- We interviewed four couples in which both partners are relationship experts about their best marriage advice.
- Common themes emerged, including: Stay curious about your partner, and know the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
- Ultimately, marriage is hard for everyone, but there are some time-tested tricks to make it easier.
There's a curious trend among relationship experts: Many of them are married. To each other.
When I first realized this, it sounded to me like the makings of either heaven or hell.
Case for heaven: No one ever name-calls, or violates their partner's trust, or shuts down emotionally because you both know those are counterproductive behaviors. Case for hell: You can't storm off like a child during an argument about chores because you just counseled a client not to do that this morning.
Curious to know which way the pendulum swings, I called up four married couples in which both partners are relationship experts and asked whether and how they practice what they preach.
In the four conversations, I heard some common themes about the conflicts that have played out in their marriages and how they've used their knowledge of successful relationships to resolve them.
Read on to find out how the pros do marriage — and what can you learn from them.
SEE ALSO: A relationship therapist breaks down the 10 most common fights couples have
They know how to be interdependent
Suzann Pileggi Pawelski and James Pawelski, PhD co-wrote the forthcoming book "Happy Together," in which they apply insights from positive psychology to romantic relationships. Pileggi Pawelski's background is in journalism; Pawelski is a philosopher. Both had been successful in their individual careers, but their approaches to research and writing were starkly different.
Pawelski talked about the importance of "interdependence," which he acknowledged "could be a challenge." At one point, Pileggi Pawelski showed her husband a draft of a chapter she'd written. Pawelski thought they could do better.
Seeing how much energy she'd put into the drafts, Pawelski told me, "I had a choice of saying, 'OK, these drafts are good; we can just kind of tweak them a little bit and then we're good to go.' Or, I could say to her, 'Honestly, I think we need to take them apart and put them back together again and I think they'll be better."
Ultimately, Pawelski gave his wife "some time to think it through more," and she realized the draft could in fact use some revision. Interdependence, Pawelski said, is about standing up for your perspective and also being willing to yield a little to the other person's perspective.
They know the 'why'
Peter Pearson, PhD and Ellyn Bader, PhD run the Couples Institute in Menlo Park, California. Pearson told me one of their biggest points of friction is that he has a "higher tolerance for visual disarray when it comes to clutter, much higher than Ellyn."
Most of the time, Pearson said, he's more conscious of the amount of clutter around and does something about it.
"There's a bigger picture of what we want to create in our relationship," he said, "and having a clutter-free environment helps us both. So it's the why. … Why would I be interested in putting forth the effort of less clutter? Why would Ellyn be interested in relaxing her standards?"
The "why" varies from couple to couple, Pearson said. It's about what you want to create more of as a twosome, whether that's peace, happiness, or personal fulfillment.
They listen with curiosity
Every couple I interviewed mentioned something about staying curious — during conflict and in general.
Carrie Cole, MEd, LPC, and Don Cole, DMin, LPC-S, LMFT-S, who are the research director and clinical director, respectively, at the Gottman Institute, shared something similar. Recently, Carrie was visibly upset with Don because she'd asked him a question and he'd blown her off. Instead of getting defensive, Carrie said, Don got curious.
He asked questions like, "Why did that bother you so badly?" and was willing to listen to the answer. Carrie told me it's about feeling validated. "For somebody to say, 'Tell me more about that' and 'Where does that come from for you? What's your history around that?' That really soothes me."
Julie Schwartz Gottman, PhD, president and cofounder at the Gottman Institute, said her husband, John Gottman, PhD, cofounder at the Gottman Institute, adopted a relationship-strengthening strategy directly from their own research.
"If I was really upset about something or making a complaint about a behavior of his," she said, "rather than going defensive, he would say, 'What do you need? Honey, what do you need?' And immediately all the tension would met away. The anger would melt away. It was a balm to my soul."
Why? "Because John recognized that when I was upset about something, first of all my feelings were valid," she said. "He loved me and my feelings mattered," plus he showed a willingness to help ease her distress.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider