How to Learn Things Faster & How to Have an Argument-Free Relationship - SYSK Choice

Things can get dangerously hot in the summer. The interior of your car, the sidewalk, even your patio furniture can heat up in the summer sun and burn you. Listen as I reveal just how hot these things can get. https://www.rd.com/article/things-that-get-dangerously-hot/ You’ve likely noticed that some things are harder to learn than others and that some people learn faster than others. Are there ways to make learning easier and quicker for those of us who aren't rocket scientists? Yes, according to my guest Daniel Willingham. He is a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia and author of several books including Outsmart Your Brain: Why Learning is Hard and How You Can Make It Easy (https://amzn.to/43Lkb8N). Listen as he explores the fascinating process of how we learn. People argue a lot. And it makes you wonder if it ever does any good. Does arguing actually accomplish something or does it leave people more upset and polarized than before? Perhaps there a better way to resolve problems without arguing. That is what my guest Linda Bloom specializes in. She and her husband Charlie are veteran marriage counselors and seminar leaders who have authored several books including An End to Arguing: 101 Valuable Lessons for All Relationships (https://amzn.to/3Y5J5yR). It's common advice that when you are mad, you should count to 10 before you say anything. That way, you give yourself a chance to calm down and not say something you later regret. Is that really a good strategy? Listen to hear some interesting research on the topic. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2168645/Angry-Counting-worst-thing–makes-furious.html PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS!!! SHOPIFY: Shopify is the commerce platform for millions of businesses around the world! To start selling today, sign up for your $1 per month trial at⁠⁠⁠ https://Shopify.com/sysk⁠⁠⁠ INDEED: Get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Indeed.com/SOMETHING⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ right now! QUINCE: Stick to the staples that last, with elevated essentials from Quince! Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Quince.com/sysk⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns! HERS: Hers is transforming women’s healthcare by providing access to affordable weight loss treatment plans, delivered straight to your door, if prescribed. Start your initial free online visit today at ⁠⁠⁠https://forhers.com/something⁠⁠⁠ DELL: Upgrade your learning experience during Dell Technologies’ Back to School event with AI PCs starting at $749.99! Discover a smarter way to learn at ⁠⁠⁠https://Dell.com/deals⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Speaker 00

  Pink Pantheress here. Coach and Spotify are teaming up to bring music and style together, and they want you to be part of it. Grab your friends and head to the Tabby Tour, hitting cities around the country with live performances from special artists, exclusive experiences, and personalized products. And discover custom playlists on Spotify, booked just for you based on who you are and how you listen. Live your story with Coach. Learn more at coach.com.

• 0:29Mike Carruthers?

  Today on Something You Should Know, just how hot does your car's dashboard get on a hot sunny day? Then, the science of how we learn. For instance, is cramming for an exam better than studying a little over several days?

• 0:44Speaker 02

  If you do not care about remembering this content after the exam, you're actually better off cramming. That said, if you want to remember content beyond the test, then cramming is terrible.

• 0:58Mike Carruthers?

  Also, when you're angry, is it really good advice to count to 10 to calm down? And how to stop arguing in relationships? By asking for what you want upfront?

• 1:09Speaker 03

  It is a myth that if you love me, you'd read my mind and you'd give me what I need to feel loved, and I wouldn't have to ask you. And I think that in every great relationship, people are really upfront about what their needs are, and it takes courage.

• 1:24Mike Carruthers?

  All this today on Something You Should Know.

• 1:29Mike Carruthers?

  Now here's something that might be worth a minute of your time. How would you like $1,000 to spend on shopping? Especially with the holidays coming. Well, the people behind Shopify have a shopping site called shop.com. And to celebrate the new shop.com, they're giving away $1 million in Shop Cash. But not to one person. A thousand people will each win $1,000 in Shop Cash. And shop.com is actually a really clever idea. It brings lots of different stores together in one place. So instead of bouncing around from website to website, you can search across stores, find what you're looking for,

• 2:14Mike Carruthers?

  and track your orders all in one place. Clothes, electronics, gifts, things for the house, all kinds of stuff. And whether you win or not, it's worth knowing. But with 1,000 chances to win $1,000?

• 2:29Mike Carruthers?

  I'd certainly take a look. Enter to win the $1 million Shop Cash giveaway from now until November 1st. Just go to shop.com. There are so many ways to win. That's shop.com. Shopping designed around you. No purchase necessary. Restrictions apply. Official rules available at shop.com.

• 2:54Speaker 04

  Something you should know. Fascinating intel. The world's top experts. And practical advice you can use in your life. Today. Something you should know. With Mike Carruthers.

