My wife’s father used to have a well known habit of not paying attention when we were gathered together having a conversation at a family meal. The family would be talking, and carrying on a conversation, and he would just kind of space out. At some point, someone would say something funny and the table would fill with laughter, and he would suddenly wake up and look around and ask very earnestly, “what’s that now?”
It was such a frequent occurrence that whenever my wife or I are talking and the other is too in their own world to respond right away, the other partner will lovingly say, “what’s that now?”
It makes us both laugh, and makes the other partner wake up…there’s also probably a very subtle unspoken element of “come on now, pay attention to me!”
It turns out that subtly telling one another “hey, pay attention to me!”, is one of the most common things we do in relationships with one another as humans…and…how we handle that moment can have profound effects on the health and future of our relationships and marriages.
That’s what this post is all about:
Recap - Gottman’s Relationship Series
This is the third post in a series on the findings of Dr.’s John Gottman’s extensive research as the preeminent marriage and couples therapist, into what key differences exist between couples that stay together, and couples that divorce.
In the first post, we looked at the importance of partners, but particularly men, to accept influence in relationships, and looked at an interesting example in the Gospels of where Jesus seems to accept influence from a foreign woman.
In the second post, we talked about the scientifically proven “magic ratio” of positive comments and interactions to negative ones for a healthy relationship, and looked at how near east ancient wisdom saved in the book of Proverbs seemed to understand the importance of positive comments several millennia before Dr. Gottman and his team ever had the chance to interview couples.
This week we’ll talk about a third key concept that distinguishes couples that stay together and couples that separate:
Turning Toward verses Turning Away.
Like the last two examples, this one can seem on the surface to be so simple that anyone could do it.
And, the great news is, that’s actually completely true.
It is simple, and anyone can do it, and in doing it, couples can improve their relationship significantly.
Okay, here we go:
Turning Toward verses Turning Away
John Gottman famously began the “Love Lab” interviewing couples in 1986, and has since interviewed and coded over 3,000 couples. You can watch this (super old) video of the love lab below if you’re interested:
Participants in the Love Lab had every action and facial expression scrutinized and judged and coded so that researchers could try and make sense of broad patterns that existed from couple to couple. What they found is that there was a distinct difference in the longevity of couples that “turned towards” one another, versus those that “turned away”.
“Turning towards”, at its core, just means acknowledging your partner's bid for connection in some way.
If your partner lets out a big sigh, “turning towards” would simply mean acknowledging their sigh by something as simple as saying “hey, what’s that sigh all about?”.
If your partner is watching Tiktok in bed next to you and starts laughing and says “that’s too funny!”, “turning towards” is as simple as saying “oh yeah? What’s so funny?”
If your partner walks up to you while you’re cooking dinner and puts their hand on your shoulder, “turning towards” is as simple as physically turning your head towards them and saying “hey babe!”.
These micro-moments matter.
Oftentimes, we and our partners do not come right out and say “hello, I’d like you to focus on me for a minute because I’m feeling distant from you and I had a hard day. I’d like to connect with you and feel close to you”...instead we all make bids for connection, insinuating that we want attention.
Learning first to recognize these moments for what they are - as bids for connection and a desire to feel close, and then learning to respond to these moments positively is a relationship changer.
It doesn’t seem like much…and a single moment of answering a partner's bid for connection may not be that much…but over time, years and years of these answered or unanswered bids can build up, and make a big difference.
5 years of answered bids for connection and “turning towards” could mean that your relationship has the foundational connection to work through conflict with an understanding and trust that you and your partner deeply care about each other.
5 years of unanswered bids for connection and “turning away” constantly could mean that you and your partner just don’t have that deep well of connection and trust to draw from when you need it most…your fights may be more intense, more full of criticism…all because you weren’t paying attention to each other in the little moments that didn’t seem to matter. And when there’s a big moment like an affair, a couple that has “turned away” for years, will have a harder time having the foundational trust needed to come out the other side healthier.
Here’s the exact numbers that the Dr. John Gottman and his wife Dr. Julie Gottman found in their research:
“Relationship Masters” (people in happy, flourishing relationships) turned towards each other and answered one another’s bids for connection 86% of the time.
“Relationship Disasters” (the opposite of the happy, flourishing couples) turned towards each other only 33% of the time.
The Gottman’s research has also shown that it wasn’t conflict, or infidelity, or other big issues that ended up being the reason that couples separated and went their own ways. Often, it was just years of distance and years of resentment from years of small failed bids of connection.
