Andrea:
We’re talking today about choosing your battles. One of the first things we want to say is, being up close and personal for so long means that there will be irritations and frustrations, and we just grate against each other the wrong way sometimes. I don’t know… maybe you want to drop a comment in. What are your little irritating habits? What are the things that your partner or family members might have complained about, that they find irritating? Hi, Peter. Oh, smiling face. That’s lovely. Hi, Louise.
Andrea:
For me, I know one of the things that I get … I was going to say challenged on. Anyway, that obviously those around me-
Jon:
Nothing at all that frustrates, my love. Nothing.
Andrea
I don’t know if you’re like me, but sometimes I get that kind of tickle in my throat. There’s this sound that I make. I’ll spare you. I won’t do it now.
Jon:
Yeah. Please spare them.
Andrea:
That can drive Jon nuts. If you’re brave enough, tell me what some of yours are. I know another one can be chewing gum too loudly, but we both do that. Not just me. It’s funny how, when you’re in close confines for a while, we can end up doing these irritating things that suddenly, it’s like a magnifying glass has been put on it, and they just seem like such a big deal. The first point we want to make, or the first tip to share is, don’t major on the minors. Isn’t that right?
Jon:
Absolutely! Don’t major on the minors. It’s not life-changing. It’s not the biggest thing in the world, at the end of the day. When you’re really up close to it, it can seem like some of these things are a real big deal, but when you step back and think of them in the grand scheme of things, is it a real issue? It isn’t really.
Andrea:
Here’s the challenge though. Psychologists actually have a name for this, which I thought was really interesting. Hi, Louise. Hi, Juds. Just getting all the messages coming through. When we do some things, so if we have an annoying habit, it’s circumstantial. My throat is itchy. It’s not a big deal, in our minds. If our partner has an annoying habit, well that’s something that they did on purpose to annoy us. They keep doing it, because they’re being disrespectful, and it’s a major character flaw.
Andrea:
That’s the kind of thinking that goes on in our heads. It’s so real to us that psychologists have a term that they call fundamental attribution error. We’re good, and we’re only doing things because of the circumstances, but when they do things, it’s a serious character flaw that they need to deal with.
Jon:
They are a bad person, fundamentally.
Andrea:
The first thing is, don’t major on the minors. Most times, the thing with habits is that we do it subconsciously. You’re not even giving the other person a second thought, so don’t take it so personally, when these things happen. That’s the first part we wanted to land.
Jon:
Feel free, as we’re going on the chat, let us have your comments, your thoughts on that. If it lands with you, if it’s something that you’re guilty of, something that you need to improve on, it’s all good. It’s all good.
Andrea:
Or any questions you might have or all that. That’s the first thing.
Jon:
The first one. The second little tip is, basically live and let live. It’s closely related to the previous one. But basically the point here we’re trying to make is, because we’re innately different as people, our personalities are different, our wiring is different, we have different tolerance levels for different things.
Jon:
Some people, for example, personality wise, who are very … You might call them neat freaks. Very sort of neat and tidy people. They like everything organized and in order. When other people are not that way, they tidy people can have a real problem with that. I, for example, am very much a … The personality model we use-
Andrea:
Organized. Structured.
Jon:
I’m a beaver. Very organized, structured. I don’t like mess. I struggle to work in chaos. I like to have things organized and ordered, which is why, if you remember from the TEDx Talk that we did, we spoke about the different desks. Some of you may have seen that. Mine was always very ordered and organized, and Andrea’s wasn’t.
Andrea:
It still isn’t.
Jon:
Still isn’t, but she knows she can find her way around in that. We need to learn to cut each other some slack. Live and let live is what we’re saying here.
Andrea:
Which is why we have different desks and different offices.
Jon:
Yeah. You’ve got to find a way around it, because otherwise you can end up pulling your hair out, just thinking, “Why is this person so messy and why can’t they be like me?” You’re not going to change them. The only thing you can change is your approach to them and cut them some slack. Live and let live. Recognize that they are fundamentally wired differently. If it’s really bothering you, maybe have a conversation with them, but ultimately you’re not going to be able to change that person.
