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27: Breaking Free from Your Patterns of Conflict with Sue Johnson Feb 23, 2016

Show notes

Have you ever had the feeling that you get into the same kind of conflict, over and over again, in your relationship? And when you recognize that, do you feel more free- like you are able to stop the pattern in its tracks and do something better? Or, are you left feeling powerless once the train has left the station? Well, it turns out there is one major source of all conflicts within a couple, and today we are going to talk about what that source is, and in very practical terms how to recognize it and break free of those repetitive patterns when they are happening. And, we will also have a helpful hint or two for those of us in relationships with children from past relationships. Today’s guest is Dr. Sue Johnson, renowned psychologist, researcher, teacher, and author of the book “Hold Me Tight- Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love”. She is a leading innovator in the field of couple’s therapy, and the primary developer of Emotionally Focused Couple’s Therapy (EFT), which has demonstrated effectiveness in over 25 years of peer reviewed clinical research.

Get ready to learn even more how to apply attachment theory to your life in a way that will help you feel more grounded and secure in your relationship, and better able to take on the world!

In this episode, Dr. Sue Johnson and I explore the following:

Romantic love is an ancient wired in survival code- More and more research, and more and more couples, are helping to crack the code of love! We now know that you must go towards the emotions in order to understand the who, whys, hows, and whats of romantic love. Adult bonding and all the emotions involved in this is the key. So much of previous couple’s therapy and relationship advice has focused on skill acquisition and controlling cognitive thinking, but as most of us have experienced, skills usually go out the window in the face of enormously powerful emotions. Emotions are not byproducts of interactions, rather they are the music of the dance. Emotions organize our interactions. When you are lost, confused, stuck, remember Sue Johnson’s exclamation as she really looked into the research: “Oh my! This is ALL about attachment bonds!” And it is. Your mammalian brain is wired to perceive relationship threats as a matter of life or death, because in many ways they are. They key question in love from an attachment point of you is: Are you there for me? Can I rely on you to be there? Will you come when I call?

A.R.E: Is there someone on this planet that you matter to so much to that they will be available, responsive, and engaged? Aka, A.R.E. If you have ever been surprised by the intensity of your emotional reactions in your relationship (sadness, anger, devastation, the list goes on), think about it in relation to attachment and the core need we each have to trust that your partner will be there.

A vision for what is actually possible in your relationship:

From last 25 years of research, and from what couples share, we know that you CAN learn to understand this dance called love. Even if you have had negative relationships, and even if you are in a distressed relationship right now where you are actively hurting each other, you CAN learn to see patterns, the way you move with your partner, the way you trigger each other, step on each others feet, and push each other off balance. You can learn to help each other in moments of emotional disconnection when your brain freaks out because it says “I am all alone”. You can help learn to balance each other and create a secure base. You can look and say “Hey! We are caught in that thing again, where I can’t seem to connect with you and I get upset and so I start poking you so that you will turn towards me, but you feel that I am just trying to hurt you and that makes you run away, so...shall we not do that thing and sit and have tea instead?!” Every relationship has that thing, that pattern, argument, stuckness that you find yourself up against over and over again. Get creative and make names for it! Our spiral, the nothing, the tornado… Make it so that you you guys can recognize ways emotional disconnection manifests in your relationship (so you can help each other out of it!).

A secure bond is the way we are meant to be! A secure bond is predictive of every kind of mental health, growth, and good mental processing you can imagine. We are born longing for this connection with a few loving others, and when you are in a secure place it is as if your whole system becomes available for collaboration. Without it our system becomes compromised. If you are spending 75% of your energy trying to prove to others that you're okay, worrying if other people will accept you, feeling alone, trying to persuade yourself that you don't need other people, or actually trying to please other people, then obviously it will cripple your growth and your ability to deal with stress.

Homo Vinculums- Somehow in the 21st century we have forgotten just how important secure bonding is. We are homo vinculum- the one who bonds. We are social attaching bonding animals and our whole nervous system is wired for that! Understand your own homo vinculum-ness and you will understand why it is so natural to be terrified of rejection and abandonment. In fact, our brains respond to rejection in the exact same location, and in the exact same way as it processes physical pain.

Hold me tight- We are social interpersonal beings that are designed to grow each other. Resilience comes from the ability to reach out when the dragon comes and hold hands with another human being. The best strategy for dealing with our vulnerableness is to ask for support, take in support, and turn to other people. This is especially true in our relationships! There are ways to share vulnerability and enter into emotions together in a way that pulls your partner towards you and leads to secure bonding. Remember that our partners can do things that no therapist can do, and that our intimate relationships are the most natural and potent places for growth. While there is always inner work that must be done (addressing triggers, looking at patterns, exploring wounds), it is in the safety and love from another that you can make sense of your emotions, learn to stay balanced, and learn to deal with panic.

Demon dialogues- Demon dialogues are those negative patterns and traps oh-so-common in our relationships. Here are three categories:

Find the bad guy- This is an attack attack pattern where both of you are pointing fingers, placing blame, and saying “this is your fault not mine”. You are giving the message that you would be “better even if I am by myself’ which is often not the case.
Protest Polka- This is the most popular demon dialogue and is also known as demand/withdraw. It occurs when one of you is searching for connection and you begin to demand it. The demander pokes and pokes their partner to get a response, and the other partner begins to withdraw more and more, feeling like the more they get poked the more they want to run. This creates increased distance, tension, and dissonance.
Freeze and Flee- This is a last resort/last ditch effort kind of pattern. It occurs when the couple becomes burnt out after hundreds of protest polka and find the bad guy interactions. It occurs when there is no clear solution and no other way to reconnect. Both partners become withdrawn and the relationship becomes a desert.

Invite yourself to think about your own relationships- Do any of these dialogues seem familiar? What patterns do you notice? Even the healthiest relationships have interactions like these, however because there are loads of other loving interactions mixed in, the ‘bad ones’ don’t become the central feature- and you are able to find ways to turn towards each other and reconnect. When you look closely together at your demon dialogues you will find the source-- either one or both of you are triggered and a raw spot has been exposed- you experienced a disconnection from your partner and you entered these dialogues in an effort, albeit ineffective, to repair connection.

Revisit a rocky moment at a later point through the lens of attachment to better process and get to the source of your arguments. Although it may seem that couples fight about dishes, laundry, ex’s, schedules...underneath all arguments is the essential question “are you there for me?” Once you can understand how the fear of rejection and abandonment is a natural fear, you will be able to identify where you get stuck and will find productive ways to deal with moments of disconnection. Talking about your fears and vulnerability in a clear way will get you both out of that stuck place where you quickly become polarized and dangerous to each other.

Deep in our bones we know this bonding dance. Even if you did not have secure attachments in childhood, we each have a deep instinctive propensity for bonding. You do know what you need to feel secure - you just need to be willing (and feel safe enough) to take the risk and as for what you know you need. Don’t make your partner guess! You can say things as direct as “Right now, babe, I need you to reassure me that you still want me!”, “Hey! Sweets! Can you please take a break and rub my feet for a few minutes I need some closeness if you are available”, “I need for you to tell me that I matter to you, and if you are too busy right now, then tell me will will do something together on the weekend”, or “This is scary for me to tell you, but I really do need you to reel me in right now because I am stuck behind this wall I built and I can’t quite get out”. People move into a new dance bit by bit when they feel confident enough to express and address their emotions.

Is a secure connection the enemy of eroticism? Many have long questioned whether long term relationship stability leads to a lack of eroticism, and some have even stated it as a truth, but good news is that all the evidence points in the opposite direction! Evidence shows that a secure emotional connection helps you engage, explore, and become attuned to your partner, which is essential for intimacy. Passion is the longing for emotional connection twinned with the ability to attune and move together in synchrony and then go into erotic play.

Extra tip: If you are in a blended family in which your relationship involves children from previous relationships, EFT is perfect for you too! At this point you may be overwhelmed by trying to balance the responsibility you feel for your children and their ruptured attachment, and the energy you need and want to put into growing your new relationship. You may be feeling like it can’t all happen at once! This is true, but the more you can work on your relationship the more you can turn as a team and parent (what are now) YOUR children in a way that makes them feel safe and connected. Focus in on the emotional realm of your partnership, learn together about the messages you send each other and why. You and your children will benefit from your increased sense of security and attunement.

Resources

For more research and videos on the science of bonding see Sue’s website: www.drsuejohnson.com

Read her book: Hold Me Tight: Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love

The Still Face Experiment: Dr. Edward Tronick

www.neilsattin.com/sue Visit to download the show guide, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the show guide to this episode with Sue Johnson - and to qualify to win a free copy of “Hold Me Tight”.

