Why Couples Have The Same Fight Again & Again - Figs O'Sullivan

Why do couples have the same fight over and over again? It's never about what they're fighting about. Right underneath the topic of what they're fighting about is this attachment world, this emotional bonding world. And so it doesn't matter what the topic is if you guys love each other. Any topic that touches these are you there for me? Am I enough for you? How could I be a disappointment? Again, the same as, am I enough for you? You're going to have a big fight. And it's very common that a couple comes to see me and they're really embarrassed to tell me what they thought about two people that love each other got hurt and scared, and then everything they did and said made things worse. Like, all of that is the basis of why people have the same fight over and over again.

All right, Mr. Figs. I like saying Mr. Figs. For some reason, I was. I was like, I got to interview Mr. Fig. I don't know if anybody's ever called you that before, but just leading up to this conversation, that that's what was happening on my side.

I like you calling me Mr. Figs. Usually. Just.

Just me, though.

Exactly. It works. When you say it. It works. Yeah. You know? Yeah.

All right. So it's been a year and a half since we chatted. We got deep into the weeds of conflict last time within the context of relationships, and talked about for. For everybody that's listening, if you haven't checked out that episode, definitely go listen to it. I wanted to navigate through a few different topics about relationships right now, because one of the things that I've noticed is that relationships right now are very tumultuous between men and women. And there's a lot of content online that, you know, there's sort of a gender war happening sort of. Maybe a lot. Maybe a little bit. And I think that for a lot of people, relationships have become challenging for a number of reasons, but interestingly enough, one of them is the abundance of therapeutic and psychological information. And I'm curious how you have seen some of that play out in your practice and how you've seen that play out with your clients. That as people know more and learn more, you know, they learn language, they learn frameworks, they learn all these things. How is that filtering and sort of dripping down into their relationships? What have you noticed?

Yeah, that's. That's a great question, Connor. It is something I think about a lot, actually. The.

Just the amount of information out there that, you know, on social media, like anybody these days can be a relationship expert of Course, right. When I'm rightly so. You have every right to work out how you feel about love and relationship. Right. But, but I do find it funny that like if I was a rocket scientist and I went to a dinner party, the person next to me is not going to tell me actually I know how to build rockets. Right. Like there's Right. But with love and relationship, of course everybody has a right to an opinion and to share that opinion. And they don't need to have any reason other than I believe it. Like they don't have to show evidence or back it up. Right. And so that's you know, it perfectly set up then for this social media age. Right. Sound bites where everyone and anyone is sharing advice. And of course people gravitate, you know, like confirmation bias. People want to hear what they already believe. They only want to consume what they already believe. Right. And so right now what I see the biggest issue is there are a lot of armchair psychiatrists, psychologists that are diagnosing their partners. It's already standard in relationship. When a couple comes to see me, usually when I talk to both of them, they both tell me how the other person is a little crazy. Right. Like you know, or they, they have, they have problems and our relationship, even if they say it nicely, they're really, really saying like 80% of the time if the other, their act together, I think we'd be okay. Right. And so, but, and that was, that's one thing when it's just like inside the relationship. But now people go on the interwebs and they, so let, let's, we'll make it about gender like since you like women are going to go in the interwebs and they're going to get lots of confirmation bias that their partner is probably a narcissist. Right. And, or has adhd. Right. Like that's just like the go to like you know, diagnosis of men and then of course the, the go to diagnosis and it's been here for a long, long, long, long, long time for women is their borderline or histrionic right. They can never be happy. They are going to go mad at the drop of the hat once a month. If they're not borderline like all month, they'll be borderline for a week. Right. Like so this kind of people have been doing this to each other anyway. But now people are armed with their favorite 18 year old relationship expert on TikTok, right. Who's taught them how you're absolutely right to protect yourself from your narcissistic or borderline partner. And it's definitely making my job harder. But, you know, because my whole. The first thing I have to do is help people see, look, it's. It's a. It's an us problem, not a me or you problem. And so, yeah, they come in with more data and evidence that it really is the other person's problem. So it's not. It's not particularly helpful.

Yeah, it's interesting because I think, I mean, one. I've fallen prey to that for sure. You know, where it's like, yeah, if the other person, you know, and the. If the other person just got their act together, I'd be happy.

Right? We'd be good.

Our relationship would be fine. I've definitely fallen into that camp before, so I get that. What I've not necessarily done, which is maybe a newer thing, is this pathologizing, right, Is taking the label and he broke up with me because he's a narcissist, or she broke up with me because she's a narcissist or whatever it is. And then the sort of.

Putting that person, labeling that person and putting them into a camp in order to find some type of, like, safety or solace or comfort within ourselves when things aren't going well, rather than seeing our side of the fence. So why is that? What is it about human nature and human psychology that is geared towards putting the spotlight on the partner rather than us as an individual?

