Transcription
When you have a partner, there are two different brains in the relationship. Then you have problems that can't be resolved because you are who you are. It's interesting that quite often the very things that attract us to someone are the things that become the most annoying. Contempt is sulfuric acid for a relationship. It's really the worst thing that you can do. When you get into fights, or if you do still get into fights, does that ever come up?
Can I tell a story? Oh, love a story. Go ahead.
Dr. John Gottman: Julie, Dr. John Gottman, the partner, Dr. Love, MBTI, Fore Dr. Gottman, Gman, Julian, John, it's my honor to have you on my channel.
Thank you.
Thank you so much, and it's also our privilege to be with you.
Well, let's dive into this topic because I was just thinking on my way over here that we grew up reading the fairy tales and watching Hollywood romcoms. So couples usually overcome obstacles and difficulties to be together and they live happily ever after. So the presumption is once you've overcome all the obstacles, then you have no problems or you have minor problems. So an ideal marriage is that. But in your book and in your research, you talk about conflict being something that's inevitable and that 69% of the problems cannot be solved. That's just mind-blowing. So can you tell us a little bit about that and how are we supposed to go on with our relationships knowing that most of our problems cannot be resolved?
The wonderful thing about conflict is that it can be a royal road to greater understanding of our partners when conflict is done well. And the reality is that when you have a partner, there are two different brains in the relationship, two different histories in the relationship. Even if you come from the same town or village, you're still going to have different families that you've come from, thus different experiences. So what that creates are typically different lifestyle preferences and different personalities. As a result, the differences between you can be sources of differences in opinion, differences in beliefs, differences in values, your thinking, your way of moving through time together. As a result, when those are different, as they almost always are to some degree, then you have problems that can't be resolved because you are who you are and you really don't want to be together with your clone.
Right. Right. So how do you talk about those differences? That's really what we mean by conflict. Okay. So I think the number one thing people should know and understand is that conflicts exist in relationships, and that's normal, right? I think a lot of times we head for a split or divorce because we assume this is not normal. This is not healthy. But your research indicates that there are problems. There will always be conflicts, but you need to manage them.
In your book, you also talked about why we are attracted to the people that we're likely to have conflict with. You talk about DNA as well.
In our DNA, we're just attracted to people that were different with.
Yeah. This is a very famous study called the t-shirt study where women smelled t-shirts of that men had worn for two days. And the t-shirts they found the most attractive turned out to be worn by men who were the most different from them in the genes of the immune system. So it turned out that these women were really attracted to men who were the most different from them. And from an evolutionary standpoint, it kind of makes sense because then our offspring have more and better immunity. And subsequent to that study, they also did the study to see whether they would actually like those men better. And they do. They like those men better too. So that's kind of interesting that there really is a selection for not looking for our clone but looking for somebody very, very different from us. And it's interesting that quite often the very things that attract us to someone are the things that become the most annoying when we finally settle down to have a relationship. For example, he's attracted to her because she's so extroverted and lively, and and he's a very quiet guy, and you know she's attracted to him because he's so loyal and sensible and calm. And then they get together, and and he thinks, "Does she really have to invite the whole church over every Sunday? There's so much noise. Does she have to be that extroverted?" And she's upset because he's so quiet. He's not sharing his feelings with her, especially when he's stressed. And so the very things that sometimes attract us to people become sources of annoyance and irritation.
Oh, absolutely. I've been with my husband for 30 years since high school, and I definitely attest to that. Our kids ask us all the time why were you attracted to dad when you can't you find this annoying? I go, well, when we're in love, that was very attractive.
The reason why I asked those two questions is because underneath my videos there are always messages about why things aren't going well. Why are their partners not more understanding, or that their relationship, they just don't seem to be in sync. And I think the preconception is that you live happily ever after, all the time, happy couples do. So I think it's important for people to understand, even from a biological standpoint, you're attracted to people that you're different with, right? That therefore conflicts are inevitable.
In your book, you talk about different conflict styles. And I think it's so important to understand ourselves before we step into a relationship because ultimately every relationship is a relationship we have with ourselves. So if we understand what kind of fighting style, how we are when we face conflicts, it would help us tremendously in relationships. And so in your book, you talk about the three different conflict styles. Can you briefly explain them, and you let us know if we can work towards one that's more beneficial for our relationship, or are they equally as good?
