Maggie McKay (Host): When it comes to relationships, especially marriage, who couldn't use a tuneup from time to time? Today, behavioral therapist, Jackie Van Zile, will tell us about the Gottman principles and how couples can benefit from them.

Host: Welcome to Happily Ever After 40, a podcast brought to you by ProMedica, where we discuss midlife health and wellbeing. In this episode, we'll talk about improving your relationship with the Gottman principles. I'm your host, Maggie McKay. Welcome, Jackie. It's so nice to have you here. To start off, can you please introduce us to Drs. John and Julie Gottman? Who are they and why has their work become a gold standard in couples therapy?

Jackie Van Zille: Hi. Thank you. Dr. John Gottman and Dr. Julie Gottman, they're both psychologists, who are also married. They've researched hundreds of couples for over 50 years or so trying to understand relationships as well as relationship success. So, as far as the gold standard, they've put their research into practice. So, they've created what's known as the Gottman Institute, which is an organization that offers direct support to couples through seminars, therapy, both online and in person, which is a wonderful resource to have. And they also help train professionals in providing counseling services based on their research. So, it's not just a gold standard of practice, but it's also a gold standard of research and evidence-based practice, which is extremely powerful and has been proven to be very helpful for all sorts of couples.

Host: And how do these principles apply to all couples? For instance, new versus long-term relationships, heterosexual and same sex.

Jackie Van Zille: It's really interesting because their work, it encompasses relationships, not just marriage. So, these seven principles that we're going to go into today, there's a lot of versatility with these principles that addresses all stages of a relationship, even at the start. So, they found that even single persons can find some benefit from reading their published works, sort of exploring what a healthy relationship is before they kind of get into one. But they find that all couples experience very similar conflicts, very similar concerns and similar ways of trying to repair relationships as well. I think it was in 2017 that there was more research results that proved that their treatment method was effective for LGBTQ plus couples, mostly the gay and lesbian population, which is wonderful. The fact that these can apply to all sorts of couples is really encouraging.

Host: It sounds like they've got every possible couple covered in these principles. So, what are Gottman's seven principles of making marriage work and how can they strengthen relationships?

Jackie Van Zille: I think at this point we'll just kind of give a brief introduction since going into detail would be a lot longer of a process. But yeah, so I'll start with the first. Sharing love maps is number one.

Host: What's a love map?

Jackie Van Zille: So, the love map is basically your understanding of your partner, what is your knowledge of them that might encompass knowing what makes them happy, you know, about their past, what they want for the future, what they like, what they don't like. We kind of want to make sure that our love maps of each other are accurate, that they reflect the person that we're with. So, it can change over time, that's for sure.

Host: What about nurturing fondness and admiration?

Jackie Van Zille: Our second principle in nurturing fauna and admiration, just very vaguely, very briefly, this is about respecting each other as a person, taking time to build your partner up and show your appreciation for one another. We try to start with friendship and look for good things to praise and build up, not necessarily all the bad things, which can happen over time.

Host: Jackie, what about turning toward each other instead of away?

Jackie Van Zille: So, this one is basically about being present in your partner's life. it's kind of showing that what you want matters to me and what you're going through matters to me. It's taking the time to be present, show that you're listening, and it's not necessarily putting a stop to your day and a stop to your goals and putting yourself aside. It's making sure that you're very present and can communicate that you want to be with each other can be a very powerful one.

Host: Kind of making each other a priority instead of just rushing and putting everything first.

Jackie Van Zille: Exactly. Yes. Taking time to choose to be purposely present instead of running by one another like, "How's it going?" "It's good."

Host: Yeah, "It's all good." What about influence, letting your partner influence you? What do they mean by that?

Jackie Van Zille: Allowing your partner to influence you, I want to be kind of clear with this one. It's not that your partner has some sort of control, because that's not what it's about. It's allowing your partner to have an impact on your decisions, a way to communicate about emotions. It's another form of respect that shows that each partner values the others' input and are considering their feelings and opinions. It's very important that disagreements are still allowed. And this one's a bit more about feeling heard as well as allowing the other person to also feel heard. It's that mutual influence. So, like you're still allowed to disagree, but we got to be able to let each other disagree with each other as well,

Host: A lot of times you hear, especially women, say, "I don't need you to solve my problems. I just need you to listen to them." But one of the Gottman seven principles is solving your solvable problems. So, what does that mean?

Jackie Van Zille: I was talking about this the other day with actually a couple of friends and we're talking about what kind of problems are solvable and then those problems that maybe are just too big, which we'll get into. But the solvable problems could just be those little everyday problems of can we address this now and solve these ones, so that it kind of makes the bigger problems less big, a bit more achievable.

