The Inner Wealth Podcast

Ep240. Part Nine – One Plus One Equals Three: The Power of Sovereign Partnership (with Angie.)

• Mike Kitko

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 42:41

Send me a some feedback!

In this episode of the Unbreakable Series, Mike and Angie explore what a truly strong relationship looks like when two individuals take full responsibility for their own growth. Rather than expecting a partner to complete them or fix their emotional struggles, they discuss how healthy relationships are built when two sovereign individuals come together and create something greater than either could create alone.

Through honest storytelling about their past struggles, including addiction, emotional wounds, and periods where one partner had to carry more weight than the other, they unpack the idea that relationships are rarely 50/50. Instead, lasting partnerships thrive when both people give everything they have in the moment and allow space for each other to heal, grow, and evolve without guilt, shame, blame, or control. 

Key Takeaways

  1. Healthy relationships aren’t about completing each other.
    Two people must learn to complete themselves and then come together to create a stronger partnership.
  2. Relationships are never truly 50/50.
    Sometimes one partner carries more of the load, and sometimes the other does — what matters is both people giving everything they have in that moment.
  3. You can’t fix your partner’s emotional wounds.
    Each person must take responsibility for their own “leaks” in energy, while the other provides supportive space rather than pressure.
  4. Holding space means loving someone without trying to control their healing.
    True support is allowing someone the time and space to work through their emotions without guilt, shame, blame, or forced solutions.
  5. A powerful relationship is one where one plus one equals three.
    When two sovereign individuals come together, the partnership becomes greater than the sum of its parts. 

Notable Quotes

  • “Looking to someone else to complete you is taking your sovereignty away.” 
  • “When you leak your own energy, it’s your responsibility to fix the leak.” 
  • “For me to ask you for more than you have is unfair to you — but for you to give less than you have is unfair to the team.” 
  • “You can’t punish yourself into a higher level of happiness, success, or freedom.” 
  • “Two sovereign people together create something bigger than either could build alone.”

Call to Action

If this conversation resonated with you, make sure to subscribe, rate, review, and share the Inner Wealth Podcast so these conversations can reach more people who are ready to build an unbreakable life and relationship.

And if you want to explore these concepts at a deeper level, Mike’s latest book Inner World, Outer World is available now on Amazon.

 Available now on Amazon Now. Click here!👥 Message Mike or Angie Directly
mike@innerwealthglobal.com angie@innerwealthglobal.com

Music Credit: "What's Left of Me" by Wes Hoffman & Friends

My Social Media:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mikekitko
Instagram: https:/

Setting The Unbreakable Frame

SPEAKER_01

You ever wake up feeling like there's something missing in your life? You ever feel the need to escape your business? Are you running your life or is your life running you? I'm my Kitko and I'll help you design and turn the life so authentic and aligned with who you really are.

SPEAKER_00

You'll get excited just to wake up. I'll help you create real wealth, success, and freedom from the inside out. Welcome to the Inner Wealth Podcast, where we learn and choose to live inspired each and every day.

SPEAKER_05

Hello, hello.

SPEAKER_01

I cut you off again. I am we were just laughing. We were just laughing before we got on here because uh she accuses me of manspreading all the time. So I am now now and when I tried to not demand spread, I was like off that felt like I was off camera. So now I'm manspreading around her instead of like right pushing her aside.

SPEAKER_05

This is manspreading was doing this to me.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, so if you see me sitting a little on the side, that's why, because this is like this feels a little more natural, like the sitting like this. But anyway, here

Sovereign Nervous Systems Explained

SPEAKER_01

we go. Welcome to welcome to to week nine, to uh episode nine, to part nine of our unbreakable series, where we talked about our collapse, our toxic relationship, our collapse, our rebuild, our rebirth, and our absolute unbreakability. And we're gonna talk a little bit about the unbreakability part next week. Leading up to this, it's really about nervous system unbreakability. And that's when when I talk about unbreakable, it's really about the unbreakability of your nervous system, and we'll we'll we'll unpack that a little more. And we have over the last couple episodes. But the two people that are becoming unbreakable in their their own sovereign nervous systems become become unbreakable in the relationship. And that's what we're here to discuss.

SPEAKER_03

Yes.

SPEAKER_01

You you ready to go?

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01

Cool.

SPEAKER_02

So I started this off. So go ahead.

SPEAKER_01

You did.

SPEAKER_02

So yeah, this is where this is where I'll leave her, and she's confused, and she's like, uh oh. Well, because you're the teacher, yeah, I'm just here to like interject a little bit of and and I I so uh I take these I take these podcasts and I clip them up, and that almost every clip is me talking.