Well, what we have found is that basically they're they all work. They're all good styles of conflict. The first is what we call avoidant, an avoidance style of dealing with conflict. And what that means is that basically you agree to disagree. You don't engage in intense, passionate discussion and expression of your feelings about a conflict. You may just say a couple of words, you know, just a tiny bit about your feelings, but then there will be a comment like, "Okay, well, you feel that way, I feel this way. Okay, well, let's just move on." And so that kind of style actually can work, especially when you are paired with somebody of a similar style.
The second style is what we call validators. And validators are people who will express their feelings a little bit more regarding a conflict, but they will stay calm. They will stay quite rational typically, and they will move very quickly into problem-solving. So again, you're not going to have that passionate, intense, you know, loud perhaps uh expression of emotion. And that style works too. That style is just fine. Um, it's remaining calm but still talking out about a conflict and moving quickly into a solution.
The third style is what we call volatile. The volatile folks, and I'm one of them, proud to say, uh express things, shall we say passionately, uh which means very intensely, lots of emotion. They move immediately into that uh expression of emotion. They don't kind of dawdle as they're moving into that. They really want all the feelings out there right away. They're very honest and open about their feelings. Now, if you have a volatile person paired with an avoidant person, those two people have very different styles of conflict management, and that can still work. But the couple has to figure out basically a happy medium. What does the let's say the volatile person need to do in order to not make the avoidant person run for the hills, you know, when when that volatile person says we need to talk? So it may be kind of a middle ground that they establish where the volatile person will calm themselves down and then think of a gentle way of bringing up their feelings that doesn't scare the avoidant person. Meanwhile, the avoidant person needs to hang in there with a little bit of courage, even though they may feel anxious about listening to the other partner and try to stay present with that other person in order to talk through what is uncomfortable for the volatile person.
Well, talk about the ratio. That's the thing that makes it work.
Yeah, that's right. So what we found in our conflict discussions is that no matter what style you are, there is a ratio that is absolutely key to having a good relationship in the future. And that is five positive little interactions for every one negative interaction. And when we talk about positive interactions, we're not just talking about "Oh, honey, I love you, and this is not a big problem." It can be something as simple as a head nod or just making eye contact with the other person or a smile or an agreement, a little, you know, word of "Yeah, that makes sense." Or "Hm, I get it." Or yeah, even little sounds like John is making. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. You know, or a head nod, something like that. Those are all, each one of those is a separate positive interaction that gets counted in that 5:1 ratio. Meanwhile, the negatives are going to be things like just looking away, rolling the eyes, which is a sign of contempt, maybe just shaking their head. No, no, no. May be saying "No, you're wrong." Or, you know, we're still are what we call the four horsemen of the apocalypse, which are the big predictors of relationship demise. And those include criticism where you are pointing out and blaming a problem on a personality flaw of your partner, like you're so lazy or how could you say that, mean things as opposed to focusing on something that happened. You're focusing instead, saying the room is messy instead of that criticism comes as you're a messy person.
Right. Yes. That's right. And then there's contempt. And contempt is sulfuric acid for a relationship. It's really the worst thing that you can do. It includes a feeling of superiority as you're looking down on your partner with a little bit of disgust as well as criticism. And that can manifest as calling your partner bad, nasty names or using sarcasm with a cutting edge or mockery or in fact rolling your eyes, um, or lifting the left side of your mouth up like that and to the side. And if any of you have teenagers, I'm sure you've seen the last two, the eye roll and the little cheek raise. So yeah. So those are the first two. The third is defensiveness, which means that you're trying to defend yourself against what feels like an attack. And you can do that either by denying what your partner is complaining about. I didn't do that. No, I didn't. Or counterattacking. Oh, yeah. Well, you're just as bad. That doesn't work. And finally, the last one, the fourth one, is what we call stonewalling. And stonewalling means one partner is totally shutting down and becoming like a stonewall and not giving any indication to the speaker that they're actually listening and paying attention. So they may look away, they'll kind of freeze, their body won't move. Uh, no head nods, no positive indications that they're really listening to their body. It's really ghosting except in person.
