Why Self-Disclosure is Not the Key To Intimacy
Learn to self-confront before self-disclosing
Is self-disclosure important in relationships?
Of course.
Is self-disclosure necessary in relationships?
Absolutely.
Is self-disclosure the key to intimacy in a relationship?
Nope.
Understanding Self-Disclosure
When relationships begin the conversations are easy and drag on for hours. Each disclosure is reinforced with further disclosures. Couples bond over their ability to talk about anything and share their most confined selves.
According to Psychology Today, “Self-disclosure promotes attraction.” Revealing vulnerabilities and personal details about oneself leads to trust and closeness with the other person. Anyone who has ever been in a reciprocally self-disclosing relationship has experienced this on some level.
But as relationships gobble up time and emotional resources, things can change. Intimacy is a strange beast in long-term relationships. On one side, intimacy is the level of safety and trust we provide for our partners to be able to share the deepest parts of themselves. On the other side, intimacy is the ability to accept the safe emotional environment your partner has created for you to share the personal parts of yourself. Emotional intimacy is important in a relationship but requires work and attention.
Intimacy requires disclosures and it’s not always easy to put yourself out there or to open yourself up, even with someone you’ve intimate with. The disclosures that once led to feeling heard and valued by the other person may leave you feeling exposed or controlled instead. As the disclosures become less frequent, you may feel like the whole relationship is fading away.
A disconnected relationship leads to mounting insecurities and anxiety. To repair the relationship and soothe personal panic, we open the floodgates and do an emotional dump on our partners seeking to elicit reassurance and acceptance. In an attempt to sure-up the relationship and reduce anxiety, we create an ash heap of our true feelings, disclosing the pain of distance and the fear of loss.
Self-disclosure worked so well early in the relationship. But this time, sharing your truest and deepest feelings didn’t result in your partner sharing their truest and deepest feelings. Somehow we’ve only succeeded in using self-disclosure to put more distance in the relationship and like a watered-down soup, we’re clueless how to fix it.
In retrospect, we realize that the self-disclosing honeymoon we enjoyed at the beginning of the relationship was dependent on reciprocal attention and validation. Indeed, according to the book The Adjusted American, our normal compulsions are to seek self-acceptance by appeasing other people. This is called a reflected sense of self and often distorts true intimacy.
The mutual self-disclosures that once created trust early in the relationship were merely another person validating your feelings and paying attention to you. It is any wonder the disclosures paled over time? It is wearisome for anyone to emotionally validate another person continually.
Consider the “was it good for you?” question which is really code for “tell me I was good.” It’s a comment that is not seeking to know the intimate response of your partner but rather is seeking to sure-up your own insecurities. When we constantly need our partner to self-disclose in order for us to feel validated and worthy of love, it is not true intimacy, it’s other-validated intimacy, and it wears out relationships.
Other-Validated Intimacy
This type of intimacy is tiring. It lacks the interpersonal elements necessary to intimacy: the ability to be honest with yourself and to maintain your own sense of self and identity WHILE self-disclosing.
Other-validated intimacy harbors expectations of validation, empathy, acceptance, and mutual disclosure from your partner. If gaining the approval and attention of your partner is the only way you can feel connected and close, that’s not intimacy.
Persons who depend on other-validated intimacy will only self-disclose if their partner will self-disclose. It becomes a “I’m sharing so you have to share too” scenario. Other-validated persons NEED to be able to trust the other person before they self-disclose. They NEED the other person to make them feel secure with each disclosure. Disclosure has to feel like a give and take. It has to an “I will but only if you will” experience.
There is a place for other-validated intimacy in a relationship. At the beginning of relationships, it’s often all about knowing the other person, the focus is on validating and attention. Other-validated intimacy is quite common in long-term relationships too, among couples who are highly skilled at self-validation. The difference is these two secure individuals are not dependent on the attention and validation of their partners. They don’t need to be. They depend on themselves first and foremost for validation and self-worth.
Real intimacy and self-disclosure shouldn’t be dependent on the expectations of and need for other-person validation. For authentic intimacy through self-disclosure, self-validated intimacy holds the answer.
Self-Validated Intimacy
Self-validated intimacy is being able to self-disclose with your partner while expecting nothing in return. This level of communication requires a strong and clear sense of self.
In his book Passionate Marriage, David Schnarch said, “Self-validated intimacy is the tangible product of one’s relationship with oneself.”
When we live in space inside ourselves where we can maintain a sense of self and identity that isn’t affected by the outside world, we are in a place of self-validation. Self-validating people don’t expect others to agree with them or reinforce their feelings or ideas. Self-validating people know they may even face rejection when self-disclosing.
Self-validated intimacy allows you to be willing and able to show your true self and share only what you feel from your point of view, void of expectations. Understanding that intimacy isn’t always reciprocal is an important part of self-validating. When you realize that intimacy in relationships isn’t always supportive and mirroring, you realize how important self-intimacy really is.
The fact that intimacy can exist in a relationship when there isn’t mutual sharing or easy responses seems counter-intuitive. But what could be more vulnerable than knowing yourself well enough to be able to share something deeply personal with another person, regardless of their response?
Without guarantees of validation and acceptance from your partner, self-validated intimacy can feel unsteady. The key here is to self-confront before self-disclosing.
Self-Confrontation Comes First
For those who define intimacy as symmetrical — the equal sharing of empathy, emotions, and attention — you’re missing out on pure intimacy, which begins with yourself. The only way to truly know yourself is to self-confront. Take a cold, hard look inside and be honest with yourself about what’s there.
Your level of functioning with yourself and your ability to self-confront will depend on your capacity to self-validate.
A crucial part of self-disclosure is being able to analyze your own intentions and infer meaning from them to know yourself better.
Before you self-disclose, ask yourself the following:
What do I intend to disclose?
Why do want to disclose this?
What response do I anticipate from my partner?
Armed with this personal information about yourself (taking time to be intimate with yourself), you are now ready to take part in an intimate relationship with your partner. Knowing yourself and your limits, your feelings and expectations means you’re growing as a person. Use those insights to remain secure in yourself while sharing intimately with your partner, knowing that your feelings are valid and you are worthy of being heard regardless of their response.
Self-disclosure is not the key to intimacy in a relationship but, if preceded by self-confrontation and completed on the pavement of self-validation, disclosure can fuel intimacy in relationships because the disclosures are shared without needy expectations to sure up your own sense of self.
When you’re not dependent on your partner’s validation to feel secure about yourself, you allow the relationship to ebb and flow through times of conflict when intimacy isn’t in the foreground. You allow the relationship to be what it is and to find its own way through your lives.
Your partner will always see you in the world differently than you see yourself. This isn’t a negative thing. It means the only truth about you is found inside of you, for your eyes only. Unless you’re willing to self-confront and self-disclose in the name of intimacy. It’s not the key to intimacy but it opens the door.