SPEAKER_01

And I try to I try to sprinkle Angie in, but I I don't leave a whole lot of room for her to talk. So I'm I try to leave more, and then she's like, nah, nah, nah, nah.

SPEAKER_04

It's a little difficult. No, I guess I I guess what you we we discussed these episodes before we before we we record them a little bit. And we were talking about this one, and um I think one thing that's important for us to really unpack today is that is one person ever really complete?

SPEAKER_06

Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_04

And I think that that's that's the piece that one person is never fully complete, you're always doing the work until your last breath, but even those two complete incomplete people can make a whole, but not dependent on the others. We said this, like it's like nine episodes, what five episodes ago, the Jerry McGuire, you complete me and such bullshit. You nobody yeah, you looking for to someone else to complete you is taking your sovereignty away.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, and and I think the anchor, the anchor of our the teaching for

One Plus One Equals Three

SPEAKER_01

for this session is um one plus one in a relationship, if one plus one equals two or less than two, then it's is it really a valuable partnership? Yeah and what I mean by that is and we'll take it back to business. In in business, if there's two partners in a business that together they create results that either one of them could have created, like you take and cut it down to half, and then and and they each could have created a separately, that's not a valuable partnership. A part a valuable partnership is where two people come together, and because they have because they have um uh what's the word I'm looking for? Complementary skills, because they have complementary talents, because they have complementary personalities, because they have complementary uh worldviews, that together they they create something bigger than they could have each created for themselves.

SPEAKER_06

Right.

SPEAKER_01

And it's the same exact in marriage and in a valuable relationship. So for years, and this goes back to the beginning, for years we were as powerful, and I'm saying this, it sounds a little self-serving, but we were as powerful as me because Angie was in bed and we were as powerful as I was. There was no there was no more than one because Angie was so pharmaceutically like hopped up is that she was absolutely actually absent. And I was taking the girls to school and picking them up from school and grocery shopping and cooking dinner, going to work, right? And I was doing all these things while Angie was in bed, and there was we were only as powerful as me. And that's not a healthy, valuable relationship.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, no, I never I never actually, I mean, I know how all the burden that you carry during that time, but I never thought of it as that we were only as powerful as you thought.

SPEAKER_01

That's pretty and and in that situation, and not to get back into the drama of it, not this isn't like whoa is me, it's just to really shine a light on, you know, yeah, because I know there's a lot of people out there in very toxic, very abusive relationships, very conflict-oriented, very martyr-like, martyr, that's a good word, martyr-like uh relationships. And when I would do this, I would get the girls, you know, I would get dinner made, and and Angie would come down out of her little coma and come downstairs and grab some food and then criticize what we were doing or what I made or whatever, and then go back up to bed. It's like she was actually like making depleting our family, not adding to it.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, and that's not what I'm not taking that as woe woe was you. That was our reality at the time. I take full responsibility for my part in that. I was a yeah, I mean it, but it goes back to I was just recreating old patterns from my for sure, from what I saw. But yeah, no, that was that that was all you.

SPEAKER_01

And you were doing the absolute best you could in that moment. Yeah. And I want to make sure we you were doing the absolute best you could. If you would have, if you could have done better, you would have. Okay. So this isn't the rehash that and the and the replay that it's just saying she was doing the best she could, I was doing the best I could. They just neither of them were very good. Neither of them were very good. And when we hit the reboot and we hit the reset and we started like actually doing the nervous system work and cleaning out and and and drilling, drop into your body, recognize what's in there, inquire within, listen to what

From Collapse To Rebuild

SPEAKER_01

your body's telling you, and then let it go. When we started doing this deep spiritual nervous system cleansing, then you started coming back to life, I started coming back to life, and we started coming back to life together. And in that situation, when both people are doing the work, one plus one equals three. Yeah, one plus one doesn't equal two, and it doesn't equal less than two, one plus one equals three. And it's kind of where we are today.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah. And and neither one of us is at a hundred every day. No.

SPEAKER_01

Nope. Right now you're carrying more than me. And what I mean by that is Annie is, and Frank, before we came down here, she closed her first real words are important.

SPEAKER_02

What happened?

SPEAKER_04

I got my first um retail real estate transaction under contract. So we are officially under contract for a four-unit building in Soulard in St. Louis, Missouri, for one of our for my client who's also a good friend of ours. And yeah, I've been, I've had my license for over a year and about a month and a half, month and a half ago, I changed brokerages. And like I would, we went to, I'm with Alexander Realty on Main Street, which is our favorite, freaking one of our favorite places. Right across the street from the trailhead where we made the decision to move here. So I'm very emotionally attached to that place.