In person. Yeah. Well said. Yeah. That's right. And what we found out by looking at physiology was that when people are stonewalling, many, many times they're actually in fight or flight. Their heart rates are jumping up over 100 beats a minute while they're just sitting there listening to their partners. Their blood pressure may be going up. They may be sweating or they may be feeling cold, but they're in fight or flight, which we call flooding. And that's a particularly male thing to do, stonewalling.
Yeah, 85% of the time it's a male stonewalling in heterosexual couples.
Yeah. But lesbians stonewall too. I feel like that's something that I'm I might have done as well at some point.
Sure. I mean, we all do occasionally. Yeah. Right.
Can we go back to the conflict styles? I was just thinking when you were talking about it, the volatile ones are the ones that are very passionate, right? And I I feel that when I am like that, I sort of go between avoidant and volatile, like when I was younger because you're so passionate about something, you're exhausted after you express yourself. Then sort of mentally you make a note, well, next time I'm just going to avoid the conflict, right? I think later on in life, I sort of move more towards validating, like uh conflict style, but I can sort of see I still switch back and forth depending on the topics. For example, a good point. Yeah. Politics, maybe it's avoidant, but if it's about my kids, then it's it's more I think full on, full on, full on, right? Um, because you know sometimes you think of your kids as an extension of you. So it's it's your inner child you're fighting for. So I'm wondering if that does happen with a lot of people and if we can sort of adapt to our partners' conflict style because in your book you talk about a lot of all the different combinations. You talked about stepping out of your comfort zone, like if you're an avoidant person, just try to stay in that uncomfortable space and not run away as your basic instinct. I'm curious if your partner, whoever he he or she might be, you might adapt to your partner's style if your partner is very volatile and you're thinking, well, I can't also go all out.
Well, that's what I was talking about uh just a few minutes ago when I said if you're volatile and your partner is avoidant, how do you deal with that? Well, the volatile person is going to come more towards, not necessarily the avoidant person, but at least a validating person who doesn't express their emotions quite as intensely, will still express them, but maybe not in a loud voice, maybe using different words, maybe slowing down the tempo of what they're saying so that it's not so stunning and difficult to fear for the avoidant person. So it's not that we're going all the way over to be like our partner. We're trying to uh develop a style all our own that is in the middle where we both can hang in there and work things through.
Right. I'm just curious if you change a partner, for example, you used to be avoidant, but then you meet someone who's also avoidant, and then nothing ever gets talked about. Nothing ever gets resolved, and you become more and more you change your style. Or the other way around, you're always so passionate, and you meet a partner who is also so passionate. So everything escalates from zero to to 100 in in in 5 seconds, and then you sort of back away and say, you know what, I need to change my style and become more avoidant. I'm curious if you see that chemistry and how if having a a different partner may change your style of facing conflicts.
There's some research by Andy Christensen at UCLA that suggests that people uh really shift depending on the topic of the conversation. And so a lot of times if it's his issue that he's bringing up, he may be quite volatile. Whereas if it's her issue that she's bringing up, he may be very avoidant, for example. So there is some evidence that people really change their style depending on if it's their hot issue or not or somebody else's hot issue.
Okay. No, because I I I'm thinking in my head so many couples that I know, you don't want something to escalate, right? You change your style. But for example, avoidant might not be her natural style, but she doesn't want to blow up in front of all the family, right? Holds it in. She holds it in. She tries to ignore it, and then you know at some point it blows up when they drive home. The when they drive home from the family, right?
Um, yeah, the setting makes a big difference. But you know, I think it's really important to understand that when you are more of a volatile person and you're holding stuff inside, that's not going to work. It's never going to work. In fact, it can result in physical symptoms. The emotions will come out in what we call psychosomatic illness, right? Uh, like headaches, backaches, uh stomach upset, ulcers, etc. So that's part of why we have studied not only the unhappy couples but the really successful couples to find out what they do that make it successful uh no matter what style they are. And then we have created methods that we use to coach couples or to help couples have positive relationships and reach that 5:1 ratio by learning how to speak in a different way, learning different words, different phrases with which to express their complaints and learning how to ask questions.
