Loading practices
Loading practices
Areas › Your marriage › Staying regulated in conflict
The more I push, the more you pull back, and round it goes. See the loop, out loud.
Satan sows discord between people, the Qur'an says. Seeing the loop for what it is, out loud and gently, is how you stop feeding it.
الإسراء
وَقُل لِّعِبَادِي يَقُولُواْ ٱلَّتِي هِيَ أَحۡسَنُۚ إِنَّ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنَ يَنزَغُ بَيۡنَهُمۡۚ إِنَّ ٱلشَّيۡطَٰنَ كَانَ لِلۡإِنسَٰنِ عَدُوࣰّ ا مُّبِينࣰ ا
[Prophet], tell My servants to say what is best. Satan sows discord among them: Satan is a sworn enemy of man
Qur’an 17:53read it in the library
فصلت
وَلَا تَسۡتَوِي ٱلۡحَسَنَةُ وَلَا ٱلسَّيِّئَةُۚ ٱدۡفَعۡ بِٱلَّتِي هِيَ أَحۡسَنُ فَإِذَا ٱلَّذِي بَيۡنَكَ وَبَيۡنَهُۥ عَدَٰوَةࣱ كَأَنَّهُۥ وَلِيٌّ حَمِيمࣱ
Good and evil cannot be equal. [Prophet], repel evil with what is better and your enemy will become as close as an old and valued friend
Qur’an 41:34read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
Johnson calls the commonest of the demon dialogues the Protest Polka, where one partner presses for contact and the other pulls back, each move driving the next. Naming the loop out loud lets a couple see it as a shared trap rather than proof of the other's character.
Susan M. Johnson (2008). Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love. Little, Brown
Conversation 1, Recognising the Demon Dialogues. Johnson names three patterns, Find the Bad Guy, the Protest Polka, and Freeze and Flee, and holds that the cycle, not the partner, is the enemy: naming it out loud is the first move of de-escalation.
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Naming the pursue-withdraw loop shows both partners how each move feeds the other.
Where this sits: EFT, Hold Me Tight Conversation 1: the Protest Polka, pursue and withdraw.