By Dr. Deborah Holt, PhD, LMFT-S, Co-Founder & Executive Director, and Sharla Austin, MS, LMFT, Co-Founder & Director of Clinical Care, Relational Therapy Collective
Inspired by a personal experience shared by Sharla Austin, this article explores how multiple perspectives shape our relationships and how curiosity can create opportunities for deeper understanding and connection.
As marriage and family therapists, we recognize that two people can experience the same interaction and walk away with entirely different understandings of what occurred.
In relationships, individuals often assume that what seems obvious to them must be equally apparent to someone else. Yet perspectives are shaped by personal histories, emotional experiences, expectations, and the meanings assigned to what is perceived.
An ordinary Saturday afternoon between a mother and her young son offers a simple yet meaningful illustration of how two perspectives can coexist, even when they initially appear contradictory.
The Heart or the Butt
One Saturday afternoon, I was tidying up the kitchen while my young son played nearby. I placed a decorative heart-shaped bowl on the counter. It had been a wedding gift, and I treasured it as a small reminder of love and connection in our home.
“Come look, sweet boy,” I said. “Do you like our bowl?”
He looked up, scrunched his face, and appeared puzzled.
“Mommy, why do we have a bowl that looks like a butt?”
I laughed. “A butt? It’s not a butt. It’s a heart!”
He was emphatic.
“It’s not a heart. It’s a butt, Mommy.”
For a moment, we went back and forth, each of us insisting that we were right.
Then something shifted. Rather than continuing to convince him of what I knew to be true, I became curious about what he was seeing.
I crouched down beside him and looked at the bowl from where he stood.
And there it was.
From his vantage point, the bowl really did look like a butt.
“You’re right!” I told him, laughing. “From down here, it does look like a butt!”
Then I picked him up so he could see the bowl from where I had been standing.
Looking down at it, his face lit up.
“Mommy, it’s a heart too! We were both right!”
And just like that, a simple moment in our kitchen became a lesson about the importance of perspective.
Two Perspectives, Two Realities
What makes this interaction particularly meaningful is not simply that a mother and her son perceived the same object differently. It is the certainty with which each understood what they were seeing.
From the mother's vantage point, the bowl was unmistakably a heart. From her son's perspective, it resembled a butt.
Neither was intentionally misunderstanding the other. Both were responding to the same object from different positions. Their perspectives were different, yet each experience made sense from where they stood.
Relationships often work much the same way.
Two people can participate in the same conversation, share an experience, or witness the same event and come away with profoundly different understandings of what occurred. These interpretations can subsequently influence how each person feels, responds, and relates to the other.
One partner may experience silence as an opportunity to pause and gather their thoughts, while the other experiences that same silence as emotional distance or rejection.
A parent may believe they are offering guidance out of love and concern, while their child experiences those same words as criticism or disappointment.
One person may interpret a question as an invitation to connect, while another experiences it as an indication that they have done something wrong.
As human beings, we are meaning-making creatures. We do not merely experience events; we interpret them, assign meaning to them, and respond in ways that reflect those meanings. While the interaction may be the same, the meanings each person assigns to it can be remarkably different.
The way we make sense of our experiences is influenced by everything we bring into them—our personal histories, the relationships that have mattered to us, what we have come to expect from others, and the experiences that have left us feeling loved, hurt, understood, or misunderstood.
From a systemic perspective, this reflects the importance of multiple subjective realities: the recognition that individuals can experience and interpret the same interaction differently. Although these realities are subjective, they are no less real to the individuals experiencing them.
Honoring multiple realities invites us to acknowledge that another person's experience can be profoundly different from our own, while remaining equally meaningful and worthy of understanding. Rather than approaching these differences as competing versions of what occurred, we can become curious about the experiences, emotions, and interpretations that inform each person’s perspective.
As Dr. Holt often emphasizes in her clinical work, relationships involve learning to dance in multiple realities. Meaningful connection requires more than recognizing that different perspectives exist; it invites curiosity, flexibility, and compassion while honoring both individuals’ experiences.
Much like a dance, navigating multiple realities involves an ongoing process of attunement, responsiveness, and mutual adjustment. At times, individuals may move together with ease; at others, they may struggle to find a shared rhythm.
The goal is not to determine whose perspective is correct or persuade another person to adopt it, but to develop the mutual understanding necessary to navigate those differences together.
When Being Right Gets in the Way of Understanding
Consider how often relational conflict becomes a struggle over whose interpretation is correct.
“That's not how it happened.”
“You're missing my point.”
“I don't understand how you could see it that way.”
“That's not what I was trying to communicate.”
What may begin as an attempt to clarify an experience can gradually become a disagreement over whose understanding of the interaction is more accurate.
As individuals become increasingly invested in explaining or defending their perspectives, opportunities to consider another person's experience may begin to diminish.
Consider two family members recalling the same gathering. One remembers an enjoyable afternoon filled with conversation and laughter, while the other recalls feeling overlooked or excluded. Both attended the same gathering, yet their attention, emotional experiences, and interpretations led them to understand it differently.
When these differing perspectives are met with curiosity, they offer an opportunity to learn something about each other's experiences. However, when one person responds by challenging the validity of the other's recollection, the conversation can shift from sharing experiences to defending them.
One person may offer additional details to explain their perspective, while the other responds with examples intended to demonstrate why their interpretation is more accurate. What began as an opportunity to understand one another can become a struggle to establish whose experience is valid.
