THE EMOTIONAL INTENSITY METER

Keep conversations

EFFECTIVE, HEALING and FEEL CLOSER

COMMON QUESTION: It seems like I have to get extremely mad at my mate to get their attention on things that matter to me. They get mad back at me and we talk, but it is a distant conversation. What keeps us from changing this pattern?

DON: Overwhelm.

Neither you nor your mate can learn anything new when either are overwhelmed. Neither of you are emotionally available for learning and to feel connected.

When the pulse is elevated around 100 or more beats per minute a person's brain and nervous system is what psychology now calls "flooded." 

The Relationship Research of Julie and John Gottman's book Why Marriages Succeed and Fail, calls it "diffuse physiological arousal" meaning that the part of both or your brains that warn of danger, Flight or Flight Response, has been activated and your body is in high self-defense alert. Your attention isn't in a "curious" mode but in either an attack, defensive or freeze (detached) state, meaning no one is really listening to learn anything new.  Neuro-science has confirmed why people who are so bright, capable, and smart in so many situations appear shallow and unable to learn the simplest things in a committed relationship. Why?  They are overwhelmed. They have not allowed themselves to calm down, as long as it take, before they reengage with the other person. In a calm state, reason toward what is actually happening or has happened becomes stronger than the emotion and a dialogue can happen that allows the possibility of new learning to take place.

Nobody learns when overwhelmed except how to be mean (fight), run away faster (flight), or detach and give the angry person whatever words they need to hear so they will stop being so intense (freeze--appease).

Curiosity is in the GREEN on the Emotional Intensity Meter

You succeeded in getting your partner's attention, and you also guaranteed that nothing will change. Along with all of this another thing happens that makes this even harder, details will not be remembered accurately.  And, I am sure you have ended up here because calm talking about the concern went unaddressed in a productive way. We will get to that shortly, but I want to answer your question fully first.

If you use our Emotionally Intensity Meter, you can see what happens to the brain and nervous system and therefore what a person is capable of at various levels of emotional arousal.

When a person is upset, making a very strong point over and over, or is listening and getting madder and madder, when their pulse hits around 90-100 beats per minute, they are flooded with intensity and changing the area of the brain that is function. They are now in a fight, flight or freeze mode and not open to reasoning or learning unless they calm down their pulse and emotionally become calmer.

On The EIM-Emotional Intensity Meter, that would put that person in the "red."  They are not available to speak, listen, learn, nor be reasonable.  And, if the conversation continues, the research shows it will end badly in minutes and sometimes seconds.  It takes at least 20 minutes, but can take hours and for some people a day or two, before they can calmly and therefore more reasonably reengage about the topic that triggered the overwhelm. The longer either or both people keep talking in the "red" the longer it takes for the nervous and brain to calm to "green" on the EIM, which means calm. 

Most people make the error to either keep talking in the red or not wait long enough to get into the green before re-engaging the topic.  And since the topic is usually important in some way, the upset patterns happens over and over again, until the couple stop talking about it and that creates another set of problems that become more and more complicated.

So, your strategy gets their attention, but the part of his brain you really need to talk with that can learn and make reasonable decisions, is not home.

The bottom of the Emotional Intensity Meter is Blue, that is when you are starting to detach from the conversation and the other person and thoughts about wanting the conversation end appear or other types of distancing thoughts. When in the deep blue, you are not available for an engaged closeness conversation. You may feel calm but your partner will most likely experience that as “cold” and “you don’t care about me.” So deep blue or deep red are both signs of overwhelm and the need for a time out from the conversation and away from each other physically until calm returns.The Emotional Intensity Meter can be most helpful in both stopping prolonged arguing as well as a way to gauge when ready to try and have a repair conversation.

Note: It is common to mistake “numb (overwhelm” with calmness. You will know it is calmness when you feel “like yourself” again and you can see the negative impact on your behavior toward the other person and take responsibility for it as you also see to repair and address the issue at hand with the other person.

The GOAL: Keep conversations in the GREEN, and when they aren’t, take immediate TIME OUT, no less than 20 minutes and no more than 24 hours. 

To Repair A Disagreement, Argument or Fight

Instructions:

To Repair A Disagreement, Argument or Fight

From the Research on Couples Happiness and Unhappiness by Julie and John Gottman, Ph.D.

First some notes before you do the process, and then the process will follow:

NOTES TO CONSIDER BEFORE YOU BEGIN

1. You are processing a PAST event, not the present.

So, talk about how you felt in the PAST event, not how you feel right now.1. 

For example, 

• Do this: In that argument, I felt hurt, sad, and dismissed.

• Don’t do this: I feel angry at you now about that argument.

