Hello and welcome to Being Well. I'm Forrest Hanson. If you're new to the podcast, thanks for joining us today and if you've listened before, welcome back. I've been looking forward to doing this episode for literally years. I'm joined today by my wonderful partner and an associate therapist, Elizabeth Ferreira. So, Elizabeth, how are you doing today? I'm doing great. I'm really glad that you're here. Yeah, I am too. And I'm glad to be here.
I'm glad we're sitting down having this conversation. Yeah. So, we wanted to talk about relationships today and we've wanted to do an episode like this forever in part because hello or in a relationship, but also because people come to you to talk about a wide variety of issues. You focus on somatic interventions and particularly on helping people with trauma. A lot of trauma is relational in nature, which means a lot of the time people are talking to you about their relationships. I think their current relationships, past relationships are, hey, relationships that they want to be.
They want to create in the future. And so I wanted to start by just running an idea by you that I've been thinking about a little bit. So. So I think that a lot of the time people are carrying around this myth that we perpetuate about relationships, that a relationship solves your problems.
So, if you're a person who is going to be your principal, come, you will find the person who is going to deliver you from your circumstance, whether your circumstances, a life circumstance or something going on inside of you that you don't like. And hey, when you meet that person, everything will just click. It'll be beautiful and we'll figure it out together.
In my experience, it's almost exactly the opposite of that relationships reveal your problems. Even if they're with an incredible person, I think that we both had a lot of problems that were revealed by our relationship. So we have a great relationship that I'm super happy with. Yeah, no, I think your spot one that, you know, when we're in relationship with another person, they're able to witness us sometimes better than we can witness ourselves.
And I think to some degree, the healthy impulse of a relationship is to reflect back to your partner, hey, like, look at it. Yeah, totally. But in that natural kind of impulse, we can do a lot of harm to each other. And it can create a lot of conflict that actually challenges or threatens the attachment. And so it's sort of like, well, how do you hold up a compassionate mirror for your partner and make that reflection without being like, you're a mess.
And mean and to fix yourself. And goddamn it. I'm so sick of this. And I think that if somebody hears that, they might naturally think something like, well, does that mean that I need to be a perfectly mentally healthy person before I get into a relationship? And clearly, that's not what we're saying here, right? I wasn't. Yeah. I still have not. So we're still working on that one.
So, but I think you need to have enough self awareness to be able to separate out whose problem is this that we're dealing with right now? Whose material is coming into the room right now? Is this my material? Is this your material or is this material that we have together based on the way that we're interacting inside of this relationship? And I don't know if that self awareness is like the number one relational scale that I would mention to people, but it's not the very, very short list.
I would say it's a pretty big one. So yeah, I'm with you. And I want by no means what we're saying to contribute to that sort of myth that once you're healed, which I have no idea what that word means anymore.
You know, whatever that means, like once you reach that unattainable thing that clearly you are not now, that then you will be worthy of a relationship. And I think every human being is innately worthy of being in a kind compassionate, loving, healthy relationship, no matter where they are on their healing journey.
So kind of within that, just speaking back to that foundational ability to be self aware. And how I define that is there's a part of you that's able to observe what's happening while you are a participant in that action. Like can you kind of witness yourself? Are you able to hear the tone that's coming out of your mouth? A lot of the time when we talk about self-awareness, it's in the frame of you need to be aware of your own content. And that is a really big part of it.
But sometimes you also need to be aware of one, it's the other person's content. And so people can kind of err on either side here. There are definitely people who get into a relationship or are just in an inter, and we're using the word relationship really broadly here. So this could be the relationship you have with your mom or with your partner or with your dog. Yes. Or with your boss at work, whatever it is, like our issues can get exacerbated by any kind of relationship.
So you might be in one of those, one of those diets, one of those relationships. And start to feel some uncomfortable feelings inside. Some painful feelings in your stomach, some weird feelings, some weird feelings of anxiety, some fears are starting to bubble up. And you attribute those as problems that the other person is causing.
This person is causing my anxiety, they're causing my fear, they're causing my frustration. So that's one kind of problem. When in truth, that issue is located inside of you somewhere. So a pattern around anxiety that's coming forward right now because of what's happening inside of the relationship. There are also plenty of people who feel those feelings and they go, this is all me, this is all me all the time.
