Car Chronicles EP 13: How To Argue Without Destroying Your Relationship

You ever wake up to a last-minute change that instantly puts you behind, then feel your mind racing to explain, justify, and control the fallout? We start there, because that same spiral shows up in marriage and long-term relationships when a simple problem turns into a full-blown fight.

From there we get into the core relationship advice: most couples don’t fail because they disagree, they fail because they don’t know how to fight. If arguments end with insults, dragged-up history, and a quick “sorry,” you don’t get conflict resolution, you get a repeat cycle. I break down what a constructive fight is actually for: understanding what you felt, what your partner felt, why the situation landed differently for each of you, and how to reach a compromise that keeps the relationship moving forward. The goal isn’t winning, it’s building emotional safety so your home doesn’t feel like a battlefield.

We also talk about the darker pattern people avoid naming: getting addicted to fighting. That adrenaline and dopamine hit can make conflict feel weirdly satisfying, even while it destroys trust and intimacy. I connect that to dopamine habits like doomscrolling, porn, gambling, and constant stimulation, and explain why a dopamine fast can help, but only if you still dig for the root cause instead of slapping on a timer and calling it growth.

If you want better communication, healthier arguments, and a stronger relationship, listen through and then share this with someone who needs it. Subscribe, send it to a friend, and leave a five-star review if it helps you.