The most fundamental level, what it does, what it seems like it does, is it stops the person from having to hurt completely, right? It seems like they. If you can blame someone else, if you can externalize your pain, right? If you can, like, basically, you don't have to be as. As vulnerable, right? So if you imagine if. What's happening in the inside, let's say if I'm a woman and I feel abandoned, like, I feel abandoned, I'm scared, and I'm so sad. I'm either on my way to being abandoned or I've already been abandoned. I'm in an emotional torture inside. Well, one logic, it's totally logical. One logical way to get out of the hopelessness, powerlessness, and of abandonment, you know, terror, sadness, is to rise up into actual secondary emotion and judgment of another, which is you. You are doing this to me. So it actually feels in the short term like it's a. It is a much better choice if you had a choice between being angry and frustrated with someone versus feeling complete. Like you're in a dark room, huddled in a corner, scared, abandoned, and there's no way out. It makes sense that someone will choose you. Oh. Like if they're the only two choices. Right. And that's what it seems like to people. Right. People will do anything, anything not to feel the depths of their pain. And yeah, the first port of call for most people, me included, is to blame someone else. Like I joke, like I this desk I'm sitting at right now, I have stubbed my toe off this desk and so my wife's not even in the house and my mind will go teal.

Like I will end up finding some way that she must, like just for even a split second that she's at fault. Did she move the desk? Right. So anyway, it's a very natural thing to blame other when I cannot tolerate the experience I'm having myself inside.

It's interesting because obviously therapy and psychology are there to support people, they're there to help people. But there is such a thing as the right tools in the wrong hands can create more problems than good.

Absolutely.

And so I'm curious if you have any insight into where that is happening more specifically in the context of modern day relationships where the right tools are maybe in the wrong hands. Because I do see people as you're talking about, not just labeling their partner, but really diagnosing them as if they have their master's in psychology and they've graduated and they've gone through the program and they're like, I'm unequivocally sure that you have ADHD and but so I'm curious as to how else you see that showing up in the relationship, because it occurs to me that that creates a kind of objectification where it turns that person into an object of narcissist or ad, you know, person with adhd, et cetera. So yeah, where does that go awry?

Well, there's a lot to say about this. Right? Like, okay, so there's so many different points to this. Let me see if I can organize.

So, so the first thing let's say is there is a minority of people that they truly are in relationship with narcissists. Right. Most of the people out there that are diagnosing their partners as narcissists, their partners aren't narcissists. Right. But there is a. Obviously it is true that there is some, not most, but some people and pro, you know, probably a small percentage are truly in relationship with a narcissist, just like there are some people that are truly in relationship with someone that is borderline or histrionic. Right now one of the main reasons why democracy is hard to make work is this kind of groups with intense preferences dominate. Look, you and I are like, I don't care if I use whole milk or oat milk in my coffee. I don't really care. I'll just go in and get a coffee. Just, just put something white and creamy in it. But if there are people picketing outside the coffee shop, oatmeal only. Oatmeal only, right? There's only 10 of them, right? And there's 500 people like me that are like, honestly, I don't care what goes in my coffee. I don't care. The 10 people end up winning, right? The 10 people that are so vocal and they're going to lobby Congress. They're going to lobby, right? So it's 10. Exactly, exactly. Like people are getting ideas right now. You know what, it does offend me that cow's milk is served at Starbucks, right? Okay, please, no, I don't drink at Starbucks. Do it at Starbucks. Okay? But anyway, so look, same thing applies. Here's the thing. This is really hard. It's very hard to talk on this topic of diagnosing partners because there's a group that are absolutely, there's a minority that are absolutely, factually correct. I was with a narcic, part narcissistic partner. I was with a borderline partner and my life was ruined. And I'm going, and I'll never be able to love again.

I'm supporting that group. Them, they're so vocal and them being supported is so important that the rest of like say the vast majority of the population that honestly, that advice isn't good for, it's good for 10% of the population and 90%, to be honest, they're better off not listening to that because it's not true for them. But that advice that is right for the 10%, everybody ends up consuming it. And so now we have someone that's having a cup of coffee in the mornings. You know, someone's having a cup of coffee and their partner like, you know, forgets to offer them the sugar and they're like, I just watched my favorite TikTok 18 year old expert talk about people like you, you narcissistic. Right? So like anyway, so, so yeah, the, the kind of this rule of intense preferences dominate the, the dialogue, right? You know, whether it's, you know, the academy, right, you know, politics. And then of course now we have this new town square of social media, right? There's that the other thing like you were saying about.

All Methods for good can be co opted. And it's really easy. Like it's really easy. And people don't do it intentionally. Like even just think about, just for a moment, we take it away from diagnosis. The main scientific body that I use to help people like attachment theory, the science of emotional bonding. So I use that to help people be really empathic and compassionate to self. Another, right? That's the whole point. But here's the way most people, when they read attachment theory, right? And they read the science of emotional bonding. And I mean, look, most therapists, right, Never mind lay people, they read it and they go, I have a new way of working out what's wrong with my partner and me. So people, instead of going, oh my God, my partner can feel alone and abandoned and they get scared. And no wonder they would freak out and arrive at my mother's house. Where have you been? Right? Whatever it is, right? Like, like, wait a second, they're terrified inside. I. They deserve so much love, right? No, they, they use that exact same information that is supposed to like soften. I mean, I say supposed to, supposed to soften their hearts to each other. They weaponize it. And so look, the same is true for obviously diagnosis right now. Like people have used this tool that is supposed to be for good, right? That you can help people identify what's wrong and see if they could actually then work on, you know, lessening the suffering in their life. They're now have weaponized it within the, you know, the battle, the act of war or cold war that is happening in their relationship. So it's very, very sad and again, unfortunately, very easy to do. If I can give an example, I lived at Esalen, this retreat center in Northern California. And I got to live 247 practicing nonviolent communication. Really becoming an expert at nonviolent communication. Like unbelievable ability to notice what I was feeling inside and then share self responsibly with other people. And then I would leave Esalen on the weekends and drive up to San Francisco and meet other people like around my age that were bad communicators.

