I’ve gotten into these with my wife, where I will be doing something thinking I am waiting for her, and she will be doing something thinking she is waiting for me. Asking this question periodically can help end deadlocks.
Normally, we just stop whatever it is that we’re doing while waiting, and proceed to whatever it was we are going to be doing once we were both ready, because most of the time, we were both ready, we just thought the other person was not ready, and so we were waiting for them to be ready.
That being said, there are exceptions (where one person really isn’t ready and is distracted as opposed to waiting), but even in the case of those exceptions, asking the question will generally also kick people out of a distracted mode as well.
Interesting. My fiancee and I get stuck in similar loops, but to use your distinction, she seems to get distracted rather than finding something that can be easily stopped once I’m ready.
“Are we in a waiting loop?”
I’ve gotten into these with my wife, where I will be doing something thinking I am waiting for her, and she will be doing something thinking she is waiting for me. Asking this question periodically can help end deadlocks.
How do you respond when the answer is”yes?”
Normally, we just stop whatever it is that we’re doing while waiting, and proceed to whatever it was we are going to be doing once we were both ready, because most of the time, we were both ready, we just thought the other person was not ready, and so we were waiting for them to be ready.
That being said, there are exceptions (where one person really isn’t ready and is distracted as opposed to waiting), but even in the case of those exceptions, asking the question will generally also kick people out of a distracted mode as well.
Interesting. My fiancee and I get stuck in similar loops, but to use your distinction, she seems to get distracted rather than finding something that can be easily stopped once I’m ready.