Heart Versus Head
A podcast that helps couples fight better and connect again.
Heart Versus Head
Are Ya a Boxer or a Lumper?
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Heads tend to compartmentalize everything. Hearts are more likely to flow things together that are linked by similar emotions. This can lead to conflict in a relationship when we don't understand it or assume that our partner does it the same way as we do. Putting things in boxes also makes the Head partner seem like an uncaring narcissist or unfeeling robot. Lumping things together makes the Heart partner seem irrational at times. In this episode, Randy and Beverly offer some insight into why it happens, where it leads and how to resolve the problem. Learn more about the hosts and their work at HeartAndHeadCoaching.com
Heart Versus Head is a podcast about relationship styles and how those relationship styles influence communication in the most important relationships. The hosts - Randy Hampton and Beverly Craddock - are a married couple who are sought-after relationship coaches, award-winning authors and regular people who (like everyone in relationships) are just trying to stay connected through all the noise of life in the modern world. You can learn more about the couple and their work at HeartAndHeadCoaching.com, where you'll learn to fight better and connect again.
Welcome to Heart vs. Head, a podcast that helps couples communicate and fight better. Here are your hosts, Randy Hampton and Beverly Craddock.
SPEAKER_01:It's Randy and Beverly, and welcome to the podcast. I have to say, Randy, today's podcast almost didn't happen.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, really?
SPEAKER_01:Well, I woke up with a headache.
SPEAKER_02:Okay.
SPEAKER_01:And it might have been from the wine last night. Could have been. But who cares what it's from? I woke up with a headache. And the one thing I've noticed about hearts is that when we have a health issue, when something's going on physically with us, not just emotionally, this was strictly a headache, it's purely physical, it really makes it hard for me and for most hearts to push through that. I look at you and you tell me the stories of times where you've had just a debilitating migraine. I mean, the one that comes to mind is before the pandemic, there was a day where Randy had a migraine during a session with a client. And he said he literally, his vision was so impaired, he could not see the client, but he didn't miss a step. And he not only completed the session, the client oblivious to his migraine, but it was a bomber session. Well, like most of your sessions. Thank you.
SPEAKER_02:It's interesting because I don't, gosh, I don't know how to explain it. I know it's a thing because we've talked about it with clients, but I don't put Randy has a headache or Randy's knee is hurting into the category of that has anything to do with work.
SPEAKER_01:Right. It's this thing about putting issues in a box. Randy and I have talked about this many, many times. I believe it's in the couple's rule book, the book we wrote that's available on Amazon. Little pitch, sorry. Hearts are much more attuned to not only emotional things, but body sensations, discomfort, fatigue, changes in our mood or energy.
SPEAKER_02:You're all feelers. I mean, you feel stuff. And so I know when Beverly has a headache, she feels that. And if It affects, I guess, the ability to function sometimes on all the other levels, like doing a podcast.
SPEAKER_01:And–
SPEAKER_02:That's crazy. Partner will say, well, yeah, but I remember in 1974 when my partner did this or did that. And hearts are just so connected to all of it. How does that work for you guys?
SPEAKER_01:We don't put things in boxes. Hearts tend to really lump everything together. It's like this deep interconnected web where all of our thoughts and feelings the different relationships we have. Everything in our life is interconnected. So that's why today, a headache, my body, how I'm feeling physically. Also, it impacts my work, this podcast, even our relationship. I'm sure I've been a little bit less energy, less good mood today. It is very hard for me or for a heart to deal with that. It's very overwhelming, as you might say. say, and it's this natural tendency that hearts have when we absorb emotions from others, we read people because we care about them so much, and it's just the way that we interpret things and we give it such a bigger, broader context. And so it becomes really difficult for us to isolate things from each other or compartmentalize or put it in a box as heads do. Although I will say being married to I do see an
SPEAKER_02:advantage to doing that. All of these things. So if she wakes up and says, I have a headache, I say, we have some ibuprofen. I would be happy to get you some. I get overwhelmed even just when you start talking about trying to manage all that stuff. My brain just goes, no, I don't have time for that. We are, as heads, we are system builders. That's kind of what made me very good in the job that I had for years as a journalist and as a news director, building these systems, going in and Yeah. No, you can't yell at me and then go have a romantic lunch. I am not
SPEAKER_01:going to let you. I
SPEAKER_02:know. I know that. I have tried.
