Why Relationships Matter

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How a couple begins a hard discussion can predict how the relationship looks years later.

Anger often flags moments when a partner’s goals interfere with our own.

Good timing, a gentle opening, and a neutral perspective may help hard talks go better.

While we might absolutely love our partner, sometimes knowing that we have to have a hard conversation makes us feel really negative. Maybe you lie awake working out exactly what you will say to your partner, and about a minute into the actual conversation, it has gone sideways. Maybe it was about the kids, or a furtive glance at a stranger. Maybe it was about money. Maybe it was about whose turn it is to empty the dishwasher, again. Experience has shown me that putting the talk off does not help much either.

The heart of these hard discussions is surprisingly direct. From an evolutionary perspective, conflict between partners is not a sign that love itself has failed. Buss (1989) proposed that conflict arises when one partner’s strategy interferes with the other’s goals, and that anger (among other feelings) is an emotional alarm signalling that interference. While the results of Buss’ study are mixed, it suggests a very simple insight, which is that the issues we find hardest to raise are often the ones where our interests and our partner’s do not really overlap.

In other words, the emotions you feel before a hard conversation provide valuable information and should not be ignored. They tell you that something matters to you. Is it your partner’s opinion? The outcome of the chat?

The challenge is delivering the information without setting off your partner’s alarms in return. The first three minutes are really going to matter. Carrère and Gottman (1999) filmed 124 newlywed couples arguing about something. Six years later, 17 of those couples had........

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