The Uneducated PT Podcast - #39 Lisa McFarland - Knowing Your Attachment Style In Relationships

Episode Date: July 12, 2024

In this episode we speak to Lisa McFarland, The UK & Ireland’s Leading Relationship Coach & the founder of Relationship Coaching NI. Lisa is a wife and mother to three almost grown-up children and has established a professional career in the HR industry. During her HR position a friend at work suggested that she went into a life coaching course and she haven’t looked back since. It is her mission to educate people on how to have healthy relationships.In this episdoe we go into attachment style, the power of communciation, the different love languages, sexless relationships and much more. 

Hello and welcome to the uneducated PT podcast with me, your host, Carlo Rourke. The goal of this podcast is to bring on interest and knowledgeable people from all walks of life, learn a little something from each conversation and for you, the listener, just learn something from each episode. So don't forget to subscribe to the channel, press the box below, show some support, and I'll see you on the next episode. Lisa, welcome to the uneducated PT podcast. Thank you for having me.

So you're going to educate me today on relationships and building strong relationships. So how long have you been helping people with their relationships and why relationship coaching? I started four and a half years ago right before COVID, so January 2020. And I just really started by running some classes in my local area for women to help them with their confidence, communication, conflict styles. And then I was coaching a few couples. And then you know what happened. and we were all in our houses. Why relationship coaching though?

Why are you so passionate about that? Where did this come from? So I've been in a relationship with my husband since we were 18. And in our early 40s, I keep saying like seven years ago, but that's not, that's more like 10 years ago.

Yeah, we don't count COVID years anymore. We've also bothered about this silly summer cough thing that's going around. So if I have to cough, sorry about that. Yeah, don't worry. So my husband and I have another bit. business together and that business was going through a big transition. We had three teenagers. My mum had passed away and we just got a little bit lost, lost in the weeks. We've just got a

little bit lost in the weeds. We were talking about the same thing, talking, arguing about the same thing over and over again. And our relationship had just got really heavy and that had never been the case for us before. So I said, I'd been to therapy before and my mom had passed away. So I said, let's go and talk to somebody. There's bound to be things that we need to educate ourselves on. So we went. We were both terrified, nervous, but we loved each other and we knew we knew we could do better. We knew we were just, as we say here in Ireland, rubbing each other up the wrong way. You know, we just knew. And we wanted back to what we had. So we went to her three times, and she just turned it around. She just turned it around. And she just said the most practical,

sensible things. And I just kept coming home every, I was like, everyone has to know this stuff. Everybody needs to know this stuff. How have we even got this far? Not knowing that like, just ranting on, you know? And he was like, uh-huh, yep. Mm-hmm, yeah, absolutely, absolutely going on with this day.

So then I, my pain as a life coach. And I started sort of that journey. I did it for the people in our business. with quite a few employees. So I trained them and educated them and just tried to build them up a little bit. And then someone in that business said, I think you need to take that online now.

Now, between you and me, that's code for, we've had enough of you. Thank you very much, amen. Go and sell your ware somewhere else. So I started a fake Facebook page in May 2019. And then my children were like, my let's get it over the Instagram and I was like okay so why why a why a face fake Facebook group because even though I was a life coach I still had not got control of my automatic negative thoughts

I call my thoughts her name is Shirley and she likes to come with us everywhere as you know and she's the one that says you can't go to the gym and you'll not be able to do this and you couldn't do that and um and my children were all teenagers but it was still you know it's it's It wasn't, you know, I had dependence and, you know, responsibilities and I didn't want them at school, somebody going, what's your mum I doing on Facebook? Who does she think she is? Turns out they love the whole thing. They love it. Turns out it was nothing to worry about at all. I think everyone, no matter what business you're going into or what kind of career you're going to, everyone has that self-doubt of like, who am I to start this business or who am I to, you know, help people in this regard. I think everyone has that, don't they? who you know so back to the old you know and we're brilliant at it on this wee island you know who does she think she is who does he think he is you know who does he think he is making a life for himself ridiculous behaviour um you even speaking of uh so so after a certain amount of years you and your partner

went uh seeked out help do you think that uh being a relationship coach like do you find that there's still like a taboo around people reaching out for help in terms of their relationships because they think that like it's a deemed as like a failure if you go to relationship coaching or something like that. Yeah, it is changing. It's definitely changing and young people like yourself are definitely helping that scene. I have people come now who maybe have just got married and maybe have a baby and they've just sort of started to see that things just, they're bit disconnected, things just to work the way and they're like look we just need educate ourselves here lots of people come to me who already have a business coach or a PT and they're sort of saying things to me like

kind of dawned on us in this most important part why why are we not educating ourselves it's definitely changing excuse me definitely changing but yes there's definitely still a lot of shame and guilt and that's why people leave it too long some people leave it until the wheels fall off because of the shame and guilt. Just come and educate yourself. I say to people all the time, you're trying to build an IKEA wardrobe without the book. And that's not your fault. Ikea didn't give you the book. You know, you don't have, you don't, you don't have any education on how to do this. But then when things start to go a little bit off centre, all we do is pile shame and guilt on ourselves. I mean, it's, it would be like not knowing about calorie intake and then beating our

ourselves up that we put on weight. It's like, don't we, silly. Do you think that a lot of people think that it should come, relationships just should come naturally and that's why they feel that they should go to seek out help or support? Everybody's in relationship.