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26: How to Get All the Parts within You to Work Together (and with Your Partner) with Dick Schwartz Feb 16, 2016

Show notes

Have you ever heard yourself saying “There’s a part of me that feels one way, and another part of me that feels another?” - or have you ever wondered why you might do things that seem counterproductive to what your actual intentions are? Do you have a mindfulness practice, and wonder how you can get more out of it - is it not quite transforming your life the way you thought it would? Or here’s another question: when you take a moment to get to the heart of what you want, or “need” - how do you know if it’s something healthy, or just a way of perpetuating something within you that really ought to be something that you heal and move past? Today’s guest is going to help you answer those questions. And if you’re inclined to do the healing work, what he offers is a powerful path to get you there. His name is Richard Schwartz, also known as Dick - and he is the founding creator of the evidence-based therapeutic modality called “Internal Family Systems” - which offers an effective way to address both issues within yourself and issues within a relationship. We’ll explain how it all works, and how you can use it on your own, on today’s show. Dick is the author of the book “You Are The One That You’ve Been Waiting For, Bringing Courageous Love to Intimate Relationships” - and we’ll use that book to help guide our conversation about how to apply Internal Family Systems (IFS) to your relationship. We discuss how to identify and heal the various parts of yourself that may be leading your actions, your beliefs, and causing internal and interpersonal havoc, and how to reconnect with your Self in ways that result in lasting healing and promotes intimacy. You will learn how to speak for your parts, heal vulnerable and hurt parts, and increase Self leadership. I think you will find that this approach makes a lot of sense and that it is very workable! In this episode, Dick Schwartz and I cover the following: We all have parts. We all have parts inside, as if we are carrying around a family or a cohort of sub personalities. You’ll recognize this as soon as you tune into your speech- how common is it to say “part of me really doesn’t want to do that right now”, “another part of me does”, “part of me is frustrated this is happening”, or any other form of “part of me…”? This is the language we each naturally use to explain the phenomena of having multiple, mixed, and sometimes contradictory emotions/instincts/beliefs. But, we are also not ONLY our parts. This is a distinct premise of the Internal Family Systems approach. We each have a Self and all that is not the Self are parts. Parts are autonomous, they have projects, agendas, missions, and sometimes are so self-like that they fool even us. An allegory to explain parts: A little boy is standing on the bank of a river watching the water flow by when all of a sudden the ground gives way, and he finds himself tumbling quickly downstream. He doesn’t know how to swim but at what seems like the last second he grabs onto a log floating beside him. He grabs on with all his might and hugs it until the water washes him safely onto a beach further downstream. The boy tries to step up to solid ground but it is difficult to walk with the heavy log. He cannot let go of the log, fearing he will not be able to survive without it, and yet he is stuck holding it. This little boy has a part that will not let go of the log because it believes the boy may drown without it. When we have difficult, traumatic, and confusing experiences we immediately learn ways to adapt in order to survive. Parts are our system’s response to painful experiences in order to protect ourselves from being hurt/shamed/embarrassed/disappointed again, and they learn to protect at all costs, even when it seems that it is wreaking havoc in our lives. You may know some of your parts already- the one that always makes you late, the one that makes you perfectly on time for EVERYTHING, the one that starts to panic when he/she doesn’t call you back, the one that makes you eat more than you intended, the one that is constantly pointing out flaws in your partner, the one that is constantly criticizing how you look… we each carry parts upon parts, some more extreme than others. Whether you love some of your parts (the hardworker? the dedicated friend?) or are incredibly ashamed by other parts (the addict, the procrastinator), it is important to understand that all parts have good intentions. Even the most damaging and dangerous parts. Learning more about your parts- Your anger, for example, may be like the little boy’s log. If you were to bring mindfulness and curiosity towards your anger (knowing that it has good intentions), focus in on it, and then were to ask the bundle of anger what it wants you to know about itself, you will likely get an answer. Often the answer will surprise you! Ask your anger what it is afraid would happen if it didn’t get angry so quickly. What you will learn is that it is likely protecting a young vulnerable part of yourself that it is afraid will not be able to survive without protection. You can ask the part how old it thinks you are. Often you will learn that your parts are stuck in the past, and that they are exhausted of their role. As we learn more about a part’s purpose we can learn what to do to help release it from its current role, and how to heal the original hurt. Most parts are not what they seem and will gladly change if they sense that it is safe to do so! What is the Self? Not only does it turn out that we all have parts, but we also all have a Self! This is an internal omnipresent essence that cannot be damaged, and has all the resources that we need to heal ourselves. Some may call it an inner leader, an inner good parent, others may call it their spirit, their soul, their “I”, or simply “myself”. IFS defines the qualities of Self as the 8 C’s: COMPASSION CURIOSITY CALMNESS CREATIVITY CONNECTEDNESS CLARITY CONFIDENCE COURAGE It can happen that our parts are so actively protecting us that it may feel like we can’t find our Self however as you learn to separate more and more from your extreme thoughts and emotions this more centered state emerges. It is helpful to recognize that it is always with us, and there are many ways to access this. Even just conjuring up these qualities helps to build Self energy. Many of you will know this process as mindfulness- the consciousness of witnessing ourselves in each moment from a compassionate place. Self-leadership: The key towards healing is to build a Self to parts relationship in which your parts can begin to sense that there is a Self present. As protective parts begin to be acknowledged by the Self (bringing curiosity helps this tremendously), they are able to begin to trust more and step to the side which allows the Self to be even more present. A key question to ask in order to build the Self-to-part relationship is: How do you feel towards this part? The more self-led we are, the more healing can happen because we will be able to connect to the knowing that we actually do know how to take care of exiled parts. Exiles- what they are and how they manifest in our lives and relationships: By nature of growing up, we all come out of our childhoods and families with many exiles. Exiles are parts that in a painful moment took on a burden, such as the belief that “I am worthless”, “I am no good”, “I am not wanted”, “I am alone”. These vulnerable parts of ourselves are usually hidden, locked away, ‘exiled’ in our system by all of the other parts that are desperately trying to protect them. Sometimes some of us come to relationships in hopes that our partner will heal, match or redeem us, someone who will give us that special something that we did not get at an earlier and critical stage. This premise sets people up for relationships that may not work out because our partner cannot do our healing for us. It is as if your parts, in desperate want of survival, choose a partner instead of your Self choosing. Exile led relationships can lead to neediness, dependency, disappointment, and will likely run your partner away. Over time the parts that wanted to be taken care of become frustrated, they begin to criticize your partner in an effort to change them into the redeemer you were looking for, or your critical parts lead you to try to change yourself, and then you may develop parts that begin to create escapes through fantasizing, drugs, work, sex, etc. Attachment theory taken inside- We are all hurt and we all have extreme protectors that screw up our relationships- and so, we each have a responsibility to our partners to work on ourselves. In order to move away from being in an exile-led relationship, it is important to learn to take care of your vulnerable parts. Instead of expecting or demanding your partner to be the attachment figure you never had, your Self must become the good attachment figure. In this way you become the one that you have been waiting for! Your partner then, can become a secondary support, a role that has a lot more vitality and sustainability! Tor-Mentors- Although it may sound less romantic than ‘soulmates’, often our partners are our most prized ‘tor-mentors’- those people in our lives that help us learn how to heal by tormenting us! Our partners trigger our parts constantly, which causes large emotional reactions that become trailheads that if followed will lead you to some key exiled parts that may need to be saved from where they are stuck in the past. In this way our partners help us transform by shedding light on areas that can then be addressed between your Self and your parts. Creating a Self-led relationship: Try introducing parts language into your relationship! Likely you will be amazed by the immediate impact on your communication. In order to get to the open hearted place of Self to Self interaction, it is important to learn to SPEAK FOR, rather than FROM your parts! Instead of “I hate it when you do that!”, say “I have a part that hates it when you do that thing”. Over time this will become something more like “When you did that thing it triggered an angry part of me that hates when you ignore me because it remembers when I was little and my father would do the same”, or something like that. In this way, not only are you taking responsibility for your reactions, you are bringing Self-energy (and all the qualities that come with that!) into the room. “I hate it when you do that” or worse, “I hate you” will cause your partner’s protectors (likely ones that experienced rejection or hatred) to inevitably react- thus creating a protector parts war in which one person’s protectors get triggered and react which alarms the other person’s exiles which put their protectors on alert. It is very difficult to get out of this cycle until you are willing to go beneath the protectors and see what it is they are reacting so strongly to. Unburdening as a way to heal exiles and increase vitality in your relationship! Once your system begins to trust that your Self is truly present, a certain safety is created that allows for the protector parts to relax enough for you to access your own exiles. Often this process is best mediated with a therapist, as they can help act as ‘hope merchants’ and help you stay connected to Self so that you do not become overwhelmed as you interact with these most vulnerable parts of yourself. Once you have gained permission from your protectors you can access exiles directly and begin to find out what they need in order to release the extreme beliefs and emotions that they have been carrying for so long. Note: experience shows that 70% of most people’s exiles were ‘born’ before the age of 10. Once exiles are acknowledged, heard, and helped to release their burdens they spontaneously transform! In an effort to protect and survive, our parts take on roles and structures that often cut us off from our most vulnerable resources. The unburdening process reintegrates the original personalities of innocent parts which leads to a surge of vitality! By taking care of your exiles (instead of adapting to them all of the time), all of that child energy- the spontaneity, delight, playfulness, and creativity will flood back into your system, and into your relationship! Dos and Don'ts of trying this at home: If you would like to explore your own parts, try the following: Imagine your partner in a room by himself/herself and you are outside the room, looking in. Just notice the parts of you that come up as you focus on your partner. Choose to focus on the part that is most visible/energetic/extreme. Take your attention inside. Where do you find this feeling/sensation/thought in or around your body? Then notice how you feel towards it? If you feel anything that is not one of the 8 C’s then it is another part! Ask those parts to give some space and relax a bit. Keep identifying parts and asking them to step aside until you feel curious towards this target part. With curiosity and compassion it is safe to ask this part why it does what it does/feels what it feels/believes what it believes. Ask what it is afraid would happen if it did not do that thing. As you learn what it is protecting then you have a lot of options- you can talk to your partner about what you learned, you can thank that part for its service and remind it that it doesn’t always have to jump in in this way. If you ask it how old it thinks you are and it is way off, then help it see that you are actually older and not stuck in that same young place. At this point the protective part has likely led you to a shadow sides of yourself, the basements and darker areas where we each store our exiles. Be careful not to rush towards exiles- if it becomes too scary or overwhelming , more extreme parts will come in to distract and may cause damage in their efforts! As you encounter exiled parts and painful memories it is suggested you work within the safe holdings of a therapist you trust. Exploring parts with and without your partner: A lot of this work involves intensely inward awareness and can definitely be done on your own. Beware however that as you work with your parts and address underlying core memories and bruises you may change a lot! Just as your protective parts will restructure themselves in response to your unburdening, your relationship may restructure as well- likely for the better! Tthe more Self-led you are the more attractive you will be to your partner! As far as working this model together, you can definitely begin today by using parts language. Begin to identify parts (make the come as alive as you can- color, shape, name) and start speaking FOR your part. As you each begin to learn about your parts and what they are protecting, share this. Share your own Self-energy with your partner by being curious, with them, about their parts. Together you can build a culture of understanding that all parts, even the most disruptive ones, have a positive intention, and once you can gain glimpses of what is being protected, then empathy for each other and your parts will emerge. This in turn leads to resilient intimacy, that kind of intimacy that is created by diving deep and coming back out to celebrate your healings together. Things to try immediately: -Notice parts and bring curiosity towards your parts. Where do you sense this part in or around your body? it may be a feeling, thought, sensation, physical pain, voice, etc. What is this part afraid would happen if it did not do its job? Ask it! Ask it how old it thinks you are! Thank it for all it has done! Let it sense YOU now. -Appreciate all of your parts and how they have been working to protect you for likely a long long time. Remember all parts are welcome and all parts have good intentions. -Try speaking FOR your parts! You will be amazed at how immediately impactful this can be in your partnerships -Find ways and take time to connect with your Self. you can invoke any of the 8 C…