When the truth is that there is something that's happening in the other person, that is causing them to feel that way. So either way is possible here. And I'm wondering what you think helps people develop that discernment.
Well, my first curiosity is what is it, what is it like to explore the opposite? So if someone comes in and is saying, it's all my fault, I'm the problem. I keep blah, blah, blah. It's like, hmm, are you also able to explore how maybe your partner might be contributing to this experience. And vice versa, if someone comes in and is really like blaming me and maybe shame me to their partner and is like, it's all their problem, right.
You see, okay, well, how much can we tolerate perhaps seeing if we can observe what the opposite is like, who will, what might you be bringing into the relationship? What might you be coming in and not in a judgmental or shameful way. But just to be authentically curious about it, because often when we're in relationship, our parts start to play with each other, you know, thinking that an I come from the sense that the self is multi-dimensional, made up of many parts.
Very IFC. Yeah. So if there is a point of tension or conflict, do you go, or do you go, this might be an opportunity to learn more about myself. Yeah, I think that's a curiosity is a huge part of it. Like speaking personally, as you are very familiar with, I was, I had a lot of view what I was the agroversa, and I still have a lot of view. I have a view driven human being. I have a perspective on the rights and the wrongs and all of the ways in which we should or shouldn't be behaving.
But. Yeah, but gift of justice. Oh, thank you. That's very sweet and kind of way to put it. So thank you Elizabeth. I think that for a long time, it might have had a justice orientation, but it was delivered in like really shitty wrapping paper. Yeah. And I had a lot of attachment to those views. We talk about attachment to view a lot in Buddhism. And I was just really wrapped up in those, those stances and as time has gone on, I've, I've developed a little bit more space in them.
It's still a tendency that I have, and it's just like a part of who I am. And I don't dislike that tendency. By developing a little room around it has been immensely helpful for me as time has gone on. And so that idea of exploring the opposite, you know, you have to be open to the possibility that the opposite is true in a order to explore it. Right. And so that's just like a really useful practice for life in general, but definitely for a relationship side.
I know what's what's the what's the version of that for you. So I have a part that can feel like my partner can't attune to me. Like can't can't give me what I need. And you know, divine from the wall, like how I'm feeling. You can't read the room. Okay, can't read the bones. Yeah. And I think, you know, this definitely showed up in our relationship, but it showed up in previous relationships that I had, where I would feel very left out.
Or I'm a little shy for some reason today to say abandoned, but it was sort of like I took it as a clear signal of, oh, this person just isn't for me. Like, this is wrong. This isn't going to work. And it fed into my own sort of limiting beliefs that I'm just a really complicated person that is never really going to find a healthy relationship because most of the time I don't really like anybody.
You know, and that was coming from a resentment of having never felt met by someone that, you know, that no one could ever really enter my world and join me. I was always the one joining out. What helped you interrogate that? Well, you're kind of going to like this.
That's fine because it's because, well, I think I'd be surprised by the amount of the same page of your reaction because I think that over time, I certainly had become better at reading you interpreting what you need, being sensitive and responsive. Like all of those normal good relationship. Yeah.
But man, I think the big change has been in you and in your accepting the good enough partner to put it a certain kind of way rather than the perfect partner that doesn't actually exist. And it feels like you've gotten more okay over time with with me being 80% right. And that being enough. Is that a fair? Is that a fair read? Yeah, I think so. You know, I'm feeling I'm feeling what you're putting down is feeling true. Yeah. I'm vibrated the right direction. Yeah, babe, you're doing it.
So to get back kind of like to your question and maybe working our way backwards, I think what also helped with that too was that as you became less rigid on what was right and wrong. It allowed me to advocate more for what I actually needed because I no longer felt like I was going to be just. Yeah, I didn't feel like I was going to be told, oh no, Elizabeth, that's not how you be. That's not what you do.
And instead you started to go, I believe you, I believe what you're asking for and I will give it to you. And that really allowed me to start to feel because now I was really getting what I needed that when it was, you know, the 80% there it was like, you know, close enough, you know, it gave us both grace, I feel right on.
But I think what really helped me in this kind of arcans back to that self awareness piece was there was a certain point in our relationship, you know, the great chaotic moment that was. And I was a COVID-19 and the pandemic and I was a nurse, I was not okay. My whole life flipped upside down, everything that had been a part of my identity, I felt was ripped out from under me. And so there was a lot of me being pushed into a very tight condensed transformational process.