Everybody has relationships. Sure, we should just be able to do this. Bring me something else in life that we do without any instruction. Yeah. nothing there's nothing and even if even if you can do it well for a certain point

sometimes you still need support or sometimes you can go to lose your way lots of people now are doing much more work individually before they get into a relationship again brilliant my husband and I were together when we were 18 I mean come on lots of people are doing a lot more therapy a lot more coaching a lot more self-development before they get India relationship, which I think helps immensely, but there's still space for couples doing the

work together. So what are some of like common problems or issues that couples have coming in for your help that need solved? Her communication, unlawfully conflict styles, lack of sex and intimacy. Okay, we're going to go through them. So I have like a few different categories that I wanted to go through. One was attachment cells. One was communication and so on. So can you just tell you. me a little bit about attachment styles what they are and how they impact relationships. Now, all these things we're going to talk about today are free. You just go online and download these. Okay, by my e-book if you like, because all the link's in there. But they're all free. So you just go online, you put in attachment style test. Okay, so let's just break it into three,

okay? Secure, anxious and avoidant, all right? Some of the tests you do, you will give you other secure, anxious, avoidant, okay? So it's our job to purpose. personally become secure. Okay. So here's the good one, I presume. Here's where you want to live. Secure is what we all want to be. Okay.

So secure attachment style is something like your partner says something that is a wee bit off or a wee bit interesting. And you say things like, okay, I don't really understand what you're saying. Tell me more about that. Okay, secure attachment style. Maybe your partner's late or maybe you're, you know, it's just, about being secure and asking questions and bringing each other closer and leaning more into each other. Okay.

Anxious attachment style is being worried about what your partner's doing, where your partner is, overthinking everything, over talking everything. Avoiding detachment style is avoiding conversations, avoiding connection, don't want to get hurt, all that sort of stuff. Now, even when we do the work to become secure, we talked before about, but people doing that work before they get into relationships. That's what we want to do. So we do the work and we become secure.

I am telling you when you get into the relationship and you are in conflict with your person, you will default to what you were, either anxious or avoidant. So anxious is, I don't want you to go out and avoidant is, I'm going to block my, I'm going to turn off my phone and go out for the weekend.

And you're blocked. And is like, are we fixed with them pipes of styles? Like if someone's always an anxious style, are they anxious in all relationships or is it the relationship itself that makes that person? It seems to be the romantic relationships bring out the best and the worst of us.

And the closer we get, the more unpacking we have to do, you know? The thing about the anxious and avoidant is when we're in conflict, the anxious wants to talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and there's nothing makes the avoidant want to avoid more than the anxious going on and on and on and on. There's nothing makes the anxious have to keep going on and on and on than the avoidant avoiding it.

So it's just about recognising it in yourself. My default would be anxious. I would keep going and keep, but why did you do that? Why did you say that? How could we not do that again? What do we need to learn from this? Now there is space for those questions, but once. all day.

Not overwhelming. You know? And then what was my programming was when I didn't get the answers I wanted, then I would shut down emotionally and I call it huffing, you know, silent treatment, cold shoulder,

you know, all picture, no sound. That's what I would do. And it's very, very, very pure behaviour. Do those anxious and avoidance, do they tend to match a shirt? They're drawn to each other like a mouth of deep flame. Which ends up in disaster a lot of the times. And so is the job then, if you know what your tendency seems to be,

like I could say straight away that I'm definitely avoiding. Like, can you then, your job is to move as much from avoidance to secure. It's just training the muscle, you know? So what we teach is a rupture. So there's going to be a rupture in relationships. where and it really worries when people say we never fight we never ever crossword that can't be a proper that's not a relationship so there's going to be there's going to be ruptures and what we have to do is sit in the tunnel of emotions to get to repair so the anxious has to sit in that tunnel in a

