The relationship cure
By: Yu Siong Ho
Tags: Couples, Emotions, Relationships, Marriage, Love

People don’t form close relationships by simply “opening up” to each other.

Bids are the most fundamental units of emotional communication.

A bid is any attempt to establish an emotional connection with someone through verbal or nonverbal communication. It can be a question, like “Hey, did you see the game last night?” An exclamation, like “Wow, look at that sunset!” A gesture, such as offering someone a chair, or even just a facial expression, like a simple smile.

And as you’ll see, these bids and bid-responses can make or break your relationships.

Bids usually contain hidden messages.

Imagine a romantic couple, Mary and Jeff, sitting on a sofa in their living room. Mary leans over to Jeff and says, “It’s a bit chilly in here, don’t you think?” This is her bid.

See, it’s not that Mary just wants to tell Jeff that she’s cold, or find out if he agrees with her assessment of the temperature. Mary has an unstated objective: she’s hoping that Jeff will give her a cuddle. In other words, she’s bidding him to move closer to her, both literally and figuratively.

On the other hand, if he responds by tossing her a blanket, well, she’s still not getting what she really wants. But at least she’s getting something positive in return, and it’s a heck of a lot better than outright rejection.

Mary is also giving Jeff a way to smoothly decline her bid. Even if he knows she probably wants a cuddle, he doesn’t have to go through the awkwardness of saying no if he’d rather keep to himself. He can choose to interpret Mary’s statement literally and respond accordingly.

In other words, the vagueness of our bids is a feature, not a bug, and it often serves us well. Unfortunately, it can also lead to some problems.

The hidden messages of bids can be hard to interpret, so respond to them carefully.

To one degree or another, all of us have feelings and desires that we don’t know how to express — at least not constructively. And if we don’t understand our own emotions, it stands to reason that we’d have a hard time communicating them to other people.

When a child throws a temper tantrum because her father refuses to buy her a toy, you might think the tantrum is an expression of anger at not getting what she wants, but it could also be a bid for her father’s comfort.

Imagine you’re the father or wife in these examples. Instead of defensively explaining why you won’t buy the toy, give the child a hug and acknowledge her unmet need for comfort.

To understand people’s bids, it helps to know where they’re coming from.

When Rick was a child, his mother left him, and so he was raised by his grandmother. She resented having to look after him and constantly told him he was worthless. As a result, he developed a fragile sense of self-esteem — which came to plague his relationship with Sarah.

Every time she made a complaint about his behavior, it was as if Rick heard his grandmother’s voice. Sarah would get mad at him for turning on the television instead of talking to her — but instead of hearing a message about Sarah not liking the TV, or wanting to spend more time with him, Rick heard her say, “You can’t do anything right!”

As for Sarah, one of seven siblings, she’d grown up in a poor family and was taught to keep her personal needs to herself. So she did just that in her relationship with Rick — at least for a week or two, after which her frustrations would explode in a litany of complaints. In the case of the TV, what she really wanted was to have a closer connection with Rick, but unfortunately she expressed this desire in a way that sounded bitter and accusatory.

So it stands to reason that the more you know about someone’s background, the more you’ll understand where they’re coming from, and the more successful you’ll be at interpreting their bids.

When making bids, reflect on your underlying needs, and express them through soft language.

The next time you find yourself about to launch into an argument or make a complaint, stop and ask yourself: What’s my unmet emotional need here?

Softening a bid also goes a long way to making it more palatable. Once, one of the authors was waiting to have dinner with his family, but his wife was busy working in the basement. “Hey, Julie,” he shouted harshly. “Stop working! It’s family time!” Understandably, Julie felt attacked and criticized; and she responded defensively, saying, “I can’t! I’ve got to get this done!”

Instead, the author could have opened his bid by calling out, “Hey, Julie, we miss you! Come up and have dinner with us as soon as you can.” Imagine how much more positive Julie’s response would have been.

If you get your initial bid and bid-response right, you give yourself more opportunity for connection.

To understand this better, let’s do a little play-by-play analysis of some emotional communication in action. Two coworkers, Jim and Linda, are in the office. Jim comes over to Linda’s desk and makes his initial bid, asking, “So, do you have any plans for lunch?”

Linda replies that she’s brought something from home and is going to eat outside. Understanding the hidden meaning of the bid, she turns toward it. “Want to join me?” she asks.

“Sure,” says Jim. Then he ratchets the bid up a notch: “I’m going to the vending machine to get a drink. You want anything?”

“Yeah, maybe a Coke,” Linda replies, turning toward Jim’s bid once again. “Oh, and I’ll find those photos I told you about. I want to show them to you!”

“Great!” says Jim, “I’d love to see them!”

Notice how the positive responses build on each other, bringing Jim and Linda closer together.

You don’t have to accept a bid at face value to respond positively.

Let’s go back to Jim and Linda and their lunch plans. In this version, it turns out Linda really doesn’t have time to take a break today, so she can’t accept Jim’s bid at face value — that is, as an invitation to have lunch together on this particular day.

But that doesn’t mean she can’t respond positively and turn toward the bid. “Oh, I’d really love to have lunch with you,” she could say, “but I’m so swamped with work right now. Maybe tomorrow? Or we could grab a coffee and catch up after work.”

Notice how Linda affirms her desire to connect with Jim even while she declines this particular opportunity. She also offers some alternative ways for them to connect. In other words, instead of shutting the metaphorical door between them with a blunt rejection, she leaves it open and calls Jim closer.

Jim can now carry on with his bid, agreeing to one of her alternatives and building on his initial overture. For instance, he could offer to bring her something to eat, giving her more time to power through that mountain of work.

Our patterns of responding to people’s bids can have a big impact on our relationships in the long run.

If you analyze other people’s communications with you, you’ll see that they’re often making bids to connect. These bids may come in the form of vague language, or they may be disguised as complaints or criticism — so you’ll need to interpret them carefully. Whatever you do, remember that your choice to turn toward, away from, or against a bid is something that can have a major impact on your relationships.