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In this episode Joel and Antonia talk with relationship expert Bruce Muzik about couples fighting and why poor communication isn’t the problem.
In this podcast you’ll find:
Bruce Muzik Love at First Fight
Relationships go thru stages.
- Romance stage: Happens at first meeting when love is new. Only see good in each other and only show each other the good in us. Lasts from 2 weeks to 2 years. Ends when one or both perceive permanence – moving in together, get engaged, get married, get pregnant. Romance endorphins stop being made and we go into withdrawals, which leads to:
- Power struggle stage: Rose colored glasses fall off. Start seeing a dark side in our partners. “You need to change, not me.” Fighting. We love the other person so much we can’t bear the thought of being without them, but we can’t bear the thought of being with them in the same way we were during the romance phase. Most people don’t make it thru the power struggle phase.
- Mature Love Stage: Once you hit mature love you stop trying to change each other and accept each other – warts and all. Mutually dependent. Relationship inspires you to be more flexible, capable, and resourceful. You are better as a team than as an individual. You will never go back to the romance stage. The romance stage is shallow compared to the mature stage.
Faulty programming that relationships shouldn’t be hard. “True love doesn’t bring struggle.”
Get rid of all the beliefs that are just plain wrong.
If you don’t have the tools to resolve the conflict most people end up fighting it out.
If you are insecure you will keep fighting the same fights over and over again until you get tired of the battle.
Most couples, even the ones on the verge of divorce, still love each other deep down inside.
We go from being children (romance stage) to teenagers (power struggle stage) to adulthood (mature love stage). Dependence > Independence > Interdependence.
Nature pulls us toward our reciprocal opposite in order to heal the wounds from childhood. Nature drives us to heal and grow. Because all of us grew up wounded in some way, we grew up with certain strengths and weaknesses. We are drawn to people who balance out our weaknesses.
The couples who are most attracted to each other are usually opposite dichotomies: I/E, T/F, P/J, S/N
The more opposite you are the more spark there will be in the relationship and the more conflict there will be.
The more similar you are the less chemistry there is going to be and the easier it will be to get along. These partnerships will have to work harder at creating chemistry.
There isn’t any MBTI type that is better suited for any other.
In the romance stage you merge your identity with your partner in a way that is immature. Like a child merges with its mother. Power struggle is relationship individuating. You’re no longer enmeshed in each other. The relationship needs to mature so each can have separate lives and still be a couple. The union creates a third entity that is totally separate form each individual’s needs.
Mature love is able to maintain autonomy and stay connected as a couple. Like two people nurturing a child – the couple is their child. Otherwise, the couple is everything to the two people, and they have no independence. If one chooses to break free it threatens the other and all hell breaks loose. Or one never breaks free and a codependent situation is developed. Two people against the world.
The power struggle stage serves the purpose of having you individuate from romance and become mature. If you don’t make it to the mature love stage then you have neglected the relationship due to excessive independence.
Independence is not the pinnacle of human achievement. Its 2 of only 3 stages. Interdependence is the pinnacle of human achievement. (Dependence>Independence>Interdepedence)
Modern dating is composed of a bunch of people who are terrified of depending upon other people. We have put independence on this pedestal where it doesn’t belong.
Independence is teenaged development. Not the end of the line.
You need your partner for sex, intimacy, comfort, companionship, co-parent.
We are needy and that is okay! Unhealthy neediness is what is usually found in the romance stage. Healthy neediness is found in the mature stage. Depend upon each other and still be two autonomous human beings.
4 free videos on Love At First Fight to help in overcoming the power struggle.
One of the biggest misconceptions is that the power struggle represents a breakdown in communication. The actual challenge is connection. We are trying to learn to communicate better in order to have a better connection. Putting the cart before the horse. If you learn how to stay connected your communication will be soft, loving, kind, compassionate, and empathetic. You aren’t triggered. You don’t see your partner as the enemy.
Connect first. Communicate later.
Connection exercise:
- Gaze into each other’s eyes for 5 minutes a day, every day for 60 days. When you wake up in the morning, set the countdown timer on your phone, and stare into your partner’s eyes. Choose one eye and gaze into it. You can change eyes on alternate days. But choose one eye each day. Not a competition. Not a stare down. Common response is laughter. Resume eye contact after every break or fidget. Breath. Some break into tears. Animals when fighting don’t make eye contact. When you don’t make eye contact with your partner you stop seeing them as human. This exercise rehumanizes your partner.
Repressing bad feelings results in repressing all feelings, even the good ones.
Demonstrate to a resistant partner that they are safe with you. After about a month most partners will be brought on board. The core fear of partner who don’t want to do the work is rejection. They are afraid they are somehow flawed in the context of love and if they allow their partner to get too close their partner will discover who they are and reject them. The cure for rejection is unconditional acceptance.
Assure your partner that no matter what you will never reject or abandon them. Don’t expect them to open up at once after a lifetime of hiding in their shell.
If your relationship has hit the power struggle stage, if you are fighting, if your sex life has lost its zest, or if there are certain topics you just can’t address you are in a power struggle.
John Gottman: #1 predictor of divorce is couples who don’t fight.
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17 comments
Thanks for this podcast guys. One thing I really resonated with was Bruce’s comment on acknowledging we need our partner, not in a codependency way, but that today esp we see independence as an ideal and forget the importance of interdependency.
I’m guessing I resonated with that because as an INFJ, thats what Fe/Ti feels like (and I hear it from a lot of Fe/Ti users)—this struggle between relying on your community, and being completley independent.
One thing I did not resonant with, and I’ve heard it in several podcasts, is the “wounds from childhood” influencing our choice in partner. I hear this come up a lot from NP types, and wonder if this is more an NP experience. I’m making the assumption here that Si is tightly connected to childhood and past, and since for NPs its in their tertiary and inferior position, its the lost “half” of themselves they are trying to reconcile.
Most FJs I know are habitual TP daters. We love Ti, we love extraverted sensing, since introverted judging and extraverted sensing are a part of our “lost half”.
I know as an INFJ Si is unconscious for me, so I would be less aware of it playing a role in my decisions than someone who does use Si. With that said, looking at my string of boyfriends these past 10 years, the boyfriends of my 2 ENFJ friends, my ISFJ mother, ESFJ sister, the pattern is clear—we find ourselves drawn to XXTP guys.
I think its more a “finding our lost half”, someone who embodies our tertiary and inferior, than it is wounds from childhood. If you are an NP type then, yes, that may play more of a part for you (I’m thinking of Citizen Kane right now…probably ENTP) Again, I might just not be conscious of it since Si is my 8th and weakest function, I’ve just never been able to relate to this idea.
What a great podcast! Worth every minute. Can’t say I will definitely be willing to try coupling again any time soon but am thinking about it differently after long burn out! Lol.
Thanks for the interview and resources.