Here’s what Gottman writes about “turning towards” in his book The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work:
A tendency to turn toward your partner is the basis of trust, emotional connection, passion, and a satisfying sex life. Comical as it may sound, romance is strengthened in the supermarket aisle when your partner asks, “Are we out of butter?” and you answer, “I don’t know. Let me go get some just in case,” instead of shrugging apathetically.
- Gottman, p. 88
The Deep Need for Connection
Humans are, as you know, deeply social creatures.
Therefore, answering one another’s bids for connection, turning towards each other, speaks to a fundamental human need within us all. Polyvagal Theory created Stephen Porges, suggests that humans at all times are, at a subconscious level, assessing our social environment for cues for safety and cues for danger.
Furthermore, humans actually are able to co-regulate one another, meaning that a calm and connected person can help make a dysregulated person (someone feeling unsafe) become grounded again and tap into that ability to rest, play, talk, and just be.
This is part of why even babies will look at us in our eyes and smile…that human connection, where we encounter another person who sends us signals by physically turning toward us and looking at us and acknowledging us that we are safe, is essential for human health and relational flourishing.
When a partner fails to meet our bids for connection over and over again, when we look into each other’s faces seeking to feel connection, safety, and comfort, only to witness our partner ignore us or turn away, is deeply damaging on a psychological level.
This turning towards and turning away to make connections and co-regulate with one another is so important and foundational to being human that it even shows up in our descriptions of God
God and Turnings Towards
Numbers 6:24-26
This passage from the Hebrew Bible’s book of Numbers has been used as a closing benediction at the end of worship services for generations:
The LORD bless you and keep you;
the LORD make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you;
the LORD lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace.
-Numbers 6:24-26 NRSV (italics mine)
Imagine the ancient writers (or God…or both…however you conceptualize it) desperately trying to find the right words to describe this completely indescribable experience…
I mean, how do you talk about what it’s like to be blessed by God?
How do you find words to adequately express what it’s like to encounter a sense of deep, peace?
And, at least here, the most accurate and most meaningful metaphor they could find, is that when God blesses you and gives you peace…when you encounter God…it’s like God literally ‘turns towards’ you and looks at you.
For me, this just goes to show us how important turning towards one another is…if our best metaphors for encountering God involve God turning God’s face towards us and looking at us with grace…then it really says something about just how foundational this turning towards one another, and looking at each other face to face with love and grace is to the human experience.
And then one more interesting thing just to note, but there’s not really space it unpack here, is that the word pānîm in the Hebrew bible is sometimes translated as God’s ‘presence’ in English (Pss 16:11 for example), but, other times translated as God’s ‘face’ (Pss 13:11 for example). Again, just a sign of the importance of physically, and metaphorically turning towards our partners, just as we express God metaphorically turns towards us.
God and Turning Away - Psalm 27:8-10
Here’s another great example of the psalmist crying out, asking to see the face of God:
“Come,” my heart says, “seek his face!”
Your face, Lord, do I seek.
-Psalm 27:8 (NRSV)
Here, instead of God turning towards us as in Numbers 6:24-26, we hear the psalmist talking about the importance of seeking out God’s face. Here it is the ancient Hebrew community who do the seeking and turn toward God.
The Hebrew Bible seems to show that both God turns towards us, and we turn towards God in our relationship as well. Similarly, with our own partners, in healthy relationship we seek this same connection - both partners turning towards each other.
But then Psalm 27 continues, instead asking God not to turn away.
Do not hide your face from me.
Do not turn your servant away in anger,
you who have been my help.
Do not cast me off; do not forsake me,
O God of my salvation!
-Psalm 27:9 (NRSV)
Again, you can hear the ancient writer’s searching for an apt metaphor to describe what it’s like when it seems like God has left us.
What is it like to be rejected and turned away in anger?
What is it like to be cast off?
What is it like to be forsaken?
What is it like to be totally alone?
The metaphor they utilize is that it’s like God has hidden God’s face.
The best, most accurate description of pain and separation from God, is God turning God’s face from us.
As readers we read the text even today and it resonates with us…
Who wants to be turned away, cast off, or forsaken by God?
Who wants God to turn God’s face away from us?
And then similarly…
Who wants to be turned away, cast off, and rejected by our partners?
Who wants our partners to turn their face away from us continually as we call out for connection?
Maybe the first step to move towards healing, restoration, reconciliation, and transformation is to make the conscious effort to ‘turn towards’ our partners as they make their bids for connection, and begin to create a sense of trust and safety.
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About the Author
Travis Jeffords is a National Certified Counselor and Licensed Clinical Mental Health Counselor Associate in North Carolina. He holds a Master of Science degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from the University of North Carolina Greensboro, and a Master of Divinity from Christian Theological Seminary. Travis writes on the intersection of faith, spirituality, the church, and mental health.