Shannon Curry

Yeah, they did a beautiful job at taking these findings they had through decades of research, quantifying it, and then codifying it into a therapy method.

It's really skills-based.

I tell couples when they're starting out with me that they're essentially going to be starting a class.

How many were negative?

Or the day.

Or the day.

Right?

So the idea of this ratio, well, it's not an idea.

It was a finding.

It is a research finding that the Gottmans got after looking at thousands of couples.

And codifying these interactions that they were observing.

Couples that tend to be satisfied in their relationships, that are happier, they have better health, etc., they are having approximately five positive interactions to each negative.

And I want to be clear about what I'm defining as positive and negative here.

So this doesn't necessarily mean that you're – these don't need to be big, sweeping romantic gestures, buying flowers, having sex.

These are things like paying attention to what we call your partner's bids.

We make these bids for affection, for connection.

all the time in our relationships, not just with our partners, but with our friends, our coworkers.

And we may not even know what our style of bid is, but if you see them on a sheet, you can pretty quickly identify them.

Bids could be wanting to show your partner or tell your partner something and have them be proud of you.

It could be wanting to go buy groceries with your partner, doing things together.