Valentines Day: Secrets to Successful Relationships [90 min Workshop]

All right. Hi, my friends, it's Brendon Burchard, founder of Growth Day. And today we have a special session on the topic of improving your relationships. So if you are in an intimate relationship, you have a partner, you have a spouse, you have someone you're dating and you're trying to improve that or set that relationship up for great success. This is the topic we're taking on today in Growth Day. One of our most requested topics because clearly we've all learned over the last year and throughout the pandemic how difficult it was to have great relationships if suddenly now you're locked in the house with somebody or you had distance. How do you create a great relationship is something I think we all want. I'm always sharing with you all here in Growth Day that we all want greater aliveness, we all want more connection, we all want more meaningful pursuits and we all want more growth. And if you're going to grow in any area that brings you more vibrancy and fulfillment and life satisfaction over the long term, it is with your relationships. Now, I know we got people from all over here, so make sure you chat down below where you are tuning in from. We're running multiple different Zoom groups all over the place today. It is just a hot journey today to get everybody onto these different groups around the world. So please make sure, make sure you shout out in the chat where you are coming from and if this is your very first time. Welcome to our Growth Day community. On the 1st of every month, I go live for my broader Growth Day community and I spend these two hours just doing a deep dive personal development seminar on a topic. Again, this one's on improving your relationships. But then Growth Day members, as you know, get the replays as well as live coaching every Tuesday and Thursday of the entire month from other really world class personal development influencers, coaches and teachers who really take it to another level as well. So I'm really excited about you all being part of this and if it's your first time, welcome. My job today is to give you some practices and strategies, maybe a new mindset around your relationships that deeply improves them. And, and like any other topic in personal development, yes, I still work on these. Yes, you still work on these. Personal development. The journey doesn't end. So I celebrate each and every one of you for being in this community. I know some of you are watching in our desktop app or some of you are watching on Zoom. Some of you are all over the place. Now as our community grows into 70 countries around the world, which just blows my mind. So we really have an opportunity today to learn together. And so even as I'm sharing today with you these relationship strategies, I'd love for you to chat and share what you've learned in your relationship or what you're struggling with in your relationship as well. Of course, with the worldwide community all over the place here, you know, we're running some subgroups here that we'll do breakouts with as well. And so if you've never been part of this, I'll teach for about an hour and then I'll do some show and tell and then we will do a breakout where you get to share what are your goals for this month, what are you working on, what are you trying to achieve? What do you need help with? I really believe that facilitating these breakouts we brought something very magical during the time of the pandemic and even now where people are just hungry to network and meet people again, but most importantly be surrounded by positive people who are also growing. You know, because there's enough negativity, there's enough hate and division, there's enough problems out in the world that when we come together to work on ourselves that we find and summon within the best of who we are, that's the moment of change. That's the moment when we make the world better. And so I really honor you for doing the work today, especially in such a hugely important area. Now I've got a lot of fun to do today with you because in talking about relationships, I made sure not only to come back, I'm going to share a couple different perspectives today. One, I'll definitely share the research. If you know my work now, it's 25 years studying personal development in depth, including psychology, neuroscience, sociology, behavioral economics, the whole nine yards to understand what is it that helps people become higher performing and create greater well being and relationships. That's what I do. Right. So a lot of research I'll share with you here today, but also kind of a little bit magical. Hopefully I'll share my own personal perspectives in dating, in relationship, in marriage. Also share with you Denise's so for those who've been through Transformation Week or have ever taken some teaching and training from Denise and I, I asked her literally this morning for her list of five most important practices that have kept us sane and happy for all these years. Going on 18 years. And just like anyone else, ups and downs, challenges in relationships, they are not easy. And so part of that is because you have a different perspective than your partner or your spouse and so I'll take my five and we'll kind of, we'll go from hers to mine to hers to mine. You kind of learn. Hopefully by the end of the day, we've got 10 practices that can really shift your mindset or give you very tactical, tangible things to improve your relationship. I also know with the worldwide community, some of you all aren't in a relationship right now, you just ended one and you're trying to debrief and learn and think of okay, what's it going to be like next time? Or you're dating somebody right now and you're trying to see if you want to deepen that relationship. Or maybe they're not the person some of you are. Like, dude, I don't want a relationship right now, but I'd sure like to know this stuff to help my friends. So I'm always telling what to do over coffee. So wherever you're at, I'm going to make some assumptions today because this is a, this is literally a seminar on how to improve your intimate relationship. I'm going to use the terms partner or spouse a lot today. I'll kind of default to partner because maybe that partner someone you're dating and, and you're deep in that relationship you're just starting, or it might be a spouse that you're with and maybe you like them or you're trying to improve it. Wherever you're at, it's okay. I've had ups and downs in my relationships my whole life. I know it is not an easy thing. I'm not here to preach to you. I'm here to say this is such an important area of your life. Get this better and everything gets better. Right? You know that when your partner, your spouse, your, your significant other, when they are happy and fulfilled and you are happy and fulfilled, there's a greater flow and magic of energy and love between you. And so it's always about, okay, let me own my stuff and let me help this person in my relationship. Let me support them and cheer them on too. And so I'm going to share two different perspectives and I thought I'd start today. Out of these 10 practices we'll share today, I'm going to start with one that is kind of the double sided coin that makes relationships so hard and that is simple rules that you already know, right? And I hope today a lot of what I share is common sense. But we all know it's not always common practice and that's why so many relationships fall apart. So simple. One first double sided coin. We all know these two rules, right? One is put the relationship first. Right? We all heard that before. And this is Denise's. I'm going to combine two of hers together right here. One is put the relationship first. But the flip side of that coin is you must grow and be independent and be striving to be your best in and outside of the relationship. Otherwise, if you aren't growing, the relationship becomes stagnant. And so it's interesting, that's that interdependence, independence thing that makes all these relationships so dang hard, right? Is because, yes, you want to pour yourself into your partner and your spouse and support them and cheer them on and make decisions just for the relationship. And we all have the individual spirit that wants to manifest and reach our own full potential. And how do we do those two things in union and alignment. We talk a lot about that today. Anyway, who's pumped for today's session? Are you ready for this, guys? Okay, so if you've got some relationship advice, remember or anything I say capture it. If you're in the Growth Day app, watching me live in the Growth Day app, remember, just take your notes because your notes actually save that you can access later on if you're watching here. If you happen to be in a zoom group somewhere in the world, maybe make sure you chat and you share and capture your learnings as well because this will be a participative session and I always think that the community drives so much huge value on this. Also, if you're new to growth and you didn't know this theme on relationships is the theme of the entire month, meaning it's not just going to be me here today with you in this two hour session talking about relationships, we also have the benefit of the rest of this month. Our world class coaches teaching you their best practices and perspective in improving your relationship. So that means this month you're getting a world class deep dive training from literally the most influential personal growth and wellness teachers alive today. And you're getting that all month long in Growth Day. That's why we're always saying Growth day is like the best offer in personal development in the world. Not just because I'm fancy, not just because the app tools are amazing, but because the community of teachers and influencers and experts who I brought together to really help lock in these lessons. It's almost like the whole month is a masterclass on relationships for you. So I think you're going to really love this. So our first teaching today. Let's jump in Our first teaching today is that simple understanding. There's two sides of a coin in a relationship. There's relationship first, and there is grow and reach your potential independently as well. That interdependence, independence, you must recognize the push and the pull of that and be attentive to that at all times to have a great relationship. I would argue that almost 90% of conflicts in relationships are actually not about who cleaned the kitchen. It's not about the finances or this kid didn't do that in the household. No, no. What it usually tends to be is a push and a pull between interdependence and independence, and the couple's not understanding that duality and not mitigating for that duality. And so one person's like, relationship first, we should do everything together. We should be on the same page. It should be perfect together. And relationship first also, though, means, hey, when you're making decisions about your life, make it please. In the context that we have chosen to live life together. Who's ever had a relationship where the person was completely oblivious to this idea of make the relationship first. Right. It was probably miserable for you. It was like, this person doesn't prioritize us. And I believe that one thing has really helped us, me and Denise in our relationship is honestly, she defaults to that. She is so good. And bringing me back to that, too, that it's all. It's about us. We plan together. We have to have the journey together. You know, don't just go do these things. Think about how does that impact us, our life, our family? And she's really just good at that. And I believe that's what has taught me to be a better man, I hope in the relationship we've gotten, you know, more and more years into our relationship together. I think that that is really powerful. How do you put your