Discover Define Design: Take Away the Emotion & Discuss Only the Facts

Jessilyn Persson: [00:00:01] Welcome to the Life by Design podcast. We are your hosts, Brian and Jessilyn Persson, where we help professional couples resolve conflict and improve communication within their relationship. As the creators of the Discover, Define, Design Framework, today we’re going to work you through Define. If you recall our last episode we talked about Discover in there and helping you resolving your conflict and improving communication. So we are going to move on to Define and we’re going to work from the story we used last episode about the garbage, and we’re going to carry it through so you understand the framework from start to finish. So what does Define mean? This is where we’re going to talk about the facts. And only the facts. Take out all emotion and talk about exactly what the situation is. So moving on to our garbage story, Brian.

Brian Persson: [00:00:54] Yeah. Taking out the garbage. That was a real trouble point in our relationship at one point. And what was the situation? The situation was that I would let the garbage overflow a little bit because, you know, professional couples, we’re both busy, we have a lot of stuff going on, and the garbage would just get a little too full. And what would that do for you, Jessilyn?

Jessilyn Persson: [00:01:19] Infuriate me.

 

Brian Persson: [00:01:22] Yeah, she would get mad. She would not tell me. Other situations would start to arise and and things would just go sideways. Yeah. All around the situation. So what we figured out is that if you can really remove the emotion from the situation, it’s not bad to explore the emotion – that’s what Discover is about – but now with Define you’re really removing the emotion from the situation. So to do that you need to ask yourself some specific questions. And one of those questions that we ask is what is or is not working about the situation? So for you, Jess, what was working and not working for the situation?

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:02:09] Yeah. When you took out the garbage, I was happy. But when you didn’t, it would get really angry and I would let it fester. What also wasn’t working is that I didn’t communicate that to you. You had no idea that it was really annoying me and it was making me angry. And then it just made me just kind of look at you differently. So, yeah, what was and wasn’t working for you?

 

Brian Persson: [00:02:33] For me in that situation was that I was willing to take out the garbage. The situation that wasn’t working was that it just was not a priority for me. So in this situation, you got to really look at at these emotions, at these situations, unbiased. So you can’t look at them with any kind of emotion around it. You just got to look at it for the bare facts. What is working, what is not working, not what you think should be working, not what you believe should be working. Just what is and what is not. Is there anything else around that situation that might have been working or not working, or any other advice you can share, Jessilyn?

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:03:17] Yeah, I mean, at any given situation, we use the garbage, but you can apply that to any chore dishes, laundry, cooking, you know, shoveling the snow for us Canadians here. But I find we have generally have a preset way of doing things. And I know women have chatted about this on many occasions where they feel like they have to be the ones to do the dishes, they have to be the ones to cook. And the thing is, as we mentioned in our last podcast, like firstly, did you ask your partner so they understand exactly what you’re looking for? But here you look at the facts and it’s like, do you actually have to do the dishes or do the cooking? Or is it you took it on and/or maybe you don’t like how the other person is doing it and so you figure it’s just easier if I did it instead of having you doing it, and then I have to go fix it. Maybe you don’t have to fix it. Maybe you just need to accept it for what it is and move forward.

 

Brian Persson: [00:04:23] Yeah, that is called being workable. So any part of your life has to be workable in order for it to actually work. Think of a car. You know, if your tire is about to fall off, that’s not exactly workable. The car can’t drive. If something is not workable in your relationship, the relationship equally is not going to drive. So dishes could be one of the workable points of your relationship. For us, things like driving around is one of the big workability points in our relationship. So I do a lot of the driving for the kids. I do a lot of the driving for their sports, and that does take a lot of time out of my week, but it is the most workable situation, right? You end up having a lot of meetings throughout the day, whereas I have a little bit less meetings throughout the day, and it doesn’t make sense for you to go around driving the kids everywhere where you know they’ll collide with your meetings. So your relationship has to be workable in that sense. What is another question we can ask ourselves to define the situation of any problem or any conflict you might be having in your relationship?

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:05:38] So a great question is making the situation entirely about you. How is the situation your fault?

 

Brian Persson: [00:05:48] Yeah, my favorite question, because this question really opens up whether or not you can take responsibility for the situation. If you can find the way to, I’m going to use the word blame yourself for any situation, and I don’t want you to use blame as in like a negative thing, but just blame in the sense of how am I responsible for this situation? If you can find that, then you immediately gain control over the situation because you will almost always – in fact, I would challenge anyone out there to find a situation where they aren’t responsible for it – and you will gain power and gain control over that situation. Finding yourself to blame is the number one way to take responsibility and and improve your relationship.

