5 Things Secure Couples Do Well
In today's episode, we're talking about 5 things that secure couples do really well to build safety, intimacy and connection in their relationships.
In a world where we often focus on the missteps and challenges in our relationships, it can be refreshing to shift our attention to the positive examples set by secure couples. We often lack positive role models in our lives when it comes to healthy relationships, leading to the need to look to aspirational examples. In this episode, we explore five things secure couples do well, shedding light on what we can aspire to in our relationships and how we can cultivate awareness around our own patterns.
Effective Communication and Conflict Resolution
One key aspect that secure couples excel at is effective communication and conflict resolution. They possess the discernment to address issues in their relationship without letting them fester or escalate. Secure couples are adept at identifying when something requires attention and expressing it in a non-inflammatory manner. This proactive approach allows them to nip potential conflicts in the bud, fostering a healthy and respectful environment in their relationship. Moreover, secure couples understand the significance of knowing when to let things go, showcasing their ability to maintain a balanced perspective in addressing issues.
Maintaining Perspective
Another hallmark of secure couples is their ability to keep things in perspective. While insecure individuals may globalize minor issues, leading to doubts about the entire relationship, secure couples can compartmentalize disagreements and maintain their faith in the strength and value of their relationship. This capacity to hold simultaneously frustration and love for their partner contributes to their relationship's stability and emotional well-being.
Prioritising Connection, Play, and Intimacy
Contrary to common misconceptions, secure couples do not constantly scrutinize and analyze their relationship. Instead, they prioritize connection, play, and intimacy, freeing themselves from the burden of relationship-related stress and insecurity. By carving out time for joyful experiences and deepening their emotional bond, secure couples create rituals and activities that cultivate a sense of ease and safety within the relationship.
Validation and Humility
Secure couples prioritize validating each other's experiences over the need to be right. By acknowledging and accepting each other's perspectives, they nurture an environment of respect and understanding. This humility fosters meaningful interactions and minimizes the potential for disconnection caused by the need to assert one's views over the other's. This commitment to validation and humility creates a culture of openness and vulnerability that enhances the quality of their relationship.
Balancing Togetherness and Separateness
Finding the equilibrium between togetherness and separateness is a skill that secure couples excel at. Rather than solely relying on their partner for all aspects of their emotional and social lives, they maintain individual identities. This balance allows them to access support from a diverse network and cultivates a sense of empowerment and agency in their lives, reducing feelings of abandonment, helplessness, and powerlessness.
Meaningful Repair
When conflicts inevitably arise, secure couples engage in meaningful repair, taking responsibility for their actions and addressing the issue in a considerate and sincere manner. By offering genuine apologies and expressing an understanding of their partner's feelings, they create an atmosphere of acceptance and accountability, fostering deep connection and respect in the relationship.
Conclusion
Secure couples exhibit a set of habits that lay the foundation for healthy and thriving relationships. By adopting the practices of effective communication, maintaining perspective, prioritizing connection and intimacy, validating each other, balancing togetherness and separateness, and engaging in meaningful repair, individuals can cultivate and enhance the health of their relationships.
In a world filled with relationship challenges, exploring the habits of secure couples offers valuable insights and actionable steps towards fostering healthy and stable relationships.
Questions for Discussion & Reflection
Do you struggle with knowing when to raise issues in your relationship and when to let things go? How do you navigate this balance in your own experiences?
How do you prioritize connection, play, and intimacy in your relationships? Are there specific activities or rituals that you and your partner engage in to cultivate joy and connection?
Reflect on a recent disagreement or conflict in your relationship. How did you and your partner handle the validation of each other's experiences during this time? What could have been done differently to facilitate meaningful repair?
Do you find it challenging to balance togetherness and separateness in your relationship? How do you carve out space for your individuality while still fostering a close connection with your partner?
Think about a recent instance in your relationship where meaningful repair was needed. How did you and your partner take responsibility and engage in a process of healing after a disagreement or disconnect?
Consider the concept of validation and the willingness to let go of the need to be right in your relationships. How does this approach contribute to the sense of safety and trust within your relationship? Can you recall a specific time where this approach made a difference in resolving conflict?