In these moments, the challenge is not necessarily the existence of different perspectives, but the difficulty of making room for an experience that differs from one's own.
When individuals become preoccupied with establishing the validity of their own reality, curiosity can give way to certainty, and opportunities for mutual understanding may become increasingly limited.
Yet what becomes possible when the focus shifts from proving a point to understanding another perspective?
Instead of asking:
“How can I make you understand what I see?”
Consider asking:
“What are you seeing from where you stand that I may be missing?”
This shift invites individuals to move beyond defending their own interpretations and become genuinely curious about the experiences informing another person's perspective.
The goal is not necessarily to establish one correct interpretation, but to create space for understanding what each person sees, experiences, and assigns meaning to.
The Power of Moving Toward Another Perspective
Perhaps the most meaningful aspect of the interaction between Sharla and her son was not the discovery that the bowl resembled two different things.
It was the willingness to move beyond a single vantage point.
As long as Sharla remained standing, she could only see the bowl from her own position. And as long as she insisted that her perspective was the correct one, there was little opportunity to understand what her son was seeing.
But when she crouched down beside him, something changed.
Rather than attempting to correct his perception, she became interested in understanding it.
And when she lifted him up to see what she saw, he was able to recognize her perspective without having to give up his own.
Neither person needed to be wrong for the other to be understood.
What began as two competing interpretations became an opportunity for shared understanding.
There is something beautiful about what becomes possible when curiosity takes the place of certainty. When individuals become genuinely interested in understanding another person's experience, differences no longer have to become sources of division. Instead, they can become opportunities for discovery, empathy, and deeper connection.
In a world where people can be quick to defend their own perspectives, perhaps one of the most meaningful things we can offer one another is the willingness to become curious about what we do not yet understand.
This is an important capacity in relationships. Perspective-taking does not require agreement, nor does it mean setting aside one's own feelings, needs, or boundaries. Rather, it involves recognizing that another person's experience can be just as meaningful to them as our own is to us.
In clinical practice, this is one of the capacities we seek to strengthen in couples, families, and individuals: the ability to slow down, recognize emotional responses, and explore the experiences that influence how people understand and relate to one another.
When individuals feel genuinely heard and understood, they may become less compelled to defend their positions. This creates greater opportunities for empathy, emotional safety, and connection.
From Competing Realities to Shared Understanding
The objective of perspective-taking is not necessarily to arrive at one shared interpretation of what happened.
Two people may continue to understand an experience differently, even after listening carefully to one another.
Meaningful connection does not require identical perspectives.
Rather, it requires a willingness to recognize that one's own experience, however real and important, may not encompass the entirety of another person's experience.
In close relationships, individuals often long not only to be heard, but to feel understood. They want others to recognize the intentions behind their actions, the emotions beneath their reactions, and the experiences that inform how they respond.
Dr. Holt often reminds clients that we are our most optimal selves when logic and affect are in balance and work in harmony, because that is where empathy lives. Our emotions help us recognize what matters to us, while our capacity for reflection allows us to consider perspectives beyond our own.
When emotion and reason work together, our capacity for empathy can deepen. We become better able not only to recognize what another person may be feeling, but also to appreciate how their experiences, histories, and perspectives influence the meaning they assign to an interaction.
When emotions become overwhelming, it can be difficult to consider perspectives beyond our own. Conversely, when we rely exclusively on logic while overlooking emotional experiences, we may understand another person's circumstances intellectually without fully appreciating their emotional significance.
It is through the integration of emotional sensitivity and thoughtful reflection that we create greater opportunities for empathy and mutual understanding.
Instead of focusing exclusively on who is right, the conversation can shift toward exploring what each person is experiencing, what matters to them, and why those experiences hold particular meaning.
This does not eliminate disagreement. Rather, it allows differences to be approached with greater curiosity, compassion, and an appreciation for the experiences of others.
Sometimes, meaningful connection begins not when two people finally see things the same way, but when they recognize that they do not have to in order to understand one another.
A Simple Invitation to Practice Curiosity
The next time a disagreement leaves someone feeling frustrated, confused, or convinced that another person simply cannot see what seems so obvious, it may be worth considering whether an important part of the other person's perspective has yet to be understood.
Rather than immediately attempting to persuade, consider pausing and becoming curious.
What might this interaction look like from where the other person stands?
What experiences or emotions might be influencing how they understand it?
What might be difficult to hear while defending one's own perspective?
And perhaps most importantly:
Is it possible to make room for another person's experience while honoring the significance of our own?
Relationships do not require people to see everything the same way in order to remain connected. Sometimes, meaningful change begins with a willingness to consider a perspective beyond one's own.
After all, sometimes the bowl really does look like a heart.
And sometimes, from where someone else is standing, it looks like a butt.
Both perspectives may have something important to teach us.
How We Help at Relational Therapy Collective
At Relational Therapy Collective in Dallas, we help couples, families, and individuals better understand the perspectives, emotional experiences, and relational patterns that shape their interactions.
Through a systemic, attachment-informed approach, therapy provides a space to explore recurring patterns of conflict and disconnection, develop greater awareness of personal emotional responses, and cultivate curiosity about the experiences of others.
Our work extends beyond determining who is right or wrong. We help individuals recognize how their experiences and responses influence one another, take responsibility for their contributions to relational dynamics, and develop new ways of fostering understanding, emotional connection, and meaningful change.
Because sometimes, changing the conversation begins with changing where we stand.