The Sabrina Zohar Show - 114: Why You Shouldn't Settle In Love And Relationships With Dené Logan

Episode Date: December 20, 2024

Dené Logan joins Sabrina in a thought-provoking conversation about what settling is and what it can look like in relationships. They talk about how important it is to  understand ourselves as souls when choosing partners. Dené challenges the common belief that being uncoupled is the worst outcome, arguing instead that relationships should add to our lives and not be driven by societal conditioning. Sabrina and Dené delve into the energies of masculinity and femininity, emphasizing that these are energies, not rigid identities, and that real connection comes from understanding and humanizing one another. Dené stresses that relationships need inspiration, respect, and a shared vision to thrive, and Sabrina adds that we shouldn't expect to change someone into our ideal partner. They both highlight the need for a community-based approach to relationships, where the pressure to stay partnered is lessened, allowing for a healthier, more balanced connection. Through their insights, Dené and Sabrina encourage listeners to reflect on whether they are truly showing up in their relationships or merely outsourcing our power to make themselves more comfortable. Get Dené's book, "Sovereign Love" Stuck After the Podcast? Master Implementation in 8 Weeks with Sabrina's Foundation Course HERE! Do you feel like your emotions run the show and react in ways you can’t control? Join the Nervous System 101: Navigating the Unknowns In Early Dating from Sabrina and Masha Kay HERE! Struggling with a breakup? Join the Make It Make Sense: Getting Through a Breakup course from Sabrina and Britt Frank HERE! Get Ad free HERE! Want to work with Sabrina? HERE! Don't forget to follow Sabrina and The Sabrina Zohar Show on Instagram and Sabrina on TikTok! Video now available on YOUTUBE! Disclaimer: The Sabrina Zohar Show, formally known as Do The Work, is not affiliated with A.Z & associates LLC in any capacity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to another episode of the Sabrina Zohar Show. My name is Sabrina Zohar, and I am your host. Hi, babes. Welcome to the end of the year. I can't believe it. I'm so excited because today we have a very special guest. We have Ms. Denae Logan. I'm obsessed with her.

She is a marriage and family therapist. She's a couple's therapist, but she's fucking amazing. And today we talk about why settling is not very good. The problem with settling and why comfortable love just isn't enough. and we start talking about the masculine feminine and like what that actually means, not the clickbait bullshit of feminine means this and masculine means this. Like we're cutting all that noise. And so I'm excited. Guys, as always, thank you. Thank you so much for everyone who writes and reviews the show. Means the world, please. If you think it's worth five stars, please leave it. Leave a review.

You can leave a comment. Let us know what you think. You could DM me if it's going to be something negative and you don't want to leave it publicly. I'm always open. But please, guys, just remember, use kindness in the words that we use because we are creating a community. And that's what we're here for. Guys, if you need anything, as always, link in show notes. It has everything you could possibly need. Free guides, free guides, there are the three courses that are all out right now. Nervis system, breakup, foundation. You can work one-on-one, ask a question, or just listen to the podcast. Whatever you guys need, it is all there. So, babies, without further ado, let's get right on into it, shall we? Deney, welcome to the show.

Sabrina, thank you. I'm so excited. I am beyond excited, first of all, to have you in studio, because it's always so fun. Such a gift. I feel like I haven't been down in your neck of the woods in such a long time, and I was just really excited to come and give you a hug in person. And this is so much fun. Thanks for having me. Of course. I'm so excited because today we're going to talk about something I think is so important that I get every single day of, well, two aspects because you threw a good whammy my way that we're going to hit on. But two aspects being kind of the settling conversation, right? Like around this settling down. Am I settling? Do I hate? You know, it's so hard in the dating and even when you're in a relationship, right, to really be able to assess. And really the masculine, feminine and all those polarities. So I'm so excited. But before we even fucking dive in, could you please share a little bit more about you and your amazing book and just who are you so our audience can get a little bit more acclimated? Thanks, Sabrina.

Well, I'm Denae Logan. And I'm a marriage and family therapist based in Los Angeles. But these days, I feel like more a group facilitator. I facilitate retreats throughout the year for all. the people. I was going to say mostly women, but I feel like it's expanding. People are coming a little bit more. The personal development sphere is just expanding. And I'm an author now, which feels exciting to say. And I wrote a book based on, I don't know, I'm primarily a couples therapist. So there are so many things about the dynamics I was seeing playing out with the

couples that I saw that I was like, God, there's so many ways my clinical training and just the way the relationship sphere is talking about these things in general. I feel like we're missing something that I started to like connect the dots on some of the ways that we're not talking about it that I think as we're evolving as a human species we need to be. And I come from a background in depth psychology, which, you know, I always say depth because people are like, death psychology. You know, I think no, I said death. Yeah. So it's a lot of times referred to as the psychology of the soul, but it's rooted in a lot of Jungian psychology, which is architect. typo-sycology myths, like all of these dream work sometimes, but really the soul work and

how do we explore what it is to do this thing called life with the awareness that we are souls. And I feel like in the relationship sphere, that was not something that I ever heard people talking about or touching on. And in terms of the book that we were talking about, so Carl Young was sort of the first person in terms of psychology to really name that we all have both masculine and feminine energetics within us and they're not gendered. So everybody has both. And I think, you know, you and I were talking about it's, there's a lot of ways that people are talking about these energetics that are so alive and I think really important to talk about, but we're missing a lot of what I mean,

at least, when I'm talking about them. I'm curious, just because I'm not curious for me to know, while you were studying about like the depth psychology, was there anything, especially when you were seeing in relationships that you started to say like, holy shit, like what are the conversations that we're not having as you've been doing? doing your own research, your own studies, your own, you know, your programs and things like that. Like, what did you see as a disconnect? Because I'm genuinely curious. Yeah. I think, you know, in addition to the soul work around depth psychology, I was a yoga teacher for many years. So I've always been a spiritual seeker. I've always really been curious around what we're doing