nice healthy way not accusing not overreacting and the avoidant has to train the muscle we're sitting in this we're sitting in this we're not going to jump we're not going to avoid, we're going to answer the questions, we're going to ask questions, and we're going to get to repair. Now, once the nervous system gets stimulated, we can't, we no longer can sit in this tunnel of emotion, okay? So once the nervous system is activated, we might have to ask for a little break. That's what we're reacting really, is it? Yeah. So you stand up and slam the door. You've just gone back to your caveman mind and you're just going. you've just, and you've just, you let your seven-year-old come out all over the place,

because the subconscious has now just taken over. The nervous system activated as like, you know, Avengers, activated, activated, you know. Your nervous system is activated and you're no longer speaking from your educated self, you know. I was reading something recently and it said, I was actually a podcast I was listening to, and it said that they actually have evidence now that once your nervous system is activated, gone, you know the adrenaline has kicked in you people say i i actually didn't even hear you say that there's evidence now to say that the part of your brain that actually receives information is just shut down we are a fighter flight we're a fighter flight we're out so so it's so you may have to

ask for a break so you might say something like burnt toast spaghetti bonnese that's your time out time out take yourself to your man cave put on the kettle um um walk the dog around the block, whatever you need to do, your box breathing, your breathing techniques to get the nervous system back in the regulated.

Okay, sweetheart, let's go again. Let's tell me about that, you know, let's go again. And the more you practice, it's just a muscle, the easier it gets. Like, I don't really, we don't have to take a break

now to suit the nervous system anymore. It's fine. You know, you just get better at it. Well, I suppose that's where something that turns into a small fight, turns into a huge fight, turns into a massive scale fight, because there is none of that time out,

and it's just, you know, you're in that. Escalating, escalating, escalating. Yeah, yeah. You slam the door, they shout, then they're walking off, and now, and I cannot tell you, the couples that I coach, and they say, we can't even remember what the argument was about,

but we end up apologising for the behaviour during the argument. Yeah, rather than. and the actual thing that started in the first place. Yeah. So we never get anywhere there. We're just in a spiral. So how do you work with people who have these attachment styles who aren't self-aware that these are their attachment styles? Well, when we're sitting in session, it might be the first time that people have actually listened to each other.

Active listening is so, so important. And we would get a lot, we would do a lot of interrupt. and no, no, what he means is, or, you know, same-sex couples do this as well. There's usually one that's more of extrovert, the one who would class themselves as the better communicator, and they'll almost like, no, no, no, that didn't, no, and my job is to say, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, thank you. Well, we're going to get to you in a wee second. Hold on a second. And sometimes the other partner, sometimes, well, I'm going to say, majority of time,

Eden Bush, I was like, the guys, they're like, oh, space for me here. I actually space for me here. Guys love coaching. Guys love coaching. There's space for me to. And then there's me saying, is it possible whenever you said that? Is there a word that maybe could be better for that? And they'll be like, disconnection.

And when I said when I said, I could not believe he even knew those words to say. And I'm like, it just didn't have the space. You know, I often say, especially women clients, all your words are right here. They're right here at the front of your frontal lobe and they're spilling out your mouth, no problem at all. It seems to be for guys, this is general. Lots of guys, the words are stuck somewhere back here

and there's 15 car crashes for it to go through and damage and woundedness and being talked over before it can get out. And we have to just make space for that, you know? Do you find that that women are more eager to come in with their partners than the men, but then the men seem to

better to the sessions over time? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just yes. And there's a funny little thing that happens when women, I'm not a big believer in bringing your partner to therapy.

Yeah. You know, that doesn't work. It's like bringing your partner to the gym. It's not, it's, you know, you can bring your partner to the gym. off. So, but usually I'm like, it's okay, who brought who today? And it's usually the guys be like, she, she organized it all, but like, I know we need it. So that's all I need. As long as I, as long as I have a willing, willing specimen, I can work with that. And then there's usually

a point in the call where the guy goes, see, that's a good idea. And the woman is like, oh, my dear. Yeah. And do you find that when you're, weren't in your inter sessions, do you ever have a case where someone is almost unwilling to recognise their own behaviours and unwilling to change? Or is... I'm... That would be sort of narcissistic tendencies. So I'm very fortunate. My Instagram has grown really naturally and really organically and shooting the right

podcast to go on and that sort of thing. I just seem to have brought the... write people on my journey with me. I'm going to say twice. I've been on a call going, okay, there's something. And the big telltale time for me is if the way they're speaking to their partner, and this is not, this can be a miscremen as well,

the way you're speaking to your partner, if that's how you speak to them in front of me, their goodness what's going on behind closed doors. But how can you, how can you? Yeah. So let's say someone is a bit of a narcissist then like obviously you can't just turn around to the partner and be like you shouldn't be with that person. What I say is you and I need to book a session. Just you and me need to get a wee session booked out.

