What's Wonderful
In this episode, Libby offers ways to create a culture of appreciation within your relationship, and why that is important, but also how it can sometimes be hard.
Transcript
So on this show, I talk a lot about how to tackle difficult things like how to deal with conflict, how to repair, how to have healthy boundaries, et cetera. But today I want to talk about something equally important because while I do think an essential part of a successful relationship polyamorous or not is the capacity to navigate difficult issues and situations together. What's all that for. It's not just to be able to do the hard things and relationships can be these incredible vehicles for growth and deeper understanding and greater capacity for dealing with the hard thing in life. But I think a lot of us are also looking for ease and care, a feeling of safety and acceptance we wanna be seen and admired and appreciated for who we are that last one appreciation. And what it can do for your relationship is what we're gonna talk about today.
Appreciation is one of those things that often gets forgotten about when we talk about working on our relationships, I think that's because of our negativity bias. You know, we tend to look for problems and wanna solve problems, especially when we're trying to create a relationship that can be a safe Haven. That can be more secure for us. We wanna find the things that might get in the way of that and root them out. But in that we often forget, I think to say the things that are wonderful to say the things that are positive to acknowledge the work and be encouraging to the people that we love when they're trying to make things better. Honestly, sometimes the people we love the most and care about the deepest and are the most deeply invested in are often also the ones that are most starved for appreciation.
And because of that, what I wanna invite you into in this episode is to consider crew creating a culture of appreciation in your relationships through intentional practice. Now, what I'm proposing here is completely different from how you might think appreciation tends to happen or how you've experienced it in the past or how it tends to arise for you. Because I think a lot of us tend to expect appreciation to happen spontaneously in the moment, responding to something wonderful our partner did, or a way that they look or just when we happen to feel it. And I'm not saying don't do any spontaneous appreciation, but if that's what you're relying on, there might be some problems with that. First of all, if things are hard within the relationship, really just within ourselves, like if we're having a bad day, we're stressed, we're feeling depressed, anxious, et cetera. We might not be feeling it. And yet the relationship is still there and beautiful and worth appreciating and holding back on appreciating until we feel it that can leave our loved ones, starved for feel appreciated by us. Also, if you grew up in a family where open appreciation of each other was not something you saw a lot or received a lot in the environment you grew up in, you may not actually know how to do it.
This is a thing you have to learn how to do. And so if you don't know-how, and you're relying on inspiration, you might feel that appreciation in your heart, but it might be very hard to get the words out. They might get stuck in your mouth and you might not be able to get them out in a, or might, may not be able to get them out in a way that feels good and affirming to your partner. Also, if you or your partner struggles with receiving appreciation, because again, it's not something that you experienced, maybe it makes you feel awkward and embarrassed to get appreciated, or you feel like you have to, you know, turn it around and give the person appreciation back right away. Instead of just taking it in. That can be challenging for a couple of reasons. I mean, first of all, if you just rely on inspiration again, then you might be inspired to give appreciation to someone in a moment when they are not at all ready to receive it because it's hard for them to receive it, or because they're having a bad moment or a bad day.
And if you express appreciation to them at a moment when they're not ready to receive it, that can also hurt you, make you feel rejected, make you feel bypassed. If our partner does something we like, and that's the only time we appreciate them, that might feel controlling or manipulative, even unintentional. Also, if you only offer words of appreciation when someone is asking for it, because they're feeling low or feeling unappreciated. I mean, again, it's good to do that when someone is asking for support or reassurance or what have you, it's good to do that. But if that's the only time you're giving appreciation, then that is putting the labor on the other person to always ask, which can make them feel like you don't wanna do it or that the appreciation you're giving is not sincere. So this is why I think it can be good to create a deliberate, intentional practice of appreciation.
And what that can look like is a lot like what's hot right now, which is like gratitude practice, right? So if you're not familiar with gratitude practice, what that is is just, even if you're having a bad day, even if you're not feeling it at the end or the beginning of every day, you think of like three to five things that you're grateful for and you write 'em down. An appreciation practice is a lot like a gratitude practice, but it's relational. And here are the benefits of that. As I see it, first of all, it helps you keep up that positive to negative ratio. In the favor of the positive. You may have heard about this positive, negative interaction ratio from the research by the Gottman Institute, they have found that it takes 20 positive interactions to cancel out one negative one. Now in their research, they're talking about positive interactions that can be super small, like just, Hey, Hey, or looking at someone and smiling at them.
