Good Life Project - How to Be Fully You in a Relationship | Mark Groves & Kylie McBeath

Episode Date: April 15, 2024

Are you ready to break free from codependent patterns and create authentic connection? Mark Groves and Kylie McBeath share transformative insights from their new book, Liberated Love: Release Codependent Patterns and Create the Love You Desire on how to heal attachment wounds, set boundaries, and communicate openly to find freedom in your relationships. Learn why we conform to societal expectations, how to tap into your body's wisdom, and steps for becoming interdependent without losing yourself. Whether you struggle with anxious attachment, avoidance, or simply desire more fulfillment, Mark and Kylie provide practical tools to stop abandoning yourself, speak your truth, and manifest the healthy, conscious love you desire. Get ready to transform not just your relationships, but your whole life.You can find Mark & Kylie at: Website | Mark's Instagram | Kylie's Instagram | The Mark Groves Podcast | Episode TranscriptIf you LOVED this episode you’ll also love the conversations we had with Julie & John Gottman about sustaining love in long-term relationships.Check out our offerings & partners: My New Book SparkedMy New Podcast SPARKED. Visit Our Sponsor Page For Great Resources & Discount Codes Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's not that great couples don't fight. It's that they just fight differently. They actually fight in a way where the conflict is resolving something that is alchemizing or merging two worlds into creating something separate. And that's why a third perspective is always more brilliant when created from two separate ones. Listen, frictions are going to come up always and forever, hopefully. But it's like we turn towards those and we allow those frictions

to invite in deeper parts of ourselves that we maybe haven't yet met or touched or examined in relationships so that they can have a seat at the table too. Yeah. It makes me think of the quote from Harville Hendricks and Helen Hunt, where they say that you're born in relationship, you're wounded in relationship and you heal in relationship. So have you ever felt trapped in a relationship that just wasn't serving you? Kind of like you were conforming to someone else's expectations of who you should be instead of embracing who you actually are, or maybe just wanting to be accepted so badly that you'd give up a part of yourself to make it happen. Most of us have been there at some point. We adapt and contort

ourselves to fit an ideal that was never meant for us in the first place. But what if it didn't have to be that way? What if being utterly you, loving freely and openly, and seeing your relationship as not only a place of deep connection, but a place for safety and healing was the secret to finding true connection, not hiding, but actually being completely openly you. My guests today, Mark Rose and Kylie Macbeth, believe it is. In their new book, Liberated Love, Release Codependent Patterns and Create the Love You Desire, as a human connection specialist and founder of Create the Love, Mark has guided countless people in improving their most important relationships. and Kylie,

host of the Journey Home podcast, shares her wisdom on spirituality and self-empowerment. Together, they have distilled their combined expertise into this practical guide for finding freedom to be yourself within your relationships instead of freedom from them. It begins with understanding where codependent behavior originates and how to heal it. From there, Mark and Kylie offer some really powerful tools and insights for setting boundaries, improving communication, and ultimately liberating the truest version of yourself. So excited to share this conversation with you. I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is Good Life Project. Y'all need a pilot? Flight Risk. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever.

It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series 10, available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required. Charge time and

actual results will vary. Before we sort of like dive into the topic of liberated love and all the different aspects of it, which is the name of your book as well. A little bit of a life update. You know, I feel like it hasn't been that long since we connected, but there's been a lot that has unfolded and changed, not just in the world, but in your lives individually and together. Paint a picture for me. Oh my gosh. Since the last time we've had a baby.

So that's, we got married. We had a baby and a son named Jasper who just turned over a year. He's now almost 13 months old. And so that was one of the biggest, and of course, writing a book in that time, which writing a book was great preparation to having a baby, which I never would have thought of that being a, but you know, two worlds, two lenses, two creative processes. That was really profound experience of preparation, but having a son was witnessing my wife give birth was one of the most transformative experiences I've ever had. Yeah. To say the least. Birth and pregnancy and preconception. I mean, the whole journey of the last three years has just been, yeah, centered around creation and bringing life to the question, like what really matters, what matters most and how do I want to steward life and consciousness in a good way? And how do we do that in this world at this

time? It's a question that keeps me up at night for sure of like, okay, wow, we, we brought life into this world at this time. And yeah, there's a responsibility to that. And there's a responsibility that I feel really strongly for supporting our son to be able to stay connected to his own innate instinctual knowing so that he can live centered, grounded, and connected in this world. So my whole life orients around, yeah, mother now, which has been such a beautiful blessing to be able to, yeah, walk through that portal with Mark and now live into that day by day. Yeah, it is a transformation for sure. I remember for me, it was the moment I realized that for the rest of my days, I would never

be my own first impulse. You know, it was always going to be in service of, and of course I have selfish moments and we all want stuff for ourselves too, but it's, you're never first in line anymore. And it can be a little bit jarring, you know, to adapt to that. But once you just kind of own it and say like,

oh yeah, like this is the nature of the way things have changed. It's incredibly freeing also. I don't know whether you've experienced that. Oh, absolutely. It's been the most liberating containment I've ever experienced, which is so opposite to how I would have oriented to the loss of independence or me being first in my early twenties or even in my late twenties.