relationship first? You always make decisions within the context of realizing you're in a relationship together. Like, obvious, right? And it doesn't mean you can't have independent decisions. It means those decisions still take place in understanding the effects and the consequences of your actions within the relationship. When we forget there's consequences of our actions within a relationship, the relationship inevitably becomes something separate than us. And when this relationship is separate than us, they feel a separatedness. And the more your partner feels a separateness in the relationship, the more that relationship struggles. This is why you hear people say all the time, make decisions together, plan together. Know what you're both working on together. That's the idea of relationship first. It's oh, right. I have a life partner. That means I do life with my partner. So when I plan things in my life, I think about my partner. And that simple reminder, I know not all of you need. But you've been in relationships where that was not true. And if you have been, you know what I'm talking about, in that separateness, you don't feel like you really know the person or you feel like they don't value your opinion. You feel like they are living their own life and they don't care about you or the effect on your family. And so it's so important for us to always remember. All right. When I think about relationships, I always think about the coin. I call it the coin. Interdependence, independence, relationship first. Okay, got it. And the opposite side, which so many people naturally gravitate towards and know. Especially if you're in a growth day community like this, which is you must continue improving yourself and fulfilling yourself if that relationship is going to come into a true, deep, meaningful, fulfilling relationship. Right. If you're stagnant, don't get mad that the relationship is stagnant. If your partner is stagnant, meaning they're not growing, they're not stretching themselves, they're not trying to learn about their mindset or their effect of energy on other people or to become more productive towards meaningful pursuits that matter to them. Well, then what happens? It's like you're growing and you're extending, but they are not. Who's ever been there? That's super hard. Now the challenge is you can. If relationship first is one side of that coin and growing is the other, and you happen to be the person on that coin, you're growing and you don't sense that they are. Because relationships are first, you also cannot be bitter towards them, hate them, be jaded about it. Because there's probably been points in your life where you weren't growing at your potential either. And what is the thing between. Like what, what is the, the material? I call it between the coin, interdependence and independence. What's the material? Right. If you have a penny, you know that the material is copper, right? In between. Right. What is, what is the in between? Here's my philosophy. The in between, the stuff of the coin is called grace. If two people are going to come together and it's going to work out, there's got to be grace between them. Grace when you're growing and they're not. Grace when they're growing and you're not. Grace when they're struggling and you're doing great, Grace, when you fall a little bit away from each other, and without that, it's really hard to keep that coin unified and valuable, if you will. And so I want to begin today with a simple idea. I know after teaching about relationships, literally for 15 years, and I've been blessed to coach some of the highest level couples in the business world and some of the highest level Olympic couples. I mean, I've worked with couples in every possible scenario that you can imagine, from new parents to people who've chosen not to have children, to people who are just trying to finally create depth and meaningfulness in a new relationship. I can share you 15 years of coaching, you have to imagine every conversation or every other conversation brings up a relationship that somebody is in. And what I have seen over and over and over again when either teaching or coaching on relationships is your or the listener, the students immediate impulse to judge the other person. So as I'm teaching today, it's very easy. Ugh. My husband, he's like this. My wife, she's like that. And you're immediate, like, soon as I start teaching about something, you immediately cast the other person as the wrongdoer. And if we're going to explore relationships today, no, the material in between interdependence and independence is not wrongdoer. It's grace. If you want the relationship to improve, if you want the relationship to deepen, if you want that thing to feel better, no bitterness here, no judgment here. I always say judge less, feel better. Okay, let's not judge our partners or spouses here. Let's educate, let's learn, let's explore how we think you can't control them. Maybe you're lucky and they're watching with you. And if you're watching this as a couple, make sure you put that in the chat and get some recognition and celebration that you're participating as a couple here. I think that's super awesome. I think that would be amazing. And so some of you are doing that. That's great, you know, but if your partner, your spouse isn't here with you right now, don't make this a judge session on them. Even if you're in turmoil, even if they feel separate, even if you're fighting, I want you instead to say, let me explore my relationships with openness and grace. Let me be accountable for my stuff, think through my stuff, and not make this a session of the they're bad and they're the wrongdoer. Because I promise you, soon as you make Your partner or spouse, the wrongdoer, life gets hard, that relationship struggles. And so I want to start with laying this idea onto you of the coin. Interdependence, independence, relationship first grow so you don't stagnate. And as you have that difficult duality sometimes in between, what makes a relationship work is grace. That means understanding, compassion, forgiveness, openness to the other and their life amid your relationship. I hope that helps. That's the first idea. The coin. The coin, man, the coin. Second big idea. And this is what, you know, I'll come into this perspective of the first thing I would say to someone once they get that, which you always keep front of, mind you, in a relationship, you are co creating the future together. When relationship gets difficult, what happens is we are judging the past or we are feeling upset about the current thing. And what happens is sometimes in relationships, they took the eye off the ball that, oh, we're building a life together. We are co creating a future in which we are both happy, fulfilled, cared for, loved, excited. It won't be perfect, but it will be better than today. That's what we're doing. We're building our ideal future today. Even when it sucked today, because the kids did this all over the house and this finance situation over here, and I'm having this trouble and she doesn't understand or he doesn't understand, and you're in that place where they don't get it. Oh, my God. Okay, this is a time to reorient and like, oh, right, I'm not here to be angry about the past. I'm not here to be, you know, upset about right now. It's like, oh, we're on a project together, building the future. You know, so funny how people sometimes have some complete behavior that is different at work than at home. And obviously these are two different things. But so many people, you know, if they're at work and they're working on a project, they have to deliver something amazing to a client, right? They collaborate. If there's a problem, they solve it. They move on. And it's kind of like, solve, move on, solve, move on. Because what are we trying to do? We're trying to deliver this thing. You're trying to deliver a future for you and your family together. You're trying to co create something that is better and more beautiful than you could even imagine now. You know, I've been very lucky to do hospice work in my life and be with people and their families at the end of their lives. And you and I both know that in Those moments towards the end, relationships really matter. And I've been with couples in those last days and moments and the beauty of a couple that has built a good life together in those last moments, it's incomparable. It's the solace, the peace, the reverence for life that happens. When a couple built a good life together and they get to be together or support each other in their last weeks or months or years of life. It's really an incredible sight to behold. It's very humbling. It's very humbling. It's always a reminder to me is like, they built a good life. So at the end they're handling this well. They feel fulfilled and grateful to have had each other. It's a beautiful, it's really. If you haven't been with people towards the end, it's super hard to explain because it's so magical. It's also so rare because very few people remember, oh, we're building this life together. You know, I've officiated some weddings with some friends and oh my gosh, I've been to so many weddings I can't even count. And I always try to think about the couple in the future. What are they going to be like? What do they desire? What's the win for them on either side of that coin? What does it look like in the future? Maybe today if you've been struggling in a relationship or you came out of one and things just weren't good, maybe today is that day. You go into your journal and growth day and you actually spend 20 minutes, 30 minutes an hour writing about what would be that future relationship that you want or you're willing to create with your partner, your spouse or somebody new in the future, what does that look like? Because you're co creating the future together. That's so powerful. You know, I think of some of my favorite times in my relationship with Denise and it would be times when we were, you know, we were working, you know, we were, we were, we had separate careers, but we were like on the same page because we're, we're going to go, you know, buy this dream house and she's going to design it and I'm going to, you know, do these parts and we're going to take on this project together to move somewhere or to start this thing or to open this business or to try this new adventure. And it's like this future oriented thing. Maybe you have that in your own life, in your spouse, your partner. When you go on vacation and you plan the vacation, a Little bit together. Then you both kind of get excited about it together. Because having a compelling future about your relationship, that opens the heart when you see nothing but a dead end and an awful day again tomorrow and the next day and the month after that. You and I both know how bad that feels. And so we must, no matter how difficult it is, reorient ourselves to an idyllic future together and do the hard work to get there. It's not just about co creating the future though. My related point here is we're co creating the future and we are co creating energy together. One of my favorite questions in mediation. So mediation usually means in my world that there's two partners or two parties and they're fighting and they can't resolve their stuff. So I'm brought in to help them work through stuff, right? And I spent a lot of my college years and grad school years doing this. And so I would see, you know, all these examples of where people were really, they thought they were fighting about content, but the really issue was they, it was the process and the energy that they were fighting about. It wasn't about the kids or the finances or that thing she did or he did. It was really about the energy they were feeling then. So I would always love to ask them. Literally my first couple questions to a couple is, tell me about the energy you two create together when you're alone. What's the energy of the house when you're on a trip? What's the energy between you when you're out with friends? What's the energy? And inevitably if the relationship. Listen to this so closely. If the relationship is in a tough place, one person is blaming the other for that energy not realizing. In relationships, energy is co created. You know, you remember that old thing in relationships, you hear, well, you know, relationships really are 50, 50. But you've heard it. No, no, it's really 100. 