Reason for this Instruction:  You are processing what happened in the past to feel more complete, so you can let go obsessing over it, learn from it and that will help you both feel closer. If your emotion is so strong now about the event, say in the “yellow” or “read”  you are most likely flooded or soon to be. So, it is best to not do the exercise until you are calm, and you can check your pulse to see. If it is close to or over 100 beats, you need to calm before you do the repair.  You both need to be in the “green” so reasonableness has a chance to stay steady. Being flooded isn’t wrong, it just means you are still hurting and need more time to calm, then do the exercise.

2.  BOTH points of view are right.

It is important to remember, and remind yourself often, that a point of view is not an absolute reality. It is relative. Subjective.  If you are flooded you will not be able to hear a point of view that you see differently without debating or being defensive. If you are in the green, you can be curious and interested in your partner’s inner world and see to understand instead of persuade them to your view.  The goal of closeness happens when each person feels heard and understood in their world. That makes each open to reasonable consideration and influence.

• Do this: I hear that you saw. . . 

• Don’t do this: What you saw isn’t right . . .

Reason for this instruction:  Repair needs to be about dialogue and understanding, not debate and convince.  Curiosity, interest, and compassion for self and other is needed. Otherwise, you will end the conversation feeling further distance from each other and worse than when you began. The goals is repair and to feel better and closer.

3.  Save all persuasiveness to step 6.  

Reason for this instruction: Happy couples in the research waited until both people felt understood and their viewpoint considered before asking for anything.  Step 6 is the Ask.

4.  In step 6, remember you are going to “try” something different next time. 

That means it may work better or it may not. Either is helpful information for your knowledge database in yourself, your partner, and your relationship. So, keep the “trying” as experimental where you are both looking for what works bests and let that grow.

• Do this:  I want to try and start soft when I have a complaint and wait until I am calm to talk.

• Don’t do this: I am going to be soft so that this doesn’t happen again.

5.  Each person gets a turn on each step. 

Start with emotions first. Don’t combine steps.

Reason for this instruction:  The emotions drive the intensity of the conversation and the repair. By starting there it takes pressure off each person and helps focus on learning.

6. If you are flooded, in the red or rising in the yellow. Stop.

When emotion runs high and stays high in the "red," it is necessary to take a break until both people are in the green, or calm. This is the most common reason repair isn't made: too much emotional intensity. It is ok and necessary to stop and return later when one or both partners are flooded.  This does not mean that  you don't feel intensity. This does mean when the intensity rises and starts to stay high or emotional intensity becomes detached, you need to stop and come back later when calm or feeling more able to be emotionally engaged.  Also, when either partner is "tuned out" or "detached," in the "blue," that is also a sign of being overwhelmed and reasonableness is also inhibited.

Reason for instruction: You cannot be yield to reasonableness, when you are flooded with emotions or detached from your emotions. When flooded (red) or detached (blue) you can make matters worse, but you can't make them better until you calm down enough to yield to reason.

7.   The Language of Healing In A Repair Conversation

According to the research of Richard Schwartz, Ph.D. and his process of ifs-Internal Family Systems.

The 8 C’s That Heal by Richard Schwartz, Ph.D. 

Calmness - (1.) a high degree of physiological and mental serenity regardless of the circumstance(s) (2.) the ability to react to triggers in your environment in less automatic and extreme ways(3.) to be less vulnerable to adopting the common fight-flight-freeze response when threatened. (Calmness experienced in dynamic degrees)

Curiosity - (1.) a strong desire to know or learn something new about a topic, situation or person (2.) to have a sense of wonder about the world and how things work(3.) genuinely interested in non-judgmentally understanding something or someone. (Curiosity experienced in dynamic degrees)

Clarity - (1.) the ability to perceive situations accurately without distortion from extreme beliefs and emotion s(2.) the ability to maintain one’s objectivity about a situation in which one has a vested interest (3.) the absence of preconception and objection (opposing) (4.) the ability to maintain a “beginner’s mind” in which many possibilities exist. (Clarity is experienced in dynamic degrees)

Compassion - (1.) to be open heartedly present and appreciative of others without feeling the urge to fix, change or distance from them (2.) an intuitive understanding that the suffering of others affects you because of your connectedness to them (3.) to simultaneously have empathy for others and a belief that the other has a Self that once released can relieve his or her own suffering. (Compassion is experienced in dynamic degrees)

Confidence - (1.) to maintain a strong personal knowledge in one’s ability to stay fully or as present as possible in a situation and handle or repair anything that happens with the belief that “no matter what, it’s all okay and will all work out the way that it can” (2.) to have the direct experience of being healed from previous traumas and learned from previous failures to such a degree that their effect does not spill into the present (3.) to understand that mistakes are only lessons to be learned. (Confidence is experienced in dynamic degrees)