I'm so grateful that I went through so much before I gave birth and felt really clear and coherent in that decision where I knew going in that I'm, my life is going to change and my priorities will shift and I will no longer be number one. It's almost like I had to get all of that out of my system, if you will. So it wasn't as jarring for me just like initially, I'd say. I think because of the conversations I've been having regarding bringing life into the world for a very long time. Like I didn't take that lightly. It felt really, yeah, it felt really big. Yeah. I think having our kid when I was 44, that I lived a lot of life without that priority of other, I mean, we got a dog and that was the first part of, you know, I got him when we had

broken up. I had got him at that time. And I remember thinking like, oh, I can't just like travel now. I can't do all these things. But there was a beautiful aspect of that that my life was about. Not that I wasn't empathic or compassionate to other people, but it was like, oh, it's not about me only. And now having a son, what I've accessed that like through the work that I've done has always been a sense of accountability to like my integrity. What what matters to me, what I what I say, is it that it is aligned with what I do and what I do is me, what I say, that it is aligned with what I do, and what I do is aligned with what I say. But having a son has really amplified the responsibility of being in alignment with where actions and words matter. Because not only will he repeat everything, a lot of the things I say, which isn't always going to be good, but he's going to be witnessing,

is my father someone who keeps his word, who's reliable, who, who actually lives the values that he talks about. Yeah. And as every parent learns pretty quickly, it really doesn't matter what you say. Kids are watching every moment, even when you think they're not, and they're picking up on it. And it's all about the behavior that you model it's like and if there's a disconnect between the words you say and the behavior modeling it's a little bit scrambling and you get called on it pretty quickly either either because the kids like when they're actually able to like calls you on it or they manifest behavior which is not the behavior that

you hope to be like like transmitting and you're you're like, Hmm, where'd this come from? Right. But you get it either way. You basically, at the same time of, of bringing a child into the world, also birth a book, which is oddly for many authors and nine month process as well. I don't know how long it took for, for you to do it. Yeah. That was pretty much, yeah, nine to 10 months is what our timeline was. Yeah, it tends to overlap in a lot of interesting ways. And the name of the book is Liberated Love. And Kylie used the word liberated a couple of times when we were just

talking. So when you use the phrase liberated love, what are we actually talking about here? It's to be liberated and love is to be able to be all of who you are and bring all of who you are into relationship. Your needs, your desires, your emotions, your soul, your internal world out into the external world. And I think to kind of get to how or what does that actually require of one. And for us in this book and also our personal journeys is to be able to even access that level of authenticity or liberation in self. We need to have a strong inner foundation of self-trust, of self-competency, of like, I know that no matter what, I've got my own back and I can resource in ways that allow me to show up authentically in my relational dynamics. You want to expand on that?

Yeah, I think you nailed it. It's like, can this relationship be a place where we use the frictions that we have, the challenges that we have, the things you witness in me that you think I could get better at. I think of my relationships in my early 20s, I did not orient to feedback from my partners from a place of like, thank you so much for offering me this opportunity to be better at relationship. But you know, through the experience of our relationship and the work that we both do independently and together, it was like, oh, this is the material. Like, this is stuff that's being asked to get cleared so we can actually just go deeper, find deeper intimacy, build deeper trust. And, you know, ironically, so many of us leave our relationship and then do everything that we wanted to do. And we start to

pursue our dreams or we don't become all of ourselves in our relationship we don't use the possibility of two people and you know and families and and i guess polyamorous too they can they can add a few extra to that soup but it's like we don't use the possibilities of the two people standing shoulder to shoulder looking at the world, you're stronger. You have more diverse views. You have the power of two perspectives. And Liberated Love is about really celebrating that and really using that in a way that's productive for both people and ultimately a real fierce dedication to telling the truth. Because so many family systems and relationships are about avoiding the truth. And that really is what produces so many of our challenging behaviors as adults,

where we want to release ourselves from, you know, as the book we talked about releasing codependent patterns that we really want to let go of these adaptive strategies, heal them and actually turn towards what's real. Yeah. And I want to dive into the notion of codependency because I think this is a phrase that we've seen thrown around in movies and sitcoms, in countless books. And I think there's a whole bunch of confusion, what it is, what isn't, why it matters. Is it a good thing, a bad thing? Is it a fake thing, a real thing? But before we get there, the way that you're sort of describing relationships as these containers for the full self-expression and liberation of the individual within the context

of a relationship, how does that square with the idea of soulmates? Soulmates. Soulmates is such an interesting concept because I think, you know, having been on social media teaching this stuff for so long, soulmates, twin flame, you know, all the all the things. I mean, I know someone who believes their twin flame is someone who's in another relationship, but they have great connection. You know, so I think words like soulmate and twin flame can be ways that we stay locked in dynamics that are maybe not productive or helpful or or they're not actually the other person isn't even interested in working through things with us. I think the word soulmate is also a concept that's very scarce minded in that there's only one person that we can be with. And so I'm going to relate in a way that this is the only person.

And so, you know, we might give someone the title, like I met my soulmate after a couple of dates, which, you know, I think the better thing to do is allow someone to become that, allow someone to earn the place of being the one. And so the concept here, I think how those can bump up against each other or compliment one another is that really my belief is that a soulmate is someone who's inviting you to heal something, to actually, it could be the is someone who's inviting you to heal something. It could be the person that doesn't choose you, that actually invites you to recognize that you have a pattern, that you pursue people that don't choose you. And so you finally choose yourself.

And so it's actually in the saying goodbye that your trust within yourself is born in healing, probably from some pretty long family pattern lineage. Like you're probably not the first person who did that in your family system. And so I really think of it more from that place, you know, that it's someone who's really inviting you to meet your soul and to really give birth to your soul, to the fullest self-expression of whatever that means for somebody. What do you think? Yeah, I think we can have many soulmates on this path. Absolutely. People that bring us closer to what is real, what is alive, what is true in our beings. I know that for me, yeah, I love that, Mark. Like, there's not just one person out there for me. There's many.

