There are two situations that commonly block empathy for one’s partner. The first is when we have have been traumatically damaged by our partner, as in situations of infidelity, life threatening addictions or intimidating rages. The other is in situations where our own self-image does not permit the acknowledgment of our own hurtful imitations. 

Always the deeper question is not about the “content” of the fight, but the “how” of how you talk to each other. It is not “what” you are arguing about but rather how you are “interacting” that truly drives the negative cycle. `

In marriages that are largely healed of debilitating negative cycles, it is seldom that the more avoiding partner comes to initiate emotional encounters and closeness at a level comparable to their pursuing partner. Even at the close of therapy each partner is left with their differing gifts and differing limitations. Not all of these differences come to even out. 

An aspect of each person’s clarification of “their individual project” involves a personal claiming of “their stuff.” That is, a claiming of the “raw spot” inherent in their own psychology, the place of vulnerability, the place they struggle to cope, and a recognition of some of the emotional costs to themselves and others that ushers from this place of inner difficulty.  

Typically, it is very difficult for partners in a struggling marriage to open up and candidly claim these places of inner difficulty, without first reliably bringing down the couples negative cycle, and having established a modicum of emotional safety in the marriage. The propensity towards mutual shaming and projective blaming makes such levels of self-claiming too unsafe for most couples. However, once the couple learns to reliably circumvent the negative cycle, each partners ability to claim their inner difficulties/struggles/raw spots, greatly enhances the feeling of growing safety and intimacy in the the marriage. Each partner is reassured by the knowledge that their partner is going to be dealing with the parts of themselves that make the marriage harder. And intimacy within the marriage is much increase by the vulnerable sharing about these places of inner difficulty. 

Negative cycles within marriages become very entrenched over time. Effective marital therapy must address this entrenchment. For most couples negative cycles are not confined to discreet moments in time. Commonly, they become part of each partner’s daily, even hourly, anticipation of the other. Over time, they come to infiltrate all manner of couples/family interactions throughout the days and nights, weekdays and weekends. The defensive ways of responding become automatic, barely thought about, even unconscious. 

Another way of saying this is that negative cycles in marriage become implicit in daily interactions, often unspoken of, but nevertheless very present. They are implicitly expressed and implicitly responded to, and barely recognized. The result is that daily life is colored by the underlying cycle… made flat, even grim, and commonly absent of joy!