Making Love and Other Non-Sexual Activities: Creating Connection in Every Relationship (Episode #41)

There's something about you that I can't help but smile when you smile and laugh when you laugh. Something surrounds.

Welcome to the human intimacy podcast, Dr. Kevin Skinner with my friend and colleague Marianne Michaelis. Maryanne, how are you?

You know Dr. Skinner, I am really glad to be here. As we mentioned at the close of our podcast last week, we talked about our, our friend and colleague Mindy Lund Green. And last week I had the chance to go to her funeral and really just see the love and the beauty of who she was. And one of the things that just stood out to me so much was just the relationships and the beautiful memories that were shared about her from her spouse, her parents, her siblings, her children, her stepchildren, their spouses. It was just beautiful. I'm really, I'm reflecting on that as I'm showing up here today.

Awesome. You know, it's interesting because it goes hand in hand with what we're going to be talking about. And I'm, I'm going to change a couple words. In our culture, we use the word making love, usually referring to it as a sexual interaction between couples. And, and I want to change the language today. If I could, in our entire culture, it would be making love and other non sexual activities and putting that in context. When we make love in that way, people feel loved, they feel validated, they feel understood, they feel like we care about them. And I think about that story you tell about Mindy's funeral, that celebration of life and, and the way that it was described. Here's a person who, in her interactions, she made the world a better place. I could say she made love. She created it.

She did. And that's, I'm, I'm excited for us to talk about that today. I know as we were just talking before we started, you had mentioned that the title of our podcast today is, is a title of a book that you, you thought about doing.

Yeah.

Say more about that.

Yeah. So a few years ago I, I, because I've really been frustrated about this process of how we create love in relationships because we don't spend, spend a lot of time about how to communicate and what not to do and what to do. But rarely do we talk about this process of being a loving person, whether that's through service, kind acts, a smile, a simple note, what some people refer to as intimate interactions. When we are making love, we are, we are intentionally trying to make the other person's life better. We're trying to help them feel felt. As Dan Siegel says, we're trying to lift them up because we care about them and we value them as a human being.

So I have a couple questions about that. I feel like I'm going to be peppering you with some questions today as we're talking about this.

Please do.

Hopefully, these are questions that our listeners might be thinking about. But as I'm hearing you describe that, I'm wondering, where do we learn that? Because if it's not modeled, where do we learn how to do these things? Do you believe it's intuitive, that it's just part of our nature, or is it something we have to be taught and we have to practice?

I think some people are very good at just making people better. It's just part of their disposition. And I think for the rest of us, I think we have to learn to put off the selfish us and think about the people that we're trying to make love with to, to, to create that loving environment with. And so to our listeners, if you're uncomfortable with the concept of making love, please go with the ride with me today, because I want to take it away from it being a sexual experience. And it's, it I wanted you to consider. It's a creation. Barbara Fredrickson, in her book Love 2.0, she talks about this concept of the, you know, we think we say to someone, I love you, which is a, it's, it's a very different theme. It's a feeling. But when I create, when I make love, I'm actually doing something, an action. I'm helping you feel validated. Let me just give a couple of things here. So when I was thinking about that book, what I wanted people to understand is I think by our natural disposition, we want connection. We long for connection. We want people to take care of us. And at times, do we want to take care of them? Do we want to take care of people? And as we think about just that question, do I want to lift another person up? Do I want their world to be better? And because when we contemplate it that way, then it's a very different question, because I've even seen betrayed partners I've heard over and over. I don't want them to feel more shame. You've probably heard that same thing over and over in your career, too.

I have. I have. I'm going to give you some pushback.

Yeah, I do.

Because I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm hearing this and I'm thinking, what would my clients say to this if I was having this conversation with them? And I think that There'd be some like. But you don't get it. I don't want. Because I'm so hurt. I don't have anything to give or where does that energy come from? Where do I get that? Because I just don't feel like I have it.

