What’s Happening in Me?

Are you really good at noticing and knowing what everyone else needs?

You notice when your spouse is stressed. You remember what your kids need. You keep track of responsibilities, deadlines, problems that need solving, and the things that somehow go unnoticed by others.

But how good are you at noticing what is happening inside of you?

This week on Marriage IQ, we talked with psychologist and self-trust researcher Dr. Brittany McGeehan. One of the things she said that really stuck with me was that we need to develop a relationship with ourselves—not just with the people around us.

I think sometimes we confuse self-trust with being selfish. But they aren't the same thing.

Knowing yourself means being able to notice: I'm getting really irritated right now. My body feels tense. I'm feeling unimportant. I'm overwhelmed. I'm trying to control this. Something about this is hitting me harder than it probably should.

And then, instead of immediately deciding our spouse is the problem, we get curious.

What is happening in me?

That little bit of space can change a marriage.

When we don't understand what is happening inside of us, it's really easy to make our spouse responsible for fixing it. We criticize. We control. We withdraw. We overfunction. Or we assign meaning to something our spouse did that may not actually be true.

This is one reason Identity is one of our Four Cornerstones of an intelligent marriage.

The better I know myself, the better I can recognize what is mine to work through—and what we need to work through together.

And strangely enough, becoming more connected to ourselves doesn't make us more selfish. It can make us more capable of deeply connecting with someone else.

Weekly Marriage Tip:

The next time something your spouse does really gets under your skin, don't begin with them.

Pause and ask yourself three questions:

What am I feeling?
What is happening in my body?
What do I need my spouse to understand about what's happening inside of me?

Then talk about that instead of starting with what your spouse did wrong.

Sometimes one of the best things we can do for our marriage is learn to listen to ourselves first.