• 3:07Mike Carruthers?

  Hi. Welcome to Something You Should Know. This episode is being recorded and published in the middle of summer, and many parts of the world are experiencing heatwaves. And when the weather is hot outside, other things heat up as well. Some heat up a lot. And here are a few things that can really burn you in the summer if you're not careful. Blacktop. You know, a parking lot or a street that is black can get as hot as 140 degrees during extreme temperatures. To put that in perspective, humans begin to feel pain at 111 degrees. At 118 degrees, you can experience first-degree burns.

• 3:47Mike Carruthers?

  So if blacktop is 140 degrees, your feet and your pet's feet can get seriously burned. Patio furniture. If your patio furniture is sitting in direct sun and you sit down on it, it can be between 104 and 136 degrees in the sun. Your car's interior. According to a 2018 study, the internal temperature of a car parked in the sun can reach 117 degrees in just one hour, making it deadly for anybody sitting in that car without air conditioning. And the steering wheel. The surface temperature of a steering wheel, in one study, reached 127 degrees in a car

• 4:31Mike Carruthers?

  that was parked in the sun for one hour on a 100-degree day. The dashboard averaged 157 degrees and the seats, 123 degrees. And that is something you should know.

• 4:49Mike Carruthers?

  As you no doubt learned from a very early age, learning something new and learning something well can be hard. Well, what makes it hard? Is it the process we use to learn? Are some things just hard to grasp? Maybe learning new things is supposed to be hard. But some people learn things faster than other people. Is there a right way to learn something? Can you make learning easier? Well, that's what Daniel Willingham is here to discuss. Daniel is a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia. He's the author of several books. One is called Outsmart Your Brain: Why Learning is Hard and How You Can Make It Easy. Hi, Daniel. Welcome.

• 5:34Mike Carruthers?

  Welcome back to Something You Should Know.

• 5:35Speaker 02

  Thanks so much. I'm delighted to be here.

• 5:37Mike Carruthers?

  So this probably seems like a self-evident question, but the learning process, I think most people experience it as difficult. Learning something new is difficult. Why is it difficult?

• 5:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, the thing that's really tricky about learning is that our brain kind of fools us. We naturally go for sort of mental processes that feel in the moment like they're working and also are not all that difficult to use, which sounds like pretty good poker. It sounds like a good strategy. But these frequently end up being processes that are okay. They're not completely useless, but they're not all that effective either. Let me give you the analogy that I like to use. Suppose that you've got a friend who is trying to train athletically, and they want to be able to do a lot of push-ups.

• 6:34Speaker 02

  So you go watch them train one day, and you come on them, and they're doing push-ups on their knees. And you say, "Wait, if you want to be able to do a lot of push-ups, like, shouldn't you be practicing regular push-ups? I mean, in fact, shouldn't you be practicing really hard push-ups, like the ones where you launch yourself off the floor and clap?" And your friend says, "Yeah, you know, a couple of people told me that, and I tried it, but I can hardly do any of those. And look, when I do them on my knees, I can do them really fast. And I, you know, it's easy, too. I can do lots of them." So when we're trying to learn new things, frequently, we end up doing the mental equivalent of pushups on our knees. We do things that feel in the moment like they're really effective and have the added

• 7:17Speaker 02

  bonus of not feeling that difficult to do. And again, it's not completely useless to do pushups on your knees, but in the long run, it's not the most efficient way for you to practice.

• 7:29Mike Carruthers?

  And so, give me examples of pushup on your knees for learning.

• 7:32Speaker 02

  I think one of the most common is when people are trying to commit something to memory, they'll read it again and again. This is very common in students, but adults do this as well. And reading over something is not very effective. The reason it's not very effective is there's a difference between something being easy to recognize, something feeling familiar, and the type of knowing that allows you to actually use the information, talk about it. So let me elaborate on that just a little bit. Psychologists use the term familiarity very much the way it's used in everyday conversation.

• 8:17Speaker 02

  When we say somebody looks familiar who we run into on the street, we mean, I know that I've encountered them before, but I don't have any more information about them. So familiarity, that judgment is made very, very quickly by the brain, and determining that you have even more information about the person might take longer, right? So that sounds more complicated than it really is. We've all had this experience. You see someone on the street, and you say like, oh, gosh, I know I know that person. Now let me think, how do I know them? And you start saying, do I know them from work? Do I frequently see them at a store I go to? So essentially, you're sort of giving your, trying to generate memory cues for yourself

• 9:01Speaker 02

  to see whether you can get more information. And sometimes that works. So notice that this feeling of familiarity comes very, very quickly, and then slowly you can coax more information out of memory.