And what honestly helped me was starting to view myself through that more psychospiritual ends and doing that shadow work piece of going, why does it bother me so much when my partner says this or why am I becoming so I'm not inside of myself when x, y and z come up and I thought, well, I can't change my partner. I have no I have no power over that. But what do I have the power over I can change myself.
And that was where I found my agency and it's also what drove me to look with more force inside of myself. And what I really realized were there were these abandoned wound and parts wounded parts of me that I couldn't even attune to that I didn't like that I was like, I don't like that part. And for a year, I tried to just cut them out, you know, be like, no, but the little shit kept coming back.
And you know, I'm still working on it, but you know, you learn to be more self compassionate and then attune to those parts. And then you don't feel like you're applying so much pressure on your partner to do something that you can't even do with yourself.
That's great answer. Super deep and thorough. There is one piece of it that stood out to me and it was just a comment you made in passing that we talk about all the time inside of our relationship, but might be new to people listening or watching. You said to paraphrase, I can't change myself or I can't change my partner, but I know I can change myself.
And I smiled and not even though we are in a what I would describe as a very open minded, malleable, receptive to the other person's input kind of relationship. Even so, that's 100% the case. Like you cannot change the person that you're with and continuing to be with somebody off of the hope that they are going to change in the exact ways that you want them to change is kind of a full zaran here.
That's kind of the paradox. If I take all of my psychic energy and I don't just mean in the woolly psychic, but you know, just to serve you. The internal psychological processes. If I take all of that and I externalize it on my partner, trying to get you to change, nothing is going to happen because you're going to become defended. You're going to have a part that goes, I don't want to give her what she wants. She's a whiny little.
And then I'm going to, there's that conflict. But if I come in with softness and I put my currency of vulnerability on the table and I go, hey, I am changing in these ways. The kind of amazing thing that happens is that you change because we're in a system together and that can't that force can't help but be channeled.
So it's sort of this in my, you know, weird and wonky neurodiverse brain kind of goes, I mean, that's kind of the way is I got to go first. If I want you to change in a way, I need to change in it first. And then at least my experience is you end up changing in the ways that I need or that I want. Totally. And it's, it's really easy. There's, there's no vulnerability and going to somebody and saying, here are all the ways that you're doing it wrong. Yeah.
That is a zero on the zero to 100 scale of vulnerability. That is a zero. But going to somebody else and saying, hey, here's what I'm seeing inside of myself. Here are the things that I'm planning on doing about it. And this is the result that I hope that we get out of it. That is an infinitely more vulnerable position to put yourself in. And I think that's part of the reason that people don't do it as much is that it's, you're just putting like so many more cards on the table.
And so much more revealed with the other person. And certainly early on in relationships, you're basically meeting somebody's at agency. You know, you're meeting their mask, you're meeting their manager, you're meeting their PR department. Yeah, the whole thing. And then it takes a while to get down to those levels where more and more of the real parts of a person start to come online. There are very few people on the planet who really enjoy being vulnerable. I'm not one of them.
Some people, I'd relatively small subset of people like being vulnerable because it draws attention their way. And that creates interpersonal resources for them that they can use in a variety of different ways. Yeah. But in a relationship, if you want it to be deep and meaningful and connected, you kind of have a few options here. You can either be authentic, and vulnerable and face the pain of that.
You can come to peace inside of yourself that the true you is never really going to be seen or met by your partner because you haven't expressed it to them clearly. Or you can just repress it and get really resentful and pissed off. And you're kind of constantly frustrated that you're not being met in those ways that you wanted to be met or those those ways that you were describing earlier. But one of the hardest things is to actually tell people what you want.
Yeah, and isn't it interesting how we literally try every other avenue other than being vulnerable? Oh, yeah, that's wild. Because being vulnerable is painful. It sucks. It's like looking to my open wound and please love me. You know, that is a very vulnerable place to be. And it can be at least in my experience, I always have to move through the river of pain before I can be vulnerable every single time.
And I think that partly is due to the fact I have complex trauma and I've had a lot of relational wounding, but it's always there. Even if the reward at the end feels great, it's like every single time. And I think, you know, here I go back in the boiling water again, you know, but with that, I think if you want to truly be intimate with a person, you have to be vulnerable first. And it never works if you're trying to make the other person be vulnerable, you know.
