Love In All Forms w/ Rodney Norris

this diet. It's it's really just clean eating, but it really involves like no added salt, no sugar, all of that. And you know, I love sweets and I like salt. Like to me, cooking without salt is like you So I'm the struggle is very real for me in that area. I'm struggling hardest, the hardest thing. It doesn't the food doesn't taste like anything without salt to me. Um, And like you know, I like sweets, I enjoy bread, like French fries are are my favorite favorite food. And so

eating clean is cutting all of that out. Anything that I think is tasty pizza, um pie, ice cream, French fries, um, some bread, you know, every now and again. I mean, because I typically have a pretty healthy diet, but to specifically cut these things out to try to lose this belly fat is really really challenging at my age, at sixty eight, trying to lose belly fat. And at the end of the day, you can't really lose weight like that.

You can't lose weight in just one area. So then I'm stuck with the potential of, you know, losing other inches in parts of my body that you kind of enjoy facts and you're doing it and not even you know, enjoying it. So but that's your thing. Yeah, you know, the struggle is real, that's all I'm saying. I know people don't believe it, you know, because they see all

these pictures. Those pictures were from five years ago. I think you look great now, And I mean people see you on the show, and I see you working out all the time, and you're posting on Instagram you look fantastic. Thank you. I'm you know, I'm I'm I'm trying. Yeah, unlike me, I'm still that diet. Yeah, but you think it's the peloton, which I'm excited about that. I'm excited that you are investing in yourself. Okay, let's get into the episode. So today we're going to be discussing some

relationship headlines in the media. Currently, our first news article comes from Mind, Body, Green dot com. The article is titled this one simple and surprising habit can Save a relationship. In the article, you may be expecting a tip to enhance communication skills or keep the spark alive by venturing somewhere new, but relationship expert Esther Perel says there's a much quicker and simpler way, and that is dancing. I know that makes you feel good. Well, it doesn't necessarily

make me feel good. It's just that I've been saying that for how long have we been together? That's what I'm saying. I know that makes you feel good because I've been saying this since we first scott together and I never doubted that. But but go ahead, you never doubted it, but you never really try to. That's not true. Well yeah you did try, but you just it's not something that you you you kept up. And the thing is is that it's the it's the it's the eye connection.

The body connection, the motion, dancing to the music. I mean, it is very dance can be very sensual, and I don't think that a lot of people men in particular take advantage of that, Like that is something that most women really enjoy, particularly if they are dancing with someone they love. Okay, so do you watch Dancing with the Stars or dance videos? I watched dance videos all the time, but while usually watch stepping videos. So that is the dance that I'm really really into. And no, I don't

watch Dancing with the Stars because that's not a dance. Yeah, that's not that's not that's kind of like performance dancing. And although it's great, that's not the kind of dance that is going to um emotionally connect me to anybody. So I don't expect you to do Dancing with the Stars dancing. So how did you feel when you first tried it out. I feel like you gave up on

it pretty quickly. To me. That's I've always felt like that. Well, first of all, I only tried it because you enjoy doing it, and I don't think I ever really did it for myself. I was doing for you, yes, And there's nothing wrong with that. And I and I didn't fall in love with it the way you and some of your friends did when you first encountered it. I didn't have that experience, so it wasn't a lot of motivation to continue, although I did take quite a few lessons.

And it's and and there in lies the problem because you know, growing up, I was a pretty good dancer. But typically I go to a party, I see a new dance. You do it. I'll watch you. Then I could do it. I'll do it, you know. But this requires you to take a whole lot of lessons and you gotta like follow all of these rules, and it's it's a very I mean, you have to take a

lot of classes to learn how to do it. Then you got to practice at home, like it's a second job almost, and it's not a second job, but you do part time job, not a second it's a part time So to the listeners, if you don't know what we're talking about, we're talking about Chicago stepping. Okay, so let me just say this. That is correct. You do have to take lessons and you do have to practice.

And I understand that it's not something that you are passionate about, like me, because I'm like obsessed with it. So yeah, I get it before Chicago stepping, because otherwise people think we're talking about what they do for the you know, like you know with the A K S or the you know the cues. No, not that, Um, I know the point that I was trying to make you. You were saying that you did it for me, right, Yeah,

And I get that. But I do that too. I think I I I learned about basketball, I learned about football, I learned about all those things for whatever. I thought my partner's interest was so that we could have some commonality. And I think that that's what you do in relationships.