SPEAKER_01

You're emotionally aligned.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, and I felt it the second I walked into that office. But anyway, um I don't even know where I was going with that, but yeah. Oh, I went we went to the Christmas party on award ceremony on February 5th. And literally between then and now, I had my first, I've got two buyers' agreements signed, got my first deal under contract, and um I got a listing appointment. Yeah, uh, so it's it's uh I'm very excited, and it's I haven't been in this space in a very, very long time, and it feels really freaking good.

SPEAKER_01

Yep. And and the I haven't signed a client in quite a while in a business, so so the energy has kind of shifted, and now it's like it feels like it's it's Angie's season to to to rise. And and uh I'll I'll share that when Angie started coming out of her her uh addiction and uh the heavy usage, she went through network marketing, a network marketing company, three three three different three network marketing companies. She went went for NLP training, um neurolinguistics programming training. She did pound certification, she didn't exercise, she did all these certifications and she went from thing to thing to thing to thing to thing to thing. And guess what my job was while I was yeah while I was holding down the fort and I the business was was was move we were moving into business and I was starting a business and and money was coming in. What was my job the entire time that you were bouncing from thing to thing to thing?

SPEAKER_04

Cheer me on, cheer you on that was it, and that's all you did. You never guilt it or because I'm gonna be honest, I spent a lot of money on a lot of these things. I mean, I like I said, uh exercise certifications, three direct sales network marketing companies. And if you've ever been involved in those, you know the the the money pit they are. Um the NLP, multiple trainings of that. I mean, it was we're talking thousands and thousands of dollars, and not once was I guilted or shamed for for I mean, let's be honest, I wasted a lot of money trying to figure this out.

SPEAKER_01

I don't see it one as wasting not

Casting Light Not Shade

SPEAKER_01

even a cent. I don't see any of that as wasting a cent. My job when you are down, my job when you aren't aligned, my job is not to cast more shade, it's to cast more light so you can find your way through the shade. And and I think that's yeah, get emotional. That's kind of the way one plus one equals three is not not both, neither of us are all ever gonna be well, no, neither of us have clicked at the same time for a sustained period of time, but there's no shade and there's no judgment, and there's no guilt or shame, and there's no you need to get this started or you need to do XYZ. It's all about casting a light on each other. And when you do that, the relationship forms this exponential bond, not just of money all the time, not just of success, not just of building uh something. It's the love, right? Right? The love one plus one equals three. Uh it it it expands the amount of life that we get to experience, not just travel, not just experiences, but the the amount of life that we experience both together and separately. One plus one equals three. And I think that's really, really important to understand is sometimes somebody's gonna have to pick each other up. And and when you pick each other up, like the weapons of the week, right? Guilt, shame, anger, threats, and blame, that's cast in shade. It's not cast in light.

SPEAKER_04

Why people say, oh, relationship should be 50-50. And that's never gonna, if you expect that, you're just up for disappointment because it's never 50-50. I mean, there's there was, I mean, there's been times where we've both been so in such a dark place where it was like maybe we were just literally each giving five percent every day because we had nothing else. It's right. And we and we both we have been in those places where, because I know I've been, as I've been trying to figure who the hell I am out, I I don't show up every day in a very heightened energetic vibration. It's pretty, pretty damn low. And vice versa. Vice versa. And it's like, but again, going back to we don't guilt each other or shame each other for we and we will sit in separate rooms while we're all we're we're both working on our own shit and just let each other be. And I think that that's super powerful. And I think a lot of people would take that as a sign of a weak relationship, but I think it's just the opposite the fact that we give each other that space and you know that I love you regardless of what space you're in, and you I I know that you love me regardless of what space I am in. And yeah, I think that's I think that's that's healthy.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I I I agree. I agree. And I got I got something funny to say in a little bit, but uh, I'll I'll hold that for a second. Um, one of my favorite stories is about um John Wooden. And John Wooden was the he's considered the greatest basketball coach in the history of of basketball. And he won 10 out of 12 championships with uh with UCLA Bruins back in, I think it was the 60s and 70s, or yeah, I believe it's 60s and 70s. And he coached some of the greatest basketball players in the history of basketball. And Coach Wooden, John Wooden, you went to UCLA when you were when you were going to be there to win championships. This guy expected a lot and he demanded a lot, but he'd ask his players every day, and he coached somebody like like Kareem Abdul Jabbar, right? Magic or uh um Lou Alcinder and Bill Walton, some of the uh these are NBA Hall of Famers. But he would ask me, he's like, hey Lou, what do you got for me today? How much what do you got? And Lou would say, I got I got 61%, coach. He's like, good, I need 61%, I need all of it. And I get emotional talking about this because this is a powerful

Give All You Have Today

SPEAKER_01

perspective. Lou, give me all 61%. For me to ask you for 62 is unfair to you, but for you to give me 60 is unfair to me and the team. You only have 61%. I need all of it. And he never pushed these guys to give more than they had, but he pushed these guys to give everything that they had and leave it all out on a court. Let's say what we do with each other. What do you have today? Not much. Gotcha. I gotcha. Let's fucking go. I gotcha. Safe space. Man, I'm getting all like uh the water works are coming.