SPEAKER_01:Well, while heads have strengths in the way that you process and make decisions that way, hearts also have strengths in the way that we do it. So being naturally tuned in to emotional subtext, to things that are unspoken, nonverbal, it really helps us to understand people really so much more. And it creates that harmony. It makes us feel We're very authentic, very open and honest with genuine with who we are and what we're feeling. And it also brings up different issues, deeper issues, things that you might just brush over because you don't want to deal with the emotion. Those are things that a lot of times hearts will spot and we will press further because we think something bigger is going on. The challenge to hearts, obviously, besides the ones you've mentioned, is true It's overwhelming, but also it comes across as irrational. It comes across as crazy, especially when our emotions are very intense. And sometimes it gets in the way of solving problems. And this is where couples come in and they really are at a standstill. And it's one of those things that it's easy for Randy and I to spot once you understand hearts and heads. Beyond talking about the differences, which is great to really understand yourself your partner, how these strengths and challenges might present in your own world. We also have some tips for it, some solutions.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it's not hard to solve, and it's probably easiest to solve just by understanding a little bit about it. So the basic of it, as we've kind of already explained long, let me make the short version of it, heads are compartmentalizers. We have boxes in our mind where things go. So when When somebody says something, we say, oh, this is that, and that's where it goes. Hearts are lumpers. Everything just kind of is all interconnected, flowing not together. We process the world differently.
SPEAKER_01:Which also means we make decisions differently because of that processing. It's difficult for me, as I said, to imagine having some kind of personal disagreement where I feel somewhat attacked or get defensive and then be able to just go have a nice lunch. A lot of times this shows up when couples have a date night and maybe the topics get a bit argumentative or discussion during dinner and what was supposed to end up in some great intimacy at the end end up in this big blow up and there's no way to recover.
SPEAKER_02:Actually, I remember a Valentine's Day dinner that went that way for us. When you can say, okay Head partner is compartmentalizing this heart partner is lumping this and sit down and talk about how are you doing that? How are you processing that? How are you thinking about that? How are you feeling about that? And you can begin to be intellectually and emotionally curious with your partner. That's the biggest thing you can do. Take that kind of emotion out of it. Impossible for hearts, but kind of take the emotion out of it for a minute. Be a scientist. Ask some questions. Ask your partner, how do you do that? Because I can't do it that way. How do you do that? And it will solve a lot of these problems if you can do it in a non-confrontational, hey, I'm curious kind of way.
SPEAKER_01:Which is how we wrote the book as social scientists is we started breaking things down and every fight we had was, wait, wait, pause, hold that thought. This is good for the book. What did you just say? Why did you just say that? What was behind that? What were you thinking? What were you feeling? We started separating things, breaking them down, putting them in boxes in order to write the book, which is probably a good way to write any
SPEAKER_02:book. The best way to write a book is to actually have some subtopics.
SPEAKER_01:Makes it logical instead of a lot of books written by hearts are a little hard to follow. I will give you
SPEAKER_02:that. A little over here, a little over there. Oh, I remember this thing that, whoa, wait, where'd we go? We tell couples that all the time. We talk to couples, we say, if you really want a great relationship and you want to communicate with your partner, you really want that great relationship, write a book about relationships because it taught us so much to be able to sit back and go, why are you doing that? And not in a, why are you doing that? But in a, wait a second, I'm curious about this kind of way. And we realized we quit fighting. We just don't have disagreements that don't have a purpose. We still have disagreements. We're two different people, but we don't have disagreements that don't serve a purpose. When there is a disagreement, we're able to go, okay, what's this about? Why is it that way for you? Why is it that way for me? And we're able to make progress in our relationship. Our relationship gets stronger through the disagreements, not torn apart by the disagreements, I think, in a lot of ways.
SPEAKER_01:I would also give you some credit for recognizing that I am a heart and emotional processor. And so if something you says in the disagreement gives me that look of, oh, you just hit a nerve. then you are very good at backing up and saying, okay, pause, what just happened? What did I say? How did you hear that? What just happened? I saw something change. And that's really helpful because when you point that out, I'm able to say, well, yeah, that hurt.
SPEAKER_02:Heads, listen up. This is for the head partners out there. You are my people. Love y'all. I realized that the easiest thing to do when I would end up in those situations where Beverly would express, I'd see her face or I'd see the emotion start to come up.