So I'm going to say two things. One is it might not be the right timing, but that does not mean that you don't want to. When you're hurt, you don't want to. It doesn't mean at the core, you. You don't want to. The hurt you says I. Not now. I can't. It's too painful. But the, the original, authentic, the loving you, I promise you, that's part of how you are and who you are. And so there's different parts of our love that we're giving and not giving because I. I truly believe this. I don't believe that betrayed partners are always angry. They're angry because they're hurt. But what's happening with the betrayal, and this is one of the bigger problems, is they can't be that genuine, authentic, loving self that they want to be. And that too is part of the problem with betrayal, is I stopped being the loving person that I naturally want to be and who I really am at the core.

So we're talking about this self betrayal. And I'm also hearing you talk about a protect. Like, one of the things I know that you and I work with, with our clients is, Is identifying parts. We all have different parts. And so this is. We're talking about protective part. Protective part that shows up and says, no, I can't go there. I've got to hold it all in. I can't go there because if I do, I'm going to be vulnerable and I will be hurt. And I cannot sustain being hurt again right now. So I have to protect that and hold it in. But that core, the core of who we really are, I'm angry because I.

Can'T be that person. Yeah, right. I don't feel safe enough to be that person. And yet at my core, I want to be that person because that's who.

I am at my core.

And so now I feel like I'm confused because part of me wants to. I want the comfort. But heaven, no, I'm not going to go comfort right now. You hurt me. And so the concept of understanding who we are, I, again, I really do believe at our core, we are natural, caring, loving beings.

I'd say we. We're born that way. And we're born also I just want to add on to that. But we're born being lovable and being loving both. And then we learn through life to.

Protect ourselves because we don't want to be hurt. We don't. We don't want to be taken advantage of. And after something like betrayal, I've heard many people say, this is the line. I don't want them to think everything's better and that I'm better. And so I hold back because I don't want to send the message that everything's better because I'm not all the way better. And yet I long for this connection. I long for this bond. And so it's this. It's a. I don't know what the right phrase is. A herky jerky. I want to. I don't want to. I want to be close. I don't want to be close. It's all over this place of. It's like driving a clutch. It's like. It's like, oh, man. We start, we go, we stop, we go. And that's what I find when we've been betrayed or when we're hurt in a relationship. We aren't. We don't know how to be that consistent kind of loving self that we naturally are.

Yeah. So it's super confusing. One of the things I keep thinking about as we're talking, Dr. Skinner, and I know you didn't reference this, but I think it makes sense with the work from Barbara. Was it Barbara Frederickson?

Barbara Frederickson that you.

That you had referred to. One of the tools I often use with my clients is something I learned from you. It's the intimacy triangle or the pyramid. And for our listeners, if you just visual a triangle, and it's cut into subdivisions horizontally. At the very base is physical or psychological intimacy. And at the very top, at the very tip top of this pyramid, we're looking at sexual intimacy. And so as we're talking about making love, it's important to distinguish that love doesn't always. It. It's not synonymous for sex, sexual interaction or sexual intimacy. And to have that sexual intimacy, we need that psychological base and layer which is. Are you there for me? Can I trust you? Can I turn to you? And then we've got the verbal, and then we've got the emotional, and we've got the spiritual and the. What's the other one? There's one more.

Well, you have intellectual, right? So you said intellectual. We have spiritual, we have ver. So verbal, emotional. Right, Intellectual. And Hal Stewart and Karen Strange suggested kind of Like a creative type of intimacy, which I think is a great addition.

Dreams and.

Yeah, the creative part. And, and then really if we look at it again, we'll, at some point we'll do a podcast just on the different types of intimacy. But, but if what we're talking about here is psychological, the ability to feel safe, what some people call psychological intimacy, psychological comfort, where I feel safe in your presence. Again, when we don't feel safe in people's presence, then we're less likely to make love. Yeah, I don't, I don't want to create it because I don't feel safe in your presence. And yet counterintuitive that that's, that's. I want to be that way. I just don't feel safe enough to be that way. And, and if we could just educate people on just this concept all by itself, then our communication can. You know, I want to be loving right now. I don't feel safe enough to be loving right now.

Oh, I'm so glad you went there because as you were talking, I thought, how do we share with our listeners? How do I do that then? So we're talking about this and we say, wait, great. How do I do that? And so even you modeling, saying, we need to be able to learn how to verbalize where we're at, even acknowledging with it, figuring out for ourselves where we're at. Here's where I'm at, and here's what I need and here's what I want. And there I'm at a crossroads because.