• 9:16Speaker 02

  So we're used to the idea that when something is highly familiar, probably you're going to be able to get more information about it. But that doesn't always happen. And when you read over something again and again, what you're doing is definitely boosting familiarity, but you may not be doing the type of memory, in fact, you're probably not, doing the type of mental exercise that's really good for this other type of memory, where you have more information besides, I know I've seen this before.

• 9:49Mike Carruthers?

  So my experience is that learning is a lot easier if you like what you're learning versus learning, particularly in school, some subject that you just don't like. I mean, it's night and day, it seems.

• 10:06Speaker 02

  Liking something is, being interested in something, is prompting you to think about it more deeply. And it's the meaningfulness that's leading to the good memory. So for example, we've also all had the experience of someone asking you to watch a documentary about making guitars or about type fonts or something that you're just like, I have no interest in this at all. But your friend kind of forces you into it and you find yourself completely fascinated. And when that happens, you are definitely going to remember it more closely. And that's because you are paying attention, you're thinking about meaning, the information is sort of organized

• 10:50Speaker 02

  and you're connecting it to other things that you already know. That's the, that kind of thing is really good for memory.

• 10:57Mike Carruthers?

  What about, you know, when you're learning something and you're having trouble with it, then you start to worry about the having trouble. And it makes the learning harder because you're freaking out, you're getting all worked up and anxious about the fact that you're not learning this right.

• 11:13Speaker 02

  Absolutely. I mean, I think there, I think Mike, there, there are actually two ways that, that, that this can happen. You're feeling anxious, as you said, you know, freaking out. And we know anxiety can't be good for memory. One of the things that anxiety is going to do is you can't really think very carefully about what it is you're trying to learn, because you're sort of in mental overload, thinking about how terribly this is going. And the fact that, you know, maybe it's math, for example, you know, I'm, I, I'm never able to do math, and this is going to be terrible, and I'm going to fail this course, and then I won't be able to get my degree, you know, and you have these cascading

• 11:55Speaker 02

  thoughts associated with anxiety. And there's just no space for the math, because you're just completely occupied with, with the, with those anxious thoughts. The second thing that can happen is you're, you've become obsessed with your self-image. You're thinking about yourself as a learner, and the way you interpret your experience. So if I think of myself as someone who's usually pretty successful, and suppose I'm, you know, at the office, and I'm trying, there's some new computer system we're using, and I'm telling it, we're all have to use this, can't use the old one anymore, you have to learn

• 12:36Speaker 02

  this new one. And I think of myself as someone who's usually pretty good with tech things. Then when things go wrong, and I make a few mistakes with this new technology, I'm not very bothered by it. I'm going to persist. I'm going to think like, well, you know, I have a history of success with these sorts of problems. So, you know, if I hang in there, I'll, I'll get the hang of it. I'll figure it out. In contrast, if I think of myself as someone who's not very good with technology, then I interpret setbacks very differently. Then I think, yep, see, here, here we go again. This is what always happens to me when there's some technology thing that I'm supposed to learn. I just can't do it. And then I'm very quick to, to want to give up and, and, you know, try and find

• 13:21Speaker 02

  some, some other way to, to deal with this problem besides overcoming it and learning it.

• 13:28Mike Carruthers?

  So it's like a self fulfilling prophecy. If you believe you're not good at learning technology, you're not going to learn technology very well because you believe you can't.

• 13:36Speaker 02

  I think that's right. Yeah, this, this persistence in particular, persistence in the face of setback is, I think, a really big part of this.

• 13:45Mike Carruthers?

  In all kinds of learning, right? I mean, it's, it's hard. When it's hard, the tendency is to want to give up and which is the opposite of what you probably should be doing.

• 13:56Speaker 02

  Anything that you want to learn is probably going to have some aspect of challenge to it. There's, things are going to go wrong and you just have to be ready for it and tell yourself that you're going to stick with it nevertheless and keep going.

• 14:10Mike Carruthers?

  We're talking about the learning process. My guest is Daniel Willingham. He's a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia and author of the book Outsmart Your Brain: Why Learning is Hard and How You Can Make It Easy.

• 14:25Speaker 00

  Pink Pantheress here. Coach and Spotify are teaming up to bring music and style together, and they want you to be part of it. Grab your friends and head to the Tabby Tour, hitting cities around the country with live performances from special artists, exclusive experiences, and personalized products. And discover custom playlists on Spotify, booked just for you based on who you are and how you listen. Live your story with Coach. Learn more at coach.com.

