Climate Change

Climate change not only happens in our environment it also happens in our relationships.

Climate Change

We all know our relationships go through phases, honeymoon, children, empty nest etc. There are many things that can influence how we navigate through those times. How we feel about ourselves, our partner and our relationship are some of those things.

Now I want you to think about those things that can mess with us as weather variables, such as wind, surface & sea temperature etc and now we can see that just like the earths climate our relationship has a “climate”. Is it hot or cold, windy (turbulent) or calm, inviting or inhospitable ?

Oh and while I’m talking about the weather have a look at my article about Flooding.

Micro Climate

Now that I’ve talked a little about the general climate I want to delve a little deeper into the idea of our Relationship Climate. I like to think of this part as a micro climate. Just as how we feel about things impact our general (relationship) climate, how we respond or react to individual situations can impact our local or micro (relationship) climate.

So here is an example of how things can look (climate wise) :

Actions/Responses		Climate
Jan says to John that she is unhappy and that they need to get the relationship back on track. John thinks everything is fine.		Pleasant
Nothing happens		Temperature rises
Jan tries harder to get John to engage by raising things more often and over time gets angry because she feels ignored. John is growing tired of the continual nagging and complaining.		Temperature rises (on both sides) a cyclone (hurricane) starts forming. Arguments start getting worse, the relationship feels more chaotic.
Jan gives up, shes tried and is tired. John thinks she’s happy again because the nagging and complaing has stopped (or at least decreased).		The eye of the storm is overhead, the worst has passed (or so John thinks)
Jan “announces” that she’s had enough and wants a divorce. John has his “oh crap” moment and realises that it’s worse than he thought.		Whether it was the eye of the storm or the calm before the storm, the relationship will (most probably) experience more conflict.

By not fully appreciating or understanding Jans concerns (weather warnings), Johns weather forecast on how the relationship is or will be was wrong and was caught out in the storm.

What could John have done ?

The simple answer is ….. LISTEN to Jans forecast. (see Being Present post)

Well, John fell into the same trap we all have (or will) and that’s looking outside and seeing that it’s nice outside. Yep, here in my suburb, the weather on my side of town is lovely (John didn’t have any issues with the relationship, he thought it was OK, so he thought Jan was “having a bad day”). His mistake was that he didn’t check the forecast to see what’s coming. In other words, he didn’t check in with Jan to see what the weather was like on her side of town (the relationship).  He really just dismissed her bad weather warnings because “everything looks good here”.

Remember climate change doesn’t happen overnight so looking for bad weather ahead is a good thing to do.

Is it always so clear to both ?

Here is a crucial concept to understand and practice. At face value they are kind of both right. Jan’s saying theres bad weather and Johns saying theres not. In their respective suburbs they’re right, at that time. Of course as time goes by the stormy weather reaches John and eventually clear for Jan.

TIP: Try this idea out. Why can’t you both be right in some way. Why does it have to be I’m right and you’re wrong. Accepting that our partners experience is/was different is a great way to move through storms.

So, Jan thought John was being stubborn or just being a $%&#$!@#$*, whereas John just didn’t understand or fully appreciate Jans weather warning. Of course as the weather changed, got worse, Jan and John started to make it personal. They started to believe that he’s just stubborn and doesn’t care and she is a complainer and nagger.

So now in the middle of the storm they’re no longer neighbours they’re threats to each others survival. Rather than coming together in a crisis, they’re now looting each others house. They’re now effectively taking the good (what’s left) and reminding the other of what they don’t have.

Remember, making things personal during difficult times tends not to have any kind of positive effect on the relationship. One thing it may make us feel better by picking on our partners flaws or deficiencies.

So if this is what you’re doing sometimes ask yourself this… is that the kind of person you really want to be ?