- Social distancing and working remotely with your partner comes with its own set of challenges.
- Business Insider interviewed four couples, in which both partners are relationship experts, about their best marriage advice.
- These experts brought up common themes and recommended that couples stay curious about their partners and remember the whole is greater than the sum of its parts — even during a health crisis.
- Marriage is hard for everyone, but here are some time-tested tricks to make it easier.
- Click here for more BI Prime stories.
Working from home with your partner can either be a really good idea or a major challenge for your love life.
As the novel coronavirus spreads, thousands of employees worldwide are working remotely. Major corporations like Google, Apple, and Twitter have asked their workforce to do so for weeks or an indefinite amount of time.
Amid the increase of remote work and social distancing, relationships are put to the test. Many couples wonder if their relationships are strong enough to power through the coronavirus pandemic.
Working remotely can mean more time to be with your partner, but it also means that your boundaries between work and personal responsibilities will also be blurred.
Business Insider spoke with four married couples, all of whom are relationship experts, on how they've used their knowledge of successful relationships and personal experiences to resolve relationship conflict. Although their tips are relevant now, we spoke to these experts before the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Here is how the pros do marriage — and what you can learn from them.
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'
Working from home with your partner ultimately means you're merging two lifestyles into one.
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
Be there for each other.
Every couple 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.
They appreciate each other’s strengths
Pileggi Pawelski and Pawelski call themselves "Aristotelian lovers," based on Aristotle's philosophy that two people in any kind of relationship should support each other's growth and development.
To that end, they try to understand the unique character strengths that each one brings to the table. (They recommend the character strengths test that's a cornerstone of the positive psychology movement, available here.)
Pileggi Pawelski gave an example. She and her husband are both highly creative, but she has "zest" and James is more inclined toward analytical thinking.
"Before having really known about positive psychology, maybe I would have thought, 'Oh, my husband's deliberately trying to annoy me and be a persnickety philosopher.'" Now she understands that analytical thinking has helped make him successful in his field.
"When I see it as an asset and I realize it's a part of who he is and this is how we're furthering a project, then it's a positive thing to our relationship."
They understand the whole is greater than the sum of its parts
Carrie Cole said she and Don often generate a "unique and blended" idea in their conversations. "We kind of play off of each other," she told me.
For example, before the Coles joined the Gottman Institute, Don suggested they get an apartment in Seattle and get licensed to practice therapy in Washington. (They're based in Houston, Texas.) Carrie looked into the licensing process and "got the ball rolling," she said.
Don noted that Carrie is more detail-oriented than he is. Carrie said, "He's the big dreamer; I make it a reality."
Pileggi Pawelski and Pawelski have a similar dynamic. Pawelski said there were times during their writing process when "Suzie will have an idea and I'll say, 'Let's go with it! That's brilliant!' Or I will have a perspective and Suzie will say, 'Hmm, I wouldn't necessarily come up with that myself, but I like the way you're thinking about that.' And that's great."
He described it as knowing that "the whole is greater than the sum of its parts."
They maintain rituals
The Coles emphasized the importance of daily or weekly rituals for maintaining closeness and intimacy. For example, every morning Carrie gets up earlier and makes Don coffee while he's still sleeping. Then, while she's getting ready for work, he makes her a cup of tea "just the way I like it."
And even though they work together, they still make time to "debrief," something they recommend in the Gottman couples workshops. It involves listening to your partner talk about what anything stressful or interesting that happened to them that day.
What they don't do on a regular basis? Spend a lot of time talking about the relationship itself. Instead, they "take the temperature" of their relationship all the time.
Carrie said, "We feel positively about each other and we feel positively about the relationship and we feel supported. And when we don't, it is such an abrupt kind of difference that it feels so uncomfortable that we work to fix it."
Have you been to couples therapy? If you're open to talking about your experience, please email Shana Lebowitz at slebowitz@businessinsider.com.