100. It's like it's 100%. I own it. 100%, you own it. We're together and it's really a challenging thing. And I know this. I know some of you are like, oh, you don't understand my husband. And you're like, no, she's a jerk, he's a jerk. This. And I know, please don't do that. Don't go there with this energy thing. The faster you find yourself blaming the other person, the deeper in despair that relationship will go. The faster you judge that other person or blame that other person, you're just opening the gate to despair. So instead go okay, how did I contribute to this? I will share. Denise has a superpower in this. Like if we're in an argument or we have a struggle or something else like that. She's very attentive too. What that energy is between us, probably more than me because I grew up in a very different like space and time and energy than my wife did, if you will. Like, very complete. We couldn't have different conflict styles, which we'll talk about, but you can have different conflict styles, you can have different love languages, you can have different psychology. But let me promise you, if you don't have a unified understanding that you are co creating the energy together, regardless, you're toast. That in every fight or every argument, I got to go, okay, what did I contribute into that energy? And she has to go, what did I contribute into that energy? And pain is when one of them is oblivious to that which we'll talk about. Don't worry. You're like, tell me how to fix them. I'm trying to lay the groundwork with you here. You're co creating the future, but also the energy. The energy, the house, the last six weeks, that wasn't one person to another person. It wasn't a transactional thing. It was co created. There's interdependence there, right? There's what energy you brought independently. Are you enthusiastic, excited, motivated, driven, hopeful, you know, like inspired? Are you coming into the relationship from your best place and your best self? Because when you do that, the energy inevitably improves. Maybe you don't change the other person, but the energy heightens a little bit. I always tell people, don't try to change them, try to lift the energy. Don't try to change them, try to lift the energy. Because you know what happens over a period of time. Human behavior change has a lot to do with the energetic environment one is in. If I am in a energetic environment, that is blame, complain, upset, hate, lack of grace or forgiveness, over and over and over and over and over again. It's hard for me to change in that. It's hard for me to want to contribute more to that. And what this does mean, again, this means sometimes you have to be the person who puts the material between that is called grace. And for those of you in awful relationships, long term struggling relationships, I don't want you to hear me saying this without empathy or understanding for how hard that is. This is the point where I like to tell people, if you've been trying to co create the future, if you have been really working to improve the energy and this person is not participating or it's not working. And it's been a long time struggle. It's like my first recommendation is always, always, always, please go get couples therapy. There is at some point, there's always at some point where you've put in your full hundred and maybe they haven't, or you've been trying, but you're not over this thing. And I'm just here to say, like, let's destigmatize couples therapy. I mean, it's crazy. There's already huge stigma, massive stigma, stigma in the mental health space of an individual going to therapy. I believe there's a bigger stigma of couples getting therapy together. It's like, oh, my God, we must be heading into hell. You know, we're. It's like that, that couples therapy must be the last and awful divorce resort. And I'm like, no, if y' all been trying or you're trying and they're not, it's like sometimes that participation of a third party will really support you. And so I wanted. I'm only in point two here. I know, but as you're co creating the future and the energy together, I just know when I talk about that I've been doing this long enough. I know some people go, you don't understand him. You don't understand her. No, they're like this. And the blame game starts happening. And it's been going on so long, that blame game, that negative energy that when I say to them, lift the energy and human behavior change can follow. Like what? Tried that? What do you think this is, Disneyland? No, it's not. I've been there. I already know that obstacle. And I know that part of our brain that goes, that won't work here. And if you really believe anything I'm teaching you won't work here. It means either time for a different approach, different energy, more grace. Or if you felt you've given that, then it's time also for an outside perspective. Couples therapy, couples counseling through your church or through a professional therapist to find somebody who can support you in those conversations. As we will talk about, Are you guys liking this so far? I hope this is helpful because it's a little difficult because it's still. Believe it or not, I'm still in a room by myself today. No, no, big team. I'm talking to the camera. I can see a bunch of you all here, and I see the production team over here on the screens, but I'm talking to screens, so I kind of watch the chat a little bit here and I'm inspired. When it, when it lights up, I know I'm doing a good job. When it's quiet, I'm like, oh, so let me know how it's going. What's something you've learned? What's something you'd like to share along here? Participate in the chat? I would love you to do that. Okay, so the first idea concept today is the coin. Interdependence, independence, which you all know, but remember, most conflict lies between those two things. So the grace in between. Second, always have the mindset we are co creating a future together. If today is difficult, that's okay. We're going over there, we're going to work towards that. Okay. If today was difficult, okay, let me repair the energy in some way. Okay, cool. We're co creating this energy together. We're co creating the future together. The third one, and this is from Denise. This morning. She said, try to be present. Try to be present. I really believe, as Denise does, it's like when couples have learned mindfulness, when both of them have learned how to be self aware in the moment, to be non judgmental in the moment, to be able to come openly into the moment and be there with the other person in full presence, not stuck five years ago present. Everything changes. I would say what our partners, our spouses, our relationships, our families want from us isn't more presence like material presence, like Christmas gifts, it's presents. They want more sense that we are grounded right here with them, attentive to them, accepting of them in the moment with them, not trapped in old stories, not angry about the stress or the, you know, freaking out about the worries of next week or next month's bills, but rather at dinner with them, in the moment with them, on the walk with them, living in the present with them. And this one, I would guess Denise probably brought up because it's so important in times of conflict to be present with them and to be, I would say, like, if I had to think about like my presence with Denise when we're struggling or when we're in an argument, I would say if I could give my, like I. Knowing. Knowing what she needs in that moment more than what I'm kind of built or I was conditioned to as I grew up, is that presence with tenderness. That presence with tenderness. I think that's what lacks in a conflict or a fight. It's like one person's so worked up and the tenderness isn't there and I raise my hand. I got to work on that. That is one of those things. I grew up in a. I don't know about some of you. I grew up in a super fast twitch, like, very speed up to argue, very vocal. Not, you know. No, I didn't grow up around any passive aggressiveness or quiet silence and conflict and judgment. It was all verbal and very physical. I grew up in a place where there was a lot of physicality, a lot from the neighbors, the friends, the teachers. I mean, I grew up in a place where the principal could swat you with a wooden paddle. Like, literally, you got in trouble, you got beat by wooden paddle by the principal. Like, I grew up so, like, crazy like that. And so my mind, until I was probably about 25, was conditioned for that. And I recognized in a relationship when I was 25 how quickly I got angered and wanted to storm out or scream or holler or. I just. I. My ego, it trapped up. But I was also just angry. I was an angry young man. I worked a decade really hard in personal development to let go of my anger. That came from just how I grew up. I had to let go of that and let go of that. Not be perfect, Just get a little better every day at it. But that means I was also conditioned that way. And I have to go, whoo. Okay, That's a weakness of mine. And where does that come out? Usually for me, that will come out in an argument, right? If we're just not seeing something, I just feel it. I feel it literally come up. I feel the emotion of it. It just can be triggered. And what do I have to do? I've got to try to be present. That's why I love her language this morning. I was like, oh, that's so good. I underlined try, like, seven times. Just try. Put the effort back into being present with your partner or spouse, even in conflict, but also in the beautiful times, Put your dang phone down, Be at dinner with them. Right? When you're intimate together, don't be staring off at the wall thinking about something else. Like, try to be passionate, intimate again. Like, bring your awareness, your physical body, your mindset to the moment with the other person. I tell people all the time, I go, imagine you just found out your beloved partner or spouse is going to be gone in three days. They got a terrible diagnosis. I promise. You would be so tender with them and so present. Well, none of us know when those days are going to come. None of us know we're going to lose the person. And as I've been with people towards the end couples, all they want is to hold each other and to be tender with each other. And so being present is about living in this time zone with them right now, in the here and out. Not the past, not the future here. But it's being attentive, tender, thoughtful, and energetically co creating together. Because some people say presence is boring. You know, it sounds like presence is just tenderness and boring. I'm like, no, presence is pop and vibe and like the thrill of it all too, right? That when you went on those first couple dates with that person, you were locked in. You were interested in trying to learn about them. You cared about what your clothes looked like. You know, you tried to smile, you tried to show some physical reaction to what they were doing. There was interest there, there was intrigue there. And you're both there, right? You're attentive. And if that relationship lasted, let's bring some of that back. That energy and the magic from that time. You fell really in love. When you went crazy for each other, what was there? What was there? Intention? What was there? Mindfulness to one another. What was there? Acceptance. And also not just accepting