Relationship Radio: Marriage, Sex, Limerence & Avoiding Divorce
Relationship Radio: Marriage, Sex, Limerence & Avoiding Divorce
2nd Annual Marriage Helper Christmas
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This episode was taken from our 2nd Annual Very Merry Marriage Helper Christmas.
Merry Christmas from all of us at Marriage Helper. We hope you leave with a little more hope after listening to this episode ❤️🎄
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Merry Christmas and we are so happy that you're here. My name is Kimberly. I'm joined today with Dr Joe Beam.
Speaker 2:Ho, ho ho.
Speaker 1:Our very own marriage helper. Santa, that's what you should have worn.
Speaker 2:My Santa suit. I actually do have one, I know. But I'm going from here to have my last radiation treatment for my cancer, the last radiation treatment I have to take. So it's a good day for me and I didn't want to go in there in my Santa suit.
Speaker 1:You know, I think they would have loved it.
Speaker 2:They might have loved it. There would have been people with cameras everywhere on their phones saying this idiot came to have his therapy in the same place we did our treatment. They call it radiation treatment. They would have loved it.
Speaker 1:They would have loved it. But either way, we are here today to answer some of your questions, and something super exciting that we're doing on our special Christmas edition of our marriage helper live show here on YouTube is we are giving away one of our solo spouse workshops. Now, for you who have been in the Marriage Helper community, you know the value of this. This is a $1,750 giveaway. It's three days live in one of our solo spouse workshops, whether you choose to do the online one, or if you end up winning and you are a man, you could come to one of our in-person men's only solo spouse events.
Speaker 2:Right, we've got one of those coming up in March, I believe we do. I'll be doing that one and no offense to anybody anywhere, ever because I do couples workshops et cetera, but those are my favorite workshops to do the husbands only. It's amazing what happens in those and so if you're a guy and you win this, you might want to look at coming in that one. It'll be amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So it's a great giveaway and you know what, throughout maybe to some of the questions or some of the things that happen, we may give away some marriage helper swag or marriage helper goodies, and Jason, our producer, had no idea I was going to say that he's just going with it.
Speaker 2:So every time you do that, I'll go ho, ho, ho. That's awesome. I think that's perfect.
Speaker 1:I think that's perfect, okay, well, remember there's the link in the chat If you're joining us here live, which is the only way you'll be able to register, but be sure that you fill out that registration before 1230, because we'll be beginning to do our elves will be beginning to do all of the things to pick who the winner is going to be before we end at one o'clock today, and that's 1230 Central.
Speaker 1:Time USA Central Time. In the good old US of A, where it is 60 degrees and not snowing, which is the way we like it.
Speaker 2:No, it's not. But we're in Tennessee and we may get some snow January, february.
Speaker 1:But right now it's 56, with a high today of 60. Some snow January, february, but right now it's 56, with a high today of 60. And I love it. Okay, here's the first question we're going to answer today. The question says how can I rebuild trust and reconcile with my spouse? She filed for divorce two years ago, dragged me through countless motions and false allegations, tried to restrict my activities with the kids and now withdrew the divorce motion, stating that she wants to reconcile for the kids and also because the legal system is bad. I still see a lot of red flags. Yet, as a Christian and a father, I have a heart that beats for her and the kids and ultimately I want to save the marriage. I would like to do the workshop, but at this time I feel like I'm absolutely unsafe around her. So the first question, or the question that he said, is how can I rebuild trust and reconcile with my wife?
Speaker 2:Well, let's answer that last question where he says I don't think I'd feel safe. Let me assure you of this If you decide to come to the couple's workshop and she comes with you, you will be safe because of the fact that we'll make sure you are. It's one of the things we do. Safety is a high, high factor for us Now, not just physically safe although I think you probably were referring to being emotionally safe but in our workshop we don't allow anybody to say anything negative about the spouse, and so if she, for example, started to see something bad about you, we would gently but firmly say no, no, and here we don't bash our spouses, we talk only about ourselves. Now, I can't guarantee that she would do that at night in the hotel room, if you stay in the same room, but I'll guarantee you that in the workshop it'll be the safest place you've ever been, where you can say what you truly, genuinely feel, as long as it's not bashing her, and she can say what she genuinely and truly feels, as long as it's not bashing you, and we'll be the protectors of that. So if you're afraid to come because you feel unsafe unless there's some physical things, some physical danger you're not telling us about, then I'm suggesting that you will be safe if you come Now to the question itself, we talk about a system called calculative trust.
Speaker 2:You see, one of the things we do that kind of sets us apart is that we don't just study the research about men and women and parents and children. We also study relationships between businesses and we study all kinds of things that seem bizarre to other people in our business. Because what are you reading that for? What are you looking for over there? Because it's amazing how many relationship principles we can find in places other than research about relationships. And so calculative trust is a trust where that okay, we're going to build a system where I can trust you.
Speaker 2:Now I can't go into all the details about how that could be done because it's pretty widespread, but when Alice and I were getting back together and she wanted to trust me, it was okay, you handle all the money. If you handle all the money, you know I'm not off doing some terrible thing out there. If you handle all the money, you know I'm not off doing some terrible thing out there. And if I were going to be late, I called her and told her exactly what I was doing exactly where I was and when I would be there In other words, I for about 10 months to a year. I made sure that it was almost as if I were a teenager being checked on.
Speaker 2:Now, you can't live like that the rest of your life, okay, but I voluntarily did that because of the fact that I wanted her to feel safe, and we call that calculative trust. You calculate away a system with these things that are going to be done so that you can feel trust, and if your spouse says to you, well, that means then you don't trust me, the answer would be that's correct, I don't, but I want to. And because I want to, let's build this system where I can feel secure. Now, you can learn more about that in our workshops, kimberly. Do we have anything on calculative trust in our toolkits? I don't remember.
