Can We Put Our Hurt Aside Long Enough to Hear Each Other?

One of the things I find most fascinating about relationships is how difficult it can be to listen to someone we love. You would think that the people closest to us would be the people we are most curious about. But sometimes the opposite is true.

We know our partner so well that we think we already know what they’re going to say. We know our parents, children or siblings so well that we think we understand why they behave the way they do. And when there’s been a lot of hurt between us, it becomes even harder.

Instead of listening, we’re preparing our response. Instead of asking questions, we’re defending ourselves. Instead of trying to understand, we’re trying to be understood.

I recognise this from my own life, and I see it in my work with couples and families all the time. I’ve often wondered how we can create conversations in which we genuinely become curious about each other again.

Why curiosity disappears during conflict

Imagine your partner tells you that something you did really hurt them. What happens inside you?

Perhaps you immediately think, “But that’s not what I meant!” Or, “That’s unfair. You’re not seeing everything I’ve done.” Perhaps you feel ashamed because, deep down, you know you behaved in a way you’re not particularly proud of.

And so you start explaining yourself. Not necessarily because you don’t care about your partner’s feelings, but because you’re uncomfortable with how you’re being seen. You want the other person to understand your intentions and know that you’re not a bad person. And while you’re doing all of that, you’re often no longer really listening.

The same happens when we’re angry or hurt. We become so focused on our own experience that there’s very little room left for the other person’s.

What Dialogue Therapy taught me about curiosity

In looking for ways to help couples have more open, curious conversations, I came across the work of psychologist and Jungian analyst Polly Young-Eisendrath.

Together with Ed Epstein, she developed Dialogue Therapy, an approach that helps couples move through conflict with greater awareness, mutual understanding and respect.

What I particularly appreciate about her work is the idea that we don’t have to agree with each other to understand each other. Genuine dialogue requires us to become curious about a perspective that may be completely different from our own.

Her approach to Real Dialogue emphasises three important skills:

1. Speaking for ourselves: We take responsibility for our own experience instead of presenting our interpretations as absolute truths. Rather than saying, “You don’t care about me,” we might say, “When that happened, I started worrying that I wasn’t important to you.”
2. Listening mindfully: We try to understand the other person’s experience before responding. Not listening to find flaws in their argument or prepare our defence, but to understand what the world looks and feels like from their perspective.
3. Remaining curious: We recognise that the other person may know, feel or experience something we haven’t yet understood. We become willing to learn something new and perhaps even change our own understanding.

This is what makes dialogue different from a debate. The goal isn’t to win. The goal is to discover something together.

What gets in the way?

Of course, this sounds much easier than it is, especially when there’s already a lot of pain between us. Sometimes it’s our anger, sometimes our guilt, and sometimes our hurt. We may also fear that if we really listen to the other person, our own experience will somehow become less important.

In my work with couples, I often notice that both partners are waiting for the other person to understand them first. One thinks, “If only you understood how much you’ve hurt me, I could listen to you.” The other thinks exactly the same thing.

And so they remain stuck. Both longing to be heard, but neither quite able to listen.

The stone between us

This is where I like to introduce a very simple exercise. I sometimes invite couples to take a stone and place it between them.

The stone represents whatever is making it difficult to connect. It might be anger, resentment, shame, disappointment or fear.

I invite each person to reflect on what is standing between them and their partner. What am I carrying into this conversation? What makes it difficult for me to listen? What am I afraid might happen if I really open myself to the other person’s perspective?

And then I invite them to do something very physical: take the stone and place it to the side.

Not because the hurt has disappeared. Not because we should ignore what happened. And certainly not because we need to forgive something before we’re ready.

But because, for this conversation, we’re making a conscious decision not to let that hurt determine everything we hear and say. We’re creating a little space to become curious, to see the person in front of us again, and perhaps discover something we haven’t understood before.