in these bodies. Like from the time I was a child, I was always like, what happens when we die? And so I've always been fascinated by spiritual teachers in ways that we go about attempting to make meaning and find peace in our skin. Before I became a therapist, I worked in addiction recovery for a really long time. And so there were all of these elements that I started drawing from in terms of what soul work is and how we find peace in our skin that is a very different conversation than clinical psychology was having around relationships, meaning if we understand that we're souls. And I believe that, you know, this is a life school and we come here for our soul's curriculum and all of the lessons and things that were meant to understand,

if we don't take that into consideration when we're sharing our life with someone. A lot of times we're just attempting to make ourselves as comfortable as possible all the time. When I started to see when I was working with couples, I was like, oh, God, in the same way that when I worked in addiction recovery, there becomes a substance

or a thing that we are attempting to regulate our internal world, our nervous system through. People are doing that in relationships. And not only are we doing it, and nobody's really talking about it. There's a ton of ways that clinical psychology is sort of reinforcing that, right? That your power resides outside of you and that if I can just get this person to comply with who I believe I need them to be in this moment, then I'll be able to exhale.

But what if they can't? What if they don't have the capacity to? What if this person leaves you? All of these different variables. And so I started to say, like, there's a way that we're really making another person our higher power without really taking into consideration that each of us has specific lessons. that we are meant to learn in this lifetime. And when it's aligned and we can support one another in that sole mission, I think it's

beautiful. And partnerships are such an enriching aspect of our life. But I think there's a lot of ways we're not really conditioned to take those things into consideration, you know. Oh, 100%. We had David, Guillem. He's a love David. I knew you.

I was like, oh, yeah, because he's fantastic. And he was talking about the light bulb, right? Of like, if I'm operating in a 60 watt light bulb, I'm not going to be able to plug into a 3,000 watt light. bulb, right? And I think because that kind of brings us onto, look perfectly, said lid, into this entire conversation of like, okay, settling, right? Because I'm sure how many times we hear it, how many times we go through it. And I would love to understand your perspective on like, what does it actually mean to settle, right? And just kind of defining that difference and like

compromise. Like, let's get into it. Yeah, let's get into it. Right. So here's the thing. I come from a little bit of a different baseline than most couples therapists where I'm actually as a couple's therapist not interested in keeping your relationship intact at all costs, which is a little bit of a different perspective. I was married for 11 and a half years. And so there were so many things that when my marriage changed form, and I often say changed form because, you know, my kiddo's dad is still one of my best friends in the world. And our relationship needed to change. We started out really young and both of us were expanding in different ways, but I think we're really conditioned to believe that when a marriage or relationship ends,

there's a failure and that we should feel devastated and like, you know, our world is ending. And that just wasn't our truth. And so I realized that there's a way that we're holding all of these relationship dynamics as though like the worst thing we can possibly be is not partnered. And it's impacting how we show up in partnerships, right? And so I started to get super curious. Serena and I was like, let's go back a little bit to like where this originated and the origin point certainly of patriarchy and that there are patriarchal structures where for our survival, especially as women, we needed to be in these nuclear family structures. And if we weren't, there were very real consequences, right?

Like it was sort of very much women were property in the same way that, you know, people were enslaved. Women were sort of property. You got a plot of land. You got a wife like all of these. things. And if you didn't have that, you wouldn't be safe. You wouldn't be sort of held within the container in a safe way, but also you could be harmed. You could be burned alive sometimes. And nobody talks about the history of like burning witches was actually women who were widowed, who wouldn't get remarried or women who just refused to get married, right? And so those are sort of

the origin points of how these relationship structures started, but we've never had a reckoning with it, right? And I realized there's all these multi-generational pain points that nobody talks about, And if you ever seen that show, The Marvelous Miss Maysel, love it. It's so funny, right? But I was watching that show one day, and I think it's like in the early episodes. And she, I can't remember the character's name, but she goes to bed or her husband goes to bed. She goes to bed next to him and she like waits until he's asleep. And then she gets up the minute she realizes he's fully asleep and she goes and puts her rollers in, puts the cream on her face, gets ready for bed, and then sets an alarm to go back to sleep and then wakes up before he wakes up so she can,

take all the stuff off, put on her full face, and lay down next to her husband and pretend that she's been, you know, asleep next to him just as beautiful as she went to bed, right? And, you know, we sort of laugh at that, but there's so much about what we were conditioned to believe by our mothers that your work is to make yourself a beautiful object. That is how you will keep yourself safe, right? And that's all fine, except that it doesn't lead to a lot of intimacy, even that dynamic within the bed between these two people, right? And we've never really had a reckoning, around that. And as I started to look at some of the research that's been done and we're still drawing from in terms of these couples therapy orientations, a lot of it was done in the 70s, right?

And that was where it sort of originated. And women couldn't even have their own bank accounts in the 70s, right? And so if my survival depends on this relationship staying intact, how honest am I really being about what is relational fulfillment? And there's so much messaging that all of us got certainly from our mother's generation, but also from our peers and the ways that we're socialized around gender that really leads to a lack of intimacy. So all of this to say, I think the reasons why we settle are because so much of what we've been conditioned to believe as early as we start thinking about relationships is the worst thing you can be is not in a partnership, right? And that ends up having a lot of impact on how we feel in our relationship

dynamics when we've settled because I need to be partnered, right? You know what I mean? Totally. Because of what you're explaining so beautiful. beautifully is like there's a version of stability versus settling, right? Of like, oh, wow, this feels really great. This feels like it's an alignment with me. I feel really seen her and understood, right? Like, this is a partnership that's adding to my life and I feel stable and I feel really great because like, you know as well as I do. We hear the like, I'm not feeling the spark and I'm not feeling and I'm not feeling. And it's like, that's like, that's a feeling. Yes. Sure, good luck. I have been in long term relationships. It's the first thing to go is this like high, high intensity

because then you're like, oh, you fart a lot. You know? And I'm just like, oh, right, because you become a real person. The Volkswagen Atlas is a seven-seat powerhouse that actually makes sense for real life. It's got cargo space for all your gear, the dogs, and even half of your rec league soccer team. And under the hood, a two-liter turbocharged TSI engine that hauls up to 5,000 pounds. The seven-seat Atlas, you deserve more space. Visit vw.ca to learn more. S-U-BW, German engineered for all.