Right? I managed to take this wonderful tool for God and make myself into a dickhead. I was superior to other people. I was a better communicator than they were. And I was able to manipulate this skill I developed to all to stay above the fold and not really be a vulnerable person, right? My competency, totally unintentionally, my competency actually made me incompetent, right? It's a kind of a weird paradox.

No, I Think it's a lovely example because I think that.

Is, you're sort of poking at the essence of what happens to the majority of folks. Right. We go and we learn a new tool, our ego latches onto it. I mean, I remember Alan Watts telling the story about the police going into the, to a building. This robber is like running from the cops and the robber goes into a building and when the police come into the building, the robber goes up a floor and then when the police go up that floor, he goes up another floor and so on and so forth. And he was equating that to a sense of enlightenment, right. That.

When we think that we've raised up a level, we're sort of fooling ourself or we're creating the perception that we're somehow above others. And that for me is part and parcel what I see happening with a lot of these tools online. And it breaks my heart in some ways because it's really unfortunate to see and I think it's creating some division. I'm curious, I'm going to take us off on a little bit of a different tangent here for a little bit and we'll come back to relationships and couples. But I think this is important. How do you feel about modern psychology and therapy really infiltrating culture in the way that it has? I know this is sort of a big, somewhat existential question, but how do you feel about modern psychology and therapy infiltrating culture in the way that it has? Because we, we have celebrity therapists, you know, like Esther Perel and all these people that have become like modern day rock stars, you know, Carl Jung back in 1920, whatever, was not walking through the streets, getting asked for autograph, you know, in New York, that just didn't happen.

So.

Yeah. How do you feel about that? What's, what's your take on it and how do you think that it's altered how we operate in the West?

Look, I think over a long enough time frame, I think it's going to be really helpful. Right. Like, you know, like anytime there's, there's a big change happening in the world, we usually go too far to the opposite side. Right. You know, like, you know, if, I mean, I don't want to pick a topic that is too con to.

Controversial right now, but you know, people were being denied their ability to choose which gender they identify as. Right. For a long, long, long, you know, for hundreds of years within our culture or society. And now all of a sudden the door is open that that's possible. For some period of time, there's some tunnel in the middle before everything settles down that it's like, you know, we have, like, we've classrooms in Los Angeles where 15 of the 20 kids are all gender non binary. Right. Highly unlikely. Right. But, but it's in the air, it's in the ether. Like it's just, it's just in the zeitgeist at the moment, right. That people choose their gender. And, but I do think in the 20, 30, 40 years, things will settle down, it'll be good. But in the meantime, when we're in that 20, 30, 40 year tunnel, it feels a little crazy on all sides, right. Like people are losing their, their minds. Right. Like about, like gender. Right. And so I think that is true for just psychotherapy wisdom, you know, mindfulness, like, you know, Buddhism wisdom, you know, Eastern philosophy, Western psychotherapy wisdom, that we're kind of in this tunnel of. I think we'll end up at a good place at integrating it. But in the meantime, it's a little, it seems a little crazy.

You know, I'm. Like you said, the, the cult of personality is one aspect of it. The diet, like people walking around diagnosing themselves and their partners.

Right. That's another aspect of it. Right.

I think it's interesting because it does seem like the, I call it the therapeutic industrial complex. Like there's sort of this very large.

And this isn't necessarily a bad thing. I think it's, I think it's done some incredible work and it's helped a lot of people. And I'm not, I'm not knocking on it. I just think that there's, I find it very fascinating that it has, it has become such a central part of our culture and our society. And it's done so in a way that is interesting because in some ways the therapeutic industry is dominated by women. And I Remember back in 2019.

The APA put out guidelines for clinicians to work with men. And it caught a lot of backlash. Like, it just caught a tremendous amount of backlash because for two reasons. Number one, it said, it said that traditional masculinity is on a whole harmful, which a lot of men took, you know, took, took a problem with. And then secondly, the very first point was saying that gender is purely masculinity is purely a social construct, so there's no biological underpinnings whatsoever. And I think that is unfortunate in a lot of ways because I think that that isolates a tremendous group of people that are like, no, my biology has certainly influenced my Gender. And so I, you know, I. I'm not 100% sure where I'm going with this per se. I think it's interesting because I've seen psychology and therapy help a lot of people. And I've also seen over the years, more and more that sometimes, not all the time, but sometimes it's not always set up to support men in the way that men actually need. And I'm curious on your take on that because I know you have a very specific framework and you've worked with a lot of men and worked with a lot of couples. So I'm very curious to get your take on that. I know I've just sort of dropped a few things on your lap there.

So let me just say the first thing is doing the work I do, being an attachment, focus.

Systems theory, focus experiential psychotherapists. It's been really my. My relationship with men, my own masculinity has. It has been very healing, right? Because what I have discovered through doing this work that about men is they actually do have lots of feelings.

They're able to access those feelings and describe those feelings really, really well. And they're able to really listen to other people and empathize with them and then be very loving and connectful. And it makes me a little emotional even talking about it. But yeah, there is a particular type of container that has to be created for men to be able to do that. Now, again, just the essence of my work, you know, I talked about it, remember? The first thing I have to do is help both people go from it's a you problem to a nus problem. Just think about that as that's actually the floor.