them, but pulling them in with your presence. Like, you were drawn in, right? You were drawn together. They say, what was that? That's that energy. That's that presence that's bringing us together. We must rekindle that over and over and over in a relationship. It begins with both of us finding presence. So I'd love for you to do something right now and in the chat, if you would, I would love to see. Just post down below. How do you get present in your relationships? How do you do it? Like, what is your. How have you become more mindful as a couple? Or could you become. Just share in the chat. Some of you do it individually. You're meditating together. You're taking walks together, you're putting the phone away together. I see all this. So good, right? Try to be present. I'll ping back to one of mine. Fourth, big idea today. Honor the individual in the relationship. Honor the individual in the relationship. What does this mean? Well, first you have to recognize there's that side of the coin. She has her own life. He has his own life. It's so important. Like, oh, they aren't me. This is so important. They are not me. They don't have to think like me, be like me, act like me. Your job is not to create a mirror of yourself on the body of the other human you make love with, okay? This is not the job in a relationship. Your job is not to project yourself and ask this person to adopt all of your values, all of your beliefs, all of your thoughts, all of your argumentations, all of your supposed greatness and perfection so that they become you. They're different than you. They don't need to be you. They don't need to understand you. They don't need to support you. They don't need to cheer you on, they don't be enthusiastic for you. They have their own life. And if they are those things for you, how. How dang blessed are you. How lucky are you? What an extraordinary thing that this person puts up with you. That this person cares for you, that this person has committed to you. What a blessing we got in this world where we expect way too much of the other, the individual, where they're supposed to be your best friend, they're supposed to be your intimate partner, they're supposed to help you with business and finances and legal. They're supposed to be, you know, clean up around the house with you. They're supposed to be the perfect parent. We expect so much from them to do things for us. Our expectations of the other for how they treat us and behave with us the way that we would like them to are completely absurd. Right? If you study human philosophy at all. One reason I love studying philosophy is you philosophers always understand the difference in people, and I think that's really important. We live in a cancel culture today where if you're not exactly like me, you're dead. I'm going to attack you on the Internet and tell all of my friends and all of your friends what a terrible person you are. Whoa. Because you didn't think like me. But I want to let you know that culture has infiltrated a lot of relationships. As I've coached the last two or three years. I've really noticed it. I was like, oh, this vilification of the other versus the honoring of the other. See, when that coin gets broken, that material between of grace. Here's what happens when there isn't the material in between of grace, and the person expects it to be steel in between. That's where the individual expects the other to be the same as them. The second you do that, you're toast. Your relationship will ultimately have so many struggles. And some of you have had this happen to you before. It's like they expect you to be exactly like them. I'm very different than Denise. My wife Denise is very different than me. And whatever is about us, we cheer that on. We completely support that. She loves all the weird, you know, extroverted, jumpy on stage. Guy Brendan stuff. She loves my career. She cheers it on that. She doesn't want to do that. We tried doing a podcast together when we moved to Puerto Rico years ago, and I think we made it maybe a month or two, and we were like, oh, we don't enjoy this together. It was more like, oh, that's your thing, and we don't have to have the same things. Just like, she built two amazing and huge exercise studios, right? That was her. Her last part of her career, and then she sold them. And I'm not going to ever build an exercise studio. I suck at building the community that she would build with the, you know, all the, you know, 30 plus women who worked with her and for her, she. She had a magic that she could do there that I was like, that's crazy. You're amazing. She doesn't expect me to be her, and I don't expect her to be me. I know that sounds so simple, but that makes all the difference when the stuff hits the fan, when there's an argument, or when the person's going through a hard time. See, it's like when she's going through a hard time, I don't think that she should solve going through that hard time the way that I would. Does that make sense? When we project upon the other that they should do things, think things, and be things, like, we will we stop honoring and having reverence for their individuality, which is probably what drew them to you in the first place, right? Maybe you had some things in common, but part of the attraction was there was a polarity there, right? That polarity of like, oh, they're a little different, they're interesting. Oh, I like this about them. But then as relationships carry on, what happens is that polarity now they try to make each other the same. And then when they try to make each other the same, a little of the magic is lost. A little the vibe and the pop goes away. And also frustration enters the game instead of grace as the material between it's frustration that they're not the same as me, and when it's, they're not the same as me. Whoa. Like, I had a very difficult coaching conversation a couple months back with two clients. We're talking, like, you know, cover a magazine, billion dollar level people in this couple. And they were just, I mean, struggle, struggle, struggle, struggle. And one of the things I was. I was doing mediation with them, and they had this moment where they were talking about parenting. And what was very clear was they were mad at each other that they don't parent the same. And yes, we as a couple have to be on the same page, and we try to get on the same page, but different styles are okay because it turned out that the child liked both mom and dad. So who's right? Mom who has a different style, dad who has a different style. Who's right? Well, the kid is happy and loves them both. It's okay that people have different styles. It's okay. Matter of fact, if you can find another person's styles and. And their strengths and you support that and you cheer that on, that is what we exactly mean by honoring the individual. I cheer Denise on for all sorts of ways she is and thinks that that's so not me. It's just not my thing. Like, she's so good at so many things. Like, one of the things she's so amazing at is, like, design and making everything just gorgeous and pretty. I'm the sloppy guy. I got stuff all over the place. I mean, I took 30 minutes to clean this place just to get ready for the show today. You know what I'm saying? I'm not. I'm not built that way. She's traveling right now, so my. My. My counter is just. I'm a guy who, like, I put it on the. If I'm going to use something every day, it stays on the counter. Why would I put it away? I'm gonna use it every day. Nuh her. As soon as it touches the counter and it's done, put it away. Difference. But I love that about her. Our house is gorgeous. I love that about when we travel, she has a different style of traveling than I do, so she sees things different than me. You have to honor the other, and they have to feel honored in that individuality for the relationship to go deeper. So I'm always trying to do that. She's trying to do that. And somehow we both feel very honored in our relationship because, like, I see her, she sees me, and it's okay that we're different. And our biggest fights are when we expect each other to think the same or be the same or do the same. Does it make sense? I think this is really profound. Honor the other. Honor their individuality. And honoring it means accepting it, not judging it, honoring it means being open to it, but it also means celebrating. Cheer them on. If you could give a speech about your spouse or partner, you should talk about all the unique things about themselves and be so prideful, joyous, happy about that. But also, let me share this with you. I can immediately tell in seven to nine minutes in a mediation. Because I always make sure to ask this question. I always make sure to ask this question. They're like, court referred. And what I learned in those processes. Ask a very simple question. If you feel lucky to have that person in your life, I know you are honoring the other. You are honoring their individuality. You follow? I think what happened is we expect so much for our couples and our spouses. We forgot how blessed it was that among 7 billion human beings, God, universe, luck, serendipity, cosmos, biology, chemistry, whatever you want to call it, put you two together. You felt that at your wedding. You felt that on those first couple dates. You felt that at the beginning that lucky to have this person. I'm so lucky I found a person finally. This is the one. And then four years later, like, oh, God. Which, by the way, I'm not here to judge. I said at the beginning, some of you have ended relationships. Tons of people watching this have been divorced or are separated, are not going through anything. There's zero judgment on this. To me, I am totally okay that couples don't make it. I'm totally okay in understanding that. It's hard. And sometimes we judge wrong or sometimes people change. Man, life is long. People change. And sometimes what people change into, we don't want to be a part of. So this is not me going. All marriages have to last forever. And being Pollyanna about it, lots of them don't. Most of them ultimately, by the end of this decade, will not. Literally, the vast majority will not. That's just where we're heading. So I'm not here to judge it, and I don't have any opinion about it. Like, I've been ups and downs throughout my life in different relationships. I don't have a judgment to it. What I'm here to suggest is when they're great, you feel lucky to have that other person in your life. I was on a clubhouse recently, and one of the guests asked me, or one of the hosts asked me such a great question. They said, brendan, what's something that has been a secret to your success that most people wouldn't think about when they think about all the marketing you do or all the business or all the investments or all the leadership or whatever? And I was like, I lucked out with the right life partner. I chose the right person, and I feel lucky to have her in my life, especially because I'm an idiot, you know? So it's like, hey, if you could have a little more. The more grace you have, the more luck you Feel that the other is in your life. Just sharing. Okay, fifth, big idea. I love this one. Denise shared this this morning, and it is so her. She said, you have to anticipate. Make their day better. Anticipate things to make their day better. I love that. I love that. Like, Denise knows, you know, when I'm doing these live broadcasts like this, which is way too often, but when I'm doing these live broadcasts, she will, like, she'll just think, oh, he has that live broadcast that day. Okay, maybe I'll, you know, order this food in advance that he likes, or I'll make him this food in advance, or maybe, you know, let me make sure I get some water in there. Let me go help clean up before. In advance. She'll just be attentive that that's something on the dashboard of my life and reality and mission and obligations