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Transcript

Late To Work And Irritated

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Yes sir. You know what that means. Back on the road again. Oh man. First I want to start by saying this. I'm a little a little irritated right now. I'm gonna tell you why. So they've been trying to this wedding. It's like some high-end, high security detail wedding. I mean they need 16 guards on the fourth. So there's been a bunch of moving pieces and they keep changing dates. So last night, before I went to bed, I asked. I said, hey, just to make sure, no wedding tomorrow. And they said yes. As of right now, no wedding tomorrow. It's okay. And so I went to bed. At the same time I go to bed, I went to bed around 7.30 because I'm a little sick. I don't know if y'all can tell in the last couple episodes, but I'm a little sick. So I went to bed like 7.30. I wake up this morning to a bunch of texts saying that the wedding is on for today at 8 a.m. I look at my watch. 7.20 a.m. The issue, the video, is two hours away. So why am I irritated? Because these mother freakers messaged me at 8.23 last night saying that it was on when I was already asleep after they already told me that I didn't need to be there. I don't like being late to work. It bothers me. Because this perception is, as I've talked about in some of my episodes, there's reality, and people are gonna think I'm a late person, which is just not the case. Because I could have woke up early just to check and make sure. And I didn't, and I'm not gonna use my sickness as an excuse, but I do feel like crap, and that's the reason why I didn't even bother waking up. I had a killer headache last night, and I was like, bro, I'm just gonna sleep. And I rolled the dice and I did not win. So I could have woken up early, like I said. I'll take uh I'll take blame for that. But I also don't like that they had no hard plans for us until the day of. Like, what about all the other guards? What if they were in the same situation? So it's just kind of annoying. So I did the responsible thing. I woke up, let them know I was gonna be late, gave them my ETA, and now we're on the way. So yeah, that's kind of annoying. But you know, the the thing is you don't let this ruin the rest of your day. Because then you'll start to then you'll start to spiral. And once you start to spiral everything, everything you everything you look at or touch is gonna go bad. So I stay in high spirits, stay optimistic. And it is what it is. So if anything, I think they have four guards there today, four or three guards, and so we're probably all just gonna be standing in different areas doing absolutely nothing. So yeah. Now, now that the uh the bad stuff is out of the way, hopefully we get to go to this foodie land that we we were supposed to go to last month, but it canceled because of inclement weather, because of that cold front storm that came through just randomly. So they moved it to April, and so we're supposed to go to foodie land here Saturday in Austin, and we've been wanting to go to a convention or I don't even know what you call it, a place like this. Just to try all the different food from all over the world. We read the reviews, a lot of people said that it was overpriced, it wasn't worth it. You could just stay home and make the food. It's like, bro, just go into these things. You already know it's overpriced, dude. It's like going to Disney World, going to a state fair, going to a Comic-Con. You know you're gonna pay$10 for the food, whatever you buy in there per per piece of per food item. Like we're going there with that in mind already. So we don't we don't really care about the food price. What's gonna bother us is the quality of the food. And the quality of the food can be hit or miss because some of these TikTok videos I'll be seeing, people think, oh, this is some of the best food we've ever tried. And then you got the other people like, oh man, this is terrible. So it's like, well, we've had bad luck in San Antonio, so we're ready for a change of pace. So hopefully it doesn't, it's supposed to rain. Well, it's going to rain because there's a 40% chance. So, and it's definitely gonna be that chance where we're at. So we're hoping they don't cancel it. Because we feel we feel like if they cancel it, then they're gonna move it to the week we're in Miami, and that's just gonna that'll just be karma, bro. Or they'll cancel it and they'll move it to the next month when we're gonna be at our secret location that I haven't told you guys about yet. So we'll freaking see. But yeah, so that's what I'm dealing with today. Uh but you know, I was like, I'll grab my mic and just let you guys know how I feel about it. And this is and this is what I talk about when you know, when you're aware of who you are, you're aware of your strengths and you're aware of your weaknesses. And if I were to just drive the whole way, my brain would be going a hundred miles per hour. Like it normally does thinking of every scenario, every way that I can get out of something or make up an excuse for something. That's just how, that's just my brain, bro. And I gotta, and I'll try to like, I'll go over different scenarios of how I can like how I'm gonna introduce myself and say, oh, you know, I was late because of this or this and that and that, and I'm sorry because of the, and it's just like, bro, I don't want to do that. It takes a lot of brain power, and it hurts my brain. I don't know if y'all have to deal with that, and it's not it's not overthinking. I saw a few videos on it on TikTok. There's a high sign of intelligence, but I'd be like, well, I don't want to be intelligent anymore if that's the case. Talk. Oh, and I gotta apologize to you guys, dude. I didn't realize the mic that I'm recording on right now, it ends the recording at 31 minutes and four seconds, and then it starts another one. So one of the episodes I uploaded, I didn't upload the whole thing. And I was like, holy crap, I only uploaded one piece of it. Because I didn't realize that it stopped at 3104. So I was like, holy crap, they only got half the episode, or a third of the episode. No, three-fourths of the episode, that's what I'm trying to say. So yeah, I need to apologize for that. I'm gonna try to find it and re-upload the whole thing for you guys. But yeah. So that's what I'm dealing with. I'm dealing with this traffic because you got cops pulling people over on the highway at freaking 0.8 in the morning, bro. Listen, don't pull people over on the highway. You're you're causing everybody to slow down and look at what's going on, and you're just causing more issues than that person was causing. What was he what was what was he doing? Speeding and weaving out of traffic. Come on, bro. You're gonna get people hurt by them slowing down and everybody slamming on their brakes. So look at what you're doing. Alright. Let me stop. Let me stop complaining. Holy crap, bro. Yeah, so. Anyways. So I'm gonna talk about this episode today. And it's gonna be more on relationship stuff. Because I've been trying to like swap my content around again. And I wanted to make it aimed more at helping men reclaim their marriages or their relationships through fitness. Because, like I like I keep telling you guys, fitness is what you know pulled me from my dark place and gave me a perp a temporary purpose until I found my actual purpose. And so I figured if it could help me with my relationship and just overall becoming a better human being, then I believe it can help others do the same. And so I've been focused a lot lately on posting