Your Childhood Survival Strategy is Killing Your Relationship

In this discussion, we explore how one's childhood experiences, particularly growing up with a single mother, can profoundly shape their perception of others' needs.

For many high-achievers, "people-pleasing" or being "easy-going" was originally a survival strategy. However, in a committed partnership, this "South" pattern becomes a system glitch that leads to a slow erosion of trust. We dive into the subtle mindset shift required to move from merely observing to truly understanding, highlighting crucial life lessons learned along the way.

By applying emotional intelligence and self-awareness, you can stop the cycle of "going with the flow" and start building a high-trust, visionary team. If you’ve ever felt like you were "carrying the weight" of the relationship or that your partner is an "invisible burden," this episode provides the framework for effective communication and lasting conflict resolution.

In this episode, we unpack:

• Why "Nice Guy" and "Nurturer" archetypes struggle with relational honesty.
• The psychology of hyper-attunement and scanning for needs.
• How to move from an "Adaptive Child" response to a Mature Adult partnership.
• Breaking the spiral between North and South identities.

🧭 Is your relationship stuck in a loop? Audit your "Operating System" with the Relational Compass:

https://www.lipcouples.com/compass

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Connect with Us

Work with Emily and Kelly for Couples Coaching

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Connect with Kelly on IG @iamkellygardner

#communicationskills #conflictresolution #emotionalintelligence #highperformancecouples #visionarymarriage #loveinpractice #personalgrowth #selfawareness #relationalintelligence #singleparenting #childhoodpatterns

Transcript

The Hyper-Attunement Trap: Growing up with a single mother and scanning for needs.

SPEAKER_02 0:00

I learned to scan my environment and understand exactly what everyone's needs were growing up with a single mom, much of my generation growing up with single mothers. We learned how to become that person who was constantly aware of the emotional landscape around us so that we could intervene before challenges became bigger problems.

SPEAKER_03 0:23

Particularly with women. Particularly with women. As you know, if we're talking about more the nice guy sort of version of.

SPEAKER_02 0:29

Yeah. And so I became hyper-attuned to the emotional landscape that was around me and felt that it was my responsibility to meet the needs of other people before they even saw them. That was a way of keeping me safe. There is a uh a people pleaser in there that recognizes that I have value when I please other people, when I give them what they're looking for, when I give them what they want. And if they need me, they won't leave me. I won't be banned.

SPEAKER_03 1:00

If you identify as a people pleaser or you're in a relationship with one, this episode is going to challenge you.

SPEAKER_02 1:06

We're breaking down why people pleasing feels loving at first, but slowly erodes trust, builds resentment, and costs you your sense of self.

SPEAKER_03 1:13

Most importantly, we discuss how to grow out of it without becoming cold. I'm Emily Koff, a relationship coach. I've spent years exploring how we connect to grow and heal in love.

SPEAKER_02 1:22

And I'm Kelly Gardner, an embodied leadership coach and communications consultant. Love isn't theory, it's practice. This is love and practice. Let's grow this.

SPEAKER_03 1:32

There is an inherent dishonesty to people pleasing that can really tear apart a relationship very quietly, very slowly. It's a very slow erosion over time, but it creates a lot more issues than it appears to from the outside. Because initially it's great. You know, that person adapts. They they go with the flow, they're easygoing, they're chill, they meet my needs. It's, you know, it's great. And as the people pleaser, it's also very rewarding because it's almost like a dopamine hit. You know, you you please the person that you're in relationship with, they relax. I feel better. They feel better. I feel better. The relationship feels better. We're good.

SPEAKER_02 2:22

Yay! Right. Yep.

SPEAKER_03 2:23

And I can take credit for that. Like, oh, just, you know, it's it's awesome. Look at look at how emotionally attuned I am. And over time, that gets really tired because resentment starts to build more and more. And I also, you know, the I, as the people pleaser, sometimes my experience has been that's also when I will start feeling that I have lost myself over time. And that that is a really actually kind of scary experience. It's like, how do I be emotionally available and give the way I am so naturally attuned to? It comes extremely naturally to me. It's a huge gift without losing myself.