But I really loved what you also mentioned because it's true. Like we think about what did our parent, what was our mother's generation? Like even my mom said, she's like the messaging was, what are you doing wrong? Your husband's not happy. Where are you making him happy? And for me, I think the biggest struggle I have, especially in the generation currently that we're in, is I feel like in the 70s, the 80s, we were really fighting for true equality, right? Like women deserve to have bank accounts and we can vote and, you know, for anyone that doesn't agree, it's like, fuck off. This isn't your show.

But we fought so hard. And then now, I'm curious your perspective on this, I feel like the pendulum has also now swung. All of a sudden, we like, we want to go back to the 50s of like, I want a provider man. I want a high value man. I want someone that's just going to take care of me. And I'm like, well, that's cool. But like nothing in life is free, right? So like if you're going to, quote unquote, like settle for somebody that they take care of the household, right?

Cool. That's your dynamic. You do you. But that comes with a price, right? Your partner then might have to work more because they have to facilitate a higher income for the home. Maybe they might be stressed more, right? Maybe they might be traveling more. And like that's, I just feel like we're not really balancing in reality.

And I'm curious your thoughts on what you as see as well with the polarities of the masculine and feminine and all of this clickbait that we're ingesting now that I don't genuinely think is what Carl Jung meant when he was saying the feminine and the masculine. It's not that this guy is taking you out to dinner. It's like what what are we really talking about here? Yeah. No, absolutely. And because these energetics are not fixed states, I think a lot of the way people talk about. about them is sort of like, you need to be in your feminine and you will never be in your feminine and live there. It's similar to the way people talk about attachment styles as though they're an

identity. These are energies, right? And so it's sort of understanding that all of us have this and what's alive within my energy and can it be information about myself. But in terms of what you were saying about, you know, this thing of like, I want a high value man to take care of me. I think if we start there, first of all, nothing in life is free, right? So there's a way that if someone is taking care of me, that comes at a cost a lot of times. And you are the object that is being taken care of. And normally I find you are treated at such, right, a while into a relationship. So that's certainly something to take into account.

But I don't know if you see this, but what I've seen shifting in relationship dynamics, and I'm going to speak heteronormatively for a minute, is that these structures were sort of the way that patriarchy set it up. was that the idea was that men would be dependent on women for their sort of meaning and sort of their connection to their emotional landscape and women would be dependent on men economically, right? And so that has shifted, hallelujah, in so many ways. And I think we come from, well, I'm a little older than you, but we come from a generation where it's sort of like we really built up girls in the space of like you can do anything,

like get in there and really make a lot of yourself in terms of your, I don't know, ability to earn and all of these, you know, like things that we were doing in school, whatever it is. But we didn't do a ton of restructuring around how boys really got to be in touch with their emotional landscape and really value their inner world and, you know, taking up space with one another with the truth of how I feel. And so I find so often there's a way that men and women are just sort of missing each other. And women are sort of in this space. Like I hear a lot of men are trash. I don't need men. like all of these things and I'm like I can't tell you how often I will say to clients if men are trash then you need to stop being in relationship with men for a while like take a step

back until that's not the truth of how you feel because whatever you feel you're going to attract in terms of your experience of reality you know what I mean oh it's a hill I'll die on because for a long time I didn't believe it I was like oh come on you stop with this mindset shit and it's like no it's very fucking real like what you believe is what you'll see what you see is what you believe, right? Like you'll, it's like, you know, we have to say, I'll see it when I believe it. It's like, no, well, I have to believe it in order to see it. Thank you for saying what I've been trying to say for a long time. Like, nothing in life is free. And I hear this. And like, again, for anyone listening, you are allowed to want whatever you want, right? You can, like, I have a

girlfriend and she stayed single. She would say, I'm not settling. I'm not settling. I'm not settling. Okay, cool. And she ended up going with a guy. And it's like, and he takes care of everything financially. She doesn't have to work and all of those. And it's like, but that comes with a price. because then what she tells me is, oh, when I said, hey, can I come get you for lunch? This was years ago. And she goes, oh, well, my partner, so he's not home. And I was like, what's the problem? She goes, well, he just prefers that, like, I don't go out without him.

And I was like, oh, okay. And then she was like, you know what, not to mention, like, he has the money. And I was like, oh, right, so you don't get any control. But she thinks, no, he's taken care of me. I'm provided for. And it's like, listen, if that's the life you want to live, I was like, hey, you do you, man. I you're not asking my advice I'm going to fuck but I think we're in this unrealistic expectation of like even for instance the video I made earlier today that was like here's a text to send to a guy for a

first date or not a first date just here's a text to send to someone to show interest like hey do you want to grab a drink and the amount of like that's in my masculine I'm in my feminine I don't chase after anyone I was like what's chasing of just saying hey do you want to grab a drink I was like there's no chase here that's just being upfront and honest that's not very feminine and I was like cool can you describe to me what feminine is well the man should be making all the moves. I said, so then how's that reciprocal? Well, I'm showing up. That's not reciprocity. That's called fucking arrogance. You think that you're, what do you, Kanye West, your presence is your present? Like, oh, no, but like, because to me, part of a relationship means give and

