledge.


An inability to communicate with your partner obscures the trust and intimacy your relationship needs to survive. You care deeply for your partner, but you’re increasingly frustrated in your attempts to uncover that love during times of emotionally-driven conflict, defensiveness, and silence.

When it comes to communication in your relationship, the stakes are high. Knowing this, how can you approach a difficult conversation you know needs to happen? The answer: Avoid harsh start-up.

The Harsh Start-Up

Researcher John Gottman’s term, “harsh start-up,” refers to the hurtful approach and first words of a combative discussion. What’s the big deal about a harsh start-up?

Because both you and your partner need to feel safe and cared for in your relationship, the words you choose when you’re talking to your partner really do matter. A perceived verbal attack can elicit a response that has less to do with answering your complaint, and more to do with defensiveness and throwing the hurt right back at you.

In other words, how you approach a sensitive issue with your partner can determine how well you will listen to one other. Of course, when you’re stuck having the same argument for a month or longer, or you’ve been holding in resentments for fear of setting your partner off, acidic words come much more easily than the kind ones.

Gottman and his team of researchers discovered that most conversations beginning with harsh start-up end negatively, and without resolution.

Imagine that your partner addressed an issue in your relationship, starting with, “You are always selfish,” or “Your problem is this.” You would likely feel an emotional wound opening up right away. Maybe you’d respond defensively, refusing the idea that you’ve played a role in your relationship problems. Maybe you would become contemptuous toward your partner. Perhaps, you would build a wall around yourself in protection, too emotionally overwhelmed to contribute to any kind of discussion.

Whatever your partner’s initial intentions, his or her first chosen words on the subject have brought you both into fight-or-flight territory—not a place you want to be when you’re in a relationship for the long-haul.

The Antidote to Harsh Start-Up

While taking a moment to choose your words carefully can be difficult when you’re hurt or angry, taking a moment to think about what you’re going to say could bring peace to your relationship—a reward that’s definitely worth the extra effort.
 
Start by reducing criticism of your partner. If you find yourself using the word “you” frequently when bringing up a difficult subject with your partner, what was intended to be a productive conversation, may end up being an emotionally charged conflict.

When something your partner does has upset you, and you want to hold him or her accountable, notice the moment. Your heart rate rises. You feel only your frustration. In those few seconds, try to remember that you would probably rather help prevent the problem from recurring, than cause your partner pain.

When you teach yourself to start a discussion without criticism, by saying “I feel” instead of “you are,” you’ll soon notice that your own defenses come down too. Try this next time: “I feel ‘x’ when ‘y’ happens. I need ‘z’.” For example, “I feel sad when we don’t do anything together on the weekend. I need some one-on-one time with you to feel connected.” Juxtapose the soft start-up above to this harsh start-up: “You never spend time with me on the weekend. I guess you just aren’t interested in doing anything with me.” The difference in communication is clear. The soft start-up approaches with an invitation to communicate productively. The harsh start-up criticizes your partner.

The reason a gentler start-up works is because kind words create a discussion in which you and your partner are still a team, not boxers in the ring. With the help of a couples counselor, you and your partner can recognize painful communication habits, and learn to replace them in a way that allows respect and admiration to remain, even when you argue.

Relationship Success Requires Giving Your Partner Priority Status

After years of meticulous observation, and study of thousands of couples, researcher Dr. John Gottman came to an important conclusion about successful long-term relationships. In the healthy relationships he studied, each person felt like a priority to the other.

Why is priority so important?

When your partner gives you priority, you feel safe, loved, and seen.

One of the reasons priority is so important is that it shows your partner you’re in tune with, and responsive to, his or her emotions. Responding to your partner’s emotional needs is crucial in relationships—you each need to know you have an effect on the person with whom you’re sharing your life.

Let’s say your partner has plans to attend a conference for work. Attending the conference is not mandatory, but it would be a good professional move to attend. If one of your parents suddenly becomes very ill, you might want your partner to stick around to deal with the crisis alongside you. You’d have emotional support, and just as importantly, you’d feel like your needs are a priority to your partner.

Love in a long-term relationship isn’t the dramatized agony of romantic movies; chances are, you wouldn’t want that kind of love anyway. Real-life, long-term love is singling your partner out as a priority in your life, demonstrating that you value each other’s companionship and care, and proving that your relationship is something you will go to great lengths to cultivate and preserve.

A great lasting romance means being partners.

How can you tell if you’re true partners?

