When Good Dates Go Bad: 6 Interventions To Rescue Your Relationship

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Relationship Hell. We’ve all been there; you’re doing the same things with the same person that once made you so happy but now cloud 9 has inexplicably morphed into planet misery. Why does it happen? How can you avoid it and how the heck do you get out of it once you’re in it?

The number one cause of a good date gone bad, is our dangerous tendency to become focused or even obsessed with the imaginary ideal of a relationship that we create in our minds. We can devote so much energy towards this fantasy that it takes on a life of its own.

If we get really carried away, longing for the relationship we would like to be having mutates into resentment about the one we are actually in. We start to project blame on the other person, righteously indignant that they are somehow depriving us of the relationship we “ought” to be having. We fall into the trap of constantly measuring our experience against the standards of this imaginary relationship and making ourselves miserable when it falls short.

We start noticing how much (fill in the blank) we are getting, weighing it up against how things are in the imaginary relationship. Then we start to question whether the person deserves what we’ve been giving- and begin to hold back. The other person reacts to the withdrawal and so the vicious cycle begins- “you’re not meeting my needs, so I’m not going to meet yours”.

Dead-lock. So what can you do?

First of all, when you’re in the thick of things, try to resist the urge to react impulsively, no matter how many buttons are being pushed. Start agreeing to use time outs with each other or at a minimum, slow things down with a couple of deep breaths. Acknowledging – even to yourself- the deeper feelings below the anger – which is usually some kind of fear, can really help to de-escalate.

Next, here is a list of 6 interventions to try in the case of a relationship emergency.

That relationship you think you ought to be having isn’t real. Resist the urge to compare and despair. Ask yourself if you didn’t have an idea that things should be different, how would it change how you feel right now?

How much of the “problem” is to do with either things that happened in the past or your fears about what might happen in the future? See that living, breathing person in front of you? The one that is actually here, right now? Give them some attention. Not just some in fact, give them one hundred percent of your undivided attention. Really look at them – with eye contact!

With yourself and with your beloved. Radical Honesty is the key. Give up the denial and stop trying to manipulate the situation. The truth will set you free – but please remember to tell it kindly.

Tell them that you want to really listen and then shut up and do it. Bite your tongue if necessary. No interrupting. Give them the gift of being willing to hear whatever they want to say without repercussions. No responding, defending or justifying allowed.

All the time. Especially when you are mad. That’s the time to make the extra effort. It’s easy to be loving when it’s easy. The tough get loving when the loving gets tough. Buy flowers when you are furious. Get out the lingerie when you least feel like wearing it. Offer a foot rub when you want to run away. You’ll be amazed at the results.

Instead trying desperately to avoid the pain you think is coming, decide to face it and stay open in spite of it. Stop defending yourself, stop trying to get your point across and most importantly, stop trying to be right.

Each of these interventions can be very powerful by themself. Start to combine them and you have quite an impressive tool-kit to bring to the table. Maybe even more importantly, is that regardless of the outcome, practicing these techniques will help you feel better and feel better about yourself during the process.

Share this list with your beloved. Since what you are doing isn’t working anyway, why not suggest something different? Above all, always remember that the only person actually under your control is you.

Mirabai Galashan MTh. helps people make the most of every day of their lives. She is a hospice chaplain, healer and teacher who works with individuals, couples and groups, offering counseling, coaching and holistic healing. Mirabai has a masters in Spirituality and Health over 20 years' experience as a professional practitioner of complementary therapies. Learn more at www.lifehack.org//mirabaigalashan.com/.

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Dates and GTD – Everything You Need to Know

I have been a GTD fanboy for around 3 and a half years now and with that has come trying all different types of systems over the years. Yet, over that time I have also slowly come to realize that it isn’t about the tools you use, not in the slightest. What GTD is about is understanding the process and actually using your system to get more things done in work and life.

One of the aspects of GTD that I have had the hardest time with is the idea of dates; be it start dates, due dates, milestones, whatever. In GTD, Mr. Allen doesn’t speak of date information related to actions very much other than the brief discussion of giving yourself a hard landscape by ways of your calendar. So, to that end, let’s take a look at the wide-world of dates and GTD, and how they can be used within your system.

Quoting Merlin Mann regarding start dates:

“Start dates are ace. Start dates are a way of punting stuff into the future.”

I couldn’t agree more. Start dates allow you to plan your actions and projects effectively while keeping things that aren’t that important or time sensitive out of your hair for the time being. This allows you to concentrate on the stuff that really matters at the moment without being bogged down by tasks and projects that are in your system but aren’t due for weeks or even months down the road.

Because of the awesomeness of start dates I can no longer go back to a system that doesn’t support start dates as a field for a task or project. The two apps that come to mind that do this well are Toodledo and OmniFocus, but I’m sure there are at least a dozen more. If you have a ton of actions on your lists you should definitely consider using start dates to get them out of the way so you can concentrate on current actions and projects.

Ever have self-talk like this regarding projects?

“Let’s see. I have a report due by the end of the month and have at least 10 actions that go with it. I’m waiting to hear back from John, get the notes from the meeting, summarize the notes, make an outline, etc. So, by next week I should have have the notes summarized and the outline completed. I’ll give that due date of 2/27/11.”

The above is a good example of “fake due dates”; these are arbitrary dates that you set up for actions within a project that are due before the actual due date project. In my experience these types of due dates don’t work. What they tend to do is allow procrastinators procrastinate more, because when they see due dates they push everything back to the last minute.

Here is a much better approach; instead of giving all your project actions fake due dates, make sure that your actions are “highly doable”, meaning that they are something that can be done within 10 to 25 minutes. This will help a project move a long much faster. What you may find is that you get more done than you would have giving all these actions fake due dates.

Real due dates are the actual due date of an action or project. These type of dates are usually put on us by project manager types or are set by yourself as the date that projects or actions are to be completed.

When I receive a due date for a school project or assignment at work I always add it to the action or the project and try very hard to avoid the fake due date syndrome I spoke of above. Sometimes in my project notes I will give myself milestones saying that if by such-and-such date I have a certain number of actions done then I am on track, otherwise I need to clear my back log of tasks to consider myself to be on time. This works well as it doesn’t clog my system with fake due dates, yet still allows me to check my progress on actions and projects related to dates.

The hard landscape that Mr. Allen talks about is the idea of putting things on your calendar that have to be done on that particular day or time (think meetings, actions that can only be done on a single date or time, or reminders for that day or time). This is a sacred place and shouldn’t be cluttered with things that don’t have a hard due date or actions that you’d think you’d like to get done on a certain date.

I will admit though, if I do have a long standing project that has a hard due date, I put in on my calendar as an all day event. Be it “right or wrong” per GTD, I don’t really care. What this has done for me is put things into perspective during my weekly review of actions and projects allowing me to see when large projects or certain actions are due at a glance of the calendar. Other than these hard due dates, the calendar is hands off for anything other than what was mentioned above.

Chris is a developer, writer, tech enthusiast, and husband. He studies MIS and Computer Science at Penn State Behrend. Chris is also interested in personal productivity and creativity and how to utilized technology to get more and better things done. Check out his tech writing at androinica.com where he writes about Android.

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