SPEAKER_02 3:11

I love that one. And I want to pause on that for a second because the inevitable experience, and I don't see this come from you as frequently, but the inevitable experience is the question comes why am I losing myself? What's causing me to lose myself? Can you speak on that?

Why "People-Pleasing" is inherently dishonest.

SPEAKER_03 3:33

That's a really good point. I think in a lot of ways, it's very easy to just blame the other person. It's like, oh, well, I'm losing myself because I, as the people pleaser, I'm just using myself in that role. I'm losing myself because you're overwhelming. You're too much. You are enveloping me. You are just you're I feel like I can't get away from you. I can't get out from under you. It's too much.

SPEAKER_02 4:03

And the other one is I always give to you. Mm-hmm. You don't give anything to me.

SPEAKER_03 4:08

This is bullshit. Yes. Right? Absolutely. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 4:17

And so, you know, we'll talk a little bit more about the patterns that are coming out here. Um, one part of this is being a people pleaser. Another part of this is you're starting to lean into, is what I hear as the caretaker.

SPEAKER_03 4:32

Mm-hmm. And there's also sort of the the nice guy. Like I'd love for you to speak a little bit of the nice guy. And all of all this is embodying the compass direction of the South. And this is the assessment tool that we created to use with our couples that you can take for free, by the way. Um, all the information is is below, or you can go to lipcouples.com slash compass and all of it is there for you. And this has been incredibly transformative, actually, in our relationship, far more so than we expected, by the way. Like when you came up with the idea and we started working together to create it, I don't think either one of us thought that it would actually transform our relationship. It was more than just like a work tool. And yet we have been shocked at how incredible it has been for us. So on a previous episode, we were gonna unpack each direction. Previous episode we talked about the north. And you, my love, tend to embody more of the north. Um, I, when we first got together, I embodied much more of the south. I have moved a little bit. I'm a bit more in the east now. But this is also the other really beautiful part about the compass is that everyone has all of these qualities from every direction. They're all sort of a spectrum. It's not a fixed label. Um, it's much more a malleable, something that can shift and evolve over time. It can shift and evolve depending on who you're with, um, the phase of life, the phase of relationship that you're in. It can evolve.

SPEAKER_02 6:05

Yeah. And I also used to be in the South as well. Um, I really identify with that nice guy. Um, and uh there's a whole whole book on uh being Mr. Nice Guy. Robert Clever. Exactly. Uh the key idea here is that we find value in the world by uh meeting people, giving them what they're needing. Oftentimes that comes because of uh sense of hyper responsibility. I grew up in an environment where it wasn't necessarily safe for whatever reason. I learned to scan my environment and understand exactly what everyone's needs were growing up with a single mom, much of my generation growing up with single mothers. We learned how to become that person who was constantly aware of the emotional landscape around us so that we could intervene before challenges became bigger problems.

The South Archetype: Safety through meeting the needs of others.

SPEAKER_03 7:09

Particularly with women. Particularly with women. As you know, if we're talking about more the the nice guy sort of version of.

SPEAKER_02 7:15

Yeah. And so I became hyper-attuned to the emotional landscape that was around me and felt that it was my responsibility to meet the needs of other people before they even saw them. That was a way of keeping me safe. There is a uh a people pleaser in there that recognizes that I I have value when I please other people, when I give them what they're looking for, when I give them what they want. And if they need me, they won't leave me. I won't be a bandit.

