How Dialogue, Zero Negativity, And Empathy Turn Fantasy Into Lasting Connection with Dr. Harville Hendrix and Dr. Helen LaKelly Hunt

What if the love you want isn’t something you find but something you build, moment by moment, with the person right in front of you? We sit down with Harville Hendrix and Helen LaKelly Hunt, the co-founders of Imago, to chart a practical route from the highs of romantic love through the grind of the power struggle into a third stage they call real love. Their promise is bold and grounded: when couples practice dialogue, zero negativity, and empathy, fantasy gives way to contact, defenses soften, and safety becomes the default.

We start by unpacking why early chemistry is so intoxicating and why it inevitably fades. From there, Harville and Helen show how structured dialogue—mirroring, checking for accuracy, and asking Is there more?—moves the brain out of fight mode and into connection. Differentiation becomes the turning point: I am me, you are you, and both of us make sense. That clarity opens the door to empathy that receives the other’s experience, not as a debate to win, but as a world to understand.

The episode digs into zero negativity as a non-negotiable, and how daily appreciations retrain attention to catch the good. We explore agape as lateral partnership—standing side by side instead of pulling rank—and why becoming the resource you seek quiets the anxious search for love. You’ll hear a vivid story of choosing warmth over criticism in a messy moment and the healing it sparked, plus simple, repeatable practices you can use tonight to reduce reactivity and increase intimacy.

If you’ve felt stuck in the same argument or wondered where the spark went, this conversation offers tools and a mindset shift that lasts. Subscribe, share with someone who needs a hopeful map, and leave a review with one line about which practice you’ll try first.

Transcript

Welcome And Why Love Fizzles

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Hi, and welcome back to the Relationship Blueprint, where you unlock your power of connection. Have you ever wondered what it is about relationships that start out so amazing? So much love, so much romance, so much connection, sometimes just slowly over time fizzle out, and we call it normal. We call it just what happens. And that's really a fallacy. There are things that will change in mature relationships, but the fizzle doesn't really have to go. It can become deeper, more satisfying, and way more fun.

Introducing Harville And Helen

SPEAKER_00 0:42

So join me now to welcome Dr. Harville Hendricks and Dr. Helen McKelly Hunt, two of the most premier theorists in all of the world. What is it about relationships that we don't know? What can we learn from Dr. Harville Hendricks and Dr. Helen McKelly Hunt, the founders of the Imago theory? And their theory keeps evolving as they do, the same way they ask couples to evolve. And so with that information that they share, we can actually discover parts of our relationship that we haven't visited in a long time, and that perhaps with their knowledge we can begin to enjoy a more satisfying, fulfilling, and really fun relationship. So I hope that you'll tune in today with Dr. Harville Hendricks and Dr. Helen McKelly Hunt. Hello.

SPEAKER_02 1:41

Hello.

SPEAKER_00 1:42

So good to see you.

SPEAKER_02 1:45

So I want you to know that you break all the stereotypes of the beautiful blonde.

SPEAKER_00 1:51

Well, I think that might be a good thing.

SPEAKER_02 1:57

See, one of the things I do is collect jokes, and I can't tell you how many jokes there are on blondes. Um, and they and most of them are paradoxical, that it looks like a dumb thing that they did, but it was the smartest thing that occurred in the context. It's like it's such a bias. Where did that come from?

SPEAKER_00 2:16

I don't know where it came from, but I certainly have heard a lot of them.

SPEAKER_02 2:20

I bet.

SPEAKER_00 2:23

You want to tell me one of yours?

SPEAKER_02 2:25

No, no, no, I would not tell a blonde joke.

SPEAKER_00 2:28

I do somehow I doubt that, but um, I'm happy to see you anyway. And I think that's a compliment that I don't fit that mold. But I have to admit, sometimes I do.

SPEAKER_02 2:39

No, clearly you are brilliant and modest.