Speaker 1:No, not at this point. But you know what, if they want to book a call and learn more about how our workshop package can help, then Jason will be putting the link in the chat to how people can have a conversation with someone on our team and see what the best entry point is for them. Okay, excellent, yeah, wonderful.
Speaker 2:Speak of the real person on a marriage helper team, an actual, real person, and so remember, it's a system of calculative trust, not just okay, let's get it back together, we're going to be okay. No, there's a process to do this, and also in our membership. I think we have in our membership what's the name of this thing Exploring Reconciliation. I'm sorry, I'm 149 years old Exploring Reconciliation, but they have to go to the workshop before they can get to that one. Right, yeah?
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, that's right, because in our workshop it's the best opportunity for people to truly experience the deep change that they're looking for. Good, right. So so many times people just want to try and do it on their own or sweep things under the rug and say, well, you know what, like in this situation he's likely. Or a lot of people in his situation say, well, now she wants to reconcile, so I guess things are kind of better, maybe I don't need to do as much work, maybe we don't need to do as much work because, kind of the, the gas, the pressure has been taken off of that gas pedal from his side a little bit. He wanted to save the marriage for two years. Now his wife is starting to turn back back around and he's beginning to question things or he's beginning to think maybe this isn't what we need, but this is the time to double down.
Speaker 2:Yes, based on my experience, this workshop is what you need at this point. Now, her motivations, according to what you said I don't know her, but you said her motivations are number one. She still loves her children and wants what's best for them. That's a powerful, powerful motivation, and many of the things we discuss in the workshop can also be used in relationship to your children. And the other was that she's frustrated by the legal system. What that typically means and I'm not sure about your wife is it's not turning out like I thought it was going to. It's not going the way I thought it was going to go. In other words, I'm now facing some reality and I'm not happy with what reality is Not quite as strong and powerful a motivation as about the children, but still a good motivation, and this is, as far as we're concerned, this is a good sign.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Let's go to another question. Okay, so this question says I was attracted to my wife because I saw in her what I wanted to be like. I found that our marriage hold on. I found, as our marriage went on it wasn't that attractive anymore. Now I find myself wanting her to be more like me. That's a problem. How do I allow my wife to be who she is? It seems like this would be very easy to do, but it's not. I find myself internally judging her because she didn't react the way I would have. This affects how I feel about her, and this isn't fair to her. Well, at least he realizes that this isn't fair to her.
Speaker 2:You're the psychologist.
Speaker 1:You know I was laughing because I I use this example sometimes when I'm talking about attraction and talking about the four different ways, ways we're attracted to people, and I talk about how, when Rob and I first started dating, one of the things spiritually that attracted me to him was how generous he was. He was always getting meals for the homeless, paying for people to go on mission trips. Getting meals for the homeless paying for people to go on mission trips, things like that. Then we got married.
Speaker 2:And then his generosity became something I didn't like.
Speaker 1:Now, he's giving away your money.
Speaker 1:Now he's giving away ours. I was like, wait a minute, you need to think about this situation more logically, like the way I would think about this situation right, which is contempt, thinking I'm better than you, you are inferior to me, and if you would just do things the way I want you to do things, everything would be better. And it's control and it leads to having contempt towards our spouse. So that's why I started laughing. How do I allow my wife to be who she is? Well, let's just go back to some of the basics of this. We are attracted to people in one of four areas, and this attraction is what begins the process of us falling in love physically, intellectually, emotionally and spiritually. We call it the pies of attraction at marriage helper. And so physically that's kind of self explanatory we're attracted to people who we find physically attractive. Intellectually, we're attracted to people who we enjoy having conversations with, and that it's not just about the bills or things that we find boring, but things that-.
Speaker 2:Actually interchange with each other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. This is the basis of friendship as falling in love goes on. Then we have emotional attraction, which is that we're attracted to people who evoke positive emotions within us. When Rob and I were dating, it was the long phone calls that we would have at night, the text messages he would send me, or that I would wake up to each morning when he was going to fly way early and I was getting up to go to classes in college, and I would have these beautiful text messages from him, or flowers that would show up when I would come back to my dorm.
Speaker 1:And then, spiritually, we're attracted to people who we see as having a similar or better than beliefs and values as we do. And so, as I said, like the generosity part, that was a spiritual part of attraction, that I perceived it to be better, that he was better at that than I was, and so we are attracted to those things. But then it is not uncommon that once you get married and start living with someone and you see them day in and day out, that some of those things that were so endearing when we were dating become some of our biggest points of frustration when we're married.
Speaker 2:Irritation, irritation.
Speaker 1:I don't know what it is in the wedding cake, do you? No, it's something.
Speaker 2:You know, Alice and I were so poor, we just had cornbread and it was in the South, so you dipped it in like peas. No, you don't dip it in the peas. You dip it in what's called the pot liquor, which is the liquid around the peas there you go yeah, that was your wedding cake, that's country For sure.
Speaker 1:And so now I find myself wanting her to be more like me. Well, because you probably have it in your mind that if she was more like you, you would have less fights, that you would get along better, that you may be more attracted to her. Maybe you love working out and focusing on your health and she doesn't, and that's become a sticking point in your mind. But where it's all coming and all falling apart is if you believe that there's a list of things that she has to do or a criteria that she needs to meet in order for her to be accepted and loved by you, then it's not unconditional love, it is conditional love. And, as you said, I find myself internally judging her because she didn't react the way I would have. This affects how I feel about her. Yes, because you are conditionally loving her. So, joe, how do we turn this around? Stop it.
