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The Relationship Blueprint: Unlock Your Power of Connection
Colleen is a student of Dr. Harville Hendrix and Dr. Helen LaKelly Hunt who created the Imago Theory and have brought this work to over 50 countries around the world. She is profoundly influenced by this belief shared by Dr. Harville Hendrix. He said, "We are born in relationship, wounded in relationship and healed in relationship."
What are you struggling with today? Colleen believes that almost any problem we have began with a broken or unhealed relationship. The anxiety or deep sadness we feel often began with unresolved issues in our relationships with our parents, partner, family or friends. When we have unmet needs we are programed to get those needs met. When we don't get what we need we protest by protecting ourselves. this often looks like defensive, critical, demanding behaviors. these behaviors are most often ineffective. As a result we may develop unhealthy relationship with food, sex, gambling our or a substance.
Colleen invites world renown relationship specialists from all over the world to help her guests explore their own relationships and see their problems through a relational lens. She will help us explore how to create intimacy to deepen our connections. Her listeners will gain insights to create a more joyful life.
Colleen is a Licensed Professional Counselor in the state of South Carolina, a certified, Advanced Imago Clinical therapist, a clinical instructor for the Imago International Trading Institute while maintaining her clinical practice in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina.
Thank you for joining Colleen today. Remember, don't let life happen to you. You can be the architect of your relationships. Join her next time on the Relationship Blueprint; Unlock Your Power of Connection.
Contact Colleen at colleen@hiltonheadislandcounseling.com for questions or to be a guest on the show!
The Relationship Blueprint: Unlock Your Power of Connection
How to Create a Shared Vision for a Thriving Partnership with Dr. Sophie Slade
Discover the importance of creating a shared vision for relationships and how it can enhance emotional intimacy. Sophia Slate joins us to discuss practical insights for couples seeking to clarify and establish their relationship goals.
• Exploring the concept of relationship vision
• Discussing why a shared vision matters for couples
• Steps to write and articulate your relationship vision
• Understanding the value of differences in relationships
• Creating a vacation vision to enhance shared experiences
• Establishing weekly rituals to keep the vision alive
• The role of appreciation and gratitude in nurturing bond
Unlock your relationship potential! Check out our upcoming workshops to dive deeper into these transformative practices.
Thank you for joining me today on the Relationship Blueprint. Remember, don't let life happen to you. You can be the architect of your relationships. So join me next time on the Relationship Blueprint; Unlock Your Power of Connection.
Contact Colleen at colleen@hiltonheadislandcounseling.com for questions or to be a guest on the show!
Welcome back everyone to the Relationship Blueprint. Unlock your Power of Connection. And today we have back our very first guest on the Blueprint, which is Sophie Slate. And Sophie is here today to help us explore what is a vision for a relationship and how can a vision for our relationship really transform things. So she's going to help us define what a vision is. She's going to help us understand really how to write one, how to include our partner and what that can mean for our relationship. So, without further ado, I'm welcoming back Dr Sophie Slade, our sex expert, relationship expert and a well-traveled woman. I think she said she was in 32 beds in the last few months. I'll let her explain that.
Speaker 2:Let's not go there, Coco, Welcome back.
Speaker 1:Sophie, to see you again.
Speaker 2:Great to be with you again.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we had a chance to be together, came to visit our home in Hilton Head not that long ago, and so it was really special to have time with you and just hang out and be our part of the world together, and I really enjoyed your visit.
Speaker 2:Well, likewise, it was wonderful being with you and Kevin. It's great.
Speaker 1:And I get to be with you next week, um, at your course. Brilliant at the basics, and, for those of you who are therapists listening, uh, I really could not recommend this course, um, anymore. It is brilliant. It is brilliant and really a way to help deepen our skills as therapists, to really take this work to the next level, and what a great way to do so.
Speaker 1:So that course begins on March 7th, 8th and 9th. Is that correct? Yep, that's right. It's in Atlanta, georgia. It is not online, it is in person. Yeah, well, that'd be wonderful. Yes, and is there any room left in the class before I invite people? Okay, yes, yes, we've got room left. Okay, well, we'll put this out on other social platforms so that people that are interested can really learn more and perhaps join us in this wonderful adventure we're going to have next week. Good, all right. So this vision, so people that are listening, our listeners we really have something tangible. I've heard from our listeners they want more things to take away. They don't always have access to therapists and they want things that are going to really help them transform their relationship, that they can do. They can leave this podcast and actually use something right away and try it on. So let's get started. Okay, so what is a vision, sophie?
Speaker 2:A vision is. It's the couple's intention for their relationship. I see it as like the beacon towards which they're sailing their relationship. I love that word relationship. It's got elation in the middle of it, so it's all about joy and a journey and like a vessel that we're going somewhere in. So the vision is really the beacon of where we're headed as a couple, and I think I see it also as sort of like the rudder. You know, as you make adjustments to your behaviors to be in line with your vision, it'll get you where you want to go. So I think it's a really, really valuable tool. It's the first one in Harville and Helen's book, Getting the Love you Want. We do it in the couples workshop as well. It's usually the last one in the couples workshop, I think, for most presenters and, yeah, it's just incredibly, incredibly valuable. I think David and I have done variations on it that have also been really useful, and I'll talk about those at the end.
