How to Be Less Emotionally Reactive in Your Relationship

It’s completely natural to have strong feelings in response to different triggers or scenarios as we move through life. How we react when we feel strong emotions is often learned and repeated from what we observe growing up. Sometimes, these reactions can become maladaptive responses that may hinder or harm our most important relationships. Chronic emotional reactivity can lead to frequent or spiraling conflicts, poor communication, decreased trust, and challenges fostering deep, meaningful bonds with important people in our lives

With expert insight, we’re diving into what emotional reactivity looks like and why it’s important to manage our emotional reactions. We’re also offering practical advice and actionable steps you can take to become less reactive, so you can foster healthy and harmonious relationships.

Understanding Emotional Reactivity

Also referred to as emotional dysregulation, emotional reactivity is when a person reacts—often via anger, snapping, sadness, or stress—to an outside stressor disproportionate to the trigger. Emotionally reactive people often feel they have no control over their actions.

“People who react this way usually do it impulsively, and they may find they regret their actions later,” says therapist Anna Marchenko, LMHC, MA, EdM. “Many people who emotionally react may say hurtful things to others in moments of anger, cry uncontrollably, shout or raise their voice at others, throw things or hit walls, or have moods that change quickly and without warning.”

When unchecked, volatile emotional reactivity can negatively impact our relationships. It can lead to spiraling fights that are difficult (or impossible) to resolve, affect communication and trust, and hinder your ability to deeply connect with your partner. 

Common Triggers of Emotional Reactivity 

The origin of emotional dysregulation is different for everyone, notes psychotherapist Lisa Brateman, LCSW, author of “What Are We Really Fighting About?” “It could be PTSD, trauma, neglect, abuse, trust issues, stress, and mood disorders that can contribute to the dysregulation,” she says. “Stress brings about mood changes and lowers the ability to self-regulate and hear things objectively.”

Common triggers may include:

• Reminders of past abuse or neglect, such as loss, abandonment, or harm
• Feeling unsafe or threatened
• Experiencing rejection
• Feeling like you need to explain or defend yourself
• Being blamed
• Feeling ashamed in response to not feeling worthy or like you are not enough

Why It’s Important to Manage Reactivity

The benefits of being less reactive can dramatically improve the quality of all your interactions with others. It will especially impact your closest relationships—including your romantic partnership—since these are the people you interact with most often and are likely to experience all sides of you.

“All your relationships will benefit from more productive conversations instead of one that begins with impulsivity and extreme responses and reactions,” Brateman says. “You will be able to reduce those knee jerk reactions that causes stress and harm to yourself and others. It will also show your willingness to stay emotionally present.” Ultimately, being less reactive translates to balanced emotional well-being.

6 Strategies for Being Less Emotionally Reactive

Knowing the benefits of being less emotionally reactive is one thing. Figuring out how to manage your responses is another. Here are some practical steps you can take.

Identify & Share Your Triggers

While personal work is critical when managing emotional responses, working with a partner can be beneficial too! One of the best ways to do this, says Brateman, is to identify your triggers and speak openly and honestly about them with your partner. When your significant other is aware of your potential triggers, they can better navigate scenarios or even adapt how they communicate with you.

It may be helpful to reflect on your triggers when you're calm and grounded. Do you notice any patterns around the conversational topics or circumstances that cause you to become extremely upset, angry, or reactive? Are there certain words, phrases, or scenarios that set you off? If so, what are they?

Develop Active Listening Skills

Developing active listening skills is important for reducing emotional reactivity. “Avoid talking over each other or only focusing on the part you don’t like,” Brateman says. “Utilizing these listening skills can shift your behavior by responding to what you heard instead of reacting to fear.”

You can practice active listening skills by repeating what you heard and using phrases like: "What I'm hearing you say is [repeat what you heard]. Is that correct?" Sometimes, we react to what we think we are hearing. And that triggers old stories or insecurities. Thus, we're unable to hear and understand what is actually being said. Practicing active listening skills can help.

Embrace Pauses

An aspect of active listening is to take a moment to pause before responding. Dr. Machenko says this might look like taking a deep breath or waiting a few seconds to respond. Silence is OK and gives you time to process and intentionally respond versus impulsively reacting.

In a very heated situation when you are triggered or activated into fight or flight mode, taking a break by walking away entirely can be helpful and protect you and the person you are interacting with. However, it’s important to state that you need some time to cool down versus just walking away without warning. Also, communicate when you will come back to resolve the argument.

This can sound like, "I need to take a break right now and I will be back in twenty minutes." Research studies show that it can take at least 20 minutes for your nervous system to calm down when it is activated and during this break, it is important not to replay or think about the triggering event. Journaling, going for a walk, listening to music or a podcast, or doing something else completely can help with emotional regulation and cooling down.

Ask Questions & Gain Clarity

Another way to actively listen and not react strongly is to ask your partner to clarify what they meant or what they intended by a statement or action. This inquisitive and logic-forward approach gives you both a chance to calmly discuss the topic, and your desire to lash out will diminish.

Assume Positive Intention

We tend to react more strongly to negative situations. By spinning the narrative and assuming positive intentions from our partner, we’re less apt to have an eruptive emotional reaction.

“Instead of reacting, ask yourself what your partner is thinking or feeling, what they might be experiencing, and what it is they want from you,” Dr. Marchenko advises. “Listen to what they say before you respond calmly.”

Giving your partner this charitable view—versus filling in the gaps with negative thoughts—can help you view them with more softness, making you less inclined to be triggered. Practice seeing your partner as your teammate, not your enemy.

Work With a Therapist

Working with a therapist can help speed up the process of improved emotional regulation. In some cases, a therapist may even be necessary for you to identify your triggers and work through them.

“A therapist is trained to help people improve their emotional stability, and [can also] offer different types of therapy such as cognitive behavior therapy, emotion-focused coping, and dialectical behavior therapy,” Dr. Marchenko says. “These therapies give emotionally reactive people the tools they need to cope with stressful situations outside the therapist’s office.”

A therapist can also provide tools and practices to help you process your emotions with less reactivity. They'll be able to identify the root of your reactivity and heal it from the source.

As with anything, the process of becoming more emotionally regulated takes time and practice, and the journey will include some natural ups and downs. Grant yourself grace and self-compassion along the way and stay the course. The work can be well worth it as learning to decrease your emotional reactivity and improving your emotional responses and communication can deepen closeness, trust, and intimacy in all of your relationships.