Yeah, stay curious. You talk about that in your book as opposed to why are you being so dumb, right?
What was that? Um, these are all the the things I I had to learn from the past, you know, 20, 30 years. I think in terms of Asia culture, probably East Asia culture, okay, um under the Confucius um philosophy, right? You have a role that you play, you know, as a wife, as a husband. There are certain rules, boundaries, responsibilities that come with that. Sort of try to stay within that. And if you can stay in your role, you should all ideally live a very happily and peaceful life. And that is not the case. So not true. So we will see that manifest in maybe what you talked about the four behaviors, the sarcasm, right, contempt, and all of that. Um, you talked about those four behaviors. Which one do you think it's the worst?
Contempt.
Contempt. Without question. Contempt. Contempt not only predicts the demise of the relationship but also predicts infectious illnesses the recipient of contempt will have in the next four years. So it destroys the immune system of the listener primarily.
If someone is in that relationship, how do they protect themselves from their partner's contempt? Because I can change the way I handle things, right? But I can't control the way my partner handles things.
Yes, you can, to. Well, you can try. That's kind of a myth that you know you have no effect on your partner. It's not true. If you can say to your partner, really be very clear that the way that you're expressing yourself right now is really damaging me, and what I've it's it's really destroying my closeness to you. It's making me feel much more distant. I want to withdraw from you. I'm afraid of you, and I'm afraid that my love is dwindling away every time I hear contempt. Have you have you considered maybe changing the ways that you talk to me? Cuz I really want to hear what you're feeling. I really do. But I think you're sabotaging the way that you're going to get listened to because I can't listen to contempt, you know. So there are ways of making change.
I love how you demonstrated that because I think as a recipient of contempt, most people are likely to fight back, right?
True. To attack or to revenge or to start stonewalling, like I'm not hearing you, I'm not going to give you a reaction. What you demonstrated requires a lot of patience and deep breaths.
It does. And the sooner it happens, the better. You see, there's that issue that you were discussing earlier about, okay, I'll just avoid the conflict. But that's not going to work. You know, if you keep hearing contempt over and over and over again for a long period of time, one, you'll probably get sick, and two, you'll be in a very bad state. Psychologically, it'll damage your self-esteem after a while. It's a little bit like physical abuse. It's it's psychological abuse.
It's really verbal too, right? You're you're
That's exactly right. So no, I think this is a great lesson for our audience out there, knowing that you need to draw the boundary and protect yourself.
You bet. These aren't just words. You actually may exhibit s physical symptoms. Yes, dynamic continues.
So I love to talk about your relationship if I may because I think it's fascinating work that you do, and you are married, you're a couple, and you study couples. Can we talk about how working together had benefited your relationship or hindered it in a way, in any sort of way? Because my father is an educator, and I understand the way he talks, like he's being very patient. And when I was reading your work and I was just fascinated, I was thinking, when you get into fights, or if you do still get into fights, does that ever come up? How does that work for you?
Oh, it's really fun. You know, both of us can point our fingers at each other and say, "You call yourself a marital therapist? Aha, I got a real right?"
Yeah. Oh, it's it's so much fun. We have a very good sense of humor. So if I get defensive and she tells me that you're being defensive, I can't say no, I'm not, because that proves that I'm defensive.
Hey, that's that's great. Yeah, it when she says you're being defensive, I say I probably am.
Yeah. Yeah. Let me see if I can say that a different way. M, but you know, Sherry, in our relationship, we've been together 38 years, is that right? 39, almost 30, yeah, 39 years actually, we came together before a lot of these results came out. I mean, there were some, but we hadn't figured out yet how the successful couples were keeping their success, you know, what did they do, and so we had lots of, you know, really difficult fights in the first couple of years of being together. Actually, I was much more of an avoider back there. I think I would I would typically leave the house and just walk, walk, you know, for a couple of hours, come back, and we wouldn't talk, but then we would. But then we would eventually
Can I tell a story?
Oh, you don't love a story?
Go ahead.