I agree, and I'm not. I haven't given up on the possibility of doing it, um, although I did take quite a long hiatus, and now I've agreed to try try again because I think, Hi, I thought, I thought that if I tried and I didn't like it, and you saw the effort, you would you would let it go. But you have it like you you're still harassing me

about this. So I gotta go back in. I gotta take some classes and at least learn the basics so we can because you you do a lot of traveling with this and it's like a big part of your life, and I don't want that to not be a part of my life as well because it's so important to you. Well, you know, I think I think that we've talked about it before, and I'm I'm actually okay. If you decide that you're that you really don't want to do it,

I don't think you are. Um, I actually am, because the thing that you haven't done is stopped me from going. You don't stop me from going and dancing and having and and going to my step and sets and having fun with my friends. So as long as it's not a problem for you, then you know that, then you know, I don't have a choice but to be cool with it. You know it is what it is, Okay, So let me just say this though, even though you may not be stepping with me, you did do a couple of

TikTok's with me. So I did that. Yeah, I did agree to make a fool out of myself and do some TikTok. I have another one coming up to you to so you know. Okay. Next headline, men are more heartbroken than women during a breakup study. Say, now, do you agree with that, I find that kind of hard to believe, but that's what the study says. Yeah, I kind of find that hard to believe to I think that, at least from my experiences, men typically don't process their

emotions after a relationship. They kind of just jump right back into something else and they just go next, kind of keep it moving, where women tend to stop process what went wrong, um or at least get that relationship out of their system before they move on to the next situation. You know, I'm not so sure that. Well, yeah, yeah, that's that. That's true. That's true. I mean I've had some some breakups that have taken me years to get over. Yeah, years, and and I kind of and it's not like I'm

I'm wallowing in it. Well, you know, I think I would tend to wallow for a little while, and you know, I would talk about it and kind of mope about it, and um. But I think when you are emotionally connect there was someone like that, and it ends regardless of whether it ends poorly, if it's not something that you that you wanted, you know, like I I would tend to sit in that unhappiness for a little while, and

it's not as easy to move on, I I don't think. Well, I'll also add that typically the person the person who who broke up with the other person tends to move on faster. Well yeah, and the person who, yeah, yeah, who you know, was broken up on if that who's on the receiving ends of the breakup, tends to linger in that because I mean, they might have felt like everything was great and now the relationship is over, and what's wrong with me that this person didn't see my

value or whatever? And a lot of times, isn't it that you've already moved on and that's why you're breaking up in the first place, because you already got your eye on something something else, or you've already moved on to somebody else, and now you're just making it official. Because when I think that I was handling with us early or when for those in the audience that don't know,

Rodney and I have a long history. We've been in each other's lives for many, many years, and we dated years and years ago, and I think that's what happened when we broke up the first time, you know, like you already had kind of moved on, and then I I found out about it and yeah, that's that's just how it was. Like I found out about it and when I questioned you about it, and you were like, you know what, You're right, that is what happened the

first time. But that's that's not you always the case, like something you just emotionally move on with and you don't have anybody and in mine, you just know that you don't want to be at that anymore. Yeah, and you just you know, you have a need to get out of that relationship and be available for something new. Yeah. But how many times was that the case for you? And was that always the case for you? Because what did you have any did you have any breakups in

your life that you really didn't want to happen? I would say yes to that, Yeah, I say that. Yeah, Well I wasn't always the breakup. I was the breakup e Yeah, And how did you and how did you feel about that? How did you how did you deal with that? Because I'm thinking I'm thinking back when you were much younger. It's the relationship that comes to mind my head. Um, I mean, like anybody that hurts and how did you deal with that? Though? Because they're saying

that men that to take it harder. Well, it's tough to quantify that, if you know, you can only speak for yourself. So I don't know how the next guy felt as in relation to how I felt or the woman, whether I took it harder than she did. I can only speak for me. So I mean, yeah, I mean, when you're hurt, you feel like well, I guess my question is more, how did you respond to it? What

did you do? Like? I think I think for women, I think women we you know, call our girlfriends or we we we look to our support systems to help us get through those feelings. Right, So there's a there's there's a support system we I mean, we're just not sitting home by ourselves like we there's a support system that we typically have. Women will talk to their supports him about this kind of stuff, and I'm not sure

that that happens. Like when you broke up with the person, did you call your buddy and say, man, yeah, I think I'm feeling something. I don't even know what to do. Yeah, definitely, I think God's God's process like that. I know I did you know? Really? Yeah for sure, Yeah, I processed like that. I'd call I'd call one of my friends and we talked about it, UM, and you know, and typically be like, you know, well, you know you're gonna get through it. It's not it's not the end of

the world. Might yeah, you you know, you're got some stuff on the ball. You'll you'll you'll bounce back, You'll find somebody that whatever the case, you just say, okay, next. No, I think I think when I wasn't, when I wasn't emotionally moving on in those instances, no, I had to, I had to sit in process. But when I was, when I was the person that was ending the relationship, like you said, I was already the ending of the

relationship was the last phase of it. I was emotionally disconnected, connected already um in a lot of cases, and then the breakup was just the last part of it. Um. But the need to move on was already cemented in my mind. Yeah. Did you ever feel like you broke up with someone and there was not finality to it? There was, you broke up with them, but you I felt like that with us the first time. Really, Yes,