that I'm going to do and how do I make that better? Or when we go on a trip, she'll think, oh, he likes to do this. Like, I love to go to museums, right? I can spend. I'm somebody. I don't know about you all, but I can travel. And the most important thing for me to see is that culture's major museums. I just love it. And so she'll think about that. You know, I will think about how in any given situation, there can be wine and a cheese plate, because she loves that stuff. I mean, the wine. God, right? So I think it's very. I think it's very important that you think of, like, how do you think through things that that person would enjoy? And she's better at this. She's so good at this. Little things, little simple things. And I think that when you both have that intention to do things together that you both enjoy, but also, I love this word and I want you to write this down. Anticipate. Anticipate. It means you must calendar. You must know their mission, you must know their goals, you must know their plans, you must know their intentions so that you can bring joy to that, so that you can serve there, so that you can uplift the experience and the energy of that thing. I think this is so understated when I hear people teach about relationships. This one I love. Anticipate things to make their day better. What are you going to do for your partner tomorrow that's going to make their day better? Such a simple question. What could you do tomorrow to make your partner or spouse's day better? Write it down. Actually, let's take a note right now in your chat down below, what's something you could do to make your partner spouse day better tomorrow? Write it down. I'm some good ones. Yeah, you all are active in here. You know what I'm saying? Some nice, you know, prepare things for them, say things to them, help them. These types of concepts here that you're all lighting up. I think this is so important. Right. Sorry it's going so fast. I can't always capture all of them. But I think it's really important that we anticipate things that make their day better. If you got anything from this whole training today, this is where I put it smack in the middle from Denise. I think if you got anything is do that more often and watch your relationship improve. All right, sixth idea. This is something that I'll share as a coach, and I'm gonna use some language here. Not everyone will like or with in the mental health space, but hear me out and maybe write this down just so it. It hits a little bit for you. When I'm working with couples, I always tell them and remind them that you are living with a trauma survivor. Every person has had a rough road. Every person had struggles, some seen and heard, some unseen and never spoken about. And I know trauma is. And using that language is not always precise from a professional psychological perspective, but I'm not a psychologist. I'm not a neurologist. I'm not here to be an ist, okay? I'm here to share with you that this perspective of remembering that the other has been through a difficult path and they've had situations in their life that traumatized them and conditioned a pattern response or emotive trigger helps you be more tender and sensitive with them. You know, I think it's important, like, oh, right, they develop that trigger or that response or that conditioning because they went through effing hell. They had that moment that was terrible. And when you can remember that the person you love went through some terrible stuff, you're a better partner in honoring them as an individual too, because maybe you didn't go through that, but they did. They had that lived experience that is different than yours. And when you not only celebrate that, but you can empathize and understand that, and everything shifts. Everything shifts. And it might not have been. See the reason I use the word trauma in. In a. In a coaching realm here, not a psychological term per se, because, you know, psychologists often trauma is. Means something very specific to them, right? And I think, unfortunately, in the mental health game, too many people think that trauma has to be this extraordinarily awful situation. But trauma can be an emotional hangover effect of something that was simple and something that was said that just. It just stuck. And it wasn't this huge traumatic event that, oh, my God, they'd write books about that. That was so terrible. It was just like. It could have been a very subtle thing that really hurt the person. And they carried that hurt forward in such a way that that hurt or that emotional trigger affected future or present behavior in a way that wasn't supportive to their goals or their health. That's how I think of trauma. It's something that has occurred where that emotional response or conditioning carried forward in such a way that it does not support your health or your goals today. And so for a lot of people, that could mean as simple as how their parents treated them. Maybe their parents didn't smack them around or abuse them in some dramatic television drama way. But you know what? They withheld love. They were strict. They were severe. They didn't speak. They didn't communicate. They had no physical affection. That can be very traumatic for children. We know from psychological research how important it is for a young person, a child, an infant, to have that parental bond of attachment and affection and acceptance. And when those things aren't there, when they don't feel that sense of security in that relationship, that can affect their behaviors and not just their relationships in the future, but literally how they think, how they feel, their sense of worth, their sense of value. That's why it's so important in your relationship, to understand. Maybe because you often. What we do is we discount. They're like, are they making a big deal about that? If they're making a big deal, dummy. Listen, that's what I'm saying. Sorry, I shouldn't go. I'm calling me dummy, not you guys, dummy. It's like, this is how I talk to my guy friends. I'm like, dummy. If you're telling me she's making a big deal and you don't think it's a big deal, she's right. If it's a big deal to her, it's a big deal. It doesn't matter if you went through that, or you would have gone through that in a different way or you would have perceived it in a different way. That's how she feels, man. That's how she feels. Grace, she doesn't have to be like you. She didn't have to react like you would have. She doesn't have to think about it the way you think about it now. She is not you. The Coin. She's an individual person who went through that and it meant something to her and she carries with it with her today. Your job is not to judge that, but understand that she carries it. And when you understand that people carry things, you're more sensitive, more understanding, more open, more thoughtful, less quick to judge and become harsh because, you know, they've gone through stuff. You know, I've been blessed to work with the US Military. And many of you guys know my father did 20 years in the US Marine Corps and served three tours in Vietnam and was, you know, in the hardest positions as a gunnery sergeant in Vietnam, as you can imagine, like had a really, really difficult time. And I grew up, probably not until later in my life realizing that dad was going through PTSD from the war. And I think that my family and others would have talked to him differently if they knew that. And I've been in a military hospital before where a, you know, a very hardened soldier at the top levels of, you know, the elite forces had lost a leg and how his unit in that situation were still themselves with him. They were very funny and jovial and playful, but there was a tenderness because they understood this person was hurt. There was a different level of reverence for life and respect of the individual because they knew he'd been hurt. Even though these were elite force level guys who could just kill anybody in the whole place, right? So it is not about being a softie. It is about having reverence for other people's struggles. And when you know that other people struggle, you treat them differently. And I think this is so important for people to hear today in a cancel culture to recognize all have walked a tough journey, you know, to take a little bit of the Buddhist mind that says life is suffering and everyone has suffered in some way. And you don't have to understand they're suffering, but they're suffering. And we must bring compassion to that. And in relationships, if you can understand that other persons have been through trauma, you look for those triggers and you understand them and you don't trip them, you don't activate them, you recognize that. And if you are in a situation in a relationship where that has become such a hindrance to you that their pain and their struggle and their suffering in the past has become a hindrance to you and the relationship together. Therapy, therapy, therapy, therapy, therapy. We've got to destigmatize it. And it's not you saying, go get therapy. It's like, you know what, let's talk to someone about this. So I know how to be better for you in this situation and that we can work through this together. It's not, you need to go fix yourself. You're frigging weird. Which is what most people do because they objectify the other versus honor the other. And remember, the relationship is first. So now when you know somebody has trauma, I'm here to suggest to you, seeking immediate counseling, either individually or together is huge. Because you know what, you and I, or maybe you are, but I'm not a therapist. There are things that therapists know and understand how to deal with in places of trauma, in places of quote unquote disorder in their lives that you might not know how to capably deal with. And once you understand that, it's important. And I'll give you an example in real life with me and Denise. So some of you guys know, in 2011, I had a major brain injury. I wrecked a four wheeler and I flipped it over. I was wearing a helmet, but I rolled several times and snapped my wrist, broke my ribs throughout my hip and my shoulder and ultimately ended up with post concussive syndrome. And I didn't know that I had, you know, traumatic brain injury right away. I just, I didn't understand what's going on with me. And yet when we scanned my brain after that situation, I got, ended up getting a brain scan. It was like, oh, this has really triggered something different is his brain. It's going to take a while to get over this. And she was very understanding that there was a period of time there, probably a year, year and a half, where I was so quick. It had activated my amygdala in such a way and damaged my prefrontal cortex, which is a lot of your executive control, your emotional reasoning reasoning. It had been dampened, injured. And so now I am. I was more like quick. I was more like speed to anger, if you will. I was more like, like freaked. She was so thoughtful because she knew I had that. Do you know what your partner has? What injuries of the past, emotionally or spiritually, that they feel they have had sensed that might make you more empathetic to them. I don't think you can really love a person until you know the pain they've been through. I don't think you can love a person until you know the pain they've been through. And when you know a little bit more about that pain, you know what, you become more sensitive to them. I really believe that. Okay, I love this next one. Number seven. Are you guys enjoying this? Is helpful. I know we're going deep Today. But that's why we do these big seminars together, right? So this one, I hope you enjoy. Number seven, take turns. This is Denise's. This one this morning. Take turns. Take turns talking. Take turns sharing in an argument. You talk, they talk. You know, it's that old thing. You hand them the stick to talk, and they literally