 So, Mira, thank you for joining us today, but we'll just go ahead and get right to it. Mira, why do couples fight? They fight because they want to get their needs met. Why even have a relationship? It's to get your important needs met. So, you're going to do whatever you can to get what you want. Unfortunately, we learned as kids to use power moves. In the supermarket, we see some cereal we want, we have a tandoor, and it worked! And so we yell, and we do that now. And we do it because we think it's going to be easy. It's going to work. The other person will just smack themselves in the head and say, oh, what a stupid idiot I've been. Of course you're right, but if you want to mess, keep making power moves, because all it leads to is underground warfare or fights. So, what kind of person do you want to be? What kind of life do you want to have? Mira, you know, in reading about the power moves, one of the things that I realized was what were my parents' power moves when they fought? And then, of course, I had to also accept that I had taken on some of those power moves as I had grown up and became an adult, only to realize in reading that how they were shutting down communication rather than opening it up. That's a really good point. Look, what happens is that we don't know what to do. I didn't know. It took me years. I've been doing this work for over 40 years. I've been struggling with this problem since I was a beginning therapist. So, I had to use this in my own marriage, and we just don't know. We have bad habits based on what we learned. That's what you saw as a kid, what your parents did. And you also saw movies and you read books, and maybe you were lucky and you had friends, parents, relationship that you could observe. But mostly, you were formed by these people who use these tactics, and they were very limited, but you didn't know what else to do. Fortunately, why couples fight will give you everything you need, so you don't get stuck in these messy, messy or distant relationships where you can't get your needs met. And I know many in our audience hearing power moves think they understand, oh, it's a power struggle, but there's a quote in your book that really struck me. It's not that anyone wants power, it's just that no one wants to feel disempowered. But from the outside and from the inside as well, it looks and feels like a struggle for power. Can you explain what you mean by that and how disempowerment comes into play? Disempowerment comes into play whenever someone says or does something that to a person feels like pressure, like they're not going to get their needs met. Shit, I can't get what I want here. I'm going to have to fight and it's going to be hell, and I'm never going to get what I want. That feeling of being squeezed, of being paralyzed disempowers you. And that disempowerment in turn leads to resentment and feeling negative feelings about your partner that you're romantically involved with. Well, it leads to your insisting on re-empowering yourself however you can because you're humiliated, you're made to feel like you're nothing. Now, be careful because the other person does not intend this. It's not about the other person's intentions. It's about what you experience, what you feel. Remember, all of this is just people's feelings. They're reacting to things. They could be wrong. The other person never meant that. But it's still how it hits them. They feel disempowered. They re-empower themselves. They yell. They say something disgusting that hurts the other person's feelings. And then the same thing happens for the other person. And it's on and on until you just are sick of the whole thing. And for some people they make distance and they don't talk about that. They give up and for other people they keep fighting. But either way, you're not getting your important needs met and it's bankrupt. It's interesting that you bring up distance. I know for myself, that's what I do when I feel disempowered as I retreat and I get quiet and I don't want to yell. I don't want to scream. And part of that was witnessing that in my own household and my dad's reaction to being disempowered and him retreating. How does distance come into play to hurt the other person? And how can, if that is our first reflex in these moments of disempowerment, can we work to overcome that? First, trust the other person. If the person says, wow, please do a do over. Can you say that differently? That's not working for me. No argument. Shut up. Stop. At that point you say, okay, take two and you do it differently. It doesn't matter. You ask a question, but you don't go into reaction mode unless you want to mess. I mean, some people really do like to get intensely angry and they're looking for a fight. There are, and I've had couples like that, they just want to fight. I remember this old couple, I had their therapist brought them in for a consultation because she couldn't cope with them. And all they wanted to do was fight with each other. It was the highlight of their day. And the therapist said to me, please, Mira, help me. I don't know what to do with these people. And I said, leave them alone. They've been doing this for 50 years. This is their fun. But they're not wanting to have a relationship where they can work things out and get their needs met. This is their major need. But that's so unusual. Yeah, I would assume not many people look to fight to showcase their love and affection for one another. Well, I would also imagine