I find the physical act of moving the stone particularly meaningful. Sometimes we need more than an intellectual decision to communicate differently. We need a gesture that helps us remember what we’re trying to do.

From defending ourselves to discovering each other

Once we’ve made that space, we can begin to ask different questions.

• Instead of “Why do you always react like that?” we might ask, “What happens inside you when we have these arguments?”
• Instead of “Why can’t you just understand my perspective?” we might ask, “What do you wish I understood about yours?”
• Instead of “Why are you making such a big deal out of this?” we might ask, “What makes this so painful for you?”

These questions don’t guarantee an easy conversation. Sometimes what we hear may be difficult. We might discover that our partner has been feeling lonely for a long time, or that something we considered insignificant had a much greater impact than we realised.

But these are often the moments when something begins to shift. We’re no longer just repeating the same arguments. We’re learning something about each other.

What systemic therapy adds to this

From a systemic perspective, I find it helpful to remember that relationships are shaped by patterns of interaction. We influence each other continuously. The way I respond to you affects how you respond to me, and your response then affects what happens inside me.

Over time, these interactions can become familiar patterns. One person criticises, the other withdraws. One pushes for a conversation, the other avoids it. One becomes angry, the other becomes defensive.

The more often we repeat these patterns, the more convinced we may become that the other person is the problem. But what if we started looking at the pattern itself? Instead of asking who is wrong, what if we asked what keeps happening between us?

This doesn’t mean both people are equally responsible for every harmful behaviour. But it can help us understand how a difficult interaction keeps repeating itself and where we might be able to change our response.

In Emotionally Focused Therapy, we also explore the deeper emotions and attachment needs driving these patterns. What looks like anger could be a fear of rejection. What looks like withdrawal could be a fear of failure or of making things worse. Once we understand those deeper experiences, we often find a new way to reach each other.

A dialogue exercise to try at home

If there’s a difficult conversation you’ve been avoiding with your partner or a family member, try the following exercise.

1. Identify what stands between you. Each person reflects on what they’re carrying into the conversation. Is it anger, hurt, guilt or fear? You can write it down or choose a stone to represent it.
2. Create space. Place the stone to the side. Remind yourselves that you’re not trying to solve everything immediately. For now, you’re trying to understand each other.
3. Let one person speak. One person shares their experience while the other listens. Try to speak about your own feelings rather than describing what is wrong with the other person.
4. Reflect back what you’ve heard. Before responding, summarise what you’ve understood and ask, “Have I understood you correctly?”
5. Become curious. Ask questions such as “What was the hardest part for you?”, “What did you need from me?” or “What do you wish I had understood?” Then switch roles.
6. Reflect together. At the end, ask yourselves, “What have I learned about you today that I didn’t understand before?”

You don’t necessarily need to reach an agreement. Sometimes understanding each other is already an important step forward. And if the conversation becomes too overwhelming, it’s okay to pause and return to it when both of you feel more able to listen.

This exercise is intended for conversations where both people feel emotionally and physically safe. Where there is intimidation, coercion or abuse, safety and appropriate professional support need to come before joint dialogue.

Making room for something new

What I love about this approach is that it invites us to see relationships as something we continue to discover. Even when we’ve known someone for decades, there are still things we don’t understand about them: experiences we haven’t heard about, feelings we haven’t recognised, and fears or wishes we may never have asked about.

Sometimes, underneath years of conflict, there are two people who still want to find each other but have forgotten how.

For me, that’s where the possibility of transformation begins. Not when we find the perfect argument or finally convince the other person that we’re right, but when we become willing to put our own perspective aside for a moment and genuinely ask:

“Help me understand what this has been like for you.”

Further reading

Polly Young-Eisendrath: Love Between Equals: Relationship as a Spiritual Path.
Polly Young-Eisendrath and Jean Pieniadz: Dialogue Therapy for Couples and Real Dialogue for Opposing Sides.
Sue Johnson: Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love.