The Resilient Mind - Navigating Complex Relationships - Mel Robbins

Episode Date: February 12, 2025

Mel Robbins is an accomplished author, motivational speaker, former lawyer, and one of the most sought-after self-help experts in America. Her TEDx talk, "How to Stop Yourself Over," has been viewed over 25 million times and has helped millions of people around the world change their lives for the better.Learn More About Mel's training: Make It HappenTake action and strengthen your mind with The Resilient Mind Journal. Get your free digital copy today: ⁠⁠⁠⁠Download Now⁠⁠Special thanks to Lewis Howes, subscribe to his channel here: https://www.youtube.com/c/lewishowesWatch the full interview on Lewis's page: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgOE-5k0rvs&t=35s Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the Resilient Mind podcast. In this episode, you will be listening to navigating complex relationships with Mel Robbins. Get access to the Resilient Mind Journal by clicking the link in the show notes. Enjoy. No human beings perfect. Of course not. And we can all learn skills. Yes.

And so whose responsibility is it to create the relationship that you deserve? See, I think it's your responsibility. It's our responsibility. And the way that you do it is you allow something. You let them be who they are. And then you come back to yourself and anything that's annoying you or frustrating you or that you're ripe into your friends about whether it's work or it's a friendship or your parents or whatever. That's the let me part. Yes.

Let me either stop bitching about this because that's the only way that you know how you accept it. Accept them. Yeah. Right? Stop complaining. Or let me sit down and be the emotionally mature one and make the request. So Chris has done this with me. So I'll play this out this way.

So, you know, you're good friends with my husband, Chris, and you know Chris. He's like Mr. Men's Retreat, Def Dula, Zen, amazing man. And I, you know, if you go into our bathroom, Lewis, Chris's counter. Clean. Organized. To you do. No, I know, because this is my bathroom is, I'm clean, you're organized. And when Martha put something on my, like, you have a whole other separate counter.

We're not sharing a counter. We have two sinks for a reason. And yours three times the size of mine for a reason. You don't have to put your brush on my side. Yes. I like it clean. Yes. Dries crazy, doesn't it?

Crazy. Yeah, he's crazy. Mine is just like Marcus. It looks like the CBS aisle ticked over on top of it. And it's like she can't even see what she has because it's so much stuff for it. Yes.

So it drives Chris Bananas. He has learned to let me. Now. Now, I let her on her side. Correct. But when the brush comes onto your side, which I do too. Because I walk over and fawking

I put it down and I walk back right. So here's the thing, though. If it really starts to annoy you. It's not bad then. Yeah, you're not going to be able to control her, right? You are starting to get annoyed, so now you know it is actually draining some energy. The power's not in controlling her. It's in your response.

So you go to market. Chris comes to me and says, Mel, I love you. Yes. The real trigger for Chris is cardboard boxes. Cardboard boxes? Oh, yeah, because what happens is they show up. When you get boxes, yeah, yeah. And then Chris is Mr.

Slice him down, flat one, Stack them. Stack them in the garage in a certain way. They got all stacked up. He likes to put one in box and I don't know. Like, I don't know. And he would ask me, when the boxes come and you enter them, please slice it. And I would do it some of the time.

But most of the time what I do is I just stack them next to the door to the garage. You let him do it. Well, it's not what I can. You're going to do it. I mean to come down. The end of the day. Yeah. You know, you're tired.

So Chris would come in and he'd see them and he has asked me multiple times. So of course it stresses him out and pisses him off and annoys him. Yeah. But what he did is he sat me down because there's a big difference between what you intend and the impact it has in another person. Yeah. If you scream as someone or scold them or shame them, you're not going to get a good response. Correct.

But if you sit down consciously when things are calm. Correct. Not in that moment. I mean, just say, hey, in a loving way, I love you. I appreciate you. I appreciate all the good that you do for us and our relationship. We have a beautiful home. We have a three amazing children. And I'm like, now spit it out, Lewis. What about you're wrong? Yeah, exactly. And there's just one thing that I would love to create an agreement with. Yes. Can we create disagreements again? And what support would you need in

order for us to have this agreement work? I said an assistant. No, I, I, it's true, though. But what he said to me was this. He said, every time I see those cardboard boxes there, it's like a giant middle finger to me. Like you don't love me. You don't respect me. You don't care about me. You don't appreciate me. Correct. You think I'm your maid. And I have asked about this. And when he explained it that way, what happened is it tapped into my intrinsic motivation because I value how he feels. Of course. And when he communicated that way and he let me know, now I am motivated to do it because I know why it matters. And this is really important.

