In this episode, I welcome Stefanos Sifandos, a venerated personal relationship coach, who believes that the quality of our relationships can profoundly impact our individual growth and collective evolution. In our conversation we explore:
We also address the relationship addiction cycle, and how people can break free from it through honesty and vulnerability. We examine how identifying and addressing our own triggers and pain points can create a space of safety and trust.
Our discussion also takes a closer look at how high-achieving women often grapple with a void in their intimate romantic partnerships and how their external success often serves as a plaster for deeper wounds.
Lastly, we take a deep dive into the impact of culture on male friendships. Stefanos highlights how societal norms often reinforce the lone wolf mentality, causing men to have limited relationships outside of their marriage, often with the husbands of their wives' friends. We examine how this lack of male friendship and support affects not just the men but also their families, partners, children, and friends, and importantly what can be done to create a cultural shift.
The episode concludes with a closer look at the power of relationships and how they can be deeply transformative for us as individuals and as a collective.
Connect with Stefanos:
IG: https://www.instagram.com/stefanossifandos/
Website: https://stefanossifandos.com/
Connect with Michelle Rios:
IG: https://www.instagram.com/michelle.rios.official/
FB: https://www.facebook.com/michelle.c.rios
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3ahwTlqiLU&list=PL-ltQ6Xzo-Ong4AXHstWTyHhvic536OuO
Website: https://michelleriosofficial.com
In this episode, I welcome Stefanos Sifandos, a venerated personal relationship coach, who believes that the quality of our relationships can profoundly impact our individual growth and collective evolution. In our conversation we explore:
We also address the relationship addiction cycle, and how people can break free from it through honesty and vulnerability. We examine how identifying and addressing our own triggers and pain points can create a space of safety and trust.
Our discussion also takes a closer look at how high-achieving women often grapple with a void in their intimate romantic partnerships and how their external success often serves as a plaster for deeper wounds.
Lastly, we take a deep dive into the impact of culture on male friendships. Stefanos highlights how societal norms often reinforce the lone wolf mentality, causing men to have limited relationships outside of their marriage, often with the husbands of their wives' friends. We examine how this lack of male friendship and support affects not just the men but also their families, partners, children, and friends, and importantly what can be done to create a cultural shift.
The episode concludes with a closer look at the power of relationships and how they can be deeply transformative for us as individuals and as a collective.
Connect with Stefanos:
IG: https://www.instagram.com/stefanossifandos/
Website: https://stefanossifandos.com/
Connect with Michelle Rios:
IG: https://www.instagram.com/michelle.rios.official/
FB: https://www.facebook.com/michelle.c.rios
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3ahwTlqiLU&list=PL-ltQ6Xzo-Ong4AXHstWTyHhvic536OuO
Website: https://michelleriosofficial.com
What do you want people to know about relationships? Relationships carry the capacity to be deeply transformative. Relationships carry the capacity to evolve us as individuals and as a collective, and so I believe paying very close attention to the quality of relationships and the quality of the way that we relate can make a tremendous difference for ourselves, for our healing journey, for those around us, those that come into contact with us and those that we deeply care about.
Speaker 3:Hi, I'm Michelle Rios, host of the Live your Extraordinary Life podcast. This podcast is built on the premise that life is meant to be joyful, but far too often we settle for less. So if you've ever thought that something is missing from your life, that you were meant for more, or you simply want to experience more joy in the everyday, then this podcast is for you. Each week, I'll bring you captivating personal stories, transformative life lessons and juicy conversations on living life to the fullest, with the hope to inspire you to create a life you love on your terms, with authenticity, purpose and connection. Together, we'll explore what it means to live an extraordinary life, the things that hold us back and the steps we all can take to start living our best lives. So come along for the journey. It's never too late to get started, and the world needs your light.
