How to Strengthen Your Relationships in 2023

So many people have superficial connection with the people around them and what do they do? They blame the people around them. I'm the first one to say, but what about your behavior? Are you being vulnerable? Are you creating memorable moments with them? Are you doing kind things to them that brings a tear to their eyes? Like crying with people, sharing beautiful stories with people, laughing with other people, it creates a different kind of intimate bond. Five things to talk about today to help you have extraordinary relationships. You've seen a very heavy emphasis in making sure that as you are working towards improving your life, that achieving your goals, you know, having an amazing mission, living on purpose, that you're also creating extraordinary relationships along the way. My greatest like surprise and joy in studying high performers was realizing that they not only maintained their well being by achieving more than other people, but they also maintained extraordinarily positive relationships. So how can you seek to have extraordinary accomplishments and achievements in your career or your life or your mission? How do you live that ultimate purpose and stay sane and maintain the positive relationships around you that make life really worth living and really feel connected? That's the topic we're taking today. Get yourself a journal because we're going to do a lot of note taking. A great framework for you to really improve your relationships today. Try to minimize the distractions, close all the other browsers, the other noise, let's close the door. You know, part of the magic of this session today is that you take time to work on yourself because we get so busy. So few people do that. You know, they're always struggling and always hustling. They're always doing so many things. They don't take the time for personal professional development. And that's why they're not, you know, implementing the great habits or the great strategies. So you took the time, you're here. So earn it by writing down some notes. And not just what I say, but whatever comes up for you today in talking about relationships that will be truly helpful to you as well. Big topics today on relationships. Okay, so let's really tune in. You've got your journal. Write down your five most important relationships in your life. The five most important relationships you have in your life, write it down in your journal. That might be for that might be your spouse, your partner, that might be somebody who is on your team, that might be an extended family. I just like the five most important relationships and I want you to be thinking about those relationships. Let me ask you a question. If you just spent two hours today thinking about the most important relationships in your Life and how to improve them. Would that be worth your time and this program? I believe it is. I believe the greatest things we can do is really focus on improving our relationships more than anything else in our life. If you said, brennan, I want one lever to absolutely improve my life outside of my health, what would that be? That'd be like your relationships, right? If, if you make those two things, if your health is good and your relationships are good, it almost like, listen, no matter what the finances are or whether you're achieving your dreams as fast as you wanted to or not, but if you got your health and really positive, great, fulfilling relationships, man, you got it all. So I think this is the most, an incredibly important part of our lives. I want you to think about the key five relationships in your life. I'm going to spend most of the day talking about your intimate relationships or relationships with a partner. Now, I know you might not be married or I know you might not be in an intimate relationship right now, you might not have a partner right now, but I still want to equip you to know how to do that. Well, if you choose that route in the future, if and honestly, you can apply these two topics today to anybody. We're going to talk about how do you get support in a relationship? How do you stay motivated, how do you increase intimacy? We're going to talk about how do you deal with conflict. We're going to talk about how do you, you know, if you do want to chase a dream with your partner, spouse, how do you work together? If you want to be completely separate, how do you do that and still make sure you're totally in it together? Right? So I think we have a lot to cover today. Five secrets to an extraordinary relationship. My hope is none of them are earth shattering to you that the common sense is there, but you'll make that common sense more common practice and you will evaluate and rate yourself today. The magic of getting, you know, mentoring like this is maybe there's some things you already know, but I'm going to ask you to really look at them and rate them today. Really score yourself in these different areas of your life in the most important relationships you already have. So again, write down the five most important relationships you have. If you have a specific relationship you really want to focus on, awesome. Focus on that one today. But if you. I'd love for you to have a broad perspective in relationships. Okay. I'm going to start with a very simple idea. This first piece, Be all in. Be all in. I know this sounds so Funny. But I know married couples who aren't all in. You know, people who, you know, they got married and they love each other and, you know, they're not all in. Be all in to improving and growing the relationship. Be all in to improving and growing the relationship. This is what I want you to write down. Be all in to improving and growing the relationship. Some people, they never really invest fully into relationship because sometimes, you know, hey, maybe when you were younger, you got hurt in a relationship, so you've always been guarded. You know, maybe one time that person cheated on you, so you never trusted anybody again. But I'm not asking you for trust. I'm not asking you to, you know, be around, you know, and always be positive. What I'm asking is be all in to improving and growing the critical relationships of your life. See, my friend Tom Bilyeu, who I brought up a minute ago, one of the things he says about his wife that made their relationship extraordinary is that he says she. He calls her. This is his language, not mine. He says, she's a ride or die chick. She will ride. She's in it. Ride or die. No matter what happens, she is forced, fully committed, 100% there, in it for the relationship. Just gives everything into the relationship. And how often are we holding back? How often are you going through the motions in your relationships because you're kind of like, okay, yeah, I love her, or, yeah, he's great, but you're not really, like, fully invested. All in. All chips, here we go, honey, it's you and me. Lifelong. Gonna make this great. How often do you go through a day and you didn't think about improving that relationship or growing that relationship? You just. You're together, you're fine, you show up, you go through the motions, but you're not working all in that relationship to make that person feel heard, make that person feel appreciated, make that person feel loved, make that person feel honored and respected. Being all in, says this person, I am all in to support this person, cheer on this person, love on this person, respect this person. I am all in to improving this relationship and growing this relationship. Now, when you