When you communicate something to someone, that it matters to you, and they don't do it, you, you have to let them. But if I repeatedly then ignore it. Then what? Well, Chris has to choose. Choose what? To either talk to me again. Or if it's a big enough issue, Lewis, is this the right relationship? Interesting.

Do I want to be with somebody who I sit down and repeatedly share my feelings and my needs with and then they do not do anything? Or they say they will, but then they don't. And the behavior shows that I don't matter. It's deeply personal. And this is why it's important to understand where your control is, because what's ultimately going to happen is if you have an issue with somebody in your life, whether it's your parents or your boss or whatever, and you've addressed it in a very mature and loving way, and nothing has

changed. It's likely not going to. And then it comes back to you. Let me choose. What to do next. Yes. What do I deserve? And if it's somebody who repeatedly, like, let's take it to the context of dating, because this was an example that's kind of funny and relatable. But if you're in a relationship with somebody. And you want to take it to the next level and they don't want to put a label on it. No. Is like, are those the table scraps you're going to take? Right. If they're sneaking out early in the morning like some stray cat, is that actually, seriously, is that the love you deserve? Because what we then do is we go up into our minds and we start explaining away the behavior. Yeah, of course. You get a little drip of dope me every once in a while. You're like, oh,

I wish I get that more frequently. Yes, and if only I can be closer to them. If only I can spend more time with them, maybe if I learn how to play golf, maybe if I, like, that now you're changing yourself changing yourself because you refuse to let the person reveal who they are. Oh, man. And there are no mixed signals. You're either a priority or you're not.

100%. Period. Yeah. And, you know, I think it's important that I recently heard some experts say, and I think it's a really important statistic to know. that 11% of people in long-term relationships have that sort of instant spark. 89% were the slow burn. And that's also important to know.

Interesting. Because over time, people reveal who they are too. And it's why people grow on you. Yes. And one of the other reasons why I love this theory so much, you know, you know, because we're all good friends, that Chris and I are about as opposite as they come in terms of energy and He's calm. They're calm because he has a pulse.

I mean, the guy's a death tool over crying out loud. He keeps my feet on the ground and I keep our life fun and exciting. Yes, the adventure. Yeah. The uncertainty, adventure. Yeah, yeah. But he's the ground and the soul and the foundation. Loving someone is letting them be.

themselves. 100%. And when I started, when I stumbled onto this, Chris and I have been through Hell and Back. And he is my most favorite thing about life. And there is something about Let Them that is a profound act of love. Because in my mind, when I think about love, I think love is two things. I think it's consideration. So having someone else in mind. Like literally, if you make a cup of coffee for somebody and you put in the oat milk, because that's what they like, that's an act of love, because you have consideration. When I slice the cardboard box and flatten it, I have Chris in mind. And the second part of love for me is admiration, which is the ability to see something in someone else that you admire.

And you asked, I don't like, how do you go the distance? I think a long-term successful relationship requires two things. It requires two people who want it to work. And that's an important thing. Because if you look at any relationship that breaks up, whether it's divorce or a breakup, there is a moment looking back where at least one of the people didn't want it to work. Yeah. And the second component is that you're both willing to do the work, to make it work. It's almost like you're always going to be on a seesaw with somebody in a long-term relationship, ups, downs, balance, but neither one of you will get off the seesaw. That's what it takes, because if one of you gets off, the whole thing breaks. Yeah. And so that's why it's really important to learn how to let someone be who they're going to.

are because I think it's a huge act of love. And one of the cool things about it for me, and it's not so much with Chris, but it's with other family members that have had very challenging issues or challenging personality styles is that I've always made it my job to make people happy and make sure nobody's disappointed and then I get upset. And so. I know that feeling. And when you let them be who they are, you're actually holding space for two things to be true. Because somebody can be deeply disappointed in you or something that you've done, and they can still love you. 100%. Yeah.

