Stuck in a "Reaction" Rut?

Are you familiar with the following reactionary scenario?

Your partner says or does something and without thinking you automatically react. Within seconds, you realize your mistake but it’s too late; the “happy spouse” ship has left the dock, leaving you with an all-to-familiar negative outcome.

“Next time will be different,” you say. But it never is.

In his book 18 Minutes, consultant Peter Bregman describes this phenomenon:

event —> reaction —> outcome

This simple event-reaction-outcome chain governs most of our spontaneous action. Something or someone hooks us and we react. Someone yells at us, we yell back and create the outcome of a damaged relationship. It’s not that we want a damaged relationship; it’s just what happens when we yell back.

Bregman points out that the most important part of the chain — “arguably the only part that really matters” — is the outcome, which we allow to become collateral damage from the reaction.

He suggests that the chain should be rearranged to look like this:

event —> outcome —> reaction

In other words, stop reacting to the past and start reacting to the future.

If someone yells at you, pause before yelling back. Then ask yourself what outcome you want. If the answer is “An improved relationship,” don’t yell back. Instead, in a normal voice, empathize with their anger and ask some questions about the concerns raised in the midst of the screaming. That’s a reaction that will achieve a better relationship.

Easier said than done, right? Bregman agrees but says that a simple change of mindset can turn this problem around:

Here’s the hard part: You react to the event because it’s asking you to react to it. But just because the event catalyzed your action doesn’t mean it should determine it. How you react can and should be determined by the outcome — by the future you want to create.

Getting out of the event-reaction-outcome rut asks you to think about outcomes in advance, which requires you to put yourself in a position that allow you to see the big picture.

The first step of Sigma Coaching does exactly that: Asks you to take the higher ground and position yourself as your spouse’s last line of protective defense. From that vantage point you can see any incoming threats and repel them before they have the chance to attack your loved one.

And being in that position is much preferable than mixing it up with the very person you’re charged with protecting.

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Dr. John Alexander is relationship expert and the author of The Sigma Male: What Women Really Want. To learn more about Sigma Coaching, visit his website, subscribe to his blog, “like” his page on Facebook, and follow him on Twitter.