Terrance Real
Twenty Practices:
1. Appreciating
- Appreciate each other at least once a day. At the end of the day, tell your partner three things you appreciate, either about something current or something more long-standing. “I really appreciate your listening to me earlier this evening” is one example. But so is “You have always had the most beautiful eyes.”
- Develop “an attitude of gratitude.” Throughout the day, notice and shift all victim thinking. If you don’t like something, change it, leave it, or embrace it. If you choose to neither change nor leave, then own your choice and appreciate the good qualities in the situation.
2. Boundary Practice
Take a moment to visualize setting your boundaries at the beginning of each day. Throughout the day, take a moment to reset them through visualization. Take stock of where you might be at a given moment and correct if necessary, softening walls and strengthening appropriate containment and protection.
Avoid all boundary-violating behaviors by staying on your side of the line. Speak from the “I,” not the “you” or the “it.” Remember, there is nothing that you need to say that cannot be said from the “I” with practice.
3. Cherishing
Cherishing is the deliberate cultivation of your capacity to take pleasure in and celebrate what you have. Cherishing your partner’s progress by giving him specific positive feedback is the best way to engender more of the behaviors you’d like.
You cherish your relationship by making time for it putting energy into it, and by giving your partner gifts in word and deed that demonstrate your care.
You cherish yourself through active self-care.
You cherish your commitment to continued growth and relationship practice by becoming partners-in-health, sharing information and inspiration.
And you cherish abundance by stepping into your particular passions and gifts with no attempt to either own or disown them, but rather with joy and respect for your own success and a wish to contribute to the world.
4. CNI-Busting Behaviors
CNI are your Core Negative Images of your partner. With your partner, draw up a list of CNI-confirming and CNI-busting behaviors – behaviors that are like or very much unlike your partner’s negative expectations, or core negative image, of you. This list serves as your relationship compass, as specific operating instructions for how best to please your partner. Decrease CNI-confirming behaviors and increase CNI-busting behaviors.
5. Coming to Center
Use the relationship grid to provide a snapshot of where you are, and correct for any imbalance by doing self-esteem and boundary work.
6. Contracting
Making explicit contracts protects you, the contractor, in two ways, by:
- Making it difficult for the other person to take a victim position, since he’s agreed to the contract
- Making each other’s expectations and commitments clear
7. Cultivating a Sense of Abundance
In both ordinary moments and, especially, in moments of upset, stop, either look down or close your eyes for a few seconds, and breathe. Feel the sweetness of a good, deep breath. Feel the warmth or coolness of the air on your skin. Feel the beauty of your surroundings, the sun, or the sight of trees outside the window. Remember that your life is abundant, that this moment is abundant, and that a particular disruption in your relationship or your circumstances will not take that abundance away.
8. Daring to Rock the Boat
In even the healthiest of relationships, getting what you want often involves assertively going after it. If something is important to you, and your partner doesn’t “get it,” you may need to stand up for your wants and needs by fighting for them. This means being willing to behave in ways that your partner will be uncomfortable with – acting as unhappy as you are about the issue, and, while remaining moderate and respectful, not backing down.
9. Dead-Stop Contracts
A dead-stop contract is an agreement to interrupt the vicious cycle of CNI-meets-CNI. The agreement goes like this: “If I feel, rightly or wrongly, that you are behaving in ways that reinforce my CNI of you – if I feel, for instance, that old, horrible feeling of being bossed around by you – I will signal a dead-stop. And you promise in advance that if you hear that signal, understanding that your behavior is CNI-triggering, you will come to a dead stop – whether you agree with my perception or not.”
When you use a dead-stop contract, nothing short of physical safety takes precedence over your goal of stopping your repetitive pattern, no matter what you think of your partner’s perception or motivation.
10. Helping Your Partner Succeed
Once your partner has responded by acknowledging and giving, you:
- Appreciate what you’ve been offered
- Ask what you might do to help
11. Listening to Understand
Remember, the speaker role and the listener role are two different roles. As the listener, listen. Focus on your partner and not on your rebuttals, explanations, or concerns, either spoken or merely thought. Turn points of connection into points of curiosity.
12. Making Requests
Instead of focusing on what your partner has done wrong, discipline yourself to focus on what he could do now or later that would be right. You shift from a negative/past focus to a positive/future focus.
Don’t criticize – ask!
13. Meeting Immaturity with Maturity
On those occasions when your partner is obviously operating from an immoderate, childish part of himself, hunker down and stay moderate yourself. Try two or three times to help your partner reseat himself in his functional adult self, as in, “Honey, I’m sorry. I really didn’t mean to put you down. All I meant was…” If, after a few such efforts, it becomes clear that your partner is simply behind a wall and not listening, politely and respectfully disengage. Don’t bother getting indignant or hurt, but also stop banging your head against the wall. Don’t argue, reason, or cajole. Just let go and give your partner space to figure it out.