These can all count as small bids for attention that are responded to positively by turning towards your partner. But appreciation, I think can sometimes count for more than one of those small positive interactions. If it's well expressed, well timed and all received, it can sometimes just instantly fill someone's bucket. Creating a culture of appreciation. Also has the power to create something that Gottman's called positive sentiment override, which is just basically a fancy term for allowing the positive things that you feel about your person to override some of the negative things. It T forms, how you look at your beloved and respond to things they say, and the ways they interact with you. Since again, we have that built in negativity bias. Sometimes we have some deliberate work to do there. That doesn't mean you ignore the really hurtful or harmful things and like fake yourself out with false positivity.
But I have to be honest, I have ever met anyone who was positive in a healthy way, who hadn't put some deliberate practice into paying attention to those positive things and calling them out next. Giving appreciation also puts you in a good mindset when I acknowledge something wonderful about you. I'm reflecting my own values in that. I'm also reflecting my value as a person in that I am with someone who is wonderful and it can be really good to articulate both your values and your value to yourself. In addition to the person that you love, also looking for ways to appreciate your partner and then articulate them as a practice can make you just feel more calm, more nourished, more optimistic again in the same way that a gratitude practice can be learning how to offer appreciation to your partner and learning how to receive it yourself can also help you understand each other more and grow closer.
I don't know if you had this experience, but I have where I've tried to say something nice to someone I love and it just doesn't hit the right notes and it doesn't go the way that I want it to. And instead of getting all defeated about it, if you can instead shift that to, Hey, we have an intentional practice here of wanting to appreciate each other. And it seems like I did a bad job. How can I do that? Better? That conversation can be an opportunity to understand and grow closer. Finally, creating a culture of appreciation can write the story of your relationship. It can help you answer the question, like, why are we even doing this together? Why am I here with you? Why are you here with me knowing why you're appreciated telling your partner how you appreciate them, can help build that security in your relationships.
And I think this is especially needed in polyamorous relationships. I mean, in monogamy, we may feel some security just in that exclusivity of our role as the sole romantic and sexual partner. But if you're sharing that role with others, it can be especially important to express clearly and regularly, how and why you value each other and what you value about each other and how that justifies the space that you get to take up in this person's life. And, and that they're taking up in yours. I think that really means a lot, especially when sometimes you can't fall back on some role that the person is filling. Now, before I get into how to create a culture of appreciation, I want to first talk a little bit about what Megan, in the way, because as much as I want a culture of appreciation in my own family, it's not always easy to get there.
And again, this is why I think making it intentional is so important. So first of all, I've alluded to this before, but a lot of what we do without thinking in relationships. So the things we do sort of spontaneously on muscle memory are things we've learned because we were taught it through modeling in the environment we grew up in. And so if it wasn't modeled for us in our childhood, then we may not know how to do it. So if you were raised in a family where praise and positive sentiments were few and far between you may struggle, you may feel awkward and clumsy giving appreciation, and you may feel perhaps downright uncomfortable and embarrassed to receive it. And this is totally normal. I think that for people who don't feel that way, they might not understand it. But I want you to know that this is a normal thing that is very common, and it's not something that has to be essential about you.
It's something you can change if you want. You just have to be with that. What feels totally normal to you is 100% learned behavior. And you have to accept also that if you want to unlearn it will mean being uncomfortable. And it will probably feel a little bit like you're forcing something and you're going to just feel like a rank beginner at it. And that can be very hard and vulnerable work. Another thing that can get in the way of creating a culture of appreciation is just a feeling of loath self-worth or even self-loathing. And I think it's important to note here that self-loathing can not only impact your ability to receive appreciation, but also to give it if you're a person who's so preoccupied with how unworthy you are and how much you hate yourself, that can make it difficult to see past your own pain and see, what's wonderful about your partner.
Now, it's been said a lot that you have to love yourself before you can love anyone else. And I think the problem with that statement is it's like a half-truth because if you don't love yourself, then yeah, it can be hard to see past your own nose and love someone else. It can also be really hard to receive love from others, which is part of what makes someone else feel loved by you. I mean, it's such a circular thing, but also it's important to say that being a recipient of love and doing the internal work to eye to receive it can help create that cycle of self-love or as bell hooks put it so much better than I just did, whether or not we learn how to love ourselves. And others will depend on the presence of a loving environment. Self-Love cannot flourish in isolation.