SPEAKER_00 2:43

Thank you. Well, I I'm so excited that you're with me today because since I had the opportunity to see you at Kripallu, Kevin and I have revamped our workshop with the relational competencies and real love and the four practices that you've um really asked of all of us to practice in order to find real love. And what I've found is that people seem to be shying away from the term real love. Can you tell me about how, first of all, what do you mean by real love? And how

Defining Real Love Beyond Fantasy

SPEAKER_00 3:16

does how do you answer that question? That that's unattainable. That that just seems too much to ask of a couple.

SPEAKER_02 3:24

Yeah. Okay. Um it's the um yes, the third stage in the relational system that uh human beings go through, according to Imaga. Yes, you know, we go into romantic love, which is uh, and then we go into the power struggle, and then there's this other stage. And what is that? And I know there have been lots of terms like the resolution stage or the the mature stage of mature love, and so forth. And so that's that's the challenge is what is that stage? What do you call it, and what is what is the furniture of that room that Helen and I have not, we have pointed all of our couples and all of our trainees and all of you all faculty in the direction of a third stage. That's the whole point of resolving the power struggle is that you become equipped to live in a new way in stage three. But we have not put anything, and as I said this morning, so we've not not put any furniture in that room yet. So and nobody knows where the room is, much less what the furniture is. So the real love title I can see as problematic, but here's where it comes from. The reason romantic love operates out of a fantasy. And you think your partner is AA, but your partner is not that at all. That's the person you care about because they fit your image of the person you need in your life. So you've got to come and talk with Hi, Helen.

SPEAKER_00 5:07

Yes, I'm so sorry to be late. Oh no, I'm just happy you're here. Great to see you. We're we're talking about real love and this evolution of your theory. And and while um you're coming in, Helen, just for our listeners, when Dr. Hendricks was talking about real love and he talked about that first stage. Some of you have heard the podcast before, some of you have not, but that romantic love, I think we can all remember, is intoxicating, can't eat, sleep, have sex all the time. It's just a wonderful experience. And so there's that. And then somewhere along the line, as both of you have described for us, is that um we get married, move in together, have a baby, and those chemicals sort of dissipate. And then here we are. That adorable laugh that I love day one is so annoying on year two, day two. So there we are. And then um, Dr. Hendricks and and um Dr. LaKelley Hunt have helped us as faculty really examine, you know, this third stage in a new way. And that's what Dr. Hendricks and Dr. Helen LaKelley Hunt are here to help us just clarify. And even for

Romantic Highs And The Power Struggle

SPEAKER_00 6:20

clinicians that are kind of struggling with the idea of this place that's called real love. As you said, where is the furniture in the room? What does it mean? And that's where we left off, Helen.

SPEAKER_02 6:34

So the focus is on the word real. And so one thing to say is real love is loving a real person. That needs to be explained as well, because in romantic love, you do not love the real person, you love the fantasied person, and then you're frustrated with them that puts you in stage two because they don't match your fantasy. In other words, they will not surrender because they cannot surrender who they really are for your wish for who you need them to be.

SPEAKER_01 7:07

So you meet someone, oh wow, this is who they are. It's a fantasy of who you think they are, but you need to learn who the real person is, you know, get that right.

SPEAKER_02 7:18

Who who is yes, who is who is the real Helen? And until I get that clear, I can't love her. I can't love her. I will love the Helen that I made up, and then she doesn't conform to the person I made up, so then I have to get her to conform.

SPEAKER_01 7:39

So I don't conform to who you would I'm not doing what you would like, and so I'm not conforming to that, and you need to figure out how to get me to conform.

SPEAKER_02 7:48

Yeah, and that and that means and I'll criticize you and tell you you're not doing it because you actually can't do it because you're not that person. You are you. And you can't you can't do that.

SPEAKER_01 8:02

And you want me to be da-da, but I'm me, and so it's a problem.