Reflect on your current understanding of secure attachment and how it influences the way you relate to your partner. How do the characteristics of secure couples discussed in this episode align with or differ from your own relationship dynamics?
How do you and your partner keep things in perspective during challenging times in your relationship? Have there been moments where maintaining perspective has been particularly beneficial to your connection with each other?
Consider your own experiences with engaging in meaningful repair after a disagreement or disconnect in your relationship. What have you found to be effective in fostering a sense of understanding, resolution, and closeness?
Examine the role of humility in your relationships. How does the willingness to take responsibility and apologize facilitate greater connection and understanding with your partner? Can you recall a time where demonstrating humility positively impacted your relationship dynamic?
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Episode Transcript
[00:00:04]:
In today's episode, we're going to be talking all about five things secure couples do well. So oftentimes, we're looking at the ways in which we might be operating in our relationships that are getting in the way of what we want, the places where we're going wrong, the missteps. And so I think that it's really useful and important to flip the script every so often and instead focus on what the goal is or where we should be aiming in our relationships by looking to positive examples of what secure couples do, what the norms are in those types of relationships.
[00:01:11]:
Because I think for so many of us, we don't have a lot of examples of that. I often ask people to reflect on whether they actually have positive role models in their lives around relationships, whether they had that growing up. And I think, unfortunately for a lot of us, when we turn our minds to it, we don't really have lots of examples of like, yeah, those are people with a great relationship, really healthy, respectful, fun, connected over the long haul. So I think that when we are doing this work of trying to repattern reprogram and understand where and why we might be stuck, looking to these aspirational examples can be really inspiring and can help us know what we're looking for and can probably also illuminate where we might be missing the mark a little in our own relationships and thereby cultivating more awareness around our own patterns and our own stuckness, if that's what we're experiencing. So, as I always say, it's really important to know at the outset that secure couples are not perfect. It's not like they've reached relationship nirvana and they never fight and they're totally on cloud nine honeymooning all the time. That's not at all what we're talking about. It's not realistic, and I'd say it's probably not even all that aspirational, but they're really good at navigating life as a team and loving each other through the hard times and really celebrating the good times.
[00:02:40]:
So we're going to be diving into five different things that secure couples tend to be really good at again, so that you can know what you're aiming for and maybe take steps in that direction in your own relationship. So before we dive into that, a couple of quick announcements. You will have heard me in the past few weeks talking about my new course, Secure Together, which I'm creating with my partner Joel, who joined me for last week's episode. If you haven't listened to that, definitely do. I've received so many beautiful comments about that. People who really valued having him along as someone who leans more avoidant to speak to that experience. And I do think that that's so valuable. It's really the whole reason why I've got him joining me in this new course, because I think it's much more much more insightful to hear it from the horse's mouth, so to speak, rather than having me or anyone else talk about it as an observer or a bystander to that experience.
[00:03:36]:
Anyway, so we are launching a new course. It's called secure together. It's coming out in less than two weeks. There's already lots of you on the waitlist, which is wonderful to see. And if you are interested in joining the Waitlist for that, that will guarantee you exclusive, very discounted launch pricing, as well as first access. So you can join the Waitlist via my website, all of which is linked in the Show notes. Second quick announcement is that I have a Free Master class as part of celebrating the launch of this new programme. It's a free masterclass called where anxious avoidant couples go wrong and how to fix it.
[00:04:11]:
I announced this on Instagram about a week ago and I've had, I think, 750 or so people jump onto it and sign up. It's pre recorded, so you get instant access. All you have to do is pop in your name and email address and you'll be sent a link. It's about 45 minutes and again, has been getting really beautiful feedback from those who've already downloaded that. So if you would like a Free Master class from me, again, that is linked in the Show Notes, or you can go to my Instagram and send me a DM with the word Masterclass, nothing else. And a little automation will get your details and send you the link as well. Okay, so with that out of the way, let's dive into this conversation around five things that secure couples do well. So I should say, as always, this is not an exhaustive list.