And there's many soulmates that are here to activate certain lessons for each of us in our own soul's path. So not living in the, there's just one has been for me personally has been really supportive and being able to stay anchored in what it is that I know I want and desire in relationship. And also in the clients I work with is it creates more space and flexibility instead of just collapsing. Oh, this is the one and only. And it's like, well, no, there's many fish in the sea. Absolutely. And there's many fish in the sea for you. Well, so many of us don't bring a lot of what we truly feel to relationship because we're afraid it will end the relationship. And operating from this fear where in society we really have created a hierarchy based on relational status so if you're married you're doing better than someone who's engaged you're

doing better than someone who's dating you're doing better than someone who's single and god forbid you're divorced right so it's like we've given this idea that the being in a relationship somehow validates your worth that oh you're you're still single. You didn't bring anyone to Christmas this year. Like there's this idea that you have an ailment if you're single. And so if someone isn't choosing you, then there's no evidence yet that you're worthy of being chosen. What this does though, is it has us stay in relationships because maybe culturally too, or religiously, it could be many things. There's shaming against relational endings. So I say all that because we avoid the very conversations that might end them, but those are actually the conversations that deepen them. Because what happens is the relationship

becomes this place that says, we actually honor the truth first. And I'm not going to put your experience of the truth ahead of the truth, because that's, you know, at the basis of that is me trying to protect you from reality. And that's not helpful in any way relationally. I mean, it's interesting the way you're describing it. You're almost like describing that there are two acknowledged people or maybe more in the particular relationship. But there's almost like these silent players. There's truth and delusion that have a seat at the table at the same time. You're constantly doing this dance, like who gets the potatoes passed to them at a given moment in time.

Yeah. I think that kind of brings us back to this notion of codependency also, which you talk about in a number of different contexts, especially earlier in the book, kind of take me into this concept a little bit and what it is and where it comes from and why this actually matters in the context of this thing that we're calling liberated love. Yeah, absolutely. I think for the listeners and for us and how we define codependency, our book is codependency is any relational dynamic where we source safety or security from someone or something outside of ourselves at the expense of our well-being, our needs, and our wholeness. And the key words, Jonathan, are at the expense of,

right? Because of course we're humans, we have needs, and we are designed to meet these needs in various of ways. It's when they become at the expense of our well-being and our wholeness that codependency starts to emerge. And the imprints of codependency start at a very, very, very young age. So for example, you're a little baby and you come into this world, you're a hundred percent dependent on your mother or primary caregiver to meet all of your needs. That's just the design. And let's just say mom is overwhelmed, under resourced, is struggling herself to stay regulated because it's a lot. The baby in that inconsistent environment learns, okay, I need to separate from me and start to orient my consciousness around

mother and constantly ask and live by these questions like, mom, are you okay? How can I support you? Mom, what can I do? How can I make sure that you're okay so that I'm okay? And this happens through various ruptures in an early family system. This can happen because of birth trauma. I mean, there's so many different angles to look at why there's ruptures in these core attachments with mother. And we go through that in the book in a more detailed, but essentially it's where we try to control the external environment as a way to make sure that we feel okay, because we actually don't feel okay in our own bodies, because we haven't gained enough of a infrastructure to self-regulate based off of co-regulation.

So in order to self-regulate and be able to regulate our nervous systems, we've needed other people, adults, who are regulated to co-regulate and be able to regulate our nervous systems, we've needed other people, adults, who are regulated to co-regulate with. And when we have insufficient co-regulation in early childhood, we lack the infrastructure we need to be able to handle the ebbs and flows of life, which allows codependency to really creep in. Nailed it. So at some point, what's interesting, because you made a really distinct clarification, like when you sort of shared your definition of it, which is, which almost like I translate and tell me if I heard this right or not, is like, there's a functional version of dependence or interdependence, but it has the ability to sort of like tip into this land where it becomes dysfunctional and harmful.

And I would imagine that, you know, a lot of our lives we're doing this dance between, you know, like, how do I lean on somebody? How do I depend on them? How do I want from them and make myself available for this in the same way to them, but not tip into this place of at, you know, with some cost associated with my own humanity. Yeah. So easy to do too, really. Like that's the dance of recognizing where you end and other people begin and where your needs and wants are in the relationship that we create space for, not just our own needs and wants, but also for the other persons. And really from like, what is the greatest struggle people experience in relationship is like, how do I hold on to me and be in relationship with you? Most of us abandon

ourselves for the relationship or even abandon relationship for the self. So how do we stay in that center space between where it's a constant dance? And that's why I think relationship is such a powerful vehicle. Like we could have this in relationship to so many different people, different dynamics, but romantic relationships really offer this magnifying glass and amplification. I think the frequency of the touch points of what we need to do better or could do better in relationship or just, they're just,

we also seem to find a deep motivation for love. We don't have the same motivation for other things, but love, we have a motivation that's like, I really actually do want to get this right. And regardless of whatever template we have, like Kai was speaking to you about, let's say the relationship as an infant with a mother, we can learn how to create, you know, what are called like secure attachment. We can learn how to operate interdependently. We can learn these things. These are not, you know, things that are just for quote unquote lucky people. These are like actual skill sets.

And once we recognize that, we start to see that relationships actually were not meant to feel the way that we often think they have to be, or this is just my destiny. And it's like, no, what do you desire? Let's create that. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you eight hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X,

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Because part of what you're describing is it's hard to be in a relationship a really healthy functional loving open relationship that's positive without doing the work to really know yourself as individuals at the same time but at the same time this goes back to a conversation i had years ago with stan tatkin this this relationship therapist, who's like, everybody thinks that we know ourselves by going into ourselves, by contemplation, by self-study, by therapy. He's like, that's actually not how it works. We know ourselves through relationship with others. The best way that we actually have to get to know ourselves is in relationship with others, which is counterintuitive in a lot of different ways. So it's almost like you want to show up in a relationship fully as yourself. Like I know who I am. I know all these different things

about myself. And yet we need relationships to let us know who we are. Not entirely. Like there's a lot of personal work that we can do in introspection and meditation and therapy, but it's the relationship or the existence of like a series of relationships over time. If you're really like drop into them and try and be aware and learn from them and grow from them, like that's part of the mechanism that we rely on to actually figure out who we are as individuals. So it's a little bit of a weird catch 22, isn't it? It is. Yeah, absolutely. Learning through the mirror of other. This is life, right?

