Friendship Part 2: Green Flags

Now that we have taken a look at what to look for in friendships that last. Again, the Gottmans have four items that lead to romantic relationships ending, and I believe that we can apply them to friendships too. 

According to the Gottmans, the four things that can make a romantic relationship last are the following: build a culture of appreciation, gentle start ups, responsibility, and physiological self-soothing. Let’s take a closer look at how each of these might play out in a friendship. 

Gentle Start Up 

Talk about your feelings using “I” statements and express a positive need 

(Gottman). 

This can be a tricky one that people have a hard time with. It’s a trap saying things like, “I feel like YOU did this.” That, I am sorry to say, is not a feeling. Saying, “I feel like YOU are being mean,” is just another form of criticism and is not a gentle start up. 

When you are starting a conversation about how you feel, especially negatively, the goal is to stick to the narrative of how you feel. Using feeling words, such as: disappointed, deflated, disheartened, anxious, nervous, lonely, etc, are words that express how you actually feel. Using an ‘I Statement’ shifts from blame or criticism of your friend, to expressing how a situation left you feeling. This can help open the door for empathy, understanding, and can lead to resolving conflict if the other person is able to appreciate your sharing of feelings, and validate how something made you feel. 

Build A Culture Of Appreciation

Remind yourself of your (friend’s) positive qualities, and find gratitude for positive actions (Gottman). 

Even in conflict, there are good qualities in your friend, and you need to express them in order to have a better chance at having a healthy friendship. 

Think about this: How would you feel if your friend only looked at all of the negative things, and never the positive? It would feel defeating and futile to even bring up an issue. 

When positive things are folded into conflict, it can help diffuse the heat of the moment, and help you both refocus your attention on what is working and what is important. Highlighting the positive things helps both of you get off of the hamster wheel, and allows you to walk towards resolving conflict by building on your strengths. 

It can sound like this, “Even though this conversation is hard, I’m grateful that we are having it. It shows me that you care about us, and that you want us to become stronger in our friendship. I am thankful for you being able to get through tough times with me, and I know we will be able to get to the other side.” 

Take Responsibility

Accept your (friend’s) perspective and offer an apology for any wrongdoing. (Gottman). 

As stated in the Friendship Part 1: Red Flags, people can confuse validating someone’s feelings for coddling them. Coddle means, “to treat in an indulgent or overprotective way,” compared to validate, which means, “to recognize or affirm the validity or worth of (a person or their feelings or opinions,” according to the dictionary. 

From a therapist’s perspective, I cannot confirm nor deny what did or did not happen outside of the therapy room. What I can confirm is how you felt about something that you experienced. The same is true for friends: each person will have a different recollection of what happened, and each person will have feelings about what happened. What doesn’t matter is who’s right or who’s wrong. What matters is validating the other person’s experience. Friends, like romantic partners, often get caught up in the trap of wanting to get the ‘facts’ of the story straight. The problem with that is this: each person might remember things differently, and each person may feel differently about what they perceived happened. 

Additionally, if you or your friend feel negatively about something that happened, it is important for the other person to take responsibility for being part of that pain. You can still apologize for how you contributed to someone else’s hurt feelings, even if you did not intend to cause it, nor did so on purpose. 

Physiological Self-Soothing 

Take a break and spend that time doing something soothing and distracting (Gottman). 

Before things get too heated, people skip this step and go straight for the throat. When we look at anger biologically, the Gottmans explain that our pre-frontal cortex shuts down when we are in a heated debate. The prefrontal cortex is important because it is the part of the brain that is able to think clearly, rationally, and logically. It is the part of the brain that knows consequences, like, “Don’t step in that hole, otherwise you’ll fall down the well.” Similarly, it is the part of the brain that says, “Don’t say that; that’s mean.” 

When we are in high stress or high conflict, this part of the brain turns OFF, and we start to say things that we inevitably regret later. The good news is that if you are able to stop yourself from getting so worked up, go take a break from the conversation and commit to returning, you will allow that part of your brain to turn back ON. 

Friends who are able to recognize that the conversation is starting to be unproductive and take a break, with an agreement to return to the conversation, oftentimes will have a better success rate. This is the opposite of stonewalling, which you learned about in Friendship Part 1: Red Flags. It is an agreement to cool off, and return when both parties are able to think more clearly. Taking a timeout, going to watch a show or go for a run, helps to regulate the body so that the prefrontal cortex is back online. 

Again, taking a break is not the same as stonewalling. Someone who is stonewalling has no intention of returning with an open mind. Taking breaks to cool down, and committing to trying again later is the way to go. 

Remember: conflict in friendships is normal. In fact, healthy conflict can bring friends closer together. Being able to maturely get through hard times with the skills above sets friends up for success in the long run. It is naive to think that you will never have tension, differing viewpoints, or negative feelings in a friendship. 

Those who deal with them ineffectively and are emotionally charged, tend to set fires in their friendships, leaving behind burned bridges and open wounds. Those who are able to tolerate uncomfortable conversations, emotionally regulate, validate someone else’s viewpoint (even if they don’t agree), and take responsibility for their part in the conflict, will be more likely to succeed as friends.

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Natalie Frazier, LMFT

Natalie's work is primarily focused on Couples and Individual Adults. She is experienced in grief and loss counseling, traumas (sexual and life-threatening), marital relations (including communication skills and infidelity), and emotion regulation (such as anger management and depression). She seeks to be an ally to all communities.