Right? The floor of this container. The walls of this container. Hey, we both make sense, right? Like the roof, right? The roof is basically like, oh my God. This only happens because we both love each other. Like so inside of that container, right? It calms the feminine down, right? Enough that now I can have enough space to really access, right. The man and how to really feeling and to share it and to be able to listen. So. So look, certainly the way I do psychotherapy, I think there's a lot of.

And when I say just not just me, right? Other people that do emotionally focused couples therapy, right? Like, it's actually easier to work with men. It's easier. Men get. This is gonna. This will blow people's minds. And this isn't just me. Men get it faster.

Like, you know this story when couple comes into couples counseling, right? The woman will stay in the gender thing. You know, I lived in San Francisco for so, so scared I'm going to get in trouble. Like, talk about men and women, right? Okay. But like, look, we, the typical couple comes into counseling. The woman is really like. The story is they're incredibly emotionally intelligent and they have amazing access to their feelings. And the man is basically a Neanderthal. We just don't even know why he wasn't wiped out. Like, we're not even sure if he's like, you know, a home Satan.

There's a, there's a really good stand up. There's a really good stand up series in there for you.

Exactly right. Like, it was just like, how is he even here? We need to DNA test him, right? Like, like he escaped, right? The mass extinction of the Neanderthals, right? But, but then, but if you think about their journey, just think about what an easier journey that is. To be seen by yourself, society and your partner as a Neanderthal. And then the other person is, right? Even if they don't realize they're doing it because they're, they're, they're a slave to this perspective in our culture. The Zeitgeist, right? They're not doing it on purpose. They're not trying to be mean right there. It's literally. They're a victim of it too. The woman is a victim of this too. Like, I am so good. I've got so many feelings and my partner will show up, right? I'm so good, right? Like, right? So, like, and then I offer both of them, hey, come here. This is both of you, right? Like it's both of you, right? You both are hurt and you're both hurting each other. It's so much easier for the person that's the Neanderthal to go, I could sign up for that. Than it is for the person that. Listen, I am basically a descendant of Queen Cleopatra, right? You know, like, what a hard thing to sign up for. Wait a second. I am on the side, same level of you. And I bring as much crap to this relationship as you do, right? That's like, this is the crazy thing. Men actually have an easier journey in making relationship work just because they're starting off right on the lowest untouchable level in our society, emotionally speaking.

So the perception.

The perception, right? So, yeah. So look, I, I find.

You know, there are more and more people that do work like this. And again, I can tell you it's not just me. Most couples therapists, the emotional withdrawal, it's not always the man is, is Go. You know, can be. The woman is dramatically easier to work with. Just think about this. Let's say even at the most extreme level, let's say you don't like me. Say you're the emotion withdrawal, right? You Connor, right? And you don't like me, right? Like trying to get in the middle of your relationship, right. I just want you just stop coming. I won't see you again. The emotional pursuer, let's say majority of time, the woman, right? I might wake up with a horse's head at the end of my bed. Do you know what I mean? It's not just like a Godfather reference, exactly. Like, like, look, it's just like I. You know what it was, the way I put it recently is.

For women. There is many a therapist that does the kind of work I do whose charred remains lie right outside the cave of the emotional pursuer woman dragon, right? They'll burn you alive. They'll burn you to a crisp. Right there, right now, just to be fair, to balance it out, there's many a therapist trying to access the man's emotions that literally died of starvation and old age outside their cave, right? But they don't know what they're doing, right? So. So look, every day I risk either being burned to a crisp instantly by like, let's say the woman, the emotional pursuer and. And. Or having literally starved to death trying to draw like vulnerability from the man. Right? The emotional withdrawal. But, but yeah. Anyway, look, I do think it's changing. I think psychotherapy actually really helps men. As long as it is based on some of these core principles. Right? No shaming. Right. We're not trying to change your behavior. We're trying to help you see what's good in yourself and love yourself and like make room for your vulnerability and be able to share it. I think it can be incredibly liberating and freeing for men.

I would agree with that entirely. Especially. Especially good attachment work and embodied or experiential work. You know, my. My mentor, his name is Dewey Freeman. He's been doing developmental psychology. And attachment for 40 years is a very long time. He actually taught at naropa for like 30 years. Great training. Training therapists and whatnot. But his whole frame is around attachment. And it's different from the Bowlby, the sort of like John Bowlby stuff because I think sometimes that can be very helpful. But I definitely see people come in and it's like, oh, I'm an avoidant attachment style. Oh, I'm an anxious attachment style. And it's like well, you're more than that. Maybe sometimes when conflict happens, you react from that avoidant attachment style. But that doesn't mean that that's who you are all the time in the context of a relationship. So, yeah, I think that that is right. So let's. Why I'm just gonna ask you a direct question and see what you have to say about this. But why do couples fight over and over and what do they fight about over and over? Because that seems to be a very common theme.

