R. Scott Gornto

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Why Your Relationships Need a Sliver of Space

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After listing the four-step Auxano Communication Approach© in Chapter 13 of The Stories We Tell Ourselves, I discuss a notion within relationships I’ve termed “the sliver of space.”

Webster’s defines “sliver” as “a small and narrow portion.” In other words, you don’t need much, but you do need some.

As I wrote in my book, “This sliver represents the separateness of the two individuals in the relationship, but it also serves as a reminder for the listener to let the speaker have and express their own feelings without taking on the other person’s emotions.”

It’s that last part that’s so important to having a sliver of space in your relationships, especially when conflict arises.

If you’re arguing with your friend and the friend becomes visibly angry, you don’t want to take on their anger. You want to remember that a “sliver of space” exists between you two and that you don’t have to reflect their emotions. This ought to then allow you to truly hear the other person without your emotions clouding your judgment.

The saying is true: “Cooler heads prevail.” Relational conflicts can often be better resolved when both parties remember to allow for a sliver of space between each other.

The Auxano Approach to Communication: Step 4

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If you have yet to read the first three steps of the Auxano Communication Approach©, please take a moment and read my previous three posts. It’s important that each step is taken before advancing to the next.

The last step toward better communication in your relationships is:

Step 4: Seek more information.

To most effectively accomplish this step, do what author and professor Brené Brown calls “passionate listening.” Attempt to tune out external distractions and internal mental meanderings as you seek to discover objective facts about the situation, the other person, and the other person’s take on the situation.

One of the most effective (and often most difficult) ways to do this is to refrain from thinking about your own response while the other person is still talking. Again, Brown has wise words on this:

When I really listen rather than thinking and formulating my response as people are talking, the entire conversation takes on a new cadence. It’s slower and there’s more white space between exchanges. It’s a little weird at first, but it’s also very powerful (“Passionate Listening”).

In The Stories We Tell Ourselves, I present one way for my clients to add more “white space” to their conversations:

Visualize placing [your] thoughts on a shelf for a few minutes. [You’ll] know where to find them later, but for the moment, they need to be somewhere just out of reach. [You] should listen with interest and seek to truly understand what the speaker is saying.

This takes practice, and I encourage you to try it the next time you’re speaking—and listening—to someone with whom you’re in conflict.

And if this final step of the Auxano Communication Approach© fails to result in a positive outcome for the relationship, go back to Step 1 in due time and repeat the process. Eventually, you ought to see, hear, and experience a breakthrough that will take that relationship to a new, deeper, and more authentic level.

The Auxano Approach to Communication: Step 3

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This week, we’ll continue and conclude the four-step Auxano Communication Approach©. As a reminder, the first two steps are:

Step 1: Observe and talk about what you just noticed.

Step 2: Invite the other person to hear the story you’re telling yourself.

Today, we’ll look at possibly the hardest step that may demand the most from you:

Step 3: Share with the other person the feelings you have as a result of the story you made up in your mind.

As I wrote in The Stories We Tell Ourselves, “If we only share the story we’ve been telling ourselves, we leave out half of the relevant information as to why we’re sharing that story.”

In other words, if you just relate the “facts” of the stories you’ve been making up and not how those stories are making you feel, you’re not exactly telling the other person the entire narrative.

To achieve relational connection, and even relational wholeness, you must be able to endure the awkwardness of telling someone else both the stories you may have been making up about them as well as how those stories have been affecting you internally.

To do this, fill in the blanks of this sentence when you’re conversing with the person about whom you’ve been fabricating stories: “Based on the story I’ve been telling myself about you, I’ve felt ____.”

This will demand vulnerability and honesty from you, but your truthfulness ought to help the relationship grow. In fact, the other person may even mimic you and relate how they’ve felt about the stories they’ve been telling themselves about you.

And once both of you have disavowed yourselves of the fabrications possibly surrounding your relationship, a foundation for a stronger, healthier relationship can be built.

The Auxano Approach to Communication: Step 2

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As the second part of a four-part series, it’s imperative that you read “The Auxano Communication Approach: Step 1” before reading any further. This approach to strengthening relationships is a four-step process that requires you to progress from one step to the next.

Now, the second step of the Auxano Communication Approach© is to invite the other person to hear the story you’ve been telling yourself.

This is a hard step, because it means you have to be honest with yourself about the possible lies you’ve been making up about the person sitting directly across from you.