Andrea:
Something that I learned with that, just the fact that we’re fundamentally wired differently, is this point about the different tolerance levels. Something that I might think is okay or manageable, in terms of a mess, Jon might find really overwhelming, but it’s the same the other way around, with things that he might find manageable and okay, like the detail attention you need to give to forms and to writing in those tiny little squares. I find that really frustrating, but for Jon, you manage that okay. We’ve learned to cover for each other in the things that are overwhelming for one, that might be okay for the other, and vice versa. Is that fair? Is that true?
Jon:
Absolutely.
Andrea:
I was going to use the example of the fridge.
Jon:
Yeah. It came to mind. Yeah. What’s your take on that? It came mind exactly as you’re speaking then.
Andrea:
The fridge is very easily a bone of contention if we let it. There’d be food in there, leftovers. It’s kind of a jumble of different things. Which for me, I’m happy to go in there, sort what’s good, create a meal out of whatever’s in there. Whereas Jon prefers if everything was labeled with the date, and stored in freezers with labels on it. That’s never going to happen in my world. We just agreed that I’ll deal with the fridge, because if ever he has to go in there, it’s just overwhelming and too much for him.
Jon:
Absolutely. It’s just the way my brain is wired. I find it overwhelming to go into any situation and just see things in order. If I can put them into order … Sorry, to see them out of order.
Andrea:
In disorder. Yeah.
Jon:
Disorder. If I can put them into order, my brain is at peace. I can relax. I can actually approach it and work with it. I used to think that everybody was like that. If they didn’t, they were just being lazy. Actually, I came to realize that no, they are perfectly able to function quite normally in that kind of setting. That, for me, was an eye opener.
Andrea:
Yeah. One is, you can have little irritating habits, which is just the way you are. The other can be, there are fundamental differences in the way you’re wired, which means some things will feel overwhelming for you, or it might not be for your partner, or vice versa, or for the children. You might think the level of mess is okay. They might think it is just doing their head in. You have to just have a conversation around what’s tolerable and how you’re going to manage things together while you’re up close and personal.
Jon:
I’ve got to say, it blew me away initially to discover that one of our children … I shan’t name names here, but one of them initially, in the early days, had no concept of what was tidy or untidy. I would say to make your bed. He said, “I made my bed.” Look at the bed. I said, “That doesn’t look made to me.” When I mean made, I mean square corners, everything leveled out. It still looks a mess to me. He says it looks completely fine to him. They’re looking at things through a different lens. You just have to learn to cut some slack.
Andrea:
We’ve learned that the bed’s fine, as long as-
Jon:
Is it life changing? Is it worth having a big battle over? No. At the end of the day, that is just going to cause you stress. It’s going to give you a acrimonious environment. You really don’t want that. Just let it go sometimes. Just let it go. Choose your battles, is what we’re saying. Theme for the day.
Andrea:
Well, that brings us neatly onto the third point. Isn’t it? Which is about keep thinking big picture. The whole point is about building strong relationships and not damaging each other in the way that you turn up in your frustration. One of the things we always challenge ourselves with is, “What’s the lesson?”
Andrea:
If there’s a lesson that you’re trying to communicate, that’s one thing. If all you’re doing is venting your frustration, then that’s not good, because we ended up attacking the person and not attacking the issue. If there’s no lesson there, and all you want to do is let them know just how annoyed and frustrated you’re feeling at the moment, especially cause you’re invading each other’s space, you might want to just pause, swallow those words for a minute, and think about whether or not they should be said. Choosing battles.
Jon:
Yeah. The words you use will have an impact on … If you remember back to session one, for those of you who may have been with us on the series a couple of sessions ago, we spoke about the emotional bank account. Very simple concept. It’s that mental record we keep of each interaction with the people around us. The quality of the relationship at any one point in time, essentially is the balance in the account. The things that we do that irritate each other drain the account. Things that we do that make deposits in the account, raise the balance in the account up. It’s really important that you understand how some of these things you’re doing are impacting the bank account, because remember, the game in town is you want to keep that bank account in positive territory.