talk. In emotional therapy, it's actually true in couples therapy, is like, some therapists give you the stick. Okay, it's your turn to talk. Okay, now she talks. Now you talk. And, like, until that has passed, no one. Because what happens is, you know, there's this. It's actually a very, very old Native American tradition, which is, you know, the talking stick, if you will. But what people don't understand about that was, is you gave the stick to the other to talk. Before they could talk, they had to reflect back to you accurately what you had said. Then they got to share. So I think that's incredibly powerful to remember that you have to take turns. But also, I suggest that you set up the conditions for taking turns. What I mean by that. So we take a walk pretty much every day that we're together, Denise and I, and I've been really working on, especially through the pandemic. It was like, start the walk with what you're grateful for. Start the walk with what you're grateful for. But then you have to go, okay, what are you grateful for? So in your sharing, in your disclosure, in your op, whenever you're talking, at the end of it, turn it back to them. That's so important. At the end of your talking, turn it back together. That's what we mean by taking turns, right? If you just shared something great going on in your life at the end, be like, is there any, you know, anything you're excited about? And if they're like, no, that's cool. They don't have to mirror you or take the same turn. They might be like, oh, that's nice to hear. Can we talk about the kids? And that's okay. That's their turn. Now, here's what's important. Their turn doesn't have to be the same turn you just took. Let me say it a different way. Their topic doesn't have to be the same topic you just took. See, you're sharing, and this topic is important to you. But guess what? In their mind, it's okay that they're thinking of other things. We would love everybody to be so calm and cool on the open landscape, to reflect everything back to us, which I really believe that that is Great training, which is learning to reflect back to the other, what they've just said. So important. But also we've gotten this expectation that the other person is supposed to be our counselor or therapist or coach. That's not. They didn't sign up for that. They signed up to be your life partner, and they have their own life. And so I've even found myself sometimes I'll be sharing something really passionate about work, and then I'll finish sharing it, and Denise will be like, okay, great, we have this thing over here. We have to do the house or this thing. And they're like, but I just. And I'll get frustrated because the conversation didn't continue on the thing that I thought was so important. Grace, they don't have to be on the same topic as you. Why are we all trying to control each other's conversations so much? What led to cancel culture was everyone trying to control each other's conversations so much without understanding that control itself ultimately would become injurious, problematic. And that we have to realize, oh, got it. It's okay. I took a turn, I got to share. Now they get to take a turn. They get to share. And what they share doesn't have to be the same thing as I shared. This is how you actually get fluid dialogue in relationships. Did you know the more a couple tries to control the communication of the other, the more misery sets in that relationship? You're supposed to talk like this. I said this. You didn't do that. And trust me, I'm guilty of this all the time. I'm the communication expert, so I have this very high opinion of how argument is supposed to go and logic is supposed to go because I studied philosophy and political science and I studied communication and leaders. Like, oh, no, it's not. And I'll get frustrated. But the more Grace I can allow into that, it's like, oh, people have to talk like me, the better our relationship gets. Right? And by the way, I probably suck at this. So I'm here to tell you all the things that I'm not good at and I'm trying to get better at, too. But I can share with you without a question that the research and my coaching experience just validates over and over and over again. When you try to control the communication of the other, we're in trouble. Right? Why was the five love languages such a phenomenon? Languages, ah, people speak a different and live a different and love in a different language. And the more we try to control that language and conversation, the more trouble we get. In what we need to understand is it's different for everybody. So when we say take turns, it's first taking turns and disclosure, but also understanding. Topics can move around, be more fluid in your conversation, less controlling, profound impact in your life. If they want to talk about the thing going on with the kids and you don't want to talk about it, let them talk about it. If they want to talk about the thing at work and you're just not interested in their projects at work, still let them talk about it. Because self expression leads to life satisfaction. The more we shut down their self expression, not allowing them to have their turns, the more they are less satisfied in life. Which means ultimately our relationships. All right, number eight. This is so cool. This is a phrase I use with our clients all the time. In relationships, repair is resilience. Repair is resilience in a relationship. What do I mean by that? Well, we think of, like, perseverance in terms of resilience. I'm like, no, in relationships, it's repair. The ability to repair conflict after it happens. To say I'm sorry, to apologize, to accept apologies, to fix the situation or understand like this happened. We didn't want that to happen. Let's try this next time. And allowing the ego to fade out of that. To be able to say, I'm sorry, to be able to say I was wrong, to be able to say, you're right, to be able to say, you know what, we didn't want that. Together without the hatred or the blame is everything Denise said this morning. She says it's so important to apologize for the other, to accept that apology and for the two of you decide to move on. I love that. Right? It's like, okay, apologize. The other person's gonna go, I hear you apologizing. I appreciate that you're apologizing. Thank you for owning that. What can we do better next time so we don't run into that? And moving it from problem focused to solution focus, Moving it from blame and upset to the next thing. That's so important. That's what I mean by repair. People have to learn how to repair when they mess up together. And you have to anticipate we're all going to mess up together. Right. I mess up all the time, but I'm so personally in all areas of my life, but I'm the first to apologize. Oh, I didn't see that. I didn't anticipate that. I'm sorry that happened. Oh, I see where you're coming from. Okay. Got it. Understood. And it's like that repair, like intrigue. Maybe it's because I'm a people pleaser. I want everyone to feel good after an argument, like right away. I'm not a steward. I can't remember anything negative that happened last week. I'm just, maybe it was a blessing of rattling my brains too many times. My memory sucks. But I just don't care to hold anything above anybody. It's like, okay, it happened. And my thought is always, we didn't want that. We didn't want that because it's about the relationship, right? We didn't want that fight. We didn't want it. They didn't want it to go that bad. No one wanted getting a screaming match. And we always say, oh no, you don't understand my spouse. They want to scream. They want the argument. Actually they don't. They just lack the education and the perspective of how to do it differently. No one wants to be in anger and wants to be in vitriol and wants to argue and wants to be belittling and condescending and awful. They literally have never been trained on a better way. They're literally unaware or ignorant of another way. And it doesn't mean they're a bad person or they're stupid. It means they haven't had that training. Like it's a really struggle. I know for many of you in, in personal development land, right? How many of us like can't believe that people don't understand basic personal development stuff, right? And we get frustrated with them. But a lot of people have never, you got to understand, 98% of this world has never had any training on mindfulness, well being or relationship improvement. Zero training. Because in school all we taught them was to memorize a bunch of stuff from a bunch of old dead dudes, right? It's like we, we are not teaching people how to do peopling. So you can't get mad that a 30 year old person doesn't know how to resolve a conflict. They never had any conflict management training. Like it's unbelievable. Think about it. We don't teach conflict management training in elementary school or middle school or high school in North America in any meaningful way. What we say is be nice or that wasn't nice. We don't teach conflict resolution. And when you know that, it's like, oh, no wonder we suck at repair. Because what happens is, here's how you know when someone is really trapped in life, their ego won't let them repair. Their ego has to hold on to the bitterness and the anger Their ego has to make the other person evil and wrong and terrible. The ego makes the others always to blame, always the awful, Always just the stuff the ego traps. And so now the issue is you're trapped in your ego, but the ego wants to condemn everybody. Again, cancel culture or vilification culture, where they're just this terrible person. They said the wrong thing, they made a mistake. It's okay, by the way, that you get upset about it. I'm not here to say we should all be Polynesian. I get upset about tons of things. It's the question of, can you repair it? When you get upset, when you get too upset, when the argument goes sideways, when your energy together sucks, can you repair it? Can you say, you know what? I know our energy stuck together. We didn't want that. I'm sorry, for my part, I love you very much. And the other person go, I accept that. I didn't want that either. I love you very much. Let's go get a pina colada. I'm just saying there's ways to repair. Pina coladas are always good on our department. I'm just saying there's ways to move beyond things. And I hope that makes a little light because, listen, I know this is serious topics, but I love this stuff. I want you to have deep, meaningful, loving relationships, but you can't ever. If you don't repair the stuff as you go, not repair every five years, every 10 years, if you need to repair it, you're going to tell all the people. I go, you got 48 hours tops to repair, which I believe is super generous. I used to teach. I used to teach you get four hours to repair. And I was very well educated by some marital therapists, being like, well, that's not everyone's style. Some people don't go sit away. But if you sit on it for more than 48 hours, you have to understand their memory. And your memory has now coalesced against something being true. And the longer you wait to repair, the more what you believe to be true is solidified and calcified. And it's harder to change a perspective or to let go of that. Right? It's calcified. It's hard now. It's harder. It's more fluid, real time. And in the moments and hours afterwards, to being defined and released, the longer you hold it on. Because you. Some of you know this. Some people are holding on to stuff that happened to them 20 years ago. I remember going back to a high school reunion. I was talking to a friend And I think it was our 25th and 25th, 20th was talking about something that happened in high school. And the way they were talking, I could not believe they were still so upset about it. Now I, in my mind, thank God, I thought, okay, well, that was traumatic for this person. I have to