Oh that's the first time I'm hearing that. That's interesting because it ended not on my I mean, it ended because you found out that I was seeing someone else, truth be told, So it wasn't on my terms. It wasn't on my so I didn't even have an opportunity to process like, Okay, this new person is cool, but do I really want to be with her or do I wanna? Um? And you know, it was it was other. It was other things going on in our relationship at

the time, that was right. So just I mean, people know that I had I was an addict, and so that was something that you were pretty tired of dealing with and you did try to help me in in that area, but it wasn't working at the time. But um, it's still interesting because I felt like you had already made that decision. And that's kind of I mean, because you I probably had at that particular time. I never got the opportunity to have that conversation or to even

have that option. M okay, And that yeah, because I think when I came to you with it, you know, I was, I was, um kind of giving you an ultimatum. You know, I had the nerve to be trying to give you an ultimatum about the situation. I mean, I wasn't nasty about it, but I didn't want to. I didn't want to share you, you know, and you and you were like, yeah, okay, well I'm done. I'm done.

And I and I you know, and I had to deal with that, you know, I left, and I and and and I had to I had to deal with that. And one thing, this is the one thing I want to talk about too, well, I don't really want to talk about I don't want to dwell on it. But I never felt any kind of way about the other woman, right, I never felt any kind of way about her because I felt like she like she didn't have anything to

do with it. It was it was between you and I. Yeah, I'm not sure why people take that me either me either and get mad at at the woman or get mad at the other person, the third party that might be involved, because it is the responsibility of the two people in the relationship. And nine times out of the ten, the third party doesn't even know what the fun is going on, you know, they don't. They don't owe you anything. Yeah, they don't, they don't. So I had I had no issue,

excuse me, issues with that party. But then getting back to the topic and off me. Yeah, the topic was do you think it's harder for a man to move on after relationship. I don't that just has not been by experience. I don't see it. I don't see it. I feel like I feel like men break up and

and move on. And that goes back to my point that typically the person who's doing the breaking up going the breaking up has man old woman man old woman has moved on faster than the person that is, so typically that person tends to stay in it longer, just based on So then it's not it's not it's not based on it's not gender it's not gender based. Yeah. Yeah, because I knew that that relationship was over. I knew that that relationship has gone, had gone as far as

it could go. Basically, Yeah, And here's the hit. A lot of times the person that is the other person knows it's over too, but out of some either comfortability or just not wanting to do any new work, they want to stay in it, even if it's toxic, even if it's not healthy, even if it's not growing like, they will want to remain and in that type of relationship and knowing and them knowing too that it's probably not or else them not being able to recognize you

know where the you know where the failures are and where the disconnect is. They're just not getting it, Like you can only go but so far in a relationship with someone who is not willing to do the work necessary to make the relationship successful. So we I'm gonna toss that out to that we should toss that out to the listeners and and let the listeners respond to

to what they have thoughts on this. So, um, this is something that I'm thinking about because I know that this was, um a big concern for one of our friends that got married around at the same time that that we got married. Actually um, but one of the reasons for them to get married, Uh, for the husband was that he did not want to grow old by himself. Right, And but I think gets it's also something to think about for people. Maybe people don't want to commit because

they don't want to end up being a lifelong caregiver. Interesting, you know, because you know it's marriages in sickness and in health and as you get older, things things come up. You know that you look one way, or you can turn around. I could turn around and have a heart attack tomorrow and you're my husband. You would be responsible for me, and if you're in a relationship, you don't think that people would step up, And um, I would hope that people would, but they're not. They're they're not

obligated to. They're not legally obligated to. So I don't know that, but I would be like, that's pretty sucky if you just now that there's sick, it's involved, you want to cut out, Like that's not much of a commitment and that's not much of a relationship. Yeah, but I get that though, I mean, you didn't sign on to be a lifeline caregiver like you would. You would help them and support them, but it's not your place to make sure that everything is in place for them.

That's that's not your role. Yeah, so I kind of get that. I mean, if somebody wanted to take that route, I wouldn't be mad at him for that. I'm gonna turn the tables a little bit because we've kind of been focusing on our age group, So I'm gonna turning around a little bit and just talk about how, you know, it's actually relationships are actually challenging even for younger people these days, not only because of COVID and the pandemic.