if that is something that you haven't grown up with and you find yourself in a relationship where the other person likes to work through discussions in that manner, it could be quite unsettling. And if you're not used to it, I could see it easily spilling over into something that is a bit more than just couples arguing with each other or yelling at each other. You're right. That's how abuse and violence happen. You're absolutely right. Now, when we think about fights, we often think about the issue was something in the moment. But you write in the book that it's actually much deeper than that. And it relates to the hunger for eight core experiences of love. And I found that really fascinating. I'd love to unpack that for our audience so we can understand what those eight core experiences are. Shall we go through them one at a time? Yeah. These are the experiences after talking to thousands of couples both in my clinical work at my clinical research. This is what people said they want from love. In the world of relationships, we know that the answer to the age old question, if a tree falls in the woods and there's no one around, does it make a sound? The answer is no. Not if the tree is like us. People need to feel seen and heard and to feel we exist and to feel we're loved. Most of us are starving for attention from someone who we really care about and who cares about us. If we're starving for that while we're in a relationship, then we know there's something really wrong. So that's what's going on when we're having these fights, that starving, that hunger for attention. We don't know how to get it. And like a little kid who doesn't know how they get attention, at least someone is paying attention that way. Yeah. I know for myself and my relationship when I get caught up in social media or caught up in work and I'm fully distracted and find myself in an argument about the smallest things, it's realizing that I just haven't given Amy my full attention. And it's just such a core important value for us to feel loved. Yeah. What I say is a rule of thumb. Most people spend more time walking the dog or watering plants than they do on their relationship. So if you want to have a healthy relationship, make sure that every day you spend at least 15 minutes giving each other your full attention. And it's probably not best to do it when you come home from work or when you've been working, give to yourself first. And when you're in a better frame of mind, then make sure that you give each other attention. And it can be anything. It can be a smile. It can be a neck rub. It can be just asking, how is your day? Whatever the other person feels would give them the sense that you're paying attention. Do that. Ask each other what would make you feel that I'm giving you my full focus and then do it. Now, I'm sure you've noticed in your career as devices have crept in and technology has fought for our attention. That's actually really difficult for us as couples to give undivided attention to one another. As we're looking for email and notifications, even on the Apple watch that I'm wearing, I'm getting dings that distract me and keep me from that attention that Amy deserves. Tough nookies. You want a good relationship or do you want to do those other things? It's your choice. I'm just here telling you the truth about how things work. You're free to do whatever you want. But if you want a relationship where you can get your important needs met that will last you for a very, that's why I wrote the book. I wanted to have an answer to the question that I promised myself I would spend my life finding out. That's how I started the book. Did you read at the beginning of the book my promise to myself? I'd like to read that for your audience if that's. Please do. Okay. I've just finished writing the last chapter and now finally I feel at peace. At last, I've kept a promise I made to myself when I was 10 years old and that I made again and again over the years. A promise I made with tears to find an answer to the question is lasting love possible? And if so, how in the world can we make it happen? I've given my entire life to this question and you hold the answer in your hands. The book, Why Couples Fight. So please think 15 minutes. How much does that take away from all the other things you want to do? And how much will it add to love? I just wrote a blog today. I posted it about the billionaires I've worked with and they all wanted a really good relationship but they couldn't get it. All the money in the world, I call it the one thing money can't buy. And it really can't but 15 minutes a day developing that habit will lead to that. It's not much to sacrifice for love. Well, you don't even think of it as a sacrifice. Think of it as fun. Fun is the glue of love. If you're not having fun together, why are you together? Absolutely. Now the second core experience of love is affection. Love without affection is like a sun without warmth or food without flavor. And food without flavor would make you wonder if it really was any kind of food at all. Affection, kisses, touches, affectionate words, hugs, sex, any token of love is the tight hull that keeps the ship of love afloat. Laugh of affection, that's what we get from strangers. That's one of the things you want from being with someone. Absolutely. Okay, support. When you can't cope, I pick up the slack. When the wind has been knocked out of your sails, I breathe new life into you. When you're not okay, I