wrote down those five important relationships, how many on each of those five? What I'd love for you to do is not do this philosophically. I want you to listen very close to what I'm going to ask you to do, because as your high performance coach, my job is to make you score yourself once in a while. So you wrote down five relationships. Each of those five relationships, I'd like you to score Yourself now, on a score of 1 to 10. And what I want you to score yourself on is, one is bad. Ten is great. Now, here's the criteria for each of these. What I want you to do is say, okay, if I really look at my behavior in the last three months in this relationship, have I been all in? Have I really focused on improving and growing this relationship? Am I showing up in a way that is improving, growing this relationship? Am I giving this person time, attention, and energy so that we can grow and improve this relationship? Okay. Okay. One would be bad. One would be like, oh, with this person, I haven't talked to them. I haven't acknowledged them. I haven't even thought about the relationship or improving the relationship at all. Ten would be, I've been really thinking about how to make our life better together or make this relationship stronger. I've been really thinking about what I can do to make the person feel happy and better. Like you really thought through it. So one is bad. 10 is great. What I'd like you to do is go down that list of five relationships and measure yourself whether or not you are all in on those relationships and whether you've not, whether or not you've been demonstrated. Now, some of you are going to say, well, Brendan, you know, I wrote down somebody who I, I, you know, is like my employee. I'm like, okay, are you all in and growing and improve that relationship with your employee? That's the question. Are you all in? Because what most people do is remain casual about their relationships for life. They never approach the relationship like the mission. Think about that. Your relationship is a mission. Have it in your heart and soul to serve that mission. The relationship is the mission. So when you can think about your daily life with your spouse and go, it's my mission to make her feel loved. It is my mission to honor us. It is my mission to grow this relationship. Isn't that different than be like, how are you, honey? Did you make my coffee yet? You know what I'm saying? So few people take their relationship seriously. And because they don't take it seriously, they don't. Yeah, you see this Odile saying, you know, a relationship like a plant, you have to care for it, give it love attention. You have to feed it and water and care for it. But you'll never do that if you don't make that mental shift to go, I'm all in. I am all in. If you want to change your relationship, you go in. That's it. You commit. You say, I'm going to Go all in, all the chips in you. Burn down the other boats. You say, here I am. I am absolutely committed to you. I'm absolutely committed to this relationship. I'm absolutely committed to improving it. And I know how hard that is. So measure yourself today. Take a quick, honest look and just go, okay. Have I been showing up for my loved ones and really trying to improve these relationships? Have I been growing my relationships with my families, with my family? Or I'm just letting my. Letting it go? I mean, listen, the reason you show up here every month is to take good, hard look at your life in these different categories. I ask you to look at yourself, and I know this one's an easy one to glance at. I know you can say, oh, well, it's not that important. Brendan. I get it. I know it's easy to make jokes. I know it's easy to tease. But listen, the most important thing you can ever do is gauge your commitment in your relationships, really look at it and really think at it and ask, well, what's preventing me from being more fully invested in this person and in this relationship? Is it because I got hurt that one time? Is it because they weren't honest? What is the reason I'm not more fully into this relationship? And then you got to do the hard work. You got to either figure out, is it your stuff? Like, is it your stuff because of your past? Is it their behavior now? And you got to solve that. If it's your stuff from your past and that's getting in the way of you having fully committed, amazing, extraordinary relationships, then it is time to do the deep internal work. It is time to get the therapist if you need it. It is time to get the relationship coach if you need it. It is time to solve your stuff. Because if you are holding yourself back from having great relationships, no one can fix you. Stop thinking that that ideal, perfect person is going to come around, or the persons you're with are supposed to cheer you on and support you and make you better. No one is going to make you better but you. No one. And that's where most people screw up their relationships. They keep, I want her to make me happy. I want him to make me happy. I want, I want, I want, I want, I want. Take, take, take, take, take, take. Without doing the work and saying, o, I'm not able to connect here because I have some stuff from my past. You got to deal with that stuff now. If the reason you're not all in to improving or growing a relationship, you have to ask one should that relationship be in your life? Now, I ask you to write down the five most important ones. So the assumption here is that they are. That this is an important relationship in your life. But if you know, you're casual about it and you're kind of looking at these different relationships, and some of you, it's time for you to break up with your friends, to break up with that team member who's not getting it and let them go. To break up with. Like, if you can't be fully invested in, improve or growing that relationship because of their behavior, you have to say, what is it about their behavior that's not working for me to be able to improve this relationship with them? And then it's time for the hard conversation. It's time to sit them down and say, listen, I want to connect more, I want to give more, I want more vibrancy or joy or connection between us. But I can't. I feel like I can't put it in because every time I do, you're doing these things. I'm seeing this feeling, this sensing this. I want us to be better, but I don't know how to make it better because we've tried. So tell me, what do we need to do? Let's figure this out together. Let's figure out how we can improve our relationship. What ideas do you have for me? Here's some ideas for you. And I know I'm going to get into this deeper later on. So for those of you who are looking for the complete answer, hold for a little while. But I hope you get the idea. If you're not all in, you got to ask three simple questions. One, is it your past? Is it your stuff that's preventing you from fully engaging, committing, or connecting? Number two, is it just a person who should not be in the picture? And you've got to make that tough decision now. Is this the time for this person to no longer be in your circle or this person to be in your life? I know that's hard. Or is it time to minimize your time with this person? Or three, if it's their behavior that is preventing you from connecting more deeply with them, it is time to have that conversation. As you guys know, I often recommend this book called Crucial Conversations, Crucial Conversations. It's a great book to read to help you figure out how to do that. You know, for those of you who really just like, I don't know what to say or, you know, they're going to fight with me, make sure you read that book. It might help you in finding some new language to be able to have that conversation. But the most important thing is to ask yourself the questions and to rate yourself. Here's what the goofiest thing, the best thing I've ever done on a weekly basis to improve my relationships in my life is exactly what I'm asking you to do. Here's the five most important people in my life. And I know five is arbitrary. You might have, you know, five kids, so those count. Plus your spouse, plus. Plus the person who works for you or whatever, right? So however many people who are really close to you or need to be close to you, write down those names. Score yourself. Every week, I score myself on a score of 1 to 10. How am I doing in these relationships? 