SPEAKER_03 7:46

If they need me, they won't leave me.

unknown 7:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:49

And so I see that in a lot of the men that I work with. Um what's interesting here is that uh I've for a long time seen that uh men in the north do not seek support. They generally don't.

unknown 8:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:03

Because they've got it figured out. Yeah. But men in the south do. Uh and we're working with men, I often find myself working with a lot more men that are people pleasers because they are so eager to figure out what's going on. They really, really want to solve this problem. Whereas men in the north have it figured out. I'd rather focus on my business, I'd rather focus on the vision, the things that I'm creating in the future. This relationship stuff will come to a resolution or it won't, and I'll move on. But men in the South, they're deeply relational. They want to find a solution. And so I find a lot of the clients that I've worked with in the past uh come from this perspective of overgiving uh to the point where they are allowing themselves to be um given scraps.

Relational Erosion: How "going with the flow" creates phantom relationships.

SPEAKER_03 8:56

I did a podcast episode years ago with uh uh the incredible Megan Bruno. I we can reference it in the in the show notes, and we called the episode um the breadcrumbs of hope. And that's often what can happen. And I have, again, also been that person where I was in uh relationships, one and one long-term one in particular, where I just kept picking up the breadcrumbs of hope, hoping that they would feed me and hoping that they would lead to the full meal when I was actually starving and wasn't getting my needs met for years. But I also wasn't really asking for my needs to be met. Or if I was, it was coming from a very resentful place as opposed to a place of security within myself. And this whole frame of people pleasing is built around preserving the peace, which is one of the main uh sort of um uh spectrums that we look at in the compass and not rocking, rocking the boat, not asking for my needs to be met, swallowing whatever it is, uh, being the first one to lean in if there's a conflict, to preserve the connection. And there's also a moral superiority to being in the South, because there have been so many times when I can look back and see where I thought I was the good one, the good partner, the good wife, the the good person who was um the person who was really being super relational and stepping up to the plate and taking care of everybody and doing all the things. And how can you not see that about me? And what are you doing over there? And of course, I would never actually want to say these things because that would mean that I was no longer preserving the peace, but secretly thinking to myself, you're clearly terrible at this whole relationship thing. I know what I'm doing, I know how to get us there. Why can't you just be more adaptable like I am? Why can't you just meet me the way I so easily meet you? The what the visual that's almost coming to mind is like melting into a liquid that would just fill all the gaps and just making sure that every gap was filled and I could mold and shape myself however needed in order to fill every gap. But then I was left with nothing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:38

Yeah, the South is a very interesting place because it's a combination of this preserving peace and moving towards, which moving towards, you know, traditionally it would fit into the camp of what we call the anxious attachment. I don't really like utilizing that language and like labeling people in that way. But what we're saying here is that this person has a tendency to say, something's not working here, we need to solve this. We need to work on this. And it seems like the most obvious strategy if something's not working, we need to work on it. Let's keep working on it until it's fixed. Simultaneously, they have this idea of preserving the peace, which is uh as opposed to holding authority, when the dignity is challenged, the holding authority will say, No, this is why, this is the reason why. The preserving the peace will go, Well, I will find my dignity, I will find my sense of value in bringing us back together. I'll show you that I'm valuable, I'll show you that I'm worthy because I can sculpt this thing, I can maneuver this relationship back together, and that's how I'll show you my value that I am worthwhile in this relationship. So there's a double sense of moving towards and have to fix it. I have to solve this problem. And I know you've talked about this before, like when when there's a rupture in the relationship, what is that? What's your experience of that?

SPEAKER_03 13:24

You ever wonder why you chose this partner and why they trigger you like no one else?

SPEAKER_02 13:29

It's because on some level, we don't choose partners at random. We choose people who reflect the parts of ourselves that most need healing.

SPEAKER_03 13:36

That's not a mistake, it's an invitation.

SPEAKER_02 13:38

The relational compass helps you understand those patterns so you can respond instead of react. And finally, start moving toward connection again.