find out what you need and then I do that. And you do that for me. And it's not even so much the doing of all this as the being able to count on the other to do this that makes all the difference. It's like walking along knowing their solid ground under your feet. When we have this, we take it for granted. When we don't, we're starving for it. And that's what so many people don't have that sense of support from their significant person. And it's heartbreaking. I know for myself, I've often relied on actions to showcase support, but it may not often be what Amy is looking for or needs as her support. And I've begun asking, how can I best support you in this moment? A lot of times I thought offering solutions to problems was the easiest way for me to support her when in actuality, just being there to listen, to listen to the emotional venting and be there in that space fully present and giving that attention was the best form of support. And in asking that question of Amy, I got some pretty surprising answers. I think many of us make the mistake that we assume we're supporting by taking action that we would like to see to support us. But that may not often be what our partner really wants in terms of support. Absolutely. What you have to do is really listen down to your toes. And most importantly, make sure that the other person sees you seeing her hears you hearing her and lets you know that you've completely understood. How do you do that? You ask. You ask questions. And then you say, have I understood? And she'll let you know if you have left out anything important. But that's not enough. We've known that forever. What I did in Y-Couples fight was I made sure that people had a solution to the problems that come up. So that support isn't just words. It's you come up with a plan. You discuss the options. Then you take it for a spin. You see how it would work out in real life. You make it all concrete and no bullshit. You want a plan that people can live with and know that this is going to work. So much is crap, where you're just being told things that you can never do. It has to be real coming from listening to the person and doing the correct one, two, three method that I offer in this book. Yeah, we'll talk about that in a bit as we get through these core experiences because they were so powerful. That's why I've written this book is because I wanted a world from the time it was a little kid. I was one of those kids who always said, that's not fair. And I just kept my eye on what was fair and wasn't. And all I saw was a world that wasn't fair. So fairness is absolutely one of the core experiences of love. Validation. People don't just fight over needs. It's also about our views of what's real. I said I was sorry. No, you didn't. But you heard me. I barely heard you, but you didn't mean it. But I did mean it. You don't mean it. You're not really, really sorry. You can't tell me how I feel. I can tell you you're not sorry because if you were really sorry, then dot, dot, dot. The exquisite emotional pain of having your truth denied is unmistakable. And people do this to each other all the time. And I'm not even talking about being lied to. I'm just talking about someone very close to you having a very different memory or perception. And it's in moments like this where you realize that there is so much comfort in seeing things in similar ways and in having your perceptions and memories validated. And that's what you're looking for with someone you spend years with. You have these memories and you want to know that they were real, that it wasn't just words. Emotions are real to us. And when we invalidate someone's emotions or discount them, we're really causing them great pain if you're feeling those emotions. Well, they're feeling like they don't exist. Like you're saying they're nothing. They don't matter. Yeah. Okay. Respect is another core experience of love. In a relationship, respect has a very special meaning. There are things about you that you take pride in and things you feel sensitive about. Respect is what you feel when your partner actually tells you that they value what you're proud of and do not disrespect the things about you that you feel sensitive about. So if I put a lot of effort into working out whatever the results or losing weight or whatever it is, I'll feel good if my partner notices and values how hard I've worked at it. And if I still have a fat ass in spite of all of that and feel badly about this, my partner will respect those feelings by never making me feel even worse. That's respect, seeing the person and showing them that you love them in spite of what they're feeling badly about and you would never use it to hurt them. Very powerful. Feeling cherished is another experience of love. We all want someone to think we're wonderful beyond our ability to really justify that. We want the person who says they love us to think we're wonderful and to cherish us just for being who we are. That's beautiful. And the last of the eight core experiences of love is passion. When it passions like a flower, something that no matter how glorious it is will inevitably wither up and die. Some people think that. Some people think it's like sunsets. Some sunsets are glorious and beautiful and some are just ordinary. But ultimately, there's no end of glorious sunsets. The truth is that passion over time is like both. People always ask me that does passion disappear? And no, of course it fades a bit with time and age. Of