Time Alone Together Ambivalence

If you make sure that you've got time alone together, even once or twice a week, you'll get more comfortable. After a few weeks, it won't be quite so rusty. You can actually keep notes of things to talk about. My husband and I do this deliberately. I have a note in my phone of things to share with him about my day and my life and things I run across that I think will crack him up. So if you get into the habit of thinking about, oh, I'm going to share this with my partner, then you're more likely to really think about their sense of humor and what will help them, what will crack them up at the end of the day Hi, welcome to Sex Love Power. I'm your host, Michelle Lizenberry Christensen. This podcast is where I convene the conversations about love and sex that help powerful women and those who love them to create the intimacy and intensity they really want in bed and in life. Together, we navigate the tensions between our desire and our devotions, between our wildness and our security with our eyes wide open. This podcast is designed to help you create more closeness, ease pleasure and justice in your relationship. And we do it by blending wisdom from the fields of sexuality and spirituality, trauma and self regulation, and intersectional feminism. I'm so glad you're here. Which of these sounds like you do? You find yourself saying, we're so busy, I feel like roommates. Or maybe you say sex is great when we have it, it's just really hard to make time for it. Or maybe you sometimes think, we know we need to go on dates, but we never seem to get around to it. And then if we do go, a lot of times we get into a fight. Today on Sex Love Power, we're talking about spending more time together. Whether that's talking, having fun or getting naked together. We're going to cover how to recognize the resistance so you can break through those totally understandable obstacles and actually get more closeness and heat between you. This is how I help my clients to change the patterns of boredom, distance, sexual stalemates, and friendly avoidance of one another, no matter how busy they legitimately are. The truth is, most people just don't see past their busy schedules and their fatigue to the very real emotional reasons they keep some distance between them. And you can't change what you don't see. So again and again, I see people trying the same solutions. They try to schedule dates or time away together. They nag their partner, you're always too busy. You need to make more time for us. Or they tell themselves that they're going to make more time together after something, after school gets out, after this deadline at work has passed, once we're on vacation, or after the remodel is over. These attempts usually don't actually result in more closeness. So if you want to go from being too busy getting in fights or being disappointed every time you do go on a date or make time alone together at home, and quite frankly, wanting to avoid doing those things over, to a new outlook on time together that actually brings you more closeness and passion each and every day, then you're gonna wanna hear today's episode. From the time I was in third grade on through till I graduated from high school and moved away to college, I would ski at least one day almost every weekend from November through April. Then in college, I hardly skied at all. And then after college, I skied pretty rarely. You can imagine how rusty I got every time I went to the mountain. It was like starting over. It didn't feel good. Picture yourself doing the same thing. What if every year you skied once, maybe you surfed once, and you cycled once, and you ran 10 miles once. Your entire experience of each of these activities would be all sore muscles, blisters, saddle sores, and wipeouts, right? You would never hit your stride, you would never really have fun, you would never feel like you were good at it, and you probably wouldn't want to do it a second time that year. It's kind of the same in spending time with your partner. If every time you actually slow down, get together, turn and face one another, you have to clear a backlog of frustration about not spending time together, and you have to get reacquainted and you have to wind down enough when mostly you've been operating like two soldiers in the same battlefield trench, then being alone together is actually going to be more irritating than intimate. And just like that sports situation, it will be like that every time. So that's why today's episode's worth your attention, because it's going to give you what you need to actually get closer. Yeah, we're all busy. That's real. It's legit. I work with clients on simplifying, on setting boundaries at work, on. On building their schedule around couple time and prioritizing being together. But really, before we can get to any of that, we have to address our ambivalence about having the time together. And that's what most people don't even recognize. So today we're going to look at five things that happen when you do spend More time together and why those are sometimes so uncomfortable. I have been there and I've helped others over this hurdle many times, so I know that we can get you there, too. So there are lots of reasons we do want to spend time together, right? We want to feel closer. We want to build, turn on, and get to sex. We