SPEAKER_02 8:07

So so the job of the third stage, the condition of the third stage, in fact, I'm beginning just recently to get clear that the positive outcome of the power struggle is the as the differentiation of self from partner. To really get clear that this woman I've been living with for 45 years is different from the woman I fantasize I've been living with for 45 years. Which means that I will have the shock of discovery who this person is, because when I discover she is her, a real human being, who is not the one I've thought I've lived with and made love to and had children with and all that, that's going to be shocking to me emotionally. And it's uh shocking to couples when they come to workshops, they say, I'm going home with a different person. I never knew that. And so which makes empathy necessary. So real love is the love of the real. Now that I know you, Helen, not my fantasy.

SPEAKER_01 9:20

Real love is the love of the real love of the real.

SPEAKER_02 9:23

Yeah, because uh Colleen had said that there's uh people are having difficulty with real love and that it's unattainable.

SPEAKER_01 9:30

Uh well, could I mention one thing? I would love you to marry me back.

SPEAKER_04 9:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 9:36

Okay. Um uh a once upon a time man named Socrates created Socratic dialogue, and he was

Loving A Real Person

SPEAKER_01 9:45

disrupting the youth, and the Greek authorities didn't like him. It was a ask young people questions. And then when they give the answer, it's like, How are you feeling today? And when they answer, say, is there something I can do about it? It was called Socratic dialogue. And uh he was eventually killed by the Greek authorities because Socrates is disrupting the youth. And he died in 330 BC. No one since 330 BC, uh, except Harville Hendrix uh said for married couples to be successful, they need to learn uh to dialogue, which means you mirror someone's back and say, Did I get that right? And then say, is there more about that? Like if your partner is saying something and they're totally wrong and you know it and it's gonna ruin blah blah blah blah blah to her, or you say that first, mirror them back and see if you got it right.

SPEAKER_00 10:59

And what you're describing, Helen, is the first of the competencies. So I really love that part of the theory now, too, is that it feels less to me when I hear the real love, I hear it as a something that is attainable at times, like my own husband and I step into it and then step back a little bit out of that fear, right? The the threatening of if I really give up my fantasy of you, then I have to deal with that reality and what what will happen to my survival on some deeper level. But when I have practiced it with Kevin, and he tends to practice it much better than I do, honestly. But when I have truly stepped over that line, as you call it, to decide to love unconditionally, it's a paradox because what I receive is so much joy.

SPEAKER_01 11:52

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 11:53

Right.

SPEAKER_01 11:54

Yeah. And you have a healthier brain when your relation, when you use the dialogue sentence stems, you move from the lower brain, uh, the we we call it the crocodile brain, it keeps you alive. Uh and people who all they know how to do is monologue, they use the lower brain.

SPEAKER_00 12:14

Yeah. And all they do is fight.

SPEAKER_01 12:16

I go back and you're doing it differently, and you are wrong, and to hell with you.

SPEAKER_04 12:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:21

And blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But if a couple learns to dialogue, they move to the neocortex. The logical part is when you mirror someone back. And then you say, Did I get that right? Right brain hemisphere. And between the two is what Dan Siegel says is the healthiest part of the brain. Is there more about that? Did I get that right? When you ask your partner questions before you respond, first see if you heard them correctly. Yeah, and then and then no matter what your partner calms down, if you have a completely different opinion.

SPEAKER_00 13:06

Thank you, Helen.

SPEAKER_02 13:07

Um And so to pick up on, and you wanted me to mirror you back, and you're saying that not since Socrates as anybody talked about real love, uh talked about dialogue. And uh to and Carl Hendrix.

SPEAKER_01 13:21

And I propose to him to get it out into the world.

SPEAKER_02 13:25

So if I'm getting you in it's the sentence stems is what makes the dialogue really work. Yeah. So let me pick up on in dialogue, I pick up on differentiation. Because I think this is something that not even faculty is that as uh sometimes talk about faculty get because we haven't emphasized it enough that dialogue is a differentiating process. That when you engage with another person and mirror them back, you are essentially receiving their self, their reality, saying, Did I get you? And I know when couples start, they kind of think of it as did I get your idea, did I get your words? But the synister is actually did I get you meaning the self that's speaking.