Speaker 2:Good afternoon everyone. I am so excited to introduce you to this week's guest, stefano Cifandos. He's one of the most sought-after personal relationship and professional coaches on the planet. He's a trained educator and relationship expert with a background in behavioral science and philosophy. He has experience that spans more than 20 years in the personal development and self-help space. His teaching for self-healing is really a deep and truly transformative experience. I've had the opportunity to sit with him before. He is passionate about leading people closer to their highest potential. He works diligently to help men and women escape negative patterns and cultivate a positive sense of self, as well as restructure and reframe their relationships with themselves and their loved ones. Without further ado, I introduce you to the very charismatic and lovely Stefano Cifandos. How are you today, my friend?
Speaker 1:Thanks, Michelle. I appreciate the kind introduction.
Speaker 2:Well, let's delve right in. What does it mean to you to live your extraordinary life?
Speaker 1:Oh, I mean a number of things for me. I was having a very interesting conversation, dear friend of mine, this morning. We're just having a sauna at his place. He asked me a question and he said you know, if you were president of the United States right now, what would you do? What were the first things that you would do? And I sat with it for a moment and I thought about that. And firstly I thought about wow, what an important position, probably the most important position in the world.
Speaker 1:And I looked at it in three ways. I thought to myself, because he asked what would you change, what would you do? I said systems, people's self. And so who am I surrounding myself by? And we're, because there's no way I know everything. What systems am I looking at and am I changing them? If so, why, how, etc. What's a transition succession plan for all of that? And then the third piece, which is probably the first piece, really is self Right.
Speaker 1:And so, when you ask that question, to be in that position, to be in a position like that, if I'm not doing my inner work, if I'm exploring the inner chasms of my own psychology, my interpersonal and intrapersonal relationship, so my relationship to myself, the relationships that I hold very dear. If I'm not looking at my patterns of behavior, the source of my being in the world am I doing in the world? Or where are those actions coming from? Where are those reactions and responses coming from? If I'm not looking at that at a regular or on a regular basis, then I'm doing a complete disservice to myself and to those around me, irrespective of if I'm president of the United States or I'm just me in my community, my family, right. So living an extraordinary life for me means being really willing to look at all of my stuff.
Speaker 1:I give you a tangible example. You know, last night my wife and I had a disagreement and it really wasn't argument, right, we didn't go at each other really hard or anything like that, but it was definitely an argument and there was hurt that came through and what I noticed was that I could have been more compassionate, I could have been more patient, I could have been more curious. You know, the things that I really speak to, that are important and most of the time 90 something percent of the time I'd like to think that I do that and I am that, but the occasions when I'm not, it can really rupture the relationship, the rupture of don't. I think I'm not going to speak for her role part, because in a relationship, anything that is relating to itself is part of that relationship. But if I really take the hard look at myself, there are things that I could have done, that could have been different, and I could have made a stand or expressed a point or been truthful or being honest whatever it is in a different way, in a way that wasn't maybe so abrasive, wasn't so defensive or protective or whatever it was.
Speaker 1:So if I'm not looking at those experiences, I'm not living an extraordinary life, because I'm really being dictated to my past by my past, sorry, and I'm being dictated. My life is being dictated by aspects of me that no longer really want to live. I don't want to give energy to those parts of me anymore, not because I hate those parts, because it's just not who I am living from, who I was, not who I am. So if I'm doing that, I'm not living an extraordinary life. For me, living an extraordinary life is being very cobalt and self-aware and then acting on that self-awareness and doing things to feel safe in my own body. You know, having my rituals in my daily and my weekly and my monthly practices that put me in a state where I can be more receptive to a more challenging environment and I can meet my environment with greater epimnity. That's an easily and extraordinary life.
Speaker 2:I'm curious how long have you been married now?
Speaker 1:Five years today officially.
Speaker 2:Congratulations, happy anniversary.
Speaker 1:Thank you. We have two anniversaries, but today's our first one, the longest.