Full show notes at the publisher

25: Get Your Ego Out of the Way - How to Be an Adult in Love with Dave Richo Feb 09, 2016

Show notes

Today’s guest is Dave Richo, a psychotherapist, teacher, workshop leader, and author of the well-known book “How To Be An Adult in Relationships- The 5 Keys to Mindful Loving”. In this conversation we explore topics found in his more recent book “How To Be an Adult In Love- Letting Love In Safely and Showing It Recklessly”, and his brand new book “You Are Not What You Think- The Egoless Path To Self-Esteem and Generous Love”. Richo’s approach, which combines Jungian, poetic, and mythical perspectives, delves deep into the Buddhist concept of loving-kindness. In today’s episode we explore the whys and the hows of egoless love in the context of romantic relationships. You will learn key questions to help you assess your own ego balance, and ways to surrender ego in order to build self-esteem, address old wounds and fears, be fully loving in all of your relationships, and to actually evolve your capacity for love. You will be reminded and awakened to the ways in which taking care of ourselves is in itself an act of love.

Here are some highlights, insights, and suggestions from my conversation with Dave Richo:

Widening the range of love- The Buddhist practice of loving-kindness is really about expanding our definition of what it means to love. It is about beaming out love to yourself, those closest to you, those you feel neutral about, those you don’t even really like, and all with EQUAL force. This force of grace and power is one that comes from beyond our ego, and extends through us to all beings. We can learn how to love, which is important, but we can also work on opening ourselves to call upon this sense of unconditional grace that is omnipresent and here to help us. How to connect with this sense of spirit is incredibly personal and you must find the right wording, symbolism, rituals, and practices that make it your own. However you relate to this concept, take a moment to consider that perhaps by incorporating awareness of this wider loving spirit you might find ways to better heal during difficult times, feel connected to your partner regardless of what you think or feel about them in a given moment, and even potentially, as Dave explains, feel more fully human.

Agape love: The Greek’s referred to this form of selfless, unconditional and utterly limitless way of showing love as ‘Agape love’. They saw this form of boundless love to be our own highest calling. Although the love we hold for our romantic partner(s) exists within the definitions of the Greek’s Agape love and the Buddhist’s loving-kindness paradigm, it is the erotic dimension that distinguishes our intimate partnerships from the crowd. Interestingly enough, the Greek’s also believe that erotic love exists in our creative pursuits as well. Therefore there are many ways to experience erotic love, and infinite ways to experience Agape love.

Tending to the relationship through Egoless Loving: So how can this wide definition of love inform our ability to engage the challenges that may arise in our partnerships? Love is about giving of oneself without being sure exactly what we will get in return. If instead, our egos are leading the way in our relationship we may find ourselves using the partnership to assert and solidify our own ego purposes, leading to patterns of selfishness (and not the good kind!).

The evolution of a relationship from Ego-ideals to Egoless led love: There are three phases a romantic relationship must pass through in order to achieve an egoless led love:

1) Ego-Ideal to Ego-Ideal Romantic Phase: In the beginning… two individuals meet, and their two ego ideals fall in love. Meaning that person you always desired is finally found! Stars, rainbows, romantic dates, until…

2) Ego to Ego Phase: The inevitable conflicts, big or small, begin, and the ego-ideals erode and you begin to see the other person as she or he really is (warts and all). You may start to see your partner as self-centered, self-promoting, self-ish, or maybe you just start getting really irritated with the way they do or don’t do the dishes, you get the idea… In this conflict stage, the goal is to confront the ego dimension of ourselves and see if we can let go of it in favor of a more loving response. There are many psychological techniques, communication tips, outlined processes, prompts and activities you can choose to engage in here to help address, process, and make it through this phase. Regardless of how you and your partner work on your conflicts, it is critical to remember that this is an act of love! When we commit to working through the tough stuff and putting in the energy when struggles arise we are showing ourselves and our partners love in action. This increases connection, and of course, trust. And it leads to the final phase.

3) Egoless Love Phase: Through successfully showing up for Phase 2 and taking responsibility for our own egos, a new dimension of love is possible. Now that our partners can trust that we are dedicated to tending to the partnership versus tending solely to our egos, true commitment is possible. (Note to eager hearts: this is the appropriate time to choose marriage rather than during the Ego-ideal phase!).

Hold up! Lets take a moment to look closer at what ego is, and what it means in love.

Ego is the latin word for ‘I’. It lies on a continuum. One extreme is when the ego is inflated which can look like arrogance/swagger/narcism, and on the other extreme when the ego is deflated it can look like withdrawn/shutdown/doormat-like. In equilibrium the ego is strong yet not forceful, direct but not judging, respectful, humble, confident without arrogance, and loving.

Only from a healthy ego is true love possible. You cannot be fully loved by those whose egos are stuck on either end of the spectrum. Someone with an inflated ego cannot truly love you, even if it seems she/he cares about you it is only because they are focusing on you to see what they can get from you. Someone with a deflated ego is guided by fear and appeasement, neither conducive to deep healthy love. Those with healthy egos however, have self-esteem, and so they are capable of looking into YOU.

Helpful questions to uncover where you are on the ego spectrum, and consequently discover if the love you are giving and getting in your relationship is healthy:

We are each born with a set of original needs, Dave categorizes them into the 5 As: attention, acceptance, appreciation, affection, and allowing.

-Attention- your caretakers focused on your needs in an engaged way

-Acceptance- your family and community accepted you as you were

-Appreciation- your family cherished and celebrated you

-Affection- your family showed affection in physical and appropriate ways

-Allowing- your family supported you without clinging or holding you back

These five needs remain with us throughout our life and they create a solid definition of how love is shown.

How do you know that you really love yourself? Ask! Using the same 5As you can ask yourself “Am I paying attention to my needs? Am I accepting myself as I really am? Am I holding myself as valuable? Am I taking care of my body? Am I allowing myself to make the choices that reflect who I am rather than what others insist?

Notice your answers, and notice how assertive you are. Can you state your needs without aggression or demand? Are you afraid of asking for what you want or afraid of your needs themselves? Are you afraid of needing or wanting to be fully loved?

Bring the 5 As into your relationship by talking through them with your partner and turning the questions around! How can I pay attention to your needs? Am I accepting you as you really are? Etc. This can be in incredibly informative and empowering process to pursue together.

When you can give yourself the 5As it is called healthy self-love. When you can give your partner the 5As it is called intimacy. And don’t be fooled. Acts of self-love are in themselves a way of showing love to others. Turning attention inward helps you show up and be fully you!

The 4A Process: In establishing intimacy, it is critical to address fears of intimacy- Although subconscious, hidden, or simply out of awareness, many relationship conflicts arise from two common fears originating from our childhoods: 1) fear of abandonment and 2) fear of engulfment. These fears develop into fears of intimacy and are the root causes of so many relationship struggles (both MAJOR and minor ones!). The 4A process can help you and your partner work through the fear(s).

1) Admit- admit you are afraid, share with your partner

2) Allow- allow yourself to feel the feeling

3) Act as If- feel the fear but do it anyway, don’t let the fear stop you

4) Affirmation- Tell yourself “I am letting go of this fear”

An example: “When you hug me I feel scared you will smother me, but please keep hugging me so that I can work through this feeling because I know you are safe and will not overwhelm me. I don’t want the fear to stop this moment that is happening, so I am going to let go of this fear.”