understand that. But if there's still bitterness, hatred, anger, but also, most importantly, judgment against others, now we're trapped in the ego and we need some help because that's the difference maker. Like, we can have something that was traumatic, but if it's still in that place where there's vitriol and judgment against others, that becomes very toxic in our own mindset. And we got to deal with that stuff again. Sometimes that takes therapy to learn to repair those things. But in motion with your relationships, I'd love to set that 48 hour rule for you. I personally am a believer. I came up in different culture. I came up in the never go to bed angry thing. Go to bed, like repair, resolve, coordinate love. Like let it go and go to bed. I know that's not true for everybody. So maybe you got to eek it out in that next day. But I would say if by the end of 48 hours you haven't brought up that you're upset, that is a weakness in your communication style, not something to continue holding against them. We must be more explicit when we're upset with people and let them know. I would say nine out of ten things that I do to upset Denise, I have no clue and I don't think is a big deal at all. But the 1 out of 10 she tells me, I'm like, I'm an idiot. I'm sorry. Explicit communication is the most important thing in all of repair. All of it. You must say it. You must not hint at it. You must not be passive aggressive. You must use the words to describe exactly how you felt and what your request is for next time. Describe how you felt, not describe what they did, describe how you felt, and then make the repair request for next time. Next time that happens, can we do this? Next time that happens, can you consider that next time, what could we do? And I think that's really important. Really important. Okay. I have so many other things to share with you guys, but I'm trying to go beyond the stuff I've shared on my podcast or my YouTube's here for this seminar with you, and I hope it's helpful. I'll move on to. What am I, number nine. I call it the three E's. Okay, the three E'S of a relationship. This is when I know a relationship is great and can't can improve in a conflict situation. So if I'm mediating or counseling or coaching, here's what I do I watch for in those initial interactions, when they're coming in, they're describing the problem. As an example to me, I watch for the three E's. First one, empathy. Empathy. Does it look like the person, the other is listening and is caring what the other person is saying and can understand it even if they don't agree with it. Can they understand it even if they don't agree with it? That's a big one for me. Can they understand it even if they don't agree with it? Ah, that to me is empathy. They care that the other person is hurt or confused or upset about something. Like there's just empathy. Often it's non verbal. I can see that the non verbal stuff is the easiest. But often what people don't understand is a lot of times empathy looks like listening. Even if you don't agree, it can listen. Like this can be empathy. Literally, this can be empathy. Like you're like, you think they're crazy, but you're giving them the allowance to speak. It's empathizing enough. Like, we all believe that empathy is warm hugs and sunshine. But a lot of the time empathy is allowing, turn taking, asking a question, waiting, nodding, not arguing. Or it's saying, I heard you say this. I see it this way. Those simple notes of validation, time, openness make all the difference. Second thing I look for, of the three E's, the first E is empathy. Second E is enthusiasm. I think enthusiasm is the master of all emotion, right? Even more than love. You're like, you're crazy. I'm like, no, no. I know lots of people who have love, but there's no enthusiasm in the relationship anymore. There's no intimacy, no pop, no vibrancy, no variety. It's just, it's like they care for each other, but there's no energy behind it. Love. I think the energy behind things is enthusiasm. When we're excited about building our life together. Or listen when we're excited about solving this problem together. I remember the first, like I was doing a divorce referred mediation. I was in like grad school and I knew this couple was gonna survive. It was like five minutes into this thing because they were just like, we are so excited to solve this thing together. And I was like, you're gonna be great. I immediately knew and it was so easy. It was so I'm sorry. It was not easy. It was so well resolved because there was enthusiasm, even if we don't agree, enthusiasm for the solution, enthusiasm to move out of this crappy time. I love when people do coaching or counseling. And I've talked to therapists who go, oh, my gosh, they were so happy to finally share their hatred for each other. They were so enthusiastic to get it out and to talk about it and to start working on it. The enthusiasm to work on it, the enthusiasm to improve it, the enthusiasm to build that future together, the enthusiasm to resolve it. That is such an indicator of things. So how do you feel? Are you enthusiastic to improve that relationship, to grow it? Are you enthusiastic to go deeper? Enthusiastic to do the things for your other who just loves it, you know? Are you enthusiastic about them and their life? So important? Empathy, enthusiasm. And the third one, encouragement. The strongest relationships are built on encouragement, right? We know this from the social sciences. I know many of you guys heard me recommend for the last decade the work by John Gottman and his wife in research and relationships. I love that work. And one of the critical things that came out of that was such a simple distinction that happy couples tend to praise each other five times more than they complain or negate. And whether that ratio is true in all relationships across all cultures is not. Is probably not super validated. But what I do believe is the simple way to break that down is encourage your partner a lot. A lot. Encourage them, cheer them. You know, they got a big date. Do something. Look, I got this on this laptop over here from Denise. I don't. Can I see that? You guys probably can't see us too. No, not gonna show up. It's just. It's a post it note that she gave me like six months ago. I still have it on my computer. It says, I love you, I appreciate you. I know you are doing big things. I love you. I appreciate you. I know you were doing things. It was just a post it note she put on my computer in a really particularly difficult week that I was having. And we're both pretty good about leaving little notes around for each other, especially when we're traveling or we'll be apart or something like that. But also throughout the day, like, she puts something over there that she likes or she does. I'm like, I love that. Good job. That's amazing. And we don't say that flippantly. Like we were like, that's great. That's amazing. Like, we cheer each other on a lot. And I think that's huge. The ability to encourage one another is so vital. So vital. Okay, so the three things, empathy, encouragement, empathy, enthusiasm and encouragement. I look for those, I watch for them. But listen, don't just look for them, cultivate them. Cultivate them. And if you don't know how to do it, ask your partner, be like, hey, how can I demonstrate empathy for you more? Hey, how can I bring some enthusiasm in this relationship? Hey, do you feel like I encourage you enough? What could I do better? Because ultimately all these things we're talking about, remember you have to do together. It's about the relationship first it's you're going to build this life together. The most important phrase to me, if I was, I'm advising him was like, you're co creating your future together. Co creation. People support what they create. You create it together and you support it together. And that's everything. So it's never like I'm mad at you for this reason. It's like, ugh, we were in that situation, didn't seem to go good. What can we do better? It's the we story, not just the me story. It's the understanding that we must communicate together, plan together and work together to build the ideal future together to build the energy, co create the energy together. These things matter. But they're open dialogues and you don't have to be right. And they don't have to be right. You get a turn, they get a turn, you understand? If they're not going to agree with you, you understand. It's fluid, it's dynamic and that's what makes a relationship great versus it has to be this way or it has to be that way or we butt heads. Okay, last big idea, which I know a lot of you been waiting for. Okay, number 10. And that is this. Love is a mode of being. Love is a mode of being. I think it is the essence of being. You know, a lot of spiritual teachers always remind us that we're either living through love or we're living through fear, or we are either living through love and openness and respect or we are living through division and closed mindedness. And however you conceive it, the way I conceive it is, I'll just share my personal beliefs here. I believe that God in spirit is a loving energy. And I believe that the whole universe vibrates with love and good energy. And I believe that we can be tuning forks to that and that that can be our frequency of life and that our sense of being is a sense of love, that we can love other people openly and Completely and honestly, and that we can tap into that. We can have divine love for other people and obviously intimate love for our partner or spouse, but we can have an expansive version and feeling of what love is. To me, if you read the motivation manifesto, I have a whole chapter on love that people quote it. Marriages and wedding ceremonies and all this stuff now, which I didn't know at the time. I was trying to capture this. But it's this idea that I believe that love never goes away. I believe that the feeling of love in a relationship can ebb and flow or, yes, kind of like be absent from that relationship. But I don't think love itself goes away because I think love is on high. So for me, love never, ever goes away. A relationship can end, but the love doesn't go away. I didn't lose my heart in a relationship when I believed that as a young man, when a relationship ended, I became depressed and suicidal because I thought love had left. I thought I was despaired to be lonely forever and I would never find love again. I'm like, love was never lost. It was lost to you, kid. But love is always here. And that's a spiritual belief that I believe. I just believe love is always available. Love is always here. I'm divinely loved. I believe I just have that sense again, I believe in God, and I know not everybody does. So I just feel that it's there. But even if you don't grab onto the spiritual aspect of that, I think it's interesting when people don't realize how profound that every philosopher, every great thinker, every spiritual text has one unifying theme throughout them. Love. There isn't a major thinker, there isn't a major movement in the world, and there isn't a major spiritual text that isn't on the foundation of this idea that we must love one another. Now, whether you believe that and it extrapolates into the concept of oneness, or you believe that and it extrapolates into, you know, I love my fellow man or love thy neighbor, like yourself, wherever that extrapolates for you, the foundation is there. And I always say, but you know what? I think a lot of people are smarter than me. And a lot of these people who spend all this time thinking about life and these great spiritual traditions who've written about this for thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of years, 10,000 years of human recorded history alone, there's that spiritual sense that love pervades. And I think sometimes we get detached from it in our busyness. I think sometimes