Speaker 2:That's lovely, Okay, I had a group of women over my home to celebrate my birthday over the weekend and it was a very mixed group. I've been married now for 19 years. I can tell you the first seven or so were bumpy at best, Then bumpy, not as bumpy Now. I can say we've worked through a lot of things. It's not always sunshine, rainbows, that's for sure, but we also give each other a lot more freedom and space. I'm curious because that conversation when all over the map in terms of where people were in their relationships, either seeking relationships, going through divorce and some that are happily married. What do you think is the biggest misconception people have about the problems that are at the heart of the relationship?
Speaker 1:That they're unsolvable, that they can't be moved through, that the problem represents a fixed aspect of the other person, or even of self or both. When we come into a relationship, thinking and feeling it's fixed, that it can't change. Where do we go from there, outside of divorce or separation, or split up or break up or whatever in terms of words you want to put around it? However, when we're both willing and open enough and we need to feel safe enough in our bodies and our minds and our being, or when we're open enough to address the issues that arise in relationship, then there is generally a way through it. Now, the way through it may be to separate. However, that's often not the only path, but it's often the path that we choose because we don't know how, or we are unwilling and or we are unwilling to work through the thing. In other words, we're unwilling or unable, not wanting to, and don't know how to shift the old paradigm of the way that we relate to the world. And look, sometimes we need to break up. And if you see a pattern that plays over and over and over again and you both can't reconcile that and maybe one of you is trying, which is something I see commonly in couples, but the other is not, and that continues for a length and period of time. That's an arbitrary number, by the way, it's not. There's no fixed objective oh, two years. And if at two years this isn't resolved, then you have to break up. It's different for everyone, of course. You know you come into life with your own soul curriculum, your own set of patterns, your own lessons and teachings and wisdom that you need to learn and move through. So it's different for everyone. There's no hard, hard and fast way around that. But if you're both willing to do your work and you're both willing to soften and you're both willing to meet each other in different places, and and and bend, but not break, not break who you are, not sacrifice who you are, but but rather, and not be complacent yourself or to the other, but rather just be open to a new perspective more often than not, and also, by the way, receive external support, because we can't see the forest through the trees in our own lives.
Speaker 1:Something can often shift and, like you said, the first seven years were rough for you, and you're not the first person to say that. Right, the many, many couples that have been together 10, 15 plus years will say, oh, when the first five to 10 years are really challenging. Or these were our challenges and as we move through them, now you know it got better. Now, who's to say that they were trauma bonded and they probably quite and quite should have broken up should have is a very interesting term, but we'll park that for a moment and that it was their trauma bond?
Speaker 1:We all come with trauma bonds, but the severity or the intensity of their trauma bond was what kept them together. But now they're in a genuinely healthier place. Well, who are we to say that's right, all was it because they genuinely, you know, stayed there, were aware of the stuff that chose consciously to be with that from a healthier place, because they saw something or felt something that was ahead of them. They couldn't quite grasp now, but they knew they together not long enough and worked on it long enough that there'd be value for them as individuals but also value for the relationship. Just thought I'd throw that in there as a bit of a curveball.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, that's. That's really good insight. You know, it's interesting to me because I can tell you, at least on one hand for me. My husband's from another country. He was from South America, gropin, peru and we came together. Instant attraction, kismic relationship started. We thought we had so much in common and we found we had completely different ways of interacting as individuals and our expectations were just not matched. His idea was we should never fight. I grew up in an Irish Catholic family where that was a daily ritual of how we connected. You argued your way through the day and that we all kissed goodnight and went to bed and forgot about it and started all over the next day and he was traumatized, like there was confrontation. I thought it was normal and I find it really interesting and I'm curious if you see this in your work. There's so many people you're just bringing so much of your childhood with your entities' relationships and you're looking at the other person like you're doing this wrong or you're hurting me in this way, and it's actually reliving things from our past.
