One of the key ways of finding joy, finding happiness, finding that fulfillment that you want in your life, and the same way that you also are able to find fulfillment in relationships that you're with, is the art of being curious. We're going to talk about that this week on episode 223 of The Relaxed Male. This is The Relaxed Male, a show that comes to you each week, helping men to remove the nice guy from their life so they can actually live their life on their terms. Music.
Join the host certified coach, Brian Goodwin, as he helps men step out of their heads and become free from the thoughts that bind them. Hey man, hello and welcome to The Relaxed Male. I'm your host Brian and I am a certified men's coach who assists men who are just neck deep in the suffering of their life. Men who are going through things like their divorce or struggles with job loss, items along those lines. I help men who are just going through their day-to-day struggles.
Life can come at us fast and sometimes we just become so overwhelmed that we don't know what we're going to do. That's where I help. I get to the root of what their suffering is, help men see and change their thoughts around how they relate with other people and help them that way they can step back, they can relax, and they can actually enjoy their life to the fullest.
In each episode, we take a look at what it takes for you to actually change your thoughts, change how you see the world, change how you view your relationship ship so that you can actually have a better, stronger, more fulfilling life without playing the victim at all. And this week, we're going to be talking about being curious, about curiosity and why we need to be curious. And why do we lose that curiosity so much? And this is a problem that we often have because...
When we're young, we're always curious. We're wondering why this happens and why this does what it does. And we see a clock and we wonder how does that clock work? And we, you know, we tear the clock up and we look at it and we examine all the gears and the springs and the, and all the other little things that make a clock tick. And we learn and grow because of it. But yet, as we get older, that curiosity starts to fade. We stop being as curious about stuff.
Now, we'll come across new things, new wonders that really get our attention and get us to be kind of curious again. Like when we first started dating girls in high school, we were trying to figure out how do we attract the girl? How do we get that girl to notice us? We really like the cheerleader in our math class. How do I get her attention? And we start trying to, we get curious about that. We learn, we grow.
And every time we become more curious, we grow more. We become better people because of it. Yet as we get older and we start having, and we get married and we start having kids and we go into, get into our late thirties and go through our forties and our fifties, we start letting up on the curiosity. We actually stop becoming as curious as we really need to be. Now, why is it good that we get curious? Well, when we're curious, we see more possibilities.
I mean, it's one of the greatest things. You're an entrepreneur. When they get curious about something, they're fixing to make a big breakthrough. through. They're fixing to find a way to rock their... Their own world. They're going to find a way to rock their customer's world. They're going to come up with something new and great because they get curious as to why this problem keeps happening and they come up with that solution. Why do we, as men, keep having a problem with relationships?
Why do we have our relationships fail the way they do? Why do we have our children pull away from us in their teenage years when they need us the most? Why is it that I can be sitting right next to my wife and still not feel connected to her?
These are things that I got curious about, and these are things that I started wondering, and that's one of the reasons why Relaxed Male is what it is today, because I wanted to get to understand, get to know, come to comprehend what was happening as I entered into my late forties and now here at 50. And because I started getting curious, I started seeing, oh, there's a lot more patterns. I started seeing a lot more clues.
You see more out there when you get curious, when you start looking at the details, things start really opening up. You start seeing what's actually possible. We become better problem solvers in all of our life. When we start being more curious instead of just, oh, well, that's just how things are. That's just how we do things. No, that's probably the worst thing you could say. That's just how we've always done it.
Well, why is that how we've always done it? It's kind of like the, uh, the, the, the story of the newlyweds who newlywed couple and they, the, the new bride was wanting to, to really wow her husband. And so she decided to do what her mom's famous roast, uh, roast and potatoes dish. And so she goes to the store and she buys a roast and she comes home and she's telling her husband all about the treat that he's fixing to have.
And first thing she does is grabs a big old knife and cuts that roast in two. And her husband looks at her and goes, well, why did you just cut it in two and put it in two plates? And she's like, I don't know. That's how my mom's done it. He's like, well, why did your mom cut it in two? And she kind of, they kind of talked about it for a little bit and they didn't know they, she, the wife, the bride didn't have an idea, any ideas to wine. So she's like, you know what? I'm going to call mom.
And so she calls up her mom and goes, mom, when you're making your roast, you always cut the meat in two. Why do you cut it in two? And she's kind of sat back and thought about it. It was like, oh, I really don't know. That's just how your, my mom always did it. And so they called up, called up grandma and grandma called up and answer the phone. And she's like, mom, why did you cut the, uh, cut the roast in two? Before cooking it. And she was like, oh, well, that's just because that's how
my mom always did it. Well, do you have any idea why my grandma used to do that? And she was like, oh yeah, because she didn't have big enough pans. We do stuff all simply for the fact that that's how we've always done it. It's usually the sign of somebody who does not want to grow. That is the sign of somebody who isn't curious. Why do we not, why do we do it like that? Why do we, you know, No, put the cheese on top of the tater tot casserole.