Speaker 1:So, sophie, as you were sharing, I felt this bubbling coming up inside me of excitement, thinking about how, when we first get married or we're first in couplehood, how we don't write the vision down, but we have this vision. We have that. That's where the excitement comes from right. We have the dream like maybe we'll live I don't know, we'll live on Hilton Head Island, or we'll have three children, or we'll travel the world, or we won't have children. Whatever that vision is, that all is inherent in that early excitement of the initial romantic stage of our relationship. And then something happens.
Speaker 2:Right Things happen all life, even before then, coco, I think this is a brilliant exercise for couples to do before they get married. It would be brilliant to make as part of their marriage ceremony to lead their vision. To me, it's almost more important than their vows. I mean, these are their vows. This is sort of an identification of this is what the relationship we're trying to create, and it goes way beyond where we're going to live or how many kids, which are some of the things that couples do talk about before they get married, before they commit. Often you know where they have the kind of life they want.
Speaker 2:But the things that they talk about less, perhaps, are things like how they're going to resolve their conflicts with each other, how they're going to manage their different likes and you know tastes. We were talking before about the differences in movie preferences and things you know and just TV shows. David and I are very different. David's my partner and we are very, very different in how we like to spend our downtime, yeah, how much we like to travel and all of these things. So I think for couples to talk about that and really get a sense of how they're going to navigate, especially the areas of conflict, you know how are they going to work through their conflicts? Um, can they talk to each other about things?
Speaker 2:I mean there are monogamy as well. I mean some many of us don't talk about our assumptions of monogamy. Before we get married, we go into marriage or committed relationship of whatever sort that is, whether it's moving in together or actually having a ceremony and we go into it with all kinds of assumptions, I think what we call in a Margo, symbiotic assumptions. You and I are one and I'm the one. So if I think our relationship is going to look like this, then you must too. Yes, start us talking about it and sort of seeing and honoring and valuing those differences.
Speaker 1:I think when you're talking about differences I just want to pause a little bit here because I don't know how many friends or clients who have talked about we're just too different. We grew apart, we're so different, and as I hear you talk about David and as I think about Kevin, how excited you are to talk about your differences, that it's something you're celebrating versus running away from or hiding from, and can you talk a little bit more about that?
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I used not to value the differences. I used to think that my way was the right way and that, therefore, david should change and see the world the way I do and do things, the way I do talk, the way I do think, the way I do behave the way I do, and so on. And it's taken me a long time to really value that the ways in which he's different are really very additive to our relationship, when I could stop trying to annihilate him and start to really see oh my goodness, I had never thought of that before, I had never thought to do it that way, I'd never sort of thought to respond to that situation in that way. Then it becomes additive and a relationship is really a relationship then, because it benefits from the perspective of two different people. So it's very enlarging. I had someone a quote once that the only emotion that makes you grow is love, and I think that it's because of that, when you love someone, you really love the ways in which they're different. It really increases your own perspective.
Speaker 1:Yes, and what you're also saying is that early on you didn't feel this way. And I think it's really important that there's this human experience of falling in love like that. It happens to us, right, and that in that stage that we don't see the differences. They're there, they're always there, but we don't see the differences. They're there, they're always there, but we don't always experience them. And then when we do experience them, then we think about it that it is your problem and if you don't change, then how do we go on?
Speaker 1:And that stuckness is so different from what you're describing, sophie. This, really, this awareness of what is it that I can learn from you? How can I see the world through your eyes and how do we stay in relationship and celebrate these differences and not let them be the reason that we pull away? And that is a big shift. And coming back to your point about the vision statement, I'm really thinking about changing the whole vision statement from the end of the workshop to the beginning, because without that vision, you don't have the rudder, you don't have the coordinates, if you will, on the sailing trip, about where you want to go. So it's such an important exercise, an important exercise. And how do you begin? How do you begin to? First of all, let's talk about what kinds of things. So, as we talked, I mentioned some things about where we live, and these are all physical things if we have children. But you brought up some really important things. How are we going to resolve our conflicts? So tell us more about the process.
Speaker 2:So the process is that each partner separately writes a series of sentences that describe their relationship as it is, when it is the way they want it to be, and you can think sort of five years, ten years into the future if you want, because it's a journey to get there, but you write it in the present tense as if you had it now. So you might have an item like we resolve our differences or we honor our differences. Differences or we honor our differences. We resolve conflicts using the Imago Dialogue process or we resolve conflicts respectfully, yeah, calmly.
Speaker 2:Respectfully, yeah. So they're worded in the present tense as if you had it now.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:So each person comes up with their list and they'll probably come up with different lists. You know, because of those differences Some items will be similar but some may be very different or they may go about the exercise in very different ways. You know, some people will be very concrete and their partner will be very sort of general. You know some people will be very concrete and their partner will be very sort of um general. You know so, even there you're navigating the differences, which is what is so enriching. So once each partner has their list and it can be as long or short as they want it to be then they start to weave them together into a shared relationship vision.
Speaker 2:So partner A, say, will read one item on their list. Partner B will just mirror that, just repeat it back, and then partner B will see if they have anything similar on their list. If they do, they both tick that and then on a separate piece of paper they write down that item. If partner B has something similar but it's kind of slightly angled differently, then they might include that different angle in their sentence so that it reflects the thinking of both partners Right. So if one has, we resolve our differences calmly and the other has we resolve our differences respectfully. Their final item on their shared vision might be we resolve our differences calmly and respectfully. Perfect, just kind of weave them together.