SPEAKER_00 14:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:19

And rather than just the words that were spoken. And this is this is a a deeper place to go with the mirroring piece. But when you mirror back another person accurately, they have not sent you a picture of the fantasy you have of them. They have sent you the they have sent you the self that they are in their language. And when you don't criticize that, when we say dialogue

Dialogue As A Differentiation Practice

SPEAKER_02 14:47

is listening without judgment, when you don't criticize that, but accept that, you have differentiated from that person. And then you differentiate further when you say, not only did I get it, which is the accuracy check that that you have to do, but then you say, go to curiosity, is there more? You now are going to a deeper differentiation because when they say, Well, I do have more to say, they're going to send more of themselves through other words. And you keep mirroring and you they they begin to disclose themselves. You begin to see this other person. And then you have to get to this awful place where you say, You make sense. Oh, which is very challenging, excuse me, because to say you make sense is threatening that I have to give up my sense because you've got the sense. There are two people in the world who see the world through their eyes separately, and that the world they fill they both filter the world differently.

SPEAKER_01 15:50

And when you say that makes sense, it doesn't mean I agree.

SPEAKER_02 15:53

Right.

SPEAKER_01 15:55

You may be voting for different political parties, and you know, you you need to learn to live together.

SPEAKER_02 16:02

So it means it doesn't mean we agree, it means I see.

SPEAKER_01 16:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:06

I see you. And that's the biggest um uh that's that's the deepest need of the human soul is to be seen, heard, and valued. So when I hear you and mirror you back, I'm beginning that process of seeing. But it's but it's not just the hearing and receiving you talking, it's the reflection, accurate reflecting back. And I we talked just about the other day who knows stuff about the brain. I won't go into the complexity he said, but when you mirror accurately, and he'd been in our workshop, he's a scientist, you activate a section of the brain that's not activated by anything else. That the mirror is not just a superficial, so you know, I get your words right. When you mirror with sincerity, saying to really get the person, the brain experiences something it does not experience in any other human transaction. Which means since mirroring, since mirroring has not been a part of the human agenda, ever since there's been a human agenda, hardly anybody's ever been mirrored. But we've all had to live in the in our fantasies with each other and engage in the conflict between those fantasies, each one of us wanting you to see me, but you will only see your need for me, your picture of me. So that differentiation process, and when you go to you make sense, that's the ultimate differentiation, and then you move to empathy. And I can imagine what it must be like being you, and that's not a judgment, like must be awful being you, must be it's it it informs me, it enlarges me, and what it must be like to be you, to be the real you. Now, I will say one more thing, and then we can go into a a question. Real love, in contrast to romantic love, cannot be found. Nobody will ever find real love. Romantic love will come to you and it will grasp you, and the power struggle will grasp you. So those two stages show up, they are a part of the human experience.

SPEAKER_01 18:25

Yeah, you're looking for someone to date and maybe marry and suddenly I think that's the right one.

SPEAKER_02 18:30

Yeah. And but real love is nowhere to be found because it comes into being when you create it. So you give birth to the love that you're looking for. Then you become the love that you're looking for.

SPEAKER_04 18:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:48

Now you're into real love. Now you essentially you've you crossed a line from the power struggle into real love.

SPEAKER_01 18:57

But you chose to cross that line by learning and using the dialogue sentence tips.

SPEAKER_02 19:03

Yeah, and that but the well, that's the mechanism by which you can make it work. But you really have to make a cognitive choice that I am out of the power struggle, and now that's a terrifying choice because the power struggle has been a defense, and now that defense can't work for the next stage. So you have to release that defense that protects me. So my frustrations with you protect me from something.

SPEAKER_01 19:35

The power struggle is two people using monologue. But if you learn dialogue, you couldn't both learn to listen to each other.