SPEAKER_01:Tears.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. No, God, no, not the tears. Holy hell, I can't not with the tears. Sorry, I don't deal with tears. I know you don't. That's why you bring them out. No. I had to learn to step back when I would see those responses and just say, wait a second, stop. That's not what I was going for. That's not what I was trying to do. I wasn't trying to hurt you. I wasn't trying to make you sad. I wasn't trying to make you angry. That's not what I was going for. Here's what I was trying to say. What are you experiencing through that? And where did I go wrong in the communication? Because even that insight helps me in future communications. And maybe that's what you're talking about, about the ability to step back sometimes is I probably overstepped one time, 1,000 times. Yeah. You do have to drop a brick on my head to get me to learn I'm ahead. I think it's good to be able to gain insight to yourself and how you fight and just say, wait a second, wait a second. Okay, wait, that wasn't my intention. Because it's not. It shouldn't be. I mean, if it's your intention to hurt your partner, cool. Nobody wins. Yeah, that makes you a jerk and move on.
SPEAKER_01:Makes you alone. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Makes you a lot of things.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Some of them I
SPEAKER_02:can't say on the program. I mean, I can, I just won't. It's not our intention to hurt our partner and recognize it and be able to step back and talk about it. So for heads, the biggest thing is slow down, realize that your heart partner, the crazy one, is a little bit crazy because everything's kind of all jumbled up in their brain that way and tied together. And so when you talk about something that happened yesterday and you're like, oh, I'm sorry I did that thing, and your heart partner is like see it wasn't just that thing it was that thing you did six months ago and and you did that remember that time when we were on vacation and 10 years ago during the pandemic and you did that thing too
SPEAKER_01:we have great memories
SPEAKER_02:yeah well and you would have to everything's connected heads don't have great memories because our stuff ends up in a box in the garage of our brain we're like i don't even remember that vacation during the pandemic
SPEAKER_01:and you weren't emotional emotional and memories go together so of course you're not going to remember It
SPEAKER_02:was just a moment and it's in a box somewhere in my brain. And so hearts will be the partner that bring up a lot of stuff from the past because it's how they felt then and it's how they feel now. And you have to be aware of that. And they're not bringing up stuff to just continuously beat us up. Feels that way sometimes, but that's not what they're intending to do either. They're trying to resolve and understand the hurt and resolve and understand how it is or why it is that we hurt them. I hate to say this. This is one of those places where, sorry, heads, this is one of those places where you have to learn to apologize too.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, that's a word that's not in their vocabulary, is
SPEAKER_02:it? No, not regularly. Beverly apologizes to me all the time. I am not that person. Yeah, once a year. I'm better, I think. I'm learning. We have to be able to step back. So for heads, be willing to say, hey, I'm sorry recognize how your heart partner's doing it what advice for hearts beverly that that might help them in these situations where conflict or or communication has broken down
SPEAKER_01:well i want to first say that when you file away all of those things that's the crazy box because you don't understand the emotion to it and that's just another crazy event you know a dinner we had where there was a fight and you don't even really know why so hopefully hopefully hearts and heads or learning something today in this podcast. It is one of the key elements in this unique approach that Randy and I have with relationships when we work with couples or individuals that are in a relationship. And once people open their eyes to the differences in head and heart, how we do things differently, how we process differently, it really is a game changer. I would say 70% is just understanding the concepts here today. So if we've said something that really interests you, reach out. We have our email address.
SPEAKER_02:Info at heartandheadcoaching.com. Info at heartandheadcoaching.com.
SPEAKER_01:Just had to put a plug out there because there's a lot more to this and we are more than happy to set up a session or have some coaching around that if anybody's interested. Okay, heart partners. The thing about hearts is that when you say that we need to kind of process through this, sometimes the tears come because we actually need to release the emotion. So crying and tears are a releasing. And what I wish every head partner knew is that when your heart is crying, it's no reason for you to feel awkward or freaked out or to just pause. It's really a moment to understand what it is that we're doing. We're releasing, we're processing, and it's actually a very good thing for you and for me. It's one of the ways to avoid next week having me say, well, five years ago you did this, and apparently I didn't release that. I didn't process through it. Also, for the hearts out there, I want you to understand a few things about heads. As much as we are sarcastic about heads being narcissists and robots, which they're not.