I'm not, I'm not there. I'm not ready to be loving right now. Boy, I can't tell you how many clients I've, I've role played this with, because it's like you're gonna, you're gonna tell me that you're. I'm not feeling love or I. You're gonna tell you, you want me to tell my spouse I don't feel love right now? Yeah, I do, actually. Right. Because it's not that again, Love is not a fixed state. It is a creation. And that's one of the biggest problems that we have with love. It's like you don't love me anymore. No, I, of course, at the core, I love you. I don't have loving feelings right now. And I'm not going to go create love with you right now because I don't feel safe enough to. Does that mean I don't love you? And that is the distinguisher here. And that's why I think we ruin the Concept of love by. We just, we just throw it out there. Like I love you. Love, love, love, love, love, love, love. No, I don't feel love right now. Do I love you as a human being? Do I love you? Yes. But I don't feel like connecting right now.

Yeah. And I think it's so important in this space to point out that our tone changes everything. So I can say that in a defensive way or in an attacking way that can be really hurtful and harmful to my, to my partner, or I can say that in a very genuine way. That's, that's. I really want to love you right now.

Yeah.

But I'm struggling. I'm really struggling and I don't know how to get there. That comes across very differently than a defensive tone which can be internalized and just, you know, drop into the system or the dynamic of the defensiveness from both parties going back and forth.

So I could interpret that, I could hear that and say, you don't love me.

Exactly.

Right. And, and that's. Right. And that's, that's where people have the disconnect. So you're saying you don't love me.

Then that's all we might hear.

Right. Because you use the word love. I don't feel, I don't right now. I'm not experiencing this. I don't want to connect. I. Right. But at the core, again, that's why love has been cheapened by our use of it. And that's why the concept of making love is a creation. I am creating it. So, so if we were talking about this creation, I'm actually doing it with you. I'm. I'm finding a way. Even your tone of voice. Right. I don't know how to do this right now versus I don't know how to do this right now. You're so annoying.

So we could break that down and say then even just like a first. I don't know if we'd want to call it step. But looking at our demeanor, looking at our conveyance, looking at our tone, like just stopping and checking is the way that I'm going to say this. Is it coming from a loving place? Does it sound and feel loving or does it sound accusatory?

Yes. So now your tone of voice, because again, they have found over and over again that most of our communication is the non verbal communication. It's. It's not the words by themselves. It is the body language and the tone of voice that make up most of our communication with each other.

Yeah. So if we're slowing down. If we're making eye contact, if we're making sure that we've got slower breathing and we're just beginning to attune to that person, making sure that they can see and hear us. You know, let me just share. I shared with you earlier, but I was speaking with a client earlier this week and we were talking about sharing a boundary. And boundaries can be hard because we're asking somebody to do something that they might not want to do or see a reason to do. But part of the conversation that we had, I had, I said, you know, can I make a suggestion? And I'm going to encourage you to put your hands on your partner's chest or to hold his, hold his face and just really look into his eyes and, and share what you need. And that was a surprise. And I think oftentimes we don't, we haven't learned how to do that. Like, we don't even think about, oh, I could do it this way. I could slow down and do this. Because if it hasn't been modeled, how would we know how to do that? So I'm hoping, as our listeners are hearing this, they're thinking, oh, how can I make love in my relationships? And it does come from me. It has to be my actions. And I might have to really slow down and start thinking about, what does this look like for me? How do I do it in a way that's authentic to me and it feels natural. And it might not feel natural because I may not have seen it model and I may have never done it before. And so it might be a little clunky and awkward.

Yeah. And so there's some, I'm going to call them simple questions. How am I communicating it? Right. How am I communicating? Am I listening? And oh, my goodness, I'll tell you, Marianne, when I have observed couples, they've stopped listening to each other. They really don't listen to each other. And so your body language could make me prepare for a defensive statement. Just your body language. Right. And the tone of voice. So I could hear what you're saying, but I'm computing you're angry, I'm fighting back. And so when we look at break down couples communication, your tone, your body language, if you're in a again, you could fight without words and, and your body language could say, I am not going to let you in. I'm angry at you, I'm so upset. And you could say very little and you could truly say nothing.

