The initial flirtation of love turns over time to flirting with disaster if you don’t become adept at dodging the dangers of…
- Silence
- Too much information
Here’s how:
- Silence is golden many times and in many places, but too much silence keeps problems from being aired. Some ways you can recognize too much silence on your part is a pattern of letting your partner have their way, when you do complain not really getting your way anyway, and tending to look down on your partner for their childish lack of sensitivity to others. In this case, do some wondering and writing about what is underneath the complaints you have. Especially wonder what your pain is, because pain is the source of all stress—both growth-producing stress and health-damaging stress. Make a commitment to stepping out of your comfort zone in order to express yourself more fully, using more words and different words, and going at it more often. Work at speaking up, coming from feeling.
- It’s a gift to be able to explain your thoughts, express your feelings and defend your actions, but too much articulation by one drowns the other. You can recognize being a source of too much information if your partner complains that they can’t get a word in edgewise, or that you always get your way, and by a feeling on your part that your partner just isn’t forthcoming with their feelings. Where this is true for you, check in often with your partner as to the impact of what you are saying and doing. Wonder more deeply yourself how you are sensing your partner, not just on the surface, not just now, but more deeply and over the long haul. Work at silence by not responding as quickly or elaborately or wordily as you are used to doing, and by putting your emphasis on listening.
Dr. Sharon's Surf Your Soul Weblog 
Very interesting. I like the part at “wonder more deeply yourself how you are sensing your partner […] more deeply and over the long haul.”