Changing this one way of speaking can help solve arguments with your partner, says top relationship coach

We’ve all been there. We’re angry with our partners for something they did or didn’t do and when we confront them about it, we both end up getting defensive. Alas, that little bicker has turned into a full-blown tornado of an argument (if you’re anything like me, it ends up getting louder and angrier and I usually slam a door or storm out for a walk).

While most of us realise it’s probably not the most conducive way to go about resolving a situation, when we are in the thick of it sometimes it feels unavoidable. However, it turns out we just need a little re-education in the art of talking to each other and relationship expert and mindset coach Ivy Miller has just the solution.

Posting on Instagram, the expert told her 56.5k followers, “Speaking from analysis will naturally create opposition between two people. Because now they have 2 choices: 1. Agree with your analysis and admit to being the bad guy. 2. Defend their good intentions, which will naturally make your pain seem dismissed or minimised. In her shared video, which has received over 8,000 likes, the relationship coach speaks about how we should approach a conversation when we’ve been hurt.

She says: “Without realising it most people when they’re in moments of upset in their relationships will talk from analysis.

“For example, ‘It was so uncaring of you not to call me when you said you would’. Not only does this keep the conversation on the surface level, it also naturally puts the conversation on the context of agree or disagree – because now the person has to either agree that it was uncaring or protect their good intentions by saying, ‘No it wasn’t uncaring that’s not what I ever meant to do to you.'”

Miller suggests that we instead “speak from our experience” and gives the following example: “When I didn’t receive a phone call from you I felt really disappointed and honestly a little forgotten.” She says: “This is what gets to the root of the conflict. The fact that something they said or did sparked some pain that is now alive inside of you that they probably didn’t ever intend and that pain is actually the thing that needs to be tended.”