Speaker 1:We are. Often we are, often we are reliving a life from our past because we just don't know how to be any different. We haven't trained ourselves to be different, and that's part of the issue that we face coming into a relationship we don't know what we don't know. And often, when we come into a relationship and there is intense physical or sexual chemistry, one of the reasons, often one of the reasons why that happens, is because, firstly, let's lay down some principles that I abide by or believe in. So, firstly, I firmly believe that we come together in intimate relationship to grow together and to learn more about each other. And often, when we come together in these trauma bonds in other words, your trauma matches my trauma in some way and I call them trauma trains that collide, and it's our job to not make them collide so hard, because if we do, we're just reinforcing all patterns of unworthiness or nondeservedness or whatever that wound or trauma or psychological distress is for us. The opportunity that we have is that our partners will often remind us in unconscious ways, often unconscious ways, of people, situations, relationships from our past that haven't been healed or haven't been equilibrated and collapsed in our nervous systems. In other words, the trauma bond hasn't healed, it hasn't come full circle and looped. The opportunity is in these intimate relationships to do that, but we're often unaware of that, so we just keep recycling our trauma, we keep recycling our reactivity. Often, though, what we would find if we become aware of the trauma, we can recognize, and we make the unknown known, the unconscious conscious, and we work together on healing. That's exactly what happens we heal and we make all those parts of us that we feel are broken. We do that in intimate relationship because it's a high stakes game, it's high risk, and so, if we can lean into that, oh man, there's so much power in that, there's so much depth and healing and advancement of self in that. But often back to what I was saying about the intense chemistry piece If the intense chemistry piece wasn't there, you wouldn't go with that person, you wouldn't stay with that person, you wouldn't.
Speaker 1:That's the key. You wouldn't remain with that person because you would be like like this I'm not going to be with this person because there's intense chemistry keeps you in the loop, it keeps you in there. So it's this. I wouldn't call it in serious, I would call it this very wise, that intelligence that's beyond us, this collective intelligence, this unconscious intelligence that is bringing us together through the intensity of chemistry, of physical attraction, sexual physical attraction, something very potent, awful and very magnetic. Otherwise you wouldn't be with that person if that wasn't there. And so the reason why you need to be with that person is to heal, is to go deeper into your own self. But we don't know that often, and when we're in it, we can't see it either, because it's so intense, it's so big, everything's just like what's going on.
Speaker 2:That, to me, is the power of intimate, relating what do you see as probably the most common treat that sabotages most relationships?
Speaker 1:Usually the clusters of fears that we hold onto. So fear of abandonment, fear of rejection, fear of loss, fear of intimacy, fear of commitment. It's usually a cluster of fears that is unchecked and unresolved within us and they're pretty specific fears, of course, that are usually created from, or they're born from, the physical environment that we grew up in and how we interpreted that environment. The experiences that we had was intimacy safe? Was it unsafe? Did we learn how to self-regulate or did we have to use external means to regulate? Did we use food or toys to regulate? Nothing necessarily wrong with that. But when done in excess and if we experience dream intensity, violence and abuse and so forth, we can become highly codependent. We can become self-loathing. Our self-worth comes down because we experienced abuse. So we make that mean that we're unworthy. After unresolved trauma is the overarching embodiment that we hold. That becomes insidious in relationship and we react from that place. So when that's unchecked, when that trauma is unresolved, we become hyper defensive, hyper protective re-attack, we become irrational. That prefrontal cortex shuts down and we go back into all protective strategies. And so one of the traits, if you like, or one of the practices that keeps couples together or in healthy ways, of course it keeps couples together in healthy ways and that helps you stay long enough in the relationship to gain from it, because often the thing that your partner is asking of you is the thing that, if you did, would actually be healing for you as well.
Speaker 1:So, for example, in my relationship, when Christine asks me to be more patient and not so abrasive and maybe she interprets sometimes the way I react to her or speak to her as being mean my intention is to not be mean. I can just be harsh in my language because it's how I grew up and had an excuse. But when she's asking me to communicate with her in different ways, I'm just being honest. I'm using a tangible example for my life and I can use tangible examples for my clients as well. But when she asks me that that would benefit me, I know it benefits me to be less impatient, to be more patient and to be less abrasive and to pause and slow down and be responsive and not reactive. It's good for my nervous system. It helps me heal and recreate new patterns of being in my life. So I'm not enacting my childhood. That's healthy for me. So when we work with our own traumas and we take responsibility for that. That's deeply healing in a relationship and the form of embodiment in relating. It's really healthy.