Well, it's interesting, you know, what you're saying. Like, the main reason people fight over and over again is because of attachment, right? It is attachment, right? Just because it's the. It's the. The base layer emotional system, right? As human beings that when you were born, your first need, your is that there's a good enough other on the other side of your birth, right? There just has to be someone there or else you'll die, right? It doesn't matter if you had a big spear and a shield when you were a baby, right? You can't pick it up, you can't stand up, right? You can do nothing. Doesn't matter if you've got like, you know, 50 McDonald's hamburgers, you can't feed yourself, right? So you're just. We're built that you need another person and they have to be there for you physically, emotionally, and you have to be good enough for them or you are dead, gone, kaput. Goodbye, little human. Right? That's a terrible thing to say, right? But that. So your system is built to, I'm going to use technical language, freak the out when it looks like your primary person's not there for you, right? And so that's what's true when you were born, right? It's your birth mother, right? And then, of course, when you grow up at some moment, right, You. You see someone and you have a like, wonderful romance. And then eventually your body says, this is the person, this is the person, right? This is my person. That if they're not there for me or it looks like I'm a disappointment to them, I'm going to hurt so bad because I'm facing an existential threat, whether you realize it or not. And then I'm going to freak out. So why do couples have the same fight over and over again? It's never about what they're fighting about, right? Underneath the topic of what they're fighting about is this attachment world, this emotional bonding world, right? Where you tell me, you know, I'm going to go away for the weekend. And I grips because I'm. I've got a sensitivity about being abandoned. I. I get in touch with, oh, Jesus, you want to do something without me? Oh, it hurts so much. And then I say to you, you know, never care or prioritize us. Don't care about us, and you never prioritize us. That's just the way I react. And then, of course, you know, my wife goes, oh, for fuck's sake, why are you such a pursuer bitch? Figs. She does call me a pursuer bitch, by the way. Like, my wife, that's what she calls me sometimes. I have both pursuer parts and withdrawal parts, right? But, but like, she calls me a pursuer bitch when I'm in my, like, why don't you. Why won't you go swimming with me? Right? Self. But anyway, so then, like, she feels all rejected and now she's going to shut down or defend herself, right? And so it doesn't matter what the topic is if you guys love each other. Any topic that touches these. Are you there for me? Am I enough for you? How could I be a disappointment? Again, as. Same as, am I enough for you? Right? You're just going to have. You're going to have a big fight. And it's very common that a couple comes to see me and they're really embarrassed to tell me what they thought about.

Like, should we go left or right on our way to the, to the kids school. We do it every day. And I think left is better. And, you know, my wife thinks right. We, My wife and I did have this fight, by the way. We had a fight bringing our kids to preschool. And I. She's driving and I said we should go right? And she's like, you know, I can't believe this. You know, I'm from here. Like, we live in Hawaii. Like, I am from here. You think I went to this school and you think you can tell me whether left or right is the right way right now? Come here. That's not a fight about directions. And it's not even a power fight. That is a. She didn't feel seen and valued. It hurts by her person. And so she's defensive. I'm like, oh, my God, like, the last thing I was trying to do was hurt your feelings. And now I'm in trouble. And so now I'm going to be mad and pissy. And now we're going to think we're going to fight about. Let's, let's, let's actually map it out. Let's actually get the measuring tape out, right? Like, oh, come on. Just two people that love each other got hurt and scared, and then everything they did and said made things worse, right? So all of that is the basis of why people have the same fight over and over again.

Say more about the pursuer part, because I think that's a lot of nice guys that are out there.

So look, in most relationships, there's two main sides of wounding and love, right? There's the emotional withdrawer and the emotional pursuer. What we call them in the empathy method is the reluctant lover and the relentless lover, right? And so the relentless lover is the pursuer part. And so they're. They have a bigger sensitivity to feeling some flavor of this, right? You don't want me. I'm not special to you. I'm not important to you. You don't really love me. You don't care about us, right? And so there's almost like a. There's a propensity at any moment to see the world through that lens. Like, just say, like, being not a priority, not special to you, us is not the most important thing to you. Just say, like, that's a color. Green. The person walks around the world. It's not their fault, right? They probably got hurt in their childhood around being abandoned or not prioritized, right? But now they have a green filter over their eyes. So this is the thing, and this is really hard for people to hear. Your perception is not trustworthy. The person has a green filter over their eyes, and then they see green. It's happening. I am being abandoned. Well, listen, there is some. I could see what the stimulus is that could have led you to, like, see that. But. But you already have a green filter over your eyes, right? So. So that's like. So typically, someone that, like, is, like, looks like a pursuer. They're critical, most likely behaviors. They're critical. They give advice. They have amazing ideas about how we could have better day, right? Like, just all the. All these things they're doing, they're just desperately trying to stay away from the terror of I don't matter. Like, I'm gonna lose you, right? And of course, that part of them is really lovable. I don't want to be there. I want to be there for that part of them all day long. But the way they try and not feel that is unbelievably annoying. They're incredibly just like. Like my wife. Look, the part of me that's scared like, that I could lose my wife is like, I love that little Fig. But the things I do to not feel that make me a pursuer. Bitch. We can do the same with the, with your side if you want. Like, yeah, let's hear it for balance, right? So the emotional withdrawal, right? The emotional drawer, right. Really deep down inside, it's unbelievably painful to not be good enough for the one you love, right? You can imagine, imagine like, let's just say like a little boy. And they grew up in a world that, and by the way, this is biologically true. Remember we say you give up certain responsibilities to the mother for your well being and your survival. You have to. You're not biologically capable of it. Your mother being happy is everything. It's everything. If they are not happy, you are a failure. You're a disappointment. It is devastating. You have not. It is not possible to feel yourself. You feel them. You have to learn to feel yourself. Because the mother is just all encompassing. They're the whole world. They're the whole world. And so like when now you're a grown up, right, and it looks like your partner is disappointed or you're failing, you hit a place of powerlessness, not enoughness, like fear, right? It's just like it's hopeless. And I can, I, I cannot tolerate feeling this way. So I rise up to escape it. And what do withdrawers typically do? Now we can have counterphobic responses, right? But what a withdrawal will typically do, they'll defend themselves. It wasn't me, it was the postman. I, I didn't do it, right? They're gonna like plead their innocence, right? They'll shut down. They'll eat a burger, drink some alcohol or work too much, right? They'll, they're just, they're like. They'll bury their head in the sand, right? They're going to do everything they can to get away from the feeling of not enoughness because it's too much, it's too devastating. But what their behavior looks like to their pursuer partner, that feels abandoned. It makes them feel more abandoned.

