Screwing Up Love

We all know that human beings love and hate. Even someone we love, we can have hateful feelings toward, like when they squeeze the middle of the tooth paste tube or leave dishes in the sink. The reason it’s important to know that we will love and hate our mates is that each is a potential in every situation. It’s a little like having two guns strapped around our waist. One is the love gun; the other has hate bullets. If our mate has done something that meets our ideals or expectations, we draw the love gun and shoot hearts. If our mate has violated our ideals or expectations, we shoot digs. We dig where it hurts. And, don’t fool yourself, when you dig, you really do want to hurt.

Digs come in assorted shapes, forms, and colors. All are forms of complaint and criticism. To understand how digs form, we have to understand the ideals we set up for our mate. Ideals specific how we want our mate to behave toward us, toward others, life, and career. Think for a few moments about the ideals you establish for your mate. Do you want your mate to have a certain kind of personality, to have a certain way of converting romance into love making, a certain way of listening to you, a certain way of looking?

Think about all the ways you want your mate to be.

Okay, now that you have a sense of your ideal mate, begin to list the ways you dig to hurt when your mate violates an ideal. Do you badger to make your mate look a certain way, like dress in fashion rather than like a slob?

Now, think about the ways your mate digs into you. What does she or he say that feels like criticism? When you’ve been dug into, how does it make you feel? Probably awful. Now, think about the ways you dig into your self. How do your self-criticisms make you feel? Probably awful. So, can you see the point here? Digs undermine our relationships and our happiness, so stop digging and start appreciating.

Jan was a woman I coached for a couple of months because her relationship with her husband Joe was in a serious decline. One day, I asked her how much digging was going on between them. At first, she didn’t understand what I meant by digging, until I explained that a dig was criticism backed by a feeling of hatred. (Wait, you’re saying, I don’t hate my mate! Well, when you dig next time, stop and think about whether hate is lurking around. I’ll bet you’ll see it, maybe not at first glance, but maybe the second.)

After I laid out my definition of a dig, I could see that Jan wasn’t happy.

Bob: “So, Jan, it looks like you’re kind of distressed about digs. What’s up?

Jan: “I just don’t want to go there.”

Bob: “You don’t want to be aware of your digs? That’s like not wanting to be aware of your underwear. It’s one of the basics of screwing up any loving relationship.”

Jan: “Yeah, I can see that, but it seems so negative. Why do I have to dwell on that?”

Bob: “Look, to make relationships work, even make it great, you have to know what people do to screw them up. Digs are one of the big screw ups. See my point?”

Jan: “Okay. I get your point. So what do you want me to say, that I criticize Joe?”

Bob: “Everybody criticizes because everybody has ideals. Behind every criticism there’s an ideal. Since we can’t help having ideals, we can’t help criticizing. How about telling me how you dig into Joe and then how he digs into you?”

For the next half hour, Jan did a careful job of identifying the ways she dug into Joe, how she used “stupid” a lot, like that was a “stupid thing to say” and “that was a stupid thing to do.” Other digs revolved about “why don’t” and “why aren’t you.” These two questions can spawn more digs than you can imagine. By the end of the half hour, she had a long list of digs that she used on a regular basis, like how she carved into Joe to make him much smaller than he actually was. Digs do that. They whittle our mates down until they seem so small in our minds that we begin wondering why we’re staying with them.

During the next half hour, Jan talked about how Joe dug into her, reminding her of all the weaknesses he was sure she had, which arose from the background question, “Why aren’t you more like me?” There were the digs, “Maybe you should go on a diet,” “You’re becoming like your mother,” and, best of all, “sex just doesn’t seem to be your thing.”

At the end of the session, I asked Jan how these mutual digs were affecting their relationship. She said, “We argue a lot.”

Of course they argued a lot. That’s what digs produce. Why? Because when we’re dug into there’s an automatic reaction to fight back. That creates fights. Fights screw up love.

What are the ways you dig into your mate and how does your mate dig into you? With that awareness, think about what you could change, because you’re the only person you have any control over.

Coaching Tips

■ List all the digs you use and the digs used against you.

■ What digs will you stop using?

■ Have your mate read this chapter and then have a conversation about how digs undermine your relationship and what you can do together to change that. When you can reduce your digs (it’s even possible to eliminate them entirely) you’ll both feel better about yourselves and each other, which can only make your relationship better so love can grow.