And it makes me think about thematically that kind of difference, right? Like between penetrating energy and like spacious welcoming energy. And I feel sometimes we can have a charge, right? And I hate to kind of use this word, but I don't know what else to use it. Maybe you can find a different one, but it's sort of that forced vulnerability, you know, when someone, it's very clearly like someone's trying to pull it out of you. I know what you mean for sure.
Yeah, my system will immediately, yeah. But if someone is just kind of spacious and wide and just is vulnerable, it's way easier for a system like mine to then soften and relax and kind of join in that vulnerability that way. So some people aren't vulnerable in their relationships today because they've never had a good experience of vulnerability.
It's literally never gone well for them or like conflict has never gone well for them in the past. It always led to an explosion. It always created more of a problem. It was never resolved in a way that felt good for the person. So, you know, we're big, we're big animals, we're big dogs at the end of the day. That gets programmed into us behavior like I know that you do a lot of work with people around complex PTSD and trauma related issues, many of which are relational nature.
And I'm wondering what you've seen help people start to get enough space around those patterns where they can actually do something about them where they can essentially like learn a different way of being over time. I feel it's about supporting the person to have a vulnerable relationship with themselves, to be able to hold themselves, being honest, observing, compassionate. And, you know, in the room with me, so to speak, it's the therapist or the coach, whatever role I'm taking on.
Most of the time I feel like I'm just being there to witness. But what I'm witnessing is someone perhaps for the first time dare to be truly vulnerable with themselves. And I feel just having someone witness that can be a really powerful transformational force. And sometimes we need a little bit of help getting there either by a reflection or a little bit of mirroring, right?
But I feel that is what starts to help people is that they can soften in that vulnerability in the room with me, in the room with themselves. And it starts to build a degree of presence in that kind of space. So I don't like to say the window of tolerance because I don't know, that just sounds horrible. I like to see window of presence, right? So you're building your capacity to be vulnerable.
And then you get to practice outside. Like what's it like? You know, don't dump all the treasure on one person all at once. Of course not. You know, like, you got to earn this. But something small like, hey, I would really like to spend more time with you. Or I like that too. Would you like to do this together? Like making little bits, little, little small things. And for someone with trauma, those aren't little small things. Yeah. Those are really big things.
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So I think you've transitioned us really well here until talking about practical stuff, which I love. That never happened. Yeah, I know. I know. Don't worry. I'm somewhere. I don't live that way. Don't get that out. I normally wouldn't show that, but I just popped out of it. What I have met was what I met was that normally like I'm the very practical ABC person and you're more the sort of big spacious person.
I splattered out the wall. I see what states. Yeah. So giving me a beautiful little practical charge that I was like, oh, right there. And then of course, and then I just immediately blew it up, of course, but hey, what's you going to do? So anyways, so it's easy to have a great relationship when everyone's on the same page about everything. When everything's going super smooth, when you want the same things, when you need the same things, all of that stuff, that relationship does not exist.
That is not a real relationship. Relationships are defined by how you manage conflict, how you manage differences. And one of the things that you've said to me recently that I think it's just right on and stuck with me is that relationships are defined by whether or not you can disagree well. Yep. Like how skillful are you at identifying differences and being okay with them?
Whatever okay looks like for you and your partner or you and the person that you're going through this with. And something that really stands out to me is something you just did, which is when you were giving that kind of roleplay depression of what that, how that person communicated. So quite specific about how much of what they needed they needed you said, oh, I would like this little thing from you. This is it pretty specifically and I think that would be really great.
Often when we complain or when we express a need to use the language that's a little bit kinder, we do it in this big amorphous way. And if you're totally unbounded, you just don't listen to me. That might be true, but I can't do a lot with that information other than like try to be a better listener. But I'm going to interpret that through my lens of what good listening means that could be very different from your lens of what good listening means.
So now all of a sudden we're in the world of having this definitional problem. And I'm just trying to be a good listener, different people to find that in different ways, right. But you know what I can really act on. Forrest, I want five minutes a day from you where you're just sitting next to me and you're only focused on me. And I can just talk about whatever I need to talk about. Okay, I can sign up to that five minutes a day. It's not a lot of a lot of pain point for me.
Maybe it really serves my partner whatever it is. That's a pretty pedantic example here. Yeah, but it's a simple example of the kind of thing that often becomes a stumbling block for people. And I think that because now we're getting also into wants and needs and it's really hard, I think for most people to ask for what they want and ask for what they need.