Speaker 2:When you see couples that have really sort of tested the test of time. They've gone through it, they've healed I don't know if anyone's ever 100% healed but they've come to a place where there's resolution and things are working. What are some of the things you see, beyond maybe the fact that they are communicating in healthy ways, right, they have more patience with one another? I'm very curious because I see a lot of relationships that maybe on the surface look good, they're healthy, but maybe don't have all of the stuff that people really need. Maybe there's not as much intimacy, or maybe there's just too much activity but not enough listening and just spending time together because we're so over scheduled in this world we live in. What do you see is really what holds people together in the healthiest ways? What are the things we need? Are there like? If you don't have these three things, it really isn't a full embodiment of a full, healthy relationship.
Speaker 1:Three things that any relationship needs to function healthily, I would say, is acceptance, compassion and space. I'll elaborate on all three of them. Of course, there are many more, but let's start with acceptance. Acceptance is acceptance of self and acceptance of the other. There's far less judgment. You've accepted them for how they are.
Speaker 1:This isn't a complacency. This isn't a oh well, I don't want this in my life anymore, but I'll just accept it. This goes against my non-negotiables and values, but I'll just accept it. Not at all. You're genuinely just accepting the person that you're with and you're choosing to stay with them. That will probably be a bonus. Actually, where you're deliberately choosing to be with that person, You're not run by unconscious patterns and unconscious wounding.
Speaker 1:Then compassion you practice compassion, Patience, the way that you communicate, seeing yourself in the other person's shoes so empathy falls under that. Understanding falls under that. Seeing the little boy or girl in your partner when they become reactive because they're going to have a human moment where is that reactivity coming from? And then space. This is such a successful practice that all couples have. They have a balance and it's different for every couple, but they have a balanced amount of space apart from each other. And time together, deliberate intimate time together and deliberate intimate time apart, with self and their own friends and their own hobbies and their own interests. And there's a nice balance there. And the key, the thread that threads all of this is being deliberate, being deliberate with an acceptance, being deliberate with a compassion, being deliberate with the space and, of course, being deliberate with our own inner work, because to have all of this you have to do your inner work. You have to be aware of, cognizant of who you are and how you wish to be in the world.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I will say I have been being married now a long time. We finally got there right around year 17. So for anybody else who hasn't quite gotten to year 17, there's still hope It'll come. It'll come and it's a deep relaxation into it of like I can go over here and you can go over there and we can do our own thing. We're going to come back together and it's going to be good. It's going to be good because we went off and did these things apart and we've cultivated our relationships and activities separately, not just in co-parenting and being in a marital relationship and all the responsibilities that come with it.
Speaker 1:You know, I know you got me thinking about something. Another powerful practice that healthy couples have in their lives is trust, and what that looks like is very much what you just described. Now, trust to be apart. More importantly, trust to repair and reconcile, in whatever way that looks like, if there is a rupture in the relationship, if someone cheats in the relationship or is dishonest in the relationship in a way that goes beyond your agreements in the relationship. Cheating is just an example.
Speaker 1:Every relationship will have cheating, even if you're in a non-monogamous relationship, because every relationship has quote unquote rules and guidelines and is bound in a container. So when someone breaks that container, breaks the boundary of that container, they are quote unquote cheating or being dishonest. It doesn't matter what it looks like. You name the details, it's irrelevant. Every relationship has that at some level. And so trust that we can at least attempt to repair that we're willing to repair. We may not be able to, but we're willing to repair that trust is everything. That trust actually lays a foundation for how we communicate to each other and how we respond instead of react. So we don't come from old versions of ourselves and hyperprotective, hyperdefensive patterns, but rather we come from empowered versions of ourselves wanting to reconcile the relationship.