Speaker 2:Stop it Next question.
Speaker 1:Stop it, stop it Next question.
Speaker 2:What I mean by that is this If you're truly going to love any human being and if you have children, this is applicable to them too If you're going to love any human being, you have to accept that person as he or she is, which means you have to accept you as you are and she has to accept herself as she is, but you also have to accept each other. You say, but what does that mean? We don't ever need to grow or get better? Sure, yeah, everybody needs to grow and get better, but the acceptance is not, as Kimberly said, conditioned on that or based on that. And so I would suggest, my friend, that you stop and ask yourself am I being selfish by wanting her to be, think, do and feel the way I do? Because if that's the way you're going to love her, then what's going to happen is she's going to build a wall against you and she'll paint a picture on your side of the wall where she pretends to be what you want. I'm not saying that she necessarily will do that, but she likely will do that, and you won't even know who she is anymore.
Speaker 2:To understand another person, you have to accept them as they are. To truly love them. You have to accept them as they are. And you say how can I do this? This is a choice on your part, my friend. Stop judging. Rather than looking for the things you would have done differently or you wish you had done differently, start focusing on the good things, the good thoughts she has, the good actions that she commits, the good behavior that she demonstrates, et cetera, et cetera. Focus on those things, because you see your mind's focusing on the negative and therefore all that's going to come out is negative when it comes to her. And if you have children, when it comes to them, focus on the positives. They're different than you. That might be the best thing on earth, because none of us, not one, is perfect. So focus on the positive, my friend, absolutely.
Speaker 1:I want to remind everyone that we are giving away a solo spouse workshop, so remember to use the link that is posted and pinned in the chat. The registration is open until 1230. So we have nine more minutes, by my clock, that you are able to do that. I don't want to veer us too much off track, but I'm also looking at the comments that are coming through on the YouTube live and someone just asked a question. We were talking about conditional versus unconditional. Someone asked is the marriage covenant conditional or unconditional? I would have to know more about what they mean. Well, I think what they mean is like, when you say I do, does that come with conditions? Or do you say I do through thick and thin, no matter what?
Speaker 2:I think it comes with certain expectations, without a doubt. And if you want to put conditions on it, well, think about the fact that if one want to put conditions on it, well, think about the fact that if one is unfaithful to the other, then that is a violation of the marriage covenant. So inherent in any covenant is the fact that you will be faithful to the covenant, that you will try to fulfill the covenant and that you will not purposely violate the covenant. So that's kind of inherent in the idea of covenant itself. Now, if you want to call that a condition, I don't see it as a condition. I see it as an aspect. It's what is. It's what's supposed to be.
Speaker 1:But unfortunately too many people in our culture and society don't take it as a covenant or as a commitment.
Speaker 2:No, as a matter of fact, and I've said this many times, so forgive me, I won't take but a minute to do it here. When people say, don't you think communication the most important thing in a marriage? And I'll say it's important, but not the most important and the one that I have finally settled on after so many years of working with so many people the most important thing in a relationship commitment. I'm going to be here in a good time. It's going to be here in the bad times, because it's not always going to be good. I'm going to be here when we're both perfect. I'm going to be here when one of us is not, and we're going to figure out how to do this.
Speaker 2:So, commitment covenant I like the idea that people are making marriage covenants now and a covenant is like a contract. So if you want to call it conditions, okay, but just like a contract. This is the expectation. This is how you fulfill this contract. You're going to be here for me. I'm going to be here for you. We're going to love each other as best we can, even though that will vary based on what's happening on a given day and we're going to be committed to be with each other, unless a flagrant violation of the covenant occurs.
Speaker 1:Let's answer another question that listeners have submitted. I often hear work on your pies for yourself not to get your spouse back. This seems easier said than done. How do you actually shift your mindset for that to become a reality?
Speaker 2:You're the pies expert.
Speaker 1:You always say that, but you're the one who created pies originally.
Speaker 2:I didn't create it, I just named it. I put together the system. But yes, you're correct.
Speaker 1:This is also a. I mean, how do you shift your mindset for that to become a reality? Well, I don't know that. You shift your mindset first. I think the mindset shift happens over time. But what you need to start and stop doing on the front end is stop looking to your spouse to and how they're reacting to you to determine whether or not you're going. I'm talking about the pies. I did one just last week and a common question that I get is but I'm thinking about stopping working on my pies because it's not working to bring my spouse back. Well, clearly, you're like, the metric of success that you're using is whether or not your spouse is talking to you more, engaging, friendly with you. Whatever that might be, and that's the wrong metric.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 1:So you need to stop that first and foremost. So the alternative like, what is the alternative? Yeah, to stop working on becoming the best you can in those four areas. That's not the alternative.
Speaker 2:The way you measure success with pies is what it's doing for you, that's right.
Speaker 1:It's really about self-esteem, self-confidence, self-worth there's so many of those things. I mean just as a general metric, and then if you want to look at metrics for each of the ones individually I mean for pies you begin looking at how well you're sleeping. You can begin looking at how much you're exercising. If weight is important to you, then you can measure whether you're gaining or losing weight. Like you can make metrics based on the areas you want to grow in in each areas of the pies, to see how you are growing in each area. But there is no metric that should include. Well, my husband smiled at me today. Therefore, I should keep working on my pies.
Speaker 2:Right or any other human being. You don't do it for your mom, you don't do it for your dad, you don't do it for your best friend, who is always nagging you. You do it only for you, because that's the measure of success.