There is another thing that can get in the way of creating a culture sure of appreciation. And this one's a little bit tough it, which is if you grew up or had past relationships where praise was part of a cycle of abuse or control, because it can absolutely be that. And I think that needs to be named, there's absolutely a stage of the cycle of abuse called love bombing, which usually comes right after a round of emotional or physical violence. And if you've been on the receiving end of this cycle in the past, especially in your childhood, but even as an adult, you may regard genuine appreciation from your partner as an attempt to manipulate you and control you, especially if you're trying to free yourself from that cycle. And, and if this is you, it may be it may be important to first assess, am I in a safe relationship where I can safely receive praise and appreciation because it's coming from a place of love, not a place of trying to control me. And then if you are in a relationship that's not abusive, but you're still holding that trauma. And it's hard to receive. It may be important to unpack that past trauma with a qualified professional so that you can work to have a different relationship with appreciation from a partner who loves you, who with whom you're in a healthy relationship.
So whether or not you have any of these other challenges in giving in receiving appreciation, I'll just say this last thing, which is, it can just feel pretty vulnerable to create more appreciation in your relationship if it's been absent. And I think this is especially true. If your relationship has been on the rocks, I think it's important to not just push that vulnerability aside and like muscle through. If you really wanna create more appreciation, I don't think it, you should be demanding it or forcing yourself because I do think that, that vulnerability and discomfort might have something important to tell you. And it's really useful to go slowly and carefully as you try to build a, a culture of appreciation in a Rocky relationship, because there are two times when people can try to use appreciation as a bandaid for the hurt of the past, or to paper over things in the relationship that aren't working or to avoid confronting fundamental incompatibility that need to be addressed using appreciation this way will just totally backfire on you and appreciation.
Generally can't solve these deep underlying problems in your relationship. I mean, it might, but it's really only a piece of the puzzle, but what it will do is make the process of being in relationship and doing the work together more pleasant for both of you, what appreciation does is it tells you why it's worth it to do all of this work, even when things are Rocky. So now what I wanna do is I wanna talk a little bit about how do we do this? How do we create an intentional appreciation practice? The first thing I want you to do is think about this as a skill you can build rather than a thing that you do spontaneously. So this is a thing you can intentionally create. It's a skill. If you don't have it, you can grow it. And it is both an individual skill and a relational skill that you create between the two of you.
It, the first part of developing this practice can be simply spending time with yourself, figuring out what you do appreciate about your partner and becoming really present to that. So you can do this a lot, like you would do regular individual gratitude practice. So either every morning when you wake up or every night before you go to bed, just sit down and write down, or even just think of three things that you appreciate about your partner. Now that's just the first step because that's internal work for the most part. And what I'm saying is that this is a relational skill. And the goal here is to get that appreciation out of your head and to the mind and heart of the person that you love, so that they know how you feel about them. And so with that, I think it's important to say also it should be a mutual project.
It's good to agree with your partner or other loved ones that you want to create this together. And it can make such a diff really if you're both putting energy in it together. And with that part of that collaboration is talking about together. What the landscape of appreciation is for the both of you. You wanna know how both of you can give and receive appreciation. You wanna know what might be in the way and how you can support each other in making that easier. It can help to ask what are the best ways and times to share appreciation, or how do you like to give it, you know, sometimes it can be useful to receive appreciation via emails, text messages, notes, rather than in person, just to give a person a chance to absorb it. It might even be good to think about giving appreciation from a radical consent standpoint.
Like it can, it could be a good idea to ask permission, to acknowledge someone or appreciate someone that you care about before just sort of offering praise or appreciation whenever you wanna make sure that your person is ready to hear it. And it can be really nice to prepare them by just saying, Hey, are you open to hearing some appreciation right now? Or can I appreciate you right now? Or I'd really love to acknowledge you right now. I'm wondering if it's okay. Another thing to think about when you're creating a culture of appreciation is what kinds of things are you appreciating? A lot of times we appreciate what people do. And I wanna say that's important. You know, it's very important to say, thank you for the things people do for you, whether it's thank you for taking out the garbage or thank you for that wonderful, thoughtful gift, or thank you for this wonderful hug or a thank you for that really sexy night last night, whatever it might be.
It can be really good to thank people for their doing. I also think it can be really powerful to regularly appreciate eight people for their being, for who they are. And when I think about that, I also wanna think about both valuing someone for who they are and expressing that you value someone for who they are to you, and also being aware of what you are valuing of them. They value about themselves, and obviously where those things overlap as well, because sometimes people don't wanna be valued or appreciated for things that they don't personally value. Like some people, for instance, don't really value their appearance all that much, and they don't want to be valued for their appearance. So when you think about how should I appreciate someone's being, you might need to take a pause and reflect on who that person is, what they're working on, who they're trying to be, what they put a lot of time and attention into, because that's usually something that they care about that they value and would appreciate being seen that you value an example of this for is, you know, I work very hard at being a good mom.