SPEAKER_02:We just act like it.
UNKNOWN:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:They actually do have emotion. Thank you so much. wired that way. It's not that heads don't have emotion. It's just they're boxing it because they don't want to really deal with that. In order to have a meaningful conflict to fight better, I want you to not see your partner as unfeeling or unemotional, to just recognize they do it differently. And that way you're not feeling alone or detached or misunderstood. If I look at Randi and I say, okay, we're arguing about something. He seems very cut off from the emotion. He's not understanding or acknowledging what I'm going through. Then it feels like I'm an alien. We're from two different planets and therefore we're not connecting at all. And connection is our oxygen. If I feel like an alien with him, we're not going to resolve this. This is going to leave me feeling worse. And this probably is very beneficial for heads where You've had a conflict. You've had the crying. You've had the arguing. You go to bed each mad. The next morning you wake up, she's still not talking. Well, guess what? There's a lot of this that's going on. If you don't acknowledge a heart and the feeling that we're having, then we will feel like an alien and even more disconnected. So what I want you to do is, first of all, recognize the differences as we've explained. Secondly, I want you to start conflicts and fights with a Establishing that you're a team. Recognizing that we're on the same team here and we're just working on an issue. We're not breaking up. This isn't about me not being satisfied in the relationship. This is about resolving this issue. Nothing personal. And if you kind of set the ground rules with that, the shared intention of what we're doing, then a heart has a better chance of giving that open space and look What hearts want is we want to be heard, understood, and we want to connect while we do it. We don't want to sit like robots and put things in boxes and check, check, check, on goes our life because that's just not the way it works for us. It's very uncaring, unconnected, again, makes me feel like an alien. So once we set that intention, then we can feel safe. I feel safe. And this is where heads need to be patient. Hearts have a lot of words, and we need that time to express, even if we bring up things from the past. Your job is to listen, to acknowledge. If Randy's just sitting there and he's not shaking his head or asking questions or acknowledging, I will repeat and repeat and repeat. The
SPEAKER_02:horse is dead.
SPEAKER_01:Yes.
SPEAKER_02:Stop beating it. The horse is dead. is dead.
SPEAKER_01:But if I get a few head nods and, oh, that makes sense, so forth, now I feel acknowledged and understood. I don't need to beat the dead horse. And we can be done with that more quickly. If I'm crying, I expect a hug, even if what we're talking about is not something that you've done to me or you feel responsible for. After that, then you can kind of say back to me in your acknowledgement, okay, so this is the way that if I understand you correctly. This is what you're saying. This is what you were feeling. That was not your intent. Obviously, give me your perspective. It helps if you can even throw in a little bit of emotion. Here's maybe what you were thinking, what was going on in your mind, reminding me that you do love me. You never want to hurt me. Sorry would be nice. And acknowledging that maybe I felt alone or attacked, so forth. Now that we've done all the hard part, it's really then just about breaking it down and saying, what can we do moving forward? What would feel better next time? And each person has a role in that. It's kind of hard to break it down generally here, but each person would know in each situation what we would do different and what I need from you, what you need from me. No one's perfect, but we can agree going forward as a team, we're going to do our part as much as we can, a little bit of grace, maybe check in in a week or two, see how it's going. And what we find is that when we present this to clients, it's actionable, it's simple, and clients are just amazed at how much better things go. Again, no one's perfect. There can be stumbling blocks along the way. We've obviously oversimplified this. However, for the podcast, Keeping Things Short, this is really a good way to understand one another and to do better, to understand and have empathy, compassion, to be a team, and then to really solve things. And both partners can really excel in that.
SPEAKER_02:Absolutely. All right. We've probably given enough words and beat that horse. The ability of heads to compartmentalize things and the process of lumping things that hearts go through is super complex. We have pretty much simplified it. We will be back to it in future podcasts with But that's everything for today. We are very happy that you tuned in and would just love seeing around the world where some of the folks that are tuning into the podcast are coming from and things like that. So glad to have you along for the ride for Heart vs. Head. We will talk to you next time.
SPEAKER_00:Thanks for listening. Thanks for listening to Heart vs. Head. You can learn more at heartandheadcoaching.com and check out new podcast episodes every Wednesday. If you have a question for Randy and Beverly, send an email to info at heart and head coaching dot com.