Work with original fears so that you can experience the other side of intimacy! There is a difference between fear management (making exceptions, working around, and placating ourselves, etc) versus taking responsibility for our fear (tracing source, acknowledging triggers, expressing awareness).

It’s not you, It’s me! While our romantic relationships are indeed sources of deep happiness, they are also our best labs in which to grow into awakened, full, and healthy human beings. As so many of us have experienced, our intimate partnerships lead us to the most undeveloped parts of ourselves. Humbling! Intruiging! And experience shows that everyone, we mean everyone, has childhood scars that continue to dwell in the psyche and play out in subtle, and unsubtle ways! Taking responsibility and becoming aware of how our past carries over into the present is in itself an ACT OF LOVE.

Healthy relationships give us the opportunity to heal old wounds, and therefore the ability to have healthier relationships, and so on. Welcome these opportunities to heal your past!

For those of you growth-oriented partners, you can begin to ask yourself and your partner “how can I best sponsor growth and healing?” From this place of love, you can engage in what Dave calls Safe Conversations.

Safe Conversations- If you want to love yourself and allow your relationship (current or future) to have more love in it, you must be willing to have conversations without judgement about how the past is informing the present. From here you can choose how you want to give and receive the 5As and how to have a relationship in which childhood wounds are no longer getting in the way. Safe Conversations help to air out and find patterns for deeper understanding. Here is short list of example questions to discuss with your partner (taking turns asking each other), but please refer to Dave’s book for more a more in depth discussion. “How were your early needs handled in childhood? How did your parents show you the 5 As?” “How can your needs be met now in this relationship?” “How were your feelings handled and expressed in your childhood? How was sadness shown? Anger? Fear? Joy?” “How were conflicts handled by your parents?” “How do you want to handle conflicts in our relationship?” “How was free speech seen ny your family?” “How can you feel safe to speak your needs in our relationship?”

This is a lot! It is long, deep, unfolding, and takes an immense amount of ego-less led presence. Take breaks!

And lastly, a suggestion for expanding your daily capacity for loving kindness: Daily rituals help call our awareness to attention, Dave shares his morning dedication with us: “I say yes to everything that happens to me today as an opportunity to give and receive love without reserve. I am thankful for the enduring capacity to love that has come to me from the sacred heart of the universe. May everything that happens to me today open my heart more and more. May all that I think, say, feel, and do, express loving kindness towards myself, those close to me, and all beings. May love be my life purpose, my bliss, my destiny, my calling, the richest grace I can receive or give and may I always be especially compassionate toward people who are considered least, or last, or who feel alone or lost”

Resources

Dave Richo's Website

How to Be an Adult in Relationship on Amazon

How to Be an Adult in Love on Amazon

You Are Not What You Think on Amazon

www.neilsattin.com/adult Visit to download the show guide, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the show guide to this episode with Dave Richo

Our Relationship Alive Community on Facebook

Amazing intro/outro music graciously provided courtesy of:

The Railsplitters - Check them Out!

24: Why We Lie and How to Get Back to the Truth with Ellyn Bader and Peter Pearson Feb 03, 2016

Show notes

Today, we’re going to talk about lies. Why do we lie - ever? And while it’s easy to perhaps scapegoat people who aren’t telling the whole truth - as with anything in relationship - it takes TWO to tango - so how does the person who’s being lied TO help create the dynamic? Most importantly - how do you bring your relationship back into balance, so that you can experience the power created by telling the truth and being in integrity. Today’s guests are Ellyn Bader and Peter Pearson. They are two of the world’s leading experts on couples therapy and the topic of honesty in relationship, and their groundbreaking book - Tell me No Lies - explores exactly these questions about how to undo the damage caused by all lies - big and small - in relationship.

In today’s conversation, Ellyn Bader, Peter Pearson and I discuss the following:

What constitutes a lie? Lying is not an exact science, rather it occurs on a continuum, with several distinct types:

Equivocations: Giving ambiguous, indirect, or contradictory information

Exaggerations: Overstatements and truth stretching

Understatements: Minimizing or downplaying aspects of the truth

Concealments: Deliberately omitting information that is important and relevant

Deliberate lies: Making up information, or giving the opposite of the truth (no versus yes)

Felony lies: These are the big high stakes ones

Why do we lie? The good the bad and the ugly. Lying always has a purpose, and is often resulting from a need to protect something. What is crucial to consider is the motivation behind the lie, and what in fact the individual is trying to protect. Is it their ego? Their sense of security? Fear of shame? In some cases, as often happens in the beginning of a relationship, lies may be told in order to HELP solidify the bond and create closeness (“Yum, the dinner you made was delicious!”). In other cases lies are told in order to avoid conflict or tension, or to avoid hurt feelings. We also lie to advance ourselves, enhance our image, protect ourselves, or gain power. While there are minor seemingly loving lies that are told in order to protect the bond, it is almost always more successful to protect the relationship through truth telling, as risky and scary as it may seem.

Lying between me, myself, and I: There is an enormous amount of self deception in most relationships, and let’s be honest, in our lives in general. Everyone, whether currently coupled or not, can take time to ask: Am I really telling myself the truth about my own experience? How well do I know myself? How much am I able to communicate what I know about myself?

These questions are incredibly potent to hold as a relationship begins to unfold. In the honeymoon phase, or what Bader refers to as the ‘temporary psychosis phase’ due to the plethora of neurochemicals involved with falling in love that make us “bonded and stupid”, it is very normal to lie. Mostly to oneself. Amidst the adrenaline and excitement of new love, many people do not pay attention to their own wishes, desires, or needs. Some may forget to ask themselves “Who am I really? What really matters to me?”. This is natural because when people first come together there is a strong desire to try and be the same. They may knowingly and unknowingly minimize differences and emphasize ways they are alike in order to prove compatibility to each other, and find alignment. This can actually be a cute, sweet, profound, and important process, however where it goes from here is the make or break…

Lack of differentiation creates havoc in the long run: While it may be normal to search for commonality in the beginning of a relationship, a couple must begin to welcome and celebrate difference early on in order to avoid getting stuck on “the dark side of the honeymoon”, that petri dish for resentment, fear, instability, and ultimately distrust. Failure to differentiate usually results from one or both partners being conflict avoidant, meaning that they hold the basic fear that conflict will lead to rupture or collapse of the relationship. Because they are seeking security above all else, they are willing to overcompensate or over adapt for long periods of time in order to keep the illusion of permanence in the relationship. This begins by the conflict avoidant partner not expressing their desires, needs or wishes, and frequently includes lies by omission. This partner gives more and more of themselves, ignoring important parts of themselves, until they either collapse, become depressed, develop secret anger, etc. This leads to the next stage, the “Freedom Unhinged” state, in which the relationship begins to disintegrate. More extreme lying occurs, including the GREAT BIG felony lies (gambling, infidelity, etc). The stakes are high, and as one partner becomes more and more adamant that such and such is NOT happening, the other partner may even begin to question their own sanity. Often at this point trust has been so violated that couples usually separate as it is rare to be able to piece everything back together.

NOTE TO THOSE EXPERIENCING FELONY LIES: It is advisable to get a therapist involved. If you guys want to try to work through it on your own make sure to slow down. Often the partner who has lied is in a hurry to heal and looks to find solutions quickly. Let your partner express their feelings, all of them, and allow them to ask LOTS of questions. Regaining trust isn’t simply a decisional process. It takes a long time and it takes a lot of small things done daily. Do what you say you are going to do.

It is common to experience disillusionment as new love matures! Some things just don’t show up in early stages. Realizing truths can come after commitments have been made, and need not incite panic. Oscar Wilde says “the truth is rarely pure and never simple”, and this is incredibly true in relationships.

Inviting truth and how to AVOID becoming conflict avoidant: In order for couples to evolve well and enter into a growthful process from the honeymoon phase, it is key to start substantial truth telling early on. Each partner speaks up about things that are important and matter to them, even at the risk of moving into areas of disagreement. Although the early years of differentiation are not always easy, there are many moments of growthful tension. It takes courage not only from the one who tells their truth, but from the partner who is willing and able to truly listen and hear their partner share!

Lie Invitees: Knowing that lying is often one of those ‘two to tango’ deals, how does the person who’s being lied TO help create the dynamic? Somebody becomes a lie invitee when they do not fully collaborate on the commitment to truth telling. For example, when your partner shares honestly and with integrity with you and you attack them or shame them, they will inevitably think twice about being honest in the future, thus leading to increased deception. So how are you receiving your partner’s honesty? Are you being reactive instead of responsive? Are you being a martyr? Acting above? Playing victim? If so you may actually be encouraging your partner’s lie telling. The BIGGEST self deception that occurs in relationships is the belief that we are victims and not contributors in the distress.

Truth telling is a collaborative process, so always stay AWARE of your participation in what goes on in your relationship. Ask yourself “what would be required of me to bring more honesty to our partnership?”, “What can I do that would make my partner glad to be with me?”, “How can I be in order to increase ease and fluency in our communication?”. Come clean when you need to, and work towards being willing to SEE and BE SEEN, HEAR and BE HEARD by and with and for each other.

According to Bader and Pearson, THE ABSOLUTE FOUNDATION OF MAKING A RELATIONSHIP WORK IS NOT LOVE IT IS TRUST. Explore this, meditate on it, discuss it, play with it, reject it, embrace it, and notice. Notice how you react and respond.