SPEAKER_02 19:44

So when you choose, you have to change essentially the direction of consciousness or the direction of attention. All your life, you have been looking for something. And it started when you had a fundamental need not met in infancy and childhood. And that led to the brain configuring, the imagu that we would call it, to look for the person from whom you would get what your parents didn't

Choosing Real Love Over Defense

SPEAKER_02 20:10

give you. So it's like the uh the fantasy has come to mind, it's like we all begin life looking for the nipple. And so the brain colonizes that idea. The brain is created by that idea. What I need is outside of me. So I have to find a resource outside of me. So the so the milk is satisfactory, but then there's this relationship the infant has with the mother, then with the father, that becomes another new another uh nutrants, the be to be held, to be petted, to be smiled, to be played with. So you need more than milk. But you still it comes from outside. The parent is the is this is the resource. This goes on, and you grow up and you still don't get met because they can't meet the need that didn't get met by the caretaker in childhood. So you'll fall in love, then you'll fall in love with somebody who's similar to that person, and you'll want it from them. And what they are similar to the person who didn't give it to you, so they can't give it to you. So then you will look for compensation. You'll become famous, you'll write books, you'll take drugs, you'll uh drink alcohol, you'll join a religion, you'll meditate, you'll do all kinds of things. You're looking for something, fill that unmet need, that empty place, that void inside. And it's nowhere to be found, but you're looking for it. So what has to happen when you step across the line from power structural real love is you give up the child consciousness that the resource you need is outside of you into the adult consciousness in which you become. Become the resource rather than looking for it. You become what you want. Then when you become what you want, the amazing thing is the brain seems to settle down because now you don't want anything because you are the resource, not the need. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_00 22:19

It makes total sense. It makes total sense. And I'm thinking about right after your lecture coming home and uh you know, Kevin's a big guy, right? You both know Kev. And uh I had made him a smoothie and I had put it on the dining room table where his computer was, and I walked away and I could hear, damn it. You know, he had knocked over the smoothie and it was all over his computer. And I have to say that typically he'll he might hear uh oh or something like that from me that's criticism, even if it's not direct, right? And so I was in the other room and I thought of you, I thought of your lecture, and I thought to myself, I have a decision, right? I have a decision, and I can either go in there with my or I can decide to be different, and I can decide that I'm not gonna be part of his wounding. And I walked in, I held his face and I said, No big deal. I don't think he's ever seen me do that before because he always gets the oh yeah. And uh I watched his face and he was like, I'm so sorry. You told me to be careful, and I said, You know what? Do you remember the time I hit the house right after we built it? And I crashed the car into the house, and we both started laughing, and there was something so healing about that moment. Bringing me to tears. Beautiful feeling that beautiful, and his face was so receptive, and I felt so much better about myself because normally I'm kind of ashamed. I mean, I do what I do, you've taught me well, and then I behave like that. So that feels inauthentic, right? So in that moment, I there was something that really clicked for me that now I try to practice more often. I'm not gonna say it's easy all the time, but I wanted to mention that I one of the things when I first read your book, I think it was in 1987, somewhere around there, and and you had the word agape.

SPEAKER_01 24:20

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 24:21

And that struck me then, and we don't use that term very often now in our clinical work. Can you expand on agape love? It's a Greek word.

SPEAKER_01 24:32

Yeah, it means love.

SPEAKER_02 24:34

Yeah. So and it also means a particular kind of love. This the kind I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_01 24:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:40

Yes, un unconditionality. Because when you went then to Kevin, instead of going needing something from him, you became a resource for him. So you changed your relationship to him from being a the critical parent to being the caretaking parent. And that that yes, that you you became empathic with him and even shared, you know, the time you hid the house. And so you you equalized yourself with that. So that's what real love is. Is that the romantic love and the power struggle are vertical? I need something, you've got to give it to me. And if you don't, I'm gonna go after you or go

Becoming The Resource You Seek

SPEAKER_02 25:20

away from you.

SPEAKER_01 25:20

Or be mad. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:22

And real love is a is a lateral thing. We are we're equal, we're joined as partners. It's not romantic sentimentalism, it's that we are living life, human life together. And my responsibility, and this is the piece of the theory that I'm trying to language now, is to see that you two things happen for you. One is that you always experience being seen, heard, and valued by me.

