There’s a famous scene in the movie, A Few Good Men, where Jack Nicholson arrogantly tells Tom Cruise, “You can’t handle the truth.” When you ask your partner to be honest with you, would they echo Jack’s response?
If the answer is yes, you are missing a crucial ingredient for successfully implementing radical honesty in your relationship. If you can’t handle the truth, how can your partner provide it?
Let’s face it, you probably don’t have much difficulty hearing the positive statements your partner makes about you. The problem is with the criticism, disappointments, and annoyances they bring to your attention.
Marriage is built on trust, and trust is built on honesty. This means being able to accept both the bad and good information being sent your way. Your ability to “handle the truth” is in direct correlation with how much truth you get. Your relationship cannot get better, stronger, faster without using the technology available. You have the technology. That technology is the truth.
Here are five ways you can react to your partner that will guarantee they will not be open and honest with you:
1. Make excuses.
Instead of really listening to what your partner is saying, you defend your behavior. You rationalize why what you did was really an acceptable way to behave. After all, everyone else does it so it must be okay. You know their feelings are hurt but you didn’t mean it.
2. Dismiss or devalue their feelings.
You minimize your partner’s viewpoint. Your partner is just “too sensitive” anyway. You can’t imagine that any sane person would feel that way about what you did. It wasn’t really that big of a deal and they should stop making a mountain out of a molehill. No one else has ever had a problem with this behavior and they just need to get over it.
3. Turn the tables.
You change the discussion to focus on your partner’s shortcomings. You may or may not agree that you did this action but it doesn’t really matter because it’s not half as bad as what they did to you. You wouldn’t have reacted this way if they hadn’t made you mad or hurt your feelings. You are able to draw past wrongs out of the past at a moment’s notice and feel justified in flinging them at your partner’s feet.
4. Correct them.
You overlook the point of their position and focus on the details. You go all Perry Mason on them and point out the factual errors in their recollection. It didn’t happen at your mother’s. It was Tuesday afternoon not Saturday. The conversation started because they were late, not that you didn’t call. You didn’t call them dumb, you just said that you can’t imagine how they get through a day if that’s the way they think.
5. Act like a child.
You don’t accept the value in their position but pout, cry, throw things or otherwise react emotionally. You get so out of control that your partner backs down, minimizes your role, or ends up consoling you. Your partner is never quite sure how you will react, so they will always be walking on eggshells.
However you respond to their attempts to be honest about their feelings, your partner knows it will be unpleasant. You will succeed in shutting down any difficult evaluations of the relationship. You will also succeed in closing the door on honest and intimate conversation. The connection between honesty and trust will be severed. Just don’t be surprised when you feel shut out and disconnected as a result.
How do you respond to constructive criticism from your partner? Does your reaction encourage your partner to be honest with you? What is the impact of your behavior on the relationship?
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Previously Published on foundationscoachingnc.com and is republished on Medium.
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