[00:05:00]:
These are not the only five things secure couples do well. These are just five that came to mind when I was reflecting on this. And I think it's particularly helpful because they are not only things secure couples do well, but maybe things that couples with insecure attachment patterns struggle with, or doesn't come naturally to couples and individuals with more insecure attachment patterns. So the first one is they know when and how to raise issues and when to let things go. And that second half, the when to let things go is, I would say, as important as the first half, which is they know how and when to raise issues. So let's break this down. We know that secure attachment, one of the hallmarks of secure attachment and secure functioning relationships, is really good, effective proactive communication. So not letting things fester, not sweeping things under the rug, becoming resentful and kind of sitting on things for a long time and letting them build up.
[00:05:57]:
Secure, functioning couples tend to be pretty good at calling something out, at naming something that feels off in the relationship and doing so in a way that's not inflammatory or accusatory, but really just puts it on the table and goes, hey, I'm noticing this, it doesn't feel good, can we talk about it? And that tends to be well received. They come to the table, they're able to share what might be going on and come up with a solution or otherwise have some sort of approach to that issue that nips it in the bud, that doesn't let it, as I said, grow and fester into something that is more damaging to the fabric of the relationship. So secure, functioning couples are really good at this, at knowing when something feels important enough, having that discernment to know, yeah, this feels like something that needs to be addressed and I'm going to raise that. The other side of the coin of that discernment, as I said, is knowing when to let things go. And I think that arguably, while insecure couples are not great at raising things proactively, they may be even worse at knowing when to let things go. And this is me looking at you anxious folks again, of course, as always, something I can relate to. But knowing when to let things go can be really, really hard when you have a lot of fear baked into your way of relating and your attachment patterns. Because it can almost feel like if I let this go, then it's going to keep happening and you're going to do it again, and then I'm going to be trapped.
[00:07:25]:
And then ten years from now, we're going to be an unhappy couple and you're going to be doing something that's ten times worse than this. It's going to be this slippery slope we can get very catastrophic. And so there can be this sense of, I need to raise every single issue, almost a vigilance. Like, I can't let anything go because I need to make sure that you understand that every single thing that has hurt me has hurt me. And I don't want you to feel like that isn't a big deal because it is a big deal to me. And of course, while it is important if something's really upsetting you to raise it, I think there's also something to be said for checking in with ourselves and going, am I having a big emotional reaction to something that's maybe not quite matching what's actually going on here? Is that mind to sit with first and maybe on the other side of me sitting with that and carefully handling it, processing it, understanding it a little better, maybe I'll come to the realisation that I was about to. Spew all of this stuff onto you that wasn't really about you or that wasn't really appropriate as a response to what was happening right here, right now. So having that ability to actually zoom out and go, okay, is this worth it? Is this something that I need to sit my partner down and have a serious conversation about or otherwise bring their attention to? Or could I maybe just give them the benefit of the doubt, let something slide and trust that there wasn't any ill intent there and maybe it doesn't need to become this whole big, serious issue.
[00:09:03]:
As I said, I think that people, particularly with more anxious patterns, can really struggle to do that because it can seem like if I let you get away with this, then what else are you going to do? Or feeling like everything is going to become kind of eternal and universal and just bigger because that's the way our kind of fear driven, anxiety driven, catastrophizing brain can work. So knowing when to raise something and when to let something slide is a really, really good relationship skill and something that secure couples do pretty well. Related to that, they also keep things in perspective. I think that's an important kind of footnote to that first point. Again, insecure couples tend to globalise things. So it's like, oh, we're having this one little fight about that one comment you made in the car and all of a sudden I'm rethinking our entire relationship. It's making me doubt everything. It's making me wonder whether we can even do this anymore because it just feels so hard all the time, right? It just can blow up and become very all consuming and take up your whole field of vision.
[00:10:04]:
Whereas I think secure couples are much better at keeping things in perspective. Like, oh yeah, we're having a bit of a TIFF in this moment. We're having some sort of rupture, but I can still feel connected to my love for you and my knowledge that this relationship is solid and good and that there is so much value here. I can hold both of those things at the same time. I can be frustrated with you and still have a lot of faith in our relationship. So that ability to keep things in perspective is really good as well. Okay, the next one is that they prioritise connection play and intimacy. So I think that there might be a bit of a misconception among more insecure people and again, probably more anxious leaning people, that secure couples are talking about their relationship all the time and that's just not true.