Speaker 1:Because I think what's interesting too about what you're saying is, when I've done this exercise with couples, it feels to me I don't know if you've had a similar experience that one partner seems to embrace the idea of dreaming big, really writing down all of their dreams. Like we travel alone together once a year, we travel with our family once a year. They really think about we actually I don't know, I'm trying to think of one now that's a big one. You know, I remember, kevin and I, after we lost a grandchild, rewriting our vision and we enjoy our grandchildren which was a hard thing to write. But we held that vision, you know, because it's written in the present tense, even after a loss. And we've just been fortunate enough to have a new grandchild born yesterday, adding to number five.
Speaker 1:But writing it at the time was hard because it was a dream that had died, but yet we wanted it in our future because children are so important to both of us. We wanted it in our future because children are so important to both of us. So this idea of you know, being able to dream about things that at the time you might feel are impossible for you, right, right, if you're fighting all the time you're not, you're writing down we wish we could resolve our conflicts respectfully and calmly, and you may not have that right now, but that's the vision, so allowing yourself to dream big. And then the other person I've experienced sometimes is looking at the other one, like why does she keep writing, or why does he keep repeating? They have so many, I don't have enough. There's that dance right Even in the relationship vision. But, as you said, when they start to combine them, they start to see like, wow, oh, I would want that, I'll take that. Yeah, it's very exciting.
Speaker 2:Yes, it is very exciting and I think it's important not to get too caught up in details when you're writing the vision, especially around the sexual vision. You know some people like to write we have sex daily. You know. One has put you know we have sex yearly, or something, just for the sake of the vision, to get something that you can both agree on, to get something that you can both agree on. So we have, you know, we have a sexual interaction with each other, some kind of sexual interaction on a regular basis or with a frequency that suits us both.
Speaker 2:Yes, so I like to include different areas of the relationship and I think a couple of things you said there, coco, were very important. One was that this is a living document. It's a document that you can update. You know annually, or you know after a big event such as a loss, or as you age also it's important and your kids leave home, it's a great time to update it or on your anniversary each year to update it. So it's a really living, vibrant document and I'll talk about its uses in a moment, but let's just continue with the construction of it.
Speaker 2:So I encourage couples to include different areas, like their social life, their relationship with their in-laws, financial relationship, their sexual relationship, their parenting relationship. So include things from all of those areas, if they want to, if those are important to them, when they're constructing it and then, when they've woven together all of those, they have a nice one kind of sheet with their shared vision on it. Now, the ones that they don't agree on or that they're not clear enough about, they do not go on the vision. They don't argue about those to try and force the other to see it their way so that they can put it on the vision. Put those aside for now, because those are the ones that will need some work.
Speaker 2:For example, if one partner does want to have children and the other partner doesn't want to have children, there's no kind of middle ground on that one, really. So that will need to be put aside and worked on directly and separately, and things like that may be deal breakers. That's why I say this is such an important exercise to do before you get married. Most couples find that they're really excited about how much similarity there actually is, especially couples who've been in conflict for a while. They say, oh look, we really want the same things.
Speaker 1:Isn't that so interesting, that so much, even if in our political world that most of us want the same things, it's just how to get there. Sometimes that's really hard. Yeah, we really do. I mean, I've seen that over and over again where people really in distress as a couple do this exercise and, as you said, it's like wow, there's so much that we both want the same. We've been focusing on what we don't want the same or how we do it, or you know the negative patterns that couples get into. But once they do this vision, there's something magic that can happen.
Speaker 2:Well, so many couples, once they start arguing about something, they actually stop arguing about the thing they started arguing about. They argue about how they start arguing about something. They actually stop arguing about the thing they started arguing about. They argue about how they're arguing and then they never get to the core thing that they're arguing about, to find out that really they are quite similar on it or, if they're not, that it's not the end of the world and that there may be ways to compromise. But when we get caught up in the you know, don't you talk to me like that kind of thing or don't you walk away in the middle of a you know we don't get there.
Speaker 1:So when is where the dialogue comes in, because the structure is what keeps them safe and on the topic of whatever they're trying to resolve, right, if you and I are just in a debate with one another, I might say don't use that tone with me. Or you know, this is the way my father talked to me, like we're all over the place and so you're so right, sophie, when you say that we kind of lose even what we're trying to resolve because we're so in the argument that now it's about me feeling like I win versus really getting to the core issue, and I think that's really important for our listeners to understand.
Speaker 2:And the value in those arguments is that embedded in them is a guideline to what we really do want. So, for example, don't you talk to me like that. How do we want to talk to each other? So that could go into the vision. We talk to each other respectfully During arguments. When we're getting too activated, we take a time out so we can use the things that aren't working to figure out what would work better for us. And that's what goes in the vision. They're all worded in the positive what we do want rather than what we don't want. We both stay present when we are, when we have a difference um, you know things like that. So present.
Speaker 1:I think present is really important. That tense right that we want to emphasize for our listeners that it's in the present tense, even though you don't have it. Yeah, it's in a positive way. You know, we we really wouldn't write down, we stop arguing and calling each other names. Right, it would be that we speak and act respectfully. Yes, so that if it's in positive, the goals have to be stated in a positive and present tense.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love that what we do want rather than what we don't want, because if we write down what we don't want, that's what we'll end up getting, because that's what's in the brain.
Speaker 1:Also extremely important, very important. So, now that I've written my list and you've written your list, and then we've joined together and I'm reading my list and the example you used about, I said I want to resolve things calmly. You said, respectfully, we combine them, that goes on our mutual list. You said, respectfully, we combine them, that goes on our mutual list. And the things that we don't agree on. Maybe I want children, you don't. Right now that may be the deal breaker, but it may not be. It may not be. Yeah, what we want to do is look at what we actually share, the shared vision, and work with that for now. Right, yes, okay, yeah. And so, as I'm thinking about a couple that I had, um, and they, they were young, younger couple, under 30 and they their whole thing was we can't have children the way we get along, right, so, it wasn't that you know I don't want children.