Depending on the severity of the situation, you may have to muster up as much courage and vulnerability as you possess. You’ll also need self-confidence to face the reality that you have no idea how the other person may respond to the story you’re telling them about what you’ve been telling yourself.

I encourage my clients to accomplish this step by starting their conversations with phrases like:

  • “The story I’m telling myself is …. ”
  • “The picture in my head is …. ”
  • “The way that I hear that is …. ”

This invites the other person into the fabrications you may have created about them and about your relationship.

And while their response may be negative, your vulnerability ought to engender more trust within the relationship, and may even lead the other person to reveal the stories they’ve been making up about you—which leads to Step 3.

The Auxano Approach to Communication: Step 1

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Over the course of the next two weeks, I’ll share each step of the Auxano Communication Approach© in its own post. The entire approach is detailed in Chapter 13 of my book, The Stories We Tell Ourselves.

In my previous post, “Your Spouse is Not Your Nemesis,” I discussed how important it is to the marriage relationship that each person approach the other as a human being and not as someone who’s “out to get you.” When conflict arises, it’s imperative to the health of the relationship that each person seek to be “nonjudgmentally inquisitive.”

In other words, each person needs to learn how to communicate better by asking the right questions of themselves and of their other half. This is not a shocking truth, but how we can go about learning to communicate better—in our marriages as well as in any relationships in our lives—is the point of the Auxano Communication Approach©.

The first step in this approach is to observe and talk about what you just noticed.

This means realizing you’ve likely fabricated stories in your mind about the other person or the troubling circumstances your relationship is facing. Some of what you’ve made up may turn out to be true, but there’s no way to know that for sure unless an honest, humble, and vulnerable conversation takes place.

But before turning to the other person, your first step is to attempt a benign, objective observation about the story you’ve been telling yourself. Does your story really mesh with the facts of the relationship’s problems? Or are you just filling in the blanks based on your feelings?

We’re all guilty of telling ourselves stories about other people on a constant basis. The first step in the Auxano Communication Approach© is to realize you’re doing so, then to assess what “facts” you actually need to corroborate with the other person—which leads to Step 2.

Your Spouse is Not Your Nemesis

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In my counseling practice, I use a particular psychological approach that helps married couples in conflict learn how to work together against a problem instead of either spouse seeing the other as the problem—even if only one spouse is the major problem within the relationship.

To do this, I encourage my clients to learn how not to approach their spouses as enemies, especially when either spouse is seeking truthful, factual information from the other.

In Chapter 13 of The Stories We Tell Ourselves, I wrote:

When you approach another person as an enemy in an effort to seek information about a troubling issue between the two of you, your perspective on the problem is myopic at best in that you are solely focused on the other person’s words, behaviors, feelings, or attitude. If you view them as your enemy, you may also be approaching them in an emotionally charged state, like anger, frustration, or irritation.

In other words, you’re setting yourself up as the hero of the story you’ve been telling yourself, and if only you could get your nemesis to admit guilt for his or her wrongdoing, then you’d be proven right and win the day.

But even if that scenario played out, you wouldn’t have won because your perspective of winning would be fairly myopic. You would have won the battle of “Who’s right?,” but you would have lost the war of “Who’s on my side?” You would have further alienated your spouse, all in the name of being “right.”

And the next time you sought factual information from your spouse, it’s even more likely that he or she would fight you or withdraw from you because of how the previous conflict played out. So, a negative relationship cycle begins, and all because one spouse wanted to be right more than they wanted a healthy marriage.

Like I said in my book,

When you do the hard work of truly seeing and relating to this other present person as a human being—someone with thoughts, motivations, and feelings of their own that you aren’t privy to—you’re working to proactively prevent yourself from casting them as your antagonist in the movie of your mind.

Even in the midst of challenging conflict, remember: your spouse is not your nemesis!

How Much Do Your Relationships Cost?

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It’s a bit of a strange question.

Try to take a step back from your closest relationship and view it as an outsider granted insider information. What would that outsider say in regard to how much that relationship costs you in time, money, effort, emotions, words, stress, or heartache?

If this is your closest relationship, I’d assume the assessment would be, “That relationship is costing you a fortune!”

But many don’t perceive relationships this way.

Rather, we view our closest relationships as having inestimable value.

In other words, whatever you give to the relationship, you ought to receive in return. You may even feel like your “return on investment” is doubled.

In the best relationships, both parties feel that way.

