Friday, August 19, 2011

Does it feel like you and your spouse live in different worlds?




In a study reported in the book Rapt by Winifred Gallagher couples were given a checklist of events and activities and asked to mark ones that had occurred during the course of the week. The list included items like fights, lovemaking, issues with children and so on. The data revealed the percentage of agreement between husbands and wives was at the level of mere chance. Your spouse is experiencing an entirely different world from you!

How does this happen? Your experience of the world depends on where your attention is focused. We all have selective attention. What you focus on is what you will remember.

What determines what you pay attention to? Attention is determined by many factors, both conscious and unconscious. Each one of us is unique. Your past, your beliefs about the world and your self all influence what you focus on. This creates an individualized experience of the world.

For example if you get a new hybrid car, all of a sudden there seems to be many hybrid cars on the road. Your attention is now focused on noticing these hybrids cars. Before you bought one you never paid attention in this way and did not notice as many hybrids.

How can you benefit from this knowledge? Realize how important communication is for your relationship. Without communication, sharing your feelings, perceptions, and thoughts you lose the connection with your partner. You stay in your separate worlds.

Learn how to communicate with your partner, pay attention to them and listen to what and how they have experienced the world. Invite them into your world and be willing to enter theirs. Neither view is objectively “right”.

Communication will increase intimacy and satisfaction in your relationship and it just might expand your world.





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