And, and that happens for a lot of our clients. They'll say, yeah, we, we didn't talk. We haven't talked for three days. We're sharing a space and we, we, we just ignore each other and, and boy, aren't we communicating so much when that's happening?

Yeah, absolutely. So the concept of, of making love, it starts with me. Am I in a space where I can be loving?

Yeah. Can I. I want to add on to what you were saying earlier about how we're like, am I listening that question? Am I listening? I know I had a recent interaction with, with my husband and he was trying to say something to me and I was in the middle of a. I was in the middle of typing. I was engrossed in something that was taking a lot of my brain power and I was annoyed. Just he was trying to talk to me about something and it was, you know, I was going to have to shift my focus and being able to say, I value what you want to tell me and I want to have a conversation with you. And it's important to me that I want to give you all of my attention right this minute. I need just a few minutes so I can finish my thought and then I want to turn all of my attention to you because I don't want to give you half of it. Being able to realize where I'm at and what I need. It's. I think it's okay to say, give me just a minute. Let me finish this up. Let me close it up so I can redirect to you.

That's part of the company. Yes. So I can be present with this conversation. And I think we're trying to do too much when we're communicating. Right. Put down our phones, turn off the television. Put down on it, whatever I say. Newspaper, there is no such thing. Put down whatever it is. And, and, and your body language, eye contact, your tone of voice, your presence is, is a way that we make love, is our simple being present with a person. I remember a few years ago listening to this person who was. His dad was in the hospital. He was there with his dad and he had a visitor that was a very special visitor. And so he just observed his dad's friend and this special visitor. And there was very little words that were said. And, and the guy said, well, after the person, the special visitor left, he said, well, he didn't, he didn't say much. And his dad said he didn't need to. He was here, he was here. And, and sometimes it's just our presence of being.

I. And, and, and with that, I think to be. I think it's important to realize that sometimes we have to shift gears and others have to shift gears. So we might have to recognize. I need a space where I can do that gear shift so that I can be fully present.

Right? And that's the personal awareness that requires us to ask the question, am I in this space where I can hear what they're saying when I. Or am I defending myself? Am I protecting myself? Am I already leading into this conversation? Am I already angry? And if I'm already upset, then I've, you know, I've got my guns ready, so you. You fire. Oh, you said that. Boom. Right? And off I go. So again, in our presence, in. In our awareness, then our presence is there. And I'm not in a good space right now to communicate. I'm not. I'm not in that space, because I am not. I've got to figure out what I'm so frustrated at. And together we can create a solution because. And here's where I. Here's the statement of making love because I care about us. It's that simple statement. I am frustrated. I am angry. I care about us. We'll figure it out. That is the statement of making love. I care. We'll figure it out. You matter. Simple statements in the midst of what could be very conflictual. I'm still going to. And I'm use this phrase, send value to. To you as a human being. You matter to me. I'll. We'll figure this out. Because otherwise what happens is I don't send that message and then our communication breaks down because I don't know if you care. All I know is you feel like my enemy right now.

As you're. As you're talking, I'm reminded of something that our friend and colleague Brett Williams has taught me, and it's a concept of realizing I'm not the problem and you're not the problem. Let's isolate and figure out what the problem is. And. And so we separate ourselves from the problem and let the problem be the problem. So just as you're saying, I'm not the enemy and you're not the enemy, but there is a problem that needs to be resolved. And so we. We don't identify with that problem. We separate ourselves from the problem and see it in an isolated space of the problem.

Externalizing it.

That's the word I was looking for. We externalize it, and then we're on the same team working to address the problem rather than fighting against each other.

That's right. External Internalization is a great thing there. Yeah. His book, you can be right or you can be married. It speaks to that concept that you just described.

Yeah.

Yeah. So again, let's. Let's push pause here because I can understand that our listeners are saying, okay, so, so, okay, I need to be present. I need to communicate that. That this relationship matters to me. How hard is it to communicate that this relationship matters to me when I'm already in a bad mood? I'm frustrated with you, I don't feel safe with you. I'm angry at you. How hard is it to say, we'll figure it out? Because at the core, this relationship is more important than this current issue.