take, right? If I'm giving, giving, giving, that's going to feel really emptying. And if I'm just taking, eventually I'm going to get bored because that can only go so far. And I think there's a way that we just have to get back to being human with one another. Something that comes up for me all the time with the dating apps is, you know, I'm sort of swiping to see if I can see myself building a life with this person. And it's like, what if we just started with getting to know a person? And if you are getting to know this person, then why does it matter if you throw out, like, let's hang out, right? And actually see how you feel in this person's presence versus like, I have to like be in my masculine or feminine with this person because we're just from the jump in a dynamic about like

what this is and what this means and what our roles are. And it's like, what if it wasn't about the rule so much as like two souls, sitting together, attempting to get to know each other as people and slowing down a little bit? Like, I just feel like there's so much dehumanization in like how does that feel for you? But also, how do you imagine that feels for that person when we're in these like really solidified rules of not seeing one another? Literal dehumanization by saying black cat, golden retriever. Like literally. That, oh, it like makes my stomach hurt. It really does.

I'm curious. I'm curious as your clinical professional experience, right? I would love to know the repercussions of the people that settle and like just say, well, I'll just take what I can get or this works. Like, I'm curious, what have you seen in the years that you're like, no, this, we can't keep doing this. Because to your point, I hear this all the time of like, make it work no matter what. And it's like, no, no, no, sometimes it's okay that it doesn't. Absolutely. And I think I think that's why I feel so strongly that people shouldn't settle is that I'm sitting all of the times in the aftermath of what. what happens when we don't have what I believe relationships need as a solid foundation. And I often say to couples, I think relationships need three things in order to thrive. And I don't even, like, period. I was going to say in the long term, but just to thrive, right? And I think it's inspiration, respect, and a shared vision. And so if we are in the space where I don't really respect this person, but, and this is a big thing for us ladies, I'm just going to say, like, but I see potential in who he could be.

So I'm going to work on molding him into someone that I could love. First of all, how's that working for you, right? Because I think there's a way that, you know, especially my brothers, I think there's a little bit of a more linear way of experiencing the world I find. And so it's like, if it ain't broke, like, why is it a problem, right? Like, this is who we are. It's working out. And women, a lot of times we see, like, where this could go in terms of our energy and, like, all of the expansion. And so for that person, that often doesn't feel super loving. Like, If I'm telling you, like, Sabrina, you'd be great. But if you could just change this, this, this, this, and this.

Yeah, you'd even better. It's like, okay, well, I don't feel super seen and supported for who I am by you, Deney, right? And this is how people end up spending their life where it's like, I think our relationships are shifting into when it is justified for us to share our life together because this person is so inspiring to me, because I know that I'm a better person with this person than I could be on my own, then that is when it is justified to come together in a part. partnership, but not because I'm incomplete. Because if I believe that, I will, again, be in that space of believing you're this higher power and you're supposed to be all of these things for me that no other

human being could possibly have the capacity to be. And so I feel like inevitably we end up feeling really shortchanged and disappointed. You know what it reminds me of. As you were talking about that, I was like, sounds like a little kid who thinks that like their celebrity crush or the movie or, right, that like, when this, then this, right? And I was her. I used to fantasize as a a kid that was my coping mechanism because my household was so chaotic and there was just it was just such a level of abuse that was just so fucked up and just in a multitude of every single person part taking part of that I mean I was fucking telling about my cousin before this like you could see the the nuts that fall from this tree and for me the coping was fantasy right I had I had he fledger

posters all over my room I was fucking obsessed with him I mean how can you not be and it was like but it started like it was just oh Sabrina's boy crazy and it was like no it had nothing to do with being boy crazy, it was because I was so unhappy in the life that I was living that I really genuinely believed someone else would make it better for me. Girl. But that part, and you're naming something that I've never heard someone else name, and I think that a lot of times relationship dynamics and being obsessed with this person and what they need to change in order to be someone that I can love becomes a distraction from really being

in my body and being in my own skin. And that to me was the piece that's like, God, this is so similar to the cycles of addiction. I'm just in this ruminating and he hasn't texted. And if he texts, da, da, da, da, da, and when he texts, right? But it's like you're distracting yourself from being in your body and staying with yourself. And I think the fantasy is a place a lot of times that we stay in that space of rumination to really avoid ourselves. It's fun. It's safer.

It's easier. Right? I don't have to deal with reality. I could just, I could project. And it was something I read and it beautifully succinctly said it. And it was, it's something that I personally relate with because every. single day I have people trying to tell me to change, right? I don't, you make me triggered, so can you talk differently?

I don't like your content, so can you do this? And I had read something where it was like, people with high anxiety, right? Anxious attachment, if we're going to label, which I don't love to do, but in this context, they get so uncomfortable with their current situation that they'd rather everyone else around them change to make them feel more comfortable than to say, hey, I don't like this so I'm going to remove myself or this isn't a place for me. And I was curious, kind of that feels like what we're talking about of the, like, you just need to go to, like, I hear it every, he just needs to go to therapy and become more emotionally available

and start to love me. And you're like, wait, wait, you want this person to be something different than they are. Then tell me, what about them do you like that you would even date if they have to do all of this? Because to me, what that sounds like you said, it's your own addiction of let me fix, let me change, let me do, because the reality is too hard for me to handle because then I have to face that you're a human. Yeah, let me distract, right? And if we think about how hard it is to make change in our own lives, right? Like, think about something that you really wanted to change or any change that you've made in a sustainable way, it's normally from a really internally resourced way. Like, I don't know anyone who has ever been nagged in the submission