Speaker 1:It wasn't that you know I don't think I'll be a good parent. It was really about how do we have children when we're not even getting along? Is this a good idea? So that part about the children, we just we let that go for now, because their goal really was to figure out how to decrease the amount of conflict there was in the relationship, to see the potential.
Speaker 2:Or they may have an item in their vision of we create an environment. We create an environment that will nurture children or that nurtures children. We do it in the present tense. You know our relationship environment nurtures our children, something like that. So that's kind of. The children are in there and the environmental piece is in there too. So it's crafting that vision in a way that allows us to move towards it, because the point of the vision is not just to have a vision.
Speaker 2:The road to hell is paved with good intentions. These are our intentions for our relationship, so with it they then become the guides to our actions. This is the rudder part. So that's the beacon. We've got it now. We've got to make these adjustments to our behaviors to get us from here to there, and I think it's really important not to overload ourselves and to try and work on them all at once, but to pick one that feels really important for starters. So for that couple, it might be about the way they do their conflicts, that that's their first focus, and they might have two or three items about that. We listen to each other, we feel heard by each other, so that's what they're going to work on first, and then they can come up with some steps about how they go about doing that so that they start to move their ship, their relationship towards the beacon.
Speaker 1:It's reminding me you know how. You know people that go to a gym often and you know they have this particular goal in mind, and how that goal doesn't happen overnight, and how they have to do this, this and this for a number of weeks a month even in order to achieve that goal, and how relationships are. So we generally see relationships so differently, as if we can change things in a day, and rather than really what you're talking about with this relationship vision is that same model of really writing down clearly what our goals are and then sharing those goals and then making our plan together to be able to achieve those goals and create success together. Because this is not a I thing, it's a we thing. This relationship, it's a we thing. I love the go back to that relationship when you said elation and ship. I've never heard that before. So, yeah, I love that.
Speaker 2:Well, if you deconstruct the word relationship, you've got the R, then you've got the word elation joy, elation and then ship. Yeah, so it's a journey. I love it, I think it's a great word, and I want joy, I want elation on board my relationship. So what do I need to do to make that happen? Yeah, the passion and the vision comes in. You know, this is where the vision comes in, to guide us in how to do that, and then back that up with the behaviors that will get us there, get that joy, that elation on board our relationship. Isn't that a fun word?
Speaker 1:It's changed my vision of the word relationship. Isn't that a fun? Isn't that a fun word? It's changed my vision of relation, the word relationship I just don't know how I ever didn't hear that before. It's so because it's so clear. It's so clear about what we really want in relationship and it's making me also think about your passion around this topic and and my passion as well. But just how often in life we get through or we cope and we're really surviving versus thriving, and that was a little bit about what we talked about in our last episode about parenting. We want to raise children not just to cope in the world but to thrive in the world, and we do not want this for our own relationship, you know, to actually be a thriving, living, breathing, joyful experience most of the time. Most of the time yeah the time not all the time, but most of the time would be lovely.
Speaker 2:Wouldn't it? Yeah, and it's possible. The time, but most of the time would be lovely, wouldn't it? Yeah, and it's possible. I can assure you that it is possible for a relationship to thrive. Yes, it's exciting.
Speaker 2:So how to use the vision once you've constructed it? So one way is to then take an item, pick what are the top priorities for you and start to talk about how you're going to get from here to there. What are we going to do to get from our current state to our desired state? Because the relationship vision is the desired state. So what are the actual behaviors when we have a conflict? You know how are we going to do that differently? So, constructing that.
Speaker 2:It's also a great tool for couples to practice the dialogue, and I think it's essential. So say, we have an item on our vision. We support each other. Well, I may have one idea of what support looks like, and David may have a completely different idea. He may think that support is you leave me alone, just figure things out for myself. And my idea might be you know you make suggestions, and my idea might be you know you make suggestions, you're there for me, you cook my dinner when I'm stressed, whatever. So, having dialogues about what each of these items means to us, and we can even go into our past experiences. You know what support looked like for me in my childhood the time when I felt most supported in my life was and that in itself can become so enriching of the relationship, because then we get to know each other more and more deeply just around one item. And dialogues don't have to be about conflict. Don't wait until you've got a conflict before you use the dialogue process. Use it just to talk about anything, any topic at all, and it keeps you on the journey of connectedness.
Speaker 2:So, talking about the items, I think that's one way of using them. Another way of using it is to I mean, I really recommend the couples read it on a regular basis, at least once a week. That way it stays in our consciousness. And it's not that thing we did and we stuck in a drawer somewhere. What the hell did we write on that? It's a living, really a living document to read it and just check in. How are we doing on that? How are we doing on that? I actually have couples in my office.
Speaker 2:The first exercise I do I do a mini vision and I have them score where they are now and they don't have to score the same. They can each score differently and then they can talk about why they scored the way they did and there are no rights or wrongs here. If one gave it a nine and the other gave it a two, you know? Great, that's information. Let's see what's going on there and they can talk about why they gave it a nine or why they gave it a two.
