Here’s something I thought up tonight in a session. It’s for the couples who have lots of conflict over house cleaning, chores, or simply just not being on the same page about what is important.
Basically for some couples this is one of their perpetual issues. It’s never going to be fixed. We need to somehow mitigate its negative impact on the relationship. If it isn’t addressed in a productive way it becomes a criticism/defensiveness nightmare or nag fest.
I’ve noticed that it’s really a problem for an “act of service” person. As they feel deeply unloved when things are not done. Que one of our stories. Kerri is one if those “act of service” persons and she feels loved when I do things like empty the dishwasher...on the flip side when she has to take the trash out and wheel the cans to the street she feels incredibly alone and that she is having to do everything. (Her words!) So although I really appreciate a clean house it’s not really a Love Language thing for me. So I can walk by a mess...
I’ve realized that people who are not necessarily clean aren’t defective they are instead just different than clean people. (At least that’s what I tell myself.) No really, we each see different things. For example one person may see things out of place and another may see emotions that are off. Here's a big key when something isn’t getting done or addressed often it isn’t purposely. They genuinely don’t see it.
So how can we have a neutral conversation not one charged by frustration and disappointment/judgement about what needs to get done that doesn’t turn into a constant eval where one person leaves consistently feeling not good enough.
So how can we have a neutral conversation not one charged by frustration and disappointment/judgement about what needs to get done that doesn’t turn into a constant eval where one person leaves consistently feeling not good enough.
Introducing the shared to do list.
This is a list where the things that WE need to address get listed. The real key is that Both are contributors and both are taking things off the list. This list could be a virtual list that is shared between phones or a physical list that is seen on the refrigerator or a whiteboard.
Maybe this exercise leads to increased role clarification. Such as..."I like doing this, I don’t like doing that...and well no one likes to do that...maybe we should hire some help there."
So instead of tasking each other with things it’s more partnership.