And we're so bad at it that that's how the resentments come in because we try to say it kind of in like in a roundabout way or we try to allude to it. Well, you know, only if you want to step kind of stuff and we're not direct and we're not clear because the risk is if we are direct and we are clear, you could say no.
You could say, wow, that sounds really dumb or you know, you could you could be nasty with it. And I think that's the like underlying fear is, well, if I actually say it, it's going to be rejected again. And so I think that when we're in a relationship with a person who's trying someone who kind of in that scenario just described when you don't listen to me, okay, well, you don't you can kind of start to see they are trying their best they just were we're missing each other.
There's a misatunement happening. I don't know how to say what I actually need. I keep trying to say it and you're trying to catch missed because it's very unclear what's kind of coming at you. And I think things get a whole lot easier when instead of holding back because we're afraid of losing the attachment. We risk putting things on the table so that we're not binding that energy to create a resentment. And that's an incredible tester for a relationship.
Just bottom line can the person receive that from you right now or not. And if they can't that does not inherently mean that this just isn't going to work out if it's a romantic relationship. It doesn't inherently mean that that person's never going to be the person you want them to be as a friend or as a parent as a kid, you know, whatever the relationship is.
But it does indicate that right now that part of you there's no space for it. And so that needs to be met in some other way in some other place. Yeah. If you want to keep on having this relationship with that person that phrase that Rick has that I really like this my dad is resizing the relationship with somebody else.
So we have a foundation that we know that we're solid on. And then as we walk out to the edge of the foundation, we get on to shake here and shake your ground with the other person. And there's some things that we know are a little unstable like, ooh, that's a little edgy like, I'm not so comfortable there. But over here we've gone there in the past and I'm good there. I'm confident that we can go there again. And all the time we're doing that exploring process.
And a really healthy thing to do is to keep on updating inside of ourselves. Where are we actually comfortable for a lot of people who are a little bit more anxious in their sensibility or they have a little bit of a harder time maybe updating some of those earlier models of relationship that they have. A lot of the reason that that anxiety is perpetuating is because you're not going through that process actively.
You're just kind of stuck in one moment where it was all unstable and you're having a really hard time internalizing the feeling of like, oh, that actually went okay. And that's easier said than done, particularly if you have a trauma history inside of relationships, ways are said than done. But still it's something that we can lean into actively as a process.
Ask yourself just the question like, hey, when was the last time I thought about what was actually stable with this other person and really went back through the role of the decks of instances together and went, huh, what can I learn looking at this whole picture of interactions rather than focusing on any single one of them.
I think that process of updating requires connection because often those moments are moments when a part of us is felt wronged or abandoned or totally missed by our partner. And so that moment in time can have an emotional trigger to it. And I feel like those get cleared up in a relationship when the other person can hold space for the other person who's holding this to be like, I need to lay this on the table.
That at that time when this happened, it really hurt me, you know, and or being more direct, you really hurt me when that happened. Yeah. And I feel like that dance also helps strengthen a relationship. And this isn't just, you know, partnered relationships, it can be friendships or whatever of that it's safe to be vulnerable with this person. Like I'm not making you responsible for my pain, but I need you to at least witness it.
I need you to be able to kind of let it pass over you and through you and trust that you're not going to now hold it and resent me because I'm trying to move past this point. And that's like another thing that sometimes can happen. You know, someone opens up and they're like, you really did this and then the person's trying to be spacious and open, but then they're like, Oh, now I'm mad and like resentful.
And it's like, okay, how can we reach that compassionate place of I'm holding space for my partner. What is my partner need from me in this moment? And one of the kind of things I think is helpful is that often when we're in a moment of activation or a high degree of like disagreement or stress, we're not really 32 year old Elizabeth. And I dare not say your age for us. But because of that old, because of that in the ground, it's not 36. I didn't know if you named it. No, I'm okay.
I'm open about being ancient. Okay. Yeah, a boomer. I think you just know the millennial. Anyway, my point is that often it is the little Elizabeth and the little forest. The wing at it. Yeah, absolutely 100%. And I'm and something that you said there that I really want to pull out is, what does my partner need from me right now? Yeah. Or how can I support my partner right now?
