Welcome to this Positive Living Skills series. This is Dr. María José Ramírez from www.mjperformanceconsulting.com
Many of us may believe that how we respond when a loved one is in distress reflects how strong our relationship is, however, a better predictor of the quality and longevity of our relationship is how we respond when someone shares something that they are happy about.
These interactions may seem insignificant, they may take only two minutes, but they are very powerful and that is what I am going to talk about today.
Responding to good news.
Shelly Gable, a psychologist at the University of California in Santa Barbara, conducted research on how we respond to others when they share with us their good news and how that influences the relationship.
She argued that there are four ways in which people respond to good news:
– Active Constructive
– Passive Constructive
– Active Destructive
– Passive destructive
There are many reasons behind the way we respond the way we do.
we may be busy or worried about something else, we may not share the same enthusiasm, we may not be interested, the news may not involve us or maybe we don’t understand what they are talking about.
However, paying attention to how we respond when others share their good news for us is important because they are choosing us to share something important for them, and that is a gift. It is an opportunity to experience positive emotions.
How we respond to good news strengthens our relationship with that person, and positive events take place more often than negative ones.
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