SPEAKER_04

They are.

SPEAKER_01

But the point being is I can't ask her to give me more than she has, and she can't ask me to give me more, or vice versa, whatever, whatever that is. Um, and that's a really important place to be, an important way to win. And that that's how we say two complete people that uh that form a more powerful union. But the completeness is isn't both people being a hundred percent all the time. It's when you are leaking energy, it's your responsibility to uh to heal the leak.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Is that does that make sense?

SPEAKER_04

Yep, and yep, it's all it's on me to figure out where it is, what it is, why it is, and drill into it and let it go. And sometimes it lasts longer than others.

SPEAKER_01

And yeah, and and guilt, shame, anger, threats, and blame is not really gonna solve anything, is it?

SPEAKER_03

No, it's just gonna no.

SPEAKER_01

All it's gonna do is deep in the wound. Yep. All it's gonna do is hurt the other person more, and then maybe they had 50% to give and now they have 45% because the person that's supposed to hold loving, awesome space for the person, loving and and peaceful, loving space, just hurt them. The person that's supposed to love them the most just hurt them. So the fit whatever they had, now they have less to give.

SPEAKER_04

I think a lot of people don't understand what the term holding space means.

SPEAKER_01

Can you explain?

SPEAKER_04

And I I think we just I think we just did. It's it's recognizing that someone is in a in a place, whatever space they're in, and loving them without res without resorting to the weapon, guilt, shame, anger, blame, threats. It's it's just giving them that space to heal without them knowing that they are not going to be subject to any of those negative energies.

SPEAKER_01

And at the same time, you could probably articulate. No, no, no, no, no. You did a great job. No, no, no, no. You did a great job. Uh I was just gonna add one more thing to it, not not not explaining that in a different way, because I think you did an awesome job. It's also for two people to own and and I I can't emphasize this enough, to own their own leakage. That when I have less, it's not her job to fill me up. It's not when she has less, it's not my job to fix her. We can't do that. We can't fix each other. We can encourage each other, we can inspire each other, we can love each other, we can we can uplift each other, we can grab each other and whisper like inspiration inspiring words in each other's ear. But outside of that, there's not a whole lot else we can do. We can't fix their leakage.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, and I remember when we first got together, it's a good story. Um we um it was real, it was right after we bought the townhouse. And so my mother passed away when I was six years old, and uh anniversary of her death is March 7th. And for many, many, many years, I kind of lived in that grief leading up to that day to where I

What Holding Space Really Means

SPEAKER_04

would just shut down. And it was it was really, really bad. And I remember the it must have been the first year that of her her death anniversary that we were together because you had never experienced that with me before, but you were constantly try trying to fix it. Yeah, I remember it was because I didn't want to leave the house, like it was it was really bad, and you would do anything you could to get me out of the house. And and I remember we went to Le Lido's Pizza or Oh, I miss Lido's. Oh, Lido's was so good.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, it's so good. And when we go back to Baltimore, we don't go there, but either way.

SPEAKER_04

Well, there's not a Lido's in Baltimore. I think I'm Timmy Airport. Oh, that's it.

SPEAKER_01

We could get it on the way out of the airport.

SPEAKER_04

So I have to look next time.

SPEAKER_01

We walked right past it.

SPEAKER_02

I'm pointed it out many times.

SPEAKER_04

Oh, sorry.

SPEAKER_02

Anyway, we digress. No guilt, no shame.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, hey, there's Lino's, and she's like, come on, let's go. We got beer to drink or something. I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

Well, Lino's beer.

SPEAKER_01

I don't know.

SPEAKER_04

But anyway, anyway. No, I just I remember that very clearly. And at the time, you know, I I saw that as love because I was still in that and it was love. You it was coming from a space of love.

SPEAKER_01

Codependency, but love.

