Have you ever been in an argument with someone you really care about, and in the middle of the argument, you could just feel things falling apart?

You're just thinking,

I wish I could stop this.

I wish I could reverse this.

I don't know what to do, but things are going in the wrong direction fast.

If I don't do something soon, this could damage or destroy the relationship.

I'm going to give you a list of exact phrases you can use to repair the damage that goes on in one of these difficult conversations or bad arguments.

These come from the marriage specialist, John Gottman, who calls them repair attempts.

I will give you a bunch of examples of exactly what to say from Gottman's book about seven principles that make marriage work.

Will the Marriage Last?

One of my favorite and best known communication researchers in the world is a guy named John Gottman. Gottman was a professor at the University of Washington, where he famously ran this communication studies lab. He would invite married couples into this research apartment, and they would sit down and there'd be hidden cameras that they had volunteered to be in front of. They would practice having some arguments or difficult conversations that characterize their marriage.

Famously, John Gottman could watch this video tape for only three minutes and predict with 96% accuracy whether these people would be divorced in three years. How did he do it?

I'm going to make a couple of other videos about exactly how he did it, but one of the things that he noticed was that in the marriages that were doomed, the spouses were unable to make repair attempts. That is, when things started to go wrong in an argument, they had no way of softening the conversation. They had no way of reversing and backing out of a bad situation once it started to get bad.

In marriages that turned out to be healthy and long-lasting, the partners had developed ways of both making repair attempts. That is what Gottman calls these techniques, repair attempts. He also stressed the importance of learning to accept the repair attempts when your partner makes them.

Accepting Repair Attempts

Gottman realizes that it's hard to accept these repair attempts. You're in the middle of a bad argument. Maybe you just want to draw some blood, to do some damage and get vengeance no your partner because they've hurt you so much. But in a healthy relationship, if they make a repair attempt, you have to accept it. Or if you make a repair attempt, they have to accept it.

So the question is, how can you make these repair attempts in a way that makes them more likely to be accepted? Because intrinsically these situations are such that they're not easy to get out of. You get all caught up in them, and it's not easy for anyone to accept a repair attempt when you really just want to go for the jugular.

I've been reading Gottman's book, Seven Principles That Make Marriage Work (you can find the affiliate link to it on our Recommended Readings page). In it he gives a bunch of specific examples of things you can say as repair attempts that have a good chance of being accepted.

1. "I feel” statements

   This is a repair attempt. You know that you're feeling defensive. Defensiveness is one of the ‘four horsemen of the apocalypse,’ as Gottman calls it. This is a statement that can get you out of it. So you say, "I'm feeling defensive. Could you rephrase that?" Another would be, "I'm feeling scared." That's just a cue for the other person to slow down a little bit. And a third would be, "Please say that more gently." So those are three "I feel" statements that would be repair attempts, said gently enough that maybe your partner could respond to them.

2. "I need to calm down" statements

   One example might be, "I need things to be calmer now." Another might be, "I need your support right now." A third, which might be hard to say in an argument but a really useful repair attempt is, "Can I take that back?"

3. "Sorry" statements

   Here are some examples of those statements. "My reaction was too extreme. Sorry." "Let me try again. I can see my part in this." Those are all ways of saying I'm sorry, ways of trying to initiate a repair and escape the downward spiral that might destroy your relationship.

4. Getting to yes statements

   Examples of that include things like, "You're starting to convince me." These lead you towards agreement and away from discord and disharmony and divorce. Another example would be something like, "I agree with part of what you're saying." A third example might be, "I think your point of view makes sense." All of these are attempting at reconciliation or repair, and of course that's the whole point of this, and these specific phrases are meant to give you some ways of saying these things in the heat of argument that might help save your relationship.

5. Stop action statements

   Examples of these include, "Please, let's stop for a while." "Can I have just a minute, I'll be back." "Let's take a break." All of these are trying to turn down the temperature on a heated reaction that might have really damaging consequences. If you say them gently enough, they have a chance of getting accepted and heard.

6. "I appreciate" statements

   These are statements of thanks or appreciation or acknowledgement. These again have the same intended action, to soften the acrimony, remind yourself that the relationship is something that you value, and remind your partner of the same thing. You still see good qualities in them, even in the midst of this difficult and painful argument.

   The most obvious one is just, "I love you." It's okay to remind your partner that you love them when you're arguing with them. It's a repair attempt. It's a reminder about the value of what you have together. A second might be, "I know this isn't your fault." And a third would be a direct statement of appreciation or admiration. Something like, "One thing I admire about you is..." and then you finish the statement with some acknowledgements of something you admire them about.

Summary

Those are about 18 different concrete statements you can use when you're trying to repair the damage that's being done in an intense argument with someone that you really care about.

As I said, Gottman identifies these repair attempts as absolutely critical to succeeding at arguing.

What he notices in his research is that the difference between successful relationships and unsuccessful relationships isn't that successful relationships have no argument.

No. Every relationship has arguments. It's about how people argue.

One of the key characteristics to arguments in successful, long lasting relationships is that they make repair attempts in the midst of an argument, and those repair attempts are accepted.

My hope is that these 18 concrete suggestions for how to phrase your repair attempts will help you preserve what is really one of the most valuable things in your life, and that is your most intimate relationships.