we get detached from it in our conflict. I think sometimes we get detached from love in our judgment. And I think if you can make it your mode of being and your sense of love life, then in the relationship, it's already there. She doesn't have to do something to earn love from me. I love her. I am love, she is love. We are loved. Love is here. And I think tapping into a love that is higher than your immediate needs is transformative in perspective. Tapping into a love that is bigger and higher than your immediate needs. That is how we attain what we'll talk about obviously in spirituality, which is the concept of oneness, one humanity, one spirit or one with one another. The understanding that across 7 billion people, we all want love, we all want a connection, we all care about our relationships and are significantly shaped by them. And I think that is the most beautiful thing in the world. And so if I can live in that frequency of love, if I can see things through a loving perspective, if I can feel it in my body, I am fulfilled with love. Whether or not my wife gets the day right or wrong. I feel loved. I feel loved when I've been laying in the hospital thinking I was going to die. I feel loved when I've been on stage and I didn't do good. I feel loved when other people judge me. No one can grab, take away or steal my love. And I think because that's who I am, I'm able to serve better because that's who I am. I'm an okay, decent person in relationships. I think that's because who I am, abundance has been afforded to me because I'm in the frequency of the world. I don't know if that's true or not, and that might sound like mojo to you, but I think you can't end a seminar on relationships without talking about a higher order love, a more creative spirit of love and a greater oneness sense of love that when we tap into that and we feel it. Game changing. I hope you have enjoyed this special session that we did here for Growth Day for all of you on relationships. If you love this and you'd like to watch it again or play it for your partner or spouse, make sure you're a member of Growth Day. If you aren't Already, go to growthday.com to get yourself signed up. If you're not already there. We have rolled out our desktop app, we are working on our mobile apps and we are so excited to bring all the personal growth tools and teaching and coaching and community to you all in one place at Growth Day. If you haven't been to growthday.com and signed up, make sure you go there and check it out if you're a guest today. I'm really excited about this community we're building all around the world and I thought I would use this time today to do a little bit of a show and tell and then do our breakout session real fast. And that is talked about where we're at with the Growth Day app. So you can see where this replay happens now in the new desktop app, where do you watch the other teachers throughout the month in the app? How can you take everything you've just learned and journal on it or plan a great date night out? All of that I'm going to show you right now in our Growth Day app. I hope you'll stick with me because I think it's a super cool this is if you've not seen it, the new Growth Day app and we are so excited to share this and debut it with you. If you've not seen it yet, the Growth Day app is on desktop and working towards mobile. What's so cool about it is this is your all in one place for personal development. Now if you haven't been here before, I'll give you the quick tour. The quick tour is we believe that you need several things for ongoing personal development. Obviously life coaching is transformative, but guess what? You also need a journal. So we've built in your personal development journal with growth prompts where you can click prompts and get questionnaires, get prompts to work on and answer so that you develop a little greater sense of yourself and life. You can have prompts or no prompts in the journal, but I think journaling today after the session, would you just go in here and just type. If you're in Growth day, just go and type your own relationship practices. Go capture your learning. What was really resonant to you today about relationships? I think that you capturing what you've learned today in a journal and you writing more about it is just super awesome. Also, we believe you got to score yourself. So we've built scores for you where you can go score yourself in your clarity, your energy, your necessity, your productivity, your influence, your courage, your movement, your mood, your sleep, your nutrition in all areas of your life. Every day, but also every week and every month we have different self assessments for you so that you can continue getting your scores and knowing where to focus on in your life. Also your plans. So if you're here and you're thinking Oh, I got to go plan a great date night or I got to go capture my to do list or whatever. People use their plans for their personal growth goals, their professional goals, their to do lists. That area. We also have our challenges. We have a mental strength challenge starting, I believe, today or tomorrow that you can come and take. We also have your learning area. This is where you guys are asking, well, where are our replays or what other courses or content do you have? Or who's coming up for live? So obviously you got me teaching relationships today. You got Dave Hollis, Jonathan Fields, David Bach. Let's see. Jamie Kern Lima, Jenna Kutcher, Gloria Tonmo, Dr. Daniel Amen, Anthony Trucks. All these experts will be teaching you live right here in the Growth Day app. You also have all the replays. So we did a brain health session. We did one on physical wellness. We did well on establishing boundaries. All the live replays from all our coaches are now in your app as well. And of course, your community. This is where you can come in and like a private Facebook group, you can come in and post your lessons. I'll invite you guys, go in your community day and post. What are your lessons? What have you learned in personal development that have made the difference for you? So our own community within the app of positive people from 70 countries around the world, you can share photos, videos, and anything that you've been learning on your own personal growth journey. And I really believe that by sharing with one another, that's how we all get better. So I hope that this has helped you and inspired you in some ways to know what we're doing in growth Day because we're trying to build the number one personal development platform in the world for you. So if you happen to join us on these first of the month sessions, which I'll do every single month on the first of the month to bring all of my communities and all of our communities together for growth Day once a month. But then if you want the replay or the app or all the other teachers throughout the year for less than a dollar a day, all of your personal development for less than a dollar a day in one place. What? That's Growth Day. All of your personal growth tools, coaching and community in one place. I hope you'll be a member with us. But I also want you to meet our members. So here in a moment, what we're going to do is a growth Day tradition, which is you getting to share what are your goals for this upcoming month. So in a minute, we'll do a breakout session where you can turn on for those who are in zoom, you can turn on your cameras and you'll get to share with one another. What is it that you learned today? What are you trying to work on for this month? And other things. So here's what we'll have you share in a moment. You turn on your cameras and get to network. Everyone always says, I want a more positive community, but they won't do it. No, no, we're here. Let's do the work. Let's meet people from around the world, learn their goals, see what they need, help with, encourage each other. You want positive, encouraging people. We brought them together for you today. So in a moment, we'll give you a breakout group and we'll just give you about three minutes each. We'll put you in a group of maybe, you know, five, six, seven, eight people who turn their camera on anyway. And when we do this, what I want you to do is share within three minutes. Share what is something that you have learned about your life or your relationships that you would like to share with others today based on today's topic. So maybe you learned about your marriage or about a previous relationship. What's something that you learned that you'd like to share with one another? So you all get to teach or share something, A perspective. Maybe you're like, brendan didn't even teach this important thing about sex. Oh my God, I got to talk about it. Whatever it is for you, keep it sane. But I'd love for you to share your lessons on this topic with each other. Then share what are your goals for the next 30 days? What are your. At least share what are your three primary goals for the next 30 days? And then third, what do you need help with? Maybe like, I need help in my business or I need help understanding how to do this thing, or I need a web designer or I need this or that. Just share what do you feel like you need help with this particular month? This month? And maybe someone has perspective or will share an idea or a book recommendation with you. This is a group of people who do personal development. They got some good recommendations for you. So with that, we'll give about three minutes each to share those things. We'll do a breakout group. We'll come back, I'll wrap it up for you, and we'll have a great time. If you've never been in one of our breakout groups before, one simple rule. Bring positivity and joy to this group. Just share. This is a chance to be like, gosh, I've always Wanted to be around positive, enthusiastic people. Here we are. We're here for you. We built the community all around the world for you. If you happen to be in a zoom group, let's really do this. Work together and learn from one another. Right now with that team, let's break everybody out in their group right now and bring the joy. Okay, everybody. Welcome back, welcome back, welcome back. I hope that you enjoyed that short little conversation with some positive people around the world who met somebody awesome in Growth Day today. All right. I hope that you've enjoyed this session. Remember, on the first of every single month, my friend, I'm here for you. I do a two hour deep dive on a topic every first of the month in Growth Day. And then if you're a Growth Day member, not only do you get the replays of all these, but you also receive live training every single week from other Growth Day coaches and teachers. Just profoundly powerful. Plus all the suite of tools that we have built for you in this community, I cannot wait for you to engage and learn more. For those who've been with us for a long time, thank you for participating, for joining us today. Wherever you watch, whether in the app, or on desktop or on mobile or in any zoom rooms around the world today, I appreciate you. Every day we get to work on ourselves and we get to improve ourselves. I think today's session was saying, hey, a lot of things, we can improve ourselves and improve in our relationships. And I think when we do that, we've achieved such a remarkable thing. We've made life more vibrant, more connected, more meaningful and we all grew together. Today was an awesome session. I appreciate each and every one of you. We'll unmute you so you can all celebrate with each other and just give a shout out of appreciation to another. If you're not yet a Growth Day member, Remember, go to growthday.com and I'll see you later this week. For all of our members, live as we take on relationships with all month long at Growth Day. Thank you everybody for this session. I love you. I appreciate you. Every day is a good day to grow together. Thanks, everybody.