SPEAKER_03 13:46

Take the free assessment at lipcouples.com slash compass. Link in the notes below and find your true north in love. Yeah, my experience and it has calmed dramatically. But uh, you know, in my in my most stressed version of me, it's a sense of panic. It's it's severe distress, like I can't concentrate on anything else, sort of level of um emotional dysregulation. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 14:18

Yeah. And one might think that it's just, oh, well, that that sounds like an abandonment wound. I'm afraid that they're gonna leave me, so this is the way that anyone in that circumstance would respond. But the important thing that I want to get across to people is that regardless, we will we we may have two people with the exact same circumstances, grew up in the same home, had the same experiences, yet they metabolized that differently and created a different strategy that would work for them to keep them safe. So I want to be really clear that it's not just, hey, this person had this wound, you know, they were abandoned, and therefore, anytime somebody starts to pull away, they go, Oh my god, I gotta pull them closer, right? It's just what has worked for them in their family system, in their world, this strategy has worked. So can you tell us a little bit about how that strategy had worked for you?

The Mindset Shift: From observing needs to truly understanding partnership.

SPEAKER_03 15:20

Yeah, it was the overachiever, the person who would um maintain the peace and had the skills to bring peace back if it did get disrupted, so that there was more of an even keel. There was safety, there was certainty in that. Um, even if it wasn't necessarily about me being abandoned in a particular moment or situation. It was about I feel safer when I can feel certain that things feel peaceful around me because there's a lot of chaos going on. I didn't have the words to put this at the at the time, but there's a lot of chaos I have going on internally. So I have to do everything I can to make sure that my more external environment feels as certain and as peaceful as possible so that I can calm and regulate myself. Um, there's a a lot of dysregulation, I think, with some of the South. The other thing is too, is also the needing to feel appreciated. So it's not just sourcing my value from um, you know, or or whoever is is fitting into this, it's not just sourcing value from feeling needed. It's also, well, I also need you to appreciate me for how much I do for you and how much I do for us. Absolutely. Right. And this this idea of feeling needed has really, and the in the much this doesn't really come up anymore, but the earlier parts of our relationship when I was much more so locked into the South, you would point out to me all the ways in which I was doing things for you, for us, to feel needed. And they were things that you didn't necessarily need or even want me to do. And you were pointing to the fact that I actually needed that more than you did. I thought I was like giving you a gift by, you know, doing this thing for you. It could be like a task around the house or whatever. But not only did you not really feel like you actually needed that, it you felt the energetic of me pulling on you because I was doing the thing not from a place of security, but from deep insecurity. And I would get so mad at you when you would point that out to me because I'm like, no, like look at the gift I'm giving you, basically. Like, look what I'm doing for you. And then I would sit with it, I'm like, oh shit. I have never fully looked at these parts of like, where am I trying to do to feel needed? And this is a really common issue for a lot of women of doing to be loved rather than trusting that they can just be and be loved for their beingness.

SPEAKER_02 18:08

But I also want to be clear that that was part of our dance.

SPEAKER_03 18:11

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 18:12

Because uh it was very much a response to my holding authority, it was very much a a response to my critical parent who was criticizing this, that, and everything.

SPEAKER_03 18:24

And like you embodying the critical parent kind of aspect.

SPEAKER_02 18:27

Yeah, me embodying that that criticism as a way of holding authority um felt natural to me, felt feels normal to me to just point out the things that aren't working, but that pattern challenged your dignity. So the way that you know to get dignity back is by showing how valuable you are to the us.

unknown 18:49

Right.

SPEAKER_02 18:50

And in doing so, then extracting out value in he'll see how valuable I am when I fix this, when I when I solve this problem. And so we're in this cycle.

unknown 19:06

Right.

SPEAKER_02 19:06

And it comes it's not just isolated, it was because your dignity in many ways was being challenged. So this was your pattern, your way of trying to show that you had value. And so I want to really point that out that it's not an isolated incident, it's in relationship to each other that we tend to trigger these parts of ourselves, these patterns that we go into to try to find safety.