course it varies according to people's personalities. That's all true. But there is a core experience of love, a sense that in some consistent, meaningful way you and your partner are hot for each other. And that like beautiful sunsets that can keep going on until the day you die. I think that's so important to realize that if you take the view that it just withers and dies, you're not even paying attention or looking for those sparks of passion. And though they may wax and wane, they can be sparked in many different ways. Maybe not how they were sparked originally when you met, but they're always present in love. Exactly. If you can delight in the other person, the things about them that you found wonderful and stay connected to that, that's like a river that runs through the relationship from the beginning to the end. It's certainly nothing to be discounted. Now, we had Annie Duke on our show and she explained that we're not really good at describing our real intentions, and it's often creating a lot of miscommunication. And she advocated bringing a level of quantification into our conversations to help us better understand each other. And I really resonated with your passion by numbers exercise to help us understand each other better, because oftentimes we use words that we ascribe immense meaning to, but may fall flat on the person we're communicating with. How can we use quantification to help us solve arguments in our relationship? We all know what numbers mean on a scale from one to 10 or zero to 10. We know that 10 is better, you know. Even a little kid knows two cookies are better than one cookie. But we don't know what words mean when people say, I like it, but I'm not sure how much. But if they say a five out of 10, you know that it's 50-50. That's very clear. The clearer people are, the easier it is to get their needs met. So it becomes critical to bring in as much clarity as you can, especially when you're wanting to use the one, two, three method. I think that's a great segue into the one, two, three method. I know that I've attempted to use it in solving a recent argument, and I'm excited to unpack it for our audience because I certainly feel it helped me immensely. Well, to show you the three-step process for resolving conflict in the one-minute version, one, step one is before you begin to discuss solutions, make sure each of you understands what the other thinks and feels about the issue you're facing. Take all the time you need. Sometimes it takes a minute. Sometimes it takes hours. But you have to make sure that you have completed that step. Step two, come up with plenty of options. Be sure you've put as many options as you can on the table. The more options there are, the more likely you'll get an option that you both can agree on. And the third step is before you arrive at a final agreement, take different options and explore exactly how they would play out. Ask questions. What are their pros and cons? How would it look in your current life? Make sure that that test run is as thorough as it can be. What will happen as you're going through this, the best option will just come up. It's there because you've taken the time to pay attention to your real needs. And you've done it in a thoughtful, loving way. When it comes to step one, I often feel like I want to rush through that and get to the solutions. I'm very solution-oriented. I would rather smooth out conflict or arguments and solve it quickly. How can I learn to slow down and what are some good questions that I could ask my partner Amy to better understand her in step one instead of rushing to step two? Well, first of all, if you think that step one will work, if you don't take the time, you're misleading yourself. You're living in a fantasy because if you haven't unpacked it, you've really understood the way you understand things that you need. If you can't get to that level, then you're just, when you make an agreement, it's built on sand. Why will you follow through? So first thing you have to know is tough nuggies again. You don't have a choice. You have to make sure that you thoroughly understand. The way to do that is to say what you understand and then say, have I left anything out? What's missing? Tell me more. How can I put myself in your place and see walking your shoes and understand what it is from your point of view? Is there anything that this isn't for you? It's not just what it is, but also what's missing here. What you can do, AJ, is you can ask Amy to write down the three most important needs that she has with respect to this issue. I find that people are much more coherent and they bring a complexity to things when they're writing that they often don't have. I know I do compare to speaking, so that will give her a chance to really be comprehensive. It doesn't have to take time and then you can read it and you can go over it and tell her what you understand and that way you're getting much faster to step two. Yeah, I could definitely see that working and I'm much the same. Writing allows me to think through it to be really thoughtful before writing it instead of just rushing to again move on and move through the argument. As someone who tends to avoid conflict even though I know how to manage it and the science behind it, I still default to that as a bad habit. I could see writing it and asking for it and writing back could be really helpful to manage that miscommunication. Glad I could help. In step three, how important is it that an