All of life is relationship and not just romantic, but like, who am I in the mirror of my mother and my father and my matrilineal line? All of these different mirrors to really understand who we are and where we come from and what is all of this about. And I think the beautiful thing about the way I see this conversation in terms of bringing all of who we are is I don't know all of who I am. And that's the beautiful thing about this mystery. Like we're still discovering communication and the openness and the dialogue that we get to have in relationship so that when something does come up, because listen, frictions to invite in deeper parts of ourselves that we maybe haven't yet met or touched or examined in relationships so that they can have a seat at the table too. So I really love that you bring that point forward of we never know who we are all period, full stop. And that's the beauty of relationship is as we continue to walk this path, can we bring more of that into the dynamic for us to explore

together? And that's one of the key tenets of liberated love is like all of who we are is met with reverence. Yeah. It makes me think of the quote from Harville Hendricks and Helen Hunt, where they say that you're born in relationship, you're wounded in relationship and you heal in relationship. So, you know, as you're saying, it's you, we actually require it. And to, you know, we might be single and doing the work, quote unquote, and then we get into a relationship, we start dating and we're like, oh my gosh, like I thought I had this stuff figured out. And it's like, this is the figuring it out. This is, you know, it's this idea that you're going to get to this place where there's no longer a trigger. It's like, well, the trigger is actually just a radar.

It's like what you do with it that matters. You know, it's not that great couples don't fight. It's that they just fight differently. They actually fight in a way where the conflict is resolving something that is alchemizing or merging two worlds into creating something separate and that's why like a third perspective is is always more brilliant when created from from two separate ones and part of what we're talking about also here is and you guys mentioned this is the notion of attachment styles because like we all based on how we were raised and a whole bunch of other things you write about this you know the mother threshold. It's just innate things that shape us

in the way that we feel safely or securely or that we all have attachment styles by the time we become adults, probably a lot earlier than that, actually. But many of us have no self-awareness of what those styles are and how they affect us and how they affect how we show up and whether they're

healthy or not, whether they're helping us or really destructive individually and like in a relationship. And it's really hard to tease out what those styles are. If they're not being triggered in some way by being in a relationship with somebody else, like it's really hard to just think, what is my style? You know, like, let me run some scenarios in my head. I mean, am I just making that up? Or just have you seen that in sort of in practice? Yeah, 100%. I always think of attachment,

which is such a beautiful framework for us understanding how we relate to other people. And it's a way of systemizing like our behaviors, you know, ultimately, when, like, how do we deal with insecurity? How do we deal with an unreliable person or someone who's breaking our trust? And I think about the different attachment styles from really how we relate to space between us and other people. So really anxious attachment style for you listening or watching it's, it's someone who's more pursuant someone who you might be more drawn to unavailability but like there's an inability to be with too much space between you and the

other person so you try to actually break down the space from a nervous system perspective kai was touching on that before there's an inability to self-regulate so to like be with the uncertainty the anxieties like where do I fit? That kind of question is always being asked by us. Really two questions are always being asked by us. Is this relationship safe? And that's every relationship we're in. It doesn't matter the context. And the second question is, am I safe to be myself? And ultimately we will compromise number two for number one always. So if like being myself compromises the relationship, I'll compromise who I am in order to keep the connection.

The avoidance style is really more of a distancing. So it's like I'm actually afraid of closeness. So I keep space between me and other. And secure, I mean, we dive deep into all the different attachment styles in the book. I think it is a really powerful framework and it is necessary to have another person in order to get that because I would say we are definitely, we can feel very secure when we're not having to deal with anybody else. I think anyone can relate to that. You're like, I'm so good at being single. I meet people all the time and we're like, I'm not dating ever again.

Like I'm not dating ever again because relationships, they're just too much work, too much this, too much that. And I respect everyone's perspective, but I think ultimately pretending that, which would be more of an avoidance style, but pretending that I just don't need relationships or need other people is really just because we fear the closeness. We fear what might happen if we get near people, if we need them. And so we still haven't learned the skill set to be able to, one, manage our needs in relationship to others, but also how to pick people who are open to learning how to relate differently. So how do we?

How do we pick different people? Yeah. Because you talk about that as a skill set, a learnable set of skills. Where do we start with that? Like if somebody is listening to this and they're like, I have blasted my way through a series of relationships over a period of years or decades

and I still haven't really figured this thing out. Like what is that opening skill set that allows us to step into the process of finding a new relationship without hopefully just repeating the same pattern? Like, like just hitting, you know, hitting that like spin cycle where it just, the same things keep unfolding over and over. Like, what are the core strategies or skills here that we want as we step into or we want to start to step into a relationship, but have it unfold differently than it has in the past? Well, I'll start with that. You know, in the book, we cover your relationship blueprint,

which is really like, where does it all come from? Like, why do you do what you do? And the reason that is so important is it adds context to our behavior. So if I'm someone who's repeating the same patterns, dating the same type of people, I might have shame associated with that. Like, why do I keep picking these types of people and everyone else is seems to be so happy. And it's like, well, I'll hear people say a lot, something like, I can't believe I do this, or I can't believe I did that. And it's like, well, that's actually the exact behavior that you learned that was necessary to get you where you are today. So the things we learn to function in our family systems and to be in relationship are

actually evolutionarily the perfect behavior. They might not be healthy or functional as an adult, but it's important to have compassion for the things even that we're ashamed of that get us to where we are. And, you know, in the book, we set it up also telling the narrative of our own relationship as well as client stories. But relationship 1.0, the sacred pause, and then relationship 2.0. And the journey of understanding attachment style is nervous system. Relationship blueprint is part of that first part. But the sacred pause is really about coming back

to who you are who are you really what do you want to create yeah and it's you know we use the in the chapter it's the liberation through limitation and it's this conscious choice to create a container for a set period of time to stop dating altogether is is the example i'm going to give in this because it's the example I walked where I kept finding myself in these codependent dynamics and I couldn't understand what was in the way. Why do I keep attracting this? Why do I keep finding myself in the same spot where I'm disconnected from my voice, from who I am, and I feel helpless? And luckily, I've met a few guides on my path. And one of them is Mark