SPEAKER_03 19:33

Yeah. And and do you hear the power imbalance, right? Like there's often power dynamics that can play out in various relationships. And what's interesting is that you and I were very aware for a long time that we had power dynamics playing out in our relationship that we were trying to unravel. And I think in some ways, it wasn't until we stopped kind of actively focusing on the power dynamics themselves and instead started focusing more on, quite frankly, some of these sort of archetypes that we were embodying and the things that weren't working within ourselves, that the prior power dynamics started to naturally dissolve a bit more. And look, you know, again, there will be seasons and cycles where it comes up in new and different ways, perhaps some of the same ways. Like I'm not saying that it's just eradicated forever, but it is really interesting to see how that how that can come up in this dance between the different versions of the compass.

The "Adaptive Child" vs. The Mature Adult in conflict.

SPEAKER_02 20:30

You know, this brings up something for me which I I think is really interesting in what I've seen in relational dynamics and where we get stuck often, where we get stuck in continuing the same patterns. When I used to teach acting many, many, many, many years ago, uh, there's this concept, there's two ways to approach acting. There's from the inside out and from the outside in. The inside out is uh what's referred to as method acting. I will think the thoughts of the character, and through this new pattern of thoughts, I will create authentic actions that represent uh truthful action under imaginary circumstances. The other version is from the outside in. Um this is generally called uh physical physical theater or uh sometimes it's mime, whatever it may be. But uh the approach is basically if I put my body in this certain circumstance, in this phrase, in this way of being, that I will start to experience emotions because the body has a the body keeps the score, the body knows that emotional. If I put my my mouth in a frown, I'll start to experience that. And I'll experience from the inside out or from the outside in. And so if I change my outward reflection, I will start to have different emotions. And I think that this is really what's taking place here when we look at this. So much of the work that people have been doing in therapy. In pop psychology, in getting underneath their traumas and their wounds and all of these things is like method acting. It's working from the inside out, changing, trying to change the way that I think so that I will have different external reactions. But what happens is when I'm dysregulated, I can't change the way that I think. I'm going to go back to what is my well-worn path. And what we're really saying here is if you can change, just change the way you speak, change the way you engage in that pattern. Just recognize that this is a pattern and start to act in a different way. Your partner is going to have a different emotional response. And the relationship is going to start to have an emotional response. And that we don't actually have to get to all of the underlying stuff of why I do these things and how they do. Sometimes I just need to interrupt the pattern. I think that's something important for people out there to recognize, and something that I think has really worked for us and worked for our clients, is, you know, for me, learning to stop overthinking it all and just see, ah, that there it is. How do I start to stop it?

SPEAKER_00 23:14

Yeah. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_02 23:17

I wanted to get back to something you you brought up earlier, which was the moral authority piece. Um, and can you kind of help us understand a little bit better what it what it means for the South to hold moral superiority and what that um what the experience is for them and and how that experience can play out on their partner?

SPEAKER_03 23:42

I think for me it was, you know, very unconsciously, it was a way for me to retain dignity when it felt as though it was being pulled away, to retain my sense of value when it felt as though you were not valuing me or past partners were not valuing me. Um it was a way for me to make myself feel better. And that's there's nothing, I want to be clear, there's there's nothing inherently wrong with that. It's just more a matter of looking at, hey, is this serving me and what's actually underneath this? And I think that you know, the way that we're talking about it too, hopefully people can see, like if you pull up the hood on that moral superiority, there's a lot going on there underneath it that isn't really being addressed. And your behaving, your embodiment of these behaviors is not actually making you feel more truly secure. They're they're still just masks. It's it's not it's not the the fullness of who you are, it's not it's not your essence, it's your insecurities playing out in the in the relationship. And that it's really painful. And and you know, I also I would love to hear from you too, because I I want to make sure to hit lots of the sort of more male version of this as well with the nice guy. Um, you know, what this kind of does to the nice guy. And I'd also love to look at like the truly the positives of this, because something that you actually shared uh about me was it very early in our relationship was my repair skills. Like that I I have incredibly high ability to repair. And that's really beautiful. That is a tribute to how much work I have done and obviously my education in the relational field as well. And it was also partly born out of a sense of necessity and an adaptive strategy.