SPEAKER_04

Codependent love. Codependent love. I mean, love is love. But uh, yeah, I I remember that very clearly where you just you cut constantly were trying to get me out of the house and to do things and to you were trying to literally pull me out of a depression that I was nowhere near wanting to get rid of, or even knowing I didn't have a single tool in my toolbox to even try to help myself through that. And you were trying to pull me out of that, and there was nothing that you could do.

SPEAKER_01

There was comfort in that grief for you for in some way. There was familiarity in the grief, and I think you just you you actually chose to stay in it as long as you could that was the place.

SPEAKER_04

There was no, I I couldn't have I didn't heal it just until what freaking seven years ago or something. I finally got around to healing that one. Yeah, dang.

SPEAKER_01

And and and the healing of that, she said, you know, I've always grieved my mother, uh, my mother's death. And I've I I'll always remember this. We were upstairs in the bedroom when you said this. And um she said, we shouldn't talk so seriously in the bedroom. But she said, uh but she said, you know, I've always grieved my mother's death, but I really I didn't actually grieve my mom. I grieved the image of my mom that I had in my head that was more perfect than the actual mom that I had. I was I was grieving the perfection of my mom that I made up as this fantasy and fairy tale. The reality is her your mom had a lot of pain and a lot of struggles and a lot of addictions and a lot of she was a teenage mother.

SPEAKER_04

She literally dumped me off on my grandma when I was not even a couple months old. So, but I had created this version of this perfect mom who I'm missing out on mole dates with, and who my wedding dress shopping and my first and the births of our children, and my mom wasn't there. I'm like, she probably wouldn't have been there anyway. I have a feeling that you know, she I definitely don't think I was definitely in unplanned pregnancy. I was definitely not wanted, and it's like, holy crap, I've been warning this avatar in my head and not Carol Ann.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

So I've got I'm sure my mother was a wonderful person. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01

I'm sure she was. If if she yeah, if you're anything like her, or you she yeah, I haven't told him very much like she she she would have been a wonderful human being, uh, you know, and and a wonderful grandmom, but the and and and whatever, but yeah, she didn't have that capability or that capacity, and she wasn't there. Now, let's back up just a little bit. The realization that you that I just expressed that you didn't

Grief, Projection, And Letting Go

SPEAKER_01

grieve your actual mom, you grieved the image of your mom that you had in your mind. What part did I play in that?

SPEAKER_03

You just listened.

SPEAKER_01

That's it. Did I provoke that out of you?

SPEAKER_03

No.

SPEAKER_01

Did I question that out of you?

SPEAKER_03

No.

SPEAKER_01

Did I did I convince you to dive into that?

SPEAKER_03

No.

SPEAKER_01

Did I have any part whatsoever? And the coaching or the inspiration or the teaching or the healing of that part of you?

SPEAKER_04

Yes.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Of your mom?

SPEAKER_04

Specifically. No, but it was the tools that you that you learned. You you went first. You're the leader. You leader, you were the leader of this. And I fully all the tools that I learned from you were taught.

SPEAKER_01

I might have taught you the tools.

SPEAKER_04

Yes.

SPEAKER_01

Did I, after I taught you the tools, did I have any part in that realization?

SPEAKER_03

Oh no.

SPEAKER_01

Nine.

SPEAKER_03

No.

SPEAKER_01

Nine. Up to that point, did I try?

SPEAKER_03

No.

SPEAKER_01

What I mean is back when we were in the did I try? Yeah. Did I try to mentally talk you through that? Did I try to mentally encourage you through? Did I try to tell you to cheer up? Cheer up. You don't have to feel blah blah blah. That's not true. Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. Because that was like I I was hurting because you were hurting. And I was trying to get you to stop hurting so I could feel okay because I was hurting, and that was the codependent part of our relationship. And when I finally just left you to fucking alone, then you came to that realization on your own. And that's when we say go to our neutral neutral corners. That's what we're talking about. So hopefully, all this stuff throughout the course of this series is starting to make sense.

SPEAKER_04

Now I do want to throw in there though, I you know, that I still feel your pain. When you've been in this dark place recently, I still feel your pain, but I don't embody your pain. I I I feel your pain and I pray for you, and I, you know, I'm just like, please, like pray for you to get out of it, but I can't do it. That's all I can do.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

Now I get emotional.

SPEAKER_01

And vice versa, right?

SPEAKER_04

But the but I can't embody it and and and come down to that level and let myself fall because of that.

SPEAKER_01

But I mean it it's not it's not easy being in a sovereign relationship where we're leaving letting the other person be sovereign, right? It's not nobody's saying this is this is easy. These are simple concepts. And hopefully, hopefully you guys like listening to this are going, this makes so much sense, but how the fuck do I do that? Because it's like this is this shit's not easy to do, it takes practice.