And you allow that person to realise what's best for them through that session. And there is an awareness when they hear their partner say it out live to somebody else. you can just sometimes see the blinders come off, you know. It's just like, or people on the mess around going, did you hear what they said? I'm like, I did hear what they said, you know? They're like, doesn't that seem, I'm like, you know, let's you and me get an appointment booked. Why does it? Why, why does it take so long for people to realize that?

Like, realize, you know, maybe their self-worth or how poorly they've been treated for so long? Yeah. there's definitely a correlation between our childhood and what we accept in relationship. The nervous system definitely is wired to, oh, this feels like love. Oh, this is what love felt like to me. I will also blame the movies that we watch,

especially as young girls, on what this Prince Charming should look like. I can't say the D word, because I'm worried they're going to sue me someday, but like until we got frozen, I mean, I was talking to something the other day, And she was having issues saying her words. And I said, what was your favorite movie when you were little?

And she said, the little mermaid. And I said, hmm, is that the little mermaid where she falls in love with a aloof stranger? And then she gives up her voice to get legs. That story. And she was like, oh, dear God. Until they say it. It is. There it is.

And speaking of childhood and stuff like that, do you think even with them attachment styles, does that have anything to do with childhood or how you're seeing even how your parents? That's where the whole theory comes from. It was experiments done in the 60s, on these actually, and how they responded when their mommy left the room and their mom came back and all that sort of thing, you know.

And yeah, absolutely, absolutely. It can then start to happen. I mean, you could have quite a secure person who then gets in their relationship that is not good. And all that secureness goes. I mean, it can be rebuilt. So the more secure we can make our children, the more stable we can make our children. And that doesn't necessarily mean they have to be in, you know, what we would call nuclear family. You know, there's plenty of people who come from, who have just been brought up by their mom or brought up with their dad who are perfectly secure.

It's not, don't have beat ourselves about that. Yeah, it's going to be multifactual, but there probably is an element to it. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, we all know our children as well. I mean, I have three almost grown up, well, two definitely growing up, one almost there. And like I can see, like from their babies, you know, you can see, you can see it in them, you know, and it's about as parents nurturing that and encouraging more security and that sort of thing. A lot of research coming out now about how young men become secure.

during those teenage years and how young women become secure during those teenage years really interesting. You spoke about communication was obviously a big thing in the process of helping rebuild a relationship.

You spoke about, I heard you speak about healthy conflict. What does that mean? Because I suppose a lot of people would be under the impression that conflict is always a bad thing. So it's just what I was saying there about rupture,

staying in the emotional tunnel to repair, okay? conflict is a good thing. Conflict, we need to be able to hear our partner's opposite of you. We don't have to agree. We can just say, I can hear that. That's interesting. It's not what I think at the minute.

And that's okay. We've been taught this sort of codependency. Like we have to fight to be right. You have to fight to be right. I could say to you, I could say to you, those are beautiful plants behind you there. And somebody else can come in and go, oh, I hate that. those sort of plants. That doesn't make them wrong and me right. It's just our personal opinion, you know? Now, there are things that do need to match in couples. Core values and ethics,

they have to be there in relationships. If our core values and our ethics aren't there, it's going to be very tricky. This was something I was going to ask you as well, because I heard you speak about core values and a mission statement. Why would they be important in a relationship? So, for example, I could have a core value that I would like to live in a caravan, my whole life. And I would like to see the world. Okay. My partner could be a home body, doesn't like to travel, doesn't like to fly.

That's going to be a problem. Okay. My core value could be that I don't want children. And my partner's core value could be, I really want a family. That's going to be a problem. You know, and these core values are in us from very young, you know. So it's about sitting down, just going on to Google, like putting in core values. I just happen to look at them because maybe we haven't even spent time thinking what our core values are.

To have to look at them and pick 10. And your partner pick 10. Excuse me. And then sit down of an evening or Sunday morning or whatever and have a chat about them and see what ones match. And the ones that match, I like to say, are almost your mission statement for the relationship. So, for example, you know, loyalty, commitment, maybe travel. One of my friends, core values, is fun. Like, that's okay.

Romance might be one. And like, if you're, and the other thing I always say to couples is, okay, now you've got your five or six that match. But I want you to look at the ones that you haven't matched on because there, your partner's core value. It's not going to go away. All right. So my husband,

one of his core values, is tidiness. Now that would not be high on my agenda. I keep a nice house, but like I can function when stuff's messy. It gets to a level where I'm like,

okay, that's it. Everybody pick up their stuff, you know? His level is much lower than mine. His level is like... That's an argument that couple's into all the time over someone being a little bit more messier than the other person in Brazil. Yep. And it's just saying, I love you, I respect you, I'll do my best to keep things a bit tighter. It's not being submissive in any way or da-da-da-da. Somebody's, some, a core value for somebody could be

punctuality and the other one that's like, mm-hmm, yeah, of course we're going to work on that. Of course we're going to try. We love each other. We want to build something lovely. but it's about having that awareness of known that other person and actually asking them questions, which I presume most people are getting into a relationship. The last thing they're thinking when they first get into the relationship is what's your core values or what's our mission statement? And another thing people don't think about is what are your needs? Why getting into this relationship?