SPEAKER_02 25:55

Yeah. What comes up for me when you talk when we talk about moral authority, I also think about power. Uh I think about um I've often talked about you know three different forms of power. Power over, power with, and power within. So typically when we think about power in the West, we think about you know having power over. You know, and when we talk about power dynamics, a lot of times we're talking about the power that I can uh show over another human being. This often is what we look at when we see that that holding authority. Holding authority is a way of holding power over. Whether it's intentional or unintentional, that's how it's being received. Power with is that when I organize and create connection, then you know the people united cannot be defeated. This idea that when I create connection around shared values and shared goals, then we collectively have a greater sense of power together. And then there's that power within. There's the sense of a deep moral guidance, a compass that uh directs me to where I know that from my higher power, whatever you want to call it, is ingrained in me, telling me exactly what is honest, what is right, what is true. Um there need be no Ten Commandments because I already know them in my heart. That's my power within. And I think that that power within, to a degree, is that moral authority. When I look at the civil rights movement, you know, I I believe that the civil rights movement was combating power over with power within, holding this clear sense of who we are in our in our best version of who we need to be with our power with. How can we combat power over, power with, and power within? That has been, you know, historically the story of the nonviolent resistance, power power with combined with power within. But it becomes problematic when that power within becomes a holding power over. My moral authority is better than your moral authority, therefore I'm better than you. I'm holding moral authority, but not to buoy myself, but to buoy myself above and beyond who you are. And I think that's really in the essence of where it starts to go wrong.

Breaking the "Burden" Story: Why the South stops advocating for themselves.

SPEAKER_03 28:35

Well, and what I will say to that is that that was often in response um in this relationship, that was trying to combat my, yes, just my overall feeling um in the earlier days of still creating more security within myself anyway, but also combating the aspects of you that are very north compass-based, where I felt inferior to you because you were holding the direction, you knew it all, so-called. You you were um holding to me a lot of the power in the relationship. And then that was how I felt I could maintain my own sense of power.

SPEAKER_02 29:24

Absolutely. Yeah. Again, fighting against that that authority. Um, I hold a counter power through my internal authority. Um, and when that's not recognized, then it needs to be projected outwards to remind others that we I hold that authority. I mean, I think that's the the basis of wars throughout the early part of the you know 14th, 15th century, uh, that we we fought endlessly and many, many, many people died over moral authority when it goes wrong. And so that I think that's a an element of what's taking place in the dynamic, is it's one, I'm crafting my sense of who I am and a core identity, but I also need it to be honored, valued, and if it's not honored and valued, then I'm going to continue to project it on you more and more until I receive what I'm looking for.

SPEAKER_03 30:27

So, what are some of the ways that the South can grow?

SPEAKER_02 30:32

That is a great point. You know, when I work with men in the South, um, and I'll say the work that I've done for myself uh coming from the South uh has a lot to do with um one, creating strong boundaries. And when I say boundaries, I don't mean uh doing the opposite of being relational. I think that many people get that wrong. They they go they start to create boundaries and instead create walls. A boundary is not a wall, a boundary is a permeable membrane. It's like our cells. They need to allow things to come and go, but a good functioning cell wall will decide what needs to come in and what doesn't need to come in. And so uh the work on creating boundaries of going, okay, I'm not going to take on this thing that you're giving me. I will this is my barrier, this is this is what where I end and you begin. I don't need to take that on, I don't need to fix that. That's yours. I see that. I have compassion and love for that part of you, but it's not me, and it's not a negative reflection on me. That's one boundaries.

unknown 31:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 31:52

Um the second part is the willingness to have the difficult conversations. To stand up and say, This is what I need for me. And I don't necessarily feel bad about asking for what it is that I need for me. I need this, this is what's required for me to have what I need. And if you're not willing to give it to me, that's okay. But this is the response that's going to happen if I don't get this. This is how I'm going to go about getting the thing that I need. Uh and so you know, those are the it'd say the two main pieces that really start the conversation is creating stronger boundaries and asking for the things that I need uh on a regular basis and being willing to to stand up in the difficulty of conversations, even when it may be a challenge to what I perceive is the relational dynamic.

