Bids: The Currency of All Human Relationships

…And how you can use them to fortify your relationships

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Psychologist John Gottman was troubled by the high failure rate of traditional couples counseling. Baffled, he spent many years gathering data and probing into the heart of why some marriages succeed and others fail. He can now predict with 91% accuracy whether any given couple will stay together or divorce, and has created a data-based framework for understanding and improving human relationships. Many of the concepts he has pioneered are relevant across all human relationships.

The basic unit, the atomic particle, of any human relationship is called a bid for connection. A bid is attempt from one person to another to get attention, connection, affection, emotional support, or any other kind of response. A bid can be verbal or nonverbal. All relationships are based on bids.

Here are some examples:

-Starting a conversation is a bid
-Sighing when you walk in the door is a bid
-Touching someone on the arm when you talk to them is a bid
-Complimenting someone is a bid
-Throwing someone a nasty look is a bid
-Asking an attractive stranger on the street for directions is a bid