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:06:44] Yeah, absolutely. So if you, we use the garbage situation, for example, taking responsibility for me would look like firstly, I didn’t communicate with you that I wanted you to take the garbage out. That is my fault. That’s on me. Another one, I’m looking at the garbage overflowing and it would make me angry, not you. So again, that’s on me. And I could have taken the garbage out myself. Then it wouldn’t be overflowing. Or, like I said, I could communicate it with you so you understood how I felt and I didn’t just assume you were this magical mind reader. So taking ownership and understanding that and then having that conversation to understand maybe why you didn’t take the garbage out, because obviously you could see it was overflowing. But as I learned, obviously later after a few little blow ups, it just wasn’t your priority. But I mean, that changed when you understood how much it bothered me.

 

Brian Persson: [00:07:42] Yeah, yeah. And asking the other person what it means to them is huge, because that can show you sort of the effect that you’re putting out into the world. So for you, explaining that it was bothering you actually helped me understand what kind of priority that garbage should have been. Whereas beforehand, if I didn’t have that information, how was I supposed to know that the garbage should, taking out that garbage should be a priority? That, you know, I’m making decisions based on no information effectively.

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:08:16] Yeah.

 

Brian Persson: [00:08:17] Yeah. And then once I understood my responsibility in the situation, it no longer was a chore. It was now just something that had to be done in order to have a workable relationship, in order for me to take my responsibility on for my side of the relationship. So one of the ways that people go sideways with a lot of these questions is, especially the Define principle, where Define is supposed to be about not having emotions, not really adding in your colors and your flavors into the situation, is they bias it with, you know, either history or baggage or a number of other things from the past, and they end up having an emotional situation when they’re trying to define the facts of the situation. So what are some ways that we have biased ourselves when it comes to things like the garbage where we’re running on a filter, where we’re not quite seeing the situation for what it is. Do you have a way that you kind of filtered yourself?

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:09:37] I mean, I imagine it’s kind of the part of what we call expectations. And, you know, we always have expectations of our partners. And I just expected you to do the ‘quote unquote’ man jobs. Now that obviously definition changes as life goes on. But it was kind of the assumption like, well, you should take out the garbage, just like you should make sure there’s gas in the tank and mow the lawn. Where is when we started to come together as couples to share those chores? I equally can do all those things just as much as you can cook and do dishes, which were the chores I originally kind of just assumed as the female of the household. So it was just a filter on like as a man you should know to take out the garbage, right? And it wasn’t necessarily specific to you. It was more, I think, a biased on from a perspective of the female male.

 

Brian Persson: [00:10:38] Yeah. You grew up with the lens of men are supposed to do these particular jobs. So when I didn’t do one of the jobs, taking out the garbage, there was a break in what you saw in the world, i.e. I should be doing this job and why am I not doing this job? Yeah. And you said a very important word that gets a lot of relationships, and has got us in the past, and that’s expectations. When they’re not set out, as you said, when they’re maybe just from how you grew up or expectations around maybe what you think should happen, and they’re not actually like defined and put out on a almost like literally written out onto a piece of paper and put on the table in front of everybody so that everybody can see the same expectations, that can be dangerous, because now you’re running on a set of expectations that is maybe different than my set of expectations. And all of a sudden we’re not seeing eye to eye.

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:11:44] Yeah.

 

Brian Persson: [00:11:45] So one of the things that we learned was to very, very clearly set out expectations, whether that’s taking out the garbage, whether that’s who does what inside of the business, because we’ve gone wrong in that case too where there’s been expectations that one or the other person was supposed to be doing something inside of the business, and it was not happening because either, again, almost the same situation as the garbage, we both get busy and priorities change. And you’re not looking at what what you should be doing and what the expectation is around what you should be doing.

 

Brian Persson: [00:12:26] Yeah. For the garbage, I don’t know if I was particularly biased. I think I just needed it more communicated that it should be a higher priority from you…

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:12:35] For sure.

 

Brian Persson: [00:12:36] Yeah, Jessilyn. But one way like, there are definitely other areas of our relationship where I have experienced my own bias and my own filters. One of those was money, and we both did fairly well in our careers. We both had very well paid jobs. And, you know, I think we did significantly better than than a lot of people that we grew up with. And inside of that, my filter was that, hey, you know, we did better. We made it. Air quotes ‘made it’. And why do we need more than what we have right now? Whereas you were a little bit more driven and a little bit, you actually have a vision workshop where you help other people workshop their vision. And inside of that vision that you have, you saw more.

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:13:29] Yes.

 

Brian Persson: [00:13:29] And for me, I had the filter of why do we need more? And there was a lot of conflict around why we needed more because we both, you know, did very, very well in our careers. We didn’t really have any want for anything. So why do we need to go and expand our income? Massive, massive filter for me and through a lot of personal development and some partners that we met and and coaches that we met, you and I both unlocked different filters and biases that we had around money, actually.

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:14:04] Yeah, 100%.

 

Brian Persson: [00:14:06] Yeah. So inside of the Define principle, it’s really about not putting a lot of emotion into exploring the conflict or the situation that you’re in. So how did we remove some of the emotion when we are really trying to figure out the what is and the what is not of the situation? Do you have any tips for everybody out there on how?