And a lot of us don't know that. But when you let someone be disappointed, and you just take that example because so many of us are motivated by guilt or we don't want to let people down, if you have a business partnership and they want you to come to some meeting or come give a speech and it just doesn't work. and they're disappointed, isn't that a good thing? Doesn't that mean they want you there? Right. And we think we've done something wrong. No, you've actually done something great because you have a relationship

where somebody wants you there. So let them be disappointed. Sure. But then do the second part, let me remind myself of my values. And I don't bend over backwards just to make sure other people aren't disappointed. I just let them be disappointed and I remind myself that I need to act in a way,

and spend my time in a way that actually supports the things that are priorities for me. And if I value, for example, family, and this is another very important thing because so many people are motivated by guilt, I used to be deeply motivated by making sure that, oh, my God, if I felt guilty because I'm working too much, or didn't see my parents or whatever, and then I'd change everything, and then I'd still feel guilty because it wasn't quite enough. Don't ever do something because you feel guilty. When you change your plans and you go home to see your parents because you feel guilty, you just made your parents the villain. Because you're resented.

Yes. And because you're making it a thing you have to do, if you let them be disappointed and then you come back to yourself and you say, okay, well, let me drop into my values. And for me, my dad's 80 this year. And I'm lucky if I got 10 more holidays for them. And so I don't make the time to see them because I want him to think. think I'm a good daughter. I make the time to see him because it makes me know I'm a good daughter because I value it. And the other thing that I love about let them, especially in challenging political times, is there are very good people in your life that have political opinions that

you just cannot explain. Yeah. And it's a deeply personal issue for everybody around what crosses a line. But there is space when you say, let them, for someone else to have a belief that you don't understand and for you to not be emotionally charged by it. And then for you to come back to your power and say, let me decide how much time and energy I pour into this relationship. Let me decide the role that family plays. let me decide if I'm going to take the time to step in their shoes and try to understand how they have come to this belief. Because one of the other things that I've learned, and especially in researching this book,

is that our brains are very interesting because when you, when somebody has a different opinion than you, or they tell you something you don't want to hear, they've scanned your brain. This is research from Dr. Talley Sharrett. Your brain literally turns off the listening part. When somebody is telling you something that you don't want to hear. And so by yelling at each other or arguing about things or I don't understand how you could possibly that doesn't do anything but create this silent distance between people. When you let people have their beliefs and then you remind yourself, let me decide what I value

and let me decide what energy I'm going to pour into what and let me decide if I want to keep the space and this relationship open. because the other thing that I was getting super wrong in relationships, Lewis, is, you know, I know that I have to push myself because I'm lazy and stubborn and doubtful and anxious like everybody else, right? I don't want to do the heart. So I'm like five or you're going on. I've pushed myself. So naturally, I push everybody else. And our brains are not only wired for control, but we move toward what's easy, which is why you sit on the couch instead of exercising, because it's easy. and we move away from what feels hard. And if you're a parent, you're stomping up the stairs because your kid's not motivated and you hear the Xbox going, do you think studying is easy for that kid? No. That's why they're doing it.

And when you come stomping up the stairs to open up the door and be like, are you studying? Yelling at them, yeah. Yeah. Do you think that's motivating? No. You just create more resistance to the chains that you want. Yeah. Now, you can't make someone change, but I never said you couldn't influence them.

Sure. So through letting somebody be who they are and then coming back to let me, let me approach us in a different way. If I know I can't change this person and I know that the hardest working person is the person who struggling. I mean, people that are fat, they know they are. They know they are. People that are unhealthy, they know they are.

And they're in tension with themselves. Of course, I see, I choose to believe that everybody wants to be thriving. I choose to believe that everybody wants to feel good about themselves. I choose to believe that, you know, if you're broke, I've been broke. I knew it. I knew I wanted to change my relationship with money. In fact, I needed your new book, Lewis. You know, where were you?

14 years ago. People know when they're not living up to their potential. They are already actively in tension with themselves. They don't need pressure from you. Because it just creates more weight and shame around an issue they already wish they could change. So how do you influence someone who you know could use support in changing something that's really holding them back, whether it's their weight or their mindset or... Have you asked them how they feel about it? Or you just made an assumption that you know. Like it's like, oh, thanks a lot. I should pay off my bills. Never thought of that. Right. Oh, I should eat healthier. Oh, thanks. You know, Einstein.