Wolin, who's the author of It Didn't Start With You. And he looks at family constellation therapy. So looking at intergenerational patterns and how they kind of play out in your relationships. And he said to me on a call, he was like, listen, he's like, what you need to do is you need to enter into a conscious container where you remove men from your life for a specific amount of time. And for me, I was like, do I really need to do that work? And he said, point blank, and I love mentors and elders who just look at you and they're like, all right, if you don't do this work, I'm going to have the same conversation with you in two years. And nothing scares me more than being in the same conversation, in the same pattern, in the same wound for an extended period of time. And at that point in my life, I was like, I was completely over codependency and finding myself in these dynamics. So I entered into a conscious container

where for three months, I set a container and it was like, I'm not going to seek, date, search, reach out to Mark. Like I was going to completely remove men from my life. And I was completely shook with how much activation came up in my nervous system when I chose to step into that container. I did not know that I was terrified to be alone in the ways that my nervous system was then expressing as I made the conscious choice. I didn't know that I was utilizing my relationships to men and the seeking and the connecting with to really source so much of my safety and security and validation and really understanding my own existence. And really, man had become mother for me. It was like everything I was searching for mother, I just projected onto man.

And I wanted man to meet all of the needs that my mother didn't in early childhood. And this container allowed me to release men from needing to do that, but also for me to come back to my own inner child and come back to do this nervous system work that I needed to do so that I could relate differently in relationships moving forward because they were outside of my conscious awareness. I didn't know they were actually driving every single decision I made until I actually stopped and removed the decision altogether. So by consciously removing something, I was able to go look under the hood and be like, oh, this part of me that's terrified to be alone,

that's terrified to step into agency, that's terrified to step into anger, that's terrified to step into all of these pieces, these are the parts I need to be with in order to actually shift my relational dynamics. How do you know when it's time for that container to end and you're ready to shift back into relational mode? Because I would imagine, okay, so you take this time, let's just say I'm going to do it for three months. And I would imagine some people a month

in are just, they're feeling all the feels and everything that you're talking about. And they're like, I'm good. I figured it out. I really, boom. You know, like the lightning bolts have come. I'm ready. And then some people are going to be six months into this or a year into it. And they're going to be like, it's just not coming. Like the insights aren't coming.

I'm just, I'm getting lonelier and lonelier. I've like created this container. Like, and I'm not, I don't feel any better or any different or any wiser or any more ready to step back into relationship with other people. So my curiosity is like, how do you know when it's time to step out of the would place back into people's hands in terms of really attuning with their own bodies, their own path and asking questions of like, is it time for me to leave this container? Does it the first example you gave Jonathan. I'm like, oh, everything's great. I've got it all figured out and like, I'm doing really well. And then, yeah, I broke my container because a fear popped in and was like, you're going to lose him forever if you don't reach out. And so I did reach out and I broke my container, which, you know, for those listening or if they actually implement a container and you break it, it's like, this is actually where the juice is. This is where the work is. It's like, if you break the container, then you have

to really look at, okay, why did you break your own container, your word to self? And how can you double down on your devotion to what it is that you're doing right now? Like, what is your why for doing this work? And so for me, I had to double down on that devotion and actually go back into the container for a longer period of time because I wasn't ready. I wasn't ready to leave. And the reason I knew that is because somatically I could feel it. Like, I didn't feel well. Like, my body was communicating to me, it was like, this isn't the right time.

You need to go back into the container. So I am somebody who loves to invite my clients and the people. You need to go back into the container. So I am somebody who loves to invite my clients and the people I work with to tune back into their body and really start to live into these questions of how does it feel when, when I move out of the container, when I am complete and when I open up the dating app or I'm open to dating again, how does that feel in my body? Do I feel good about that decision? What would you say in addition to that? Well, I'd say usually, so like the idea of container is agreements, right? So the concept we present in the book is that you could be in a relationship and enter a sacred pause where

you're really just pausing the old way of being. And so you create an agreed upon time. You might, when you get to the end of, let's say, the three months, you might be like, do we want to extend this or do we want to now exit it? As Kai's saying, like really tuning back into self, I think the one thing I'll say is leaving the container early is almost, I would argue, almost always a fear of actually not being able to make it to the end. So if I'm talking to someone and they're saying, I'm going to take a three month break from dating, they'll inevitably want to break it. They'll inevitably the like perfect almost person will show up covered in

coconut oil. And they're just like, how do I not, you know, but it's actually that trust of enduring and making it through to the end of the agreed upon time that you build the capacity to know that when you are faced with relational choices, that you've got you first. And the reason why this is so pivotal, because I think you could stay too long and that long would be because we're actually avoiding reentering relationships. So there needs to be an internal sort of question of like, am I ready to date because I'm really excited to, and it's coming from an integrated place, or am I feeling a frenetic energy that I'm just trying to get rid of? But the real inquiry I think that people want to have is to be able to explore like when we're actually in that dating possibility and the dating world is it's like if my pattern is to say yes to unavailable people or to agree to, let's say, situationships or friends with benefits when I really want more. But that I actually entertain what is actually not a full yes till I actually know that I can say no to what is not a yes. My yes is not trustworthy or authentic.

And that's so key for people to recognize is you have to learn that because till you have access to a no, your yes is not a yes. So that's the agreements really that you're creating within whatever container you create are so imperative in that, like it's just those choices you make every day that really build the evidence that you're someone who keeps your word with yourself first. And as you were saying, you know, you don't even get to know yourself without these sort of experiences of being in relationship with the other.