Come clean with grace and generosity. When you become aware of a place in which you have not been totally honest with your partner, do not rush into confession. There is an art to everything, confessions included. If you are going to express a difficult truth, give your partner a loving heads up. Telling lies/not telling the truth can feel so shaming and heavy that there is a tendency to want to unload quickly and release the guilt as soon as you feel ready to share. This is not advised! It is as if you hit your partner with two arrows instead of one, stinging them once with your news, and second with the selfishness of your delivery. So SLOW DOWN (less in time, but more in tone). Say something like “Hey, I want to share something with you that isn’t easy for me to say”, and then verbally honor that your motivation in telling them the truth is to continue to build the trusting foundation you are both committed to creating in your relationship. This acts as a paradigm shifter- from ‘me and you’ to ‘us’, and helps facilitate your partner’s ability to hear the truth.

BE CURIOUS NOT FURIOUS- There is also an art to receiving truth telling. If your partner has shared something with you from a generous and couple centered place, it is good to remember to respond first with “I really appreciate your honesty”. Work together towards a place in which you can respond by staying curious, and saying “tell me more”. When and if you recognize ways in which you are either being a lie invitee, or having difficulty receiving your partner’s honesty, share this. Say something like “Honey, I am noticing that I have been doing such and such and that it might be making it hard for you to be honest with me”. By the mere fact of owning one’s contribution to the patterns, doors will open and fresh air will come into the relationship. You can also experiment together. Say “Look, I know that I have been reactive in the past, and I am really going to try to listen and hear you without demanding anything in this moment”. Then take turns! Give this platform a try and see if it eases or shifts any stuckness in your communication patterns.

Truth is a process and the key is to build a culture of truth telling in your partnership- Nobody is totally honest all of the time, but if you can start talking more openly about how to give and receive honesty before the nitty grittys come crawling out of the closets, the monsters from under the bed, those once upon a time white lies get revealed, it will make all the difference in the world. The more hiding you are doing the less vibrancy and energy is available for the relationship and for your life. So, create a container and a commitment together to being clear and direct, and don’t forget these two rhymes:

IT TAKES TEAM WORK TO MAKE YOUR DREAM WORK

BE CURIOUS NOT FURIOUS

Resources

Check out Ellyn Bader and Peter Pearson’s work at: www.couplesinstitute.com

Read their book- Tell Me No Lies

www.neilsattin.com/lies Visit to download the show guide, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the show guide to this episode with Ellyn Bader and Peter Pearson

Our Relationship Alive Community on Facebook

Amazing intro/outro music graciously provided courtesy of:

The Railsplitters - Check them Out!

23: Useful Things You Never Knew about Feminine Sexuality with Sheri Winston Jan 27, 2016

Show notes

Today’s guest is Sheri Winston, wholistic sexuality teacher, founder of the center for intimate arts, and author of the award-winning book “Women’s Anatomy of Arousal: Secret Maps to Buried Pleasure”. We’re going to talk about how the sexual energy of a feminine person works. We’re also going to talk about the female anatomy - and you just might find out some things that you NEVER knew before. Sheri also brings her knowledge as a midwife and a massage therapist to bear on the topic of just how we might come to sexuality from a completely different perspective. I guarantee that unless you’ve already read Sheri’s book (and maybe even if you have) you’re going to learn something new today.

Here are the highlights from my conversation with Sheri Winston:

What is wholistic sexuality? This is a way of seeing the sexual life force that emanates through us and around us at all times. When you’ve heard me talking about “the continuum” - this is it. We are always able to access this energy, and with our partners we are always connected, even when we’re not in the bedroom.
Contrast that with “male sexuality” - This is the popular model for “how sexuality works” - and it represents a very masculine way of looking at sexuality. Quick turn-on, deep penetration, huge orgasms. However, feminine people have a completely different type of sexuality.
What is feminine sexuality? Rather than a quick boil that starts at the center (masculine sexuality), feminine sexuality starts at “the edges” and heats up slowly, until the entire system is fired up. It can take a little while!
So wholistic sexuality is: being able to recognize these different types of sexual energy and recognize where you and your partner fall on the spectrum - and then to take each other into account!
How does a woman know when she’s actually ready to experience penetration? If you are “desperate” to have your partner inside of you, then you are ready. Anything before that and your entire system may not be quite ready. Also it should feel “completely fabulous”
If a woman is “wet” does that mean that she’s ready to be penetrated? NO! In fact, lubrication is one of the earliest stages of arousal, but many more things need to happen in a woman’s body (along with lubrication) for penetration to feel completely pleasurable.
It’s about the journey - so enjoy it!
Did you know that women have as much erectile tissue as men? Along with erectile tissue that’s present all throughout the broad genital region, the clitoris is actually just the tip of an enormous clitoral network that extends throughout that part of a woman’s body.
As an experiment, if you’re a woman (or partnered with a woman): See if you can observe all of the changes that are happening within a woman’s body as she is getting more and more aroused. Can you figure out where all (or at least some) of the erectile tissue is? Sheri Winston calls this a “herection”. :-)
Timing is everything! For instance, there is a stage in arousal where the cervix gets pulled up and out of the way. When that happens, deep thrusting penetration can feel amazing! Before that happens - it can be painful!
O1 vs O2...and beyond! How sensitive are you able to become to the levels of arousal when you bypass “Peak Orgasms” and allow your bodies to ride deeper waves of pleasure together, for more time?
Arousal is an “altered state of consciousness”: And when you see it that way, you can understand why it can take time to make the shift, and why it’s an experience that can be deepened. Figure out what you need for yourself, and what your partner needs, to stay in and play with that state of consciousness - it’s a grand experiment!
Here are some ideas for how to expand that altered state: How does changing the way that you’re breathing affect the sensation in your body? How does your state of relaxation affect things? Can you set the stage in different ways that connect you to a ritual of sensuality - to help deepen your presence, and ability to be absorbed in the moment?
The power of sound: Making wide, open sounds can actually help your body relax - it’s part of an automatic response where the lower part of our body reciprocates the openness of the upper part of our body (our throat and mouth when we make those kinds of sounds)
Set the container: Create an intention with your partner to close the space, energetically, to the rest of the world. That space and time when you are together is yours and yours alone, and other intruding thoughts/energies are not welcome. It can be a good idea to keep technology (phones, etc.) out of the bedroom.
How to keep things “alive”: Be INTERESTING and INTERESTED! Cultivate your creativity and imagination AND your curiosity about your partner’s experience.
Eye contact and kissing with tongue: Both magnify sexual energy and help induce the “altered state of consciousness” that we’ve been talking about.
Dedicate Time - In long-term relationships, sexual connection “just happens” less and less, without attention. Dedicate time as frequently as possible to experiencing your partner’s sensual essence. Even just 5 minutes of eye-gazing is better than nothing.
How do we handle shame? If you know that shame is an issue for you, recognize that it is at times for almost all of us! During the altered state of arousal, it can be a prime time for you to reprogram those parts of you - especially if your partner is prepared for those moments. Prepare positive statements that reverse the shame, and, as an example, you can have your partner whisper them to you (or yell them at you!). Whatever feels right.
Debrief - LATER. You can always take time at a later moment to talk to your partner about what came up for you (or to ask your partner about what came up for them) - what worked, what didn’t, strategize for the future, and take a moment to affirm the depth of your love for each other.

Resources

Sheri’s websites:

www.intimateartscenter.com

www.intimateartsonline.com

Woman’s Anatomy of Arousal on Amazon

www.neilsattin.com/arousal Visit to download the show guide, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the show guide. If you download the guide within the first week of this episode's airing, you are automatically qualified for a chance to win a free copy of Sheri Winston’s award-winning book “Woman’s Anatomy of Arousal”.

Our Relationship Alive Community on Facebook

Amazing intro/outro music graciously provided courtesy of:

The Railsplitters - Check them Out!

22: Essential Skills for Conscious Relationship with Harville Hendrix and Helen LaKelly Hunt Jan 19, 2016

Show notes

Today’s guests are none other than Harville Hendrix and Helen Lakelly Hunt, authors of “Getting the Love You Want” - which offers a step-by-step path for you and your partner to attain a more loving, supportive, and satisfying relationship. In this conversation, you’re going to get to hear exactly how their system of conscious relationship works, and come to a deeper understanding of what’s possible in relationship. You’ll also learn about their “Imago Dialogue” - also known as “safe conversations” - which is a process that you can use in your partnership - or in any dialogue, really - to ensure clear communication that actually GETS you somewhere.

An essential part of being in relationship is the path that it offers to you to become more fully who you are meant to be in the world. And to do the healing required - both the inner healing as well as what’s only possible in partnership with another person. On today’s show we’re going to cover some essential skills so that you and your partner can create a solid foundation for this healing journey into conscious relationship together.