Speaker 2:So you can score it, so that you can score it periodically and see how you're doing, especially on the ones you're specifically working on. Are the things you're doing to make it, to get towards that goal, actually getting you there? If not, well, we need to change some of the things we're doing, or change the goal, the intention things we're doing, or change the goal, the intention. So scoring it is one thing and then reading it on a regular basis so it stays in your consciousness, picking one or two to work on actively and deciding how you're going to do that and checking in with each other and how you're doing and then using it as a basis for your appreciation of each other. So, as you read it, oh, I notice how, when we were having a conflict the other day about something. You stayed so calm and respectful. I really appreciate that about you so you can use it as a basis of an appreciation dialogue. So there are lots and lots of ways you can use it.
Speaker 1:I mean, really, if you think about it, how frequently do couples really appreciate one another? I was with a couple just last week where you know he was saying I do this, I do that, I do this, and he clearly has a high need for an appreciation to be seen, to be recognized. And her retort was well, you live here too, it's just, I mean, because it's part of the household, you're part of the family, it's expected. And what she couldn't hear was how much he needed affirmation from her. And it's a very, I think, a relationship changer when you really do practice the gratitude of your relationship through appreciations.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's another whole podcast right there for you, right there. Yeah, yeah, that's another whole podcast right there for you, right there. Yeah, the appreciation dialogue and living in that place of appreciation, which is so much healthier for the person who's doing the appreciating as well as for the other partner who is being appreciated, and learning how to receive appreciation too, is a whole other challenge. But I'll leave that one for your next podcast or a future podcast yes, and what.
Speaker 1:What, though, you're saying, though, about the um vision, the shared vision statement is noticing along the way when it goes well, because whatever we focus on is going to grow. So we, we focus on what's not going well. We, we're going to see more of it. It's like when you buy a new car and you start to see that car everywhere, and it's the color you bought. It's really the cars haven't changed, it's your focus that's changed, yeah, and so I think that's why I wanted to highlight this appreciation part, because noticing what is going right and what you're doing together to support your relationship vision cannot be underestimated. It's so, so critical. I love that. And then you said about how you post it. You know somewhere where you can see it. Kevin and I have it framed, and it's really time for us to do a new one, as we talked about when you came to visit me. It's just time we really have.
Speaker 1:We're doing a workshop in Florida, by the way, on March 28th, 29th and 30th. We have I think we have 15 couples, that we have room for a few more, and that's in Claremont, which is right outside of Orlando, but I we always tend to redo our vision right while the couples are doing theirs. It's so funny it just seems to be when we rewrite our relationship vision, but it's absolutely time. And I had a client once who said after they wrote the vision, he said I'm the kind of person who has to put this everywhere. And so he had it on his visor in his car, he had it on his mirror in his bathroom, he had it on his phone. He had typed it up in a word doc and and he read it all the time because for him he said it has to be present in front of me because I'm my forgetter is pretty good pretty good one of those two.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's so important. Yeah, I've seen it as screensavers. Um, put it on the fridge, you know. Yeah, whatever, anywhere, where you'll, you will see it on a regular basis because it will remind you. And then eventually, in those situations where the old brain is taking over and you're in full reactivity, if you've kind of rehearsed it enough and said it enough, shared it enough, then something else, some other part of your brain will kick in more quickly, I think, than it would have done. Some other part of your brain will kick in more quickly, I think, than it would have done, and you can shift gears so that you can move from the reactivity to the intentionality, which is a big part of the Imago journey is moving from this old brain reactivity to living in accordance with your intentions. So, um, so, yeah, using it for appreciations, um, tracking.
Speaker 2:I think another thing that's really important is to use it as a guide for one's own behavior. So, look at what your partner is doing well, that's living the vision moments when they're doing that. And in terms of looking at yourself, maybe looking a little more at where well, how could I have done that differently? That would be more in line with where I want to be. So never, ever, ever use it to criticize your partner. Oh, you said you wanted this and then you're not doing it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you know, those are the places to just get curious about why is my partner not feeling safe enough to live the vision? Or they may just have, you know, not embedded it in their consciousness yet, and so let's have a dialogue about it and how we can live it out more, but looking at ourselves and taking ownership for the ways in which we could be more conscious about living towards the vision, because if we start to criticize them for not, uh, not living the vision, then we not obviously Very few couples include we criticize each other rapaciously in their vision statements you know, you know, in the Gottman research, right, we know the four behaviors that will pretty confidently predict divorce, right?
Speaker 1:And one of them, of course, is criticism.
Speaker 2:And so if we somehow believe that, if we criticize our partner, that somehow, if we say it loud enough or harsh enough, that they're going to change, yes, I love the way Carl said it, I think originally, If I hurt you enough, you know you'll change and you'll love me the way I've always wanted. Somehow that never worked for me.
Speaker 1:I tried it. It certainly doesn't work. But I think the other part I want to highlight for our listeners that we can't emphasize enough is that if this was going to be easy for us or for our partners to do, we wouldn't have to do the exercise. So if I really want to change the desired state for my relationship, if it was easy for me to, let's just say, to appreciate Kevin and all the things that he does to support me, if it was easy for me to say that, acknowledge it, then I'd already be doing it all the time. And because it's a stretch for me to give that, I have to be really intentional about it and really work at it.