A really, really, really critical part of that that I kind of alluded to earlier, but I just want to talk about a little directly right now. And I think there is a huge gap between, oh, they said that they want to be soothed. This is how I would want to be soothed. So I'm going to do that for them because that's what soothing looks like versus actually thinking, huh, what does this person want? Maybe I should ask them, how would you like to be soothed?
They may or may not be able to answer that question. If they can't answer it, there might be a lot of different reasons for that. And then you kind of have to play the guessing game together. But that's just a thing that I see people do over and over again that creates a lot of problems for them is that they try to sooth their partner by doing what would be soothed for them. Or they try to support their partner by doing what would be supported for them.
When the truth is that you need to figure out what is actually supportive for you, not like what would help me out in the same situation. Yeah. And because I can't help myself. That is extremely difficult for folks that have relational or developmental trauma because just speaking for my own experience, I remember there would be times when you would kind of ask me that. And it would feel horrible because inside I didn't know how to tell you what I really needed and it felt very penetrative.
You know, like that, like, well, what do you want? Like, okay, what do you need? And I was like, you know, it's kind of scary. You know, the little Elizabeth in me was like, you know, I got to hurry up and find the right answer because this feels, what if I give the wrong one? And, you know, over time, making small little bids. And I think you maybe have felt this, but like, that was really difficult for me in our relationship to actually tell you specifically what I need. Yeah, for sure.
And in many ways, it still is, but, you know, I just got to name it because this memory just peeps popping up. But, you know, one time I was real in the soup of stuff. And I was feeling really dysregulated and just totally overwhelmed. And when I get that way, I seek isolation. I'm like, because it's the only way I've ever known how to self-south. And here's, you know, my loving partner clearly can see I'm not doing okay and wants to do that.
And I didn't have to ask you, you just got up, you grabbed the hair brush and you started just brushing my hair. And it was this click moment because that moment was achievable because of all the other moments of me pushing to really be vulnerable. Being like, talking doesn't help me, you know, just immediately move into touch. And you tracking that when you brush my hair, it's a deeply soothing experience for me, right?
And so those moments, I feel are only attainable because I did a lot of work to be able to reveal myself, be vulnerable in that way to show you these are the elements of what actually suits me and helps me. Yeah, that's the magic part of that is that I was not, this was not a moment of mind reading. Yeah, this was a moment of a crude experience with a person based on effective communication.
Yeah. And the moments that end up looking like mind reading after many years of being in a relationship together and we've been in a relationship for seven years, there are many people listening to this. We've been in relationships for much longer periods of time to that, but like, okay, that's enough time to accrue some experience with each other and really learn about what doesn't doesn't make you feel better.
And so, and that was the result of that and it was a really beautiful moment that it was meaningful for both of us in different kinds of ways because I got to feel like a dog with a job. I feel like I did a good, you know, and that was like very satisfying for me. I like feeling like I am capable and effective inside of my life. And then me being able to tell you that's it.
You know, saying that that's exactly what I needed. Thank you so much, like giving that reassurance because that's also vulnerable to, you know, when you can track your partner just once, maybe it'll end and you're like, with anything, you know, just slide in there. So something I think that we should talk a little bit about here is that we're painting a picture of a certain kind of relationship.
Yeah, we have a specific relationship works well for us. We've definitely changed a lot of people over time and some of that growth has been a lot of that growth has been driven by the nature of our relationship, but that's just us. We're just two people and there are a lot of different ways to have a very happy, very satisfying relationship. And sometimes what can happen when you listen to like podcasts of people talking about their relationship is a lot of pedestal and happens.
So this is the right way to do it. And our kind of soft relational style may or may not be for you. And I think that's totally fine. When I was prepping for this conversation, I looked up a little bit of the research because I couldn't help myself from the Gottman's on relationship styles and they outline these five different styles of relationships. Three are more healthy to our more unhealthy.
But something I just want to draw attention to the specifics of it aren't so important here, but there are three different kinds of relationships that they put in the healthy category. One of them is conflict avoiding another one is sort of more Africa what they call it, but it's more relational what we're describing kind of like softer and more validating. I think it actually might be validating. But the third one, the third one's called like volatile.
There's a lot of engagement. There's a lot of not necessarily arguing, but conversations become debates very rapidly. It's kind of what I do with my family. Yeah, where we just get into it. We really like exploring an idea and like sometimes, yeah, we start arguing with each other, but we're laughing the whole time. We're having a grand old time as we're doing it, but to somebody on the outside of my look like a debate has broken.