SPEAKER_04

The other day, I uh I was trying to make a phone call to get a credit remedy that was on the a bad PayPal transaction or something, and I was literally screaming into the phone, literally, and I finally hung up and I just sat on the couch and I went and I screamed, he's like, What's wrong?

SPEAKER_05

Oh my gosh, what's wrong? And I said, I said, nothing. I'm just dealing with something. I said, Fine, just sit there and scream. I said, That's all I want to do, I'm not sure.

unknown

Okay.

SPEAKER_05

There was nothing I did. I just wanted to sit there and scream.

SPEAKER_02

I had no idea what to do. I'm like, I don't even know why she's dreaming. Scream lovely. I'm not gonna try to fix it. I'm not gonna try to take it away from you. If you want to scream, scream, girl, get it after it. If that's if that's you know it's best for you. If screaming's best for you, scream.

SPEAKER_05

It was like, it was like my I did, I did like a goose. I did shake it.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, this is you know, the this this sovereignty, and this is why I love the word sovereign, right? Sovereign mean just means owning yourself. That's all it means. Being your own ruler, right? So a sovereign means you rule over something. Like a a king, a queen, right, is is a sovereign. You're you're you're you're ruling over something. And all personal sovereignty, I use the three, the three phrases, personal power, personal authority, and personal sovereignty. All personal sovereignty means is you own and rule yourself. And in a marriage, it's often what the the shadow aspects of our marriage in the past was I tried to rule over both of us, right? And and that's that is not a healthy I am I am the leader in the family, right? As the leader goes, the family goes, but I am not I am not her ruler by any when with her with her Aries. If I tried to be her ruler, I wouldn't do something.

SPEAKER_05

That one goes a little.

SPEAKER_01

Um and but with my Venus and Cancer and me being the emotional the emotional man that I am, because I am very emotional, even try even though I tried to stuff it for so many years. When those emotions come up, if she tries to fix those or she tries to tell me to get over myself, it's just not going to go very well. But when we give each

Sovereignty Over Fixing

SPEAKER_01

other space and time, we eventually lock into this next thing that we're here to learn. Because it's all a spiritual journey, it's all spiritual evolution. And we're just getting the lessons that we need to learn and we're transcending the things that we need to transcend so we can become who we're here to become.

SPEAKER_04

And we get off track periodically and still pull ourselves right back. And we we know the we know the the powerfulness of the bond that we built.

SPEAKER_01

Yes. And one little caveat to that we can't force ourselves to come back. We come back when we are ready to come back.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah. Well, I know when I get off track, I mean, I know I recognize when I do like when I do notice my nervous system dysregulation getting off track, it's like I wanted to be back on track because I don't ever want to go back to feeling that way.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

And I think that for me, that's what's super important is I remember how how terrible I felt. And I'm like, I don't ever want to feel that again. So I try to pull myself back as quickly as possible.

SPEAKER_01

But you can't demand yourself back. If you demand yourself back, you can't, you can't punish yourself into a higher level of happiness, success, and freedom. You can't demand, you can't punish yourself back into that. You literally have to love yourself.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, and there are times where it's like, hey, you know, if I'm I'm sad and I just want to feel sad, I just like I wanted to scream the other day. It's I just that's what I wanted to do. Sometimes it's just like, okay, right now I I just need to feel this. I just want to feel sad. And that's what it is, yeah.

SPEAKER_01

And it's important to understand that there are seasons of life and seasons where sometimes, like I said, sometimes we're both gonna be high, sometimes we're both gonna be low, sometimes one person's gonna be high, and sometimes the other person's gonna be high. It's just traversing those together, but never for us, never threatening to break the bond. I that's that's the most important part. We're gonna talk about that next week. Um, but uh our relationship right now, I'll say this is I think we we mentioned it on on this podcast before on this this series, but it's it's finding the person, and I think I remember when when we when we learned this and we connected to it, it's we always there there was a part of our relationship and time in our relationship where we felt when it wasn't exciting, we were doing something wrong. Where if if it if it felt boring, we needed to go and do something. Okay, and we needed to find some adventure because we were bored. And I know for me, I remember when I first understood the the um the concept that the perfect partner is someone that you're willing to be bored with for the rest of your life. Man, that really, really connected and resonated for me. How about you? What do you think about that?