Consequently, loving well is not about how much your relationship costs you.

It’s about how much it’s worth to you.

The Most Important Thing in Life?

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If relationships are often the key ingredient to anxiety in our lives, why should we even bother with pursuing them? Why should we worry ourselves about seeking to heal broken relationships? Wouldn’t it make more emotional sense to just distance ourselves from the other person? Wouldn’t that save everyone involved from more heartache and pain?

Of course, people do this. When faced with relationship problems of a certain magnitude, they turn and run. Or they pursue unhealthy coping mechanisms (e.g., drinking to excess, porn, excessive social media use, etc.). Or they clam up and play the silent game. I’m willing to bet we’ve all been guilty of these types of actions in our relationships. But when a flight response kicks in, a relationship can’t be mended. After all, a relationship requires at least two people to even be called a relationship.

Yet we need relationships. We seldom consider how deeply we need relationships. As human beings, we have a deep, intrinsic need for healthy intimate relationships. This is why we will weather almost any storm in order to bring equilibrium to our relationships.

As I wrote in Chapter 13 of The Stories We Tell Ourselves:

Nothing is as fulfilling in life than a deep connection with another person. Few things in life bring such lasting fulfillment as knowing others and being known by them. When we can shed our masks of pretense and offer our true selves to those in our lives, the stress of keeping up the charade fades away. Conflict and misunderstandings will still occur, but the sure foundation you’ve worked to establish in each of your relationships will hold firm so that any shifting ground beneath your feet won’t ruin your relationships. True connection leads to solid relationships that can withstand nearly anything.

Do you believe that? If so, how does your life reveal that?

When You’re the Focus of Someone Else’s Story

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Much of The Stories We Tell Ourselves focuses on you as an individual. I outline multiple ways for readers to stop telling themselves made-up stories based on inaccurate, faulty, hoped-for versions of reality.

As I often remind my clients, the only thing you really have control over is yourself, so learning how to change yourself will change your relationships. Thus my singular focus on how we can all learn to do better when it comes to allowing our fabricated stories to rule our lives and relationships.

But what if you’re the focus of someone else’s made-up story?

What if you’re suffering the injustice of being treated poorly based on someone else’s inaccurate perception of you or the troubling situation at hand? I briefly touch on that in the book in Chapter 12:

At this point, you have to decide whether to base your stories about them on facts or fear. Ask yourself, “Is what I believe about the other person right now based on the best information I have, or is it based in fear that they still don’t accept me?” Become aware of whether or not your emotions and cognitive thought are in balance to where you are not overtaking the other in terms of swaying your opinion about that person. When a person does not seem to be relating to you well, you must decide how much power and energy you want to give to that person, both in the moment and in the minutes, days, and months after that moment. If you find yourself getting frustrated by their inability to connect, press pause on your stories until more information can be learned or the other person has a change of heart.

Unsurprisingly, the key to combatting someone else’s false story is to refuse to play the same game. Don’t let your possible misperception of the other person continue to negatively affect the relationship. Healthy relationships learn how to see each other for who the other person really is, not for who they want them to be.

When You’re Right

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In my last post, I asked the question, “What if you’re right?” What if the stories you’ve been telling yourself about a situation or person turn out to be true?

Now, I’m of the opinion that this is seldom the case (else, I wouldn’t have written a book that aims to edit or eradicate The Stories We Tell Ourselves.) But there are moments in our lives when our intuition strikes the center of the dartboard.

So, what should you do when the stories you’ve been telling yourself about someone else turn out to be true?

Take these steps: stop, corroborate, and listen.

1. Stop: Even if your assumptions seem correct, don’t keep building a tower of assumptions. Pause the stories you’re telling yourself based on your intuition until you’ve had the opportunity to proceed to Step 2.

2. Corroborate: Have an information-seeking conversation with the other person in question. Seek out their side of the story to see if it corroborates what you’ve intuited. This may require some careful handling on your part depending on the issue at hand. You can never fully know if you’re right unless the other person is able to corroborate your assumptions.

3. Listen: One of my favorite quotes is from Suzanne Wallace: “Listen to learn. Speak to be known.” Your job in assessing your assumptions is to listen to learn. Don’t judge or argue when hearing the other person’s story. Rather, listen with the goal of hearing their side of the story as objectively as you can.

These three simple steps can help you confirm some stories you’ve told yourself that have turned out to be true.

But if you’re right, don’t boast—you’ll be wrong soon enough.

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