I enjoy optical illusions, those visual montages that look like one thing but if you study the picture long enough you will see other images. Visually these illusions and montages illustrate that our brain can perceive more than one image from the same visual stimulation. What we perceive is a function often of what we are looking for or what we are most primed to see. The visual signals being sent to the brain are the same but the perceived image will change depending on how our brain organizes the visual information. A well known example would be the two faces - vase illusion. It is a black and white image in which one may see a flower vase, or two silhouettes of human face profiles facing each other. Which image is perceived has to do with how the image is being processed by the brain. We may be able to shift back and forth between the images but most people will only see one image at a time. It is an example of a figure/ground perceptual challenge the image that is given prominence becomes the figure, the rest of the image blends into the background. Some people will easily see one of the images but not be able to see the other unless told what to look for. The example illustrates how significant perception is and how complicated it can become.  This fact of human perception is often demonstrated during interpersonal communication, especially as might occur in a marriage.

When my spouse is talking to me there may be several messages being sent simultaneously while they are speaking. Good listeners recognize this and learn to organize the competing messages and respond according to the message that seems most important at the moment. Understanding which message to let be the “figure” and what to let fall into the back ground can be a challenging task. Communicating with our spouse can become like the visual perception game “Looking for Waldo.” In this perception task Waldo is an drawing of a young boy imbedded several times over within the larger drawing. The drawing has many elements all being portrayed at the same time. It might be a drawing of an amusement park as if being viewed from a helicopter or high look out tower. To find Waldo in the picture you must concentrate on specific areas of the park and see if Waldo is there. Some of the drawings of Waldo are easy to spot, but others may require several minutes of concentration to find. Talking to my spouse and trying to determine which message should be most important can be like looking at a “Waldo” drawing.

Our experience at National Institute of Marriage working with couples in sometimes deep relationship distress has suggested to us some keys to effective emotional connection through a system we call “Heart Talk.” This system uses much of the information gained over the years on interpersonal communication and applies it to couples trying to understand each other emotionally. For example, let’s say it’s Saturday and my wife, Mary Jo, comes home after spending much of the day away from home running errands. She discloses to me during conversation that she is extremely irritated by the condition of the kitchen, to come home and find the kitchen in such disarray puts her over the edge. She continues to explain that knowing I have been home all day and not touched the kitchen throws gas on the fire.

At this moment I am in a figure/ground dilemma. There are at least two messages coming at me at the same time. One is the message that she is angry with me for not helping more. The other message has to do with her feeling overwhelmed. In a communication where emotional understanding is the goal, if the listener lets the message about the speaker’s emotions be prominent there is a good chance of emotional understanding occurring. Sadly, many times we only hear the attack of ourselves, personalizing the message and missing the Speaker’s attempt to be understood emotionally.

Imagine the result if I respond, “What?! So you think I sat around and did nothing all day?! How dare you accuse me of not doing my share in this family!!!” This reaction is a counter attack and is provoked by the perception that Mary Jo’s comments were meant to primarily put me down and criticize me. I would be letting the message about me be the prominent one, the figure. This can be referred to as “personalizing” what the speaker is saying. This response misses entirely her feelings of being overwhelmed and maybe anxious about keeping the house in order. I could even veil this personalizing as a summary of her communication, appearing to be listening but missing the more important message, “So what I hear you saying is that I didn’t help enough today.” Again, there is no acknowledgement of her emotional experience. The summary only captures the message being sent about me. When I respond this way both of us feel discouraged and disconnected. Mary Jo likely won’t feel heard and I feel judged and misunderstood.

Listening to connect emotionally means letting the Speaker’s message about them selves be the most important. Even if there are messages about me in the communication, good listeners put the spot light on what the Speaker is saying about their own emotional experience. So, the more productive summary of Mary Jo’s emotional message might sound like, “Whoa! You sound tired and overwhelmed, and it looks to you like I don’t care about the kitchen.” In this summary Mary Jo’s feelings are mentioned first. By putting the potential message about me second I acknowledge that message as being in her communication but let her feelings of being overwhelmed be the more important message. Her feeling overwhelmed is the figure, her concern I don’t care is the ground.

This principle of letting the Speaker’s emotional experience be the primary message takes real discipline on the part of the Listener. It may be very challenging for me in the moment to hear Mary Jo’s feelings if I am already sensitive to being attacked and criticized. This is especially true if she is not very direct about her own feelings and only criticizes me in the communication. What can be liberating and reinforcing is that over time with practice one can train themselves to let their spouse’s message about their own emotional experience be the primary message, or figure, and the message about the Listener be the secondary message, or ground.

Learning this skill will dramatically reduce the escalation that so easily occurs when one spouse discloses negative emotional feelings. In some relationships any emotional disclosure results in the listening spouse retaliating with counter criticism and attack. To focus in on what my spouse is trying to tell me about themselves first gives me an opportunity for discovery and possibly even compassion.  Put this principle of listening to the test and see what happens. Don’t just test it once but try it several times and see what the results are. Be prepared, if your spouse is extremely hurt they may be out of touch with their own emotions and the only message they want to send is the critical message of you. This is challenging to say the least, however, letting them know you care about what they feel by acknowledging their feelings can be a significant step toward healing deep hurts in a relationship. Deep wounds in relationships require persistent patience, understanding, and compassion to heal over time. Listening well is a key component to that healing.