SPEAKER_03 32:52

Yeah, in in my book, actually, You Grow Me, my co-author and I write about the idea of confident detachment, where you very very warmly, it's not about being cold at all. It's not about being detached in uh or or unable to be attached. It's more about detaching from particular outcomes and having the conversations, putting your truth out on the table and then letting the chips fall and being okay with the result, even if it's hard, and trusting that you will be okay either way, ultimately. Um, no, you you can't necessarily trust in the sense of uh determining um uh 100% outcome that if I have a conversation with this person that it that it will go the way in which I want it to go. Instead, if you can have the conversation in a trust, in a sense of trust that I will be okay regardless, and that is easier said than done. But I think that it's really important to be able to recognize you know your unique gifts that you as you know someone who is embodying more of the South offers, brings to the table, um, recognizing where those parts are also working against you and being able to speak your unique truth.

unknown 34:16

Yeah.

The North-South Dance: How opposing strategies create circular arguments.

SPEAKER_02 34:16

The unique gift of the South is attunement. Can you speak a little bit about how attunement shows up for you in relationship, where it can be a superpower, um, and where it can be kryptonite?

SPEAKER_03 34:31

I mean, the the very first thing that comes to mind is I can read every expression, I can read every body language, gesture, energy shift that would be imperceptible, seemingly. Now, the issue with that is I'm not necessarily correct about the story that I attach to what that means. So, yes, I am reading it correctly that I can sense that something has shifted, something is off, there's a shift in mood, any of those things. But what would often happen, and and I sometimes still struggle with this, is not making it about me and not making it personal, especially if we're talking about my partner. It's like, how do I not take your mood to be about me? Like I think we've talked before, the perfect example in our relationship is you're not really a morning person, and I am, and I used to take that so hard. I thought that you were waking up mad at me every day, and I was struggling with that because it would throw off my entire day. It was like starting my day that way. It was really unpleasant, actually, but it was more about the story I was creating around it. Once I learned to let it go and let you do you in the mornings, not only magically did you become far more pleasant with me in the mornings, uh the you know, ironic karma of that one. Um, but also it just allowed you to be you, allowed me to be me. And I didn't ruin my own day ultimately by making whatever your seemingly imperceptible shift in, you know, you didn't make eye contact with me at the exact right moment that I thought that you should. I didn't make it mean anything about me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:20

You know, I think that's interesting because my experience was like waking up, like, oh shit, am I gonna get this wrong again? You know, like being on edge because I'm thinking, oh my god, if I don't do this right, I'm gonna get oh God, I'm too tired. I don't want to deal with this. I just want to go, you know. Um, so the superpower is the awareness. Yeah. The superpower is being able to really read the emotional awareness of the room, being able to identify uh what's present in the space. The social superpower. Absolutely. The kryptonite is thinking you know why. Yes, exactly. I mean, really clear. The kryptonite is thinking that you know why that emotion is present.

SPEAKER_03 37:07

We're not saying you're not reading the emotions correctly. We're just saying that you don't necessarily know the reason why that emotion is showing up.

SPEAKER_02 37:13

Absolutely. Yeah. Because part of that attunement in its negative or its self-protective mode, its adaptive mode, is uh-oh, this is probably going to be about me. Thy adaptive self that created this superpower is going to revert to I'm in danger. So it makes perfect sense that the story comes up is uh-oh, why is this about me? What am I doing wrong?