Speaker 2:And I'm assuming we have very healthy self-worth. And I think that that's such an important piece because I can tell you, an earlier version of me, a younger version of me, a less mature version of me, was not at the same place that I am today. I'm in a much healthier place myself, as is my husband, and I think that's what makes a lot of it work right. We're individually a lot healthier, but-.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Well me when you see and I know this has probably come up for you a lot with the work that you do with women, really successful, very attractive, highly educated women, who are like I just can't find a relationship that works. I want love in my life, I want a relationship in my life, but it just doesn't seem to be happening for me. Or I find someone, but they don't stay. What do you usually find is really at the heart of the matter?
Speaker 1:So when I'm working with successful women and I've noticed this with so many, this particular trade with so many women that I'm working with that are very successful externally in the world However, feel a void. They feel a deep void in their intimate romantic partnerships and they can't quite seem to address that or really be with that. It's not because they're broken, it's not because something's wrong with them, one of the reasons why they've gone into this masculine energetic of doing and becoming and validating self through external success which, by the way, isn't right or wrong. And it's not that women cannot be in this masculine energetic in any capacity, because masculine and feminine energetics are ways that we adjure in the world. It's ways that we be in doing the world, that we go and flow in the world, that we're active and passive in the world, and every human carries those traits and you can call them some of the traits that I just mentioned there. You can look at it through that duality as well, right, but often the reason why that woman has become so successful is because she's compensating, same as men, but men will do the same thing.
Speaker 1:We have to be so successful because we're compensating for something that doesn't feel full within us or doesn't feel fully healed. So the way that we're seeking validation, the way that we're justifying our existence, even our presence in the world, our value is through all these amazing things that we're doing. So at the core of it is we have this wound, that we're not enough, and so it's going to be very difficult to attract a relationship that really is meaningful and depth of depth, and so it becomes so important that that woman looks at the source of, or that individual looks at the source of where is my need to be successful coming from and where am I a block to deep intimacy? Because often two will go hand in hand. Right, because often it was.
Speaker 1:I didn't receive the intimacy that I needed. I couldn't trust intimacy. It was unsafe for me. That means that I now need to source that from another place. I need to be important elsewhere. Anything that resembles the most intimate relationships I grew up with ie my parents, ie romantic partnership, which emulates that I can't be near that. So we have to get to the core of that.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's interesting. So the thing that you want the most is the thing you're likely repelling unconsciously because you're afraid of getting hurt in the first place. Tell me a little bit about your own practices, because I've heard about your journey and one of the things that came up is that you went on your own I would say odyssey of some sort of really getting to know yourself better before getting back into the relationships zone and where you are now and having the partnership you've been able to cultivate with your wife. But you were alone for a while. You took some time off from this whole scene of intimate relationships and looked really closely at yourself and did some inner work. Tell us a little bit about what prompted that.
Speaker 2:Obviously, usually that comes when someone's deeply fed up with life and there's a willingness to say okay, I got to do something different and I've got to change the scene. But I think what happens to a lot of people and I think this is why I'd love you to share that is, rather than taking the time to go on that personal journey, even if it means being alone for an extended period, they hop into another relationship, thinking it was the last person just wasn't the right fit, I'll find something new, and they just continue this pattern. You don't want to be alone, but it never is working. Tell us a little bit about what was going on for you, because I think you really kind of just stopped the whole dating scene, got out of it and you went on several years of being on your own.
Speaker 1:Yeah, most people are addicted to song because of the honeymoon period or the limerence phase, because it's so exciting, there's so much novelty and variety in it. And we're addicted to that for various reasons. One, because it really activates our pleasure senses and we have distressed and distorted pleasure senses in the modern world that we live in and also because it's a beautiful distraction. The greater the pain, the greater the pleasure required in order to mitigate the pain if we're not choosing to address it, which means that we have to often feel more pain for a shorter period of time to actually move through it.