and made, like, a substantial change in their life that they've been able to maintain. But it's hard to change, right? And so the young part of us tells ourselves the story that if I were worthy of love, you would change for me. You would, the person that has ghosted me will circle around and come back to me, right? And that is a lot of self-abandonment of that younger part when we understand everybody's got stuff. That person is doing the best they can to negotiate their stuff just like you are, and we're really making someone other than another human when we expect them to be able to make changes that is really difficult for us to make within ourselves, you know. I'll die on that hill. Because for anybody, I've had a couple people leave me some reviews on the podcast saying,

she's just repetitive. She just keeps saying the same thing. And I'm like, well, that's because that's called psychology. I'm like, that doesn't change, right? Like the basic blueprints of like, hey, so this isn't healthy or this doesn't like get back in your body. You're ruminating and spiraling. Like, can we bring it back internally? And it's like, here's a thing. For me as a kid, did you just know when someone said one plus one, you just automatically knew it was two. You didn't have to repeat it. You didn't have to say it to yourself over and over. And I think we're in this day and age of like, I need new. I need new. I want you to tell me something different and you to tell me something different. But what I get from that is like, oh, that to me just sounds like

more self-abandonment, right? Jeff versus Taco Truck Salsa, whether it's Verde, Roja, or the orange one. For Jeff, trying any salsa is like playing Russian roulette with a flamethrower. Luckily, Jeff saved with Amazon and stocked up on antacids, ginger tea, and milk. Habiniero? More like habanier, yes. Save the everyday with Amazon.

And then we end up settling because of, I hear this every day of like, I'm in my, you know, I'm in my late 30s. I want to have children, right? And it's like, how can we support, one, how can we support people in that decision? Because, like, we're women. I understand that. I understand the clock. But more so, like, I really want to know how we can help people to understand the difference between, like, is this a stable, healthy, secure partner for me? Or am I settling and just taking what I can get? Like, what are things that people can really look out for? Because I know you gave the three main components of a relationship. But for anybody that's like, oh, I don't actually know if I'm settling right now or not, because that was one of the number one questions. How do I know? I don't know. Something about you saying that I just like, it really struck me because I think that sometimes I think what we're avoiding is the grief of the timeline, the person, the thing that I thought was going to be my life at this point. It's not here yet, right? And even that is a space of can I stay with myself through the pain that that brings up for me.

And it's very real. I don't want to minimize that. If I dreamt of having children and I'm at a certain age. I don't know that that's still going to be possible for me, I think that there is grief to be felt, and I don't ever want to minimize what that is for someone. And I think what we don't talk about is the importance, what you were saying about, like, something that is real and stable of, like, oh, my God, anybody who has ever had a child, like, it matters who you have a child with, right? I, you know, I am a single woman with a child, not a single mother. And there's a very distinct

difference because my child has an unbelievably present father. Fuck yeah. And I always make that distinction because not having that, I don't know how women do that, right? But a lot of times, you know, someone will say to me, like, but I just, the clock is ticking and I know I want this child. And he's not the person that I would want it with, but I don't want to get back out there and date again. And I'm like, this decision, not just for you for this child that you're saying you want to

have, think about what it will be like to co-parent with this person if that is not the reality that you stay together. And those are some of the things we have to have some like big kid conversations with ourselves about because that is the reality of your life. And we are making choices that will impact us in the long term in terms of what our lives feel like. Oh, it's 100%. Somebody actually had written in saying, I don't want to have to go slow. I just want to know, like, how can I deal with this? I'm in my 40s. I want a child already. Like, what do I do? And I just said back to her, I was like, I get it. Trust me. As a woman, I'm 34. I don't have children. I don't personally want them, but I do have a biological. I have a body. So I understand

the desire of like, I have maternal instincts, right? And like my heart goes out to anybody that that's your dream. Fucking chase it. But to your point, my question to her was, okay, so for 18 years, you'd rather be completely inconvenienced versus just even thinking about like, my friend, she just adopted a child, single. She did it herself. More power to you. Right? She was like, I don't want to be stuck with some schmo and have to deal with him because there is a lot of repercussions that come from that. And so I caution anybody, if you're thinking of, I'll just take it. It's like, really think about if there, it's one thing if you're saying, like, one of my friends told me, I know that maybe there could be a better partner there for me, but she was like, but he would be an amazing

father. And she's like, and I love my partner. And she was like, could I, you know, could I go out there and search? She's like, I don't want to. I want to have a kid with him. And they did. They ended up having two kids. They're a great team. The parent, he's a fantastic father. But she also knows, like, this isn't, you know, she's like, I would be an idiot to think like, oh, my God, this is the best relationship ever had, but she was like, but where I'm at in my life, I wanted children, and this really worked for me. And I'm curious your perspective on, I guess really just how do you start to kind of make those decisions? Or if you find yourself going, oh, fuck, I think I settled, right? Like, how can we, with love and grace, be able to navigate that?

I love that you said love and grace, right? Because I think I am that person that doesn't believe in mistakes, which everyone's like, and I don't. I think this is like, we came here to learn. I think every experience of my life has never been wasted because it's taught me something I needed to know. It's supported me in becoming the woman that I've become. So I think we have to give ourselves grace for where we are, wherever we make those decisions and hindsight, you know, really clear. But it can be hard sometimes to have that ahead of time. And I think, you know, there's, if I feel like I've settled and this is the reality, I think this is where we got to get into no fault zone, vigorous honesty and how do we move forward? So let's say your friend that you're describing

realizes like you're an amazing father and you're not the person I want to share my life with. I think that is where the sharing of a life with two souls part comes in to me because you know what I love to normalize is it doesn't have to be that anybody's failed. If we say this is no longer aligned and I look at my kiddo's dad and like the women that he has had in his life, many of which are like really good friends of mine, but they're such beautiful women who are aligned with what I believe that he deserves and were just both able to be so much happier and thriving in truth than we were when we were trying to hold on to something that was no longer aligned, right? And I just think the other thing you said about your friend who is having a

child by herself, I think we really need to normalize more community. I think there's so much about the nuclear family structure that is. is so unbelievably depleting to parents, people in general, but it's just not enough. I think one person, and this is sort of the partnership aspect, being everything for me, you know, my friend, my confidant, my travel buddy, the erotic other, like it's too much. One person does not have the capacity to be that for us ever. And so, you know, I think normalizing that we need to do this a little bit more in a village and we need to have other people that are in my child's life and they will benefit from that as well.