Speaker 1:So if Kevin said to me today well, you didn't thank me for doing A, b and C, I would be so less motivated to do the thing that he really wants me to do. But if he had said something like that he really wants me to do, but if he had said something like you know, it helps me so much when you notice, you know that I've done A, b and C while you're gone, then I'm more likely to lean in and say, yeah, that really did mean a lot to me, and I'm sorry I didn't mention it before, but yeah, it really did. It meant a lot to me and I'll do better, you know. So it's that subtle difference is so big when we really want to focus on what our partner's doing right and also what you said, sophie is focusing really on what we can do better versus looking at the other to change, because the only person we have control over is ourselves. Right, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and that's hard enough. Right, absolutely, absolutely, and that's hard enough. That's a big car. Our eyes point outwards, you know. It's much harder to kind of roll them back and look at ourselves and take ownership.
Speaker 2:Another thing I want to say about the vision is that David and I we used to go on separate vacations together. You know we'd go off on vacation. He'd have one idea of how it was going to be, usually involving a lot of sex. And I go off with him on the same vacation but with a very different idea of how it was going to be. Oh, I can finally relax. You know, I don't have to think about anybody else, the kids. You know, I can just, and, or I can go sightseeing or whatever, and by day four we wouldn't be talking. And then when we come back, you know, by the time we got back from the vacation, we'd need another vacation to recover from that vacation, which had not been very wonderful. And so we learned to do a vacation vision.
Speaker 2:So before we head out on our vacation, we do the vision of what it looks like to us. You know, we do some sightseeing, we dedicate time for lovemaking, we have time to just relax and read. We, you know. So we kind of spell it all out, including things about conflict, how we, you know we stay connected. If we have a rupture we resolve it within an hour.
Speaker 2:So all of these things that we put in our vacation vision guide our behaviors, and then we can read it every day or every couple of days to make sure that we're living the vision. How are we doing on this? How are we doing on that? Do we need to tweak this one a little bit? So that started us on that journey. We also now do an annual vision, so our anniversary falls at the end of the year. So around the time of our anniversary, the new year, we'll sit down together and we'll just focus on our intentions for that year in terms of our relationship, but also in terms of some other projects that we may be doing that work for both of us. You know that are relevant to both of us.
Speaker 1:When you talk about vacations. I really, really think that can't be exaggerated anymore, because I think what we also don't realize is that there's this excitement about vacations and we need vacations and yet there's so much to do. Before you leave for a vacation, you know the nervous system is pretty charged up, and then you have expectations I have expectations, and then the vision can absolutely help with that. One of the other things that Kevin and I had to work through was I had no idea how anxious he got before a vacation, and so we'd be at the airport and he'd be frantic and I wouldn't really understand it and he'd snap at me. And once I started to look at the pattern and we looked at the pattern together it became so much easier because now I expect him to be anxious.
Speaker 1:I know it's part of his nervous system. It's not about me and not taking it personally. So when he snaps at me, instead of that being the big old bad beginning of the vacation, like what are you doing? What did I do? I didn't even touch anything. I'm able to look at him and put my hands on his shoulders or something being like it's okay, my hands on his shoulders, or something being like it's okay, I got you. You know it's it's really okay. And what do you need right now?
Speaker 1:So it's very opposite for someone to snap at me and then for me to say what do you need? Okay, yeah, but it it really has become I'm not, I don't take it personally and it actually, ironically, has happened less and less, and it actually, ironically, has happened less and less. Well, yeah, yeah. So it's really an important time to really think about. We have this idea. This is this great thing that's going to happen and usually it's mostly great. But preparing for it, the way you're talking about it, and getting really interested and curious about how much we do internally and externally to prepare for these things, really sets the stage for the success of such a time of reconnection and quiet and getting away from our typical everyday world. So I love that the relationship vision is also a vacation vision.
Speaker 2:What other ways do you? Let me just add here what you're talking about also is transitions. Yes, there's another podcast topic for you. I remember Al Kroll, who was an imago therapist. Way back in the early years he did an audio tape on transitions. That was really, really interesting and has helped me to understand how fragile we are during those times of transitions the big ones in our lives, but also the little daily ones and how to navigate those better.
Speaker 1:But that's another topic for another day better, but that's another topic for another day. Yes, it's a really good topic because I think it is sometimes, as you were talking about our old brain and our nervous system as we're navigating, that we really don't have as much autonomy over our behavior during those times because it is old brain stuff and so we have to get even more aware of our own behavior, our own reactivity and really being sensitive that our partner's going through the same thing. It's not easy to navigate those things, so I'm glad you also labeled that as the transition time, because it is a transition.
Speaker 2:Transitions. Another vision that I have couples come up with, especially if they're having issues around their erotic relationship, is the sexual relationship vision, and it's the first one that we do. The first exercise we do at the start of the Satisfying Sex for Committed Couples or Enhancing Intimacy workshop we haven't quite decided on the definitive name for that yet, but, yeah, to get couples, you know, give them an idea of where they both want to head in terms of their sexual relationship, and even if they feel miles apart now, that's an exercise that often really brings them much closer together. And then it becomes a how? How are we going to get there, given you know what's going on between us around our sexuality, rather than you know where the hell are we going?
Speaker 1:Well, in your first podcast that you did with me, I really it stayed with me this idea that just really talking about our intimacy is intimacy and that having the sexual vision for our partnership is really just such a deeper way of talking about what our desires are. You know what our needs are, and just being able to have something that we're actually focusing on our intimacy issues feels really important. So I love this. Now, so the couple who's hearing this and they are really having some intimacy issues, they really could begin right here with writing you know what is my vision, what does my ideal relationship look like sexually with you? Yeah, and they would follow the same procedure, same process.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's the same process of coming up with each.