Harville Hendrix, Helen LaKelly Hunt, and I talk about the following:

Imago Match - Combine the best traits and the worst traits of your childhood caretakers, and you come up with a list of the qualities that you are most attracted to as an adult. In particular, your unmet needs are calling out to be met by someone who also matches your childhood caretakers’ negative traits. Wouldn’t it be easy if you could just find someone who will naturally meet those needs? Of course! However, that’s not the way that our unconscious mind works - in order for the healing to actually occur, those needs must be met by someone who shares the same difficulty with actually meeting them! It’s a potential recipe for disaster (and why so many relationships don’t work in the end). And - if you’re aware, also a potential recipe for great healing and transformation through your relationship.
Couldn’t you just try to hack your way around it, and find someone to meet those needs directly? Isn’t that what’s at work as we’re looking for the “right” partner? We’re looking for someone who fits an ideal list of traits - and usually when we first decide we’ve found a match - ZING - they’re perfect in every way. Nearly all relationships lead to a time when suddenly you see that along with all of those positive qualities come a host of negative traits that were also there all along. So as much as we think that a hack could be possible, there seems to be no way around actually having to create a container for growth and change in your relationship - to handle the inevitable challenges that come with the easeful moments.
Is conflict a sign of trouble in a relationship? No - in fact conflict is usually a sign of a place where you and your partner can actually grow. Your partner actually contains a “blueprint” for your own growth and healing.
It’s easy to look to your partner to see where you might want them to change and grow...and yet the first place that you should look is within yourself. Helen LaKelly Hunt offers the example of how she might have really wanted to foster Harville’s latent emotional exuberance, she actually learned a lot and facilitated growth in her relationship by learning how to contain her energy. And this created space in her relationship with Harville for him to learn more about being expressive.
Why is this all a good idea? Now you are able to develop parts of yourself that were probably not encouraged within you as you were growing up. Harville and Helen even suggest potentially developing the parts of yourself that you are least attracted to in your partner, as a way of pulling yourself up the growth curve and getting in touch with the parts of you that are within you, waiting for their chance to shine in a healthy way.
So if conflict is OK - then how do you know whether or not you’re in the wrong relationship? While Helen says that essentially if the attraction is there then ANY relationship could be the material for a lifelong, growth-oriented partnership (that has the power to overcome some big things, like chemical dependency, or infidelity). That being said - if you’re in a situation where your partner literally cannot take responsibility for ANYTHING - i.e. everything is your fault - then that relationship is unlikely to succeed.
A suggestion: If you’re in a relationship that you think is in trouble (or even if you’re in a relationship that’s ok, but you want it to grow even more) - go on a couples retreat for a holiday or birthday. In a retreat-like environment even a partner who’s not inclined to do “growth” work might see unhealthy patterns that they’ve been contributing to, or get excited for a vision of what’s possible. Many couples have shown up to these kinds of workshops thinking they were done, only to get a renewed sense of possibility and love for each other.
Instead of trying to find the right partner, focus on BEING the right partner. Instead of trying to change your partner, focusing on growing yourself and your own capacities within the relationship. At the same time, it is helpful to energize and appreciate your partner for the things that they do well - to amplify that energy within your relationship. Otherwise too much change can lead to exits popping open for either partner - and having exits closed is an important part of having a safe container in the relationship.
Imago Dialogue: This is a three-step process for effectively communicating. First decide who is the “sender” (the person talking) and who is the “receiver” (the person listening). The job of the person talking is to speak in an “I” statement - and to break what they’re trying to communicate down into small, digestible chunks.
Mirroring: The first step as a receiver is to Mirror back what you’re hearing from the sender. Try not to paraphrase - use their exact words. And then ask - did I get it? And if the answer is “no” - then give the sender another shot at expressing what they need to express, and repeat this step. If the answer is “yes” then you can ask “Is there any more?”
Validation: As the receiver, can you understand where the sender is coming from? Do their conclusions make sense to you given what they are saying about their experience? If not, you can ask questions to clarify. If so, you should say that it DOES make sense. Note that you do not have to AGREE with their view of the world - the point is simply to GET their view of the world.
Empathy: As the receiver, can you imagine what it would feel like to be in the sender’s experience? Can you convey that to the sender as well?
IS THERE MORE? Always take the time to give the sender the opportunity to really communicate everything that they need to communicate.
Then, take turns. Once the sender’s meaning has been fully mirrored, validated, and understood - it is time for the sender to become the receiver and vice versa.
Make a commitment to ZERO negativity. What does it take to simply notice all the times that you’re bringing criticism, blame, or judgment into your relationship? And once you notice that, can you shift yourself into a position of seeing yourself as the source of your experience, and taking responsibility for your part in how things are (or facilitating change) rather than pointing the finger, or expecting the other person to do the work?
It’s not that you can’t tell the other person how you feel...but simply that you can learn to always communicate respectfully. It’s not what you say but HOW YOU SAY IT.
Are you making time for fun? Don’t just rely on happenstance for fun to happen! Schedule fun into your calendars, so that you are guaranteeing that you’ll have good times and be infusing your relationship with positive, fun energy.
Appreciation Practice - You could try giving your partner 3 appreciations every night before you go to sleep. How does that shift the quality of your relationship, when it becomes a regular practice?

Resources

http://www.harvilleandhelen.com

http://www.safeconversations.org

Getting the Love You Want - on Amazon

www.neilsattin.com/imago Visit to download the show guide, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the show guide. If you download the guide within the first week of this episode's airing, you are automatically qualified for a chance to win a free copy of Harville Hendrix and Helen LaKelly Hunt’s groundbreaking book “Getting the Love You Want”.

Our Relationship Alive Community on Facebook

Amazing intro/outro music graciously provided courtesy of:

The Railsplitters - Check them Out!

21: Healing Pain from Past or Present Breakups through Conscious Uncoupling with Katherine Woodward Thomas Jan 12, 2016

Show notes

One of the biggest obstacles to being fully yourself in the present is being held back by the pain of the past. I’m thinking specifically of the endings that we go through. If you’re like me, you’ve been through a breakup or two in your life. Maybe you coasted through each one just fine - or maybe you collected a scar or two - or more. Whether you were the person leaving, or the person left behind, or it was a mutual decision - I’m curious - are there any remnants of past relationships that might be influencing you now, in the present? Are you in a relationship wondering if you should stay, or go? Or are you in the middle of a breakup right now? Or are there aspects of your current relationship that you’d like to breakup with - so that your current partnership can begin anew? Whether your breakup was something long past, or something happening in the moment - this episode is for you.

Today’s guest has been on the show once before, back in episode 2. Her name is Katherine Woodward Thomas, and she is the author of the New York Times Bestseller “Conscious Uncoupling: 5 Steps to Living Happily Even After” - as well as the national bestseller “Calling in The One: 7 weeks to attract the love of your life”. (I’m currently in her Conscious Uncoupling coach training program.) While the focus of this show is on how to have amazing relationships, I thought it was wise to tackle the question head on of how we break up, and how to turn it into a positive experience - instead of a traumatic one. We’re going to talk all about Katherine’s powerful 5 Step Conscious Uncoupling process on today’s episode.

The main points that Katherine and I cover are:

Your current relationship actually starts with how your last one ended. What from your past did you carry into your current relationship? Are there expectations of your current partner that are left over from your prior partner? Are there wounds that you have yet to heal? Fears that are holding you back? Your ability to grow from past breakups will determine whether or not you can avoid repeating past mistakes.
Conscious Recoupling: The process of going through a breakup process with your current partner, growing/healing, and staying together in a totally new way.
However in order to truly recouple, you have to be willing to go through a true breakup process. If you follow the Conscious Uncoupling steps, then you need to actually be willing to let go of the relationship in order to begin again.
You could be in the “bargaining” phase of grief. If your relationship is truly ending, there is the phase of grief that you go through where you think perhaps it isn’t possible going to come to an end - so there’s a risk of going through Conscious Uncoupling with the idea that you’re actually going to stay together with your partner. Most of the process is meant to be done alone - so if you focus on your work, and your growth, and your healing - then you can assess where things are truly at as you wrap up the process.
Why do breakups cause so much pain? They are considered a “rupture of attachment” - which is actually one of the biggest sources of trauma that we can experience. In fact, our brain processes relationship trauma in the same place that it processes physical pain - so no wonder it can feel so physically intense!
How do you know if you should stay or go? It’s always helpful to get professional help in deciding what the right thing to do is. Also, one question to ask is whether or not there’s room to accept each other’s growth in the relationship. Do your values match up? Can you support each other even with different interests/passions? Get curious about where you’re at, and where your partner is at - can you look at what’s happening through your curiosity instead of your pain and frustration?
What happens if you shift to seeing yourself as the source of your experience? One of the core attributes of Katherine’s work and the Conscious Uncoupling process is to see how you are the source of your experience, to take your power back from any feelings of being victimized by whatever situation you’re in. When you make that shift to seeing yourself as source and healing core source fracture wounds, then your entire perspective on your relationship may also shift. You can do that healing work within the context of your relationship - and it might inform your decision about whether to stay or go.
When you see how a source fracture like “I’m not special” is running your life, and shift to a more positive sense of self - miracles happen. Are there negative messages at the core of how you interact with the world? How does that determine the way that you see the world? How does that shift for you if you invert a core negative image into a core positive image? How will your interactions with life and your partner change?
STEP ONE - Find Emotional Freedom - The first step allows you to create a container to safely experience any big emotions that you’re having, so that you can then harness them for your own positive change.
STEP TWO - Reclaim your power and your life - In this step, you start asking the kinds of questions that help you actually make use of the situation. Questions like: How did I give my power away? What are different choices that I can make that support my vision for the kind of life and relationship that I want?
The power of making amends - TO YOURSELF. What are the specific actions that you will take to ensure that you never make the same mistake(s) again? This is an important part in the process of outgrowing who you were in the relationship.
STEP THREE - Break the pattern, heal your heart. At this point you get to dive into the core negative belief that your painful feelings seem to be reinforcing. If they had a voice what would they say? Things like: I’m not important, I’m alone, I’m not lovable, etc. You start to see how a belief like that totally polarizes your experience in order to support itself. So what happens when you take on the OPPOSITE belief? Suddenly your experience will re-oriented around that new view.
STEP FOUR - Become a Love Alchemist. In this step you clear the air with your former partner (this can happen on a soul level, not necessarily in person) - and create a new vision for what your connection to that person can look like moving forward.
STEP FIVE - Create your Happily Even After Life - This is the step where you decide on a new vision for yourself in relationship, and can also create a ritual that empowers your new vision for your connection to your former partner. The community around you can also feel supported by participating in this new vision - helping your community heal from the ripples of trauma that your breakup has caused.
The importance of clearing the air - When you take responsibility for your part of things that happened in your relationship, you are creating breathing room for your relationship with your former partner to be able to grow in a new direction - and empowering yourself, again stepping away from being a “victim” and reclaiming your own power of choice and to steer your life.