Gottman found that priority and partnership are sometimes harder work in heterosexual relationships, due mostly to old stereotypical gender roles. Gottman believes that one of the main ingredients in a successful relationship is accepting influence from the other—another way of saying, “giving priority.”

Interestingly, Gottman found that the ability to accept influence mattered most in men. The women Gottman studied usually had much more practice accepting influence from men. The willingness of men to be women’s equal in their relationships can make a significant difference in creating a relationship that is a partnership.

Giving your partner priority is a promise you make to each other—that when things get tough and your partner needs you, you’ll be there, no question. When you give your partner priority, taking time out of your day to take on some of your partner’s responsibilities during a stressful period, you are responding positively to a request for help. When you put down your smart phone, tablet, computer, or turn off the TV, and spend a few minutes connecting with your partner, you show that your partner is a priority to you.

How can you start giving your partner priority status?

Giving your partner priority doesn’t come up only in dire situations like a parent’s serious illness. It can be as simple as connecting at the end of the day to share the day’s events with each other.

“What if we’re both so busy, we can’t find time to connect?” you might wonder. Making a few “five-minute connections” throughout your day can make a big difference when it comes to how important you feel in each other’s life. A small act of kindness from your partner, or a few minutes cuddling in the morning, lets you know you’re important even when your daily routines diverge.

Share moments and stresses from your day. When you listen to each other’s ups, downs, you demonstrate that you support your partner.

If you’re struggling to give priority to your partner, or feeling that you are not receiving a priority status from your partner, it’s a problem worth working on together. Prioritizing your partner in your life is a measure of commitment to your relationship. How much importance do you place on your relationship, and how much work are you willing to put into your relationship to make it last?

Research Proves It: Couples Who Play Together, Stay Together

You can probably think of one or two couples you know who seem perfect together—they have the same interests, same temperament, and they balance one another out. Yet every time you see them lately, neither looks quite as happy as they once did.

The perfect couple you know probably still love each other, but the love they have could be smudged, scuffed, and obscured by years of routine, stress at work, and time spent mostly on the kids.

Once upon a time, you might have thought of romantic love as an intense chemistry between two destined-for-each-other people. The truth is that even if you and your partner are perfectly matched, you’ll have to tend to and care for your relationship over the years.

Does that sound like a lot of work?

Before you start to worry about what the upkeep of a great partnership entails, know that the work your perfectly-matched friends might not be doing is having any fun together. Researcher John Gottman suggests that the myth of magical soulmate love belies the greater truth that your relationship thrives when it’s built on friendship.

Why is fun so valuable in a committed relationship?

Your relationship is a "job" with a high burn-out rate. A good relationship means being attentive and present, even when you’re tired, stressed, or have a short fuse after a long day—something that doesn’t always feel easy.

As in any high burn-out role, you and your partner can feel rejuvenated with a little bit of self-care. Self-care means checking in and taking your emotional temperature even—and especially—when things are chaotic.

Playing can be a great way for you and your partner to care for your relationship. When you do something fun together, you’re engaging with each other in a way that doesn’t involve talking about logistics like who will pick up groceries, or take the kids to school.

Maybe you and your partner have lost sight of each other in the routine; spontaneity brings your relationship back into focus. You can see each other in new ways, reviving your attraction and interest in the person sharing your life.

Play brings joy into your relationship—an invaluable resource when it comes to feeling good, and being flexible with your partner.

Having fun together can make a big difference in how you and your partner approach each other during conflict. If a lot of the time you spend together is positive, it’s much easier to approach an argument with understanding, and to let the conflict go when the time comes. If you have more negative interactions than positive, each conflict might seem like a sign of fundamental problems in your relationship.

Why is friendship more important than romantic passion?

When you think about favorite moments spent with your partner, many of your memories probably involve a time when you felt seen by your partner. Maybe your partner picked you up for a special lunch on a particularly challenging day at work.

Gestures like these are romantic, but more than that, they’re a hand extended in friendship. Paying attention to your partner’s needs and feelings says, “I’m here,” “how can I help?” and “things will get better.”

Showing up for your partner matters in the little moments—turning toward him when he makes a bid for your attention, or finding ways to bring him into your world throughout the day.

John Gottman discovered another surprising thing about marriages that last: Conflict is okay. What matters more is how you and your partner communicate with each other during the conflict. How you handle conflict together often comes down to how solid your friendship is—even when you’re angry, you act in a way that conveys you still care.