[00:10:54]:
I think that the beauty of a secure relationship is that you don't have to talk about your relationship all the time because it doesn't feel like the relationship needs constant scrutinising and fine tuning and examining and probing. It's just like, okay, we can talk about things, but that's only one tiny sliver. And really there's this whole other field of our relationship that is available for us to explore and to be playful and silly and to joke, to be intimate with each other, whether that's sexually or otherwise. But so much energy is freed up to connect and to experience joy together when you're not always bogged down by the stress of insecurity. So that's one of the really beautiful I suppose it's almost like a natural side effect of removing some of that insecurity from the relationship and building more trust and stability is that you aren't devoting so much time and energy to worrying about the relationship and then talking about the worrying about the relationship. So being able to just free up some bandwidth to really connect with each other. And I think secure couples do that naturally but are also good at prioritising it and making space and time for it to the extent that life can get busy. So I think secure couples really value that and are good at carving out the time and space and often having rituals around it.
[00:12:22]:
So it might be that you do some sort of activity together every Saturday morning or you play tennis on a Tuesday night or whatever it might be. You like to play cards together while dinner is cooking. Lots of different ways that you can just be enjoying each other rather than just feeling like you're bogged down in the trenches of relationship stress and drama all the time. And I think that play and that lightness is a beautiful way to really co regulate, to be in a really easeful, safe, embodied space in the relationship which works wonders so far beyond what our rational thinking brain can compute. But that experience of really embodied safety with someone that is available through play and that really we're not able to access that play and that joy and that easefulness unless we're in that embodied state of safety. Okay, the next one is they validate each other's experience rather than needing to be right. Now this is such a big one and I've spoken about it on the podcast before in various other contexts. But again, when we're in that insecure mindset it feels like it has to be my way or your way that I so fiercely feel this urge to protect the rightness of my perspective, my perception, my feelings, all of that because I feel like we are in competition or opposition with each other.
[00:13:53]:
Then I feel like for me to be right, which I so desperately want to be, I have to make you wrong. And so to the extent that you're sharing something that is at ODS with what I'm seeing or thinking or feeling, I have to convince you as to why my way is actually the truth and yours is wrong or a misperception or a misunderstanding. And what that does instantly is invalidate the other person right. It just makes them feel totally unseen, unheard and unloved a lot of the time. And I think as much as we defend that when we're the ones doing it, when we're on the receiving end of it, we know that that doesn't feel very good, right? So this is really one that secure couples do very well, is dropping that need to be right, which I think, again, comes somewhat organically, from not feeling like you're in combat, from not feeling like you have to defend to the death the rightness of your position. So I think that the more you do this, the easier it gets, because you totally change the culture and the energy of the dynamic. So being able to say that wasn't my intention at all. But I can see that I've really upset you or that you're feeling really judged or criticised.
[00:15:11]:
And I'm so sorry for that. Please tell me what I can do differently or help me to understand where I went wrong there, or how I could have communicated myself differently. So having the humility and I think humility is at the heart of this, having the humility to recognise that we might have gotten it wrong or that our intention might not have been received in the way that we wanted it to, that we might have inadvertently caused someone to feel hurt or judged or criticised or attacked, even when we might have been trying to do the opposite of that. So having that courage and that humility to say I'm sorry and I totally get it, if I were in your position, I would probably be feeling the same way and I don't want you to feel that way. So how can I do better or do things differently? That's so disarming and it's just so connective because there's nothing to defend against anymore, right? When someone says that kind of thing to you, it's like, oh, I can lay down my guard, I can lay down my sword, because there's really nothing to fight with there. So it does take a bit of bravery to lead with that kind of open heartedness, particularly in times of conflict or disagreement, when we are so geared towards self protection. But it is really, really powerful and I think it's something that secure couples do pretty well. Okay, the next one is secure Couples balance togetherness and separateness.
[00:16:40]:
So a few weeks back I did an episode on healthy interdependency as distinct from codependency and hyper independence. And this is in a similar vein. So secure couples have a really lovely balance between time spent together. Joint experiences, joint vision, joint goals and separateness. So they have separate people in their lives, separate friendships, separate hobbies. They spend time apart. They're not totally enmeshed into this one unit. They have a distinct sense of self.