• 14:53Speaker 05

  This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Football has a play for just about everything. You can go deep, keep it on the ground, or draw up something nobody sees coming. And whether you want to run a flea flicker or the tush push, you need a plan to fit your unique situation. That's why State Farm takes the time to get to know you, so they can help personalize coverage for your life and budget. Now that's a solid game plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

• 15:21Mike Carruthers?

  So, Daniel, what do you say to people? And everybody says this when they, when they're in school is, you know, I'll never use this again. And, and, and like when I try to help my son with his homework, this is stuff I probably learned, but I don't remember it anymore. So what was the point other than to, you know, get through school? But we seem to learn a lot of things we really don't need, but there must, there's, so there must be another reason.

• 15:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think there are a few reasons. The first is that more of this sticks with you than you probably realize. So one thing that might stick with you is very general approaches to problems. So in mathematics, for example, you may not remember how to solve particular types of equations, but you may, there may be very high level ways of thinking about problems, constructing problems. This is a theory that psychologists have worked with and there's, there's been some, a lot of psychologists think this is probably right because you do see benefits broadly

• 16:35Speaker 02

  speaking of education. People who've been to school longer are sort of more resourceful when they're trying to solve completely new problems. And so this is one theory is that you get these, you learn these very broad problem solving strategies while, while you're in school. So that's one reason. A second reason that you may remember more than you realize is that there's a particular type of memory measure called savings in relearning. And what this means is you may not really remember when you're trying to help your son, you're confronted with a problem. But if it happened that you needed to actually learn this content now, it suddenly became

• 17:15Speaker 02

  relevant in your work and you tried to teach it to yourself, you would be faster in mastering it now than if you hadn't learned it in school. I actually experienced this personally. I took French when I was in high school and by the time I was graduated, I was fairly competent in, in conversational French, competent enough that I didn't have to take it in college. I tested out of it in college and really had no opportunity to speak French again. And then I found myself going to Paris about 15 years after I had spoken any French at all, and I absolutely did not remember my French. So I thought, this is going to be terrible, but...

• 18:00Speaker 02

  plunged into an environment where French was being spoken all the time and trying to relearn it. I think after about 10 days, I was pretty close to where I had been in high school. I'd had this very, very rapid relearning of my French. So in other words, it was kind of, the French was in there, it was sort of in my databank, but just hard to access and then rapidly relearned. So that's a couple of ways of thinking about the idea that content may be in there even if you feel like you've forgotten everything. And then the final thing, I'll just mention this briefly, is that if we decide, oh, there's

• 18:43Speaker 02

  no reason to learn this because you're never going to use it. Most of the time when students are saying that, or even parents, we're deciding at a pretty young age that this is, this is something you're never going to need and therefore there are certain lines of work that may be closed off to you. And that, that makes me anxious thinking about, you know, someone who's 15 and saying, well, you know, there's no, you don't need algebra, you're never going to use it. Because that, that may really hamper their ability to take more advanced mathematics and then close them off to a lot of careers.

• 19:19Mike Carruthers?

  Well, maybe it was you, because we've talked before, but if it wasn't you, it was somebody else that, that said something that made me feel better. And that is, that like, when, when people like me in school think math is hard, the other side of that equation is that it's hard for me, but it's easy for other people. And that, the fact is that math is hard for everyone, it's just that the math geeks enjoy that hardness, whereas I don't.

• 19:49Speaker 02

  I, I hope I said that, because that, that's a lovely way of putting it, and I, and I think that's right. It is, you know, it is hard for almost everybody. There are people who, yeah, just sort of do seem to take to it like, like a duck takes to water, but not, but not many. Most things that we want to master do take work. And I mean, and this is one of the things I'm emphasizing when I'm talking to my students, when I'm talking to, talking to my children. You know, and it goes back to what I was saying earlier about the pushups. It's like, yeah, I mean, do it. Doing this well is hard. You should expect it to be hard. It's not, it's not going to be fun in the sense that, you know, going to a party is fun.

• 20:34Speaker 02

  But there is satisfaction that comes with learning something and, and feeling like, yeah, that was, that was really challenging for me, but I'm, I'm, I'm happy to have mastered it and I feel proud that I've done it.

• 20:49Mike Carruthers?

  Obviously, every topic, every subject is different. But is there a general approach to learning that seems to work? That if you want to learn something, here's how you start. Here's, here are steps one, two, and three. Or are, is everybody in every subject too different?

• 21:06Speaker 02

  I think there are general principles you can draw that are pretty universal. The first one is that it's much, much easier to learn things that are organized than things that are not organized. And this is, this relates to something I, I mentioned earlier, which is that memory really loves meaning. Things that are organized are meaningful. I'll mention briefly sort of a classic experiment on organization if I, if, if that's all right. In this experiment, subjects came in and they were handed a tree diagram. And the diagram described, the, the pinnacle of the diagram said minerals.