Well, honestly, it's because it tastes better if you put the cheese on top of the tater tot casserole. These are, we don't, if when we're not being curious is when we're just setting, we're in that comfortable spot. When you don't ask why, why can't you do this? And there are people who don't want you to ask. And those are the people who really need to be pushed. We've done things. We've had too many people in government these days who just don't want you to ask questions.
You start questioning, they're finding ways of trying to say that you're doing mis, dis, or mal information or whichever type of wrong information they want to deem.
They want to try to scare you from being curious. curious yet when we are being curious when we actually stop and look and examine stuff closely we can come up with better solutions to our problems but also when you're being curious about something you're becoming more relatable because you're showing other people that you don't know everything and it's actually a good thing to not know everything if you're this if you're the smartest person
in the room buddy you're in the wrong room you become more relatable when you become curious and when you're eager to learn. You become more knowledgeable when you are curious and you learn. And you take in the information. You're like, oh, well, who would have thunk that? You know, that's a more relatable way of opening yourself up to other people. You want to get a girlfriend if you're not married. If you're married, you want your wife to notice you a little bit more. Or get curious.
And we'll talk more about how curiosity strengthens relationships here in a bit. But to have a better relationship with anybody, to be curious. Will help you determine, hey, this is someone I'd like to get to know better. This is someone who is right up my alley. But you can also really, you can quickly ascertain, this is somebody who I don't want to hang around with. If you get curious and they are very standoffish, why do you want to know?
They start becoming very defensive over the fact that you're curious about them.
That's probably somebody who is doing something that we don't really need to know much about when you are being curious you are more creative you will come up with more interesting and unique ways of solving a problem and because of that you actually become more fulfilled there's more fulfillment in your life when you take the time to actually stop smell the roses look around around examine the details that are around you you are in a growth-oriented mindset.
When you are curious you're more you have a more abundant mindset also when you're curious because when you stop being curious you're starting to hold on to just what you have and all of a sudden you're going to start realizing that you're not holding on to the the details that you want to to hold on to nearly as much. And that those details and those friendships and all those things start to kind of flake away and we start losing those resources. And so we start to slip into more scarcity.
Those people who are scared that they're losing stuff are the least curious of the world. The sadder people are those who are just not willing to be curious about what's around them. Now, as I said, curiosity can allow you to strengthen your relationship, especially the relationship with your wife.
Because when you start to have discussions, instead of lecturing her and telling her what you know, you can actually strengthen the relationship that you have, strengthen that connection by listening to what she says. I forget exactly what it's called, but it's something along the lines of like the five five why rule or something like that, where you ask a question or you hear something from somebody and you ask them why.
And about five whys in, you're, You're going to come to the root of that person's, well, problem, if they're having a problem, or their actions, if they've got an action that you're kind of curious about. Why do you have trouble with your wife? Well, she just doesn't want to spend any time with me. Well, why does she not spend time with you? Because she thinks I'm being rude because I'm talking about her television shows.
Well, why are you being rude while you're talking about her television shows? Because I think they're dumb. Well, why do you think they're dumb? Because they attract the drama that I don't care to have. There you go. There's a drama in the life that you just really don't care, but she loves it. And so you're willing to shove it out of the way. You're willing to dismiss it. You're willing to dismiss a part of your wife that she actually enjoys.
She likes watching the drama. It feels like she's a part of the group when she watches the reality shows. When we get curious, we get to understand our spouse more. We get to see what makes her tick just a little closer. We can build the needs and the wants and the sense of security that our wife wants for us. If we want to have more intimate nights with our wife, we have to become curious.
We have to spark her curiosity. curiosity we have to spark her why why does she care about you well that's a good question to ask go ask her so what is it about me that you like what is it about you about me that drives you up the wall irritates the snot out of you are you brave enough to ask those questions and be okay okay with the discussion that ensues after that. Where are we in our relationship?
Asking questions. When you're letting her know that I care about our relationship and you're willing to ask questions that might kind of piss her off from time to time. And you can ask questions, you can ask why's. And you'll figure out that the tone of your voice when you're asking why reflects a lot on how she's going to respond well why do you do it like that is not going to react a very loving response as opposed to so why why is that the way that you do it why why go.
Take the loop and go around, you know, if you're like, why is it that you need to take the, take the, the bitter end of the rope and go around, around the tree up or out of the hole around the tree and back in again, why do you have to do it that way? If you want to tie a bowling line, because if not, you don't get a bowling line, but we get, we have all the, we can ask these these questions, we can look and examine.
And sometimes we just don't think of the question at the time, but yet if you can activate the curiosity, you can decide, I am going to be more curious. Now, is it going to be where you're all of a sudden, you're going to be, all right, I'm going to be more curious. And all of a sudden you're just, you turn into a two-year-old. I mean, you could, you could start asking questions like a two-year-old. So why are you doing it like that? Well, why are you doing it like that?