SPEAKER_04

Oh no, I agree completely. That was that was definitely a light bulb moment for me because it isn't always going to be excitement and celebration and all highs. There there are going to be seasons and different versions and different and life changes and life shifts, and we all go through different different things and biological biologically, you know, our our our bodies shift, our everything shifts, and it's going through all of that crap together together.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, so we had two years where we were traveling a lot, and it was really exciting and it was really adventurous, and it was never ending. And we we would start planning one the next trip when we were still on the other one, and and we that was the season, yeah, and that season closed. And then I remember somewhere around November, I'm like, I don't want to move. Yeah, I don't I don't want to move, I just want to like close up shop for the rest of the year, and that rest of the year

Seasons, Boredom, And Real Intimacy

SPEAKER_01

bled into January.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, and we we we had a trip planned in January, and I ended up it just wasn't to feel right, and it happened to be that the day we were supposed to leave, we got a freaking foot of snow in St. Louis. So I was grateful that we did cancel that. Yeah, we haven't been on a plane almost four months.

SPEAKER_01

And we we we sloughed our and and hermined our way through November, December, and January, and and and you know, and then then we started to re-emerge, but it felt like a natural re-emergence, not a forced re-emergence, right? There's different seasons to all of this, and you just gotta guys gotta talk through and just accept, we gotta accept, talk our talk our way through and accept our way through all the way until something shifts, but don't try to force anything. Yeah, right? Two people that are sovereign together, one plus one equals three, two people that are sovereign together, creating something bigger than either of them could create it by themselves. But understand it, not everybody's gonna be 100% all the time.

SPEAKER_06

Right.

SPEAKER_01

And it's definitely not 50-50. Sometimes it's 70-30, sometimes it's 95-5, sometimes it's 99-1. Sometimes it's 99, which is the radio station I listened to most when I was growing up. So when you said that, you know, that that was pretty cool. Um so the funny thing that before before we end, okay, and before we end this, because hopefully that that's a that was a good description and a good understanding of what a whole relationship looks like. Okay. One plus one equals three. Two people that are recognizing their own leaks, not trying to fix the other person's leak, giving each other the space to understand and to resolve those leaks when it's time and as it's appropriate, without the use of guilt, shame, anger, threats, and blame, never forcing anything that's not intended to be in that moment. That is what has built an unbreakable bond for us, which we're going to talk about next week, the the the lack of escape hatch. And I think it's important. I know for a lot of years we lived with an escape hatch, right? And now this the escape hatch has gone away. It is as hard as it is to grasp that sometimes um when the insecurity starts to creep in, the escape hatch is gone. But the funny thing that I the the that I thought of, and this is most people say that this is a sign of a an unhealthy marriage and an unhealthy relationship. And I disagree completely. Okay. Because this is what I feel that that we have sometimes is this relationship is almost like friends with benefits. That's what it feels like to me sometimes.

SPEAKER_06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

It's like not only do I have my best friend here, yeah, but like I get to use your body every once in a while.

SPEAKER_04

That's pretty cool. Yeah, I guess that why wouldn't you want to be the best friends with your partner?

SPEAKER_01

Because then they talk about that it's emotionally disconnected, that it's just it's it's emotionally cold, that it's emotionally distant. And the only connection is a physical connection. Okay. And and it's I would say that that's not true for me. My emotions are definitely, definitely pointed your way. They're just not entangled with you.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

And abusing your body. I've got a sex drive, and I'll look at my wife, and and right now she's in menopause or menopause. So it's

Best Friends, Boundaries, And Daily Rhythm

SPEAKER_01

not, it's not my happy season right now, right? It's not my happy season right now. But but it's almost like a friends with benefits relationship where we share space, we share time, we share a life, we pull resources, we both contribute to those resources in different ways. And every once in a while, we get to have a little physical fun, and that's really freaking cool.

SPEAKER_04

But I don't think I don't think I see a lot of people with a friendship like ours.

SPEAKER_01

No, we uh shit.

SPEAKER_04

I think that that's that's that just hit me. Like I don't see a lot of people with a friendship like ours. We go to our damn bar every single night to see our friends and grab a beer and hang out and watch sports and we do our little after like sports betting fun that we do. I mean, like we're buddies, yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Travel buddies, bar buddies, uh all of it.

SPEAKER_04

We just have fun, and I we can be together all day and we'll go and sit at the bar and we will still we're still talking. It's not like we go there and just don't speak to each other, like we have and we've seen couples at the bar, they come there, they eat, and they don't talk, right? Yeah, and we see couples that come in there just one just by themselves because they don't want to be with their partner. So yeah, I don't know very many people who have a friendship like ours.