Speaker 2:Coming up with it separately, without too much specifics initially, initially, and then weaving them together so they have agreement, focusing on the ones they have agreement on writing that as a shared vision, and then the other ones that they don't have any agreement on or they don't understand yet they don't know quite what the other means by that, but where they don't feel as though they can jump on board with that straight away, then they put those aside and come back to and they may need some help from a therapist to work through those ones either a sex therapist or a relationship therapist to work through those specific items.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then, how are we going to move towards that? What's that journey going to look like? What are the behaviors we need to do to get ourselves there? So, yeah, it's exciting work. I love it. I think it's so valuable and, as you say it's you know that in talking about it, in being able to have really safe conversations where we honor our differences, we're already building a whole lot of connectedness, intimacy, safety and we're improving our relationship just by doing that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's making me think about when you said you could see a sex therapist. You could see a relationship therapist. I think that there's still an old way of thinking that my marriage isn't that bad, I don't need couples therapy, I don't need a couples coach and what I like to just remind our listeners that if you're learning to play golf, or if you're playing golf and you're good, even if your relationship's good, right, if your golf game is good, you still may see a golf coach to get better, and I would love for therapy to be seen the same way. Okay, so we're having this particular issue with this thing and we really need some help for right now. It does not necessarily mean you need to be in therapy a long time. Yeah, yeah, you're just going to an expert to just really kind of get some real clarity about where you're going and what you can do next. It's really not for sick people, it's for all people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you often just have to tweak something, but you know an outside perspective on what you can tweak and how you can tweak. It can be really really helpful to improve your relationship. I see myself as a joy worker A joy worker.
Speaker 2:I see therapy as being about joy. You know people come to us to get their joy back. You know people think, oh, you've got to have problems to go for therapy. You know, no problems Every week we go for therapy. We've got to come up with some problem we're going to talk about. No, let's celebrate what's working, let's look at that and rejoice in it and, you know, really honor what's working well in our relationships. And yes, we do have to look at some of the things that are getting in the way of us living fully in that joy that I see as our birthright, so that we can move those out of the way. And it's usually based in the past in some way or based in those assumptions that our partner should be different or you know, whatever. So, yeah, we've got to work on that stuff to get that out of the way. But I think therapy is really about joy, not about problems.
Speaker 1:I have a dear friend who's not a therapist but a wise woman, and she said to me I was in my early 40s and I don't know what I was not doing or whatever it was, I can't remember but she looked at me and she said this and that's really what you're talking about, I think, is that you know we are here to live lives full of joy and that we get today. And so what do we want today to look like? And so that idea yeah, we have a few problems, yes, we pay attention to what's negative, and then that feels like it overrides our brain. But if we really sit down and look at what we have as we talked about with the relationship vision we're often really surprised that, oh, look at all we do right, look at all we want, that's the same. Let's figure out a way to get there.
Speaker 1:We don't sit in our car and not put it in ways where we're going right. We don't sit and just wonder like, oh, I hope I get there. We figure out, let's find a way to get there, and the vision is one way to do that. The vision that you talked about, that I really, really loved and this is on the heels of meeting with Marcia yesterday about parenting. Can you talk a little bit about the parenting vision?
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I think, the parenting vision. In fact, any shared project and parenting is a shared project but it could be, you know, building a house or opening a business or running a business together. It's important to have a vision and then to look at it regularly and decide what you need to do to get there. But the parenting one, david and I, when we did our first workshop, our first Getting the Love you Want workshop, in 1991, we were in such conflict around the way we parented. We had such different parenting styles. I went overboard on trying to understand where my kids were coming from and I was completely useless at setting boundaries. David, on the other hand, boom, you know, do it, just do it. You know, get on with it. If you don't do it, I'm going to yell louder until you do do it.
Speaker 2:You know which was the way he was raised by his mom, who didn't have time with four boys to sit down and listen to them. So we had really really different parenting styles and that was one of the main sources of conflict. That and sex were the two main sources of conflict in our relationship and one of the items that I remember still from our shared vision that we did in that first workshop was we parent from a shared, shared ideological perspective. And so that started us on the journey of sitting down and saying what is our ideological perspective about parenting, what do we think works and what do we think and what are we going to, where are we headed with our parenting? And it was just so valuable having that item in our vision statement and then looking at it and looking at it and how do we need to be different.
Speaker 2:David was setting the boundaries, but his style sucked. My style was okay, but my boundary setting sucked. And through that we learned to really value what the other brought. Yeah, kids need both, you know, being heard and being understood, and they need clear boundaries. And how can we both become more? How can we integrate what the other brings? So it's really really helped us to shift in our ways of parenting. We still have our basic styles, you know, but we've both kind of modified them and honored the other rather than thinking that the other was wrong for their way of being. So I think having a shared parenting vision is essential to that project of parenting. And if couples are separated, if the couple does decide to separate, I think having a shared vision of their parenting relationship is just as important, if not more so.
Speaker 1:Another podcast for sure a shared vision for parents that are trying to co-parent from different homes to keep the children first. You know it highlights again for our listeners, I hope, is that your differences with David that that could have been grounds for divorce, right, oh, dead. I mean. I mean Kevin and I definitely had some. I mean I would say our one of our biggest struggles was around co-parenting because we were a blended family, yeah, and so that adds a whole nother layer of complication.