on Instagram about little things that I've learned over the years in both my relationships, uh, the good and the bad, and just things that might help people. So that's what I've been posting about, and I believe one of the biggest issues in a relationship is how couples fight. Because you know you're not gonna agree on every single little thing in a relationship, it's just not possible. So when you do ultimately run into a fight, how do you handle that fight? And most couples handle fighting by tearing each other down, trying to hurt each other, trying to do as much damage as possible. Why? Because hurt people hurt people. So if you're hurt, and this person hurting you, well then you're you're trying to get your get back, and you're like, well, I'm gonna hurt them then. Until the fight devolves into a drag out slug fest, and it ends with not a resolution, but with apology, and either side saying, sorry, I'll never do that again. And what exactly did you gain from that fight? You know, where's the conflict resolution at? There was no resolution. That's the issue when you fight like that. You don't come to a resolution, you don't come to an understanding, you don't come to a compromise, you just come to an apology. So the same behavior continues because it wasn't seen as negative outside of the fact that it was seen as something that I need to learn not to do, and that's from both parties. So when you don't know how to fight and you fight like that, that starts to wear on the relationship, and eventually you get to the state to where your relationship feels like a battlefield, and you know, every time you come home and there's something wrong, you know, you start preparing yourself because you know how you guys fight. And eventually you start walking on eggshells because one or the other party, usually the woman or usually the man, well, I guess it can be both, depending on the dynamic in the relationship. But both of you guys start walking on eggshells eventually because you don't want to set the other one off because of how you know how each other fights, and it's just a hurt, and you get tired of being hurt, and when you get tired of being hurt, things like intimacy, affection, all that start to fade, and you start seeking comfort and peace outside of relationship, and that's just what happens. So, like I keep saying, people's stress tolerance. Everybody has a different stress tolerance, and the higher it is, you know, the more you can put up with it, and the longer you stay in the relationship, the lower it is, the lesser you can put up with it, and the faster you'll lead the relationship. So fighting is understanding how to fight is crucial for the times that you do get into fights. Because those times can make or break a relationship, depending on how depending on the scale of the fight. So, how do you actually fight? You know, what's the purpose? What should you learn from fighting? Well, that's simple. When you're fighting with somebody, first you have to understand why you're even fighting to begin with. This will give you clarity on your current situation. Did you start this fight, or did somebody else start this fight? And when you're fighting, and you say you started the fight, you want the other person to what? To understand why you're upset, to understand what you're going through right now, to understand that what they did made you feel some type of way, or what they didn't do made you feel some type of way. That's why you're fighting. So when you want somebody else to understand what you're going through in the moment, you use, you know, you you get upset because they're not understanding what you're going through. And when they're not getting it, you get even more upset, so that's when it turns into attacks. So when you're fighting with somebody, you want them to understand you and they, and then you need to understand them because just because you want them to understand what you're going through doesn't mean that they don't want you to understand what they're going through. Because you're you guys are both looking at the situation differently. He might not understand why it's making you so emotional. So he's getting mad at you because he just doesn't understand why you're getting mad at him. So this is the whole point of why you want to understand each other. There's this fusion around what it is to begin with that is causing you to be in the state of mind. And when both parties are confused, that's when it leads to altercations. So the whole point of the fight is to understand one another. And once you're able to understand one another, as she said, then you can actually have a constructive fight that will no longer feel like a fight. It would just feel like you're having a deep, meaningful conversation. And that's what it's supposed to feel like. There's no ad hominems, there's no, you know, people tearing each other down, there's no digging up the past and throwing it at each other. There's just someone trying to understand why each other feel the way they feel. And then once you're able to feel why each other, once you're able to understand why each other feel the way you feel, guess what you can have? You can have conflict resolution. You can now come up with a resolution. So once you come up with a resolution, you can come up with a compromise. And once you come up with a compromise, guess what? That behavior now can be put in the rear view mirror. So now you don't run into the same issue again. You guys tracking, and that's the importance of understanding how to fight. Because once you understand how to fight and you can get to that conflict resolution, then you can get to that compromise. Now, now guess what comes into play? Now you're gonna have to be the one, now you're gonna have to understand that you may not be on the winning end of the compromise, and you may have to sacrifice something, something, or that you something that you wanted out of the compromise in order for the relationship to move forward. Remembering that you got to the compromise state to begin with is already a win. Most couples don't get to the compromise state. And if you have to sacrifice a little something that you wanted from the compromise just so the relationship can stay cohesive and move forward, then that's a worthy sacrifice because it's for the betterment of the relationship. You can always revisit the compromise later when both people are in a better headspace. Does this make sense? Do you understand now the importance of actually getting or actually understanding how to fight and what it can actually lead to if you know how to fight correctly? So that's why fighting, understanding how to fight is important, and that's what I believe one of the biggest issues with most couples is nowadays, like I said earlier, is that they don't know how to do that. And if you don't know how to do that, your your whole entire dynamic for your relationship is going to look and feel completely different. And I'm telling you right now, it's going to feel ice cold and like neither person cares. Because you're always tearing each other down. And once you start to fight and you get addicted to think because you get that adrenaline rush, you get that dopamine hit, like yeah, I'm about to tear her up, or yeah, I'm about to freaking say he did this, did that, did that, and it starts to feel good, you become addicted to it. You become addicted to fighting, and once you get to that state, it's hard to change that. Just like with any addiction, it's hard to undo that damage because you gotta think about the psychological damage and the emotional