• 21:51Speaker 02

  And then branching off of that below to the left and right were metals and stones. And then branching off metals were different types of metals and then likewise stones. So there was an organization to it. And the subjects were told, listen, you, we want you to memorize these words. You see they're in this tree diagram. You don't worry about that. We're not going to ask you to reproduce the tree diagram. We just want you to memorize the words. Other people were given exactly the same instructions, but the words were randomized. The tree diagram didn't make any sense. The, you know, the broadest category was not at the pinnacle.

• 22:33Speaker 02

  And then everybody got, I think it was 10 minutes to try and commit things to memory. And then there was a delay and then everyone just tried to list the words. And as promised, the organization was not part of the test. But the organization made a huge difference to how many words people remembered. It was like 65% versus 19% memory of the words. And it shows how enormously important organizing things, making them meaningful is going to be. So that's, that's probably the, there are others, but I think that's probably the most important principle you can point to.

• 23:10Mike Carruthers?

  One thing you hear students particularly talk about this is when you're trying to learn something, or well, when you're studying for a test, which means you're trying to learn something, is it better to cram the night before? Or is it better to, you know, study for an hour one night and then the next night and the next night, leading up to the test? And, you know, there's arguments on both sides. What do you say?

• 23:34Speaker 02

  Students cram and cramming does, from a certain perspective, work. If you, suppose you're going to study five hours for an exam. Are you better off studying all of those five hours the night before the exam? In other words, cramming. Or are you better off studying one hour for each of the five nights before the exam? The answer is, if you do not care about remembering this content after the exam, you're actually better off cramming. You're certainly no worse off and you're probably a little bit better off. So this is very unfortunate for teachers like me because it leads to students' perception

• 24:19Speaker 02

  that cramming is really effective, and they're not completely wrong. That said, if you want to remember content beyond the test, then cramming is terrible because your memory really will nosedive right after the test. And there's lots of experimental evidence that this really happens. You're much, much better off, if you're trying to remember for the long term, to distribute your time several days before the test.

• 24:48Mike Carruthers?

  And of course, students tend to be interested in just the test, which is why cramming is so popular. Well, I find this really helpful in understanding how we learn things, how to make things easier to learn, and the whole learning process. Daniel Willingham has been my guest. He is a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia. The name of his book is Outsmart Your Brain: Why Learning is Hard and How You Can Make It Easy. And you'll find a link to that book in the show notes. Thank you for being here, Dan.

• 25:18Speaker 02

  Oh, awesome.

• 25:19Speaker 00

  Pink Pantheress here. Coach and Spotify are teaming up to bring music and style together, and they want you to be part of it. Grab your friends and head to the Tabby Tour, hitting cities around the country with live performances from special artists, exclusive experiences, and personalized products. And discover custom playlists on Spotify, booked just for you, based on who you are and how you listen. Live your story with Coach. Learn more at coach.com.

• 25:49Speaker 05

  This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Football has a play for just about everything. You can go deep, keep it on the ground, or draw up something nobody sees coming. And whether you want to run a flea flicker or the tush push, you need a plan to fit your unique situation. That's why State Farm takes the time to get to know you, so they can help personalize coverage for your life and budget. Now that's a solid game plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

• 26:20Mike Carruthers?

  People argue all the time, especially couples. And when you think about it, arguing doesn't really do much good. You may have noticed it tends to polarize people. They get mad, they say things they probably shouldn't, and often escalate a difficult situation, making it even harder to resolve than before. So maybe we need to stop arguing so much. So how do you do that? What do you do instead? That's what Linda Bloom is here to reveal. Linda and her husband Charlie Bloom have been psychotherapists, seminar leaders, and marriage counselors for quite a while, and they've authored several books.

• 26:58Mike Carruthers?

  The latest is called "An End to Arguing: 101 Valuable Lessons for All Relationships." Hi Linda, welcome to Something You Should Know.

• 27:08Speaker 03

  I'm delighted to be with you, Mike. Thanks for inviting me.

• 27:12Mike Carruthers?

  Sure. So what makes an argument, an argument? And why is it so bad?

• 27:18Speaker 03

  Well, an argument is different from having an impassioned discussion. Because when you go over that very crucial line to trying to coerce somebody to think differently about the subject, or to behave differently, you've already grabbed some ground, and it's really not respectful. I'm all about people being honest and forthcoming, and having their opinions, and their attitudes, and their viewpoints, and even with intensity and, you know, determination about the way they express themselves.

