The Relationship Cure: A 5 Step Guide to Strengthening Your Marriage, Family, and Friendships

by John Gottman

  33. Name three preferences your child has about weekends. (For example, would your child like to go to a museum? A ball game?)

  34. Name two of your child’s favorite songs or pieces of music.

  35. What are the main problems your child will have to overcome to have a successful and happy life?

  36. What are two of your child’s favorite musical instruments?

  37. Describe two of your child’s dreams that have yet to be fulfilled.

  38. What occupations has your child seriously considered having when grown up?

  39. What are two occupations that your child definitely would not want to have when he or she grows up?

  40. What are your child’s two favorite colors?

  41. What three games does your child like to play, if any?

  42. What color are your child’s eyes?

  43. Where would your child most like to travel, and why?

  44. Name two of your child’s favorite restaurants.

  45. How does your child feel about reading?

  46. Name two places or events that your child would find uncomfortable.

  47. What does your child like for you to do when he or she is sick?

  48. What are your child’s comfort foods?

  49. What was the saddest event in your child’s life?

  50. How does your child feel about mathematics?

  51. What was the worst time your child ever had?

  52. How does your child feel about writing?

  53. What is your child’s attitude toward crime?

  54. What would be your child’s ideal bedtime routine?

  55. What are two of your child’s favorite ways to exercise?

  56. What would be your child’s ideal birthday present?

  57. Name two things your child fears.

  58. How does your child feel about war?

  59. What would be your child’s ideal weekend?

  60. Describe one great day your child recently had. What happened that day?

  61. What two things make your child most angry?

  62. How does your child feel about travel?

  63. Does your child know the real difference between good and evil? How do you know this about your child?

  64. Describe one heart-to-heart talk you recently had with your child.

  65. Describe your child’s ideal sack lunch. What would he or she like least?

  66. What are two of your child’s current stresses?

  67. Name two lies your child has told.

  68. What does your child think about hunting animals?

  69. How does your child feel about the police?

  70. Name three of your child’s personality weaknesses that you worry about.

  71. What are the worst and best parts of your child’s current school year?

  72. List your child’s three favorite adults.

  73. What is your child’s attitude toward money?

  74. How does your child feel about politics?

  75. How does your child feel about popular animals like cats, dogs, horses, or whales? Why does your child feel this way?

  76. How does your child feel about school tests?

  77. How does your child feel about teasing?

  78. What is your child’s attitude toward poor people?

  79. Describe one time when your child felt ashamed or humiliated.

  80. What was the best time your child ever had, and why?

  81. Name two things that your child is really worried about.

  82. Who are your child’s favorite painters?

  83. What would be your child’s idea of the “coolest” car to own?

  84. What are your child’s attitudes toward violence?

  85. What is one thing you could do to improve your relationship with your child?

  86. What would your child describe as the best experience he or she ever had?

  87. What does your child most like to do with friends?

  88. How does your child get over being sad?

  89. What have been some of your child’s ideal and worst summer experiences?

  90. How would your child ideally like to decorate his or her room?

  91. How does your child try to get your attention?

  92. What is your child’s attitude toward homework?

  93. What are two things your child is proudest of about himself or herself?

  94. Describe one bad day your child recently had. What happened that day?

  95. What would your child choose to give you as a birthday gift?

  96. Who was your child’s favorite teacher, and why?

  97. Describe one nightmare your child has had.

  98. What are your child’s feelings about nature?

  99. How does your child feel about charity?

  100. What would your child describe as the worst experience he or she ever had?

  Step 2. Discover How the Brain’s Emotional Command Systems Affect Your Relationship with Your Child

  A young father once told me this story about trying to put a new snowsuit on his three-year-old son while a neighbor was visiting. His son didn’t like the snowsuit at all, and put up a mighty resistance.

  Finally the neighbor dad asked, “Do you mind if I try?” A bit embarrassed, but grateful for intervention, the father released his son and said, “Fine.”

  As the little boy watched, the neighbor laid the snowsuit out on the floor and began fussing with its zipper and Velcro wrist straps. “Do you want to see how it works?” the man asked. The little boy nodded, approached the suit, and fiddled thoughtfully with the Velcro. After a minute or two, the man asked, “Do you want to put the snowsuit on—all by yourself?” The boy nodded again, and with the man’s instruction, he stuck his feet into the legs of the suit. Then he wiggled his arms into the sleeves. Finally the boy pulled the zipper all the way up and announced proudly, “I did it all by myself!”

  I like this story because it demonstrates what can go wrong when children and parents are operating from different emotional command systems. With his Energy Czar system fully activated, the father was thinking, “I must protect my child from the cold!” But the child longed only to activate his own Commander-in-Chief system and say, “I can do it myself!” He wanted to experience his Explorer system and say, “Look what I discovered!”

