When being the “most” doesn’t mean that much
During a friend’s bachelor party, those of us who had been married were asked to share one breakthrough piece of advice. I was one of the surprisingly few married guys, and easily the one who had been married the longest out of the bunch. But I always tend to dish out advice pretty conservatively so I had to give it some thought.
I landed on an observation that’s really been a game-changer in how my wife and I use our differences to understand each other better.
Most people already know that speaking in absolutes is detrimental to a productive conversation. I’m talking about times you catch yourself uttering those special phrases like “you always” or “you never…”
The catch is that in a more tense moment it’s so much easier to take it there.
My money is that something about flight-versus-flight responses and all that quickly yank our brains in the direction of black-and-white thinking. When our parasympathetic nervous systems get going, they’re wired for rapid decision making and seeing the world in binary terms can be pretty helpful.
Too bad that’s not a great style of thinking for better understanding your differences with another person.
So the big helpful reminder I had to share with my friend is this:
You’re never as opposite as you think you are.
Of course in this conversation we were focused on marriage and long-term romantic partnerships, but I think this really applies in any one-on-one relationship you have with another person where you’ll be interacting closely.
Don’t forget you’re a population size of two.
When your sample size is that small, each person will automatically occupy the most extreme position.
For example, it's common for one person in a relationship to have a greater need for social interactions, dinner parties, and getting out of the house, and for the other to be a little more home-oriented.
But when the two hit an impasse over something, like trying to plan out a week, it might be easy for one partner to accuse the other of always being restless and unable to sit still, and for the other person to retort with accusations of being a hermit and total recluse.
In reality, for these two to end up together, it’s unlikely that they are as far apart on the spectrum as they feel.
At one point, one was probably attracted to their partner because they appreciated their outgoingness, their ability to create community, and their sense of adventure. And some of the reciprocal attraction might have been over one’s quiet stability.
Understanding personalities is fun, as long as we remember that we simultaneously contain multitudes. And sometimes those multitudes make space for all the traits and experiences of other people.
In the above example, I know plenty of people who’ve felt permission to take their foot off the gas when it comes to making friends, because they’ve coupled with a total extrovert. Finding ways to make your differences complementary can be a great part of a relationship, as long as you keep the ability to check yourself when thinking in absolutes.
Yes, in a population of two, you are always the most-something and least-something.
If the Premier League consisted of only Aston Villa and Tottenham, the latter would be the absolute worst team and Aston Villa would be incredible. In reality, their records are extremely similar, and only one point separates the two as of the time I’m writing.
How does remembering this help keep things in check?
There’s a number of ways, but whenever you’re in the position of trying to figure out “what do we do, given our differences,” remembering similarities can help steer you in that direction.