14. Remembering Love
Before bringing up a difficult topic, recall that the person you’re about to speak to is someone you are about and that your goal in speaking is to make things better. Keep your eyes on the prize!
15. Responding with Generosity
Remember that in the repair process, the respondent’s only goal is to help his partner move back into harmony. You are “at his service.”
Your response is a two-step process. You:
- Acknowledge all that you can of what your partner has said
- Give all that you can of what your partner has asked for
16. Responsible Distance Taking
In contrast to unilateral, or provocative, distance taking, responsible distance taking always includes two elements:
- An explanation
- A promise of return or a proposed alternative
Anytime you say no to someone, you are taking distance, and should do so responsibly.
17. Self-Esteem Practice
Check to see where you are – one-down, one-up, or same-as – and correct if necessary.
In your mind’s eye, reach down if you are in a toxic shame state and visualize pulling yourself up into your body so that you look squarely out of your eyes at the other person, from a level, same-as, position.
In your mind’s eye, reach up if you are in a grandiose state and visualize pulling yourself down into your body so that you are looking squarely at the other person, from a level, same-as position.
18. Smart Generosity
Giving your partner more of what he’s asking for by asking yourself, “What will giving this cost me?” Things that aren’t difficult to give but that mean a lot to your partner, such as remembering an important date, admitting when you were wrong, or agreeing to do something you intended to do anyway, are low-cost, high-yield investments.
19. Time-Outs
When either partner calls a time-out – by saying the word “time-out,” by using the “T” hand signal, or by using any agreed-upon sign – the interaction comes to an immediate stop. The spoken or gestured signal is understood by both partners to be an abbreviation of the following words:
- “Dear partner, for whatever reason, right or wrong, I am about to lose it. If I stay here and keep this up with you I am liable to do or say something stupid that I know I’m going to regret. Therefore I am taking a break to get a grip on myself and calm down. I will check back in with you responsibly.”
- Twenty minutes
- One or two hours
- Half a day
- A whole day
- Overnight
20. Using the Feedback Wheel
- Contract with your partner to do the process; don’t just dump.
- Remember Love.
- Use the four steps of the feedback wheel:
- What I saw or heard
- What I made up about it
- How I feel about it
- What I’d like
Terrance Real
Overviews:
The Five Losing Strategies
A. Needing to be Right
- Finding out whose view is more “valid” or “accurate.”
- Leads to endless objectivity battles.
- Fuels the psychological violence of self-righteous indignation.
- Can be direct or indirect (manipulation).
- Short of outright coercion, control is an illusion.
- People don’t like being controlled. Payback is inevitable.
- “I have the right and the need to share my feelings with you ‘spontaneously.’”
- The Idea that all sharing is authentic and will increase closeness.
- Rarely endangers generosity in others.
- Perverse justice: “Offending from the victim position.”
- Perverse communication: trying to make you feel what I feel.”
- Can be explicit or covert (passive aggression).
- Differs from responsible distance taking.
- Stems from either resignation or retaliation.
- Often masquerades as mature acceptance.
The Five Winning Strategies
A. Shifting from Complaint to Request
- Move from a negative/past to a positive/future focus. Don’t criticize – ask!
- Make your requests specific, behavioral, and reasonable.
- Contract with your partner to engage in the repair process.
- Remember love.
- Use the four steps of the feedback wheel:
- What I saw or heard
- What I made up about it
- How I feel about it
- What I’d like
C. Responding with Generosity
- Listen to understand.
- Acknowledge whatever you can.
- Give whatever you can.
- Acknowledge the gifts the responder has offered.
- Ask what you might do to help the responder deliver.
- Acknowledge whatever you can and give whatever you can.
- Remember abundance.
- Give your partner specific positive feedback.
- Nourish yourself and your relationship with time and energy.
- Practice smart generosity.
- Inhabit your talents and gifts without owning or disowning them.
- Give back to the world.
The Repair Process Overview
Phase One: Speaking and Listening
A. Speak out with love and savvy
- Remember love
- Use the feedback wheel
- Contention becomes curiosity
- Understand the internal logic of your partner’s experience
- Questions stop when you can accurately reflect and empathize
- Clarify your partner’s wishes
- Acknowledge whatever you can
- Give whatever you can
A. Switch roles
- Speaker appreciates and then asks how he might help his partner
- Listener makes a request
- Speaker acknowledges and gives
A REPAIR PROCESS MINI GUIDE
Speaker 1) Describe 2) Ask 3) Appreciate 4) Help out
Responder 1) Listen 2) Clarify 3) Acknowledge 4) Give