A client of mine, Erin, feels like she has the same frustrating conversation with her husband on at least a weekly basis.

She's an external processor, so after a stressful day at work, she finds it helpful to come home and talk about all the challenges she's dealing with. For her, it's just a way of decompressing and venting out her feelings of the day.

Her husband, on the other hand, is a problem-solver. He's logical by nature, plus his job requires him to be in solution-mode all day long. So the moment she starts talking about her problems at work, he starts offering solutions.

The problem is that, when Erin's in venting-mode, she's not ready to talk about solutions. She just needs to release some stress without the pressure to DO anything about it just yet. So she gets frustrated by him constantly trying to "fix" the problem, and he gets frustrated that she's not open to his solutions.

Erin has tried to ask him to just listen when she's venting, and he gives it his best effort. But because he cares about her happiness, and because he's such a natural problem-solver, it's hard for him to simply listen when she's complaining.

So eventually, the conversation devolves back into him offering solutions, her shutting them down and feeling unheard, him feeling aggravated and helpless, and ultimately … them both feeling disconnected.

She asked me, "Is there a better way I can ask him for what I need in those situations?" I told her, "Sure, there are always ways you can communicate more clearly. But I don't think that's going to change much for you here. What you really need is to stop going to the hardware store for milk."

In this week's blog, I'm sharing what the heck I mean by this, plus some ways you're probably "going to the hardware store for milk" and how to get what you *really* need from your relationships, your career, and every other area of life.

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My previous blog: Are you an internal or external processor?

Rachel's previous blog: How to know when it's time to quit (a job, or anything else)

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