Marriage Improvement Monday
Sunday, February 21st, 2010
The Challenge: Write a Grudge List
We are probably all guilty of doing any number of not-so-functional things during a marital argument, and one of the most common is this: stockpiling. The argument might have—at one time—been about the snotty comment your spouse made while you were cooking dinner. But now it’s about the time he forgot to buy you an anniversary gift.
And it’s about the time he smoked the Thanksgiving turkey so long that it tasted like parking lot gravel, and he did this because he left the smoker to fend for itself while he rode his bike all afternoon.
And about the time he was an hour late to his own wedding.
And about the time, when you were just dating, when he let it slip that he thought your best friend was a whiney princess, and he let this revelation slip right in front of her.
Thing is, while all of these incidents were definitely angering and incredibly disappointing, mentioning them all during your current argument is not going to resolve things any faster. If anything, it’s just going to cause the argument and the anger to drag on even longer. It may very well even thwart you from getting your true point across, because your spouse will feel so under siege that he’ll stop listening. As you shout about all of the indiscretions that prove that he is indeed a despicable human who is not worthy of the likes of you, he’ll hear something that sounds a lot like the teacher on Peanuts. You know what I’m talking about: wah-whawha-wha-wah.
Indeed, if you really want your spouse to stop making snotty comments, keep your discussion focused on the latest snotty comment and how it made you feel: hurt. Don’t bring up the past.
Yes, of course, it’s easier said than done. That’s where the grudge list comes in.
Make Your Grudge List
This is what you’re going to do.
You and your spouse both make a grudge list. Write down every single maddening incident that you can possibly remember, dating all the way back to the day you met. Don’t go on and on about it. Just write down enough so that you both know what you are talking about. Start your list with the phrase, “I still feel hurt because of …” and then list specific incidents. For instance, your list might look like this.
I still feel hurt because of …
- The time you didn’t have a closet cleaned out for me when I moved in with you.
- Last Thanksgiving, when you told my sister in law to eff off.
- When you missed our daughter’s birth because you were working late at the office.
You get the idea. Don’t worry if your list has 25 or more items on it. Just write them all down.
Once you both have a grudge list, share them with each other, using these Grudge List Sharing Rules.
Rule #1: You share your lists one at a time, moving through each and every item on one list before you deal with the other list.
Rule #2: The person who is sharing will try not to blame, use curse words, sigh loudly, perform acrobatic eye rolls, or raise his or her voice. You just read from the list. That’s it.
Rule #3. The person who is listening to the list does not try to convince the reader why he or she should not be hurt. He or she also does not use curse words, sigh loudly, perform acrobatic eye rolls, or raise his or her voice.
Rule #4. The person who is listening says just two words after every item on the list: “I’m” and “sorry.” It’s okay to expand on those words as in, “I’m sorry I did that” or “I’m so sorry I hurt you.” But it’s not okay to say, “I can’t believe you keep bringing that up! What is wrong with you?”
Rule #5: After you’ve both read your lists and said your sorries, burn your lists, hug and PROMISE to never, ever bring up these grudges again.
Does this technique seem sort of silly? Are you thinking that it could not possibly work? It’s just too simple, right? All I can tell you is this: I did this with my husband and, I have to say, it worked. Once I read my list and heard my husband tell me that he was sorry, a soft forgiving spot opened up in my heart. It’s my hope that this challenge will help you find your soft spot as well.
Try it and let me know how it goes. Also, if you’ve been practicing last week’s Marriage Improvement challenge, let me know how that’s going as well.
Oh, and today’s post comes with a fun little challenge. I listed 7 seemingly imaginary grudges in this post, but two of them were based on real issues that took place in my marriage. Can you guess which ones were the fake grudges and which ones were the real ones? The first person to guess correctly gets a signed copy of my latest co-authored book Back to Life After a Heart Crisis.