What is it you need? Sometimes people are like, oh, never thought about that in my life. I'm like, yes, but you're here because you're not getting your needs met. but you have told the person or you haven't even discussed with yourself what your needs are. Very important. You speak about love languages. Yes. What are love languages?

So another free test. Just go online, put in free five love language test. Time, touch, words of affirmation, acts of service and gifts. You do the little test and you will get your primary. And then I always say to people as well, look at your secondary. Okay. So if you and your partner, if your love languages are very similar, you're probably going to have an easier relationship. Yeah.

Because how you love each other is very similar. Because we show love how we want to receive it. Make sense? Yeah, it makes sense. Someone told me one time that their husband would have the bath, you know, ready for them and candles and everything. so when they'd come home from a stressful day everything was sitting already so she would then go to this bath

and lie there for 20 minutes and then but what she actually wanted was to talk to him and tell him about her stressful day but he was loving her the way he wanted to be loved he would have loved for her to have the bath sorted for him candles lit and then be a glass of red poured

so he was loving her how he wanted to be loved it was quite amusing He was loving her through access or service. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. And that was his love language, not hers. Yeah, and she wanted to talk. She wanted time. Time, yeah, yeah.

That makes perfect sense. And what a lovely thing to do, but she was like, I don't know how to tell that I don't want this. You know, or lots of women will say to me, he does everything around this house. He tidies, he gets the kids dressed, he mops the floor after dinner, he does everything.

I couldn't ask for a better partner in that way. But all I want is for him to put the kettle on and come and talk to me. So he's loving again an acts of service and she wants time. Would you say that's common between men wanting to show love through acts of service and women wanting to receive love through time or is it doesn't really? Just love can be the other way around. sometimes women take on too many jobs, make themselves too busy. And their partner are saying to me, I didn't ask her to do that.

I don't put my clothes away. I don't know why she does that. I'd love to do the cooking, but she won't let me. You know, just depends. You spoke about, I was listening to a podcast and you were speaking about in communication not to use the you bob. What is the you bob for anyone who doesn't know? How can we avoid this so we don't?

get into trouble. So you didn't pick up the kids. You were late again. You said you'd bring me coffee every morning and you haven't done it all week. It's not going to get you anywhere. That is not going to get you anywhere. All that's going to get you is, well, you're one to talk. You didn't that. And then you know what you did? And what about that when you didn't you, okay? So it's about recognizing that there's been a rupture. Kids weren't collected, laundry wasn't put away. you're whatever it was. I'm an irrupter. Sorry. I'm an irrupter.

And it's about saying, when that happened, I felt that, da, da, da, da, da, da, da. And then your partner says, I'm sorry about that. I didn't mean to make you feel that way. Not, I'm sorry. You feel like that. It's totally dismissive. I didn't intend that.

I didn't mean to make you feel like that. Do you think that there's a, a danger when Puppel's start almost keeping score and having this kind of competition between you did this and I did this kind of thing. So what

happens is we get we get a bit of courage once we've started an argument. We get a bit of courage and we think, oh, you know what I'm going to bring up now? I do what I'm going to bring up now. I do know what I'm going to bring up now and I forgot to say I'm about that. So what we talk about is like can we just deal with the bowl

at the side of the sink? We don't need to be throwing the whole based on over each other. Okay? Just deal with that ball and then deal with the next ball and then give it. Just that, just one thing at a time. One thing in a time. It's not fair.

It's ambushing, isn't it? Yeah. I heard you speak about how sex and finances are the most difficult things to, or the things that people struggle to speak about or communicate in a relationship.

There's five of them, but those two are definitely up there. And they're so important, but they're the hardest things to talk about. And it's what couples tell me, I have no idea what happens with our money. I don't know where it goes. I don't know. Or, you know, and then I think we're really struggling. Then they sit down and actually discuss their finances and they find out they're fine, you know.

Sex and intimacy. Everybody wants sex intimacy, but having those conversations about what you liked, what you didn't like, how often you would like it, that you're sad. It's not happening. They're hard conversations. So I presume that you have a lot of couples who come into it, maybe whether, I presume you, you deal with couples of all ages, younger couples, older couples. Let's say for someone who comes in or a couple that comes in and, you know, at the moment, whatever life's gone on, you know, they've had kids, they have busy jobs and they've just ended up in almost a sexist marriage. They don't really have time. They don't want it.