Well, why is that? And why this? And why, who is this? And why? And you could ask nothing but questions. You're probably going to get the same results that your wife gave you two-year-old when the two-year-old was always asking questions. Eventually it's going to be, cause I just said, go, you know, she's going to get frustrated.
She's going to go, she's going to shoo you away. But at the same time, you can be curious and you can come to understand where your wife is coming from, where her path of thinking is coming from. You also get to learn more about what makes your wife bloom, what makes her open up and just want to share her life with you. When you're curious and you lean into what it is she's doing, why does she like to paint? Why does she like to do beekeeping? Why is it that she likes flowers so much?
What is it? And get to understand and look and you kind of start appreciating what she likes and. I mean, one, you'd be able to buy better presents for her. Can you have a, become more romantic with her? Can you do the cheesy romantic stuff and still look at yourself in the face? Well, in the mirror, how can you do that? I don't know. Best thing to do is try something cheesy and then see her response. If she loves it, you know, you're on the right path, which I don't know a woman
who doesn't like a little bit of cheese in a relationship. All right. Be silly, be goofy, be curious, be childlike and not like a grown boy type of childlike, but to have fun and just to giggle for the sake of giggling.
If you think your Tuesday uptight and you and stuff, you're not going to want to, you're You're not going to let your light shine near as great as if you allowed yourself to be curious, allowed yourself and leaned into the curiosity, leaned into why your girlfriend or your wife feel like that particular aspect of whatever. You get to learn. You can learn more about your kids by asking questions.
Most people don't even realize that when you're having a conversation, if you're the only one asking questions and letting the other person talk, that person is going to think you're the greatest conversationalist ever. All because you gave them the prompts for them to talk. best way to have prompts is to just ask questions really even stuff about that you don't even care can you. Be curious enough to even ask questions about things you don't even care about.
They're going to drop little hints about, hey, how about this and this? And you pick those up and you become curious about them. You're going to, A, learn more about a field you never thought you would ever want to learn about. But also, you're building a stronger connection with your wife, with a stranger, with a friend of your wife's, with one of your friends.
It doesn't matter who you're talking to. you will learn and discover more about your world, about her world, about how things happen, all because you got a little more curious. And like I said, it helps when you start asking questions and you start becoming curious about her world. She's going to feel safer. She's going to feel heard. She's going to feel understood a lot more.
When that happens you're going to have more intimate moments it may not be with the horizontal mambo but you're going to have moments that are going to be very deep and intimate which is what we really actually want we want those caring times where we have a connection we have a moment and it happens when you get curious you start asking questions you start asking why asking why and your life will and your relationships will become greater so i suggest this next week,
as you sit down with your wife or calling her up if you're out on on the road ask her questions so how was your day well okay what made it a boring day you don't have to coach her so asking things like so what could you do to not make it boring anymore probably not the best thing but just try Try to get a little more curious, a little more in-depth, and see where things go. You might accidentally be surprised. If he ends up in a burning disaster, that's fine. That's okay.
You can have the burning disasters too. There's nothing wrong with that. What happens is that you just learn a way to a segment of her life that might be a little more, a little tender, and you may have to figure out a way to more gently navigate that area if it's something that you want to know more about.
So get curious ask ask the questions learn grow from those experiences and learn and grow from what you learn about your wife about your kids about your best friend about the about your boss and see where things go from there all right so guys make this one here a little bit shorter i want to thank you very much for taking the time to listen if you heard anything that just rang a bell for you just resonated with you just it's like yeah i know somebody who could stand to hear
this message who really needs to hear this send this over to them there's all of our podcast apps these days have some type of share function hit that share button share it out via text on facebook instagram any of the places that you listen you know that your friend is where your your community is. You may have no group of guys who could stand to hear about becoming more curious about their spouse.
And let them know that there's a site out there on the net that is out to help men change their relationships, to have stronger, better. More fierce relationships with their spouses and their kids and their friends. These are all things that are possible. These are all items of a relationship that are possible if we take the time, become curious, start taking the time to just get to understand each other just a little bit. And from there, we can become even better.
We become stronger men. We become the men that society needs us to be. So if you liked what you heard, you would like to get this podcast added to your, to your podcast app of choice. You can go to relaxmail.com forward slash subscribe, and you'll see your more than likely you're going to see your app in that big old list of, of apps. And you can hit that. It'll bring up relaxmail on, on that app for you. And, uh, you can, you can add it to, uh, to the, uh, to your app.
And it'll download every Thursday during the night. And when you get up, it'll be red eye, rare and rip for you. So guys, with that, I want to say thank you again. Nice little short show this time. Y'all have yourselves a great rest of the week. Music.