And then you see how much you compromise yourself and what you desire and what you need and what you want, and that you've probably been doing it your whole life. I mean, it makes a lot of sense. And especially if you're really thoughtful, and I love the sort of description of a container as a set of agreements, you know, with yourself and potentially with others too, if it's sort of a shared container. But if you make it really clear what those agreements are upfront, then it becomes more clear when the desire to break those agreements arises rather than just kind of being, oh, I'm going to do this thing for a while and not being really crystal clear and really

articulate about what those are. And the notion of also feeling it in your body, I feel like it's so important. I feel like we're so disconnected from the wisdom of our bodies these days. We try to think answers through to everything. We intellectualize it. Let me get out the checklist here. Let me put it into AI these days. Am I done with the container? Rather than the notion of reconnecting to what our body's telling us, like our somatic sensibilities is so alien to so many people now, yet it contains so much of the wisdom and the answers that we seek and we just pretend it doesn't exist. So I love the invitation to also say, okay, so don't just wait for sort of like the checklist answers or like the rational conversation to sort of like to figure out, am I 80% there? Because at that point, I think now I'm good. But actually tune into what your body and what your physiology are telling you. Do you feel in the folks that you work with over time that there is this disconnect with somatic wisdom is a widespread thing. Oh gosh. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's so like, if we just look at

our culture in general, it's like so many of us are living disconnected and dysregulated. It kind of has just been the norm. Like, and not only that, but in the West, we've really honored the mind, the intellect, the rationale over the body or over instinct or intuition. And we've kind of suppressed those or created a pseudo hierarchy where it's like, we're going to disconnect from intellect, the rationale over the body or over instinct or intuition. And we've kind of suppressed those or created a pseudo hierarchy where it's like, we're going to disconnect from all of that or label it as woo or, you know, however culture has, you know, disconnected us from the bodies and from the neck down really. So what we see in a lot of our clients is, is so much of us are in this thawing process of really thawing our nervous systems out of freeze,

that freeze response that we talk about early on in the book of like, it wasn't safe for me to touch all of these emotions, to grieve, to be connected to my anger, to run when I wanted to run, to fight back when I wanted to fight back. And I've just had to be frozen. And it's hard to discern what's capital T truth for you when you're frozen. And so this is like a really tender process that so many of my clients walk through is like really allowing themselves to have the space to grieve and process and feel what has never been felt before. So that they can actually come back into right relationship with their intuition and instinct and live outside of just the mental realm. And so many, I'll say for, I'm going to speak generally for women here is there's so much self gaslighting because there's been so much external gaslighting of our intuition and instincts. And so we're like having to peel

back all of that, that all of that internalized shame and all that internalized repression and actually start to own that our bodies are wise, that our intuition has wisdom, that our instincts are there for a reason. And so I'm really grateful that a lot of people are doing this work to thaw and remember and restore that connection because I believe it's the only way forward for us as a species. Yeah, thaw is such an interesting word in that context. Because it's also, it's not like when your own nervous system is dysregulated and you're in that frozen state, oftentimes whoever you were in relationship with, that relationship becomes frozen as well. And the whole relationship needs to solve. Does that make sense? Oh yeah.

Yeah, it does. I mean, so many of us are in our adaptive strategy. So we're like two reactive people, you know, are the way we operate in conflict is usually a behavior pattern that we learned really young. And you can ask someone like, how old do you feel right now? And they'll be like eight, 12. Like we know where the, where where the the neural pathways were forged, like social media is all really appeals to the need

to regulate. It's like, I'm just going to keep going down this rabbit hole where there's literally thousands of behavioral scientists that are designing these products in order for me not to be with my own self. And I think for a lot of us, that's how do you not become addicted to something that is specifically designed to actually do that and i mean i don't the answer i guess is not get rid of smartphones but there's definitely an answer somewhere yeah there's some sort of uh i don't think anyone has figured out that answer yet like it's so intertwined with just the way that we live our lives now and also in a lot of great ways like right you know that our lives now and also in a lot of great ways. Right. You know, technology can be amazing in a lot of ways for relationships and for life. But, yeah, I think we're all grappling with the tug, you know, that's really persistent, intermittent reinforcement that just won't let us go. We'll be right back. The Apple Watch Series X.

Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone Xs are later required. Charge time and actual results will vary so curiosity here also you know you describe the sort of like the process of you know creating container liberation through limitation let me let me create this this sort of like set of limitations and agreements because i need this time to do the work and really self-reflect and maybe do some individual growing within it. And maybe you're in that container alone, but maybe you're in a relationship too.

And at some point you emerge from that container and hopefully somewhat different or at least wiser, at least knowing yourself better and then ready to step back into a relationship in a way where you're showing up, or at least maybe you're not even ready to show up more as that person who you now know yourself to be, but at least you know that person better. And then you step back into this relationship. And even if you haven't isolated yourself from it, maybe you're married for 20 years, and you decide we need to take this three-month window to really sort of create this experience. And then the window expires and you're sort of like,

we're stepping back into this. And my curiosity is, because I've seen this through sort of personal growth experiences and transformational programs where people are in a relationship and generally one person takes the lead in this process of growth and transformation. One person is generally more motivated, more curious about it, more open to actually doing the work and enduring the uncomfort that goes along with it. And oftentimes the other person's like, I see the benefit of this. I'll kind of go along for this ride. This could lead to some repositive. But oftentimes I've seen scenarios where it is really one person who's like all in, and the other person is kind of like yelling along for the ride.

And then that leads to very different end states, very different levels of individual growth and revelation and sometimes transformation. So when you emerge out of that container and one person is like very changed, the other person's kind of like, okay, I'm ready to sort of like just drop back into the way things were-ish, but maybe a little bit better. That can create some really powerful dynamics. I mean, you talk about this in the book on the context of reopening your heart, being seen in a new light after personal growth. Sometimes this can be powerful and amazing and, oh, wow, this is incredible. But sometimes if there's these unevenly distributed growth experiences, it can also lead to a lot of friction, can it? Yeah, I mean, 100%. And I'd say this would just be more fuel for the for the work more

material because you know when you have that dynamic when one person is the one who drives growth which i'd say if we're speaking heteronormatively that's usually the woman you know he's like i read this book i listened to this podcast like i want to do this i want to do that i remember interviewing harriet learner years ago and she said to me that the reason that women consume emotionally, you know, emotional intelligence, relational information is because the subordinate group always needs to learn the needs and nuances of the dominant group. So there's a survival based motivation. And women really are.