damage that you're doing to your significant other, the person you say you love most in the whole entire world. Meanwhile, you're bombarding them with demeaning things and just shredding them, tearing their whole life apart every time you get into a fight. That don't sound like a person that really loves me, does it? So that's and then when it all ends, you'd be like, Oh, I'm sorry, baby, I would never do it again. I love you so much, I love you more than anybody else. It's like it's like, really? So why'd you do all that? You know what I'm saying? So it's hard to change that dynamic once you get there. So you have to nip it in the bud before you become addicted to fighting. And that's the hardest part. Is understand that you're gonna have to make a sacrifice. Somebody needs to be, well, I wouldn't say somebody. The man needs to be the bigger person. And I'm telling you right now, if you nurture your girl, she will change for you. She would change for you. If you are doing your job as a man, if you are leading, providing protein coach change. But guys, it's real. It's just if she feels safe with you, that will give her the space she needs to elevate you. Because then she will start to take care of you. She will start to nurture you. She will start to treat you like the king. She will be in her feminine. She will evolve. She will adapt. She will try to do everything in her power to make sure that she's taking care of you in the house and making sure it's a home and not a battlefield. She will become your peace. And when a woman becomes your peace, she then has the capacity to push a man past his limits. Because now you have something worth losing. Now you have something of value. And you would do everything in your power not to lose that thing of value. Your ambition. Look at what I got. You want to have kids to leave something behind to show that all the hard work you put into this world is going to pay off. That's what a good woman can do for a man. It all starts. It all starts with something as small as learning how to fight. Because if you can't do that right, she's never gonna want to be, she's never gonna feel safe if she's always in fight or flight. If every step she takes is a cracked eggshell. She ain't gonna want to do none of that stuff I just said. Because she's too worried about the next time you're gonna demean her, the next time you're gonna tear her down. She's always in fight or flight. She doesn't want to come home. She's always stressed. So it really comes down to being the man, understanding your role in the relationship. If you have to take a sacrificial hit on the compromise and get less out of it, so be it. You could bounce back better than they can. And by they I mean women. We can handle more stress. And stress doesn't affect us as much as it affects women with their hormonal cycle. Too much stress can lead to disastrous outcomes for women. And so our job as men are to protect them. Not just from physical harm, emotional and mental harm as well. And we do that by giving them protection and a safe space to be. If you haven't sipped it through your baggage, take it out your trash, then guess what? Hurt people hurt people. Okay? You need to figure out what's going on in you to why you're projecting onto others. And then once you figure out why you're projecting, you'll have your answers. But it starts by taking a look in the mirror and figuring yourself out. And once you figure yourself out, you will know how to navigate these fights. You will understand that it's not about winning. It's about what's better for the relationship. How can we keep this going? So yeah. Figured I'd go ahead and put that out there. Hopefully, this episode helps you guys understand why it's important to understand how to fight properly. And maybe it opens your eyes to how you've been fighting in your relationship. And if you find it hard to do this type of thing, you may already be addicted to fighting. And like I said, if you are already addicted to fighting, it is hard to turn it around because you're looking for the fights. But you're not looking for the fights because you enjoy them. You're looking for the fights because of the dopamine. That's what you enjoy. The feeling it gives to you. And if this is the case, then you need to go on the dopamine fast, and you need to start trying to reset your dopamine and start utilizing things that are dopamine, like scrolling, doom scrolling, porn, gambling, anything that excites you. Give it a break. You know, do it do a 2B dopamine fast. Just to reset everything. And then just take it slow. You know, why are you why are you doom scrolling on social media? You really need to be doing that? Sure, you can set a time limit on your phone, but it's like, or you can just figure out why you're doing it to begin with. Listen, and this is what I'm talking about when you get to the root cause. Everybody wants to put a band-aid on everything, right? Okay, I'll set a timer on my phone that won't let me look at social media anymore. Like, okay, but you're still looking at it until a timer goes off. So get to the root cause of why you're looking why you're doom scrolling to begin with. And then you can figure out how to deal with the the cause of the doom scrolling, and now you now you are left with the choice of oh, I can look at social media whenever I want to because you fix the root cause. And think about when you're doing it. Are you just are you just on your phone 24-7 at work whenever you get an opportunity, you're just doom scrolling? The only time I'll be looking at social media is after I make a post, after I post something, right? I'll scroll on my feed and comment and hark other people's post. Just so I can try to get engagement on my post. Okay. Or if I'm taking a nice little dumpy dump in the morning, I'll look at Instagram to see what's going on. Or I'll look at Instagram. I'll look at TikTok to look at the to see the news. I guess I wouldn't call that doom scrolling because I'm specifically looking for things. And we we have our nightly routine where we'll look at all the reels, not reels, all the TikToks that we sent to each other throughout the day. We usually have about 20 or 25 TikToks that we'll look at that we thought were funny combined. Not 25 each. So it's not even the issue is with our job as being online coaches, is our our job is on social media. But even still, when I tell you guys, I get a headache if I doom scroll. I legit get a mother freaking headache. All this freaking crap, bro. All this freaking crap and the stuff that I can't stand. But I just keep swiping past it. I don't leave comments and stuff like that. That's why I don't do scroll. But yeah, so figure out why you do it. And you'll have your your root costs, and once you have your root costs, address the root cost. And once you address the root cause, you don't need timers. You don't need to set the freaking thing on Instagram to only allow you to lose use your account during certain times. I choose what I get on social media. I choose. I don't need no freaking timer. I don't need some freaking timer to tell me what to do with my life. I took back control of my life. Therefore, I decide when I get on social media. I don't let no urge decide when I get on social media. Okay? And that's what I'm getting at. Take back control of your life, and then you'll decide what you do, when you do it, and how you do it. Yeah. Okay. With that, I'm gonna leave it right there. Hopefully, you guys enjoyed this episode. If you did, don't forget to like, comment, and share, and leave that five star review. Until next time. See you!