SPEAKER_01

But then you come home with them. We then we're here, and during the morning, I wake up and I come down the steps at four o'clock in the morning. Typically, that's the that that's kind of that's been my rising time lately. That and that's not, you know, I set no alarm clock. So my body naturally has a rhythm somewhere between four o'clock. Lately, it's been four. We've been going to bed a little earlier, but right around four o'clock, my body wakes up. Me and the boys, right? We have some books, some man couch or boy couch. And I got three, sometimes four hours of time just by myself with the boys. And man, I freaking love that time. I absolutely love that time. And then she comes downstairs and she goes in.

SPEAKER_04

Wait, stop right there. I come down the stairs and I stop to say good morning to you and the pets that are there, and you immediately start talking.

SPEAKER_01

Sometimes I do. Sometimes I do. Like this morning, she she says, Can I can I get a drink first?

SPEAKER_05

Can I get my water?

SPEAKER_01

Can I can I get a drink of something first?

SPEAKER_05

Okay, so now carry on. Then I go in.

SPEAKER_01

Then she goes in and she sits in in the couch. Yeah, exactly. She sits in the uh television room and I sit in in the sitting room with my kitty cat and romada. I got my boys, she's got her girl, and that's it. Like we might be there for two hours and we might talk a little bit, but we don't talk a lot of it. No, and she does her stuff and I do my stuff, and and it feels really, really good to have that distance, but still have that bond. We're in a house together, best friends, and we don't need to always be together in the house. And then, you know, at some point during the day, maybe, oh, and we take a nap together typically when we can. Yeah. Right? When when one of when both of us aren't in motion at that time. And then when when as the day starts to wind down right around five o'clock or so, then we go and we we hang out and we we do some socialization and hang out with our with our buddies and our other friends, but we do it together. Yep. And and it feels really good. Then we get on a plane and we travel awesome together. Yeah, like we are the best travel partners of all time.

SPEAKER_04

That should definitely be something that if you're in a new relationship, you need to make sure that you're compatible in air temperature around you. And can you travel together?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, for sure. For sure.

SPEAKER_04

But I love you very much. We get in bad seasons, it's up and down, but it's it's this is us.

SPEAKER_01

Yep. And uh I wouldn't want to do it with anybody else.

SPEAKER_04

Well, you're you won't, so you're not going to.

SPEAKER_01

I don't. But I'm I'm just telling you, if I had to do it all over again, I would do it again in a heartbeat. Even the times when

No Escape Hatch Commitment

SPEAKER_01

we were in the darkest, darkest spots. I would go through all of that again to get here. And only a fucking madman would say that. That shit was painful for both of us. But anyway, next week, do you remember what we're gonna talk about?

SPEAKER_04

We're gonna talk about uh the lack of escape hatch. There's no no there's no outs.

SPEAKER_01

Yep. What what what happens instead of outs? Let's just tease this. What happens instead of the escape hatch? We used to we used to threaten divorce and we used to threaten whatever. Instead of that, what do we do? Exactly. Nothing.

SPEAKER_04

Nothing. Okay.

SPEAKER_01

That's it. Instead of threatening divorce, we just kind of like just walk away.

SPEAKER_06

Yep.

SPEAKER_01

Yep. And let let things clean up themselves. Sometimes it takes a discussion and sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes the where what what used to take a month to clean up now takes about a minute.

SPEAKER_04

Oh yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01

So so and and sometimes it goes unspoken. That that that was fucking stupid. Let's not do that again. Yeah, all right. So lack of escape hatch, we're gonna talk about that next week. And it it has all of this nine episodes up to this point. It's all created in an unbreakable bond.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Right?

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, it's been fun.

SPEAKER_01

Last words?

SPEAKER_04

It's it's been fun. You're gonna you're gonna miss me when this is over. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. So we're gonna have to come up with another series. Uh I don't have a plan right now.

SPEAKER_04

Well, we're not, we'll we'll we'll discuss because we'll we'll discuss.

SPEAKER_01

No, you're gonna you're gonna do more. Um because I'm I'm sovereign over you, I rule over you. So you will do what I say when I say, right? But anyway, no, I she she will do the exact opposite. I know that that's how she's built. Um, the worst thing you want to do is tell an Ares what to do because they will do the exact opposite. Um, next week we close out this thing. This is this is uh uh part nine, that's part 10, and then I'll figure out what to do going forward because I've got no plan, but the inner wealth podcast will continue because it keeps for me, it keeps getting better. Oh, yeah. All right, and it's better doing it with you, not just the podcast.

SPEAKER_04

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01

All right, guys. See you next week. See ya. Love y'all.

SPEAKER_00

If you enjoyed what you heard and you want to learn more, go to www.innerwealthglobal.com for more tools and reports.