They initiate divorce more than men i think it's 70 after the age of 40 so it's like they're a much more accurate barometer of relational health and they have a lower tolerance for a lack of relational health this isn't you know necessarily i wouldn't say this is a bad thing but what happens when we enter that that let's say a married couple enters that three-month container is there is a recognition a calling forward of like i feel like i've been driving this i feel like i'm the one bringing the book i'm the one book and the things i'm the one who brought this book you know the person who is the over pursuer or the one who's you know the term

might be used is called over functioning is like, I'm doing everything is going to learn through, I mean, through our book, but through that experience of the container that they actually need to step back that, you know, early when Kylie and I were dating, I'm more prone to being anxious and Kylie, we were both, she was more prone to being avoidant and so i realized like how could she come towards me if i'm always taking up the space and so there was this real learning of me staying in my own lane me like inviting her forward and the container would create that like just through creating the agreements of a three-month container for a married couple

there is now we're both responsible for this. And the agreements that we come up with is like, that the other person has to come up with some things, has to like, they're also bringing their own agreements into the circumstances. So one person would start to get to regular functioning. And the other one, the terminology would be called under functioning. They would actually step in to becoming becoming driving more of the relational dynamic. Now, one of the things we talk about in the book for couples is that the intention, like,

let's say they're exploring the question, do we stay together or not? The purpose of the container is not to stay together. The purpose is to actually explore things and be open to like, when you get to the end of that container, first off, when you're beginning it, do you even want to enter it? Right? Because like, what are you going to do enter a container with someone who doesn't want to do it? So already, that's brought forward. But let's say we get to the end of it. We're like, is this relationship actually in as a romantic relationship in the highest service of both of us. These realities exist anyways.

As humans, we don't want to confront these realities. But it's actually through that truth that's being saying, like, this is what's real for me. And so many of us will never say that thing. We'll spend our whole lives in relationships without saying that thing. So I know that was a long way around the barn, but to say that the person who's over pursuing needs to start to take a step back because that would likely be the healing of a pattern. And the person who is not meeting at the same level is likely healing a pattern too. What do you think? Yeah. I've seen so many of my clients, and I work predominantly with women, 99% women, get really clear about what's not working and what they desire and bring that forward. And when they do that, when they trust in those desires enough and start to embody that self-trust that I'm going to bring what's in here out into the world, out into this relationship, it really catalyzes the other

partner. And sometimes it does end a relational ending. But what I've seen, which has been really fascinating, is it actually catalyzes the other person, their partners, to do the work necessary to meet them back, like in a full circle kind of way. Where it's like, I'm not going to tolerate this. And that no ignites their partner on their own personal journey to come back into a full yes. Very similar to us, but I keep seeing it in the work. And that obviously is a shorter term relational dynamic, not a long term like married. But at some point, like Mark's saying, we have to stop trying to fix, change, prod, heal our partners. Like we're not their mothers. Like at some point we release all of that energy and focus, like bring that back in on self and then start getting clear. Yes. On the agreements and also what it is that we desire in our relationships. And hopefully by bringing more of who we are in that truth into the relationship container, like it does allow us to get to the deeper truths of maybe I'm interested in that path or I'm not

interested in that path. Yeah. It's interesting when one person is constantly trying to fix and take care of other people and the origins of the terminology codependency really come from being in a relationship with an addict and that term popularized by Melody Beattie and her work. And so it's like the other person identifies as being a problem that needs to be solved, that they're never showing up enough. They're never, oh, I need to read another book. So their identity has to die of like, I'm broken and I need to be in relationship with someone who's going to constantly remind me of my brokenness. It's like when an addict finally gets sober, it's because the person says, like, usually you see these interventions,

right, where they say, we're no longer going to tolerate this, and we're not going to enable anymore, same idea. And the other person then gets sober, ideally. And then the people who were trying to get them to change have to get sober from the addiction of trying to get people to change. So it's like, if you need me, because you have something flawed or wrong with you, then you're going to keep me close, you're not going to leave me because you need me because you have something flawed or wrong with you, then you're going to keep me close. You're not going to leave me because you need me. And so both of those identities and adaptive strategies have to be loved and then let go for liberated love to thrive.

Yeah. It's that letting go part. You know, it's like, you did all the work. Like we did the healing, but now not quite, right? You know, it's sort of like this constant shedding process and rebirthing. It's like, you know, perpetual Phoenix to a certain extent. And you can look at that as terrifying and demoralizing, like quote, when will this ever end? Or you can look at it and say, well, how cool is that? Like I'm going to spend my entire life getting to know who I am.

We're going to spend our entire lives, God willing, getting to know each other. And that may change and shift over time. You know, it's funny. You were describing like a Harville Hendricks quote many, many, many, many years ago. I was at a workshop and as happened in those workshops, like a couple would get invited into the middle and there's a circle of like a hundred other people around there. And there's one couple, it stayed with me, got invited into the middle and they were an absolute emotional mess.

And basically saying like, this was, they tried everything else and they were there because this was their last shot. They were desperately trying to keep the relationship together. And what didn't come out of either of their mouths was, we want to know if this should stay. We want to know actually if this is, should we actually keep this together? The assumption was like, no, we have to. And I think that brings us back to another thing that you explore in the book, which is this, how often we allow the state of our relationships to be governed by societal norms and expectations, and the shame of not living up to those norms, even though within the context

of our own individual relationships, those norms could be brutalizing on a daily basis and completely inappropriate and damaging for us. Yet, we're so wrapped up in wanting to be seen in a certain way and not letting other people down who we want to see us in a to conform to cultural, societal, familial norms. You speak to this in a powerful way also. And I wonder what tools or questions we might ask to try and identify where's this coming from? The exploration, yeah. That's starting to tease out of like, why? I think even, is it Rumi who says, live the questions?