SPEAKER_01 25:53

By using the dialogue sentence.

SPEAKER_02 25:57

In every interaction, like the one you just did, that you get seen. And the second is that my responsibility is to support your evolution into your full potential for what the universe put you here to become. And you're not my caretaker nurse resource, uh, and I'm not yours. We've transcended being a resource for each other to joining together to live our lives together, to live out the purpose that nature put us here, and that's to become our full potential with each other. So now we don't have anything to do. And it's so so wonderful to give up having to fix Helen or to get her to fix me or to be like I want her to be. I don't have to think about, well, how am I going to get that make that happen? I that's no longer the agenda. And believe me, once you once you get it, that the the survival need, the survival need is one of the things that drives romantic love in the power struggle. Once you realize that survival is no longer an issue with Helen and me. We are there for each other. So being afraid is not a part of the agenda. Safety is indigenous to the process. And when you're safe, you don't have to protect yourself. There's nothing to defend because there's nothing threatened. And there are no deals we make. So I don't have to find something, you know, pay for something. We don't exchange things. And like when we celebrate uh our birthdays or Christmas or New Year's now, is like, well, no, I don't need anything. So I think what what what and that but affirmation, you remember affirmation, affirmation is one of the things, is that the biggest request, uh, and I know the biggest joy Helen has if I write her an ode.

SPEAKER_01 27:53

A poem.

SPEAKER_02 27:55

And the ode is affirmation.

unknown 27:57

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_02 27:58

And you know, that's not buying her sweater uh or trying to because you get the color wrong. You can't get affirmations wrong. Because an affirmation means your being is infinitely valuable independent of anything you do for me or anybody else. You're valuable because the universe created you, and I'm grateful that the universe put me into your life. Well, there's nothing to fight about there. So, and the other thing about need is that I found that once I got across the line and became a resource, my need disappeared. So it's not like I'm now looking for it somewhere else. The need was to become the love I wanted.

SPEAKER_00 28:45

That is so beautiful.

SPEAKER_02 28:48

I have become the love I wanted. So therefore, I don't need it anymore because I am it.

SPEAKER_01 28:56

Because he uses the dialogue sentence Tims with me.

SPEAKER_02 29:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:00

And um, and um uh I know I know you know what that's like when you've helped us with our getting the love you want workshops. The couple sign up because they don't have the love that they want. But once the first night we teach the dialogue sentence stems, asking the partners to give each other an appreciation, and then the next morning now convert a frustration into a request. And then it moves on, and the couples are you see how happy they are at the end.

SPEAKER_00 29:35

Well, it's so interesting, Helen, what you're saying, because I think that when a couple come into the office, you know, many come saying in their own minds, like if and I remember doing this myself, was if you could only fix him, then we'd be happy.

SPEAKER_04 29:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:51

And then also having the same argument over and over again. And they think, well, why are you gonna slow us down to talk about the same thing that we've talked about a hundred times and never resolved it? And in that, in the in the structure of the beautiful dialogue you've created, then afterwards, just as you said, Helen, it's at the very end, they're like, we never talked about it that way. I never heard him that way. I never understood where that came from or that impact. So I I think that what you're sharing with us is so important for our listeners because I I believe that sometimes a Mago dialogue is seen as purely a skill. And yes, it is, right? It's a skill, but it's so much more.

SPEAKER_02 30:33

But it's the skill that conveys and embodies a new way of being.

SPEAKER_01 30:38

It makes another person feel seen, heard, and cared about because you mirror them back and say, uh, now let me see if I got what you said. And then you can say, Well, can I tell you what I think? And you and the other person then will mirror you back. So both of you feel seen, uh heard, and cared about. And it's

Agape, Equality, And Safety

SPEAKER_01 31:00

easier then to work out conflicted situations.

SPEAKER_02 31:04

And when you still feel seen, heard, and cared about, you don't have conflicted situations.

