Video: Why I Don’t Recommend Asking Your Partner to Be "Emotionally Stable"?
Compared to emotional stability, the way emotions are expressed is more crucial. Differences in emotional perspectives can lead to conflicts. Mastering emotional regulation methods, understanding human nature, and being a gentle empath can help.
Introducing the Issue
Can someone from a family with emotional instability have an emotionally stable relationship?
Theory
John Gottman’s The Relationship Cure is hailed by the media as "the most valuable book in the field of interpersonal relationships." It mentions the concept of family’s philosophy of emotion.
Gottman, through years of research on families and interpersonal relationships, has summarized methods to understand and improve the emotional atmosphere in families. These methods involve family members’ recognition, understanding, and handling of emotions, which have a profound impact on family interactions and the overall atmosphere. Members can establish healthier and more harmonious emotional relationships, promoting overall happiness.
Cause of Quarrels
True arguments do not arise from various life conflicts but from the fundamental contradictions in both parties’ emotional philosophies.
Case: A woman's emotional breakdown in a noodle restaurant
Regarding the noodle shop incident, the husband, even before his wife got angry, expressed fear of her anger. This reflects a philosophy of dealing with anger. He believes that injustice leads to anger, anger leads to outbursts, and outbursts lead to bad consequences, so anger should not be expressed. The husband mistakes the emotion of anger for the way anger is expressed, which is a common misunderstanding of emotional stability.
The wife, on the other hand, said she was not angry but was merely telling the owner that the noodles were not good. This reflects a completely opposite philosophy of anger. She believes that anger can help address injustice by conveying her true thoughts to the store owner, enabling them to see the problem clearly and improve their service.
One party sees anger as a method to improve issues, while the other views it as a threat that leads to conflict. This is why the wife feels deeply wronged, while the husband feels like facing a significant threat.
A Test Reflecting Emotional Philosophy Origins
Imagine going back to your childhood. Your cousin comes over and messes up your toys, scattering them all over your room. You cry in anger and run to tell your father or mother. How are they more likely to respond?
A. Parents calmly say, “Don’t be angry. He’s just a child. Clean up after he leaves.”
B. Parents hug you and say, “It’s so unfair. He messed up your toys. I’ll deal with him!”
C. Parents sigh heavily and say, “Stop making a fuss over little things. Be more generous and don’t be selfish.”
D. Parents kneel down, touch your face, and say, “You’re very angry, right? I know you spent a lot of time tidying up. How about we clean it up together later?”
During childhood, the neural pathways in the brain are highly plastic. Every feedback from emotional expressions shapes future emotional expressions.
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Option A, the Ignoring Emotional Philosophy—negative emotions are irrational and unnecessary, just solve the problem rationally.
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Option B, the Permissive Emotional Philosophy—releasing negative emotions equates to releasing inner pressure; focusing on oneself only. Unchecked negative emotions turn sadness into depression, anger into aggression, easily triggered in daily life.
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Option C, the Suppressive Emotional Philosophy—viewing negative emotions as sinful, allowing oneself to feel anger, madness, or pain is blameworthy.
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Option D (recommended), the Empathetic Emotional Training Philosophy—all negative emotions are understandable and acceptable, but not all ways of expressing emotions should be abused. Family members should support each other through emotional difficulties with gentle empathy and practical help.
If every emotionally unstable person has an inwardly projecting parent, then the inherited emotional philosophy is affecting your intimate relationship. The key is not to criticize parents, as they are also just ordinary people, but to transcend the original emotional philosophy and become a gentle empath.
Three Methods of Regulating Emotions
Current Psychological State Analysis Method
When having emotions, don’t let the other person guess your feelings. When emotions are expressed healthily and named, allowing them to be seen without judgment, they lose their destructive power.
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Example: You can say, “I’m so angry, I really want to shout at you.” But you won’t actually shout, you just let the other person know you’re very angry and want to scold them.
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Example: You can say, “What you said is wrong, I really want to retaliate and attack you!” But you won’t actually retaliate, the other person knows you feel very cold and want to defend yourself.
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Example: You can say, “I’m so sad, I really want to run away from home.” But you won’t actually leave, you just let the other person know how lonely you feel.
Cool-Down Ritual Creation Method
Studies show it takes at least 20 minutes for a person to calm down from intense emotions. You can design a ritual to pause the argument, like pressing a virtual “pause button” on the other person. By breaking the inertia and pausing for 20 minutes, most people can regain their thinking and empathy abilities.
Heart-to-Heart Method
Find out the deep desires behind each person’s conflict.
The most challenging part of this method is interpreting your partner's sensitivity:
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One interpretation is self-centered, like “he’s siding with others, doesn’t care about me.”
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The other is partner-centered, “although he loves me, at this moment he can’t handle his inwardly projecting parents, showing avoidance, indifference, and lack of concern.”
Obviously, the second interpretation is hard to achieve, so here’s what to do:
After calming down, take turns narrating the conflict and your feelings for at least five minutes each, without the other person interrupting or defending. Your task is to use questions to help the other person better organize their emotions. After finishing, switch roles and repeat until everything is expressed.
Example Questions:
- What are your feelings about this issue?
- What do you want to achieve? Recognition, respect, or a sense of being loved?
- Why is this important to you?
- Does this meaning have any past childhood experiences and injuries? Can you elaborate?
- Do you think what you want can be achieved through arguing?
As long as you can listen to each other without judgment, each argument can bring you closer to being soulmates.
The key to emotional regulation methods—both parties must act. If only one is willing to work on it, it won’t be effective.
Saying Goodbye to Negative Emotional Philosophy
If someone is eager to defend themselves, it’s because, deep down, they have been criticized numerous times, feeling guilty and ashamed. If someone sees you unhappy but doesn’t comfort you well, it might be because their own fears and sadness were never seen, leading them to forget how to comfort an unhappy person.
Knowing that the person who loves you isn’t targeting you or deliberately provoking your psychological issues, but handling their own issues, transforms arguments into opportunities to love each other more.
The negative emotional philosophy passed down generations will eventually be broken. Childhood doesn’t define you, nor do your parents. Only you can decide how to treat the person you love in front of you.
Insights from the Theory of Emotional Philosophy
There is no one hundred percent emotionally stable person in love. True emotional maturity comes from the process of mutual support in dealing with each other’s irrational beliefs, past traumas, and unstable inner child.
When you learn to look gently beyond the surface of emotions, you see two frightened children. As a child, you didn’t understand, but at some stage, while building intimate relationships, you see the complexity of human nature. The person you love can bring you both cruelty and love, disappointment and nourishment, regression and growth.
The goal isn’t to agree with, accept, or tolerate the other person’s bad actions, but to understand them. If, like many couples, you’re tired of stormy emotional outbursts, bored of defensive rationalizations when pain arises, and particularly weary of the abandonment feeling from avoidance, denial, and self-justification, you can use a dignified adult approach to see each other's emotions hidden, suppressed, denied, ignored, and then say: now I understand why you feel this way.
The more two broken people understand each other’s humanity, the more they can generate the power to cherish and change each other. Because being seen by each other means being liberated by each other. This is the greatest significance of an intimate relationship.