1 is bad, 10 is great. Then I ask those questions. What is it about me preventing me from improving this relationship? And what's their behavior that's making me feel like I shouldn't? And then I get to do the hard work, because you know what the opposite is? Going through the motions or avoiding. And you know what high performers don't do? They don't go through the motions and they don't avoid. And I've been blessed to study the highest performing people in the world. I coach many of them. I've trained most of them. And I've had that beautiful gift now of seeing over and over and over and over again that true, real thing. And that is, man, they're willing to look at themselves and rate themselves on a consistent basis. I really want you guys to be willing to do that for yourselves. All right? I mean, I wish I could tell you how life can feel when you get that immediate circle of loved ones, whether it's spouse, family, friends, partner. When you get that circle, just vibing. I mean, when you really got, you know, couple people who. There's just an amazing, extraordinary quality relationship. If you guys have that. If you already have that extraordinary quality relationship with most of the people around you, and it's a deep, connected, vibrant, amazing, joyous relationship. Double high five, my friends, because most people don't have that. And so what have you done to create a great relationship? You need to work on improving and growing those relationships. That's the goal. You know, I once wrote this book called the Charge. The subtitle was activating the 10 human drives that make you feel alive. And in the Charge, there was something controversial in there. And I taught that you. As you get busier in life, sometimes you have to start bucketing friends and relationships, and you have to kind of Mentally put people into, like, you know, buckets of how much time you're going to spend on them. And not everybody liked when I said that, because I said, listen, you have old friends, that's one bucket. You have maintenance friends, and then you have growth friends, right? Your old friends, they're old. They're another part of your life. Maintenance friends, that's the person you reach out to on their birthday. You might send them a Christmas card. You know, once in a while, you connect with them. Growth friends, you are actively creating adventures and time together. You are doing things together. You are in communication. You're texting and teasing and making fun of each other and having a good relationship where you're growing and learning together throughout life. So I'm here to tell you, if we accomplish one thing today, it's develop that growth circle. That, whether that's your spouse, your partner, that's two or three of your best friends, I want you to have, like, a circle of friends where you are working hard to improve those relationships and grow those relationships. And everybody else, they get less time. They got to get less time from you. We've got to get your time back to the relationships that matter and will matter in the future for you. Okay? How many of you be honest, how many of you hang out too much with people who drain your energy? They're old friends, but they're still hanging around. They're maintenance friends, but there's no connection and vibrancy and joy in that relationship anymore, that friendship. What do you got to do? Ask those three questions. Is it something from you holding you back? Is it they shouldn't be in your life, or is it something about their behavior? You need to communicate, and then it's time to maybe cut ties. Maybe it's time to have that tough conversation. But, man, I want you to make it like your peer group and your intimate relationship. It's going to be vibrant and amazing. You've been through enough in life. You deserve to have extraordinary relationships that now. But you've got to find those relationships and you got to go all in on improving and growing those relationships. Let me give you one example of what I did in. I did it in multiple areas of my life. But one area of my life that was lacking was the relationships I had with the peers in my industry. And what I mean by that, they were. They were very. They were good relationships, but they weren't great. And that's because many of you know, many of us in my industry of personal professional development, we attend each other's Seminars, we see each other on stages. You know, we do live casts together, podcasts together. But it's very work driven. And I said, you know what? I don't have amazing industry relationships. Like, I should. They like me. We make a lot of money together. We promote each other, we trust each other. But I was like. So I gathered a group of them who I said, I want to be great friends with these folks. I took them on a huge trip. We went out to Jackson Hole, Wyoming. I taught some of them to fly fish for the first time. We went, you know, to an amazing place for that. We, gosh, we just did crazy things. We were kayaking these beautiful lakes. We were, you know, we were just out in nature and we were brainstorming and sharing and connecting, and I wanted to do that. Sometimes you have to make an event to bring together, you know. Now I'm understanding as I'm sharing all this today, that there might be some of you who you're like, I don't have anybody who I'm really close to anymore. Maybe you lost a spouse or maybe, you know, the relationship kind of fell apart with the kids. Or maybe at work, you kind of go into work and you talk to people, but you don't really connect with people. Make this year the year that you take action to create extraordinary relationships in your life. It's. I. I can't emphasize it. It's so sad how many people are lonely, but they're lonely because they're not doing the work. And what I mean by that is, listen, there's 7 billion people on the planet. There's somebody you can connect with. There's somebody you can call, there's somebody you can take out to coffee. There's somebody you can deepen a relationship and that will create an extraordinary thing in your life, which is connection. I want to tell you a story as I'm going to teach you. The second point today, two of my friends, one of them from Montana and another Matt Boggs and Jason Miller, they had terrible relationships. There are two men who were having terrible relationships throughout their, you know, their early 20s or something like that. And they just, they couldn't figure it out. They couldn't have good relationships. But one of their grandmothers had had her relationship with her husband for like 50 plus years. And he sat down with his grandma and he said, well, you know, what's the secret? And they started having some conversations