Speaker 1:That's right Now. The caveat part to this is that emotional attraction when I work on emotional attraction, there's an intrinsic part of it that's going to depend on how I make other people feel.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:So in that sense, there is kind of one part of the pies that you do see, that you do kind of gauge another person's reaction, but it's not to see if the pies as a whole are working. It's looking okay with emotional attraction. I want to spend more time with my son because we feel very distant. Using this as an example, instead of a, instead of a spouse, I want to spend more time with my son because he's going through a hard time. We feel very distant. So what are some things that could evoke emotions with him, within him he would enjoy feeling. What are things that I can do with him to see if we can have some more time together, if he might open up more? So in that sense, you might have a metric.
Speaker 2:But that's a secondary metric. The primary metric in emotional is you healing your own emotions? Do I have peace? Do I have joy in my heart? Those kinds?
Speaker 1:of things, have I let go of anger and forgiven, and forgiven where needed and let go of resentment. That has to be the first step.
Speaker 2:It has to be the first step and then you can start looking at how to apply to other people. Now one last thing very quickly, before we go to the next question. That's this you said it seems they're not working. Listen, when your spouse gets angry because you're doing the pies or starts ignoring you more because you're doing the pies almost always, that means you're messing up their plans.
Speaker 2:You see, they have justified not being with you. They've justified the way they treat you. They've justified leaving you. They've justified being with somebody else or whatever it is they are doing. They have justified that based on a picture in their mind that they have of you. And when that's part of their justification, and when you start changing, becoming better, you screw that up, because the picture they had of you in their mind is giving them the justification to do what they're doing. Now. There's becoming a better person, physically, intellectually, emotionally, spiritually. It messes up their plan and that hurts them because it's messing up what they want to do and that leads to anger, and that's when they'll start being rude or calling you more names or giving you more of the cold shoulder. Actually, what it means is it is working and the reason they're reacting negatively to it is because it's messing up their plan, but it is working because it means you are becoming the better you, and that's the ultimate goal.
Speaker 1:So work on your pies for yourself, not to get your spouse back. You do that by stopping looking at what your spouse is doing or how they're responding to you as the metric or gauge of whether or not working on your pies is working. Working on your pies is the best thing to do for you bar none, regardless of what your spouse does or how they react, and so the alternative is to not to stop working on becoming your best self. Yeah, that's not it. That's not it.
Speaker 1:All right, let's go to the next question. As a reminder, there is one minute left. Registration shuts off in one minute. The winner will be drawn and we will announce it right at the end. So in about 30 minutes we'll be announcing, or maybe even about 25 minutes, we'll be announcing who the winner is. So be sure you stick around. Short and sweet, how can I let my husband know that I know of his indiscretions?
Speaker 2:Now do you realize? You said husbands.
Speaker 1:Husband how Okay.
Speaker 2:Okay, all right.
Speaker 1:If there are multiple husbands, choose one.
Speaker 2:Did you say husbands? I don't know, because that would be a totally different question.
Speaker 1:How can I let my singular one husband know that I know of his indiscretions?
Speaker 2:See, folks, it's the treatment for the cancer. I've lost all sense. All right, so here, think about it this way it's according to how you know, if you know because of the fact that you violated his privacy, you sneaked into his phone, you hired a private detective to follow him or put some GPS thing hidden in his car, whatever it might be, in other words, if you've sneaked around to find out how to do that, and then you say I know you're having the affair. And he says how do you know? And the only honest answer is going to be well, I looked into your phone or whatever. Don't expect him to go. Oh, my goodness, I'm caught. I need to repent and do better.
Speaker 2:Almost always, the reaction is going to happen, and we've been watching this for 30 years. Almost always it's going to be an attack on you. How dare you look into my phone? How dare you have me followed? How dare you? How dare you, how dare you? And so, if that's what you're going to tell them, that you know, I don't think it's going to come out to your advantage. Now you can say I'm pretty convinced you're having an affair. I know that you're doing this because I feel it in my heart. Now he's going to deny it, he's going to lie. That's what almost all people do when they get caught doing something they shouldn't do. Now, if you know it through some other fashion, that you're willing to tell him, like I know because your best friend called me and told me, now his anger is going to be directed toward his best friend. It's going to be different than if you say I called your best friend and he told me, then again it's going to be anger at you. No, your best friend called me and told me, then anger is going to be directed at the best friend. So always look at the source.
Speaker 2:Now, when you tell, if you're going to tell your husband or your wife for that matter, if you're listening try not to do it in an accusatory matter, even though that's what you want to do. You want to say I found out what you're. It's a whole lot better to say I just need to talk to you about the hurt I feel Because I have been made aware that you're cheating on me, or that you're gambling away all the money, or that you're using cocaine secretly, or whatever it might be. If you start off with, let me tell you about the deep hurt, I feel, because I found that then you have a greater chance of them being honest with you. If you attack, you have a lesser chance of them being honest with you. Now I realize it may sound that we're asking, like you, to be superhuman, and it almost is, but if you can do it that way, you've got a whole lot better chance.
Speaker 1:Let's answer the next question, so this one.
Speaker 2:Oh, it's closed right.
Speaker 1:It is closed. Time's up.
Speaker 2:Registration is closed.
Speaker 1:Time is up. We'll announce the winner in about 23 minutes.
Speaker 2:And if you're watching a later replay of this, it's closed.
Speaker 1:It is closed. It was closed for you from the beginning. How do you tell the difference between treating your reluctant spouse with kindness and minimizing pushes versus being an enabler? I end up being my husband's safety net, financially as well as emotionally, but find it hard to say no, since I know that it would be a push. How do you tell the difference between treating your reluctant spouse with kindness and minimizing pushes versus when you're becoming an enabler?