Right, like just even being open. If we're starting to even ask questions, we're already in a really beautiful beginning or continuation of an adventure. But I think the questions we would ask is, when we understand our family frameworks, then we will start to put pieces together. Like when we start to see the blueprint of how our mother or father showed up. different blind spots that we have that will help facilitate a lot of introspection, I think. But as you go on the adventure of discovering, like, where do things come from? You inevitably start to tease out who have I become in order to be loved? And is it stuff I want to keep? Like,

is this mine or is this culture? Like, I remember when I did my undergraduate degree in finance, I didn't do it because I loved finance. I never touched finance again after that. You know, I did it because that was the undergraduate degree I was taught was going to be the most reliable to become a good provider. Yeah, it reminds me of the questions in chapter two. It's like, what am I sourcing externally from someone or something at the expense of? And is this sustainable for me energetically, emotionally, physically, spiritually? It allows us to start to look at, okay, where am I sourcing externally? Like maybe that validation, that security, that safety, that love,

attention, that identity. And what's the cost of that to me right now? And is this sustainable for me? And is this working, right? Is this actually working? Yeah, where will my life be in one year, five years, 10 years, 20 years if I keep doing things the way I'm doing it? I think we don't take the time often. Like we have a whole chapter called Getting Right With Reality. And that being about this adventure of like really discovering like what is true that I don't want to acknowledge? What's true that or a feeling I've

had that I've never labeled? And so I think by doing that, you start to tease out, you know, the recognition that you, I always think back to that. And I know I said it already, but it's like, who do we become in order to maintain belonging? Like like who do we become in order to maintain belonging like who do we become in order to maintain love quote-unquote love because you know we're really inviting that self-abandonment in service of connection is not love yeah no that really resonates deeply you kind of come full circle in the book the conversation really starts out in a lot really diving into codependency and attachment styles, which we've talked about and how this affects our relationships and then cultural norms and how those external expectations affect us and how to create this

container where we can just create our own space to really like go deep and then see if we can grow and change and step back into relationship that way. But, you know, you also, you don't say we need to exist outside of culture. In fact, the opposite, at the end of the day, like this relationship, I think it was the title of one of the last chapters in the book, it takes a village, right? Classic line. There is a role for what would be called interdependence. And this thing, you describe building a golden net. And this is not about trying to isolate yourself from community or family or society or culture.

It's about really trying to understand who am I just in this smaller dynamic, but then how do I exist and get all the nourishing, amazing benefits of actually being a part of this bigger ecosystem also? Because we are like interdependence is kind of like where the greatest, the companion plants, the pollinators, like they need everything works symbiotically. And humans are the same way. We have just forgotten, you know, even just the cultural norms of like rugged individualism of like, you should be able to do it all on your own. And you're, you know, gold star for being self-reliant and all this stuff. And it's like self, self,

self, right? And it's like, no, actually that's not in service to our wellbeing. We need one another. And not only do we need other humans and sisterhood and brotherhood and family, blood and kin, but we also need, and this is where my work is heading is like, we need a deeper relationship with the earth, with the elements, with the plants, with the animals, like all of these ways that we can resource and be in mutual reciprocity with are things that I think humans have been severed from and we're returning to because we can't just rely on humans for everything. There's not that we can't, we can, of course, you know, have a diverse community of humans, but I think the invitation is deeper.

It feels deeper to me of like actually restoring our relationships with the whole circle of life to really tap into the magic of interdependence in the way that I see it and feel it in my body. Yeah, I think what you're speaking to is like when we see research that says forest bathing is good for you. And it's like, do we need research? Just go take your shoes off, your socks off and put your feet on the ground. Like take a big, deep breath and look out at a vista. You know, like look at the ocean, listen to the waves. Like all of these meditation sounds that we like put in our head that are nature you know you go to a spa and what do they have playing like birds torch you know

tweeting and stuff and it just tells you it's like that our nervous system is meant to be in those environments and we do need each other so it's not about not needing each other it's about creating a space where needs are honored and that there's not about not needing each other. It's about creating a space where needs are honored and that there's not a compromise of self. And I think that's, when I say compromise, I really mean the abandonment of self. Because compromise in a relationship, the difference between that and self-abandonment, is that compromise is in service of the connection of the community. But there's also a recognition of the loss. So there's not a like, oh, you had to give that up. It's like an actual recognition of the loss.

Yes. But that's the, we get to interdependence by walking through the fire of saying, this part of me matters, or this need matters, or this value matters enough so that we can even find the people who align with that on the other side, right? Yeah side. It's so much about trusting that there are people, there is that golden net available to us as we continue to live in integrity with our bodies, with our intuition, with our instincts,

and with who we are. Now that makes so much sense. It feels like a good place for us to come full circle as well. Mark, I've asked you this question before, but it's been a couple of years since. So I'm going to ask both of you in this container of good life project, if I offer up the phrase to live a good life, what comes up? Kylie? Oh my gosh. The first thing that comes to me is like, is to live simply connected with loved ones, the elements, the earth, and my heart and soul. Well, the last time I answered that question, I didn't have a son. So I would say to live a good life is to be with people you love. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Hey, before you leave, if you love this episode, say that you'll also love the conversation we had with Julie and John Gottman Thank you. Jonathan Fields, editing help by Alejandro Ramirez, Christopher Carter crafted our theme music and special thanks to Shelly Adele for her research on this episode. And of course, if you haven't already done so, please go ahead and follow Good Life Project in your favorite listening app. And if you found this conversation interesting or inspiring or valuable, and chances are you did since you're still listening here, Would you do me a personal favor, a seven second favor and share it maybe on social or by text or by email, even just with one person, just copy the link from the app you're

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