Speaker 1:And so things like sex and novelty and new partners and food and drugs and alcohol and adventures and adrenaline and success and external validation they all fill that void, but it's empty because we need more and more of it, not only from a physiological perspective and dopamine pathways, but also from a psychological, psycho-emotional, psycho-social, relational perspective as well. So we become addicted to these cycles and if we don't change them and we don't create distance and space from these cycles and these addictions and compulsions, we can't see the forest through the trees and we can't make change and it will be disrupted. So there has to be a willingness to actually experience challenge and difficulty and pain in order to move through it, so that we don't keep repeating it.
Speaker 2:Tell me a little bit about some of the first things that you're looking at to help cultivate greater intimacy and trust when you're bringing couples together in workshop or in retreat.
Speaker 1:Honesty starting from a place of honesty, whether it looks like verbal honesty, whether that looks like emotional honesty, whether that looks like somatic honesty. In other words, helping couples really break down walls of habit and just doing things for the sake of doing it, because they think that's what marriage needs, and teaching couples to look at the signs, the somatic cues that their partner's body is showing them. Are they really a yes? They're saying yes verbally, but is their body a yes? And going through an extensive, more extensive process like that and just being honest and being honest comes in many different forms of different couples that it can present differently and doesn't have to dig up or dredge up past, but it does have to start from a very solid foundation of what do I desire?
Speaker 1:Now and again, before we can even express that, we have to help the individual and to feel safe in their own bodies and in their own mind and they can trust that what they share is going to be held by the other. You may find one of the couples may say look, I want to bring another partner into our relationship only sexually, and the other partner, if they hold a lot of judgment towards that or they reject that person, they become reactive and volatile and have an extreme reaction. They will just continue to shut down honesty. So how do we have really open, transparent conversations with each other?
Speaker 2:And so vulnerability becomes a key part of the whole equation. How vulnerable can you be and feel safe while you're moving through it?
Speaker 1:Yes, but to be vulnerable let's reverse engineer this, for lack of a better term. To be vulnerable, we have to feel safe in our bodies. To feel safe in our bodies, we have to do our inner work and know what our triggers and our pain points are. To know what our triggers and our pain points are and do our inner work, we have to be willing To be willing. We often have to have a rock bottom or cataclysmic event moment that propels us into a new way of being. That happens for many people, but the majority of the choice that many people make which is what I made for a long time until I didn't is to just go about business as usual and just forget about it and just scratch it to oh well, that's just the way it was and that's the way it is and be done with it. That's not necessarily the right way. Well, it's not the sustainable way, it's not the way it's going to listen deeper change.
Speaker 2:What do you want people to know about relationships? You spent more than 20 years now really looking deeply about relationships, the importance of them in our lives. I think connection is what we all crave. It's part of we're not meant to do this alone. We're meant to be in connection with others. What is it that you want people to realize from the work that you do?
Speaker 1:I think part of what it is is what you just shared, that we're relational beings and we're not meant to do it alone and there's just deep healing, wholeness and advancement of self and the human race and the planet and potentially, if we magnify the ripples of that, of those actions outward, if everything is interconnected, the entire cosmos. Relationships carry the capacity to be deeply transformative. Relationships carry the capacity to evolve us as individuals and as a co-active. I believe paying very close attention to the quality of our relationships and the way that we relate can make a tremendous difference for ourselves, for our healing journey, for those around us, those that come into contact with us and those that we deeply care about.
Speaker 2:Tell me a little bit about this phenomenon I'm sure you've seen it where when people come together, they have their own friends to begin with and then they get married. And then what happens? Men tend to have relationships. Men tend to only have relationships with the husbands of their wives' friends at best. I wouldn't even say it's relationships, sometimes it's just acquaintances. You've done this differently, I know you do. I know that you have strong relationships that are independent of your marriage. Why does that happen? I think as a woman, we tend to have lots of relationships that go beyond our marriage. Because we're communal in lots of sense, we feed off having relationships with other women. What happens to the guys in our lives and how come that's such a common phenomena that we see?