about what secret to a lifelong relationship was. This inspired them to want to know more. She said, go ask some other couples. Don't just take my word for it. And this began what they called Project Everlasting. And they rented an rv, and they had people from all around the United States nominate couples who'd been married 40 years or longer. And they had to be nominated, and they had to be happy, you know, because a lot of people have been together 40 years, but they're not happy no more. So these guys were reported to be happy. They were nominated. My friends got in an rv, went around and interviewed them to find out what their secrets were to extraordinary relationship. And so these were like America's greatest couples, more or less. They've been married 40 years longer, had been nominated. And out of all the relationship advice in the world, what do you think was the pattern? This was over 200 couples who've been married over 40 years each. What do you think was the number one thing they said led to a great quality relationship? The number one thing was respect. And that's why I'm going to start it. But I'm going to say it this way. I'd like you to make demonstrating respect the actual goal. Make demonstrating respect the goal. And I'm using these words specifically. So first, the greatest secret of couples married 40 years or longer still reporting to be happy. The number one thing they said was respect. Number two is communication. So you guys got it. But respect. And respect is a difficult one because, listen, that last time you were condescending with your spouse, that wasn't respect. The last time you judged their feelings as stupid, that wasn't respect. The last time you interrupted them when they were really trying to share something or explain something, that was not respect. That last time you said you would do something, but you didn't do it. That wasn't respect. We break respect in these subtle little ways so often. So here's a simple scoring mechanism. And again, this might be a punch in the gut for somebody so helpful. Go back and score yourself on this category. 1 to 10. 1, you have not been demonstrating respect actively and consciously at all. 10, you actually think about it. How can I demonstrate respect to this person? And you think about it actively and consciously. That's a 10. That's like, wow, you're amazing. Okay. One, you don't even think about it. You're just going through the motions or being disrespectful. 10, it's like on your agenda to demonstrate respect. I'll give an example. Sometimes my wife and I will go out and we'll see other. We'll be with a couple or we'll see other People, and I make it a goal. I literally make demonstrating respect of to my wife and of my wife a goal. So as we go to sit down, I'm like, okay, these. We're all together as friends or we're meeting these people. I'll say, I want them to know that I respect my wife. So I will say things to her or give a level of appreciation to her verbally that people hear. And they're like, wow, he really loves his wife. But. But I'll often use the word literally with her respect. Honey, I respect how hard you have worked to make an amazing relationship with us. And I'll say that to her in front of other people. Honey, I respect how hard you work. Honey, I respect how caring you are. Honey, I respect and appreciate all the help you give. Honey, I respect how brave you are. I respect how courageous you are. I respect how giving you are. I respect how. How thoughtful you are. You're the most thoughtful person. Respect is not just something that you demonstrate by sticking to your word or not interrupting. You have to tell your partner on a consistent basis that you respect them. What do you respect about each of those people you wrote down? And when's the last time you told them that? Write down the five most important people in your life, or 10 or 15, however you want. Write down the most important people in your life and score yourself. Have you been demonstrating respect? One is no, 10 is yes. But then what I love you do is just scratch out real fast. Just write, what's something you do respect about them that you could communicate and tell them. That's what I mean by that. Like demonstrating respect. I didn't ask you to have respect of them. I. I said demonstrate it to them. Demonstrate your respect for other people. Demonstrate. I tell myself this before almost every major meeting I have. I say respect the people in this room. Respect the people in this room. Something my dad taught me. Respect other people. So I try to actually verbalize it. I try to communicate it. I try to do things that show it. And. And if you were one of my friends and you knew me like none of my friends or none of my family questions whether or not I respect them. Everyone knows it. If you're in my inner circle and I have respect, you know it, you know it. Now, here's the issue. The funny thing is this new generation. And when I say new generation, I mean people alive today. I don't mean millennials or generation X or Y or whatever. I mean, if you're alive today, respect is not a word that's actually used that often people prefer other words that are easier, and that's nice. And yet that's why there's no depth in the relationship. You know, there's lots of other things that we could say that we want. You know, even. Oh, look, look, even Odile said. She said, I, I like, I appreciate better than I respect. I understand that, and that's a good thing. But respect is something that they need demonstrated. And said all people, like, I understand that that might be your approach. Like, I, I like. But appreciation is just one form of respect. And I think that we need to put that word back in front of us again. We need to make it a goal, make that a goal, make demonstrating respect a goal. So, so maybe something. What could you do for your spouse or someone that you love to show your respect for them or to explain to them that you respect their work, their effort, their values, their heart, their commitment? My wife, she knows I respect her, like, more than any other person alive. She. There's no question, there's no lack of respect ever in our relationship, even when we have fights. And we're going to talk about that later, because the number one way to quickly make a conflict be worse is do something so that the other person feels like you don't respect them. When respect is gone, it's. There's almost nothing else you can do. You can placate, you can say nice things, you can write them a gratitude note, but if they don't feel respected, that's trouble. So how do you demonstrate respect to your spouse? First, you speak respectfully of your spouse to other people in a way that when your spouse can see it, like, literally say the words. I really respect my wife's heart, her giving, her thoughtfulness, her care. Like, say the words. I respect this person for these reasons and say it around other people. So the person's like, wow, that was so nice of you. That was so kind of. You also know how your partner feels disrespected. I'll give an example here. Like, because it's different, right? The way I feel disrespected is not the same way my wife feels disrespected, right? For me, I feel disrespected. If I am sharing something, I'm right in the middle of, like, passionate sharing. And someone interrupts something and they interrupt and it's something that's kind of unrelated and it's not, like, in line with what I'm sharing about passionately. So I feel interrupted and kind of like, from a tangent, I feel Disrespected. Now, I