SPEAKER_00 31:08

Yeah. And the part too that I also love, of course, we know that there are the three stages of the relationship, and they've been there from the beginning, but this relational competency that you've talked about two of those skills, you've talked about the dialogue itself, you've talked about the affirmations and that Helen likes the poetry, and someone else may not want poetry. They may want something else, but it's honoring what she wants and knowing that. And then there's also the zero negativity. And I think that emphasis that you have on the zero negativity seems just critical to this whole relational paradigm.

SPEAKER_02 31:50

Yes, it it is critical. You cannot be connected and be negative, it's simply not possible.

SPEAKER_00 31:59

Even my sigh when he would spill something is critical.

SPEAKER_04 32:04

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 32:05

It's really repeating the critical mother that he grew up with, and so it's not only that that I've been critical, but I'm just scratching at that deeper wound in him that has always heard the same loop of feedback, and it made me feel shame to to be a part of that, you know, and so I'm so grateful for that piece of it. And then the other other uh relational competency, would you talk a little bit about that?

SPEAKER_02 32:31

Well, just to get really clear, zero negativity is not negotiable if you want a thriving relationship. It's no longer negotiable. So the third uh skill is empathy, which is also a missing interaction between us couples. And empathy means that I get you what it's like to be you. You know, I give you a prosaic example. So you call up your friend, and your friend said, you know, I'm so sad my dog died. And I say, Oh my god, your dog died. So empathy is I've never had a dog, or I've never had a dog die. So I don't know how that feels. But I'm imagining how that must feel for you. Sympathy is, gosh, that must feel awful. When my dog died, I thought I was gonna die too. That's sympathy. I've had the same experience, so I can imagine that you feel like I did with that experience. That's still an illusion. That means I'm not differentiated, but at least we had the same event. And I know that that was painful for you as it was painful for me. But in empathy, we didn't have the same event. But I feel your experience of that event and can imagine what that was like for you.

SPEAKER_04 33:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:54

That it must have been terrible, that you felt lonely and afraid, and so forth. But I never had that event. I'm now and here's the beauty of us human beings. I'm actually picking that up from you. I'm not making it up. Because I have nothing to make it up from. I'm picking up what you're experiencing and putting it in my language and checking, is that how it's feeling? And Ellen can say, Well, yes, that's some of it, and I'm also feeling, and so I pick up that. That's I'm fully now differentiated, not merging her with me, imagining that I'm feeling the way you would feel, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. We're differentiated. You have this feeling, and I can imagine that. But it's not merger when I read it, it's not an imaginary construction, it's actually a a um energetic uh reception of that.

SPEAKER_01 34:49

Harville, you did such a great job. Could I just mention one more thing?

SPEAKER_02 34:55

Of course.

SPEAKER_01 34:55

One of the things that we really recommend for couples to do, no matter what happened throughout the day before going to bed, and Harvel and I do this every night. We give each other three appreciations of something the other did that day.

SPEAKER_00 35:15

I love for that. It reminds me, Jessica Ames has done a beautiful video about um, it's called Catching the Good. And yeah, have you seen it? Yeah, and it is, it's really like once you start looking for the good, you can't really stop finding it. But as you've taught us, that if our toe hurts, that's all we think about. We don't think about our back feeling good or anything else. But I think that that that's such good advice, Helen, to really look for what is good in our relationship and whatever we focus on is gonna grow.

SPEAKER_02 35:50

Quantum physics confirms what you just said. The way you look at something determines what what it does and what you do. That that we create our reality by the way we look. If you look at your partner as a resource for you, then you have to keep looking when are they going to give you the apple. But if you look at your partner as a human being who has inherent value because they exist and they're a beautiful creature of the universe, you get to live with that person and discover them, and then you have two worlds in your head instead of just yours. But hardly anybody knows how provincial their brain is, because it only has information that it creates for itself. But when you let another person in by hearing and differentiating, you're gonna have two universes.

Relational Competencies In Action

SPEAKER_02 36:40

So that's what I mean by real love is the love of the real, which you have to go through the differentiating process to create. But I think it's a part of the process of real love is that you have to remain differentiated, and that if you get frustrated, it means for temporarily you've gone back to the power struggle.