• 27:58Speaker 03

  But to be cognizant of where that line is, where it goes over, to being coercive of the other person. Because that's where the damage to the relationship takes place. So yes, people need to be honest and open and forthcoming with each other, but be careful not to be a bully about trying to put your views on others.

• 28:24Mike Carruthers?

  So where's that line?

• 28:26Speaker 03

  Well, everybody has to be careful to see because it's different for different people. It's a felt sense. You watch their body language, you watch their facial expression, you watch if they tense up. And if you're treading a little too close, then you need to back off and modulate your tone and be a little bit more congenial about the way you're expressing yourself.

• 28:51Mike Carruthers?

  So very often in arguments and conversations where there's conflict, people feel the need to get it off their chest. "I just need you to hear what I have to say," what I, you know. Is that a good thing to vent your feelings or is that best not done?

• 29:08Speaker 03

  No, I think it's important for people to express themselves. And I think there's a lot of people who are conflict phobic, who sit on their opinions, on their feelings, on their needs, and they are not forthcoming nearly enough. I call it going on the record. And I think it's really important with all the people who we want to have a close and trusting rapport, to have an agreement with them that if we have strong feelings about something, that we have agreement in place that we can express it. I think that's what great relationships are made of.

• 29:45Mike Carruthers?

  So put a real life example to that advice. What would it look like if, say, Bob and Betty are having a discussion?

• 29:52Speaker 03

  Okay, so Betty wants more cuddling and she wants more eye contact. And she, to feel safe and secure in the relationship with Bob, she wants to feel loved. And she wants to feel loved in the way that is soul nourishing to her. Bob might think that because he's got a good, stable job and he brings a lot of money home and, you know, he helps with the kids and the housework, that that's enough. But Betty, she may need to hear, "I love you, Betty. You're beautiful, Betty." Why don't we just cuddle for a little while? And when Betty doesn't get that need met,

• 30:34Speaker 03

  she's gonna eventually be irritable and not be a happy camper with Bob. It's his enlightened self-interest that he asks Betty, "Are your needs getting met? Are you feeling the love that I feel in my heart for you?" And when Betty says, "I really need more kisses. I want you to kiss me goodnight every night." That would be a clear example of Betty being courageous to ask what she wants, being vulnerable and expressing a deep need that she has to feel safe and secure in Bob's love. Because without her feedback, Bob doesn't know.

• 31:16Speaker 03

  He may be going along blissfully, thinking that she's as happy as he is in the relationship, and she may be withering on the vine.

• 31:24Mike Carruthers?

  And yet, so many people think that if you have to say, if you have to ask for love, then there's something wrong, that the other person should just know, it should just happen, it should just be. And if I have to ask you to cuddle me, well, then like it's like the magic's gone.

• 31:45Speaker 03

  Uh huh. Well, it's a romantic myth. And you don't have to be in your teens or your early twenties to go in effect of the romantic myths. And you know, it is a myth that if you loved me, you'd read my mind and you'd give me what I need to feel loved, and I wouldn't have to ask you. And I actually suffered in my twenties with this myth running me and had no idea that it was my own fear of getting vulnerable and asking. And I think that in every great relationship, people are really upfront about what their needs are. And if you ask, you may get refused, you may get rejected, and it takes courage to tell ourselves the truth

• 32:30Speaker 03

  and then to speak openly with the people in our life about what it is that really composes a satisfying relationship for us. And it's so individual. You know, some people don't need that many words of affirmation. Some people don't need that many acts of service. Some people don't need that much touch. But it's very individual, and people need to know themselves well enough to know what it is that they need and then be brave enough to stick it out there and ask.

• 33:02Mike Carruthers?

  So I want to go back and talk about this idea of stuffing things, because I think here's what happens a lot of the time, that people don't say anything because you want to avoid the argument. You wrote a book about avoiding the arguments. So I'm doing the right thing. I'm letting it go. I'm letting it pass. I'm not going to say anything. This is avoiding an argument, and that's a good thing. And then, but then later, when there's 15 things stuffed in there, it all blows up.

• 33:33Speaker 03

  And you're making a very important distinction here. If you can really let it go, great. We call that clearing. If you can clear it internally, it's a great gift to the people in your life that you're not holding on to it. But if you're conflict phobic and you're just afraid to bring it up because you're afraid of, you know, having backlash, you're afraid of being accused of being a whiner or complainer, do you know, that's not really letting go. That's stuffing. And it's up to each of us to know whether we're conflict phobic and whether we think conflict is dangerous

• 34:15Speaker 03

  or whether we can modify our belief and see that healthy conflict, healthy interaction, healthy debates and discussion are really useful. And always try, try to let go, try to clear it. And if you can't, then you've got to speak up and bring it up.