Speaker 2:When we talk about acceptance in our workshop and of course it will be much abbreviated here. But when we talk about acceptance in our workshop and of course it will be much abbreviated here, but when we talk about acceptance in our workshop we say acceptance is acknowledging reality. And so if my wife tells me that she's in love with Charlie, accepting that would be okay. I hear you and I understand that you're in love with Charlie. That's acceptance. You could think what? Yeah, it's acceptance, it's acknowledging reality.
Speaker 2:Now, there's a difference in that and encouraging and abating or not abating, that's not the word. Helping them, enabling them, that's the word I was looking for. And so if she said I'm in love with Charlie and I say, wow, charlie's a heck of a guy. I can surely understand why you love him. He's really neat. That would be endorsing it. I'm not going to endorse it. If she said I'm in love with Charlie and I say, well, maybe you don't need to go ahead and move in and live with him for a month to see if that really is going to work out or not, then that would be encouraging. And so we never endorse, we never encourage and we don't enable. Now, if his financial difficulty is due to something that's not his fault and that you're just trying to help him through that and it has nothing to do with his. Is this guy having an affair? Is that what she said?
Speaker 1:She doesn't say that.
Speaker 2:Okay If his financial difficulty is based on his inappropriate actions, my suggestion and of course you have to make your own decision but my suggestion is don't help him with the finances because that's enabling. But if it's something that's not his fault he lost his job, he got laid off and it has nothing to do with inappropriate action then helping him out can be a good thing. But I personally wouldn't give anybody anything that would enable them to do the things that they should not be doing. If a drunk stops me on the street and asks me for money, I say look, buddy, I'm a recovering alcoholic. I know what you're going to do with this money. Therefore, I'm not going to give it to you because I'm not going to help you get drunk Now, if you want something to eat, I'll go in there and buy it for you, but I'm not going to enable you to do that bad thing.
Speaker 2:Now apply that to marriage. Yes, I'm not going to help them do the wrong thing. I'm just not, and I recommend that you don't do that either. But, as I said, it's your choice. So be open, be understanding, listen, care. Let him know that you accept that this is what he feels, accept that this is what he's doing now, but you're not encouraging it, you're not endorsing it. As a matter of fact, you're against it. But you're understanding. But don't in any way help him do it. That's at least what I recommend.
Speaker 1:Yeah, these are things that are difficult to navigate, sure they are. They are, but we believe that there's always hope and there's always a way out of it. Here's a great question that someone submitted. They said how can I get my spouse to look and see things from my perspective instead of always getting defensive about how he is feeling?
Speaker 2:I don't know that your spouse will do this without the help of a counselor. I don't know if our coaches actually are equipped to do this or not, but sometimes you can do a role play where you switch sides and some counselors who are very, very good at that will say okay, now you be her and you be him and now come from their perspective and have this discussion as if you were the other person. If you're being open and honest with her, if you can talk to each other, then that can help the other person see it from your perspective. Otherwise, my only recommendation would be that when you try to explain your perspective, don't explain why he or she is wrong. Explain what you feel. Can I tell you what I feel about this and may I tell you why I feel that way? And sometimes, if you're going to be really trying to understand each other, you're going to go back to your childhood to explain why you feel that way, like my dad used to beat my mom every other weekend and it was a terrible thing to experience, and he only did it when he was drinking. And therefore, when you have an extra drink and I start getting all hard to get along with, it's not just because you had that second drink, it's because of what's happening inside of me. Can you understand how that affects me? And if the person comes back and says, well, I'm not your dad, I know you're not, I'm not saying that you are my dad I'm asking you, can you understand how I feel and how that affects me? Sometimes, being able to tell people not only what you feel but why you feel that Worked with a couple once he was a physician and she was a pharmacist or vice versa, I can't remember.
Speaker 2:It's been so long, so relatively intelligent people, highly educated, and they'd been having arguments about sex their whole marriage until finally, in their fifties, she finally told him about how she was sexually abused as a child. It changed everything, because now he saw it from her perspective, not just because she said I don't want to do that or that makes me feel bad, which he was trying to override with it shouldn't make you feel bad, but when he found out where it came from and she opened up and told him the story of what happened and let him see her emotions of when it happened because as she told it, she felt some of those emotions all over again Then he really understood it from her perspective, and that changed everything.
Speaker 1:The only other thing I might add to this person is make sure that they are approaching the conversation in a way where they are not criticizing on the front end. So, thinking through, how are you even bringing the topic up? Are you bringing it up at the right time, when, when your husband is the least stressed? Are you doing it in such a way where you're bringing up the fact he hasn't helped with the chores or done the dishes, or whatever it might be, or what like? What is the topic and how are you approaching it? Are you doing it in a way that leads to defensiveness?
Speaker 2:or not, and if you do that, well, just before I came over here as a matter of fact, I got here a couple of minutes late. You can't tell that because the intro was going on I noticed my wife was very sad and I asked her what it was about, and she said I'm worried about money and we're not rich, but we have money. And so I sat down and said help me understand that. And so, as we listened, finally she talked about what it really was. It's her mother who's been dead for many years.
Speaker 2:And now her mother made all these candies and cookies for Christmas and she was thinking about making candies and cookies for Christmas and now she's very, very sad. Had nothing to do with money at all, but at least on this occasion I was able to listen and ask gentle questions until she finally was able to tell me what it was she really was feeling and why she was feeling that way, and that was worth being late here, to me and to her.
Speaker 1:But finally made it anyway, We'll take it that's an acceptable answer. How do you come to an agreement if your spouse changes their beliefs and values?
