Venting Can Be Good – Or Destroy Relationships

Confession: I am a recovering gossiper. I was terrible. Whether it was family, friendships or work relationships, most people knew most of my business and often that of those in my circle, too.

But, if anyone would have accused me of gossiping, I would have vigorously defended myself. After all, I wasn’t gossiping.

I was venting.

“Venting” is today’s safe word for gossip. We tell ourselves that we are simply “letting off some steam” or “just reducing my emotions.” There’s value in that approach. When we talk with a trusted friend or advisor, it can help us work through the issues and reduce our emotional intensity to the point that we can start to problem-solve the situation.

But often the intent is not to problem-solve. Too many times, we wallow in the emotions. In how we were wronged. In common parlance, we take on a victim identity.

Beyond that, we often do it with the wrong people and at the wrong time, which means that it shifts from venting to complaining. Complaining turns to bashing. And the whole thing is one big, brooding nest of drama, perfect gossip-fodder.

For someone with abandonment issues, this can be a tough thing for me to manage. Over the course of our relationship, we’ve worked out some methods to help me manage this: he texts me every morning, sends me a Google map of where he’s working that night and makes an effort to reach out to me several other times during the day. It keeps me feeling connected to him.

Recently, however, the morning texts started to get skipped, and texts went unanswered all day long. Not every day, but often enough.

This was not good, and I made it worse. I became clinging and annoying, a childhood reflex to get the attention of any kind. Positive or negative, it didn’t matter to me in the moment.

I now have enough self-awareness that I knew what I was doing was unhealthy and ineffective. I knew I needed to address it with Dan, yet I also didn’t want to spoil the little time we had together by bringing up drama.

Out of desperation to get some of my feelings out, I vented to a couple of friends. To be clear: as a recovering gossiper, this is something I avoid. I now have the skills and preference to address most situations directly and healthily. This wasn’t a one-time deal; it was in my small groups, on multiple phone calls, and over text messaging.

I unleashed a round of frustration again, this time under the guise of “seeking wisdom.”

Even after all this venting, I was still living with a lot of emotion and unable to get past it. I found myself sitting on Mike’s couch a week later in a therapy session, venting again. Mike finally called me out on complaining, not venting. I realized how far afield I was when he asked me to list qualities I like about my husband.

Even with this call out, nothing changed on my side. In my next small group, I unleashed a round of frustration again, this time under the guise of “seeking wisdom.”

Finally, I realized what I was doing and knew I had to resolve the situation even at the cost of a pleasant evening. At that point, I reached out to an experienced wife in my circle, laid out the facts, and got some actual wisdom on how to handle the situation.

Eventually, Dan and I did have a conversation, and it was clear he had no idea how I was feeling. Once he understood how I was feeling and what triggered the emotion, he started taking small steps to help me feel re-connected to him.

In reflecting on this experience, it struck me how easy it is to confuse venting, complaining, and seeking wisdom. Or, at least, to convince ourselves we are seeking wisdom when we want to vent or complain.

The goal [of venting] is to reduce the emotional intensity so that we can look at the situation more objectively and determine the best path forward.

Venting is about a quick release of emotion. It’s allowing the emotional reaction to run through us. We do it in a safe place, with a safe friend or family member. It’s brief, it’s intense, and it helps us process our hurt, sadness, anger, or other strong emotion enough to get to a point where we can start to problem-solve the situation.

When we vent, we are venting about a specific situation, not a person. If I were truly venting about Dan, I would point to a specific day and a specific behavior and process the emotions I was feeling about that. It’s like lifting the lid on the pot to allow steam to escape. The goal is to reduce the emotional intensity so that we can look at the situation more objectively and determine the best path forward.

In complaining, we are no longer looking at the facts, but the story. And the story may not fit the facts.

Venting, in small doses, can be healthy behavior. Venting, taken too far, turns to complaining and becomes personal.

Complaining moves beyond venting about a situation or experience, and becomes a catalog of all the hurts and pains we’ve ever suffered at the hands of this person or group of people. We take on a role of persecutor (“I can’t believe how wrong she is”) or victim (“Why does this always happen to me?”). In its more extreme forms, complaining expands beyond the singular experience and includes other experiences that may only have a tangential or emotional relationship to the current relationship.

Whereas venting helps us move to problem-solving, complaining usually leads to more complaining. It also tends to fuel other unhappiness and relational difficulties. It creates drama, and in our openness to share, we implicitly permit others to share our situation, as well.

The thing about complaining is that it sneaks up on us. In my community, we are encouraged to “seek wisdom” when resolving a situation. In this sense, seeking wisdom is about finding someone with experience (like that seasoned wife I referenced earlier) who have walked the road before and can share thoughts and help us problem-solve the situation. The goal here is to move toward resolution.

Yet, we commonly use “seeking wisdom” as a cover to simply complain about a situation. Rather than seeking out people who we know we can specifically rely on to aid us in resolving the situation, we turn to our regular friend groups, instead. They nod their heads sympathetically and sometimes even encourage us to keep going. In a worst-case scenario, they may even pile on to the situation. “This makes me think of that one time that Sally…” or “Yeah, they are all about that drama and let me tell you…”

In complaining, we are no longer looking at the facts, but the story. And the story may not fit the facts.

The reality is that seeking wisdom is not about venting. It’s not about complaining or gossiping. It’s about problem-solving, and keeping emotions out of the way is a critical component. It’s about laying out the facts and figuring out some possible solutions or approaches. Someone with wisdom will help us separate the story from the facts and help us walk to a path to resolution.

Ultimately, however, none of these steps are useful until we have the conversation with the person or people with whom we have the issue. It doesn’t matter how much wisdom we seek (or receive) or how much venting we do; the situation is not resolved until we take the final steps to resolution.

For me, this experience helped me appreciate how far I’ve come in avoiding gossip. It also reminds me that I have a ways to go. This situation helped me understand the differences between venting, complaining, and seeking wisdom. It helped me see issues in the way that I approach and resolve problems. With my new roadmap and understanding, I’m optimistic that I will continue to grow.

After all, who likes a gossiper?

Are you a recovering gossiper? What are some things you do to resolve situations?