know many of you can say, brendan, take it easy, man. You don't feel disrespected about that. But that's my immediate impulse. Doesn't mean I freak out about it or go crazy. I'm just saying that to me, it's not a show of respect. Show respect is cheering it on or jumping in the conversation or aligning with it and like. Like creating something together. Now, for Denise, she's. I mean, that's not a big deal to her. She's happy to jump in in any conversation. So we have different ways. Another way of respect, as I said before, is absolutely making sure that if you say you're going to do it, you do it. That is integrity. That is congruence. I'm defining it here as respect to your partner. If you promised your partner something, show up, said you're going to do it, do it, promise to be there at that time, get there on that time. It's not that we don't all struggle with those things, but you being congruent with what you promise is a real big thing, right? Someone asked Tara asked, how do you get respect back if you feel that it's been lost? You start number one by honoring your commitments. If you say you're gonna like, the way to get someone's respect back is be kind and thoughtful towards them and do what you say you're gonna do. That's how you get it back, how you win respect from another person. You do what you say you're gonna do. You show up when you say you're gonna show up and you're generous, kind or thoughtful towards them, they will feel respected. Also, the way that people feel respected is to be heard. So learning to reflect back what they are saying to you accurately. And I really work on this one, it's like learning to, like, if Denise says something, I listen to the words with precision of what she says and I reflect those words back. Not my words, not my. Take what she said. Because when people feel. That's big. When people feel like you say, oh, yeah, he heard what I said, they feel respected. So you got to work on that one, too. And listening to other people, being thoughtful towards other people, doing what you say, all those things are so obvious. And that's why I say make demonstrating respect the goal. Hey, guys, it's Brandon. I'm jumping in here real quick. First, I want to make sure you've gone to progressmode.com to join the newsletter because I have a resource for you related to this episode and I have an upcoming meetup with my private group, Ultra. If you've ever liked to be in a private group with me where I help you get more progress towards your passion projects or to build your business or your brand in a bigger way, just go to progressmode.com, click on Private group to apply to. See you can get into Ultra and we can take it to the next level by getting in person and meeting up virtually once a month online as well. Just go to progressmode.com if you're looking for a new group of friends, a great peer circle and you're just trying to get around positive people who are giving and who are extraordinary, I'm going to encourage everybody here to go volunteer. Great friendships come out of service. I've always found that, that some of my best friends, I, I volunteered with them at kids camps we know as we were growing up or I volunteered with them as I grew my brand and my business or I volunteered in Kiwanis or Junior Achievement or ymca. Together those relationships are just like priceless. And for those of you who are looking to make meet new friends, guess who volunteers? Usually the most accomplished, hard driven people in your community. So go find an organization locally to volunteer for. It can make the greatest difference. And then it's the simplest thing. You volunteer with someone or you do something with this person. Schedule the next time to hang out. Friendships are built by hanging out. They're not built by texting, they're not built once in a while you got to get in live, go do stuff with people and that will always improve the relationships. And I bet there's a lot of people right here who are going through the same thing and have been through the same thing. As you said, the way that you get over being crushed in a prior intimate relationship is first and foremost to reconnect with what's important to you in your life. It's a good time to do some self evaluation and say what do I really want now at this stage of my life? What do I really want now at this stage of my life? And start thinking about the different areas of your life. Start thinking about your, you know what, what you want for your mission or your goals or your finances. Start thinking about what you want in the other relationships that you still have. See, sometimes like turning on the faucet of more attention and love and joy into other relationships can help this one not feel dead and make your heart still come alive. I would also share that you think as you think about the other Areas of your life and what you really want, the goals that you have. That's future thinking, right? We got to get you in the future. Because sometimes if you feel broken about the past, look to the future and really connect with it. But I'm also encouraging you to do that inner work, to release, let go of, and forgive your actions and, and the actions of another. It doesn't mean you make them right. It doesn't mean you try to make any excuses. You just say to yourself, you know, you use your word, you use your own name. I would say, Brendan, it's time to let go of the hurt from that previous relationship. The hurt will no longer serve me now. The hurt will just hold me back from connecting and loving other people. I need to let go those feelings that I've been holding on to because I want them back or I want to explain them. I need to know now that right now there is no feeling right now. I can choose the feelings that I want to experience in my life right now. I understand that what happened has passed. And as it has passed, now in the moment, I am free as that day is gone, that relationship gone. Now in the moment, I am free. And in this freedom, these are the things that I choose. These are the things that are important to me. This is what I want for the future. And I think you always got to do that, right? You got to deal with the past by letting go and you got to deal with the future by getting clear. And then I think maintaining the relationships you do have around you are important, right? And if again, if you don't have them go out and reconnect with some old friends or some old family, because many of you guys have had that as coping mechanism, right? How many of you ever had a friend who you haven't heard from in five years, they broke up with somebody and all of a sudden they're at your door like, hey, what's up? Let's hang out. That's good for them. They need that. Cheer that on. Don't be mad at them for being gone for a while. They're reaching out now. Reconnect if you want that person in your life. I mean, there's just no question. Deep, fulfilling, engaging, fun, vibrant relationships. Even if you have three of them in your life, that feels way different than 30 Instagram friends or 500 sort of co worker friends. It's like, no, you want to have deep, connected, amazing, fun relationships and really prioritize developing those. Really prioritize developing those. I think too many people are casual and and sort of interested friends I call it, they're kind of like, oh, you're cool, let's talk. You're kind of interesting. You talk once in a while, but you're not developing a deep relationship there. I'm like, I cut off the interested friends. I'm like, I'm happy to swipe by them on