5 Ways Contempt Shows Up in Relationships & How to Avoid It

John Gottman has been studying couples for decades. By now, he and his team of researchers have a pretty good sense of what makes a marriage successful—and what doesn’t.

Sometimes a failed relationship is chalked up to becoming different people, having vastly different schedules, or having philosophical differences that were impossible to resolve.

While a relationship can appear to stop working for a number of reasons, there are usually bigger, more troubling conditions underlying the varied symptoms: One of those conditions is showing contempt toward your partner. In his lab, Gottman discovered that contempt predicted relationship difficulties and failure more than any other factor.

When contempt appears, one spouse feels “less than” the other. A hierarchy exists in place of a partnership.

Contempt makes it almost impossible to trust, hear, and live alongside someone you believe doesn’t respect you and regards you as someone in an inferior position in the relationship—especially when that person, your spouse or partner, is someone you should be able to rely on for emotional safety.

Contempt doesn’t rear its destructive head overnight. Gestures of contempt are often the product of weeks, months, even years of simmering discontentment with your partner.

So what does contempt look like?

· Verbal jabs
Verbal jabs are poison-tipped insults or names, like “stupid,” “ugly,” “jerk,” and even worse. A verbal jab is filled with undisguised contempt; it makes the person receiving the jab feel small and destroys their confidence. Insults and name-calling are never acceptable in a relationship.

· Hostile humor
Sometimes contempt is thinly veiled with sarcasm. When a comment is made at someone else’s expense, the person delivering the so-called humor might claim that it’s all in fun and question your ability to “take a joke.” It’s no joke when you are on the receiving end of hostile humor, and it’s also disrespectful if you and your partner don’t listen to one another and change the behavior.  Hostile humor is not funny and hurts the person on the receiving end.

· Mockery
Contempt in relationships can appear in more subtle ways. If your partner has negative feelings toward you and your relationship, he or she might make a mockery of your words and actions. Mockery eventually transforms relationships into a place where feelings of unworthiness, lack of trust, and lack of validation take over and replace the feelings of safety and security that a successful relationship requires.

· Body language
When you or your partner are angry and having conflict, contemptuous impulses may be hard to control. You may not even be aware of what is being communicated with body language. Contempt can be an eye roll, a sneer, looking away from your partner, arms crossed in front of the body, and other subtle and not-so-subtle body language. Contempt communicates that you or your partner have little regard for what the other has to say.

· Tone of voice
How you speak to your partner is a tell-tale sign of respect or contempt. When you speak calmly, your partner most likely feels understood and safe. When anger is expressed with a raised voice or shouting, it may feel more like an attack.

Can you diffuse contempt?

Gottman’s research shows that the antidote to contempt is to describe your own feelings and needs, rather than focusing on your partner. When you are communicating with your partner, and feel the urge to lash out in a contemptuous way, take a short break and look inside to identify your feelings and needs at the moment. Showing contempt toward your partner only creates a wider chasm in your relationship.

If you recognize the behaviors in the list above, it’s important to know that you and your partner have choices when contempt comes riding in to your relationship.

Here are some things to keep in mind:

· Don’t be drawn in.
When you’re feeling hurt and vulnerable, your impulse might be to lash out with reciprocated disgust; but hurting your partner won’t make you feel any better. Your response can have a powerful effect on how the contempt affects you, and it can potentially open a new door in the way your partner chooses to express frustration.

· Make respect the starting line.
If respect is the rule, the alarm bells of contempt are less likely to ring. Talking about how you’ll fight, and the treatment you each expect to receive before you’re angry, can sometimes ensure contempt isn’t a tool you and your partner ever feel like using.

· Pump the breaks.
Contempt is something that can overflow out of you, when maybe you intended to say nothing at all. If you know you’re feeling overwhelmingly negative, take some time alone. Get to the bottom of what’s bothering you. Return to your partner with a calm attitude that’s more productive than destructive.

Incorporating Rituals Increases Couples' Connection

What defines success in a relationship? Dr. John Gottman and his research team have studied thousands of couples, and found this: Happy couples have created mental maps of each other’s lives, they show affection and respect for each other, and they respond to each other positively—even during conflict. Happy partners value the dreams and ideas of the other.

These are the ingredients of a stable and healthy relationship. What Dr. Gottman has to say about bringing all of these ingredients together, to find lasting happiness in your relationship, sounds a lot like what positive psychology advocate, Martin Seligman, has to say about life: There are many ways to be happy, but finding meaning is perhaps the most deeply rewarding of all.