equal number of solutions are given? Is there a balance that needs to be met there? Again, talking about power imbalances, I could see one side being really willing and forthright and giving solutions to the problem and maybe because of that power imbalance or disempowerment, the other party feeling uninterested or unable to give their real solutions. If someone isn't giving options, what's often the case is they're not feeling safe enough to speak their truth and you have to talk about that obstacle. You have to say, what can I do to make you feel that it's worthwhile to take a risk and say what you want? How can I help? What do you need? The two all-purpose magic questions are, how can I help? What do you need? Those are very powerful questions especially if you're fully present and willing to respect the answers that you receive. I think the last question that I have for you and it's something that Amy and I are now sitting with is money and how to handle the inequalities that are found in almost every relationship around money. I know Amy and I up until this point in our relationship were engaged but not yet married. We've had to postpone now twice due to COVID and we've kept separate accounts and our finances have allowed us a level of independence from our family and are very important to us. What do you recommend a couple do around money and its inequalities to manage any potential arguments, disagreements or power imbalances? Step one is no power moves. Whatever you do, make sure that you are listening down to your toes and you're really there for the other person's point of view. Ask questions, a million questions. How would that look? As for what you do, I always recommend that people keep their money separate. They have three accounts. They have each their own and then they have a shared account if they can possibly afford it. But there are so many problems that people have with money and all of these, the eight core experiences of love, the power moves, the money is the place, money and sex and kids is the place where it happens. So wherever you can, see if you can set up structural changes and the structures will work for you. So some people who have incomes that are pretty close, one of them will pay all the bills and they save the other person's salary. Whatever the two of you think is fair, I can't tell you what to do, but you have to have a thorough discussion of it and if one of you makes a power move and you know it's a power move because the other person says, I feel that's a power move. The meaning of the communication is the response it elicits and then you say, okay, I'll say it differently. You do take two until you unpack it. Think of it, I have two images that I find are really helpful for people. If you go into a dark room, you're likely to trip over things. So when you walk into a room, first thing you have to do is turn on the lights. Turn on the light so you don't trip. Turning on the light is asking all these questions. Turning on the light is not making any assumptions. Turning on the light is finding out what is going to really do it for the other person and working very hard to make that happen. Taking into account what you need. You both, the only way it's going to work is if you're both getting your important needs met. That's why you can't just negotiate. Negotiation works when people are never going to see each other again, but the two of you are going to have to make love. So it has to be something that both of you feel great about, not only the end result but the whole process you went through. So meta-communicate at the beginning and find out how should we do this. I know the book has an exhaustive list of power moves and a lot of them were very eye-opening for me and I encourage everyone listening to get the book. Can you give some examples of some power moves around money that would allow us to recognize this and obviously communicate better around money in particular? A power, one power move would be not acknowledging the fact that there are imbalances of income or wealth and that has an actual effect on the power in the relation dynamics. Say let me do it wrong first because that's what you asked for, right? A power move. Well I give you all the money you want that it sounds like a fact or you have all the money you want or you need. It's a power move because maybe the other person doesn't feel that way. It's not right or wrong if the person feels that their need isn't being met. That's a power move and you can't invalidate some one's feelings. Feelings aren't right or wrong. They just are. It's like someone says I like chocolate ice cream. You don't say you should like vanilla. You accept. This is how they feel. This is their taste, their preference. That's what feelings are like and so any power or anything you say or do that makes the other person feel they can't say what they need, whatever your intentions. So someone says I want to move to a bigger place. It's a power move if you just saying I want to move isn't a power move but saying we can't move. It's unreasonable to even talk about it. That's clearly a power move, right? Yeah. Mayor, in reading your book, it appeared to me that a important piece of love is missing out of modern day romance or the way that we're looking at relationships in this modern era where couples love to make memories but one of the things that allows love to flourish is a discovery between each other and learning about each other and I think that