Host: So, they don't snowball

Jackie Van Zille: Exactly. That's such a great phrase for it too. So, choosing to solve these can remove a lot of the other stress as well that kind of comes with just a little bit of conflict here and there, or maybe the problem isn't between each other, but the problem is something else that we need to be a team on.

Host: Like an in-law. Just kidding. I have very nice in-laws.

Jackie Van Zille: Oh, that's a whole 'nother podcast.

Host: I'm sure. The Gottmans talk about overcoming gridlock. What is gridlock in a relationship?

Jackie Van Zille: Absolutely. So when neither side can kind of come to like a productive resolution about an ongoing problem. It's almost that-- what's that quote? Agree to disagree, which I think has a lot of value. So, like the key to this one is identifying what this gridlock is, and get into the habit of having like a healthy, genuine conversation about the problem. Because like we said earlier, not every problem can be solvable. I think it also involves a little bit of trust on your partner. Just trust that they're going to be willing to cooperate and compromise when they can, when that opportunity comes about just as much as we are. So, it's a lot of shared communication and compromise when appropriate. And sometimes it's not always an option we figure out a solution by ourselves. Sometimes we need a little bit of help in finding that solution instead of staying stuck and so focused on that problem.

Host: Right. You're kind of like at a standoff. It reminds me of this therapist who once said, "Do you want to be happy or do you want to be right?" And that's the only thing I got out of a year with him. But it did stick and it has come in handy a few times. Sometimes we just have to give in and say, "All right, agree to disagree," like you said. And they also talk about creating shared meaning together.

Jackie Van Zille: I like this one too with, especially with like newer couples. At first, we kind of want to see do your goals, do your beliefs, do your perspectives mesh well together? Have they blended well together? And then, we continue on with small gestures to large gestures to build intimacy and affection for one another. So, I can have an event or family get-together or something where we share that common value of family, our belief systems, they kind of coincide. That's something that we share together. In other ways, it could be like, "I'm going to encourage my partner to follow their passions, to follow their dreams and be right there with them," which I really like. We don't have to be completely meshed. We don't have to have the same goals and dreams, but we can have complementary goals and dreams.

Host: Yeah, and be supportive of each other. Jackie, any recommendations for couples seeking help or guidance just in general? Any other tips?

Jackie Van Zille: Aside from maybe seeking some couples therapy or professional counseling, the book itself that the Gottmans have written are called The seven Principles of Making Marriage Work. And it's more than just about the seven principles, they also talk about relationship repair and a lot of their findings, which is actually very, very interesting. And when I was reading the book a couple years ago, actually, right in the beginning, they had said that their research, even just a research regarding the people who have read the book, it's been proven that the book itself has been very helpful, which I thought was great.

Host: How do they get their data? I mean, do they do surveys of thousands of people or what?

Jackie Van Zille: Yeah, I think that's a mixture. So, one of the really interesting experiments was that they would have couples that they would monitor over a period of time and they would allow for privacy and whatnot. But they would just observe their interactions and observe the way that they moved around each other, how they communicated in times of distress, and they built this huge database of knowledge over years of research, and it's remarkable to see. And when you read about it at first, it sounds a little creepy. But obviously, everything's consensual and the couples know what they're getting into. But to see the differences in how couples handle things together is really remarkable. And sometimes it's nice because you realize you're not alone.

Host: Exactly. And I guess it all has to do with different personalities and your background and the way you were raised and just what you saw in your parents' modeling.

Jackie Van Zille: Exactly. Like I think a lot of us, it's very common to understand that, "Hey, this doesn't work for us. How can we change this because it doesn't work?" And to continue to try to make something that doesn't work work, that's a gridlock right there.

Host: Exactly. Jackie, in closing, is there anything else you'd like to add that we didn't cover?

Jackie Van Zille: One of the other things that they recommend and that we really like is just kind of taking maybe a quick 15-minute stress reducing conversation on a regular basis to decompress and talk about things with each other that are not related to the relationship. They're not associated with the relationship itself. So, like a decompression conversation with each other to kind of increase fond fondness, bonding, touching base with each other and showing your support. It doesn't have to be very long. I think they said 15 minutes is a good timeframe. But I really like that idea.

Host: I don't like those big long relationship or even non-relationship conversations because they go on and on and on and then you just start talking about the same things. I think the 15-minute mark is sort of what they say people's best attention span is.

Jackie Van Zille: Right. Plus lives are so busy, you know?

Host: Exactly. Well, thank you so much for this encouraging information for couples who might be struggling or just want to improve their relationship, Jackie. It's been very informative and helpful.

Jackie Van Zille: Oh good. Thank you for having me.

Maggie McKay (Host): Again, that's Jackie Van Zile. If you'd like to find out more, please visit www.promedica.org. If you found this podcast helpful, please share it on your social channels and check out our entire podcast library for topics of interest to you. Until next time, stay happily ever after 40.