Yeah. to me that I should exercise. Right? So you feel like you. So here's how you do it. And this comes from, you know, one of our favorite people, Dr. K, the healthy gamer. So first things first, you just follow this ABC method. Okay. A is you apologize. You apologize for pressuring and judging and assuming. And I like to have these conversations, by the way, in the car because there's no drinking. And there's something about, I guess the word is forward ambulation as the car is moving that creates more open-mindedness. Plus, you're not looking at each other. Yeah. Or walking or moving or something. And you're trapped, you know, because you're

in a car. You can't get away in a car. Yes, too. And so you apologize for being judging and assuming and I know it all. And then you're going to ask some open-ended questions. I haven't even asked you how you feel about your health. And they might say nothing. I'm fine. What makes you like fine about it? And here's the most important question. Is there anything that you want to do about it? And Dr. Kay says it doesn't even matter what their answers are because what you're doing is you're removing outside pressure. Something you want to do, yeah. Yes. And you're actually putting your arm around them. And when that tension rises up inside you, like I've known in my life

when I drink too much, I've known when I've been a walking red flag, I've known when I've been struggling, I've known when I'm in the wrong job, I've known when I'm not taking care of myself. And I'm in tension with myself. Nobody's actually stuck somebody who's... The intention. Yeah, with myself. Oh, I love it. Intention. Not intention. Yeah, like in frustration and friction. Yeah. And nobody's actually stuck. People who are stuck have woken up a little bit and they're like, I'm not happy where I am.

But you're not quite sure what to do about it or worse. You don't have hope that it's going to work. Right. And so when you say, what would you like to do about it? You've now just exposed the gap between what they actually want and what they're doing. Yep. and you're awakening intrinsic motivation. Yes.

So then you go to B, back off. That's it, back off. Back off. Don't try to coach them, don't tell them what to do, don't try to control them, don't try to. You should do this and you should do that. You better wait three to six months, just back off. Just listen and they say, okay.

Yeah, great. And if you screw up again, apologize again, open-ended questions again. You thought about what you might want to do about this, if anything at all. And then the third part is C, which is you've got to celebrate any small thing you see without being passive aggressive. Oh, see, it wasn't that bad. You didn't eat that pie today. Good job.

No. And here's the thing that none of us do. You got to model the behavior change. And you cannot expect someone to stop drinking while you're pouring yourself a glass of wine. No. You can't expect someone else to motivate and go for a walk every morning when you're not. Mm-hmm. And you also have to make it look fun and easy.

And I want you to give it three to six months, and here's why. We all have the need to feel in control. They have to have enough space from you for it to feel like their idea. That's true. So I love this example where if you think about being at work, and I'm like one of those people that used to, eat the sandwich, work through work, like, you know, eat through my lunch break, like shoving your sandwich on my mouth. And you see somebody get up and go for a walk.

work, work, work, work, work, work. And then they come back and they're super refreshed. And the next day, work, work, work, work, and they go for a walk. After a couple weeks, one of these days you're going to look outside and you're always going to think, you know, I should go for a walk. Yeah. You don't credit them. You think it was your idea.

But that was the influence of your colleague who made something look easy and fun. Right. This is why we buy so much dumb stuff online because people are making it look easy and fun. Right. That's the power of your interest. And when you let them be who they are and you let them change on their own timeline and you learn to love them as they are It's so hard. Then you've just created the space for positive change to happen.

And what I also love about this is that when you do it this way and you let them, you're also communicating, I believe you can. When you micromanage pressure and protect other people from the greatest teacher in the world, which is life, then you're actually saying, I don't believe you're strong enough to face this. Because I'm a control freak. Right. And, you know, we couch it as worry and love and thinking we know best.

And it's a wonderful thing, Lewis, to want more for the people you love. Yes. It's a wonderful thing to see the potential of a friend of yours. It's a wonderful thing to see that if your brother would stop drinking, his life would get better. It's a wonderful thing to want your girlfriend to stop dating these losers. Wanting a better life for somebody else is a beautiful thing. But we've been going about it the wrong way. We've been pressuring, worrying, judging, fixing, controlling.

And the truth is, the more you let people be who they are, the better your relationships. And the more you let people live their lives, the better your life gets. and the more you learn to see who people are, the more you get to choose how much time and energy you pour into what relationships and which ones you don't, this doesn't make you closed off. It actually makes you more connected and more compassionate and more loving and more supportive. And for me as a mom and even as a boss,

it's made me realize the power in truly operating in a way where I'm clear when I'm especially at work about what I, the outcome is. is, but then I have to let people do the job because that gives them control over their creativity and expression. And with my kids, learning how to let them live their lives and let them make mistakes and let them face the consequences of the decisions, it is the single most powerful thing I could do because I'm saying to them, I believe in you. And I believe in your ability to figure this out and know that the second year, you, you are

The second you need me, I'm there because I'm always standing on the side cheering for you. I'm not on the field playing. I'm standing on the side cheering for you because I believe you can win this game. Thank you for tuning in. Continue strengthening your mind by listening to our other episodes. Download the Resilient Mind Journal by clicking the link in the show notes.