I looked that way to you a little bit. Certainly I still kind of does. I haven't gotten there yet. I'm sitting there going, oh my God, this feels horrible. Is this an, are we like what's happening right now? Like, this feels like an argument, but everybody's laughing. I'm in the uncanny valley. What's going on? But it totally works for us and everyone's quite content as narrows I can tell. At least everyone's quite content with that way of being.
There's a lot of positive for poor, a lot of positive emotion, and there's not a lot of hostility or contempt or the other. There's a lot of negative emotions that the government's highlight. And I just want to pull that out to give an example of something that's a little bit different than what we've talked about so far, but that can still really work for people. Right. And if you think about it, anger and passion are really close with each other. And some couples really thrive on that energy.
But I think part of the reason why it thrives is that it's they're able to take that force and go, we're coming together to solve this problem. We are a team. And how do we fix this? Right. We might have some debates going back and forth. I might, you know, say something and run. But like most of that tension and power is moving and force is moving towards this is the conflict.
How do we solve this conflict? And that actually shows the couple closer together because they're taking maybe more natural attributes that they have. And they're coming together to solve a problem. We're getting toward the end of the conversation, toward the end of the episode. And I would love to leave people with some very direct things here.
So if you're comfortable talking about it, what I would love is one thing that you think that you do very differently now than you did at the beginning of our relationship. That's affected it in a positive way. I have really sat down my protection around pleasing. I'm not as preoccupied with pleasing you or being nice. I'm more leaning into compassion and kindness. And kind of being okay if you're a little frumpy or upset, you know. Sometimes sometimes the dogs got cried out. Yeah.
Low-fed. Sometimes I'm just in mood. Yeah. And within that, that requires me to attune to myself, regulate myself, and trust that this little moment is not a threat to our attachment. It's not a threat to our relationship. In fact, it helps support the relationship because I'm giving you space. I'm giving you room. And I'm also showing you that I can hold your rate. I can hold your anger that I'm not a wimp. I'm not a whisper that's going to like fall over.
And when it's appropriate, I'm going to call you in. You know, to be like, hey, like, did you hear what that how that sounds? You know, or hey, you want to try again? Yeah, I think it's so interesting how you set up a difference there between kindness and please. Yeah. Because they can kind of feel like they're their next door neighbors to each other. Do you want to take a second and kind of peel that apart a little bit?
Yeah. So pleasing is I will put on the mask. I will front the part that you like. I will agree with you. I will appease this part of you that's rolling in. Oh, yes, absolutely. You're so right. I'll be the one that falls on the sword. Right. It's it's a little bit in that fawning kind of place. But you know, I'm trying to appease you. I'm trying to move myself in a way or form myself in a way so that it's easier for me to be with you.
That's really the context. Yeah. But that's not kind, you know, because because something important may never be revealed, because I'm doing all of this internal work for you. What is kinder is allowing you to witness the impact that behavior has on me, even if I don't like it. Or in other times, me kind of going a little bit more firm or standing standing in to again hold up my end of the relationship to be like, I'm going to be a mirror for you so that you get to look at this.
I'm taking responsibility for my stuff, but also. Yeah. We're looking at you too. And I think that doing that maybe counterintuitive lay has given me an experience of you as being more sturdy. Yeah. And more, I don't feel like I need to be over regulated as much because I don't need to be as concerned about whether or not. And you know, look, I think that part of it is my disposition is not I'm not a very like explosive.
So we're talking about it. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the very the range of intensity here is like from a one to a four by a large. That's my big range, right. But I can go there and be confident that it's not going to overwhelm you. Yeah. It's that you're going to be able to do that because sometimes we just need to express ourselves. Yeah. Sometimes I'm just feeling kissy about something and I got to just get it out of my system. And it's the getting out of the system that resolves the problem.
There's not an actual problem here. There's just some energy that's built up in the system that needs to be released. Yep. Yeah. And can your partner hold that with you? Like are we able to be with it together? Yeah. One piece that I want to just say before we close is that I really come to understand that love is a choice. And it's not like, you know, I met you. Well, you know, I might break the veil here.
But it's not like I, you know, met you and immediately it was like, I am madly deeply in love with this person. I mean, you were pretty great from the start. But it was that I made it choice. Yeah. I would choose to love you. Even if that meant at some point our relationship would end or whatever. And I feel like that's what has really allowed me to experience such a nourishing relationship in the form that we have it.