They're never in the mood. And they're starting to doubt whether they're even attractive. to their partner anymore. How do you help them to get through them kind of barriers? Yeah. So we need to start gently. You start gently. You know, what would feel comfortable?

Would holding hands feel comfortable? Would go in for a walk holding hands feel comfortable? Amazing. My people, hand holding is very, very, it seems very difficult. It's very intimate, you know. It's cuddling, is a cuddling up together on the sete, watching a TV program? is that a comfortable place to start? What we know is that

there's, I think, 2% of the population who are in sexless relationships and very happy in sexless relationships. It's a decision that they've made. It's not. But what we do know is, even if we decide to be in sexist relationships, we have to continue to cuddle, hold hands, kiss.

Human touch is very, very, very important. And I presume people that are in sexless relationships, probably are doing that as little as possible, probably because of life. People who have had a conversation and say, look, you know, I enjoyed that when it was happening. I'm not really interested anymore. And their partner says, same thing. I enjoyed that when it's happening. It's not really interested anymore.

Maybe just they're older or whatever. And they're like, no, they don't have any problem kissing and hugging and holding hands. They know they've had the conversation. This isn't going anywhere. it's for the couples who haven't had those conversations who are scared of hold hands and kiss and hug because it's like, oh, what if this ends up going somewhere and I don't know if I'm ready for that?

So it's about saying, how would you feel about having a kiss every single day for six seconds? How would you feel about that? Yes, no, I could do that. Every day, six second kiss. But that's it. It's just a kiss.

It's a standalone activity. It's just a kiss. Or maybe a 20 seconds. hug. If that's it, it's a standalone activity. We've got to start that connection and intimacy somewhere. Do you find that it's women who are more, find it more difficult after maybe they don't have that connection or intimacy anymore to engage in sexual activity whereas the men probably want it a little bit more? It depends. What we do know is women need emotional connection before physical connection. We also know that men tend to want and desire physical connection and then

emotional connection. So it's about getting both up and running. But I've had, I've had plenty of women say, look, we just need to rip this plaster off and get it done. And Lisa, I don't want to hear about this kissing and hugging and bloody night. I'm getting the kids looked after. I'm ripping this plastic off and it's getting a sort of, you know, women are quite, you know, pregnant. And their partners like, okay, same sex couples, the same thing, you know, same sex couples. You know, it would be very similar. There's usually one who'd be like more dry. One maybe he was going, okay, I could start with the kissing.

I could start with the other's like, for God's sake, let's just drip this plaster off and get this done. You know, and I just so I shouldn't say, it might be the best, but you know what? Just, just, you know, if that's the way you want to go, just, you know. And it's just about making, it's easier to not get to that place. Let's not get to that place. Let's have the conversations that, oh, there's a week has gone past and we haven't been. intimate or had sex or done anything just for us, you know, for us it's an intimate thing, you know? Oh, there's two weeks that's gone past, right? Okay, let's get organized here. Let's get

a date and night started out. Let's prioritize this. That seems to be it. Like it's, it's prioritizing and scheduling things that you've probably let slide over the last couple of years because of other important aspects of your life that you probably took more priority in. And how long do you think an average sex session lasts for? Not longer than probably the emails that they're sending. Between two and 19 minutes is the average sex session. So you know what?

Can we carve out 20 minutes for our lover? Yeah. Yeah, there's always time there because you can create, create time for whatever is important to you. But some people come to me and they say, no, I will not carve out 20 minutes because they haven't spoke to me all week. Fair. And that's when the emotional connection's gone, so then the physical connection can't be there.

You're far too young to remember this gentleman, but his name is Dr. Phil and him and Oprah used to work a lot together. And Dr. Phil says, great sex on a Friday night starts when you empty the dishwasher on a Monday morning. Yeah. It's that checking in. Did the kids get that? Did so-and-so members football kit?

Did you have an appointment today? It's keeping that awareness of each other. So, so important. Someone had a great line online that I heard a couple of weeks ago and it was like, four play happens in the morning by checking in on how they're doing or something like that. Esther Perel is the queen of this. She studied 40 years. She studies eroticism and connection and intimacy.

say and she says for play starts right after your last orgasm. That makes sense, yeah. Yeah. Getting them a couple of days or something. Exactly. Exactly. And do you know what that could be also? It could be talking about the next day going,