But I think that's the other aspect of when we have community around us. I think there's a little bit less pressure on like I need to partner up because I feel alone and I feel isolated. And it's like, you know, if we have people in our lives, then we don't have to feel alone, but we can sort of hold off until it's a more aligned partnership. Oh, yeah. To your point, she lives on a compound. She's got like, yeah.

Because even she said she was like, I can't do this alone. Like I need. Yeah. And she's very successful. So she was able to facilitate what her needs were. And it's like, fuck yeah, right? Like it doesn't have to be the cookie cutter man-meat woman. If we're talking heterosexual norms, man-meet man, woman.

I don't really care. It doesn't need to be what the movies say, right? It can also just be your lived experience. But I wanted to talk because you had mentioned the stability and aliveness. Yeah. Right? And you were like, oh, let's talk about kind of what does that actually mean and look like. Yeah.

And so a lot of the way that I talk about masculine and feminine energetics, that's what I mean when I'm talking about. I'm talking about these dualities, these polar energies that are like, the stuff of life, right? And so, you know, I think Gabor Mate, but like so many people talk about these fundamental human needs that we have. We need a sense of attachment, stability, something that we feel tethered to. That's just like if we think about it in a collective level, that's like a sense of community, something that we feel like, okay, this is the solidified space that I know I'm rooted in, but we also need aliveness and eros and life force and expansion, right? So, The masculine energy within all of us is sort of the ego, our body.

It's like the solidified, here we are, you know, like the container. The feminine is the aliveness, the life force, the eros, all of that energy. And we need both, but we live in a society that for thousands of years now has put a tremendous amount of emphasis on the masculine. And I would say wounded masculine structures, right? But what we're seeing right now, and we're like right on the tip of the iceberg with the Aquarian Age, is that the feminine energy within all of us, regardless of gender, is rising and it's expanding. And so what that means is we're starting to question a little bit, you know, like, this is the way I've always been taught that it has to be done or it should be done. But like, what else could be true? And I think with the couples that I see, that's why I'm seeing such an explosion of like ethical nonmonogamy and polyamory and all these other ways that we can structure relationships.

And I kind of love it, not so much because I have an opinion on those things so much as I'm like, it's the exploration. It's sort of defining our relationship dynamic for ourselves. And I think when we put too much emphasis on the structure and just the safety and just the attachment, but not the aliveness, it becomes this thing of like if we're repressing any part of ourselves, what we resist persists. And it will come to the surface. And a lot of times it comes to the surface in some maladaptive ways.

So if I'm just focused on the security, the stability. the relationship communication stays intact, then I will need life force. I will need Eros. And sometimes that's like an affair and fidelity happens, right? Or all of these things happen because we haven't been putting enough emphasis on like, no, we need to be constantly evolving and expanding and changing and in curiosity and not a meshed. And like we are each other's everything. And so a lot of what I get into in the book is like what it looks like for the couples that I work with to sort of be in that space of the dance of the masculine and feminine within ourselves and so that we're not really looking to outsource that so much to another person. Yeah, I love that. If anybody were to look at my

relationship, we're the polar opposite of the feminine and masculine. I am the quote unquote masculine. Like, it's my business. My partner and I work for my business. We, but I'm the breadwinner of the house in that sense because I pay both of our salaries. Then we look, he cooks and cleans. He takes care of the kitchen. Like, that's his thing. And I remember somebody like one night who he was like tickling me or something and I like was laughing and I was like, just feeling so comforted. And that was when it first hit me, I was like, oh, for me to access this quote unquote feminine part of me. I was like, I needed safety. I needed somebody that allowed me to receive and to just disarm. But then also to have that space to where I can be more

masculine and say, no, I need to take control of this. And so for anyone listening, let me just, I think, clarify again to the internet that has fucked up masculine and feminine. Feminine to me, when I hear the like, I'm in my feminine and I just receive, it's like what I hear is a fond response of like, oh, I'm just going to sit and just wait and I'm just going to let you do everything to me because I'm terrified of rejection and I can't actually stand up and say, I'd like to show you interest because God forbid I'm in my masculine. But all of us have that because every day you have to be in your masculine in order to fucking take care of yourself in order to be if you're single, right? You have to have both of those dualities and it can't all one versus all the other. If the pendulum swings too severely, when we're so in our masculine, it's like, are you trying to control the outcome? You're trying to control the situation.

Is that why you feel like you need to be a bull in a china shop because you're uncomfortable just being in your own body? I don't care how you want to slice this masculine and feminine polarities at the end of the day. Get back home to yourself and start to find that balance internally because you can't have such a masculine man. That sounds machismo. That sounds like toxic masculinity. That's right. The same as the toxic femininity of like as a woman, I just do my nails, then just get my hair done. It's like there's a lot more to a woman and femininity than that shit.

Listen, this is why I love you. You're so brilliant. But it's that, right? So if we understand that all of us have both masculine and feminine energetics, if a man is all in his machismo and not connected to his feminine, he cannot be in relationship with your feminine. He will be abusive to your feminine because he's completely rejected his own feminine, right? And so what I love about what you're describing about your relationship is, to me, this is the thing of like, how do we be in this dance of aliveness, but really present-centered awareness with like knowing myself well? and I don't care about the roles. It's like, who loves doing this thing?

