Rebeccah Silence, a national marriage and family specialist, delivers a motivational talk on relationship dissatisfaction. She argues that couples are often dissatisfied not primarily because their partner is flawed but because they have "lost themselves"—becoming enmeshed (codependence: one+one=one). She proposes an alternative model (one+one=three) that preserves individual identity while nurturing the relationship, offers practical steps (journal prompts about an independent vision, taking ownership of satisfaction, choosing to "go all in" first), references ~15 years of experience, and ends with a CTA offering a free self-care masterclass at rebeccasilence.com/spa-day with code "self care."
Questions this video answers
rebeccasilence.com/spa-day
self care
Approximately 15 years
What is your satisfaction, success rate? How satisfied are you in your life? How satisfied are you in your relationship? How satisfied are you being a parent at work with your relationship to your health, with your relationship to your body, to your spirit, to your finances, to your sexuality? We could go on and on and on. But I want us thinking about how satisfied we are not to get more discouraged, but to quantum leap ourselves into even more satisfaction. If you haven't met me before, I'm Rebecca Silence, national marriage and Family Specialist. And the number one reason why couples come to me is because of how extremely dissatisfied they are. But here's the myth that nobody talks about. We're not dissatisfied in our relationship in particular, because our spouse sucks. Let me just say that one more time. We're not dissatisfied in our marriages because our spouse sucks. We're dissatisfied because we have lost ourselves. And we don't like ourselves. We don't like who we're being. We don't like how we're showing up. We don't like that we're not as open and as honest or as free or as independent as we were in the beginning of the relationship. Right? And it's not cookie cutter. I'm just sharing some ideas, planting some seeds for you to connect to what resonates and what's true for you. But the thing is, I haven't ever met a couple that was fully satisfied, and I haven't met a couple that was dissatisfied that wasn't blaming their dissatisfaction on their partner. And the thing is, yes, maybe your partner is behaving badly. Maybe your partner is emotionally unavailable, or there are secrets or there are lies, or there's been infidelity, or there's been heartbreak, betrayal, devastation. But if you're not satisfied, guaranteed you've lost you somewhere along the way. And the good news here is that can be reinvented. Just like that, babe. Just like that. You can get back to, at the very least, a belief that relationship doesn't mean you're limited. Relationship doesn't mean you're trapped. But most of all, relationship doesn't mean you can't be the best of yourself or the truth of who you are. Independent and identifying as the you you want to be, you can be free and have your relationship. Let me just say that one more time. You can be free and have your relationship. I promise. I've worked with so many couples over the last 15 years helping them understand just this. So I'm gonna give you a satisfaction model for your relationship to play with this week and to practice and to flirt with and to consider. All right, it's three pieces. The model looks like this one plus one equals three. There's me, there's you, there's us. Now, this model, it does not only apply to your marriage, it's to your relationship with your children. It's to your relationship with your team. It's to your relationship with your best friend, even with acquaintances, any relationship. When we use this 1/1 equals 3 remodel, you guarantee that you never lose yourself in that relationship. And instead, you're anchored in alignment, unwaveringly committed to you experiencing the best life has to offer, and to you, committed to being the best version of you possible in this scenario. So again, when you follow this one plus one equals three model, you guarantee satisfaction within yourself. It doesn't mean the other person's behavior will be satisfactory. It doesn't mean that life in its circumstances will be satisfactory. But you can be satisfied because you know love, trust and honor. You and your right to independence and freedom in the relationship, no matter what. What gets us in that position where we get willing, whether we mean to or not, whether it's conscious or not, to lose ourselves and abandon ourselves in the name of love is the model of codependence, which is just very simply the model of one plus one equals one. There's me, there's you, there's us, and we just all become enmeshed. And there is no more me, and there is no more you. And there's just the relationship. And it grabs you like a tidal wave and takes you out into the sea, never to be seen or heard from again. Right? That's the codependence model. One plus one equals one. No more me, no more you. Just this relationship that has us both losing ourselves in the name of love. I hope the way I'm describing this you can see there's never a benefit to giving yourself up in the name of love, ever, ever. Never ever, ever, never ever. And I know these are big, absolute terms, but just one more time, hear me and let this hit your heart. There's never a benefit to losing or abandoning yourself in the name of love for any relationship, for anyone, for any reason. So instead, let's go back to our one plus one equals three satisfaction in relationships. Model me. This is my job. This is my responsibility. This is my greatest gift I can give myself, taking ownership over my right to be in charge of and in control over who I'm being and how I'm being and how I'm experiencing life again, no matter What? So a couple of great things to consider. Write About Journal About 1. What's my independent vision for my life now? What do I want? What do I want to create? What do I want to experience? How do I want to experience myself and my life? And what do I want to do in this next chapter, in this next season? And as what version of myself? I am responsible for my happiness. I am responsible for my satisfaction. And when I'm unhappy or dissatisfied, I gotta turn the volume up more on what I'm choosing, how I'm operating, what I'm expecting. We could go on and on, but it's your job to take ownership and responsibility over you and, and where your energy is going and where your energy is flowing. And then it's your job to get completely off of what's the other person doing. It's their job to have a vision for their life. It's their job to be responsible for the choices they're making for their behavior, for their alignment, their satisfaction or lack thereof. It is truly not your job to help anyone figure out what they're doing with their life. It's your job to know what you're doing with yours and to be the person you can be proud of in any and all moments. Then there's the relationship, part three. Okay, that's for both of you to nurture. But it's your job to go 100% all in in who you're being for that relationship. It's your job to go 100% all in in who you're being for that relationship. Now, the more you've practiced nurturing yourself as an independent individual who is so deserving of all the good in the world and all the best that your relationship in your life have to offer you, the more you attract people that committed as well. That's how you get reciprocal relationships built on reciprocity, right? But what most people do is they wait for the other person to behave better so that they can show up as their best. They wait for the other person to commit more to the relationship and then they'll go all in. But what I want you to do today, if you're brave and courageous and willing to quantum leap yourself so that you never feel abandoned in your relationships or dissatisfied ever again, is I want you to go, all right, I raise my hand. It's my job to take on my satisfaction in my own life, my ability to be independently satisfied with myself, with my life. That's my job. I take it on. And it's my job to be the best partner I can be and the partner I want to be before I feel like the other person deserves it. Just start here. Reach out to me if you're ready for unmatched support in your relationship and in your relationship with how satisfied you are in your life and in your marriage in particular. And I've got a free gift for you. Go to rebeccasilence.com spa day, put in the code self care and give yourself a master class that I gift all my couples after they do my two day couples intensive work with me to kickstart the self healing into more satisfaction journey. I'm going to gift you this course today. Rebecca Silence Forward slash Spa day. It's not a spa day for your body. It's not about more healthy eating and sleep and hydration. Even though all that's beautiful. It's self care for your soul babe. Go get it. I will see you soon. Reach out. You deserve to be independent and satisfied and free and have love. Talk to you soon.