the Internet. For me, I'm creating deep, real relationships with the people around me. I don't think that that can be replaced at all. I want to get back into our five points of the day. Be all in and measure whether or not you are truly all in. Number two was demonstrate respect and make demonstrating respect a goal. Like I'm always asking, how can I make my wife know I respect, appreciate, adore, love, honor her? And I'm always asking that. And I truly, the days that I don't ask that, I'm a big jerk. Okay, here we go. Number three, stoke each other's dreams. The greatest thing that I've ever got, I think if you could say, Brendan, what's the greatest thing you ever got to do in your career? Was I got to use the success of my career to help make my, my wife's dreams come true. You know, many. Even though when I began, you know, it wasn't like this is this day, you know, with, you know, four huge brands, 200 plus employees across the big brands that we invest in or run, you know, millions of fans, the books, you know, the fancy things, the, the, the cameras that I can't figure out how to work, you know, all this stuff. I had the dream to write a book and become a life coach. And when I started, I went broke and I had to move in with the niece. And a lot of people don't know, we didn't really didn't want to move in together until we got married. But it was like either I was going to have to move back to my parents house, which was in another state, or we were going to move in together. And when we moved in together, I didn't have anything except a bunch of boxes of books. So she was buying my groceries and she really cheered me on and she stoked my dreams even when I was like struggling to believe. Like those days when I couldn't write or didn't write and I felt bad about myself and I'd get down on myself and she would cheer me on. And it was like she recognized potential even where I didn't know it was there and she just kind of cheered it on and very casually it wasn't like she sat down, had big, long conversations with me. She's like, you got this, you can do it. Just like little, just little moments of cheering on your spouse is so huge, you know, so she would do that. And then, then things took off. Life's goal and ticket. My first seminar, partnership seminar, High Performance Academy, Experts Academy. These things started really taking off. And the first thing as we made money wasn't to go buy some fancy thing. The first thing was, thank you, honey. You've made, you've helped me make my dreams come true. I know that one of your dreams is to, you know, do this exercise studio stuff. Let's open an exercise studio. And that was her dream. And we did that. And even before that, I was always trying to, what do you want for the future? What are your goals? What do you want in this area? And supporting that whatever way I could with a little gift, a little note, a link to go learn about something. And here's how I tell people this. And I'd like you to look at those people that you wrote down who you are trying to build relationships with and, and measure yourself in this area. Have you stoked their dreams? And when I say stoke their dreams, I know we got international audience here, so let me use some other language here. Support their dreams, cheer on their dreams, empower their dreams, enable their dreams. All these words, I just call it stoke their dreams. Like if you know me, if you and I are friends and you tell me your dream, something's important to you, watch out. You're going to get a barrage of, of emails from me with links to go check this out, read this, look at this, buy this resource. I'm going to text you videos to learn about it, books to read about you. I'm going to introduce you to people by email. Like, I'm that person. If you make the mistake of mentioning your dream around me and we're in the same circle, I'm going to hit you up with so much support, you can like, oh my gosh, this guy. That's how I approach relationships. Cheer them on, give them what they need. You can't do it for everybody. Some people don't want that. They're just like, you know, they just want to talk. You know, like that might be your family members sometimes. Or maybe they don't want you to do that. Like, I have family members, they would hate that. You know, they're like, hey man, go be motivational guy for somebody else. You're my brother, you know. But other people who I've created the Deepest relationships in my life with are those people who, when they told me something, I went all in and supporting and cheering on them. I opened the door, made the introduction, sent the thing. That's what I want you to do. And ask, on a scale of one to 10, have you been stoking these people's dreams? One, you don't even know what their dreams are, man. 10, you know the dream, and you're seeking in some way to cheer it on, support it, empower it, especially with this community. Guys, you all do more personal. I cheer you on. I literally, not to be facetious, I genuinely have so much respect for each and every one of you for being here today to work on your personal and professional development. Most people won't do it. You're doing it, you're here. I respect that. I also know that if you're here, you're somebody who's got lots of other personal development tools. I bet you guys read more books than most of your peers. I bet you watch more courses or more videos. You listen to more podcasts. So stop doing that in a vacuum. For you. Listen to the podcast. Yeah, for you. But as soon as you hear a good podcast something, share it with 10 friends. Not to promote it, but to it. Because you learn something, maybe your friends can, too. I'm always sharing my learning, book recommendations, podcast recommendations, links from YouTube, things with those who are closest to me. And that's what makes those relationships deep. They're like, man, Brennan's got my back. I mean, I'll be in a bookstore, in an airport somewhere, I'll see a book. I don't want to read it. I'm not interested in it. But it's something I know one of my friends will want. I'll buy that book and I'll ship it to them. It's just, I'm a nut bag like that. I'm weird. I know. I hear you. But I really want you to understand that's how you deepen relationships. And with your partner or your spouse, it's about knowing their dreams. And here's how you do that with your friends, with your family, the people who are most important to you, please sit them down, have a real conversation. Say, hey, you know what? I just want to know more about what you want in life. Let's talk about your health. Let's talk about your mission. Let's talk about your finances. Let's talk about the relationships that you have in your life. Let's talk about the big things you want to achieve. Let's just have some coffee and talk about this and write down everything they say and ask them 10 questions about everything they say. And just, like, pretend that you're a life coach and it is your job to understand their dream and to cheer it on. And what you're going to find is that most people in your life have never been provided the conversation to articulate their dreams. It's never happened for them. It's. Let me. Here, let me say it again. It's never happened for them ever. No one ever had a real conversation with them about their goals, ever. Their parents kind of said, like, what do you want? Where are you going to school? But no one ever sat them down, said, how do you want to feel about your day? What's your ideal day look like? Who's in it? What are you doing? What are