Amazing. You be responsible for the cooking. If that's what you love to do. Thank God. Dream, right? If I, like, really thrive in, like, the idea space and the work, like, great. Like, I'm like, let's just remove the roles. But how do we be in relationship with myself in a way that I can really show up in this

relationship with you knowing myself well so that I'm not just, like, projecting all of those fears and roles onto you, you know? God, I wish, we were talking about this offline. And I wish people understood how much projection happens. Like it's 99.9% of the time I have interactions with people. I'm like, okay, that's cool. But I can identify it. And I think that to me, like, that's how I feel about when people attack on the masculine

feminine, the black cat energy and all this fucking nonsense. Let me ask you, how is your fucking dating like going? How is your, how are your relationships? Do you feel fulfilled and charged and energized and like, I feel so comfortable around this person? It's like, are you always playing this dance because you have to be something that's not realistic? Yeah, and it's just defending against actually taking responsibility for my part, right?

Like, I feel like we were talking about this a little bit before, but like something that's like nails on a chalk for it to me around like the avoidant conversation or even like the fuckboy conversation. It's like, okay, and where was your part in the energy of the dynamic? Like how much were you like, this is my person? I just know, right? Like he's the one and it takes off and then all of a sudden he's gone. He's ghosted you. And you're not even like taking, well, but did I? I move a little fast. Did I really get to know this person? Was I really present with how it felt in my body moment to moment, breath to breath? And that's like it's, again, all the grace for ourselves. But I think this is a little bit of like where we've just decided, like, I need a night in shining armor to come rescue me. And that's the thing about settling. It's a lot of times I'm just looking for someone versus like, are you really in present-centered relationship with this person right here in front of me? Really? And that's the 100% I have to take.

100% I'm all day and anytime I hear that I'm like I'm tired of this what was me story like I'm very I'm over the all these guys are such assholes they're all so avoidant they're all this and it's like again what is my partner I had a narcissistic ex you're right God he was terrible but you know what I was also super fucking unhealthy I was really toxic I thought he was my dad I was projecting onto him I use protest behavior I didn't have self-esteem I would do that I can't do this anymore and then he would feel abandoned and then he would react to me and we would get into these screaming matches and then he'd walk out the door and then I'm on the floor crying and I'm like, this is my dad. Okay, now let me be a good girl and get him back. I played into that dynamic.

I don't blame or shame myself, but I will take full accountability radically that I played a part in why this didn't work. And like that's why I love what you were saying about the marriage. I have an ex. We left it off of great terms of like you're an amazing person. You're not my person. And I feel like we either, it's like that black and white, either has to be good or bad. Because if they're bad, I'm good, right? Because holding that two conflicting truths of they're an amazing person, but they're not my person,

it almost feels scary, I think, for a lot of people to have that much control and power over their life. So I'd rather control you the fake perception of control than actually be in control of what I have, which is moire. That's like chef's kiss, what you just said. Because honestly, I think what is so scary for us is how much agency we have and how powerful we are. and that we are outsourcing our power as a choice. And that's like, again, big breath on how much grace because we've all been there. Everything you're describing them like, same girl, same, right? Like, we've all been there.

And once we have the conscious awareness of it, I don't have to do that anymore. And I think what's shifting in terms of our relationships is just this understanding that to me, and it's a little bit the perspective of depth psychology, is relationships are the most beautiful mirror I can possibly have places. placed in front of me, showing me to me, showing me my pain points, showing me my growing edges. If I choose to see it this way, this is like the most incredible curriculum possible, versus this person's going to save me from my existential fears. And once the one comes, then, like, and nobody's ever able to do that or be that for us. So again, when I say, like, I don't think we should be settling. It's not that I don't think we want to be really realistic about being human.

and like, you know, we are in relationships with other humans. They're going to do all the other human things that we do. And I think it's really like, how do I come back to the relationship with myself as what this relationship is really about, right? Like it's showing me the things that I need to grow through. Which is kind of one of the, let's get to speed dating. Speed dating. I decided to add this feature to the show where I was like, we're going to do speed dating,

which means I just ask you rapid fire question. But which kind of answered the unrealistic expectations for settling, right? of like, I'd be curious, do you have anything that stands out hearing that? Because I'm sure we get this all day of like, well, they don't do this and they don't do this and they don't do this. I'm settling. And it's like, how do you balance between the like, no, dude, you just sound like you're being wildly unrealistic because he has to be six, five, blue eyes finance. Oh my God. You know, so how can we find a balance between that? Because that was the number one question was like the difference between settling and settling down. Like, I think there's a confusion of how do we navigate what's actually

good for us versus the like, hey, I just don't think this is right. Yeah, it's hard, right? Because I think so much of this is in our logic space. And to a certain extent, maybe it's the romantic in me, but I think it's not logic. It's love and, right? I think it's we're meeting another human, right? And how do we be in the space of, like, there's just so much dehumanization in even those like things that you were describing. And I think the six five blue eyes, it's like, oh, God, you know, it's so dehumanizing. It kind of makes me cringe. But, um, again, I think it's like, do I feel like who this person is makes me want to be a better version of myself, makes me feel like, oh, God, I'm just, to me, love is a little bit, like, I'm grateful to know someone like this exists, right? Like when I think of the couples that I really admire who they are with one another and the way they show up, it's that energy of like, I just admire this person, right? And if you don't feel that, I think it's about something else. It's a little bit in the realm of fear.

And if we're not sure if we're operating from fear or love, I think a lot of times fear has an objective, right? It's like, here's what I'm making happen, right? Love is like, you know, I'm present. I'm curious. I'm really attempting to understand what I don't understand, right? It's not in that space of attempting to control or manipulate. And even the like six, five blue eye, like there's some control and manipulation at it. Right?