Resources

http://www.consciousuncoupling.com

http://www.katherinewoodwardthomas.com

Conscious Uncoupling on Amazon

Calling in the One on Amazon

www.neilsattin.com/kwt2 Visit to download the show guide, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the show guide. If you download the guide within the first week of this episode's airing, you are automatically qualified for a chance to win a free copy of Katherine Woodward Thomas’s book “Conscious Uncoupling”.

Our Relationship Alive Community on Facebook

Amazing intro/outro music graciously provided courtesy of:

The Railsplitters - Check them Out!

20: Sparking Passion through Generosity and Being Authentically Yourself with Shana James Jan 05, 2016

Show notes

We’ve talked a lot on this show about the stages of relationship - I’m thinking in particular of the John Gottman episode, and the Terry Real episode - how almost unavoidably the “honeymoon” ends and then the real relationship begins. Would you like to know some ways to get that spark back - in a way that’s sustainable? Do you know what you REALLY want in your relationship, and I’m talking about how to get below the surface-level to the desires that will actually satisfy something deep within you? In this episode, we’re going to cover how to connect with your partner in a way that promotes passion - and we’re also going to take the experience of attunement (like we talked about in our episode with Keith Witt) to an even deeper level that you can use in ALL of your interactions with other people.

Today’s guest is Shana James, a coach for the Authentic Man Program and co-creator of the Authentic Woman Experience, and whose site “ready2dateagain.com” helps men who are looking to have more satisfying relationships after experiencing divorce or painful breakups. I’m a huge fan of her work, and her ability to help men find their presence, women find their radiance, and to help everyone to connect powerfully in the kinds of relationships that they’re looking for. She’s currently hosting a telesummit for men to help them have more conscious, healthy, and satisfying sex lives - which you can find out more about at sexualsatisfactionsummit.com.

In this episode, Shana James and I talk about:

How do you figure out what you REALLY want? On the surface it seems like you might want one thing - an example that we talk about is wanting your partner to wear sexy lingerie - but what is the desire UNDERNEATH the want? The closer you can get to asking for what you really want - making yourself vulnerable in that way - then you might actually get your real desires met instead of surface-level desires.
What’s wrong with surface-level desires? Nothing is wrong with them, per se. It’s just that when you get a surface-level desire met you might find that it doesn’t actually satisfy the itch that you thought you were scratching. When you get to what’s beneath your desires (like a desire for connection, or vitality, or curiosity, or adventure) then you actually have a chance to feel satisfied...AND get what you’re really looking for.
What’s one thing that kills spark in relationship? Partners who have become unwilling to be vulnerable. If you can cultivate your courage in relationship to BE who you are, then your vulnerability can be an incredible spark enhancer!
How do you generate change and connection? When you choose to be generous in your relationship, you are adding energy in a way that invites your partner to come forward and meet you. It also helps you ignite your curiosity - which is the antidote to boredom and disconnection in a relationship.
What if you’re always the one being generous? How do you know if you’re just stuck with someone who’s a perpetual victim, or a narcissist, who just takes takes takes? One thing to ask yourself here is, are you being “generous” truly? Or are you being generous to a point, and then blowing up or shutting down when it doesn’t turn into getting what you want? How do you stay vulnerable, even in those moments?
How do you stick a fork in the windmill of a repetitive relationship pattern? Shana James shares a powerful question that could help you change the direction - and also some other ways that generosity and vulnerability become powerful agents for change in a relationship.
The power of true listening. Your ego might have a REAL problem with just simply listening to your partner. It could even feel like you’re “dying” in a way. And yet figuring out how to truly receive your partner is an amazing act of generosity that can keep your connection going strong.
Shana James talks about Authentic World, Authentic Man Program, Authentic Woman Experience and...what is authenticity anyway? Does what you have inside match what people see on the outside? Do you know your internal landscape, and are you healing negative images of other people that might be “authentic” to who you are right now, but might actually be getting in the way of connecting in a powerful way.
What are the different ways of being present? Are you being present in a spiritual way? In a physical way? In a sexual way? Can you be present with yourself AND be present with the other person, and their experience?
Learn how to engage your connection from different places within you. Shana and I talk about how to reach into a connection with another person and diagnose where you feel the life and vitality within them, and within yourself in relation to them - and how to use that to fuel conversation and curiosity.
Why is it important for your partner (or prospective partner to know the real you)? One of the biggest source of pain for people in relationships is the inability to truly be themselves, to feel like who they really are is going to be rejected by their partner. Wouldn’t you want to know if a prospective partner could truly accept you BEFORE you’re in a committed relationship? Wouldn’t you want to know that about your existing partner before you let another 3, 5, 10, 20 years go by?
How do you know how another person is making you feel in your body? Step one is to have an actual awareness of your body at “baseline” - how do you feel when you’re just you - alone? Then you can begin to notice how your internal sensation changes when you’re in proximity to (or even just thinking about) another person. Shana James also shares some amazing ways to use this information to create more connection and play in your interactions with other people.
The power of questions. We’ve talked about this a lot here on the Relationship Alive podcast - the quality of the answers you get and the experience that you have is determined chiefly by the kinds of questions that you’re asking. Want a better experience? Ask a better question.
How can you experience more pleasure? We talk about how your ability to tune into your own sensual and sexual energy - without turning that into an agenda, but just experiencing it - tuning into your own vitality, how that starts to resonate with the other people in your life. Can you be comfortable with that part of yourself and bring it into your interactions with your partner? Can you do it in a way that doesn’t have an agenda attached to it?

Resources

Shana’s websites:

www.SexualSatisfactionSummit.com

www.AuthenticWomanExperience.com

www.Ready2DateAgain.com

www.neilsattin.com/shana Visit to download the show guide, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the show guide. If you download the guide within the first week of this episode's airing, you are automatically qualified for a chance to win a free copy of Gary Chapman’s book “The Five Love Languages”.

Our Relationship Alive Community on Facebook

Amazing intro/outro music graciously provided courtesy of:

The Railsplitters - Check them Out!

19: Recipe for a Secure, Healthy Relationship with Stan Tatkin Dec 29, 2015

Show notes

Title: Recipe for a Secure, Healthy Relationship: Stan Tatkin

If you’ve listened to some of the other episodes then by now you’ve heard how so much of what happens to us as kids can affect how we are, in relationship, as adults. You can get into the specifics if you want - and there are times when I think that’s a good idea - but you can also look at the big picture of whether or not you had a secure attachment with your parents (and now are able to have a healthy, secure style in your adult relationships). Or you might find that you developed what’s known as an insecure attachment style with your parents, and now THAT is affecting how you connect with (or withdraw from) the people you love as an adult. Do you sometimes feel an overarching need for space and find yourself always feeling like your partner wants too much from you? Do you start to feel anxious when you’re alone, like your partner isn’t there for you enough. Well, guess what - this all relates to your attachment style. The great thing about it is: there’s something you can do.

On today’s show our guest is Stan Tatkin, Doctor of Psychology, one of the world’s experts on attachment theory, and the author of “Wired for Love: How Understanding Your Partner’s Brain and Attachment Style Can Help You Defuse Conflict and Build a Secure Relationship”. On this show we’re going to get to know the ins and outs of how we attach to others - and give you some successful strategies for knowing and understanding yourself, and your partner, and finding healthy ways to support each other in relationship. If you’re single, we’re also going to talk about the implications of attachment style on dating - and Stan’s new book “Wired for Dating” is coming out this month - January of 2016.