you contributing? Tell me about five years from now. What would be your dream life? What would your dream life look like in five years, honey? And when she says something, ask five more questions. When he says something, ask 10 more questions. Just keep digging. Just keep digging. Very few people have ever had that platform of a conversation with a loved one to share their dreams. All we do is we share it casually. You've been to a family reunion or you've gone, you know, to Thanksgiving, and people are like, how's it going? You're like, it's good. And like, well, you know, what are you working on? I'm working on this. Oh, you sure seem busy. Yeah, you're busy. And you have a holiday with people and they still don't know anything about what you want. That happens all the time, and I'm guilty of that, too. It happens all the time. So being more conscientious about listening for people's goals and dreams, but eliciting that and then cheering it on with resources, tools, connections, door openers. Listen, you all are an amazing group of people. You got a huge network, you've learned a lot, you got a lot to share. I'm just suggesting that maybe this should be the goal. A little bit more. A little bit more and you'll have a great quality relationship. I genuinely believe the greatest gift of my life is my wife and Denise. Many of you guys see her and I working together right now. We're starting this new brand called hpx. If you haven't seen it, it's called the High Performance Experience. We're trying to help you understand that if you achieve a higher level of vibrancy and more connection in your life and you strive with more excellence each day by Being thoughtful, by paying attention to the details, by serving, you can really change the quality of your life. And so we're starting a new podcast that's about to come out. I'll send you guys a link when it comes out. I'm super pumped about that. And it's her and I, and we. Part of it is because at this stage of our life, we thought, you know, she had built and sold her exercise studios and that gave her some location freedom. We could work anywhere, go anywhere, and I've built my brands. But a lot of people always wanted another perspective and we finally thought, well, I can bring that. And so we started HPX together, the high performance experience. So that's rolling out. And what's been really fun, honestly, in working together is having daily conversations about what do we want? What do you want this to be about? And some of the magic conversations we've had is asking what do you want this thing to be about? What do we want our life to look like? What do you want to have? And give and serve. And I know many of you have those conversations once in a while, maybe at New Year's. But if you can go a little deeper in your spouse, your partner, or the relationships around you, if you can get into their dreams a little bit deeper, I promise some magic can happen. Number four. This is a good one. Oh, you're going to hate it. Oh, those of you who are really argumentative with your spouse, you're so going to hate this one. Take their side first. Take their side first. You want an advanced relationship principle? Learn to take their side first. Here's what happens in arguments and conflicts. You want to explain your side first. You want them to understand and give you first. You want to think through why they're not doing what first. You're always making you first. In great relationships, you make them first. And this is the first one. Take their side first. This does not mean you immediately say they're right. It doesn't mean that you discount your side. All it means is step into their shoes first and take their side first. So when Denise and I are arguing, we're having a good argument, meaning it's like we're, we see things differently, but we're being. We're productively moving forward. What I mean is, like, the times it goes well is when we step into each other's shoes and wonder, why are they thinking that way? She's really good at this. She's one of the most thoughtful people I've ever met. And she does this. She doesn't go, well, Brendan's crazy. She goes, why does he think like that? And she kind of asks questions and tries to root out and understand why this crazy husband of her is saying what he's saying. So passionately or intensely. And taking their side first helps you gain perspective, right? It's. I want you to think about this. The next time that you're getting into an argument you're about to fire up, I want you to go, okay, their side first. What are they thinking? Why are they feeling that way? Get some more information before reacting. Telling, saying, I know it's a good one. It's one of my favorite relationship principles. I also think this counts socially. And here's what I mean by that. If Denise comes home and she's complaining about other people or about other situations, and maybe she wouldn't call it complaining, but she's sharing it, it feels like a complaint to me. I'm Brendan Burchard, the high performance coach. I have suggestions for you life. So I will. It's immediate for me to go, oh, well, honey, you know, I don't want to hear anymore. Here's how. Let me solve and fix it for you. Solving and fixing it is not taking her side first. And what I mean by that is she might say, well, these people did that. And what I try to do is I try to explain, oh, well, they weren't thinking this, or maybe you could do that, or maybe this would help. That's taking their side, that's justifying them. I've got to get into her side. What does she think, feel, see or believe in that situation? That's huge. Being on her side. You know what? Your spouse wants you on their side. But often when they share to you, when they share to you, what you often do is explain the other side or tell them what to do with the other side before saying, you know what, honey, I'm sorry that happened. What's going on there? Oh, well, you know what? I'm on your side. You want to talk about something that you could do? Do you want to have a conversation? You want to brainstorm, or are you just sharing to share? I don't want to step in here, but I hear it simple things when you. John Gray is a great mentor and was a great friend of mine at one point of early in my career. He wrote Men are for Mars Women from Venus. And one time he told me, brendan, when your spouse is sharing something about the day and it's difficult, don't try to solve it. Just say, oh, that's so Hard. Sorry that happened. That's so hard. And just shut up. Literally, just say that. Just acknowledge that's difficult. That's challenging. That's the demonstration of empathy in that moment to say, oh, man. Really? I'm so. That must have been so difficult for you. I'm so hard. Sorry, honey. Whoa. Points, guys. Points. Everyone wants to know in relationships that you got their back. That's huge, right? That you want to know. They got you. They. They. You got their back. You got to get their back. It's so huge. I love this one. Take their side first in every way. Think about all the different ways you can think about that. But since we're here, in our little mentoring session here, I want you to go back to those five relationships you wrote down. Be honest with yourself. On a scale of 1 to 10 with each of those people, 1 is bad, 10 is good. How much have you had their back? How much have you taken their side first before trying to get yours or explaining or, like, how much do they know that you're on their side? 1. You haven't been taking their side. You don't know about you or about explaining away things. 