So it's like, yeah, like what's the objective that I'm chasing versus. being in relationship with another human being. Which I think to your point, what you're saying so beautifully is like, is there rigidity versus like, is there a little bit of flexibility, right? That's the, to me, the unrealistic expectations are incredibly rigid. You have to do this. You have to do this. Why didn't you calm?

It's like, it's almost everything to where you're like, hey, this is heavy, right? Like, I can't. I don't know what you want, right? To me, when I think of unrealistic expectations, I think of unmet needs. Yeah. Right, especially when they're unrealistic, that you're like, oh, so let me guess, this person has to make all the money. They have to do everything.

They have to be the one that provide. They have to be the one that chase you. They have to be the one that shows their interest. They have to be the ones that are this. But then my question back is like, cool. And how are you showing up? Yeah. And do you care about how that feels for them genuinely?

Like even, and I love that I hear you talk a lot about like this thing of like, you know, he hasn't texted me and there's like there's been this whole response. And it's like, I think we're so quick to jump to the contempt versus the curiosity. And what I love to say to couples all the time is how can I offer the most generous interpretation in my mind first before going to the catastrophe, before going to the like, this is why this person who I'm saying that I love is doing something inevitably to hurt me. And again, that's a pain point. That's something historic normally that is making me draw from the place of catastrophe.

But also, can I think about what that feels like for that person I'm in partnership with or I'm dating, right? If I'm jumping inevitably to the least generous interpretation of their actions, we don't talk about what that feels like for the person that I don't feel like is texting me enough a lot of times. A lot of times it feels like, uh, whatever I do, I'm doing it wrong. And, and that feels like really awful, you know. 100% to that to that point, the amount of times even Ryan will be like, cool, you want more texting. He's like, I know anything that makes me feel the person that doesn't want that. And it's like, that's, I think why I'm so glad we had this conversation is because

we do need to see different perspectives. It's like, it can't. That's also why I don't just do solos. It's one fucking echo chamber just constantly bouncing back and forth. But it's so important. It's like we don't need to villainize other people to make our suffering and pain feel more valid, right? We don't have to make them the bad guy of like, fuck that guy or she's dick or all these. It's like, we could also say, hey, maybe they do have a void an attachment or maybe they're just not the person for me, right? I don't need to diagnose them. But instead of going guilty until proven innocent, it's like, how can I show space? Because I've had clients that'll say they're freaking out. And I'll be like, so this is called hypervigilance, right? You.

don't know what the problem is, but you know there's a problem. And sure enough, they find out, like, one of my clients found out that the guy, she was dating like his daughter had gotten hurt. And he was like, right? He was at the hospital with the daughter and didn't have reception. And so she was, and I was like, yo, you're making it about you and you're not holding space, but yet you wonder why your partner doesn't know how to show up for you because it's the you show. But it's not the, we also have to make space for another person's reality that maybe that person's avoidant and shutting down because you're being really overwhelming to them. And they don't how to handle this. It doesn't mean I have to be wrong for it, but I can also take a step back

and say, yeah, you're right. I could be a bullet in a china shop. I can see how that could be really hard for someone to receive because I'm also thinking about their experience. Yeah, you're so good. And I think that is to me what is often missing in the, but why is someone avoidant, right? Like, we're so quick to villainize and it's like if we understand some of that energy you're describing is for people a lot of times what it felt like in childhood when a parent needed so much for them from them, excuse me, or a parent. parent was like really big in their needs and their energy and their overwhelm. And from a child's perspective, it was like, uh, and shut down, right, and go inward.

And that's become their trauma response or their initial way of navigating overwhelm. And it's like we don't really think about though, but why? Why is that person operating this way? And it's not to like excuse it or make it okay. It's just maybe it's not aligned in terms of where they are and what I want in a partnership. So beautiful is that. Okay. Let me ask you one last question.

which I don't want to have to end it, but we have to. Okay, what questions can you ask yourself if you feel like you're settling? Oh. Yeah, I think just maybe even some journal prompts or something that we can get curious, right? We can invite some curiosity to anybody that's listening to be able to navigate like, am I settling or am I finding a fucking problem with this person because they're really great? Two questions I love, and I love this question. So good.

The first I would say is if nothing about this dynamic, this relationship, this person ever changes one iota, would I want? this, right? Do I still want this for myself? So that would be the question around am I like falling in love with potential. But the other question, and I love this, I heard this like in a real somewhere and I was like, ooh, that is so good. But it's like if someone told you that you were just like your partner, would that be a compliment? Oh, I love that. Or would you cringe a little bit? I love that. It reminds me of like when I was with my ex and I went to my friends who had been married for like 10 years and he looked at me and he goes do you accept him for who he is i said yeah but he goes i'm done and he goes that's it yeah but and he goes no you either accept him he's like you've been with this

person for over a year he was like you accept him or you don't but when you incorporate the but i need and he was like so then you don't accept him for who he is and this isn't what works for you and i was like oh fuck so real it's so real oh dinai i could have you on for fucking hours oh my god to be continued i am obsessed with you we will do more 100% 2025 we're coming for you but where can people find you? The book will be linked in the show notes, but plug away. Where can people find you work with you or even just learn more about you?

Thank you, Sabrina. So my best, Vanessa Bennett and I have a community called the Cheaper Than Therapy Community, where we do a lot of group work and community and all kinds of like facilitating of groups all the time. Deneylogan.com is my website. And yeah, sovereign love is the book that gets into all of what we're talking about from my perspective. Yay.

Okay. I'm so excited, guys, go get the book. Go follow. go do all the things. Thank you again so much for being part of the family. Thank you so much, my love. This is so fun.