Speaker 2:You're the psychologist. Well am I? When do you now?
Speaker 1:predict you'll be, at which point, at what?
Speaker 2:point do you think you'll have a degree?
Speaker 1:I mean I have my master's in psychology Right, and then I am in the middle of my data analysis for my dissertation, which means my research is completed. I just have to write chapter four, chapter five, like there's a light at the end of the tunnel and it's not a train Good At that point.
Speaker 2:So before too very long, you're going to be Dr Holmes.
Speaker 1:You know, yeah, there's several levels of iterations of after I write, chapter four and five. I understand.
Speaker 2:I got a PhD remember. I know Okay but that makes you the psychologist.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, all that trying to work around. So how do you come to an agreement if your spouse changes their beliefs and values? It's it's difficult to not know what this agreement is that they're talking about and what is the belief in values that's changed. But I mean, let's just talk about the recent political season. People tend to grow as they age. We aren't, we don't always have the same beliefs and values as we did when we got married, and that's normal.
Speaker 1:But the problem can become if you both get married and you have the same political beliefs in this example, and then, over time, one person begins to change or another person begins to change in a more, in a more rigid way. So this can lead to conflict, which we see not only in marriages but across all family and friend relationships, especially in in the past several years, unfortunately. So how can you come to an agreement if you originally agreed on something, how to vote, what to believe about certain things? Well, it goes back to things that we've already said Instead of what's currently happening in society, where someone shares a view that you think is absolutely asinine and you just tear into them. Here's all the reasons you're wrong.
Speaker 1:What if we thought about it as how can I ask questions so that I can better understand where this person is coming from? Because what we know is that beliefs and values come from who and what is important to a person. And you talk a whole lot about this, Joe, and so if something has changed in my life or I'm just thinking of some friends in my own life who they started doing a whole lot more work in inner cities or they became missionaries well, things in the political realm that are going to be important to them may look very different than it did when they first start out, because who and what is important to them has changed in their life, and that's not a bad thing. But when we begin to put Not necessarily a bad thing.
Speaker 1:No, right, it's not necessarily a bad thing.
Speaker 1:Terrible situations is when we stereotype and group people together based on what they may say.
Speaker 1:Say, if they say, well, I'm going to vote for a Democratic president in the US or I'm going to vote for a Republican president, well, based on which side you're on, you may stereotype someone in either of those camps and I'm not making any political statements at all, right here but you're stereotyping most of the time when, in reality, if you actually had a conversation to understand, you may find you actually have more similarities with that person than you thought you did. You just view how to approach it in some different ways. So how do you come to an agreement? Start by just trying to get an understanding of well, tell me more about why you believe this way and what's important to you, and let's see where we can come to a middle ground of understanding so that we can maybe agree to disagree or come to a compromise, because 69%, according to the research, of things that we fight about in our marriage we will never agree on. So then, how can you agree to disagree with? Respect is another point that would be helpful here, Unless it's a deal breaker.
Speaker 2:We had a couple we dealt with a few years ago where that she had been invited by one of her friends to go to a sex club. In that night, she had sex with three or four men that she had never seen before. She was titillated by it and came back and told her husband, we're going to start going to a sex club and have sex with different people, to which he replied oh no, not going to happen. And so in that particular case, that's a deal breaker. And so the first thing I would recommend is okay, find out and Kimberly's already alluded to this but find out who or what has changed and what is important to them, and so it would be.
Speaker 2:Is there somebody that's come into your life that has become a very important person to you and they're influencing your change of beliefs? Is there something that now has risen to the top, something that you want, some dreams, some desire? You're chasing something that you actually maybe accidentally, got into to begin with, but now you like it, and now your beliefs and values are changing because of the fact that whatever or whoever is most important to you has changed. That's what I would start trying to find out. First, Tell me how your life has changed. Tell me who you like to listen to now. Tell me who has the most influence on you. Now, typically, you can't ask that directly. You've got to be more casual and come about it in a gentler, kinder way. And then, well, if he says you know, I've been hanging out with this guy named Charlie. He's a new guy at work and he's made me think about some things differently. We've had some really long conversations and I'm really impressed with how this guy thinks, and he's beginning to make me think that I'm wrong about some things.
Speaker 2:And so is that? What's changing your beliefs? Yeah, Tell me about the beliefs that have changed, because that's when you're going to find out why the values change. And in the case where we had the woman that wanted to go to the sex club and a husband who wouldn't, she said this is who I am now. This is what I'm going to do. You either do it or I divorce you. And he said I'm not going to. And so it can wind up being a deal breaker. It can actually lead to divorce, but the first thing you want to try to do, if you can, is, through a gentle process, find out what has changed and who and what is important to them, Then start to understand how that has affected their beliefs. And it's not an easy process, but it can be done.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm and people can go back to an original set of beliefs and values. I did, yeah.
Speaker 2:I changed my belief and value system when I left Alice for another woman way back in 1984. I divorced Alice and then finally came to my senses. It took me about three years, but we were married in 1987. And I actually did go back to my original beliefs and values. So don't think that just because they have changed, this is who they are from now on. Even with that lady that went to the sex club, there's a pretty good shot at some point she's going to look at it and go what the heck was I thinking?
Speaker 2:Right and actually go back to her original belief and value system.
Speaker 1:It's up to you, then, as to whether or not you choose to wait for that to happen, right, well, and I think we should, as people say, and it drives me crazy double click on that. So to double click on that and like, make it bigger. So we hone in on that.
Speaker 2:That's a new one for me. I'm in the wrong age group, I think.