Why are shared meaning and rituals of connection so important?

“What’s the problem?” or “What’s going on in your relationship that brings you to see me?” may be the first question asked in couples and marriage counseling. In some cases, there is no immediate problem, conflict, or tension, but an unidentifiable dissatisfaction in the relationship. Yet years down the road, some couples who show no hostility or indifference to each other, still divorce.

Gottman and his researchers suggest that these relationship failures have less to do with problems that are present, and more to do with what’s missing.

Maybe the relationship advice you’ve gotten in the past advocated elaborate date nights or a weekend getaway. Maybe you’ve been told to have more sex, or to approach your sex life in a different way. While all of these suggestions can help, they leave much unsaid.

If you return from a romantic weekend retreat with you partner, and find that the lack of connection you felt at home still lingers, you and your partner might find the connection you’re missing is a spiritual one. You’re missing a culture of symbols and rituals that are unique to your marriage. You’re missing expressions of appreciation for the roles you play for one another, and the goals you share together.

How can you go about creating shared meaning in your relationship?

Growing up, the symbols and rituals through which your family connected probably held great meaning. Maybe you find that the memory of a particular board game, or watching football on Sundays, still strums internal chords of belonging and family communion.

It’s also possible that recalling the rituals from your past causes you pain or discomfort. Maybe connection wasn’t the centerpiece of your family life at all.

The wonder and importance of creating shared meaning with your partner is that this time, you get to choose. The rituals you create can be as simple as a long kiss in the morning, before you both leave the house. Maybe you drink tea together and talk about your day, after the kids are in bed.

Rituals can be more formal too: What holiday traditions from each of your pasts do you most cherish? What do you wish had been different about the traditions you didn’t enjoy? Talk about how you can bring your personalities and values together to build new meaning.

There are lots of opportunities for building personally meaningful rituals of connection. Think about:

· How you leave each other for work.

· How you reunite after time apart.

· Carving out time each day to offer a supportive shoulder, and share personal stresses.

· Avoiding conflict during mealtime; cultivating attention and affection instead.

· Frequent expressions of gratitude.

· How you take care of each other when you’re sick.

· Celebrating milestones.

· When and how sex is initiated, and how you talk about sex—finding ways to share physical intimacy even, when you’re busy or stressed.

Rituals in a relationship are the things that you can count on to be present every day, every week, and every year. Establishing rituals creates a narrative backdrop connecting you and your partner again and again, decades into your relationship.

How Criticizing Your Partner Can Harm Your Relationship

Do you criticize your partner?

Frequently?

In private or in public?

If the answer to most of the above is “yes,” you are probably harming your relationship.

If your partner objects to criticism, you probably fight a lot. Maybe he or she then criticizes you back. You both feel hurt and, later helpless.

Criticism on a regular basis inflicts emotional pain. But maybe you don’t even realize what you are doing, because your partner has already withdrawn from you to protect himself.

What is going on here?

The Oxford Dictionary defines criticism as “the expression of disapproval of someone or something on the basis of perceived faults or mistakes.”

This definition contains two important elements regarding why criticism can harm your relationship: “disapproval” and “perceived faults.”

Disapproval

Disapproval is a major ingredient in toxic relationships. It’s a negative judgment, a withholding of affection and support. It also usually signals a position of power, or perceived superiority that gives the “disapprover” a sense of entitlement to criticize.

Disapproval is meant to hurt.

It’s involved with toxic parenting, inducing feelings of shame and inadequacy. Many people learn the strategy of disapproval in order to control very early in their lives, from disapproving parents.

Perceived faults

Criticism says a lot more about you than about the person you are criticizing.

The faults that you are pointing out are filtered through your own perception. In other words, they reflect and express your judgment. From another point of view, they may not even be faults at all.

What is missing is a sense of self-awareness.

What is also missing is a sense of respect for your partner as an equal, who makes his or her own decisions in life.

Criticism is a form of aggression

If you have trouble expressing angry with your partner, criticizing can be a less open form of aggression. You hide behind a “comment” on his behavior, so that you don’t have to own your own feelings.

Shaming

Because of the element of toxic disapproval, people often feel shamed when they are criticized. This is particularly true when it’s directed at who they are, rather than at what they do.

And the worst experience of being shamed is public humiliation. Public criticism can cause major psychological and emotional wounding that will affect your partner and your relationship for a long time.