Was because I didn't fall into the trap of like the princess in the high tower. And these feelings are just going to come like it was an active practice to love you. Yeah. And I think that's what makes a relationship special is that that's my agreement to you in every day I practice loving you. Yeah. Well, for starters, likewise. And I think you're highlighting in some ways the conditional nature of relationship. How that's an active choice you're making. You can choose not to not do that.
You know, that's up to you. That's up to everyone who's listening. It's all okay. You get to be a choice. And that choice gives you freedom. It gives you free and it gives you freedom and it gives you control. If you're just a prisoner to waiting around hoping that you suddenly feel that way one day. That's embracing a lot of luck. That's embracing a lot of random chance.
The more that we're able to kind of claim agency in life and take more responsibility for our outcomes, the better those outcomes tend to be. I did want to also answer that question that I asked you here, the way you've changed those benefit of the relationship. Definitely the first thing that I said early on in the episode about relaxing around rigidity, huge one for sure. Either tied for first place with that or maybe even in some ways more important.
But I think what kind of go hand in hand is I essentially did not really express once and needs in the first half of our relationship. When I did, it was in a framework of I'm disappointed or bothered by what is not happening as opposed to what I would like if it did happen. I think that's a big way that I've changed my communication around my wants that has been super beneficial for us. There's also a required way more.
It's also been a long slow process and it's required a lot more vulnerability as we were talking about. Then I've typically displayed inside of my relationships. I think it's one of the reasons that things have ended up going really well for us is because we both become much more comfortable with that expression of what we want. I agree. Before I felt like I was in a dark room, having to feel around, what does this man want? What does he need? Then I'd be like, is this it?
I was kind of lost in it. It's been really refreshing because, oh, I can do that. No problem. I like to be a dog with a job. I wonder how to close this. This has been a wide range of conversation. We've explored a lot of different things. I felt really great about it just because I like talking with you about this sort of stuff. I hope that people got some value out of it. This is a, we were a little bit fuzzier with the exact topic.
We just wanted to talk about relationships and we find helpful inside of them, which maybe led to a slightly more, slightly less like bullet pointy episode. Then normal, if you like this kind of thing, please let us know. We'll definitely do more of it. Or if you would like things that are for granted, it'll slightly tighter way more great. Please tell us that too. Is there anything that you want to just add at the end here, Ma'am? Or anything you think we should talk about for five minutes?
I think one piece is that it's important that you like your partner. Yeah, geez. It's really difficult when you don't like them. To open up part of what you're saying there. I think that a lot of people, they say I really love this person. But you look at how they act and it doesn't seem like they like them that much. I might love them, but man, do you actually enjoy it being around them on a day-to-day basis? And it's just shocking how rare that is, I think.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I just think it's important that you like your partner. That you like the person you're in a relationship with. That life is too short in some ways to try to shift ourselves to be with people that fundamentally either were incompatible or we just don't like each other very much. And a piece of what you're saying, I think, is that you like the person you are when you're in a relationship with that person. Yeah. Yeah. Do they make you feel small?
Do they make you feel grand and spacious? Do they make you feel smart? Do they make you feel dumb? Again, to go back to the very beginning, a lot of this is about self-awareness. Are you feeling these ways, maybe these negative or painful ways, because of something they're doing, or because of just being in a relationship is activating for you on some level? There are a lot of fair answers to that question. But if it truly is their behavior that's making you feel this way, that's a big red flag.
Yeah. You're so smart, Elizabeth. I just like talking about stuff. Wow. I wasn't prepared for that. The level of authenticity is going to like to do that. To diversify the idea. You didn't there. It's totally true. And I think that part of the reason that I don't want to do the like, the thing people do at the end of podcasts with their partner where they just get very gushy about it and all of that. Oh, fucking. But I just think that it's so great that we can have a conversation about this.
And one of the things that people often say that they really like about the podcast is one of their favorite parts is just like getting to see me interact with my dad in the way that I do. And because we have a great relationship. And I hope that for for people out there who are, you know, maybe frustrated with their relationship life in different kinds of ways. Good relationships are out there. You can be functional with another person.
It's not all just the grimest part of the social media under ballet and what they show you with the relationships. You really can find ways of being in the world with another person that feel very rewarding to him.