Speaker 1:Because culture reinforces the lone wolf mentality and approach when it comes to men and friendships and relationships. It does that through the individualistic society that we live in. It does that through the runaway capitalistic world that we live in, in terms of the individualist supreme and getting to the top of the mountain can only happen to you as an individual and then the subordinates be below you. Let me be very clear. I'm not against the capitalist system. I think it's the best system from all the systems that we have. I think that there are some systemic issues with that now and that's a separate conversation. Culture reinforces the lone wolf mentality.
Speaker 1:It's not okay for men or boys to have emotions. It's okay for men to show weakness or boys to show weakness. It starts very young. It's not okay for men to be seen in a particular way that, coupled with so many men experiencing so much of disconnection with their fathers that it becomes very difficult to trust other men. They do it alone. They don't share them, they don't know how to share themselves emotionally. It's not a trustworthy environment to share oneself because the canon will be used against you. That's what they've been showing, that's what they've been taught. That's all they know. It's safer and easier to be isolated, and it's also rewarded. It becomes this deadly cocktail of. This is how you do life as a man, which really is very disheartening, and there's no real right of passage for men. The sad thing is that doesn't just affect that man. It affects every single person that a man comes in contact with, including his family, his partner, his children, his friends, because so many men don't have friends, his colleagues, he's dead inside, he's empty.
Speaker 2:It's so interesting because you see kids, boys, have mates where they're on teams, they're involved in different activities and they have colleagues. As soon as we get through that college phase and you start to couple off, men have a handful of friends at best and by the time marriage rolls around none, or it's rare. What do we do to start to turn that around?
Speaker 1:We're not mean couples where the man has very limited contact with other humans outside of his work domain, where he doesn't have close friendships and he doesn't have men that he can really trust. There's a couple of things that happen for me. I want to go deeper with that man on that. What's the source of that mistrust or that challenge to connect other men, or that inability or unwillingness? Where has he been so hurt or so indoctrinated by culture, or so hurt by other men? Or what are his beliefs around human art, him and his life and what that actually means?
Speaker 1:I want to go into that depth. I want to unpack and explore that and help him feel safe enough. I want to also be a safe space for him and an example of what a safe man can be like. In other words, non-judgmental, compassionate, curious. Those three applications are very important. Secondly, I want to help his wife, encourage him, not force him, not tell him what to do, not direct him. Just be compassionate, be curious, be empathetic, be understanding and just be present. It's a safe space for you and give him a blessing to explore new relationships.
Speaker 1:I would also encourage that man to go and be part of groups. A men's group forge a men's group, form a men's group or be part of a men's group. Join a men's group and begin to practice being witnessed in front of other men. There's deep healing in just that, just a place that you go to once a month or once a week where you can just share some of the shit that's going on in your life. You can start off really superficial on surface level, but having that place and that space and getting a real-time example of men that can be trustworthy is priceless.
Speaker 2:Benefits everyone, involves Correct, well beyond the individual. Yes, absolutely, that's wonderful Plans for your anniversary.
Speaker 1:Not this one. I said this too. This one is when we got legally married. Nevertheless, still a beautiful moment. And then our ceremony has already passed. That was September. Wow, wonderful, it was a fun year.
Speaker 2:How old are your kids now?
Speaker 1:My child is 18 months.
Speaker 2:Oh, you have the little one. Oh, this is exciting, congratulations. I hope you're enjoying every bit of this. It does like they say it goes by in a quick blink.
Speaker 1:It feels like way already. It really does.
Speaker 2:It's exciting stuff. Alphanos, I am so grateful that you stopped by today and were part of the show. I look forward to connecting with you further and watching as you continue to help couples and individuals find healing and intimacy and healthy relationships. The work you do is so needed and you are such a light in the world and I have just enjoyed every minute of it, so thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you very much. I appreciate you having me on the show.
Speaker 3:Thank you for listening to today's episode. If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please take a moment to rate and review. If you have recommendations for future topics, please reach out to me at michellereosofficialcom. Lastly, please consider supporting this podcast by sharing it. Together, we can reach, inspire and positively impact more people. Thank you.