I really enjoyed that. That was really fun. You know, I loved it when this happened. Oh, that was not hilarious when that happened. You know, having a bit of fun. And as we say here, a bit of banter, you know, about the whole thing and just making it a bit of bit. normal. Well, that's probably why at the start of relationships, it's so easy because you're so

attentive to each other and you're listening to each other and you're spending time with each other, whereas then obviously the longer goes on, the less that gets prioritised with other things. Actually, at the start of the relationship, it's led by spontaneous desire. The spontaneous desire is what the body does. So the body kicks off all these lovely chemicals to make you basically a attracted to someone. Now, that spontaneous desire can go a little awry sometimes because you can fall in love with somebody and they're not the right person for you at all or you've seen this. You're saying to your friend. Do they see him? Like this is not. You know, so when you're in that spontaneous desire, it is important to talk to your good friends and say, aren't they lovely and

da-da-da-da? And your friend's like, well, now they're nice, but you know, I thought that was weird, said they're not, you know, that sort of thing. So when you're so spontaneous, desire can last anything from four months up to 18 months, okay? Then spontaneous desire goes away, okay? It goes away. And we have to move into responsive desire. And that's where the relationship goes to the next level. Do you think that it's easier to go into,

add the responsive one when you know yourself a little bit more in terms of you know your values and you know what you want in a partner? Or is it still, you know, sexual desire can, cloud us. I think that once people know that if I'm simultaneously desire and responsive desire, they can just take a breath and go,

okay, so we don't have to beat ourselves up that we're not ripping each other's clothes off 24-7. I'm like, yeah, it's not that you fall in love, you just are moving to the next stage, you know? And once you get into response, that's really when you start seeing each other properly

without the rose-tinted glasses or, you know, the, what is it, love goggles, you know, that's when you really start seeing each other. property. I wanted to ask you a question that is related to a lot of the kind of health and fitness coaching that I do. And so obviously, when someone comes to work with me, like, you know, they're looking to get fitter and they're looking to get healthier and they're looking to get in shape. But what they're really looking to is just like improve the quality of their life, be on kind of like a

self-development journey. You might start with fitness and it might, you know, enter all different areas of their life. And sometimes I've had, and obviously it's not my lane to be in, so I try to avoid the questions, but sometimes I would have clients who, you know, are on this journey of self-development and they're really improving themselves and their partner is not on this journey of self-development. And, you know, their partner can say things like, oh, yeah, don't lose too much weight or, you know, really trying to kind of pull them back. And it seems to be from like a place of kind of jealousy of not wanting them to change. do you think that it's

it happens a lot where you like you have one person in relationship who's really kind of change in who they are in all aspects and the other person who is staying exactly where they are like can that relationship last we definitely can I grow people

we definitely can I guess if you're in a good healthy relationship sometimes sometimes there's a minute where we have to say, okay, I'll take a wee pause for a second and let you catch up. Okay. There's a minute for that.

There's a minute for that. I know when I was starting this madness, I mean, I know I'm on here doing the podcast and I'm on the Instagram. But I have a husband and three children that we're all kind of a package here, you know? So one of the kids that's, well, I have a TikTok when my son Jake is like, take that down. No one needs to see that. Get rid of that one. Can't stand it. it's okay.

I can listen to him. Because he's a 16-year-old boy going to school. I do not want his friends making fun of him, you know. So it's about us all going in this journey together. We don't want to stagnate. We don't want our person to hold us back. You know, we'd have conversations now and my husband would be like, you know, I should have been more supportive, X, Y, and Z.

And I'm like, it's okay. You know, we learned, we lived, we learned. It's okay. And now he always jokes because he says, said at the beginning I was like sweetheart I'm 100% behind you 100% for support you but I will never be on that page I will never be on that page and I was okay with that sure what's he like now comes up with ideas for the page take this will be good content this is good content this is good content for this good look lovely let me get a picture of you look like I think this would be good content

for it I'm like oh my day is good gracious me do we get any comments do we get any comments do we get I'm like okay stop you just put it up there you just put it up and you walk away that's it and he's Oh, can't be coping with this, can't be cooking with it. You know, so it's not, you know, it's just funny. But I would hear from people a lot and a lot of podcasts I would do for fitness people. What they'll say is their partner will say, oh, here we'll go again. Another diet, another fad, another thing. And I guess my question there would be, ask your partner, why are they scared?

What happened? And your partner might come back and say, well, the time that you tried X, Y and Z, You were literally grumpy for six months. The time that you did the cabbage soup diet was one when I was with. The time you did that cabbage soup diet, sure couldn't look at you and we didn't have sex for three months, you know? Inquire. Don't just go to defensiveness.

Four things that shouldn't exist in relationships. Criticism, contempt, stonewalling, that's skimmy syndrome, and defensiveness. And we all go to defensiveness out to game. it try to be a bit more curious. Why? Is this going to take up time? Are you going to miss me when I'm at the gym?