Speaker 1:Honestly, it's a very annoying phrase to me, but it makes a lot of sense in this context. So double-clicking on that. What I don't want people to hear is oh, you're saying, once this happens, there's no hope.
Speaker 2:Oh, if I left that message, it was certainly a mistake.
Speaker 1:Well, I don't know that you did, but people hear things right, and especially people who are in struggle and in crisis. So what we're saying is, if your spouse has, is in the middle of doing something where they have changed their beliefs and values, they're involved in an affair changing like seriously changing deep, Deep beliefs about monogamy, about I mean, there's probably a whole list of things that we could put in there that are deal breakers, as you would say, things that you cannot logically isn't the word I'm looking for but you, just like you, would not feel good continuing in the marriage.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can't do this.
Speaker 1:Right, because then it begins to affect your own beliefs and values.
Speaker 2:Right exactly.
Speaker 1:It's not that, then clearly that's a problem. However, that doesn't mean that your spouse is too far gone or lost, although it may feel that way right now, but your spouse can come back to their original set of beliefs and values, and, in fact, the process that we guide couples through helps to facilitate that happening.
Speaker 1:That's correct, which is one part of why our couples workshops are so effective in the success rate that we have Um and Dr John Hill and I I mean recently just talked more about. There's a podcast coming out tomorrow where Dr John Hill and I go through current success rate at Marriage Helper and breaking down what it is, how we come to that data, why you should understand what success rates mean when you're looking at different ways to get marriage help and how those success rates are calculated and what the population is and what the powering size of that sample is, because those things are important and you deserve to know that to make an informed decision. Our success rate still, over three different research studies over 30 years, has shown a 70 to 75% success rate and we break that down in our podcast tomorrow. Why am I saying all of this? I'm saying all of this because a huge part of what our couples workshop does that facilitates.
Speaker 1:That is what we're talking about here, and our encouragement to you is, if your spouse is involved in some of these things, that you do continue to have hope and you continue to do the right things and you build a foundation for your marriage that is strong, so that if and when your spouse comes back, that you will be set up even more so for success of actually reconciling and being a strong and committed marriage a year, two years, seven years, 10 years, 20 years from now. Because, at marriage helper, our goal is to support, save and strengthen marriages to last a lifetime and we believe that there is hope for you, even if your spouse is in the middle of doing the craziest things that you could never have ever imagined. Well, half of our team has probably done that and saved their marriage and now they work with us.
Speaker 2:Yeah, triple click. One other thing to add to that. That's this Don't change your belief in value systems, thinking that's what you have to do to save the marriage. A lady told me once well, he wants us to start having threesomes and so if that's what will save the marriage, I'm going to do it. And I knew that was outside her beliefs and values. And what I said to her is you're actually going to hasten the destruction of your marriage if you change your beliefs and values to try to make him happy. Stick with what you believe in value unless you discover what you believe in value is wrong.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Well, Joe. We only have five minutes left before we announce the winner. We have three questions, so pick a number one through three. Two. All right. How do I create a safe environment for open communication when past interactions have been hurtful?
Speaker 2:I'm not sure I understand.
Speaker 1:Would you like to change the question?
Speaker 2:I'm just not sure I understand. Well, this is change the question. I'm just not sure I understand.
Speaker 1:Well, this is all I have, so let's make some assumptions. How do I create a safe environment for open communication? If I had to guess, I would say they've fought a lot about issues in the past. So how can we be open about how we feel about things and have it be a productive and healthy conversation, when in the past we've just never been able to do that?
Speaker 2:Okay, Make some ground rules. The time to make rules about how to have communication, especially how to argue, can't be made while you're arguing. You've got to make them sometime when you're calm and easy. And so you can make some rules like this that you both agree to, you both sign, so that later nobody looks back and says, no, it was this. No, no, we wrote it down and we signed it. So we we know what it was and one will be. It's always going to be safe.
Speaker 2:Nobody ever does anything that's going to cause the other person to feel unsafe, particularly physically. So no yelling, no screaming, no, no standing up and stomping, no threatening gestures that you're going to agree to that. And if one of them happens, then by agreement, you end that discussion and you start back in four hours or the next day, whatever you want to do. And another is that anytime anybody starts well, going toward what we call flooding, you don't have to explain it. But if somebody starts getting out of hand that, you'll take a recess for 15 or 20 minutes and then come back and you make those rules in advance. And the reason that you want to come back to it is so that the recess is not going to be used as a method to get away from the discussion. So sit down, look at what happens when you do and make some rules about that. If that happens, here's what we're going to do Now, to begin with.
Speaker 2:Once you make those and agree, if you almost immediately violate them in the next visit, get you a coach. Seriously, you can get one of our coaches, for example they're trained and have your discussion with the coach listening in, so that then, if any of the rules start being violated, the coach can be the one that steps in and says no, okay, kind of calm down a little bit there, charlie, because that's a little too strong. Or back up a little bit there, sally, and let the coach teach you. I actually know a couple over in New Mexico I'm blanking on their names cool people. They went on a cruise with us one time, first time they'd ever seen the ocean scared them to death.
Speaker 2:What a time to see the ocean for the first time when you're in the middle of it. The captain came in and said we were going over some kind of a trench that was 26,000 feet deep and he started panicking and I said anything over six feet doesn't matter, it's okay. Anyhow, they took a couple that couldn't communicate, brought them to their house and they would facilitate the conversations until the couple. One night this couple that I know actually got up and left and went to the living room and started watching TV, because the other couple didn't realize they had left because they had finally learned how to talk to each other. So sometimes you need a coach or a wise couple or somebody to help you do that. But you can do that.