So when we were first married, I was driving home from work, and I was I was thinking, did we pay the plumber? Because we just had this plumber come out, and I want to make sure we we paid him. And I I didn't write a check. I I didn't know if Julie did. So when I when I walked in the door, I said, "Julie, did you pay the plumber?" And she said, "Did I pay the plumber? What what did you pay the plumber? Why are you attacking me like that?" you know, and I thought I married a lunatic. She's crazy. I just try to find out if she paid the plumber, and she's getting all upset about it. It's a simple yes or no. I had no idea why she got so upset. And then when she calmed down and I calmed down, then she said to me, you know, the reason that I got so upset is that when I was a girl, little girl, I come home from school, and my mother would often criticize me when I walked in the door. She'd say, "Is that what you wore to school? You look terrible. No wonder you have no friends." I said, "Oh, that's awful." And she said, "You know, when you first come in the door, I really need you to first come over to me and put your arms around me and say hello, give me a kiss, and you know, and talk to me about your day, and I'll talk about my day." Then you can ask me, "Did you pay the plumber?" And it'd be fine, you know.
Oh, okay. Well, I didn't know that. You know, I as I got to know her mother, I kind of understood what she had gone through, but at first, I didn't understand that.
You bring up such a good point that we carry so much baggage with us from our families or interaction with just people from the past that there is no way your partner would know. And if you don't know and you can't articulate how you want your partner to better support you, there's a third reason too, which I think you've probably blocked out, but I remember uh saying at the time, which is I'm 74 almost, and I grew up in the 70s and was very, very active in the feminist movement and women's liberation, all that stuff in the 70s and still consider myself a very strong feminist, always fighting, you know, for women's rights, right? So what I was thinking at the time was how come it's my responsibility to be doing this kind of household management stuff? How come it's not your responsibility? You're assuming it's mine.
This definitely resonates too because obviously we live in the modern times, and and in Asia, it's probably more evident that the inequality between the genders and and the roles that comes with it. So it does, it's also a trigger, and it's an innocent question. I'm sure John and I say that to my husband a lot too now that we're older. It's like I know you don't mean anything by it, but somehow this triggers a number of emotions in me, which is a topic I'd like to bring up the next, which is you talk about five big fights we all have in relationships. And one of which I think it's resonates with me and it resonates I think with a lot of the couples that I see is the shallow. You don't know what happens. The fight escalates, and you were fine probably five minutes ago, and it escalates, and you sit there and you use your logic and you use your prefrontal cortex to analyze everything. It's like what what happened? What is the problem? If you use logic to analyze it, you will never get an answer. Can you tell us a little bit more about the fight that you call the shallows? How do we overcome something like this?
That's a wonderful question, Sherry. I'm loving these questions. So what we mean by the shallow is when you're fighting about a particular topic, but there's actually some very deep stuff underneath your position on the topic and maybe your partner's position too that you are not unearthing and looking at and talking about. And so you're trying to find a solution on the surface when you haven't really explored what's beneath your position on the issue. Let me give an example. Let's say that it's a question of parenting, and you really don't like hearing your partner raise their voice when they're angry at your child. It really, really bothers you. And so you're saying to your partner, I don't want you talking loudly to our little boy. I want you to use a soft tone. And he says, "Why? Why do I have to use a soft tone? I feel passionately when he does something wrong, and I need to really let him know how I feel." Okay. So you're talking about how loud should he talk. So what the heck is going on underneath that? Well, there might be a lot going on. And what we discovered actually, John and I created this during one of our conflicts that we couldn't work out, were six questions that we decided to discuss with one another in a particular structure that really worked. You know, most of the time when we are arguing about a problem, we're each representing our own point of view, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, and we're not listening. We're not really listening. So in this structure, one person is the listener, one person is the speaker. And the listener's job is to just ask each of the questions that we've posed as being important and just take in what the speaker is saying without thinking about your own position. You put your own position on a back burner, and then you reverse roles after you've heard your partner's answers to all those questions and listen to these questions because you can hear depth uh within them. The first question might be something like, in your position on this issue, do you have any beliefs, ethics, or values that are part of your position on this issue? Second question is, do you have some background or childhood history that's a part of your position? You know, there's that child again showing up. The third question is, why is this so important to your position on this issue? Fourth question is, what are your feelings about this? You know, all the way down deep, what are your feelings? The fifth question is, do you have some kind of ideal dream here regarding your position and how you would like things to unfold regarding this discussion and this conflict? And then the last question is, do you have some underlying purpose or life meaning that is a part of your position on this issue that that you want that meaning to be a part of your life? So if we go back to that conversation about speaking loudly to your child, you know, the first answer might be, well, I think it's very important to be gentle with children because children are fragile. They're tender, and we don't want to scare our children with a loud voice cuz we can look like a monster, we're so much bigger than they are. So we don't want to do that. Second question might be in childhood history. Well, my father was a monster. My father yelled at
Me and it actually hurt my ears. He yelled so much, and I was terrified of him, and I couldn't hear his message at all because I would just want to run away right. And I didn't want to be close to him; I didn't feel loved by him, you know, etc., and I don't want our family to be like that, and I don't want our child to be afraid of you. I want them to feel your love.