  The neighbor succeeded in getting the boy to put on his snowsuit because he understood this. He could see the boy’s desire to be independent and powerful. He looked at the situation from the child’s perspective and he thought, “This boy hates the feeling that he has no control. But he would probably love to show his family and friends that he’s capable of dressing himself—especially once he sees how cool the new snowsuit really is.”

  Dreams of being independent, skilled, adventurous, and powerful are important to most children throughout childhood and into adolescence. That’s why preschoolers are so fascinated with cartoon superheroes. It’s the reason young teens were so taken with the scene in Titanic where Leonardo DiCaprio stands on the bow of the boat and yells, “I’m king of the world!” It’s also the root cause of many power struggles between parent and child. When they’re little, battles may center on bedtime, eating habits, or getting in the car seat. When they’re big, conflicts shift to issues like homework, fashion, friendships, and curfews.

  Kids need much more than independence and power, however; they also long for security, protection, and a sense of belonging. They lack life experience and they need adult guidance. They need to know that we, as grownups, are there to set limits and to shelter and defend them if things get scary. We’re there to give them nurturance and support. So while we need to allow children to activate their Explorer and Commander-in-Chief systems, we also need to stand beside them with our Sentry and Nest-Builder systems appropriately activated, setting limits, offering guidance and safety. We also need to pay attention to our Energy Czar systems, making sure that children get the rest and nutrition they need. As adults, our message is this: W
e believe in you and we want you to try your wings, but only when you’re ready. And we’ll do our best to catch you if you should fall.

  What’s the best way to achieve this balance? By allowing kids to make choices for themselves whenever it makes sense to do so. If you’ve got little ones, for example, you can take them to the grocery store and line up three types of breakfast cereal that fit your Energy Czar’s nutritional criteria. Then say, “You decide.” Let kids choose what color of shirt to wear, what book to read, what game to play. Having such choices, and learning to choose well, helps kids to feel competent and satisfied. Then, as kids get older, you can let them take responsibility for more important choices. For example, you can give them a clothing allowance and let them decide how to spend it. Let them choose their own elective classes, the sports they want to play, and the hobbies they want to pursue. All of this allows them to explore their own independent dreams and visions of the types of adults they want to become. It allows them to take responsibility for their choices in incremental steps. And by letting them make their own choices, you show that you care about their preferences, their hearts’ desires. It’s a way to show your willingness to understand them. It’s a way to connect emotionally over and over again.

  Although I’ve discussed some of the common conflicts that arise between parents and children here, the questionnaires in chapter 4 can give you a more individualized picture of the emotional command systems you rely on most. If you haven’t completed these questionnaires, I encourage you to do so. You may even want to complete them as you think your child would. Then, using Your Emotional Command System Score Card on this page, you can see how you and your child differ and you can read about ways to negotiate interactions across those differences.

  Step 3. Examine How Your Emotional Heritage Affects Your Relationship with Your Child

  Have you ever had this experience? You’re talking to your child when you suddenly realize that the words coming out of your mouth are not your own, but words your mother or father said to you so many years ago. For better or worse, the way you connect emotionally with your child is influenced by the way your parents connected with you. That’s why it’s important to be aware of your emotional heritage. This includes the messages you heard as a child about expressing feelings, your family’s philosophy of emotion, and your enduring vulnerabilities—that is, past emotional injuries that still feel sensitive to this day.

  Understanding your emotional heritage is important because it can provide insight into the way you bid and respond to bids for emotional connection with your child. For example, if you had a strong-willed father who reprimanded you for not being cheerful, you may have a hard time responding well to your own child’s sadness. On the other hand, if you had a dad who mostly empathized with your negative emotions and helped you to find solutions to problems, you’ve got a head start toward teaching your child to cope.

  Exercise: How Does Your Past Influence Your Connection with Your Child?

  Below is a list of questions designed to explore the way your emotional heritage affects your ability to bid and respond to bids for connection with your child. Before you answer these questions, however, look back at the exercises in chapter 5. If you haven’t completed them, you may want to do so now, because you’ll need the results to answer the following questions.

  You can write the answers to these questions in your Emotion Log. Sharing your answers with your child’s other parent or a trusted friend may be helpful as well.

  1. Look at your scores on the exercise What’s Your Emotional History? on this page. Note your scores in each category: pride, love, anger, sadness, and fear. Think about how you feel when you hear your child express each of these emotions. Then answer the following questions, thinking about each emotion separately.

  • How does your comfort with hearing your child express this feeling affect your ability to connect with him or her?

  • Do you feel that you’re able to empathize with your child when he or she is feeling this way?