Speaker 1:It's like a referee.
Speaker 2:Almost.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I feel like there's a marriage helper board game somewhere in here where we have a. We'll flesh it out. We'll flesh it out.
Speaker 2:If not at least a card set.
Speaker 1:Yeah, something, something like that. Okay, Jason, where are we at on time?
Speaker 2:I'm expecting a phone call any minute now. Mm.
Speaker 1:Of course.
Speaker 2:So in the meantime, until my phone call comes, is there another question we can answer really fast?
Speaker 1:Pick a number, one or three.
Speaker 2:Three.
Speaker 1:I don't know what. I don't know.
Speaker 2:Which one's the shortest question?
Speaker 1:Well, one may be longer but easier to answer. You know what this one? What do I do with my wife being emotionally attached to Pardon?
Speaker 2:me. That's my call. Hello, hey, santa. Thanks, I've been waiting for that call. I wanted you to remind me. Thank you very much, okay, kimberly. Santa Claus called.
Speaker 1:Santa.
Speaker 2:Santa to say remember to give away the Solo Spokeshouse Workshop.
Speaker 1:We've got to do it, okay, do we do it now or after we answer this question?
Speaker 2:We've got to do it.
Speaker 1:Okay. Do we do it now or after we answer this question? No let's do it now.
Speaker 3:Oh, jason's ready, let's do it now and then we can maybe finish the question after Okay, so the winner.
Speaker 1:Do we have a drum roll? Joe and I are going to drum roll.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you can drum roll. Okay, the winner of the free.
Speaker 1:Solo spouse workshop.
Speaker 3:It's fine Is hopefully I pronounce this correctly Yahaira Suarez. Congratulations.
Speaker 1:Congratulations, Yahaira.
Speaker 3:You have won a free solo spouse workshop. We will send you an email later today confirming that to get you registered and signed up.
Speaker 2:So no way to know if male or female from that name Okay, that's fine, we'll find out, we'll find. Or female from that name? Okay, that's fine.
Speaker 1:We'll find out.
Speaker 2:We'll find out. Congratulations, congratulations.
Speaker 1:Very exciting. Love it. There are a lot of things and ways that we can help you at Marriage Helper as well. So, even though you may not have won the Solo Spouse Workshop and also I didn't give away any hoodies, I just totally forgot, you know what? We're going to pick three people from the list of questions that we got and they're going to be able to pick something from our swag store.
Speaker 2:So from people that sent these questions.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, we had 250.
Speaker 2:Okay, so three of them are going to get what?
Speaker 1:Anything from our swag store. So we have hoodies, we have coffee mugs, we have t-shirts that say there's always hope. Why?
Speaker 2:don't, I have any of these things.
Speaker 1:Well.
Speaker 2:I'm never here, that's right.
Speaker 1:No, I don't. I actually don't have any of them either, except for the there's always hope shirt, which I think you have. That, um, look, you have a marriage helping mug right there.
Speaker 2:It's not mine. It belongs to the office.
Speaker 3:For Christmas I will get you a marriage helper mug. Thank you very much If you're selected for the merch giveaway we will also send you an email later today there you go.
Speaker 2:Thank you, jason, jason's, our producer, jason's everything. He wears so many hats. I mean, it's unbelievably talented.
Speaker 1:He does, he does. Okay, we have to finish this question.
Speaker 2:Okay, what was the question?
Speaker 1:What do I do with my wife being emotionally attached to someone else and so caught up in her confirmation bias that she makes a negative storyline of anything I do? How do I lead back to the marriage?
Speaker 2:Okay, the negative storyline of anything you do is actually called a negative effect. Okay, and the negative effect? That's what that means. It means anything you do will be interpreted negatively, even if you open the door for it. He's proving he has control and power over me. Negative affects don't go away immediately. It takes time. The positive effect that she has toward this guy at some point is going to change. But why am I answering this? This is psychology.
Speaker 1:No, it's not, Keep going, you're on a roll.
Speaker 2:You can't make it change. If indeed it's limerence and I can't judge that based on what you just said here but if indeed it's limerence, then it's going to fade at some point. So what do you do? Don't react to the negative effect. If she attacks you, says negative things about you, et cetera, don't fight back.
Speaker 2:If it makes sense, you can say hmm, I can see how you'd feel that way and then just keep on trucking, keep on moving, and what you want to do is not fight her. And at some point, if you continue to reduce the pushes and continue the pulls and hopefully you know what we mean by that If you continue to reduce the pushes and increase the pulls, at some point, when that positive affect for him begins to change because right now she's seeing everything he does in a positive light Well, that doesn't last forever. He's not perfect and at some point she's going to see that. And if you want her to look back toward you, it's when that turns out to have more pushes than pulls, that thing with him, which it will eventually you want to make sure that you've got more pulls than pushes.
Speaker 1:Fantastic. Basically, there's a big theme that we've had in a lot of these questions, which is consistently work on yourself, because it's the best thing that you can do for you and because it builds a good foundation to reconcile your marriage when it's time.
Speaker 2:Try to do everything you can to evoke positive emotions from everybody and, as much as you can, to reduce evoking negative emotions from anybody. It makes your whole life better your life better and you never know how it's going to make other people have a better life as well.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Well. Thank you all for joining us for the past hour. We hope, from our Marriage Helper family to yours, that you have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, and we have a ton of exciting things lined up for 2025. Believe it or not, it is almost here, so be sure that you're subscribed to the YouTube channel, be sure that you're a part of the marriage helper email list so that you can be a part of all of the exciting things we have lined up as we start strong into 2025. Until next time, there is always hope.
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