So you're going to be getting these answers that take things so much deeper than just "no, it's wrong to use a loud voice." And when you have the understanding of your partner's position at a much deeper level, what happens is that you feel more compassion. You feel more understanding for what your partner went through and much more willing to reach some better compromise, some better solution than just arguing back and forth, right? I love that because a lot of times when we're under attack or when our emotions are running high in conflict, we don't really take a deep breath and really sit back and be more curious about the person that you're fighting with. And in fact, he or she might have some burdens that you don't know. So understanding that and being curious about that, I really think would be so beneficial in any relationship, really.
Right. But you talked about a lot of times that underlying theme of the fight is we have an ideal, we have a dream, and your partner's behavior deviates from that. I like to talk about how can we look at our relationship and decide, is this worth saving? Is this worth the effort? How do I know? Are we at a point where it's just, it takes too much effort? It might be easier just to start retreating new. For example, you've tried certain things, and your partner is still a little bit more contemptuous than you'd like, or you have completely different ideals, right? In terms of parenting or in terms of your values. After looking at all these relationships, and I think one of the things that in your work, uh, in your book that shocked me the most is that you don't believe couples need to have the same ideals, right? ing goals to go on. But what are the things that are really important? What are the things that can indicate if you don't have that, then maybe this is not the right person for you?
Let me just address something first, which is in that list of questions that I just mentioned when uh I address the fifth question, which is, you know, do you have some ideal dream here? It's not an ideal about the relationship itself; it's an ideal dream for you pertinent to this particular issue, right, and your position and your position on the issue. Okay. So coming back to what are some indicators that you know it's over? One is you feel no love, and it's not no love or no caring or no respect for just a couple of days or maybe even a month or maybe even a few months. But it's gone, gone, GONE, gone. No matter what you go into therapy, doesn't make a difference. You go on vacation, doesn't make a difference. Your partner starts giving you romantic gifts, doesn't make it. It feels hollow. It feels gray. It feels dead. It feels like ashes. That may be an indicator, but you have to give it a lot of time and a lot of chances. Not just, you know, okay, we had a bad fight, I better leave.
Right. Secondly, is what we were talking about earlier, contempt and psychological abuse or verbal abuse, you know, whatever you want to call it. When your partner doesn't want to change and believes you deserve the contempt and they're expressing contempt for you so that you can learn how to be a different person. M, oh boy, is that a bad one. Um, and they just don't give up. They don't, you know, they just keep expressing contempt no matter what you say. There's no empathy for how it impacts you. Okay. And that just keeps going on. There's no attempt to take responsibility on that partner's part for contempt. Time to go. Psychological abuse is very damaging, or time. Another one is physical abuse, of course, but there are two types of physical abuse. There's characterological abuse and situational abuse. Characterological physical abuse is when there's a very clear batterer, the perpetrator who's committing the abuse and the victim. The perpetrator is blaming the victim for the abuse. Nothing the victim can do changes the abuse. No matter what they do, and the abuse is causing moderate to serious injury or harm, it's time to get out. Versus situational abuse, which is much more mild. Typically what we've seen in our research is that both people will be violent. One will slap the other, one may throw something, maybe punch a wall, you know, something like that. But both people are expressing uh a lot of negative stuff through their physical actions. And both are flooded, and both think it's wrong, right? Both think it's wrong, and both really want to change.
