Page 118 - SILFlip

“Can you just take your shoes off when you come in, pleaaaase. It tracks a lot of dirt into the house...”
Is met with:
“Ugh. I’m sorry. I have got to remind myself to be more considerate abnout walking in with my shoes on.”
When people start to cross complain they invite a conversation about “relationship history.” A disagreement that takes the path of cross complaining places both partners in a position of seeking “blame equity,” and then “being right.”
When I say “blame equity” this is what I mean:
The person who lodges the complaint hurts the other person by saying (higuratively):
“You are imperfect and your imperfection just made me upset.”
Then the person who hears the complaint against them has a choice. The hirst choice is to own the behavior that led to the complaint. The alternative choice is to hight hire with hire. We do that by reminding the person who complains that they are imperfect too and then brings something up from that past to prove it. If you take the path of ownership, you can heal the relationship with an apology — sometimes. I say sometimes because in some relationship dynamics if you take ownership, the person on the other side keeps
Staying in Love: Secret Recipes For Making Love Last 118