Teamwork makes the dream work
We’ve all heard it. Teamwork is key to making a couple relationship work. Yet when conflict arises, or emotions shift, that team spirit can get lost. One of us goes quiet, or turns up the volume, the other reacts, and before you know it, our teammate feels like our enemy. We’re locked in a disconnecting dance, and it seems there’s no way out.
Maybe dung beetles have something to teach us about this. According to research, these tiny creatures team up in pairs to tackle a task that benefits them both – moving and burying balls of dung, which they later use as private breeding pods. Working in pairs helps beetles move dung balls more quickly and efficiently, keeping them away from rival species.
What the dung beetles seem to understand is that working together benefits both partners. They get farther faster. They accomplish more together than they could separately.
When we’re locked in a disconnecting dance with our partner, it’s tough to see this. We get stuck in a mindset where our partner is the enemy. We think negative thoughts about them, and about ourselves. We make moves we hope will make things better, but only make them worse. We’re stuck in a repetitive dance that doesn’t get us anywhere.
Sound familiar? Time to take a lesson from the dung beetles: Team up and reconnect.
Step 1: Talk about your dance.
In a calm moment, talk to your partner about your dance. (It could be helpful to write down your responses to steps 1-3, and put them somewhere handy so you can refer back to them later, in steps 4 and 5, when you want to stop the dance.)
See if you can each identify your main moves in the dance. Usually your moves will fall into one of two categories: pursuing (moving toward your partner) or withdrawing (moving away from your partner).
Pursuing can look like: complaining, accusing, poking, questioning, blaming, raising the volume, teaching/lecturing.
Withdrawing can look like: defending, explaining, getting quiet, freezing, minimizing, making jokes, getting logical.
Step 2: What’s behind your moves?
Talk together about what you may really be seeking when you pursue or withdraw.
Pursuers want connection. They may be seeking reassurance that they are important to their partner. They may want to be seen or heard by them. They may want to be reassured that their partner understands them.
Withdrawers want to protect the relationship by keeping things peaceful. They may want reassurance that their partner sees the best in them. That their partner loves them exactly as they are. That their partner values their contribution in the relationship.
Step 3: Name your dance.
Together, come up with a name for your dance of disconnection. Examples include: the hurricane, the freezer, the danger zone, the terrifying two-step. Come up with something that captures the feeling your dance creates for the two of you.
Step 4: When the dance happens, call it out.
Make an agreement that the next time your dance starts (and it will), you will try to call it out to each other. You will both try to say something like, “We’re in the danger zone.” Or “The hurricane is happening.” This will be your signal to team up like dung beetles and communicate, rather than staying stuck in your dance.
Just calling out the name of your dance is a step to getting on the same page!
Step 5: Once you stop your dance, talk about how it got started.
Once you’ve called out your dance, you can go on to talk about how the dance got started this time. It’s best to focus on yourself. What happened that cued you into your moves? What were you thinking to yourself? What were you scared would happen? What moves did you make? What type of reassurance do you need from your partner to get back on track?
Teaming up in this way isn’t easy. But it’s the best way out of the dance of disconnection. When you team up and work together, you become teammates rather than enemies. Together you can more effectively stop the disconnecting dance. You can give each other the reassurance you really need. You can get yourselves out of the dung and back on track!