• 34:38Mike Carruthers?

  You say that you shouldn't pick your battles, but that's been a pretty common advice, to pick your battles. Not everything is worth a discussion, which is kind of what you're talking about. Some things you can let go, but as you're saying, but only if you can really let it go.

• 34:56Speaker 03

  Only if you can really let it go. And some things are more trivial than others, and it's very important to prioritize what the most important issues are. We can't deal with every little thing. And that's where the Pick Your Battles guideline comes from. But if you have a mentality of the discussion being a battle, that's going to predispose you to a win-lose orientation, rather than a win-win orientation. So we

• 35:33Speaker 03

  want to promote having a successful interchange where both people get to win by having a deeper understanding, different than agreement, a deeper understanding of each other's point of view, of each other's needs, of each other's feelings. And that is a win-win situation because they feel connected when they feel understood.

• 36:00Mike Carruthers?

  What if, though, the discussion is about something that is really, you know, you believe this, or you did this, and, you know, that there's a real difference of opinion, this was right, or this was wrong, that it is a conflict, it's a real conflict, and it seems so easy to turn that into a fight?

• 36:24Speaker 03

  Yes, and every couple, even the happiest couples, have irreconcilable differences. And the research is so clear about this. When they interview couples, when they first fall in love, they first meet, they first decide if they're going to get married or move in together...

• 36:42Speaker 03

  Forty, fifty years and more later, they still have those same differences. They don't homogenize. And some things, we just have to make room for. And Gottman is a researcher that I really respect. And he talks about the five to one ratio. As long as there are five parts of your relationship that are smoking good, you can have this one part that doesn't really work. And couples have to have some areas where they just agree to disagree. But it's important not to have too many of those areas. It's important to try to work out the differences in as many areas as you can.

• 37:27Speaker 03

  And it's important not to be too righteous and opinionated. The way I see it is the way it is. To have a little bit more flexibility, a little bit more open-mindedness, that there are a whole lot of ways of viewing the world and what relationships are made of and what we really need to thrive.

• 37:48Mike Carruthers?

  And so what happens, do you think, from all the work you've done? Why does this so easily go wrong? What typically goes wrong? What happens that this is such a problem?

• 38:02Speaker 03

  Well, I think that there's a very strong influence, and a lot of it's unconscious, of the loyalty ties to our family of origin. So people tend to play out the way their folks handled differences, even if it wasn't very skillfully done. And the loyalty to the family of origin is still running them. They tend to do it the way their family modeled for them when they were imprinted as young children. And if we don't stop to evaluate whether the things we learn from our families are really working for us or working against our own best interests, we're in trouble.

• 38:47Speaker 03

  Because a lot of families didn't learn, I'm not blaming our parents. Our parents did the very best they could. They modeled for us and taught us the best that they knew, but they didn't learn from their families. So I sometimes tell the counseling clients I'm working with that you have to be guilty of the sin of outdoing our family, that we need to learn more and better, over and above what they taught us.

• 39:15Mike Carruthers?

  So let's talk about something that happens, I think, a lot in conflict. And that's when you're talking about something. You have a complaint about the other person. They leave their socks on the floor. They don't put their dishes in the dishwasher. Complaints, things you do that really bother me. And so it's hard not, it's easy for that to turn into an argument because it's, you're doing something I don't like.

• 39:39Speaker 03

  People fear complaints, and I think that complaints have a bad reputation because they get confused with criticism. And man, it's a thin line to go over the line from complaint to criticism. I value complaints because when we're identifying what's not working for us, that's the indicator and the entry point to what we are committed to and what we really need. So at first, you may have to speak your complaints out loud to get comfortable with them and create agreement with another person that your complaints are valuable because you want the relationship to be better. But when you get skilled at this,

• 40:24Speaker 03

  you can do identifying the complaint internally and not have to speak it to the other person. So you don't have to hurt and wound them and invite, you know, blowback. But when we stop with the complaint, that's only the beginning. We need to keep going because the complaint is the indicator of what would work for me better is. If we go back to Betty and Bob, Betty would say, when she's just in complaining mode, "Bob, you don't kiss me and hug me and cuddle me enough." And Bob's gonna feel kinda depressed and discouraged. He thinks he's a good husband. And here is Betty with the complaint.

• 41:08Speaker 03

  But if Betty admits to herself that she needs more affection shown from Bob, she will take the complaint to him in such a respectful way, and she will give what she wants to receive. She'll kiss on him more. She'll hug on him more. Because she'll have learned from the complaint of what's not working and gone directly to resolution.