want to have space to do problem solving and make decisions together. And lest we forget, we want to have fun. We actually like each other. Or we did at some point. Even if we don't remember that all that well, sometimes being with our partner can be pleasurable. It almost sounds ridiculous to say it, but so many of my clients forget that. So of course those are the reasons we want to spend time together. But then there are also some reasons that most people haven't pinpointed until I really ask them to. Why do you not want to spend time together? So I invite you to think about that for a moment right now, and then I'll outline six reasons that come up the most frequently with my clients, and I'm going to help you address each one. So first, being together can be boring. If you don't do it very often, there's nothing to talk about. You're out of the habit. Reason number two, not to spend time together. Somebody usually picks a fight we pull from the backlog of conflict and frustration, or we wind up in a fight over nothing at all simply because we're so uncomfortable in the stillness of slowing down and being alone together. The third reason? It's disappointing you finally have that long planned date and your partner doesn't live up to your expectations. Reason number four, you're out of practice. It always feels like you're working on the first draft. There's always that kind of itchy, uncomfortable, wait, who are we kind of feeling? And that can trigger real fears of like, wow, are we not really meant to be together? Or, gosh, when our kids are grown and it's like this all the time, will we even want each other? So it's really uncomfortable. The fifth reason sometimes we don't want to spend time together is that we have other habits and patterns that we're really in. So there might be a show we really like to watch or we really like to read, or we might be in the habit of going out with friends or spending a lot of time running or cycling, and we have to change those habits in order to be together instead. You know, you have 168 hours every week, and if you're not spending a whole lot of time alone, truly connected to your partner, you are still spending every one of those 168 hours. So we need to make a change in order to spend more time with our partners, and that's intrinsically uncomfortable. And the sixth most common reason that people don't want to spend time together is that when we spend our time together, our historical roles can get enacted. Sometimes it's roles you saw your parents act out or roles you played in your family as a child. And that, just like the others, is really uncomfortable and can cause pain and conflict. So all of this to say, if any of those come up for you, and they mean that there are times when, theoretically, you could get closer, you could move towards sex together, you could have a deeper conversation, just hang out, take a walk together, and part of you doesn't want to, you're not alone. It's not just you. A lot of couples face this because, frankly, we're tired, especially after the last few years. Our emotional reserves are low. And if we think that there's going to be more discomfort associated with something than there is going to be comfort and joy and ease and fun, we might shy away from it. But I am on a mission to help you have the absolute best love you can. And if you really want to have a better relationship that feel closer, share more pleasure with your partner and safeguard your marriage against divorce, let's tackle these so that you can get out of ambivalence and move toward spending more time together. So I'm going to go after them one by one. First, how about problem number one? That it's boring. There might not be anything to talk about. You can address this obstacle by making it a habit to spend time together. If you make sure that you've got time alone together, even once or twice a week, you'll get more comfortable. After a few weeks, it won't be quite so rusty. You can actually keep notes of things to talk about. My husband and I do this deliberately. I have a note in my phone of things to share with him about my day in my life and things I run across that I think will crack him up. So if you get into the habit of thinking about, oh, I'm going to share this with my partner, then you're more likely to really think about their sense of humor and what will help them will crack them up at the end of the day. And speaking of humor, bringing humor into the awkwardness can really help lighten it up. Just like if you were first dating someone and you ran into your humanity, it's a lot More disarming to bring humor to it than to try to present like you're perfect because nobody is. Another way to address this boring problem is to remember what I always tell my kids. Bored equals boring. Every time they would say to me, I'm bored, I would say really boring people are the ones who get bored. If you're bored, it's not because your partner is boring, it's because you are. You have 110% control over how bored you are. You get to do something that's more diverting, entertaining, joyful fun right now just by choosing to so let's go on to reason number two that couples don't spend time together. Couple conflict when we get alone together or I've heard so many times and boy did we get into this pattern ourselves too. Boy, when we go on a date it