10, man. You got them. You're on their side. You're validating their feelings. You're cheering them on. You're, like, understanding where they're at. I know that is so basic, but it will change the relationship forever. Okay, take their side first. Let's do a recap. We got one last one. Let me go through these. Number one, be all in. And I don't mean be all in in any other way than be all in to improving and growing those relationships. All in. I'm going to improve this. I'm going to grow this relationship. Number two is make sure that you demonstrate respect. Make demonstrating respect an actual goal. So as you go into interactions with your spouse, your partner, your lovers, the people that you care about. Lovers. I said plural. I did say that. What happened? Y' all make sure that you share with them, that you want them to feel respected, and you actually use the word respect also. I love this one. Stoke other people's dreams. You need to know their dreams, talk about their dreams, empower their dreams. Number four, Take their side first. Always take their side first. And number five. Here it is. I love this one. Make laughter and intimacy a daily thing. What do I mean by this? Laughter and intimacy? Okay, let's talk about laughter first, and we'll get to the intimacy part. Laughter. Have you made. Look at those five people that you wrote down. Or the most important People. Have you made them laugh on purpose, consistently? One, oh, you haven't even thought about making them laugh. Five, you guys just laugh together naturally. Ten, you try to make them laugh like you really do want to make your partner, your spouse, your partner, your friends. You try to make them laugh, bring joy into their life. I'm amazed by how few people actually have it as an intention to make others laugh. I think of my closest friend in the world, outside of my immediate family or my lady, and it's my buddy Ryan. He's the funniest guy I know. He. In. In every conversation, he tries to make a joke, tries to point at something that, you know he'll bring up a joke. Three years, you know, he'll bring up something from three years ago that happened. How many have a friend like that who can bring it. Like, you'll be in the middle of a sentence and. And they'll say something that's. They'll find the funny thing that you say. They'll make fun of your words. They're the jokester of the group. I'm not saying you have to be a clown. I'm not saying you have to be the jokester, but I'm suggesting that you could be more conscientious about bringing joy to other people's life by making them laugh. Now, as I say that, I know some of you are like, well, I suck at jokes or whatever. I want you all to know I couldn't make a joke if you paid me. I can't remember any. I don't have any jokes. It's so, like, disheartening to me when someone says, tell me a joke, Brandon. Like, I. I literally don't know a single joke. Not I. I can't think of one single joke. None. It's terrifying. But what I can do is make people laugh by sharing my story, my foibles, the. The goofy things that are happening, pointing out something. It's like, I just. I think that we can all do better at that. Isn't life about laughing a little bit and having fun along this journey? I know. I wanted to share this one because as we're talking about relationships, people get so serious in them, and they're always serious with their partner, they're always serious with other people. They never try to bring joy in that relationship, and they never try to make them laugh. And because that person never laughs, there's not a full spectrum of positive emotions there. They're in one language. And there's such a greater depth of emotional range in a relationship. When the two of you can laugh together. Now, if you struggle to make them laugh, then watch a comedy show with them. You know, go to comedy night with them. Like, get yourselves in situations where you're laughing together. I love watching a funny documentary with my wife or a funny, you know, like, comedy special with my wife. Like, we'll just laugh and she just. She just comes to life. And so I think it's just so important. It's so important to. To laugh and enjoy life is. What's the point of relationship if you can't laugh and enjoy life together? Okay, this. That's daily. It's a daily thing. I daily try to make my lady laugh, and luckily we have a cat that is the dumbest little fur ball ever that makes us laugh all the time. It just. I mean, so if you really struggle, get an animal. I. Okay, see, it's funny, right? Okay, other part. So daily. I said make laughter a daily goal. Also intimacy a daily goal. Now, I don't mean sex necessarily. What I'm meaning is an intimate depth of connection. That's the stuff where you look into the eyes of the other person and you're looking into their soul. It's where you try to really make a moment of presence with them so that if you kiss them goodbye, you hold that kiss two extra seconds longer, you look in their eyes two extra beats longer. You try to make moments, like intimate moments of connection between the two of you. It's where you share something more vulnerable. Maybe you wouldn't share with anybody else. That's an act of intimacy, isn't it? Sharing something deep and vulnerable with somebody where you wouldn't usually do that. That's a beautiful thing. It's creating these beautiful moments with the people that you love. It's just. It's so needed today. So many people have superficial connection with the people around them. And what do they do? They blame the people around them. I'm the first one to say, but what about your behavior? Are you being vulnerable? Are you creating memorable moments with them? Are you doing kind things to them that brings a tear to their eyes? Like crying with people, sharing beautiful stories with people, laughing with other people. It creates a different kind of intimate bond. And I know it's so easy these days to make jokes about it. It's also why most people are lonely. You know, there's a lot of people who are the jokesters out there, and they'll hear me say the word intimacy, and they'll make stupid, inappropriate jokes. And I feel sorry for them because they're missing the depth that relationships can have by sharing those more intimate details about your life with another person. You know, when I share about my brain injury with somebody, when I share about the struggles that I had growing up in, you know, fairly abusive environments, when I share about having lost so many important people in my life, that creates a different bond with other people by sharing those intimate details about my life. You have intimate things about your life you have not shared with other people. And it's one reason the depth isn't there that you want is because you're guarded. You're a step back instead of a step in and feel how different this is than this is. You know, when you're there with them and you're really intimate and you're really connecting with them and you're just being present, it changes everything. And you all deserve to have extraordinary quality relationships. That's what I want for you. I hope you have appreciated being here with me as much as I have appreciated being here with you. I'm cheering you on. Make sure that you are caring about your health and your relationships as much as you are about those achievements and all will go well. Until next time, my friends. Please remember you can be a high performer because you choose to bring intention and great energy and excellence into everything that you do.