Constructive criticism

The invention of the term “constructive criticism” is an acknowledgment of the fact that criticism is usually destructive. Constructive criticism is more a form of participatory advice, showing that you are part of the “team,” and that you feel a stake in improving a situation.

What are you trying to achieve?

If you know all this, you’ve seen the effects of your criticism, and still cannot stop criticizing your partner, ask yourself what you’re trying to achieve.

If your partner changed his or her behavior completely in line with your criticism, would you be happier?

What can your criticism of you partner tell you about what’s missing in your relationship? Is he right when he assumes that, deep down, you don’t like him?

Criticism as a failed form of connection

When you criticize your partner, you’re trying to make contact. But the form of contact you are choosing is hurtful.

So what if you tried to make contact in a positive way?

What if you started by saying that you are upset or angry, and why that is?

What if you remembered that this is the person you chose to live with, and what you really want from this important relationship in your life, both for him and for yourself?

Maybe you can try that the next time you feel the urge to criticize.

Maybe it will give you a little bit of the contact you long for.

Learning to Fight Fair: Avoiding the "Stonewall" Response in an Argument

Fighting couples stay together – but only those who fight fair.

‘Fighting’ isn’t even quite the right word here. What helps to create and sustain a healthy relationship is the ability to recognize, express, and work on conflicts together.

What doesn’t help is a refusal to engage with your partner. In its more extreme form, this is called “stonewalling,” which means shutting down communication and letting your partner run into a painful and unresponsive “stone wall.”

Examples of “stonewalling”

You ask your partner to take care of a weekend task, and he turns away to read the paper, muttering under his breath.

You get up your courage to approach a delicate subject, such as your love life, and he says he doesn’t have time to talk about it. When you insist, he moves away to another room, either in complete silence or with a nasty remark. After that, it’s never the right time to talk.

But maybe it is your husband who wants to voice his disappointment with your lack of support, and you’re the one who turns away and doesn’t engage?

“Stonewalling” and “time out”

Although they are both forms of withdrawal from conflict, there is a huge difference between stonewalling and time out.

Sometimes, an argument gets to a point where one of the partners can no longer tolerate the intensity of his or her feelings. Calling for a “time out” communicates the need for time alone before resuming the discussion. “Stonewalling” means leaving the scene or staying pointedly silent indefinitely, and possibly avoiding the subject forever.

“Stonewalling” and nagging

“Stonewalling” men often accuse their partners of “nagging.” But this “nagging” can actually be a somewhat desperate response to persistent “stonewalling” – ignored attempts at communication, either with the partner, or the issues she brings up.

What is behind the “stonewall” response

Withholding communication can be a very powerful tool in an unhealthy relationship. The withholding partner can gain power from denying the other partner contact, communication, and other needs. But ultimately, withholding is a sign of fear. The withholder is unable to respond, afraid of losing control. The stonewall response can be the last resort of someone who feels that he has no other communication tools left.

How to react when your partner is “stonewalling” you

Again, first recognize what is happening.

Ask your partner directly to engage with you. If he still refuses, calmly communicate your response and your boundaries: “I don’t want us to go on playing out this pattern. Could you let me know when it’s a good time to talk?”

If the “stonewalling” goes on for a long time, or if you start to feel afraid, then it’s time to seek couples counseling. Discuss your failed communication in the presence of a professional who can guide you toward productive communication.

How to stop yourself from slipping into the “stonewall” response

First, recognize the signs. You may feel it’s all getting too much for you. You may feel overwhelmed. You may feel unreasonably angry. You may even be at a point in your relationship where you don’t have much hope for the future. (This is when a lot of the more extreme “stonewalling” occurs.) Observe yourself, and notice what happens just before you feel the urge to stonewall your partner.

Then, try to communicate. This is difficult, particularly when “stonewalling” is the result of fear. But just saying a few words can make all the difference and turn “stonewalling” into “time out.” Maybe you can practice by yourself before the situation heats up.

Don’t stonewall yourself. Allow yourself to feel your feelings; don’t shut them down.

Fighting fair – the tools

Remember the main tools of “fighting fair,” and work out a conflict together:

1. Speak for yourself, not for someone else.

2. Listen.

3. Don’t make assumptions, ask questions.

4. Avoid the words “never” and “always.”

5. Don’t accuse, explain how you feel.

6. Take responsibility both for your anger and your fear.

7. Allow time and space for compassion.

8. Remember that your partner is not the enemy.

9. Don’t give up, don’t run away, don’t stonewall.

10. Above all, remember that you are talking to your partner – the person you love.