So this is the tragedy. It's a terrible misunderstanding, right? Your withdrawing partner feels devastated when you're disappointed in them because they love you so much. And then they withdraw or defend themselves. That's the only reason they defend themselves because they're devastated at thought of being a disappointment to you. And then of course, all they managed to do is confirm for the pursuer, I really am being abandoned. I really am not important to you, right? I tried to tell you and you came back with some defense about the postman. I don't even understand what the postman has to do with this, right? And so they're even more abandoned. And so now they have even more logical reason to tell you even more details about how shit you are and what a failure and a disappointment you are. And then that couple, they do that over and over and over and over again. And then they go online, right? The pursuer goes online and gets somehow very easily, is going to get like a video what to do when you're in relationship with a narcissistic partner, right? And the withdrawal is going to go to the pub, right? Or go to his men's group and they're going to sit together. Hopefully not. Not with yours, Connor. I know, right? But like, they're going to go sit together and go, dude, will I tell you how, like, my wife this week was like, nag, nag, nag, never happy, right? Like, so they both go find ways to be sure that, look, I'm hurting, and if the other person just got their shit together, everything would be okay. And so they keep that cycle going forever and ever.

It's common. I'm assuming that withdrawers and pursuers get into a relationship. Or do you have withdrawers and withdrawers? Or how does that work?

Yeah, I would say 70 to 80% of the time pursuers and withdrawals get into relationship with each other, right? Let me describe. So look, that was a description of a pursuer withdrawal relationship. And that's most of the time, right? You can imagine what a pursuer and a pursuer looks like, right? Fireworks. Very exciting, right? You don't love me. No, you don't love me, right? They'll go for it, right? It's more like a UFC match, right? You know what I mean? They're gonna really get like, be trying to land blows on each other, right? Emotionally speaking, while they're both devastated and hurting inside, right? So it's pretty hot and fiery. And then you could imagine what a withdrawal withdraw couple looks like. They're both devastating, hurting inside, feeling like a disappointment, but they just don't want to really talk about it.

And so, you know, those relationships, in some ways, those couples are hardest to work with because I have to actually get them to hurt to the point that they can't keep just trying to avoid it.

What are the ways out of those cycles? Like, how does, you know if somebody's in the common pursuer withdrawer cycle, which I think is, you know, very common in relationship dynamics? What are some of the pathways out of that cycle?

The main pathway out and it doesn't seem like a big deal, right? This is one of the trickiest parts of my work. I'll explain to you the way out. And it is the way out, right? It's the way out. But it seems like it. It seems completely.

Like, silly. It's like if I told you the sun is in the sky right now, you're like, the sun is in the sky. What is a big deal? But I'm like, wait a second. You do understand what that means, right? We're on this little planet. We're flown around the sun like, it's just like, what the. Like, what the hell, right? It's such a big deal, right? So here's what the big deal is, right? If you can transition from two separate stories of what's going on to one shared story of what's going on, that is like, we just love each other so much that the deepest parts of us get terrified when we're disconnected. And that's what leads both of us to act in ways that is terrifying for the other person. And the couple lives inside of that, right? If they live inside of. That's the story. That's what's happening, right. Then they can really be there for each other. So all roads to a better relationship, we have to get a couple to live inside that narrative that we're both hurting because we love each other and both of us do and say things. Not because we're bad, when we're hurting, when we're disconnected. That make things worse? Yeah. If a couple lives in that world, they don't need to protect themselves the way they protect themselves anymore. They can actually be very soft, loving and vulnerable with each other. And then they remember that narrative for the rest of their life. Right? You. You'll forget it momentarily, but you can keep coming back to, that's what's happening. And now all of a sudden, your relationship then becomes the most solid foundation on which you do everything else in your life, Right? You want to go start a business, Start that business. Standing on top of this solid understanding of my partner and I love the shit out of each other, and we're going to be there for each other no matter what. Now let's go. Thrive in the world in all aspects.

It's interesting as you were talking about that sort of converging into a shared story as a couple versus the sort of two individual, sovereign stories that are existing, which are often.

Counter to one another and creating. Creating issues. Because a lot of the times, the challenges that we're facing are about the stories that we're holding, right, because of the experience that we're having, it's coloring our story and then we're telling that story about our relationship. And so it occurs to me that immediately a challenge comes up in this moving towards one story, which is that it's very hard oftentimes to really hear the other person's perspective and really understand their experience from a real empathetic way.

Any thoughts on how, how and why that's so challenging and then what people can do to really get themselves into the other person's story and understand it.

So the most important main first stop in the journey of having a better relationship is we got to live. We got to stop at and live in what I call empathy. And empathy squared is what I just described, where we're not just feeling empathy for the other person, right? So there's two people, right? And most people understand empathy is one of the two people is hurting and they tell the other person and the other person feels their pain and they share it in a way that, oh, I feel like, you got it. That's one directional empathy. We want all directional empathy. And so here's what I'm like, we're both hurting and we're both hurting each other and we can feel empathy for ourself and the other person. Both people feel empathy for themselves and the other person within this system that we created, all at the same time that up levels a human being. So just to be clear.