Jon:
You want to keep it positive. Ultimately, long-term, big picture, what you want is a positive bank account, because you want to have a nice, healthy relationship that feels good. You’ve got to keep making these deposits. When people do things that irritate you, you’ve got to think again, coming back to Andrea’s point about big picture, is this going to make a difference to us when we get through the other side of this bell curve and we’re all back into normal, assuming that’s going to happen at some point? What do you want the relationship look like then?
Jon:
If we’re stressing about all these small things now, chances are, it’s going to have an impact down the road. What do we need to do differently now to cut each other a bit more slack and choose our battles, back to what we were saying there, so we actually come out of this, the other side, in positive territory?
Andrea:
Yeah. One of the disciplines that we learned, this is something we talk about when we do the course on how to be careful, not crushing, which is all about how do you turn up to conflict, how do you to treat each other during conflict, and how do you come out understanding each other more, with an even stronger relationship? Using conflict to build relationships rather than to damage it.
Andrea:
One of the things we talk about is having ground rules. Maybe now that you’re home, now that everybody’s up close and personal, and maybe grating against each other from time to time, in those quiet moments, when you are able to be more reflective, and more of the real you, think about the ground rules that you’d like to create for yourself and for your family.
Andrea:
Ground rules are those boundaries which you will not cross, no matter how angry you get. It’s about thinking about who you want to be, even in your most intensely furious moments. Who do you want to be and how do you want to be experienced? What are the ground rules that you could set? Well, one of the obvious ones, which we would strongly recommend, insist on actually, is not hitting.
Andrea:
Sadly, domestic abuse is going through the roof with everybody in lockdown, because some people just don’t know how to manage their anger, or to plan for anger beforehand, and decide who they want to be when they turn up. Think about the ground rules that you want to have in place. I guess now that we’ve mentioned domestic abuse, we have to say, if there’s anybody on the call experiencing anything like that, please reach out for help. It is never okay and it never ends well. Actually, both people need help. Hopefully, that’s not your story.
Andrea:
If you have to tell somebody off, sometimes choosing to say it in a gentle voice, choosing to whisper, makes it land more easily. Especially for men, where your booming voice and positional authority can make a strong, loud word land much more heavily. Just think about how you’re saying what you’re saying. Just whisper it sometimes. You can say, “I really don’t like that. I want you to do that differently.”
Jon:
Think about how you’re saying it, but also think about how it’s landing. Because again, remember, in relationship land, perceptions are often much more impactful than intentions. It doesn’t really matter what you meant. That’s interesting. Really what matters is how it’s landing, how it’s being received on the other end. Think about some of those things.
Andrea:
Yeah. Yeah.
Jon:
I’m conscious of time. We’re up to 15 minutes.
Andrea:
I know.
Jon:
It goes so quickly.
Andrea:
It does.
Jon:
Wow.
Andrea:
Well, hopefully that’s helpful. Choose your battles. Look after each other. Life can get frustrating, just being in each other’s space and grating against each other. Most times, most people have the best intentions. Think the best, and try not to judge and criticize so easily, and remember that whatever they’re doing to annoy you, there are things you’re doing to annoy them as well.
Jon:
Absolutely.
Andrea:
However you’d like to be treated, that’s the way you want to treat them. That brings us to the end of this 15 minutes again. Next time, which is on Tuesday.
Jon:
Next Tuesday.
Andrea:
Next Tuesday, after Easter, we will be looking at-
Jon:
11:00 AM.
Andrea:
Yes. We’ll be looking at how to create healthy boundaries and to use this opportunity to redesign the home work life balance that you want. That might serve you better when we come out of COVID-19. Create a new normal. But until then, tomorrow is Good Friday. We’re taking a break over Easter. We wish you a wonderful Easter, a very peaceful Easter. We’re praying for all of us, that there will be healing in our land. Look forward to catching up with you next Tuesday.
Jon:
Meanwhile, happy Easter. See you next week.
Andrea:
Happy Easter.
Jon:
Bye bye.
Andrea:
All right. Bye bye.