But just because I think, UM, you know, times are changing, and I think younger people and I don't know that it was that much different for us, that younger people

want something different. I think, you know, younger people see that the standard or typical or what the norms are for relationship with societal norms have been for relationships UM have not been working all that great, and I think young people want something different, and so trying to figure out what your relationships are and what kind of relationships you want UM has been challenging. I mean I see

it with my own grandkids. I think you see it with with your with your kids, how they're struggling to UM make their relationships work and find relationships that are meaningful for them. Is that any different from when we were at that age, though, I don't know. I think we talked about it a little bit in the beginning that I wanted what I saw that my parents had, you know, and that was just commitment. And even though my parents showed love differently, my parents didn't show a

lot of physical love UM. They weren't demonstrative in in their love in that way between with each other in front of us UM. And how they showed love to us, but we knew that we were loved, and we knew that they loved and were totally committed to each other. Um. It's just how they demonstrated it back and those days

was different than you know, than what we see now. UM. But I think you know, younger people today are like they seeing people divorce and fighting for us and carry on in it, and they don't want it, and they don't they don't believe that monogamy works. I think a lot of people don't. Like when we grew up, everybody had a mother and father and a lot of there's there's a lot of single, single parent households now more

so than ever before. So I think a lot of people seeing that um or growing up in that environment unlike what we were exposed to. UM. Although I didn't have that same loving I didn't see my parents like loving on each other. I mean, we knew we were loved. I wasn't sure they loved each other, but they stayed together for over what fifty years sixty But there was a demonstration. They showed their love by their commitment to

each other, but it wasn't always expressed. It was a lot of like you say fussing and yeah, shut the door. You were leving over like over nothing turned? Who changed the TV? But you don't know what you're doing there. It was a lot of that. Um. But I think that there's a lot of single family how souls now and and young people see that and that kind of it's it's okay. They see that as being okay for them, Like they grew up in that, like I wanted what

my parents had. You wanted what your parents had. But I think a lot of people now they they see a single family home and and if that's all you know, that's all you know. So it's okay to be a single parent. And I think a lot of people just kind of either choose that to fall into that. Um. So in my situation, let me talk about me. I have two daughters, one is married, one is not. And one of my married, you know, my my daughter that's

married seems to want that traditional what we had. My younger daughter doesn't seem to you know, really um at least not yet. And according to her, she doesn't she doesn't find a lot of um, she doesn't see a lot of candidates for marriage out you know, and and dating for her she doesn't. You know, I'm like, you need to have this kind of guy, and she was like, okay, well then where the hell is he? Yeah, you know it's that kind of thing, like I'll take him if

he shows up. But these jokers that's out here now, you know, they don't, they don't want that. Have you ever talked to her about using the dating app? Like? I wonder like if you were singing that, would you use a dating app? I would? I did that before I met you, I mean before we got back together. Yeah, I tried the dating app. Really, I did not know that I was on e harmony really and match dot com out here under under an alias with no picture? Did do that? Did you get it? I'm sure you

didn't get any responses? I did. I had a nice bio, you know, I worked up this nice bio. So it's kind of like, well, let me see if this no picture guy is. I would never respond to you. That's crazy. And then was before before you really Now, this was before FaceTime, so you actually you couldn't even call somebody and be like, let me see if this joker looked like and you know, FaceTime somebody, so you had to actually go on a date. You had to go on a coffee day to something to see the person, did

you I did? Really, I went on. I went on a couple. I can't believe we have been together all these years and I never went on a couple. Yeah, I mean I didn't didn't go beyond that. I went on like two and they were for coffee and it was like, nah, we didn't really make a connection. But yeah, I tried it. Were the people that responded to you? Well, did you see their pictures before I did? Okay, so you knew what they look like. That's messed up. You

do what they look like? They didn't, so but interesting. I know we have a couple of friends that we are trying to encourage to use the the dating app because it's difficult. It's the called nowadays to to meet someone. And I think I think the pandemic has a lot to do with it. But I just think I'm wondering too. Is as you get older, if it's just more difficult? I don't, I don't know. And everything is a you know that culture is kind of like a right now culture.

So you know, you want something you swipe, you know, like what in my and our day you had to go to a club, you had to meet somebody, You had to work up enough carriage to go over there and say something if that wasn't really your thing. So

how often could you meet people that way? With a With an app you can meet ten people a day easily, just by and and you go through a catalog and you see, you know, you kind of like pick out what you like and like physically, and yeah, and I would also be interested in hearing what people's perspective was on that. And that's our show for this week of positivity damp. You can follow me online at gammy Narris and you can follow me that I am Rodney Nars.

You can submit your questions to positively gam at red table talk dot com for a chance to hear me answer them on a future episode. Also help us out by leaving a five star review on Apple Podcasts and by hitting the follow button on I Heart Radio. Stay grateful, y'all. Positively gam is produced by Red Table Talk Podcast and I Heart Radio. Executive producers are Adrian Banfield, Naris Balin, Jethrow, and Jada Pinkett Smith. Our audio engineer is Calvin Baylis,

and our associate producer is Irene Bishoff. Burger our theme song is produced by dbats