Coopertive Cooperation

Ms and I have had a rough couple of days. Working with your partner, your spouse, is a great thing, and Ms and I have mutual admiration for each other's talent. But working together doesn't resemble the frolicking pillow-fights in our lingerie that you'd like to imagine it would. (Okay, perhaps sometimes it does.) And the last couple of days have been ripe with misunderstandings, short tempers, and trouble seeing eye-to-eye .
It's hard work hashing out two different creative visions for the same idea and not leaving one person feeling shorted in the process. In these last couple of days Ms and I have been trying to tackle the beginnings of a handful of pet projects and I've come to the conclusion that there are some basic rules one should follow when working with a partner -- especially when that partner is also someone with whom you share a bed and a bank account.
The first rule is that you must always, ALWAYS respect the other person's idea. Even if you think it's crap. Furthermore, even if you do think it's crap you must also listen fully to the other person's thoughts before you offer a careful, and clearly spoken argument against them.
The second rule relates to procedure. I have found it is quite beneficial, even for the most wildly creative personalities, to outline a method for organizing your work. If there is more than one project on the table then start at the "project" level and find a way to physically separate each of them. Write them on a dry erase board or stick post-its on the wall, something. Otherwise you can talk yourself around in big circles and manage only to feel completely overwhelmed.
And third, you should establish at the beginning of the process what method you will be using to cooperatively work together. Ms and I are writers. For us, it is not the most productive to talk through every adjective and punctuation mark. We work better writing individually and then merging ideas and editing each other's work. But that's not true of all co-writers, so find your own way. Really, most importantly, keep your priorities straight. If you don't have fun working with each other than it's not worth it. Even if you're both brilliant. Be brilliant on your own.

~ Miss