Can I add another one? Yeah, go for it. If people don't take any responsibility for their part of problems, and that's and they do that over and over and over and over again. It's always your fault. It's never their fault. I think that's a very good indicator that therapy will not work. If people keep doing that in couples therapy, then the relationship is doomed. That's my experience as a therapist. The ones that fail, it's one person is saying, "Nope, it's all your fault. I have no role in this." There's one more. I don't know what things are like in Taiwan or in Asia, but in America it's a huge problem, and that's addiction, addiction to uh alcohol, addiction to drugs, to serious drugs like opiates, addiction to gambling, addiction to sex, even, you know, the addiction itself is not reason to leave, but if somebody doesn't want to change and doesn't want to work on changing, then it's a problem. My final one is there are some times when one person's dream is the other person's nightmare. Oh, sure. Like one person wants to have children, and the other person absolutely doesn't want to be a parent. There are some issues where there's just no compromise at all. One person wants to live in one country, the other one wants to live in an entirely different country. Some issues are deal breakers.
Yeah. No, it sounds like there are a lot of reasons for people to leave, but I really think there are more reasons for people to stay. I think addiction, I just wanted to add to that. It's interesting because in Asia maybe there's not as much of drug addiction as it is in the Americas. But I will say if you are addicted to something that the society accepts, for example, work, you see that a lot more. So as a partner, it's hard for for the partner to say you're addicted to work. Like work is 24/7. It occupies every single waking moment, but it's acceptable by the society. So I think a lot of couples that I see have a harder time drawing a boundary with that addiction.
Yeah, that's right. You know, Sherry, we've taught in Korea five times, and we gave a couple's workshop in Japan, you know, and so on. And so time to come to Taiwan. Well, we need an invitation. Oh my gosh. We, I have to get working with my coaching. But yeah, but in in Korea and in Japan, actually, you know what we saw, which was really heartbreaking, God, is that the rules of the society, the actual rules of jobs, a lot of jobs in those two countries is that if you don't work 24/7, you're either laid off or fired or you never get promoted. And it's like an absolute value. There's there's almost no flexibility in it for people, especially who are working in big businesses or corporations. It's it's just horrible. And it's horrible for the family. It's horrible when husbands have to socialize with their co-employees after work; they have to go to the bars and drink and whatever, get entertained, or they won't ever get promoted, you know, I mean it. And so it's from 6:00 in the morning to midnight, right? So when do you have family time, you know, I mean it's it's so sad. People don't want to live that way, but if they don't, they're in trouble. And I think you you will see how it's reflected in the birth rates, and then people choose not to marry because it's a systemic issue. You can't sustain a marriage that way, and so that's why people opt out of it.
In the end, I I did want to ask if there is one takeaway for the readers of your book, what would that be? One thing I want to say is that in the book, Fight Right, what we really are trying to do there is show that even though conflict is never welcome in a relationship, when it occurs, it can actually lead to greater intimacy and greater connection. It's hard to develop this attitude, but you know, the idea that conflict is actually an opportunity, that we need conflict in order to be able to love each other better over time. And we're trying to provide the tools to make conflict a pathway to greater intimacy and connection.
Nice. Love that. Just have a particular suggestion kind of in light of the conversation we've had about conflict, is look for what your partner is doing right, not just what your partner is doing wrong. Look for what they're doing right. Say what they're doing right, and say thank you. We need to hear thank you. We need to hear "I love you." And just because you said those things during dates doesn't mean we stop needing them after 30 years of marriage. We need to hear those things all the time throughout our lives. So say thank you to your partner as much as you can. Remember gratitude. Yeah. Yeah. And work on that 5:1 ratio. Right. That's right. I just again like to congratulate you on your book and your research because as an organizational psychologist, a family or your partnership with your spouse, your partner is the smallest unit in our society, and you sort of built on top of that. So thank you for your wisdom, and thank you so much for your work.
Thank you, Sher, for your great questions. Yeah, these were wonderful. Oh, thank you. And I love to visit the love lab. Maybe bring my husband.