Speaker 1:You know, this idea of boundaries and how to really raise children is such a deeply emotional topic because we love our children so deeply and there's daily decisions to be made around children. So really being different is the grounds for really what you described, which was your loose boundaries needed David's structure and David's rigidness, needed your empathy and your space that you were creating for the children to have their own experience and feelings, et cetera. But if you had not had that opportunity to have that vision together, I would imagine that that would have been a really painful place for not just you and David but for those children.
Speaker 2:Yeah, right, oh, it was for many years, unfortunately, sadly, it was painful, um and but what? I think, the gift I think we've given to the children is to show them that couples can change, that they can grow beyond those old, automatic ways of being, into something completely different. I hope that's a gift that we've given them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think that we all just do as we do, what we do, until we know better. Yeah, and then that is a gift, too, to that idea that we can change and grow, and our children need to watch us grow. They need to see us. Yes, right, we're so human and I think sometimes, as parents and even as a couple with our friends, there's a pressure. You know, do we have to be perfect? And the truth is that nobody is. We keep saying that on this podcast, but we all have this amazing potential for change and growth and transformation, and that is where we unlock our own power of connection. That's what this whole thing is about.
Speaker 2:Another podcast for you, coco, is about blended families. I was hearing yesterday that we just don't have enough information about navigating blended families and the challenges of that, and you've lived that, we've lived that it's not easy.
Speaker 1:It is. It's definitely not easy. It's adding another layer. It's already complicated, it is. It's definitely not easy. It's adding another layer. It's already complicated. Relationships can be complicated, but what you've done for us today is you have taken the idea of here we are in this relationship. We want to be here. How do we get there? And the relationship vision, the parenting vision, the sexual intimacy vision, the vacation vision If we're opening a business together. Vision, because all companies, they have vision and mission statements, but yet as families we really don't know how to do that or we haven't traditionally done these things. And could this be a path to more connection and fewer divorces?
Speaker 2:And with the families, including the children in creating the vision, depending on their age. But I think that's you know. Making them part of the process would be very valuable.
Speaker 1:It would be. Is there anything else that you haven't shared today with our listeners that you would like to share? Oh, I'm sure there anything else that you haven't shared today with our listeners that you would like to share?
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm sure there is, but I can't think of it right now. So I think that just about covers what I had wanted to share about the vision, just that it's such a guideline, it's such a valuable thing to do, such a valuable process and, yeah, the beacon and the rudder.
Speaker 1:Well, you've made me excited about Kevin and I are going to and he's talked about it as well, I think when you were visiting that we really need and want to not need to, want to, probably need to as well but we're ready to rewrite ours, and how exciting it is to think about the new potential. And when we get excited about our relationship, something transforms immediately. Right, that excitement.
Speaker 2:I think the other thing I would like to add, coco, is that one thing that David and I do is we have this little ritual on Friday evenings to end the week, where we sit down, we have a cup of tea together and we start by reading our annual vision. So every week we read that vision and we check through and how are we doing on that and do we need to tweak that? So we have a little ritual each week and then we do an appreciation of each other and we talk about anything we need to let go of, if there's something, some niggly bit that's kind of lurking around that we would like to let go of, either about our relationship or something else, something we'd like to have more of in our relationship over the weekend or over the coming week. So we do that ritual around our relationship vision each week and that just keeps it present for us our episode today.
Speaker 1:I think this intentionality that you're describing is the secret to this joyful aliveness that you're feeling within your relationship. And as long, how long have you been married to David?
Speaker 2:I've been married to him for 41 years. We've been together for 51 years, okay.
Speaker 1:So after 51 years, this ritual is what the I mean. If people could see your smile, they'll have to watch this on YouTube. But really, if you think about people that you know that have been married for 10 years or 20 years or 30 years, you know it's hard when I ask couples in my office. Do you know a couple that you really kind of just want what they have like you? You see them and you think, gosh, I'd like a relationship like that. Is it your parents? Is it your brother and his wife? Is it your best friend? And to watch people sit and look at each other and wonder and they search and they rarely come up with a couple that they say, oh, I really want what they have. And I think it's because of what we're talking about here today that there isn't the intentionality that you described today and the energy that you and David bring to your relationship and that, like everything else, like being healthy, eating the right foods and going to the gym or whatever the thing is it requires intentionality, doesn't it?
Speaker 2:It does Reduce the negative, increase the positive, live the vision. That's it, Margo. Say it again Decrease the negative or eliminate the negative, increase the positive, live the vision.
Speaker 1:I can't end on a better note. Thank you, sophie Slade, for being with us today and for sharing your brilliance, and I look forward to being with you at Brilliant at the Basics in Atlanta, georgia, march 7th, 8th and 9th with Jessica Ames, and we're going to have a wonderful time there, and I also invite all of you to look at Imago Relationships work. That is where you'll find our workshop, our couples workshop, which I'm also really excited about. That is March 28th, 29th and 30th in Claremont, florida. So, without further ado, we're going to end today's episode and hold on to this beautiful idea of decreasing the negative or eliminating the negative, increasing the positive and living the vision. That is a MAGA. Thank you, everyone, and we'll see you next time on the Relationship Blueprint.
Speaker 1:You continue to unlock your power of connection and remembering that the power is all inside of you. We are the only people we can change, so that is what our mission is here in our podcast is to help people unlock that power within you, and we're excited to tell you that we are in 22 countries I think 142 cities trying to look for that piece of paper right here, whatever it is. We're growing and we're international, and that's because you are downloading the episodes, you are liking the episodes, you are commenting, you are sharing with friends and family and clients. So keep sharing and have a wonderful day. Thanks everybody, thank you.
Speaker 2:Coco.