You know, I'm thinking about, was it Dr. Whiting that you had on your podcast a while ago?

Yeah, Dr. Jason Whiting.

Yeah. I loved what he said about this. I love that he said we all have bad days. We all have times where we are not fit for consumption. We're not fit for a relationship in that moment. And we need to maybe turn to other people and vent our feelings or, you know, work through before we come back into the relationship to really show up fully. And I do think that we need other supports and we need to give ourselves some grace as well, saying, I might be having a bad day and I might not be in a great place. And so maybe using some personal boundaries even to say, where's can. Where am I? Where can I show up at the best time and place to make sure that this is productive so I'm making love and not ruining the relationship or hurting the relationship that it's helpful rather than harmful?

Yeah. So if I was just going to ask our listeners or give you a thought here, maybe we need to do a self evaluation. Am I in a space where I can make love right now? Right. Am I in this mental space where I want to create, or am I in a defensive posture? And if so, then I've got to figure out why, and I've got to figure out how to communicate this, and I've got to deal with my stuff so I can be present and. And I've got to be able to say, if I'm not in that space, I'm really not in a place right now where I'm going to do this very well. Not because I don't want to. Now here's the question. What if I'm constantly in a place where I don't want to? Right. Because I'm so frustrated, I'm so angry, and I don't feel Hurt. I've been betrayed, let's just say that. And I'm not really in this space, and it may be weeks or months where I'm not in a space where I want to get closer to you. In fact, I don't know if I'm ever going to get it back. See, that is what I hear from some of my clients is I don't know if I can get that feeling back. I'm going to try, but right now it's. Think about the authenticity of this statement. I don't have those feelings of love right now. I'm so angry. I'm so hurt. And in some ways, I'm disgusted by what's occurred. That authenticity is true and real.

And.

And I've heard it many times. People have told me that, but they won't tell their spouse that. So the realness is, I don't know if I'm going to get it back. I'm willing to try, but I can't guarantee that I'm going to just feel those feelings and get to that space again. I don't know that.

And I. I'm hearing you say it's okay to give ourselves space.

If you don't, you will resent. You will resent yourself, and you will resent your partner because you're not being genuine. Your partner will know because they will know you're not connecting with them. See, our partners know when we're creating love. There's no. I mean, we know that. And when we're not our partners, like, we're flailing. Why aren't. Why aren't you doing this? Why? Just like the still face experiment with Dr. Tronic. Right. It's like, why aren't we doing this thing? Well, we're not doing this thing because I don't trust you. I don't feel safe with you right now.

Yeah. Can I maybe flesh out that. That still face experiment that you mentioned? Because I think it's so important. In this experiment, they had a mom interacting with her baby, and then just for a couple minutes, she just put on just a total blank face. And the baby looked at the mom and cooed and tried to interact. And then the baby started to protest verbally. Ah, Some things like that. And then the baby threw a fit, had basically a tantrum, doing anything that she could to get her mom's attention. And then she shut down and turned away. And it was in a very short span of time. But as you're saying, we need to make sure that what I'm hearing, it's about our intentionality. It's about being really intentional about where I'm at and being authentic to where. Where we are. I think you alluded to this, but I want to really verbalize it. The emotions that we show up with, they're not good or bad. They're just our emotions. And oftentimes our emotions may be connected to our parts that are trying to protect us. And so taking that time when we need to just step back and say, what state am I in and how do I want to show up? And sometimes we, as you said, sometimes it might be a period of time where we are not able to give that or make the love that we want with the person because it isn't safe or it hasn't been safe. But I think it's important to realize I can still take that authentic part of me because we all need it. As you said earlier, we need connection. We need that I can share that love with myself through my self care. Because I'm going to say that if I'm in a space where I can't give that or and I'm not in a place really receiving that, I need a lot more support. I need a lot more self care for myself. And I can hopefully find other relationships where I can still show up in a way that I can be loving because that's part of who we are.