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:14:28] Yeah, I think some of it comes right back to focus. So an active listening. So as we mentioned in our previous podcast, when you’re going to have that conversation that you’ve scheduled with your partner, you make sure you both have that space available for the conversation that’s about to happen. Then you’re not worried about thinking of, like I said, shopping lists and what you’re going to make for dinner. And then you can focus on what your partner is saying. And when they’re saying something, know that they’re coming from a space of sharing. And so when they’re saying the facts, just remind yourself that those are the facts to them. It’s okay if they’re not your facts, it’s okay if you don’t agree with them. But you got to listen to them. And then you got to also assess like, wait, are those the facts? Maybe those are the facts, right? And kind of align them with what your facts are. And instead of being upset because that’s not how you saw it or upset because you don’t think that’s right, put those aside and just listen.

 

Brian Persson: [00:15:32] Yeah, yeah, actually, you nailed something in one of your previous sentences there, and that was grocery lists and cooking supper and all the busy stuff that happens in a relationship. That was a thing that actually would really shut down the communication for me. And I had to realize that it was not the right time to communicate with you, because you were busy trying to figure out the grocery list, trying to figure out, you know, how the boys, our kids’ schedules were. Everything that was going in your head was not providing any room for any communication from me to happen. So that’s one of the big reasons why we schedule our communication so that there is a defined space where we can communicate and inside of that communication, the only thing we have to focus on is what we’re talking about in that exact moment, not all the busy life of of a professional couple.

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:16:31] Yeah. And time is key. Timing, I should be more specific. And I say that because as most busy couples, we kind of wait till the end of the day. Kids are in bed, it’s late, you’re exhausted, you’ve had a long day, and then you want to have a conversation? I mean, that’s not going to bode well for many people, but especially for me. I love my sleep and it was easy for you to keep going because you were more of a night owl than me. I’m more of a morning person, but you would want to keep going and having a conversation and I would just eventually fall asleep. So I mean that ended the conversation, but not in the way that was productive.

 

Brian Persson: [00:17:10] No, no, it’s, both parties have to be on board. You cannot have a conversation with a party of one. Yeah. And you actually touched on something else there, is keeping it short. We, in the past, used to have – whether we were just having a normal conversation or an argument – we would have lengthy arguments to the point where, you know, we were literally exhausted, as if we had ran a marathon because it just went on too long and we would suffer from communication fatigue.

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:17:43] But why were they lengthy? Because we both felt we had a point to prove. We had to be right. We weren’t thinking about the other party. We were only thinking about ourselves and making sure that we thought we were heard and understood. And so then you just go on and on, and then it just becomes too, like you said, exhausting, you’re fatigued. But when you take that out and, like we said, we’re just talking about this episode, the facts of it, you remove all the ‘but I did this in the past’ and ‘I did that’ like, no.

 

Brian Persson: [00:18:13] There’s no history bias in there. All the filters that you put on for, you know, the last ten situations that happened in the same way, none of that, or I should say all of that came in in our past.

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:18:27] Yes.

 

Brian Persson: [00:18:27] And that’s why a lot of the conversations were really lengthy. And we aim to keep our conversation short because we know that two things are going to happen. Number one, we’re going to get fatigued from the conversation. And number two, that conversation is going to lose its effectiveness very quickly if it goes on too long. If you can’t have, or if we can’t have a conversation in a short manner, it means you’re probably not quite clear on that situation. And you really need to sit down and think about it a little bit more so that you can become clearer on the situation. Hence our scheduling. You know, we schedule a conversation every week. If it doesn’t make sense or if we’re not clear on that conversation that week, we have a book where we write down the topic, and we actually like schedule it for the next week so that we don’t forget about it. It doesn’t just get swept under the rug or forgotten about and then disappear into the void, right?

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:19:30] Yeah.

 

Brian Persson: [00:19:31] Yeah. Those are really big in trying to remove a lot of the emotion and the bias from the situation, is just keeping it short, keeping it clear.

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:19:41] Yes, 100%.

 

Brian Persson: [00:19:43] So that’s kind of a wrap on really what Define means in the Discover, Define, Design Framework.

 

Jessilyn Persson: [00:19:51] And to recap on that, three takeaways we’d like you to learn from this episode is, firstly what is and is not working in the situation? Number two, making a situation entirely about you. How is this situation your fault? And number three, remain unbiased and unfiltered when you’re looking at the situation and having the conversation.

 

Brian Persson: [00:20:14] Yeah, absolutely. Really, really good points that’ll help you help you communicate better inside of your relationship. So we release podcasts every two weeks. Our next episode is going to be about the Design in our Discover, Define, Design Framework. Design is all about creating a solution where we are going to help you get the tools and the support you need to create the ideal solution for your problem or your situation. Be sure to hit the subscribe button on your favorite podcast app, and continue the journey with us and create your life by design. Thank you for listening to the Life by Design podcast with your hosts, Jessilyn and Brian Persson.