is lost. Is there anything that you could speak to to help reframe the idea of relationships and getting to learn about each other to allow love to blossom? Well, you have to stop the power moves and you have to use the one two three method. Now we know that that can make pretty much if you... many relationships work. Look, there are four kinds of relationships. There are the relationships where there's a lot of good stuff and some bad stuff but these people are willing because there's so much good stuff work things out and that's you know that's what we're hoping for. There are those relationships where there's not much good stuff and a lot of bad stuff and people stay in them because of transaction costs of getting out the psychological and financial changes difficulties that would happen people like their lifestyle and they have a wonderful solution which is distance you're not making love as often there are problems with sex and you can't talk about it just don't make love as often. You don't you can't talk without having a fight well you just don't talk. Distance is the perfect can solve any problem until the ultimate distance which is divorce. Yeah I think many of us and certainly in our audience have realized that the modern fairy tales that we've been taught growing up around finding that perfect person and that a perfect relationship exists with no adversity and no conflict and no argument has led us to break things easily to not commit to relationships and be unwilling to put in the work necessary and in the book you talk about it much like you would maintain anything in your life like a car. Relationships need you to be constantly checking in with the other person listening fully deepening your understanding of the other person as you're both growing in that relationship they're not static absolutely if you don't keep it alive it'll die you don't have any choice you either put in the work you learn new skills you find things that you both care about together that bring you closer you make a life together that satisfies both of your needs but up until now people haven't known how to do that because when there's conflict we run a lot of us are conflict folks and it sounds like you are AJ so I'm glad you you know what I'm reading you know what I'm mirror that's it I didn't know this stuff I had to learn it and it's something that I'm conscious of and working on and I'm thankful that I have a partner who's patient with me and understanding of those patterns in my own life as I try to learn more about the patterns in her life you brought up obviously money and sex and the third one being children as I'm looking to start a family with Amy I would love any insights around getting prepared to raise children and at least being on the same page I know that parenting especially trying to figure that out after you've given birth and had the child is very difficult so what are your recommendations for those in the audience who are looking to start a family and want to have a fantastic experience in raising their children and being understanding in an agreement with one another talk to each other about it ask a lot of questions start out with your visions of what family life would actually be like on a day-to-day basis what are your hopes and dreams for it if your vision visions of that family life are not aligned then you're going to have real problems remember family life and love being a couple are very different things some people can have great family relationships with each other but they can't make it as a love couple and vice versa so you have to you have to think of them as completely separate relationships basically and figure out what it is that you each want and if the two of you can find use the one two three method can you come up with a plan so that you are all in alignment when the kids actually come because once they come everything changes excellent advice and we thank you so much for joining us we love asking every guest one last question what do you believe your x factor is what is it that sets you apart and has created such great success for you in your career it could be a skill set or a mindset that has allowed you to master relationships well it's not that I'm so smart because I'm not I I'm just someone who wrapped on and wanted to know my curiosity from the time I was a kid I remember I used to um study the salamanders I'd hunt for them in this summer and I study them and I I I just wanted to know everything there was to know about it so that that sense of wonder at how amazing things were and refusing bullshit refusing to accept anything that wasn't evidence-based and wasn't real that I could trust the true truth and I would you know I've worked on this power book since I was a kid I've wanted to I saw I was a refugee kid and we were very poor and I saw disempowerment everywhere I was a girl I mean all I saw was disempowerment and I wanted to understand how it worked and what could be done and people don't have to be victims of it they don't have to suffer we can change it so maybe that's what it is that hard work that I'm willing to do and I do with my whole heart anyone who knows me knows that we can definitely tell that and thank you so much for your steadfast pursuit of the truth when it comes to managing and creating happy and healthy relationships the book is fantastic and we're excited for our audience to check it out and we appreciate you for stopping by thank you so much thank you my pleasure