starts out okay, but by the end, eventually we get into some kind of stupid fight and I just don't want to do it again. So there are a number of ways to address this obstacle. First, notice what backlog you have. Write out your frustrations in the relationship, the bones to pick that you might have that you find yourself bringing up with your partner. Even if you resolve not to really get clear for yourself what the no fly zones, the frustrations, the long standing conflicts that you haven't really addressed, what all those are, make sure that you're really hearing yourself and then seek other people to talk those things through with so that you can get to a constructive place with each one. Your initial way of viewing it, if you're not talking it through with other people, is probably one sided, is probably the perpetuation of old patterns, and is probably more painful than it needs to be. So get some input, don't hold it alone, and don't keep barfing it on your partner every time you're alone together. Next thought for addressing this obstacle is to front load the fun. Get your connection time in first. Don't make resolving every issue between you a prerequisite for connection. You know, know that gosh, we haven't been spending a lot of time together and so that means there's less sort of lubrication or another way to think of it is like cartilage. You know, we're a little bit bone on bone in this particular joint between us and we need to have more fun together in order to help us resolve some of these conflicts. It's not the other way around where we have to resolve all these conflicts before we can have fun together. Remember that softness, fun, tenderness, and gentleness make the resolution of legitimate disputes, which way more likely and way more easeful. And then when it comes to those fights about nothing that we've all had, just recognize those early on, you know, even as you go out, you can say, hey, I've noticed that when we do this kind of thing together, whether it's sitting down and having an evening talking where you don't turn on the TV or going out for a date, I've noticed that we wind up in a fight that doesn't feel like it has a whole lot of content. And I heard a podcast episode that said, sometimes that's just trying to off gas the discomfort of getting back into the habit of spending time together. So let's just notice when that happens tonight, if we start to bicker, and I'm going to do my best to just drop it, recognize it for what it is and not escalate it, would you be down for doing the same thing so often? Naming it can help us head it off at the pass. Let's move on to the third obstacle. Spending more time with your partner may be disappointing. If you have expectations about how it's supposed to be, ways they're supposed to be in order for you to be satisfied, then you're almost certain to be disappointed. So the best way to address this obstacle is to notice what your expectations are and release them. Let go of how it has to be for you to be okay and work to be in the present. Acknowledge that you're human, and welcome your partner's humanity as well. Relationship is the finest place on earth to cultivate our tolerance of frustration. Every single date, every single sexual encounter, every single conversation alone has missteps and frustration. John Gottman's research shows that 60 some percent of the time, our initial communication misses the mark. So we're always needing to make corrections. It's just human. It's how we are. So if we can roll with them, if we can deflate our disappointments rather than inflating them and making them a big deal, then we can come back to center and keep going and build more of the good. So soften into more human expectations. And that doesn't mean that it's not okay to have desires to wish for things and to ask for things. It's really the expectation, the attachment to it being a particular way that causes us suffering, not the desire itself and not the request. The fourth reason that couples often don't wind up spending time together or feel ambivalent about it is that we're out of Practice. So the solution here is the same as the solution to the first obstacle. Boredom. Make it a habit. Get in practice. But in the interim, until you're in practice, acknowledge that it's not going to be that much fun. You're beginners again in a certain way. So know that once you establish the habit, you won't be so rusty. But until then, it's kind of like running the water out of a rusty pipe, a pipe that hasn't been opened in a long time. Just open it up, let it run, give it time, invest, repeat, show up. And know that the dividends will begin to come as you keep making payments into the account. Obstacle number five to spending more time together is you have other habits and patterns that you have to break in order to find the time. So you can address this obstacle by identifying what you've put into your life in place of time together. Some of those things may truly be more valuable to you than spending time together on the margin. And that's worth looking at. But most commonly, I find that people feel more comfortable with their other habits, not more happy than they would if they saved some time for their partnership. So your habit of going back to work after dinner, or your habit of watching TV every night while your partner goes to bed