So, so here's the interesting thing. I can't be loving in this relationship right now, but can I be loving with my children? And here's where I see so much resentment. You're giving love to your family, you're giving love to our children, and you don't want to love me anymore. You're not giving love to me. That's where I see so much resentment. It's like, wait a second, why are you not lo loving me that way? Well, again, it's safety. It's history. Right? It's this time together where we. There's been hurt. That's why the authentic part is I want to be loving, but I can't right now. We. There's things that we're gonna have to work through and. And that resentment can actually create more distance where I don't want to love. Because your resentment is sending a message of you have to love me, you have to love me.

And.

And we can't force love, you know?

You know, as you're saying that. Just a thought. I'm reminded of one of my clients who has been in a really hard situation with betrayal. And one of the things that they continue to do, despite really, really hard circumstances, is they've continued to fold their spouse's laundry and to do their laundry. And. And I. And, you know, I've said, wait a second with the situation. Are you sure about that? And. And what I loved is they've said, I feel like that's important for me to do. It's important for me to still show love how I can. And that's one way that I can show my love. Even though I'm terribly hurt, this is a part of me showing up the way that I want and need to. And I can fold some laundry.

So what I can give right now is I will do the laundry. I'll try to do it this way, but I'm not going to be able to show love in the ways that maybe you need it right now. Right. This is how I can show love again. But can we be mature enough. Can we be mature enough to allow our partner not to love us, not to be making love with us in every moment? Can we be mature enough to say, that's okay, we're not in that space right now, but we can get there. That. That's a maturity that it requires us to get to. To be to a space and say, okay, it makes sense. We're no, we're not there right now, but we'll get there. And if I can create an environment where you feel my love and I can be consistent, then that's how I'm making love. When you're not in a space where you want to make love.

Yeah. As I'm hearing you say this, Dr. Skinner, I'm also just thinking about one of the biggest breaks, I think, in this is eye contact so many times. If we can, you know, if we're in these hurt places we're feeling, I can't. I just can't be with you. I'm just not in a place to do that. It's amazing to me when we sit down and we actually look at each other in the eyes, how much kind of just melts away. How much can shift and change when we allow ourselves to see the other. Like, to really, truly look and see the other person and to let them inside to see us. It's terrifying. I have clients who are like, no, I can't. I can't. I can't look at my partner's eyes. But when we do, there's some melting. I don't know. I don't know. I'm sure there's no word for it.

But no, you're absolutely right. Marianne, in fact, in the intensives that I do, that is one of the closing exercises that I do with couples is. It's an eye med. It's a. It's eye contact meditation, couples meditation. Incredibly powerful. Love it when. Love it when couples are at that space of our intensives. But, but here's what I found in the beginning. They couldn't have done it. Yeah, Right. Because we. We stop seeing each other. We stop seeing this person. So you can fight all you want. I mean, to our listeners, we can fight all you want. You can do that all you want. And you can get hurt, and you can hurt each other, and you can. Can do all of those things, or you can learn to make love. And fighting's not hard. You're into those patterns Most, most of the time when we get in these patterns, we fight in patterns. We do things over and over again, or we can learn to be more loving beings. And I can hear some people saying, yeah, but I grew up in a home where love wasn't given, or I did this, or this happened. Love is a choice. Love is a choice. I. I can choose to be a loving person.

So you're saying this is really dependent on me, how I choose to show up in my world, in my relationships. I get to choose how I. How I show up it. So as you're saying, it's very intentional.

I can love with boundaries. See that people think that those are. They can't coexist, but that's not true. I can love you with boundaries. I. I can say to you, I don't feel like connecting right now, but I still care about you. You matter to me. But right now I'm not in a place I want to connect. And that's where I'm talking about the maturity to say, maybe the best way I give love to you there is, I say that's okay.

So. And I'm also hearing that it's also about being able to understand where I'm at so that I can have that mature conversation.

Yes, yes.

When I can identify that I'm not in this space right now and find the words, here's what I need to say. And, and I. I will go back again to. I do find with a lot of my clients that we don't always have the words that we need to bounce off from somebody. We need to sort it through so that we're not just showing up in a very sharp, aggressive way. Those might not be the right words, but in a really raw way. But being able to bounce off with With a friend or somebody that we trust. Figuring out the words so that I can come back and really convey what I want and need to convey in a way that's authentic and honors who I am and honors that I want this relationship. I'm just not quite ready maybe to have the. That I need.

