How to Break Negative Cycle in Relationships?

The state of positivity in a relationship generally becomes the first victim of external pressure that get placed on one or both the partners. External pressures like a conflict with in-laws, financial troubles, professional challenges, parenting issues and others have the tendency to push couples from romantic mode too frequently to pointing each other’s mistakes and later on frequently fighting on each other’s differences. In many cases, this is just the starting point where couples divert their relationship into the path of a negative cycle.

According to Delhi’s Eminent Relationship Expert and Marriage Counsellor Shivani Misri Sadhoo, when couples get inside of the negative cycle, instead of pausing to assess what’s happening in their relationship, couple tend to fall into a reactive debate around who is right and who is wrong. With each passing day in negative relationship cycle, the intensity of non-agreement and arguments increase and each partner starts thinking and accusing each other as wrong and guilty.

So how to break such negative cycle in a relationship? Today Counsellor Shivani Sadhoo shares some important tips to break such vicious negative cycle in relationships

1. Acceptance

In reality, 69% of relationship conflicts are gridlock issues, these issues tend to resurface no matter how long two people have been together. It's natural for each partner to make the fundamental error that itis all our partner’s fault.

To stop this cycle from ruining your relationship, you need to address the bigger issues underlying your difficulty. Take turns discussing with your partner about your subjective reality about the issue. When your partner is talking, your job is to listen, be non-judgmental and try to make sense about your partner's subjective reality. When it’s your turn to talk, try doing the same thing. By treading more gently into touchy areas, you should at least be able to agree to disagree or make some small concessions or compromises for one another.

2. Break the pattern

Troubled relationships tend to follow a demand-withdraw pattern. This means that one person turns more critical and demanding, while the other withdraws or shuts down in response to conflict. According to many psychological and medical studies, withdrawal and shutdown in a relationship are one of the major factors of cardiovascular systems failure in middle age. This happens because the partner that shutdown generally suffers from immense suppressed stress and emotional pressure that never finds a path to get and expression or release.

Hence couples must attempt to break the negative pattern of conflict in their relationship by using their intelligence and thoughtfulness instead of acting loosely with anger. So, how one can use intelligence over their free-flowing anger? First, remember anger is your personal pet devil and you are responsible to let it act upon, in reality, it’s not the world that makes you angry rather it is you who lets yourself be angry.

Hence next time things get heated between you and your partner, let your partner know what’s going on with you by saying: “I can see this issue is important to you. But I’m feeling too angry to discuss it right now, though, so let’s come back to it once we’ve cooled off.”

3. Sharing Power

A lot of people suffer from the inability to share power with others, they hold power to themselves. Though holding power can work well in certain phases of career but in a marital scenario, it acts as a time bomb. According to research, when a man is not willing to share power with his relationship partner, there are 81% chance that his relationship will self-destruct. The reason why hoarding power backfires in a relationship is that the partner from whom the power is hoarded, ends up feeling like his/her opinions aren’t valuable and it doesn’t matter to their partner. Hence to help save your relationship, develop a more accepting attitude towards compromise. Practice by giving in on issues you don’t feel extremely invested in.