A commonly asked relationship question is: "How do I buy my partner to open up to me?” The pain housed within this question is so legitimate because intimate relationships are built on a foundation of… intimacy.....
Relationship scientists have attempted to define intimacy in a number of various ways. For our purposes here, let’s use a definition from group therapy researchers, Lyman and Adele Wynne (2007). Intimacy may be a “relational experience that's characterized by mutual exchange and an ambiance of proximity and engagement between two persons.”
In other words, intimacy is about having the ability to open up to your partner and trust that what you're sharing is going to be handled with respect and care. Researchers and theorists have debated the degree to which intimacy is a private capacity (like a personality trait) or a relational dimension/characteristic. the solution seems to be that intimacy is both a trait and a dynamic. The complexities of loving and being loved to mean that the solution to most questions on intimate relationships finishes up being hearty both/and.
So, we yearn for closeness. We yearn to be ready to share our interiors with our partners—our hopes, dreams, fears, concerns, and questions. and that we yearn for that very same quiet access into our partner’s inner world. Feeling as if we are met with a closed-door is painful and creates the conditions for loneliness. “How do I buy my partner to open up to me?” is such a legitimate question.
Origin Stories
- Plant the seed of the possibility that things are often different by creating a hopeful frame around the problem.
- Focus us on what's blocking the healthy response. Once we all know what's blocking the “solution” (here, opening up) we will start to figure on lifting that constraint. Reflect on the question: “What is keeping my partner from opening up to me?” If you would like “extra credit” you'll ask your partner this question directly. Some common constraints to an emotional vulnerability that I see in my work include:
- Gender Role Socialization: If your partner has been socialized within the masculine, he learned early to associate emotional vulnerability with weakness. He was told implicitly and explicitly to stay a stiff upper lip, stay his guard up, and positively never, ever cry. His intimate relationship with you'll be the primary and only place he ever exposes. While the quantity he exposes may feel only an in. deep to you, to him, it's going to feel as deep because the ocean because it stands in stark contrast to his other relational experiences. this is often not an excuse. it's a context. I would like men’s partners to expect the depth and tenderness that foster intimacy because I even have seen men grow into this ability. I just also want men’s partners to practice patience. What may desire resistance is more likely inexperience.