SPEAKER_03 37:39

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:42

So let's talk a little bit about these beautiful South people and the relationship dynamics that they tend to find themselves in. Who do they find themselves attracted to, and what ends up happening when they do?

Overcoming the "Invisible Weight" in your relationship.

SPEAKER_03 37:59

Well, honestly, I think we've already covered a lot of that. You know, they often end up with people, typically in the West or the North, who are also perhaps a little bit more likely to, if not actively pull back, not nearly as likely to lean in as much as someone in the South does. Um, and that can create a lot of a lot of strife. Um, sort of this push-pull dynamic that uh I think most of us have experienced that is really unpleasant. And um, so many people are attracted to someone in the south because of these beautiful qualities, these relational superpowers that they possess. Um, you feel really seen and felt when you are with someone who is in the south. You feel understood in a way that you maybe haven't ever quite felt before. Um, these parts of you that you know no one else has ever been able to really get. You feel like they've got you. Um, and I think it can also be an experience of feeling as though you won't be abandoned. Because someone in the South, you know, especially if they're preserving peace really strongly and stuff, you're potentially um not even aware that they might have something going on underneath the surface because they're hiding it really well, again, consciously or unconsciously. And so you you think things are awesome, things can feel really smooth with someone in the south because they can be in certain expressions of of uh of that particular archetype, really good at not rocking the boat. Um, so it's like go with the flow. Oh, they're so chill, they're really easygoing, like they're so helpful. They they give to me so much. I'm not used to being the one on the receiving end of the relationship. There's not a lot about that that feels bad. The downside is when you start sensing and eventually fully experiencing um the growing resentment that is forming if the person in the south is in their more adaptive expressions.

SPEAKER_02 40:22

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, the the the caretaker is very strong, very comforting. Um, can be very comforting to the exiles of the West, to the that part that says, I'm the strong silent type, nobody's ever gonna accept me. Oh, I see you. I see your your soft underbelly. I'm gonna rub it and make you feel okay, it's fine until they really wall themselves off and it becomes extremely anti-relational. But also to the north.

SPEAKER_03 40:53

I can fix you, I can save you. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:56

But also to the north, it has that that uh that underlying uh uh prove it that's just waiting to not have to prove anything to anyone. I'm accepted, you know. Uh and so in those dynamics, you know, we also see them turn um where we always start out in the the positive version, you know, the the thing that we're looking for, and then inevitably the South becomes that needy, desiring, constantly m pulling at me, constantly needing to fix everything. Can we just let it go? Can we just just let it breathe? It's everything's fine. That is overwhelming a burden which then creates that underlying story that is so central to the South as well that I'm a burden, I'm too much. And we're off to the races, where our adaptive selves are constantly getting into a conversation and the mature adult has left the room. Yeah.

Final Practice: How to use the Compass for long-term growth.

SPEAKER_03 42:08

Yeah. So if you think this is you, or if you think that you're in a relationship with someone who might fit this, or maybe you see a past version of yourself in this, um, strongly advise you to go and take the compass, see, see what it can tell you, see what it can gift you with, uh, so that you can shift some of this. You also might get a better idea as to who you have perhaps ended up partnered with and why some of that is. And this isn't just self-awareness that we are creating. That's sort of the initial step, but there's a lot more to this. This is just the very beginning of a journey of practicing different ways of being in relationship uh that will really serve you and benefit you.

SPEAKER_02 42:49

Absolutely. And as always, it's love, it's practice. It's love and practice. We've all been there. You say one thing, your partner hears another, and suddenly we're off to World War III.

SPEAKER_03 43:02

Those moments aren't about who's right, they're about what's unhealed.

SPEAKER_02 43:05

That's why we created the relational compass. It helps you see your triggers, your strengths, and how to turn conflict into connection.

SPEAKER_03 43:13

Five minutes, powerful insights, totally free.

SPEAKER_02 43:16

Find your direction at lipcouples.comslash compass and start loving in practice.