Dancing Elephants prompt Relationship Column

Are You and Your Partner on the Same Team?

It depends on how much you have your ego in check

Our egos can get the best of us. The constant need to be “right” holds back our relationships from growing and thriving.

The only way to have successful relationships is to recognize when our egos take over and understand the need to let go of defending our position at all costs. Our viewpoints during arguments are not matters of life and death, so we need to stop acting as if they are.

It's not easy, as it can happen so fast, and if we lack awareness, it can cause irreparable damage to the very relationships we seek to have.

We’ve all been there — caught up in an intense emotional argument, the pace of our thoughts comes faster than the words can leave our mouths.

We end up saying things we “didn’t mean,” all in an attempt to invoke emotion out of the person we are fighting with because we feel pain or not heard, and so should they. They don’t agree with us, and they should.

Our need to be “right” is all that matters. We are so glued to our position that our partners may feel like they are not being heard.

All is fair in love and war, right?

When the fight ends, we part ways and run through everything said in a loop. We even get mad at ourselves because we think of something that we should have said that was even more clever or something that would have had a greater impact on defending our position, but in the meantime, we lose sight of the real questions.

Are we even on the same team?

Do we want to be right or be happy?

Growing up, I watched my parent’s dysfunctional patterns play out just like the above scenario over and over again. I quickly learned and unfortunately adopted the three definites in life: death, taxes, and my mom delivering these catastrophic, hurtful atomic bombs in every argument.

Every fight went exactly the same way. My mom would do something irresponsible, like spending too much money at the grocery store, and then my dad would either ask her to be more careful next time, or he’d give the silent treatment.

Side note- the silent treatment is unproductive, immature, passive-aggressive behavior. Real quality relationships consist of two people who can respectfully discuss all types of topics, whether difficult or not.

Feeling attacked (ego) by my dad’s request to be more mindful of her spending, she’d launch into her ego’s self-preservation strategy, and the haymakers started to fly.

Her unaware ego left her with no other choice but to defend her fiscally irresponsible decision by resorting to name-calling, but it never stopped there, so everything was now on the table.

She pivoted the fight away from spending money and started to justify her behavior because of other reasons. She would complain about what needed to be fixed around the house, how she didn’t have her own car, how she never got credit for what she did right, how my dad was perfect and needed to “shine his halo,” and on and on, it would go.

What was once a simple request to be more careful and mindful about spending turned into a referendum on all the ills of their marriage.

Is this how teammates are supposed to act?

The only constant in their marriage was that it would surely happen again, and most likely, in the near future. Only each time this happened did my dad become less and less likely to discuss anything that bothered him in the future, and eventually, he shut down completely. Now, 47 years later, they are basically roommates.

It was only natural that I took this destructive behavior into my relationship with my wife as it was all I saw for the first 20+ years of my life, but thank God, she held me accountable for it, and finally, change was possible.

One of the greatest lessons I’ve learned in life is that change starts with yourself, and if you are genuinely interested in better relationships, you have to get a grasp of your ego.

A massive problem in our society is that too often, we finger-point and blame other people for how we feel, and we lack accountability when we screw up. It’s ALWAYS someone else’s fault.

The truth is we are responsible for our own emotions.

One of my favorite Eckhart Tolle quotes is:

“The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation but your thoughts about it.” — Eckhart Tolle

Tolle is right, and once you realize that, you will live your life with so much more ease. In addition, your relationship will undoubtedly improve.

When you are able to see the ego for what it is and become aware of it, it diminishes.

So now, when you are faced with an argument with your partner, you realize their thoughts or feelings about the situation are not who they are, and your thoughts and feelings about the situation are not who you are.

In relationships, it’s okay to agree to disagree. The key is to give your partner the respect to hear them and ponder their perspective.

More fights continue, and animosity grows when people don’t feel heard more than when the person doesn’t agree with them.

After my wife and I got through the “honeymoon” love-bird phase and started to have real arguments, I resorted to my mom’s atomic bomb tactics. I knew I was hurting my wife, and it was not what I wanted to do, but my need to be “right” was stronger than valuing her. It was all I knew how to argue.

She quickly pointed out this destructive pattern that I had. I honestly didn’t realize I was doing it. It was so automatic, and I lacked the awareness even to see how hurtful my actions were.

The first step to change in any facet of your life is awareness.

If you want to lose weight, bring awareness every time you go to eat something. Ask yourself, will eating this help me get closer to my goal?

If you want to build wealth, bring awareness every time you want to spend money. Ask yourself, will buying this item help me get closer to my goal?

If you want better relationships, bring awareness every time you are in a disagreement with your partner. Ask yourself, am I listening to what my partner is saying, or am I taking this personally?

It’s not easy, and you don’t even have to agree with them, but active listening and understanding that just because your partner doesn’t agree with something you said doesn’t mean it’s an attack.

I give my wife all the credit because when she called me out on my dysfunctional behavior, she said to me, “Hey, I’m on the same team as you. I am not against you.”

It was an ah-ha moment for me. All of these years, I watched my parents fight, and I thought there had to be a winner and a loser. But that’s not how healthy relationships are supposed to work.

My wife was right. We are on the same team, and she taught me that if you want great relationships, you must act like teammates.

We have the same goals, dreams, and aspirations in the big picture. Yes, there will be bumps along the way, but we need always to realize that being a great teammate should be our number one priority.

In my experience, recognizing and suppressing my ego is the first step to becoming the best partner and teammate, and who doesn’t want to be a great teammate?

Are you ready to do the inner work to be a great teammate for your partner?

If you are and want to learn more about how to get control of your ego, I suggest you read A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle. I read this book once a year, and it has had the greatest impact on my life.

Best wishes on building and sustaining the best relationships you can.

There’s a lot of synergy in this piece by James Boylan. Check it out.

Thanks, Libby Shively McAvoy, for having a place to share these stories for your relationship column in DEP!

✍ — Published by Warren Brown, at Dancing Elephant Press. Click here for submission guidelines.