• 41:33Mike Carruthers?

  Well, what about something that's more like, you leave your clothes on the floor, and that drives me crazy. And then the other person says, "Well, that's just what I do. You know, it's really hard for me not to do that. So suck it up and learn to live with it. Because it's going to be, you're going to be disappointed if you think I'm gonna clean my clothes up, because that's just not what I do.

• 41:57Speaker 03

  Uh huh. If it's absolute, I think that that's disrespectful, not to show caring of the person who is daring to get vulnerable and tell you what's unhappy. But I heard in the little scenario that there was a little bit of room. Would you be willing to at least try your best? Because I would feel loved, respected, and cared for if I didn't have to pick up after you so much. I'll pick after, pick up after you some as showing my care of you to relieve you of that responsibility.

• 42:38Speaker 03

  I hope that you will meet me with trying to at least, I don't mean you have to pick up every single thing, but if you would pick up more, it would mean a lot to me. It would strengthen our relationship. If you have a relationship that is important to you, you want the other person to be happy, to feel respected and cared for and loved. And this is an indicator of a way that I would feel your care for me.

• 43:09Mike Carruthers?

  So in your example, and this is something I really want to get to is this idea, because as you just explained it, it was very emotionless. But that's not how people talk to each other. People get angry, they get mad. What do you mean, I don't pick my clothes? And it would be easy to do it the way you just said it if there was no emotion in it, but it's those angry emotions that sweep people into pretty nasty arguments.

• 43:37Speaker 03

  You're absolutely right. It's indulging our anger that leads to the blame game. And by the time people have been sucking it up, maybe picking up their clothes off of the floor for years, and they're over it now, you know, by the time they start really speaking up, they're so toxic with all the stuff that they've stuffed down for such a long time, that it comes out angry, accusatory, blame me, what the hell's wrong with you? I feel like I have more kids in the family, not just our literal kids, but that you're one of the kids too wants me to be in the mommy role. Do you know, full of blame, full of make wrong.

• 44:22Speaker 03

  And for people to take responsibility for their part in how unskillful they're bringing it to the other person's attention, it can be full of emotion, but not full of rage. It can be full of emotion of, I strongly desire to have an up-level in our relationship. I strongly want to feel cared for by you, loved by you, and your picking up after yourself would mean so much to me. Do you hear the emotion in my voice? But it's not angry.

• 45:06Speaker 03

  It's appealing to them in a strong way, but not in a blaming and accusatory way.

• 45:13Mike Carruthers?

  You've been at this a long time. What is one thing that you see that, over and over again, that people do in relationships that... Really bother you?

• 45:25Speaker 03

  Oh, Mike, people settle for so much less than is available. They make some gestures towards each other and it doesn't go very well and it ends up in an argument. So they just shut it down rather than persisting. It really takes a lot of grit, commitment, persistence, fall down, get up, fall down, get up, begin again, begin again, begin again, to grow a great relationship.

• 45:52Mike Carruthers?

  Sounds like a lot of work.

• 45:54Speaker 03

  It's a lot of work. It's a labor of love and the only thing that makes it worth all that work is because the benefits are bliss.

• 46:03Mike Carruthers?

  Well, when you compare your way to the more traditional, you know, let's get mad, hash it out and argue way, it seems like your way makes a lot more sense. I've been speaking with Linda Bloom. She and her husband Charlie are psychotherapists, marriage counselors. They've authored several books and their latest is An End to Arguing: 101 Valuable Lessons for All Relationships. And there's a link to that book in the show notes. Thank you, Linda, for coming on.

• 46:31Speaker 03

  Thank you, Mike. I've really enjoyed our conversation.

• 46:38Mike Carruthers?

  Have you ever heard the advice that if you're really upset, you should count to 10 before you say something and that will help prevent you from maybe saying something you shouldn't or getting really, really angry? Well, researchers at Ohio State University say that's actually a mistake. Apparently, all counting to 10 does is enhance your focus on how upset you are and it usually backfires. Those who count to 10 are more likely to actually act aggressively once they get up to 10. The researchers say the best way to keep your anger in check in the moment is to try some self distancing. In other words, mentally remove yourself from the situation by trying to watch it

• 47:22Mike Carruthers?

  from the point of view of, say, a fly on the wall. Of the many techniques they tested, that was actually the most effective. And that is something you should know. If you'd like to share your thoughts about this podcast with the world, we invite you to leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or whatever platform you listen to that accept ratings and reviews, and most of them do. I'm Mike Herrothers. Thanks for listening today to Something You Should Know.

• 47:53Speaker 00

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• 48:20Speaker 05

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