Do you listen to understand or do you jump in to defend yourself?
A good defense helps you out if you’re playing football, but it doesn’t help you win in your relationships.
Defensiveness destroys good feelings between each other.
Sandy was telling her husband that a critical comment he made about her in front of their friends really hurt her. Her tears showed that it was really painful.
Jack’s immediate response was:
“What about the time you……….So, how dare you get on your high horse when you do the exact same thing.”
Sandy defensively responded, “I would never say that, I’m not a person who would ever talk that way about someone I cared about.”
Jack continued to defend his behavior, “If you were hurt by that, then you’re just being too sensitive. You’re probably so hurt because you know it’s true. It’s really your problem, not mine.”
Sandy, continued to defend her position. “Anyone in my position tonight would have felt the way I did. No one likes to have their spouse talk that way about them. I’m not being oversensitive—you are being insensitive.”
Jack didn’t hear anything she said and he couldn’t hear any of it. He was too busy defending his words and his behavior.
Jack sent the message to Sandy that she was completely wrong in how she was feeling and that he hadn’t done anything wrong.
Jack’s response mocked and devalued her pain.
Now Sandy’s pain was intensified because she felt misunderstood, confused and unloved.
Nothing was resolved, and they both felt more distant from each other.
How could this have been handled differently?
Sandy could have stated, “You need to bring up those issues in the moment they happen so we can deal with it, and not as a way to defend yourself months later. We’re dealing with what I brought up right now.
How could Jack have responded in a way that would have brought them closer instead of the “You do it too” argument which intensifies the pain.
At no point did Jack try to understand her feelings. He immediately jumped into defensive mode.
He could have validated her feelings. I can see that really hurt you. I will try to be more respectful and thoughtful of you in the future.
Like Jack, we often feel like we have to protect our egos. We can’t just acknowledge, “I can see that you’re really hurt by the way I was.” We feel the need to defend ourselves.
Defensiveness leads to Distance, Disconnection and Lonliness
Defensive can destroy relationships.
Listening to truly understand and then validating the way someone feels leads to higher levels of closeness and connection.
So often, when we learn that someone we love is hurting, our immediate response is to defend ourselves, rather than understand their hurt.
We set out to prove that the other is wrong for feeling the way they feel, even though it is the way they feel.
We’re not comfortable with feelings of pain, so we try to convince them that they are wrong for feeling that way.
The truth is that when we validate how the other person feels and truly try to learn from it, it leads to healing and closeness.
When someone tells us that we caused them pain, we often get angry at them. We hurt them even more when we try to defend our behavior instead of listening and understanding their pain.
The next time the opportunity to know another’s experience presents itself, try out what it feels like to listen— without defending what you have or have not done.
Connection does not come when you try to prove to them that they are wrong. It does not come from trying to make yourself look like a good person who is in the right.
When you get defensive, it erodes the feelings of love and connection.
We are conditioned to believe that strength means coming out on top and winning the fight. But in fact, real strength means having the courage to put our egos down and to risk being open and undefended.