In this conversation, Stan Tatkin and I cover the following topics:

Wired for Love is a manual for how to feel safe in relationship. When we don’t feel safe and secure in our relationship it can create a lot of stress, problems with thinking and focus, creativity, patience, etc. And the long-term effects of stress can contribute to all kinds of illness and dis-ease. So there are very practical reasons for understanding clearly how to feel safe in relationship (both what will increase your feelings of safety in relationship as well as how to help your partner feel safe).
What is at the root of your attachment style? Your attachment style is created by the primary relationship that you have as a child, generally with your mother. As an infant we learn very quickly whether or not our parent (or primary caregiver) is there for us unconditionally. If so, we learn to trust those on whom we come to depend in our primary relationship. If not, we develop an insecure attachment style as a response to the uncertainty that our needs will be met in our primary relationship.
Insecure attachment styles: Islands - People who are more “islands” in their attachment style (the ones who need extra space) typically had to perform or be a certain way in order to experience love in their primary relationship. They tend to distance themselves in relationship as they are afraid of losing themselves within the relationship, or being co-opted.
Insecure attachment styes: - Waves - People who are “waves” tend to be more needy and afraid of abandonment in relationship. Typically they were responsible for the emotional well-being of at least one of their parents, and so they were rewarded for being dependent.
Both insecure attachment styles can be distancing: Both waves and islands can also distance themselves ultimately within a relationship, waves because they are afraid of being abandoned, and islands because they are afraid of being consumed. At the root of both avenues: fear. And both islands and waves WANT relatedness - it’s just the kinds of fears that relatedness creates that lead to wave-like or island-like behavior.
Are you an island or a wave? How about your partner? We all have elements of secure attachment, and the different insecure attachment styles, but under duress you will probably veer more towards one than the other. And the way you go can change depending on the relationship that you’re in. Are you more of a “go it alone” kind of person, with the feeling that no one can do something better than you? This way of being is supported quite a bit in western culture, and can lead to being an island. Are you more chatty, interested in other people and relationship, very related to others, very affected by separations and reunions? Odds are that you’re more of a wave.
No judgment! It’s important to know that neither of these is good or bad, they just “are” and affected by your experience. With an understanding of where you are, and an understanding of your partner (or potential partners), you can come away with a map of how to build safety in your relationship - a secure container from which everything else grows and prospers.
These patterns of behavior only come up in relationship. So - don’t be surprised when it emerges after the courtship/honeymoon phase of a relationship. This is just “what we do” when we begin to see a relationship with another person as “permanent”.
What is the difference between securely attached, or creating safety, and co-dependency in a relationship? If you’re codependent, then you are overly concerned with the other person and not concerned with yourself at all. You are sacrificing yourself for the sake of the relationship. However, in a secure relationship, or a relationship where islands and waves come together in order to create a safe, thriving environment for each other, both people serve the THIRD entity, the relationship, as they see it as a path for both of them to grow/expand even more than they could if they were on their own.
It’s not important to worry about moving from an insecure attachment style to a secure attachment style. It’s more important for you and your partner to understand how each other operate and to create agreements that support you and your safe container. By virtue of doing so, you will naturally move towards a more secure attachment style. Either way, though, those agreements will ensure that you are working collaboratively, without judgment of each other - instead appreciating how each other is in the world, and knowing better than anyone else in the world how to provide an environment that feels safe and secure to each other.
Be a detective to learn what works and what doesn’t work with your partner. Taking this approach helps engage your curiosity, and helps you tune in to how what you do actually is affecting the other person. The “I’m just going to take care of me and you just take care of you” approach may sound good on paper, but it’s usually experienced as a threat to the relationship. Excessive self-reliance can actually become an exit strategy in a relationship.
These mechanisms are ruled by the primitive part of your brain. And, in general, if the primal part of your brain is triggered then that part of your brain is going to call the shots - the higher-functioning part of your brain can’t even do it’s job when the primitive part of your brain hijacks it or diverts resources away from it.
The importance of agreements: Do you have agreements with your partner that allow you to repair as soon as either of you gets triggered? These kinds of agreements allow you to come back into balance and connection with each other - and then address the specifics of what came up afterwards. If your partner is in distress then it becomes a priority for you to help them recover first - and then figure out strategies for working through whatever caused the distress.
Establishing the “Couple Bubble” - All of these strategies are about improving the container of your relationship, or what Stan Tatkin calls the “couple bubble”.
Create rituals to reinforce your togetherness. Bedtime rituals, rituals upon waking - or I also share in the podcast a ritual for reminding each other of togetherness before walking into situations that could be triggering.
It’s not healthy to avoid conflict. However, you can learn to “fight smart”. For one thing, are you always looking for ways to resolve conflict that are true win/win options? Only when your interests are aligned with your partner, and nobody loses, can you get out of being triggered in anger and arrive at conclusions that foster greater love and connection - even when you are in a disagreement.
When dealing with an island… it can be helpful to offer quick doses of love without holding on for too lengthy a period of time. Islands can be more left-brain dominant (verbal, logical) - so it can be helpful to express your love in left-brain sorts of ways.
When dealing with a wave… offer reassurance that you love them, touch, etc. Waves tend to be more right-brainy, so offering touch, emotion, movement - those are all strategies that can build safety and connection for a wave.
Your relationship is an ecosystem. And once you create a secure, safe ecosystem where you are safe being you and sharing everything with your partner, you are now have energy and resources free to be able to thrive even more in your life than you could in an insecure environment, or independent of relationship. That kind of security that only partnership can offer actually allows you to be more fully “you” in the world than you could have before.
Are you still auditioning? We act differently when we’re not all in in terms of commitment. One to two years is a reasonable amount of time to know if you really want to be with someone. After that, it’s time to decide if you’re really in it or not - so that you can experience what it’s like to be in relationship with this person when both of you are fully invested. And then you’ll get MORE information that will help you decide if it really is what you want for the LONG long term.
Eye contact and close physical proximity! Both are important strategies for fostering the biology that leads to feeling safe, secure, and happy in your relationship.
Another reason oxytocin/vasopressin is important: These neuropeptides allow you to experience stillness without fear. So important for fostering intimacy, particularly when intimacy can stimulate fear - either through being a survivor of trauma, or through simply being a wave or an island.
What about polyamory? At the core of polyamory is generally the “primary” pair. Who would you turn to first when you’re in distress, or to celebrate something amazing? That being said, the main thing is that all of your relationships should keep you feeling safe and secure, and when a relationship violates that, it’s going to be problematic, whether it’s your primary relationship or secondary, tertiary, etc.
How does this apply when you’re single? Bear in mind that the cascade of neurochemicals that you’re experiencing when you’re dating will keep you from really knowing what’s going on with the other person. One important tool for you is to leverage the power of your community - family, friends, etc. - to help you decide whether or not someone is actually good for you. Not that you should invalidate your own opinion and feelings, of course - but you can count on others who are not love-drunk to help you get clarity on the situation. There’s more information in Stan Tatkin’s new book “Wired for Dating” as well.

Resources:

Stan Tatkin's website - www.stantatkin.com

Stan Tatkin on Facebook

Stan Tatkin on Twitter

Wired for Love by Stan Tatkin on Amazon

Wired for Dating by Stan Tatkin on Amazon

www.neilsattin.com/wired is the direct link to this episode. Visit to download the show guide, or text “PASSION” to 33444 and follow the instructions to download the show guide. If you download the guide within the first week of this episode's airing, you are automatically qualified for a chance to win a free copy of “Wired for Love”!

Our Relationship Alive Community on Facebook

Amazing intro/outro music graciously provided courtesy of:

The Railsplitters - Check them Out!

18: Integration Time with Neil Sattin Dec 21, 2015

Show notes

It’s been 17 straight weeks since the Relationship Alive podcast launched, and I hope you’re enjoying the deep dive into how to do relationships in a completely new way. This week, I’d like to give you a gift. There’s so much value in new information, new knowledge - I don’t know about you, but my temptation is to be always trying to learn something new, always trying to grow. And yet, some of our growth happens not when we’re trying, but actually when we’re giving ourselves time and space to integrate. You can go to bed overwhelmed, or confused, and wake up with completely new insights. Plus rest is so important for being able to bring energy to your life and everything that’s important to you.

So this week, rather than giving you another interview with another amazing guest, I’m inviting you to spend some time integrating. This is an opportunity to spend time with the important people in your life - your partner, your family, your friends - and, most importantly, yourself! You could simply let everything that you’ve heard in the past 17 episodes of the podcast wash over you - and see what percolates out in your interactions with the world.

Or it could mean taking some space to reflect. What have you learned about yourself, about yourself in relationship? What are some new questions to help fuel your growth over the coming weeks, months and years? What kind of relationship would you like for yourself - and can you develop a solid sense of what it would feel like to be in that? In terms of the podcast, maybe there’s an episode that really made an impression on you that you’d like to listen to again? Or maybe there’s one you haven’t had a chance to listen to yet? Now’s your chance!

If you really, really, REALLY want something new, my partner Chloe and I put together a free meditation to help you harness the energy of any emotional pain that you’re experiencing in your life to discover new possibility. It’s on our new website - if you want a sneak peak, you can visit http://www.thenewloveparadigm.com or simply text the word “POSSIBLE” to the number 33444 and follow the instructions to download the meditation. It’s our gift to you this holiday season, or whenever you happen to be listening to this episode.

There are exciting things coming in the year ahead. New episodes with amazing guests, the book that Chloe and I have been working on will be coming out, and some even bigger projects that I’ll be telling you about as they take shape.

Meanwhile - I’d love to hear from you. If you have a chance, drop me a line at neilius at neilsattin dot com and let me know what’s been really helpful for you on the podcast, what you’d like more of, and what you’d like less of. Or if you have any stories about some specific change that’s happened I’d love to hear them. Lately I’ve been hearing more and more about just how much Relationship Alive has been helping people in their relationships - and I can’t tell you how much it helps me stay fired up about my mission with this podcast - to help you be able to do relationship better and be yourself more fully in relationship and in life in general. Thanks so much for listening, and I’ll see you next week with another new episode. Take care, and enjoy your week!

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