  • Do you feel embarrassed, frightened, or angry when your child expresses this feeling?

  • Are you likely to turn toward, turn away, or turn against your child when he or she expresses this feeling?

  • How would you like to improve your ability to be with your child as he or she is being emotional?

  2. Review the results of your responses to the exercise What Was Your Family’s Philosophy of Emotion? on this page, and answer these questions.

  • Was your family’s philosophy primarily emotion-coaching, emotion-dismissing, emotion-disapproving, or laissez-faire?

  • How does that affect the emotional philosophy you express in your relationship with your child?

  • In relating to your child, is your philosophy primarily emotion-coaching, emotion-dismissing, emotion-disapproving, or laissez-faire?

  • What effect does your own philosophy of emotion have on your child?

  3. Review the results of your response to the exercise What Are Your Enduring Vulnerabilities? on this page. Then answer the following questions.

  • How do your enduring vulnerabilities affect your ability to connect emotionally with your child?

  • Do you feel that past injuries interfere with your ability to bid for emotional connection with your child? In what way?

  • Do you feel that past injuries interfere with your ability to respond to your child’s bids? How so?

  • Do past injuries ever get in the way of your ability to feel included by your child?

  • Do past injuries interfere with your ability to express affection toward, or accept affection from, your child?

  • Do you sometimes feel that you’re struggling too hard to control your child because you feel vulnerable?

  • Do you sometimes feel that you’re struggling too hard to resist being controlled by your child because you feel vulnerable?

  Step 4. Sharpen Your Skills at Emotional Communication with Your Child

  Emotional communication between parent and child begins long before kids learn to talk, and continues for the rest of the life of the relationship. You can hone your skills at emotional communication by practicing the Emotional Communication Game, which was first introduced in chapter 6 (see this page). Here are several more items geared to give you practice at reading and responding to emotional cues in parent-child conversations.

  Exercise: The Emotional Communication Game for Parents and Kids

  You can play this game with another adult or with your child, if he or she can read. Start by silently reading each item and its three possible interpretations. Then take turns reading the items aloud, as the other person tries to guess which of the three meanings you’re trying to convey. You can also practice the game on your own. Doing it with your child, however, may help you notice things about the unique ways he or she expresses feelings.

  1. Are you going to practice your piano lesson?

  a. You see that your child is going to practice, and you’re pleasantly surprised.

  b. You think it’s high time that your child practiced, and you’re afraid that he or she will never get around to it.

  c. You’re just asking for information.

  2. Are you going to eat that?

  a. Your child is very fussy, and has been playing with his or her food and you’re annoyed.

  b. You understand that your child doesn’t particularly like this dish, and you want to give permission to leave it unfinished.

  c. You’re neutral about it, and just asking for information.

  3. You left your game in the yard. If it stays outside all night, it will get wet and be ruined.

  a. You think your child is careless with toys, and that makes you angry.

  b. You know the game is precious to your child, and you want to let your child know that you’re worried about its safekeeping.

  c. You’re simply reminding your child where the game is and that it might rain that night.

  4. Your friend Jami
e called. Are you two getting together again this weekend?

  a. You like your child’s friend, and hope they’ll see one another again soon.

  b. You think your child has been seeing too much of this person, and you’re worried.

  c. You’re just asking for information.

  5. Have you taken care of Max?

  a. Your child keeps forgetting to feed the pet, and you’re angry about this kind of irresponsibility.

  b. You’re pleasantly surprised that your child has taken the initiative to feed the pet.

  c. You’re just asking for information about whose turn it is to feed the pet.

  Step 5. Find Shared Meaning in Parenthood

  What does it mean to raise kids? By exploring this issue and sharing your insights with the important people in your child’s life, you can help build a stable, committed social environment for your child. When parents and caregivers find common ground around child-rearing issues, they build stronger emotional ties and are less likely to engage in conflict—an obvious plus for kids. They’re more likely to support one another’s goals and visions for raising a child. In addition, exploring such issues gives you a better awareness of the values your child may be learning from others.

  Below is a list of questions designed to help you better define your vision for parenthood. That’s followed by a list of rituals that can help you to find shared meaning and emotional connection with your child and others involved in your child’s life.

  Exercise: What Does Parenthood Mean to You?

  Here’s a list of questions. You can write your answers down in your Emotion Log. It’s also a good idea to share your answers with your child’s other parent and/or caregivers.

  If you have an older child, you may want to talk about these issues with him or her as well. The discussion might help the two of you to view your relationship from one another’s perspective, enhancing your connection.

  • What does it mean to you to be a parent?

  • What’s your definition of a good parent?

  • How does your understanding of good parenting differ from your own parents’ understanding?