alone, or your habit of going out with friends a couple times a week, or whatever you're doing instead of being with your partner on the margin, perhaps finding a split where you still get to do that thing you like to do and you get to save time for your partner. It's a great way to make more time to be together. But as you do, acknowledge that change is hard. The brain and the nervous system resist change at first, every time. Give yourself time to make the change and give yourself space to grieve it at whatever level. I know maybe that sounds cheesy to some people, but so many things in our lives are losses. If we won't let ourselves metabolize the loss, then the part of us that's losing something will cling all the more tightly to that thing that we are trying to change. And then finally, the last obstacle, those historical roles that can get enacted. This, this is a great one to address by becoming aware of what the roles were in your family. What did you see your parents do when they spent time together? What was the dynamic between them? What was your role in your family? What has your relationship historically been to having time alone, to having time one on one with other people? Are you more of a pursuer who chases the other person, wants more from them or a distancer who moves away from or withdraws from other people and wants less connection. What meaning have you placed on being alone with your partner? Now I imagine that you can see what I can see about these obstacles to spending time alone with our partners. They're about the same as the challenges that people have spending time alone with themselves when that's uncomfortable. And I've heard it said that the mark of our wellness is our capacity to be alone in a room with ourselves. You know, not ourselves in our phones, not ourselves in a book. My favorite go to. But truly still, you know, just present with oneself. And if we can't do that, then we're really going to have a hard time doing it with our partner is our capacity for presence that undergirds all of our capacity to be present with other people. So that's the real invitation. If you've noticed that there's a lot of discomfort when the two of you have the opportunity to spend time alone together, notice what it's like when you have the opportunity to just be still yourself. And working on that is a great way to build your capacity for being still with someone else. All right, so we've looked at the six reasons we often don't want to spend focused alone time with our partners. We looked at what you could do to address each one. We looked at being present with yourself as a foundation for being present with other people. And I know you already have good reasons you do want to spend time with your partner or you wouldn't have listened this far. So I hope that this episode has helped you eradicate some of your ambivalence. But you know it can only help if you go put it into action. So please do implement at least one thing you've heard today. Cultivating love over the long run is not easy. It's sweaty work. And it's really simpler to let the entropy of cohabitation take over, swallow our passion, even though that leaves us stranded on the plains of lukewarm love. But it is so worth it to take a stand for legacy love, the kind of closeness and turn on that get deeper year after year. So now you have a choice to make. Do you want to stay in that cycle of ambivalence about time together, never quite getting enough of it to really feel connected and vibrantly alive? Or are you ready to break through the obstacles to spending more intensive time together and cultivate the kind of love you really deserve? Let's go address just one obstacle to more time together experiment just a little bit this week and then build from there so that you can give and receive more joy, more pleasure, and more care. You deserve it. Your family deserves it, and the world deserves you and your partner to be the supercharged, fully alive people that you can be when you really make those investments in your connection. I can't wait to hear what you discover. I'd love to hear what you're taking away from this episode and what questions you have. Where do you feel this conversation in your body? My free Conscious Couples Circle is the place to continue our conversation. You can share your experiences, ask questions, and get more actionable ideas for creating the love and sex you deeply desire in ways that evolve you both. It's all happening@society.lizenberry.com that link is in the show Notes for you. You know, new listeners need to hear what you're taking away too. Podcast reviews are what really help others recognize how this podcast is different from other relationship and sex podcasts. So thank you in advance for leaving a review right now in your podcasting app while you're thinking of it. Before you forget for just a few words about what this should show gives you. And hey, have you subscribed to the podcast? You're going to want to so you never miss an episode. Please go to the app where you listen, hit that subscribe button and then you'll always get notifications of new episodes when they drop. Thank you so much for listening. I'm Michelle Lizenberry Christensen and this has been Sex Love Power. I will see you on the next episode and until then, may the light within you illuminate the world around you.