SPEAKER_00 36:59

And I think that the whole conversation around quantum physics and relationships is so important. And I hope that maybe one day you'll come back and we can expand on that because I don't I don't think that most of us walk around realizing that we're sharing energy, an energy field all the time, except that if we stop and think about it, how do I feel like what do I feel like when I'm in a room with this person? Do I feel pulled in or do I find myself pulling away? And the just thinking about it in that just simple context uh may be helpful to our listeners. Well, I could spend all day listening and talking to both of you, and I know that your time is valuable, but thank you so much for being with me today. I know you've had a busy day. And is there anything that you'd like to close with before we end our episode?

SPEAKER_02 37:53

I think I would just to add a reminder that that you could be listening to this and it become terrifying. And because it's like, oh, you know, that means I will always be without. And the response to that is as long as you live in that consciousness, which is the consciousness of the child, you will be without. That you can never get it there. You have to make the decision to become a resource rather than to look for resources. And that when you become the love you want, that's the transformation. You become the love you want, then you have the love that you were looking for. And only you can create that.

SPEAKER_00 38:38

And when is your next workshop so that we can I'm sure that anyone listening to this podcast is saying, I really love to be there in person and hear what these two founders of our theory have to say and be able to be in the same room with you. When is that next workshop?

SPEAKER_02 38:54

You know, I really don't know, but uh it's uh on our the website, harvelandhelan.com. Our schedule is there. But I know that it's uh the face-to-face workshop it is in early May or early June.

SPEAKER_04 39:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 39:07

So we don't have one until the summer, and then we have several from summer into the fall. But the website we give you our schedule.

SPEAKER_00 39:15

Well, thank you. And I hope that everyone will go to this website, and it's such a rich website to learn more about Imago theory. And Harville and Helen have many books that you can purchase, and I'm gonna put that in our show notes so that you'll know where they're available and how to order them. And thank you everybody for being with us today on the relationship blueprint. I'm so in awe of these two people and what they have done to really shape the way we see relationships. They say that we are born in relationship, we are wounded in relationship, but we are also healed in relationship. And hopefully today you were able to find out a little bit more of how that healing process really happens.

SPEAKER_01 39:59

And the healing, the main thing is you can work out a compromise.

SPEAKER_02 40:03

And yeah, and then both grow. So I want to thank you, Coco, for your contribution to Imago with this podcast and all the other stuff you're doing in the Imago world. You are bringing your intelligence and creativity and strategic planning to to this community and getting out this word as you've done today. So thank you. I'm honored to be on this pod podcast with you.

SPEAKER_00 40:29

Thank you. We have a big workshop Kevin and I are doing in Florida next weekend, a week from this weekend, and we have about 40 couples.

SPEAKER_02 40:39

So Fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 40:40

We're very excited, and this will be our second workshop using your new format. And we're very, very excited about um sharing

Zero Negativity And Daily Appreciations

SPEAKER_00 40:50

this video with them so that they can get to even know you. What an honor it is going to be to be able to share your words and for them to see your faces um and hear your perspective on your theory. So thank you for again for being with me.

SPEAKER_01 41:05

What's so beautiful is those at the end of that workshop, the couple's marriage will be changed, but they can teach dialogue to their children and teach it to other. And we also have a connecting and work program for corporations. So anyway, bravo.

SPEAKER_00 41:24

Thank you. Yeah, I it's addictive, these workshops, right? Because people come in, they're a little nervous, and then by the time they end, you see them sitting closer together and you see them smiling, and they leave with hope. And there's nothing more powerful than providing people with hope.

SPEAKER_01 41:42

Because they feel felt seen, heard, and cared about by the end of the workshop.

SPEAKER_00 41:48

And you are both seen, heard, and cared about by many all over the world. So thanks again for being with me. And thanks everybody for listening to the relationship blueprint. And we hope you unlock your power of connection. Have a great day.

SPEAKER_02 42:03

Thank you. Bye bye.