SSS 182: The Relationship Skill Most Men Never Develop (Responsiveness vs Reactivity)

What's up, my friend? I just arrived back in Lisbon the other day, reunited with my partner Amanda. We were apart for the last five weeks and I've just had some really interesting insights about some of the skills that men often neglect in their relationship that I want to share with you in this video. Going to do it. While I walk to the cafe to meet Amanda, let's see if I can pull this off. But look at this beautiful room that she lives in. Epic. Epic. Lisbon's a great city. But yeah, like I said, five weeks apart, I was in Toronto. I've just reunited with her in Lisbon. Because we travel and work online, we're away a lot. And over the last couple of years we've spent time apart. That has brought up unique challenges and opportunities in our relationship, but it's also allowed me to have this really unique perspective where when it comes to almost like relearning some of the ways in which I want to show up. And I know men need to show up in relationships because what I found, this is also what I've noticed like in these last couple of days was those versions of me that were coming back when I was around her, these versions of me that would, you know, because I've been around my friends and the boys so much. Like, I forgot that there's an extra level of awareness or attentiveness around how I communicate around my partner or what she's needing in certain moments, or even just like some of her behaviors around me that would bring up old reactive patterns and some of those patterns around defensiveness for me that would show up or not speaking my emotions and kind of projecting my anger onto her. And I noticed these come back online in the last couple of days and I was like, ah, interesting. It's fascinating how even though I've been in this work for so long and I've been coaching men for so long, even I will forget, even I will go back into this old reactive tendency. And this is where like the biggest thing, I actually think one of the most primary pillars to sustain a healthy long term relationship for men is to continuously to step into the place of responsiveness instead of reactiveness. And responsiveness requires space. It requires an understanding of where you might be reacting out of defensiveness or shutdown or just childish wounds or in a sense, sometimes for me it's just the fact that I'm energetically stimulated, I'm energetically overwhelmed or I don't have internal space to be able to even notice the instant reaction that comes out. And when that Instant reaction comes out. I've seen it. What it does to the female nervous system and my partner's mood is they immediately withdraw, they immediately shut down, they immediately don't feel safe around us and then they withhold their love or we start to bring up these aspects of them that trigger us even more. And then it just creates this cycle, this loop. So having awareness around it is the key, the reason why it makes it so easy for me now that I have awareness around it. And it's almost like because I've been out of practice, I've been away from her for five weeks of like, that muscle has gone weak. The muscle of being able to lead and respond around her and to notice when she's saying things that don't feel nice in my body or to communicate a need from a place of respect and understanding and love. To show her love in these simple little ways like that when that muscle goes weak due to having time away from your partner or just getting complacent in the relationship, then you have to relearn or retrain yourself or even discover how to lead in this way. If you've never done this work before to start to get a new reflection or allow the relationship to take on a new trajectory, right? So for me it's beautiful because I'm catching these things and I'm seeing these things. I'm like, ah, fascinating. It's weird. That's coming back. I thought I'd move through that. But no, this, this just a man. Constant refinement, constant refinement or constant contemplation or constant mindfulness that needs to happen always. If you ever get complacent with those things, like that's what happens. Your subconscious will default back to the familiar place of being. So a lot of this stuff is on the subconscious level. The subconscious reaction to defend or to protect or to fight back is wired in there. It's like an instinctual thing. So to override that, you have to be super connected to unconscious responses that might be playing out. And that's why it's super helpful to have a process of self reflection every single day to analyze or reflect on how did I show up today in my relationship? What went well, what didn't go well? To get feedback from someone, if maybe your partner is able to give you feedback. If you have a weekly touch point with your partner where you sit down with each other and say, hey, I'd like to get some feedback around how I'm showing up in this relationship. How you, how you feeling? My energy like, what are you needing more of from me? What are you needing less of from me? Like, that feedback is crucial. Should be happening at least once a week. As you start to progress and you start to develop this expanded energy as a man as well, you actually start to pick up on the things that you put your partner needs before they even do. That's advanced stuff, but it's starting to happen. Some of the guys that I've been working with and coaching, I started to give them these practices to follow through on that, and their energy starting to change. Now all of a sudden, they're going out of their way to show love to their partner and getting creative with how they do it. That's so beautiful because it just shows when you shift your energy, when your energy changes, you start to see opportunities that weren't there before. You start to be able to give love because you've given love to yourself first. You are able to express love because you've given love to yourself first. Right. You can only give to the level that you're willing to receive. So just remember that. And even in my case, like, usually if I'm not showing up for Amanda in a way that she needs or she's not feeling nourished in the relationship in the way that she needs, it's probably because I'm not feeling. I get to look at, where am I not nourishing myself, where am I not loving myself, where am I working myself to the bone? And that's cutting me off from these creative ways of giving love to my partner. One of my clients, John, call him, he's done very well. I was very happy with him. Started to write these, like, love letter slash poems and sticky notes, and then put it in his wife's side of the bathroom when she wakes up in the morning in different places around the house so that she would see that. And I thought, that's a beautiful little way to express love or show love to your partner that says, hey, I'm thinking about you. I'm sending love your way. Like, I care about you. That stuff for women is massive. It's massive. It's in those micro moments. People can do that. In the micro moments. She's going to start to build more and more trust with you because she can tell that you see her and you feel and you care about her. So much of this work comes down to that. These micro things that happen on a daily basis that stack up into the big macro moments of like, hey, I trust you. I know that you're going to be there for me and the trust just builds that energetic space where you can both co create something beautiful together. I know I'm close to this cafe, but so trying to get my bearings here folks. So you might have to round this out in a second. But the point is, it's a muscle. Being able to lead love and leading a relationship is a muscle that must be refined, developed and practiced over time. The only way you can refine it and develop it is if you know what it looks like. It's if you know how to raise your energy and your frequency and to let go of all of these reactive tendencies that are coming from suppressed emotions or lack of space in your life that's causing you to knee jerk reactions to your partner's moods or emotions or what she's saying or what she's doing. The other thing that I will throw in on that is that sometimes it's perfectly normal, natural and important to give your partner feedback around how they're showing up for you. If there's something that she's saying or doing or how she's saying something that doesn't sit right, that goes, fuck, you know what? Like that didn't feel good, how you communicated that. It's so important that you learn how to express that. It's so important that you learn how to say, hey, what you said earlier or how you said what you said earlier felt like this in my body. It felt disconnecting, it felt frustrating, it felt hurtful. And I have this need in our relationship where I want some more grace and want some more cooperation. I want some more softness. I want some more truthfulness in how you communicate. So can I make a request or would you be willing to. Would you be open to communicating to me in this way? It's important that you do that importantly, give your partner feedback. You don't withhold that frustration as men, if you withhold that anger and that annoyance and irritability inside of you, it just starts to stack up. And then over time, that's when you, you're like a fucking kettle that's boiling. The top's about to come off. You don't want to get to that point. It doesn't need to get to that point if you're good at addressing these things as they come up. So I wanted to mention that too because I've seen that this come up a lot in the coaching conversations that I'm having. On the topic of coaching conversations, if you do want additional support, you feel like you need that extra bit of guidance through some of these complexities around how you're relating with yourself and your partner. Check out the link in the description. We've got the men's group starting up real soon. Three months weekly coaching with some powerhouse men, myself leading every single call, and there's nothing else like it. It's a lot easier when you got a group of men in your corner. So reflections from Lisbon folks back in Europe. Next chapter in the journey of Amanda and I as we start to look into the back end of this year and where we're heading. But I'll keep you posted. Hope you got you some value from the podcast or the video today. Click subscribe if you haven't already, and we'll see you in the next one. Peace.