Courage - (1.) strength in the face of threat, challenge or danger (2.) the willingness to take action toward a goal that you or others would find overwhelming(3.) the ability to recognize the damage we do to others then take action to make amends (4.) the willingness to reflect and “go inside” toward our own pain and shame, carefully examine it and act on what we see. (Courage is experienced in dynamic degrees)

Creativity - (1.) the use of the imagination to produce original ideas (2.) the ability to enter the “flow state” in which expression spontaneously flows out of us and we are immersed in the pleasure of the activity (3.) the ability to create generative learning and solutions to problems. (Curiosity is experienced in dynamic degrees)

Connectedness - (1.) the state of feeling a part of a larger entity such as a partnership, family, team, community, or organization (2.) a connection to a meaningful purpose or a "higher calling" above the circumstances of daily life (3.) to be in a relationship with someone who truly knows and accepts you for who you actually are(4.) to be able to relax your defenses with others as you know that judgement or controlling can happen and can addressed openly with options and have less fear of getting hurt because you have grown degrees of confidence that you can repair damage or misunderstandings when they occur. (Connectedness is experienced in dynamic degrees)

••••••••••••••••••

THE INSTRUCTIONS:

Step by Step Guide To Repair A Disagreement, Argument or Fight

I. FEELINGS

Go through the list and say the ones that you felt in the disagreement that needs repair. The more the better to help you express to your partner how you felt. This helps relieve the intensity about the past argument.

1. I felt defensive.

2. I felt listened to.

3. My feelings got hurt.

4. I felt understood.

5. I felt angry.

6. I felt sad.

7. I felt happy.

8. I felt misunderstood

9. I felt criticized.

10. I didn’t take my partner’s complaints personally.

11. I felt disliked by my partner.

12. I felt cared for.

13. I was worried.

14. I felt afraid.

15. I felt safe.

16. I was relaxed.

17. I felt right and my partner wrong.

18. I felt we were both partly right.

19. I felt out of control.

20. I felt in control.

21. I felt righteously indignant.

22. I felt that we were both morally justified in our views.

23. I felt picked on unfairly.

24. I felt appreciated.

25. I felt unappreciated.

26. I felt unattractive.

27. I felt attractive.

28. I felt morally outraged.

29. I felt taken for granted.

30. I didn’t feel taken for granted.

31. I felt like leaving.

32. I felt like staying and talking this through.

33. I was overwhelmed with emotion.

34. I felt calm.

35. I felt powerful.

36. I felt powerless.

37. I felt that I had no influence.

38. I felt I could be persuasive.

39. I felt as if my opinion didn’t even matter.

40. There was a lot of give and take.

41. I had not feelings at all.

42. I have no idea what I was feeling

43. I felt lonely.

44. I felt alienated.

45. Other feelings

II.  Share your subjective reality.

Summarize your own personal point of view, your personal reality about the disagreement. What was your story?

III.  Find something in your partner’s story that you can understand.

Try and see how your partner’s subjective point of view, their reality, make sense,  given your partner’s perspective. Tell your partner about one piece of his or her reality that makes sense to you.

IV. What triggered in you during the disagreement.

What in your history, your childhood, life before this relationship became triggered during the conversation?

V.   Accept some responsibility. 

       Admit your role in the conflict, what you did that made matters worse.

1. I have been very stressed and irritable lately.

2. I have not expressed much appreciation toward my partner lately.

3. I have I have been very stressed and irritable lately.

4. I have not expressed much appreciation toward my partner lately.

5. I have taken my partner for granted.

6. I have been highly sensitive lately.

7. I have been highly critical lately.

8. I have not shared very much of my inner world.

9. I have not been emotionally available.

10. I have been turning away from partner.

11. I have been getting easily upset.

12. I have been depressed lately.

13. I have had a chip on my shoulder lately.

14. I have not been affectionate.

15. I have not made time for good things between us.

16. I have not been a very good listener.

17. I have not been asking for what I need.

18. I have been feeling a bit like a martyr.

19. I have needed to be alone.

20. I have not wanted to take care of anybody.

21. (Add your own)

Overall, my contribution to this disagreement was __________ . 

VI. Make it better in the future

This is where persuasion is appropriate. Not trying to manipulate, but asking for the favor of trying something different.  By the time you get to this step, you both will clearly see possibilities to try differently next time. Be sure to start with what YOU will try next time. Then have your partner go. Then, what your "ask" is for your partner to try next time, and then, theirs for you. If the "ask" to too far of a stretch  for either of you, adjust it to something you can try that is reasonable. Remember, it may not work out so whatever happens is ok to learn from and try again and again as you learn to care about yourself and each other.

1. One thing you could try next time? (Let each respond before moving to number 2)

2. One thing you would like your partner to try differently next time?