[00:17:12]:
They have separate support networks, so they're not each other's only support when things get hard. So being able to balance those two things provides for a lot of safety, because when we have too much togetherness, we tend to lose our sense of self and it can make us feel overly dependent on the relationship as our only source of everything, right? Of our only source of connection, as our only source of support as our only source of joy and play and humour and all of those things. And that's actually a lot of pressure. If you're more anxious, you might be like, yeah, that sounds perfect, but I promise you that that's a lot of pressure. And when you're putting all of that pressure on one person in one relationship, then it's going to be really easy to judge the ways in which it might fall short or be imperfect. Whereas when you have a whole spectrum of people and places and things that you go to to get your needs met, then all of a sudden we can kind of let go of the grip of needing our partner. To be a certain way and to show up 100% of the time in the way that we would want them to because we feel less dependent on them in this needy, survival driven way. So I think being able to balance that really helps with things like feeling abandoned, feeling helpless, feeling powerless.
[00:18:34]:
We feel much more empowered and we feel like we have a much greater sense of agency over our life, over our well being, over our joy, over our thriving, when we have this really lovely balance of togetherness and separateness. Okay, last but not least, when things do go awry, secure functioning couples engage in meaningful repair. So, as I've said many times before, it's not that secure couples don't fight. It's not that they don't have bad days, it's not that they don't say things that they shouldn't have said or that they'd like to take back. It's not reaching this place of perfection where we're all monks on a mountain in total Zen like state. Life is stressful and things can get hard and there will be seasons of disconnection in any long term relationship and that's totally normal. But as I said at the start, secure functioning couples are good at calling things out. And if there is some sort of rupture or someone gets snappy and makes a snide remark or anything like that, there's this culture of taking responsibility and really repairing meaningfully, right? That doesn't mean having to have a four hour conversation about it, because I think that's actually those sorts of really long, draining conversations tend to be more of a hallmark of insecure relationships than secure ones.
[00:19:56]:
But there is this sense of ownership going, I'm really sorry about this morning. I shouldn't have spoken to you like that. I was feeling really stressed about this thing and I took it out on you and that was unfair of me and I'm really sorry. I'm going to try not to do that again. That can be a really beautiful, concise way of just taking the sting out. And oftentimes that's all it takes to restore this sense of connection and respect and love and care. So having things like that where it's like, okay, when something does go wrong, when we do feel like there's a rupture or a disconnection. We really have a culture of taking responsibility, ownership and apologising in a meaningful way that allows both people to feel like the issue has been addressed.
[00:20:45]:
There's an understanding of why we went wrong and there's some sense of a plan around making sure that doesn't happen again, or putting in the effort to be aware of that going forward so that it's less likely to happen again. So that's a really important one. And it links in with all these other ones, right? It links in with validation. It's this sense of like, I see you, I see the impact that my behaviour had on you and that's not what I want for us. So here is my awareness and my love for you. And that, as I said, is so disarming and it just kind of, like, melts away our defences in a really beautiful way. Okay, so those were five things that secure couples do well. I hope that you enjoyed that episode.
[00:21:31]:
I hope it's given you something to think about. And as I said, if you are interested in going deeper into all things secure, relating the new course secure Together is going to be a really beautiful, deep dive into all of this stuff. And it's not just going to be theory, it's going to be a lot of practical things walking you through how to implement this with a lot of exercises that Joel and I will be demoing. So we'll be the guinea pigs for you. And it's going to be designed to be really approachable and unintimidating for everyone, even those with more avoidant patterns who might be a little overwhelmed or reluctant to do this kind of thing. Our intention is to make it really light and playful and, as I said, unintimidating for everyone involved. So if that's interesting to you, jump on the waitlist less than two weeks until the course goes live. Otherwise, thank you so much for joining me and I look forward to seeing you again next time.
[00:22:28]:
Thanks, guys. Thanks for joining me for this episode of On Attachment. If you want to go deeper on all things attachment, love and relationships, you can find me on Instagram @stephanie__rigg or at stephanierigg.com. And if you enjoyed this episode, I'd be so grateful if you could leave a review and a five star rating. It really does help so much. Thanks again for being here and I hope to see you again soon.