And so if you wanna knock my socks off and pay the best compliment to me in the world, you can tell me that you think I'm a good mom. And I suspect this is true for a lot of people who are parents is that they would love to be acknowledged and seen for their, the care that they give to their children and the attention that they give to their parenting. So but you know, that might not be everyone and that's certainly not everyone has children, but so it's really useful to check in and see, okay, what does this person put a lot of effort into also though we sometimes don't just wanna be seen for the things that we value about ourselves or that we know for sure we're good at, although that again, that can really make a difference sometimes cuz it's sort of validating.
It can also be nice to be acknowledged for things that maybe we don't see about ourselves. And again, it's worth being careful here because you don't wanna acknowledge someone or appreciate someone for something that like they don't want to be appreciated for. But I think it's really important also to know that we often want to be seen by the people who love us as even better than we see ourselves sometimes. So appreciating things that we don't see about ourselves or that we couldn't have imagined someone else would appreciate can be really helpful. And of course, I think it's also useful to appreciate and acknowledge the things that people that you love do that are easy, that, that are easy for them, but maybe not easy for you because I think it can, it's worth acknowledging that, you know, the, just the way you are, just the way you are, just who you are, just how you are in the world.
Just the way you move through a space is beautiful to me. And it's because it's who you are now, if you are trying to create a culture of appreciation, another thing that might be useful is again, consistency, you know, cuz if we're relying on inspiration, then we may never get there. Especially if this is something that's hard or challenging or new. So a thing that I can I think is a good idea, is to actually pick a regular time or a time of day or a day of the week to make an intentional effort, it, to appreciate the people that you love. And you can even set a reminder on your calendar or on your phone. And this may feel a little contrived, but I just kind of wanna point out that what you're doing is you're creating an intentional practice and there is maybe an element of contrivance here.
But again, it's sort of a, you know, you gotta put the intention in and get the wheel going. And then once it's a consistent practice, then it's kind of like flossing your teeth or anything else. Then you don't have to think about it so much. Also, if you struggle with giving appreciation, you might need to, and I've said this before, you might need to accept that this is gonna take some practice. You might try and things might feel clumsy and awkward. Maybe in the past too, you might have some past pain around this, between you and the people you love. Your partner may have asked you for some words of appreciation and maybe you've totally failed at it and you weren't able to give them what they needed. And all I'm asking is neither of you, neither the person you've been letting down nor you accept defeat here, be willing to put some deliberate effort into thinking about how to do it better, both giving and receiving and soliciting feedback.
There will be misses along the way. That's just part of the deal. So you might miss on the timing you might miss on, on the wording. You might miss on how the other person hears what you have to say. And that's why I think the mutuality of this being a project that you're doing together is so important because then that gives the space for grace. You know, you're seeing the other person trying, you are trying so you can forgive each other and can forgive yourselves and you can learn from it and try again. And so in the spirit of getting very intentional about this practice, I wanna offer you an exercise to help. So this is an exercise from the Gottman Institute and I'm going link a worksheet because there's some writing that will be useful to you for this, for this exercise. But this exercise from the Gottman Institute, it's just called appreciation exercise and on the worksheet there is a list of adjectives and all of these adjectives are being adjectives rather than doing adjectives.
So things like loyal, funny, strong, charming, brave, et cetera. And so you go through the list of adjectives and of course you can add your own, of course, but you go through the list of adjectives and circle like three to five that apply to the someone you love that you want to appreciate. And it helps if you can especially attach some kind of experience you, of them or a memory or some attribute that they have that applies to that adjective. And then, you know, expound on the adjective, write down, you know, your brave because of that time, when you got up the courage to speak up to your boss, when he was being a jerk, you know, that's just like one example, but like, you know, sharing something that you admire about the person and the example, if you can give an example about how you see that they are this adjective.
And again, as you think about which adjectives you want to appreciate your partner for, make sure you're thinking about what your partner values and them, but also stay rooted in yourself because this should also be about what you wanna tell your partner, what you wanna let them know that you really feel this activity can, can be something that you can do together. So you can, you know, do the work separately on the worksheet. And then you can set aside a time to say, let's, let's appreciate each other. And if you do a business meeting, which I really recommend this could be one of the things you do at the beginning of your business meeting before you kind of dive in, you can just spend a moment appreciating each other. I promise that creating an intentional appreciation practice will make such a difference in how you feel about your person and how they feel about you too. Again, it can be an opportunity to understand each other better, strengthen your relationship, feel good about yourselves and each other, and just enjoy the people that you are and how wonderful they are, and really cherish each other. So go forth y'all and do some appreciation today.