I won't do anything else other than try and make a couple have that experience. And it's going to seem weird. They're like, listen, we need to work out, are we going to Italy next week, right? Or are we going to Spain, right? I'm like, okay, let's see how we can use this opportunity to have an empathy squared opportunity, right? Just everything depends on we can have an empathy squared opportunity, right? And then, and then it's so powerful that it lives inside their organism and it's the dominant narrative forever.

When you say empathy squared.

I think what comes up immediately is that there's oftentimes a narrative that men aren't as empathetic as women. And I'm curious if that's true in your experience and if there's different hurdles that men and women need to overcome to be empathetic for their partner. Because you see betrayal happening, infidelity lies, that sort of riddle of relationship and create distance. Couple can get into a period of time where they're sexless for, you know, whatever months or years and Having empathy for the other person can be very challenging unto itself. And so what do you see getting in the way for people? Is it. Maybe it's not gender specific, but I'm just curious.

Let's say it's attachment style specific in a way, right? But let's say. So look, let's say the man is going to have trouble empathizing because remember, the other person's feelings are too much. So they're. They're not going. It's not that they're not empathizing, they really empathize, but it's devastating. It's too much for them. When mom was upset, it's too much. So they have to go away. They have to do something else, right? It's too much. But they had the experience of empathy, remember, like empathy, just like shame. It's actually, biologically speaking, it's a neutral experience. It's an experience of feeling with the other person, right? Like empathy. And shame is a sudden interruption, a positive affect. But then what happens next when you feel empathy? What we really. So we need to have the person be in an empathic experience. And then if we can make that safe enough, then what gets. What fills the empathic experience, right? Usually for the man, what fills the empathic experience is great overwhelm and shame. That they're disappointed in me and they have to defend themselves and go away. So we have to study that and get to know it and then we'll see if we could interrupt or at least describe. Like, look, imagine the first step is you could get the man to go, hey, by the way, you know the way I just went away right now. I did actually hear you. It really fucking landed. I feel like shit. And that's why I defended myself and I went away. But now we have. It's not that they didn't have empathy. They did have empathy, but they can't tolerate. It's so big. It's the opposite of no empathy. It's huge. They feel so much that they have to go away now, by the way, the same is true for the woman, right? So the woman has all these big. The pursuit. They have all these big feelings inside. I'm so unloved, I'm devastated. And when they look over at the man, they can't recognize their suffering because what the man does to go away from the pain they're in, it doesn't look like suffering to the woman. It doesn't compute that they're suffering, right? So because they're, they're the tremendous pain, they're Actually living and have access to makes the woman incapable of seeing. Seeing the devastation the man is in when they're disappointed in them. So, look, I have to help both of them really have these living, breathing experiences of, like, actually organize all of that, have them share those feelings, and they both end up having, like, holy moments. Wait, what the fuck? When you go away, you go away not because you don't give a shit. It's because you're devastated inside when I'm disappointed in you. Like, wait, are you saying you love the shit out of me? What? Right. Like, start them to actually process that. Right. And the same. Right. Like when you're. When you look so disappointed in me, like the woman looks so disappointed in the man, you're not actually just disappointed in me. You're devastated inside because you love me so much, you can't tolerate how scared you are of losing me. Wait, what are you saying? All our fights just happen because we love each other. Wait, what the hell.

Do we. This is a crazy. That's what's happening, right? If we can get a couple to really see it and feel it deeply, not just like, it changes the. It changes how blue the sky is, the sun is brighter. It changes everything. Right? And so that's it. We got to have that empathy squared experience. Right? And I'm just. Yeah, all roads to a better relationship have to pass through there.

What are the signs that. You made a post recently talking about the signs that couples therapy is working?

And.

I think this is an interesting one. My wife is a couples therapist, and she had a bunch of therapists that work for her. And we've done a bunch of work with couples before. And it's been often that couples have come to us and been like, oh, we've done therapy before. It hasn't gone well.

We've done therapy before. We're still dealing with the same shit. And so I'm. I'm. I would love to hear your take on what does good couples therapy entail and how can couples actually know that it's working? Because I think for us as men, we always want the data points. It's like, how am I going to know that this is, you know, that this is working? It's like going to the gym or eating healthier. I want to see the results. So. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, listen, I don't remember what I said in that video, to be honest. Right. Because I'm an improviser only.

Right.