And so, and so let's talk about that for a second because you're talking about I feel safe with this other person. So in that relationship, our communication is positive. It's loving, it's kind. It's. In this relationship we are. Are making love. We're creating a safe place where we can create connection and kindness and love. But I may not be in that space with my partner, which can be confusing. Right. So why can I do it here and not here? Well, again, it goes back to the concept of safety, but it also is this place of are we putting the most energy into the relationships that matter the most to us? Because I have found that people turn their attention to so many other places work. Sometimes it's an addictive behavior that we turn to other things because we don't know how to do it in our most important relationships. And so in many ways we distance ourselves from connection because we don't know how in this most important relationship. And so we turn to other things and we don't turn to what we value the most.

Yeah, I, you know, just coming back again to what breaks down these barriers, I, I want to be very explicit that we. So not contradicting myself from what I said previously about reaching out for support from friends and helping figure out what we need at the same time, I think it's important to be very. To be vulnerable. It's okay to say. I don't know what to say here. I don't know how to do this. I don't have the words. It's okay just to show up where we're at, not knowing and I care about you. I don't know how to make this work.

Yeah, great, great point. So. So now that's the authenticity. I don't know how even that saying, I don't know how, but I want to. Again, that's a very loving statement. I don't know how, but I want to. That the expression of want is huge. So again, as we get ready to close, there's a few things that I would like to just. Just summarize here. Love is a choice. How do I do that? Well, let's think about the language we've used, the desire to express want, the other ways that I Make love is to acknowledge and do my own work so I can be a loving person. I love the way Tara Brock said it. Do you make it easy for people to love you?

Radical acceptance.

It's in a podcast she did on Unloving Kindness. Right. But. But the statement, do you make it easy to love you? Well, if not, then I've got work to do. Again, it's really hard to fight with somebody who's consistently being a loving person, even when they're creating boundaries, so we can create a better environment and we can choose to be more loving in our interactions. I believe in you. And I've shared this story before, but this is one of the most incredible stories of something I can't grasp. But it was after this experience, we were doing an interview with an individual who had been abused by her husband physically. He was physically abusive. And after one of the episodes, she said, this is the last time he beat me. And it was when she said, she looked at him. He was standing in the doorway. I'll never forget her telling the story. He looked at. She looked at him, and he was looking at her. And she said, I don't believe you want to do what you just did in another way. I don't believe that's you. And to me, that was the most loving thing she could have ever said in one of the most difficult moments. And I. They ended up getting divorced eventually because he shifted from physical abuse to being emotionally and verbally abusive. But I think about that often. How do we show love in these most difficult moments? And how do we see a human being? I don't believe that's. You know, I don't believe it's you.

Yeah. It sounds like she was out. She was able to get outside of herself rather than being stuck in a victim place and being hurt. She was able to kind of be a spectator to step back and look at the situation and see that's not you being your best self.

Yeah.

And that. That is. That sounds like it takes some intentionality to let me slow down, let me think about how I want to look.

At this and how I want to show up and how I want to be loving. Right. I mean, I. Again, I. There's this internal core inside of all of us. I really do believe it's there. There's a part of us that longs. Longs to be a loving human being. I think that's who we are. And when we hold back, I think we're. In many ways, we're deceiving ourselves. It's a form of self betrayal. And so figuring out how to be the authentic loving us is a gift we give to the world, not just to our spouse, not just to our children. It's the gift we give to the world is learning how to be this loving being. And when we do that, personally, I think the world is such a better place.

I think what you've said is so beautiful. I'm. I don't even have anything to add to that or respond. I think we need more loving ourselves, loving others, and.

And when we do, the world will be a better place.

It will.

Yeah. All right, Marianne, thank you so much for your time today. Thanks to our listening audience. I hope this conversation gives you a few things to think about. So my final invitation. Two of them. Love is a choice. Make it every day. And then the thing I often say to my clients when we're done is, now my invitation is to go make love.

And this is where you usually say, any thoughts, any closing final thoughts that you have for that, Marianne? I don't know how I could even add anything to that. Dr. Skinner, go make love.

Now that you understand what I mean, I hope you will. To our listeners and Marianne, thank you so much. Absolutely delightful experience being with you today.

Thank you all.