You know, I only do live. Right. There's no preparation. But. But I'll tell you what comes to mind right now, one, most importantly is we're just checking what their narrative is on what happened, right? Let's say I was seeing you and your wife for couples counseling and you had a fight that week. I'm going to ask you what happened and are you going to tell me the system story? We both got hurt. We both hurt each other and it was heartbreaking for both of us. Or am I going to have to hear Conor go, well, I'm glad you asked because let me tell you what they did to me. And then you rest your case. And then she goes, well, thank you, Connor, because she's a therapist, she's got really good self responsible language. And she goes, yeah, because that's interesting because here's the things you did to me, right? Then I go, okay, so it's not working yet because we're still not in the shared narrative. You're both just taking turns sharing your individual narrative, right? So first, most important thing. And I will literally cry with joy when a couple comes in to see me and they're holding hands. We had a fight this week and I was hurt and I told him he was terrible. I could see how bad he felt. And then he goes, yeah, I know. And then I pulled away from you and I saw how heartbroken and scared you got. Oh. And they squeeze each other's hands and they kiss each other's little noses. That was so hard for both of us, right? That's just like, holy shit, that's brilliant. Right? So that's the main thing, right, that they, their main dominant narrative when they're not terrified is it's an us thing, not a me or you thing, right? So that's the main thing. And then look, the other thing is, weirdly, they're just not having as many fights. And oftentimes couples don't understand why this is happening, right? Because, you know, it's hard to explain why something is not happening. They'll often say, I don't think we spent that much time together this week. This kind of work changes people in their sleep. Like they end up just on the level of their limbic system feeling safer with each other. They can look each other in the eye, they'll laugh at each other, right? They'll like laugh at each other's jokes. You can literally tell just like, look, if you were at a dog park and you saw the first time you bring your dog, there's this other dog and they both, their hair is standing up when they first see each other. And then let's say six weeks later, the two of them are like, having little, like, paw on each other and rolling on their back and having a little like. The dogs don't even notice anything changed, right? But it's obvious by just their body language that they're in a completely different world with each other. So we just see that with couples, the repetition of going over this over and over and over again, of developing a shared story that you fight because you love the shit out of each other, it just makes people feel so much safer with each other. And then, of course, the ultimate. Ultimate is we get to get. Because that's true. Then we get to go to the deepest, most vulnerable parts and people and have them share it with each other. And. And then the other person actually catches them and loves them now in their deepest, most vulnerable part place. And our work is done right. If we. If we can do that.

I think one of the things that I've always found very interesting about this part of, like, creating a really healthy relationship is how. How not obvious it is that things are working really well. Because when things are working really well, you don't really notice because they're working really well. But as soon as shit is hitting the fan and it's not working really well, you. Not immediately.

Exactly.

And it's like our internal dialogue. If you're having a lot of internal negativity, you notice immediately. But if things are going well and you feel good and your thinking is good, you just don't even notice. And so it's a very interesting thing because for people it's like, oh, wait, I remember working with a couple. My wife and I were working with a couple, and they came in one day and they're like, we realized. We were talking the other day and we realized that we actually haven't had a fight in a month and or two. We haven't had a conflict, and we hadn't even noticed. And I was like, yeah, that. That means that it's working.

That's a good thing. But so it is kind of like one of those funny things where couples, you know, when they're. When they're working through things, it sounds like what you're saying is they almost have to pay attention to the good stuff that's happening and unfolding, and they have to pay attention to the ease and the connection and maybe the peace that is showing up between the two of them. Is that accurate? What would you add to it?

Well, it is. That's great. It is accurate. But it's really important how we got There, right? The how we got there is really important, right? Like if we didn't get to.

Look, we are safer with each other because it's both of us, we both heard each other. It's a few feature of relationship, getting in fights. It's not a bug. Like that actually has to be the reason why we feel safer with each other, right? So let's say a couple came to me and they said, look, we haven't fought for the last six weeks. And I go, why do you think it is? And one of them says, I've been like, you know, putting an extra effort into date night. I've been wearing my little Tarzan outfit, she's been dressed. And as Jane, it seems to be working for us. I'm like, fuck, listen, that's good. But that's not a sustainable forever way to have a better relationship, right? It has to be this deeper like cellular level understanding of how important we are and that fighting is a feature, not a bug. And the only reason to fight because we love each other. And they can, they can do the Monday morning, like, you know, quarterbacking. They can do the analysis after a fight and put together the whole system. They can explain and understand what it is that happened and it fills them with love and empathy for each other. So look it, feeling better is great, but they do have to, they have to fit through this tunnel where we feel better because we understand who we are and we know fighting is a feature, not a bug of relationship. The only reason we fight is we're so important to each other that we scare the living daylights out of each other sometimes. Of course we do, because that's, that's how we know we love each other so much, that has to be the narrative.

And even if they don't get it consciously or got to see that that's why the improvement was made. If they tell me they bought Twister and they've been playing naked Twister together while oiling their bodies up and they haven't fought in six weeks. I mean, listen, I'm happ, like I'm going to try it with my wife. Like if it's work, if it works that well, but it's, it's, you know, you'll have to find a new weird game together in like in a couple of months, right? It's not going to twist. Naked oil Twister is not a sustainable way to your relationship being better forever. Heaven knows how crazy the next game is going to be, right?

It's probably better than naked oiled Monopoly. That would just be awkward for everybody, but that.

Yeah. By the way, we're playing Monopoly for the first time with our kids right now, so that image was. Yes. No, that's great.

I'm glad I could tap into that one.

Thank you.

Well, listen, Figs, this has been great. This went by very quickly. Where can people. We'll have all the links in the show notes and whatnot, but where can people learn more about you and your work?

Yeah. So the main website is just empathy.com and it's empathy with an I on the N, not a Y in the n dot com. And then all of our social media stuff is just empathy now. No W. And it's just empathy with a 90 end now. So all the platforms. That's what it is.

Yeah. And. And we have our own podcast, my wife and I do, and it's called Come Here to Me Podcast.

Awesome. Well, we'll have the links to all that in the show notes. Thanks again for coming back on the show for everybody out there, Obviously this is probably a good episode to listen to where with your significant other, should you have one, and if not, it's probably a good one to listen to yourself and save it so that when you do have one, you can listen to it then. Until next week, this is Connor Ben signing off. Take care.

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