You know, be a bit more curious. Instead of being like that my partner doesn't understand me or my partner is resentful of me trying to, first from your own point of view, find out why that is. And then what if it comes to a stage where it's like, okay, I've tried to be understanding, but this person keeps. pulling me back or trying to self-sabotage my efforts,

even though there's something that I really want to do. Like, for example, like, if we used you for an example as well, like your husband has been really supportful and wants to be involved in it. But what if he was like, you know, no, this is not what I want you to do, trying to box you in almost. You send them to me.

On the one-to-one session. You send it to me for a nice couple session, and we'll get there. we don't have the ability to get there ourselves. You know, when we went back in the day, that's another thing I need to tell people, because people think once you start this, I mean, most of the mentorship program that I do,

it's three sessions, you know, we just need to get you back on track. You know, then you might come back to me again in six months' time, a year's time. You might never see you might just drop me a wee note now and again or whatever, you know. Some people come for one session, and I'm like, right, okay,

So just see how that goes. And they'll message me and they go, oh my God, listen, it's just changed. I'm like, one session, done. Especially if it's just a little thing. I thought that's little, but especially if it's just something, you know. But when we went to our sessions, my husband said things and I was like, have I not know this? Yeah.

Have I not been asking, you know, have I not been asking the right question? We become a lot, become white noise to each other, you know. We need, and it's about the way the questions ask about giving space to let the answer. You know, my terrible habit was stonewalling, huffing, asylum treatment. I would do it for days. And she said to him, how does it feel when she does that? No, I'm going to tell you, I never thought about how it made him. I just thought it made him pissed off.

That's all I thought it made him. And it made me happy. Well, it made me happy. It didn't really. They just made me raging. And she said to him, she said, how does it make you feel? And I thought, I have never asked him that question. and we were together 24 years.

And she said, how does it make you feel? And he said, I can't reach her when she goes there. That broke my heart. The silent treatments are a real common one, isn't it? But now instead of the silent treatment, people just block each other off. They're what side. Three things.

Silent treatment is emotional abuse. Yeah. Stop doing that. And you cannot block your partner if you have children. cannot do it. Stop doing that. Ridiculous behavior. Well, I think it's, I suppose, like,

once you're in that kind of rage, people just stood out really. You do not respond. You do not do anything when you're in the red mist. It's childish. When you said sometimes it might only take one session for people to kind of get back on track with what they want to do, I suppose, like, you can't make change without awareness,

so awareness is a huge part of this. I mean, when I heard that, when he said that, I can't reach her, it was like, it just a click. It was like a switcher. I was like, I am never doing that again. Yeah. And I said, I'm never doing it again. And she said, well, you're going to have to put something in place.

You can't just say, I'm not going to do that. I'm going to put something in place. I was like, right, okay, I'll ask for a hug. Every time I want to, I want to ask for a hug. She was like, brilliant. So I was standing over there in the corner of the kitchen. And he was standing here. probably about five, six steps away,

I thought my skin was going to fall off, walking across that kitchen. Thought my, if a stone had to fall off, like I wouldn't have been annoyed, but I thought my whole skin was going to. My nervous system was screaming at me. Surely, my automatic negative thoughts were, don't you dare give in? How dare you? You've been doing this for 43 years.

Why would you change your programming now? Went over, got the hug. Nothing helps them. nervous system like a hug got the hug sat down put the kettle on let's talk about it that makes sense that's very difficult to do but makes perfect sense we can do hard things um we don't use these behaviours in work we're not going around slam on doors and shouting at people and giving people a sound treatment and work we're not allowed to do that so it's just about transferring those skills that you use in other parts of your life to your relationship.

Do you think that you don't, like a lot of this comes down to a lot of self-awareness and it's being shown that kind of self-awareness? Like, but I presume a lot of people, let's say, got into a relationship early, never kind of learned that self-awareness. Do you think it's better to have that self-awareness before you get into a relationship or can it be learned along the way? I think it's much better if you do a little bit of work on yourself before you end. relationship, but it absolutely, people say to me, do I need to leave this relationship to fix myself?

I'm like, well, that one to work right off for me, would it leave in a relationship with three children to fix myself? So, no, you can absolutely do the work within a relationship. It's usually something similar. One will do a bit of work. If that one keeps going and the other is stuck in the mud and won't go on the journey with you, you have to give each other time and space, but if that person is just, I'm not moving, I'm just, you will, like, grow each other. Yeah. Absolutely will, it grow each other.

So there may be times that you have to pause and say, okay, let's see if they come along in this journey, if they do this, and if months and years start passing that they're not, there's, you know, it becomes too much of a gap. Too much of a gap. So, like, things happen now all the time. And my husband goes, I just thought to myself, would Lisa tell me about this?

What was it she said and knew about this thing? You know, or funny things will happen and he'll be like, remember we said that what we were going to do if this happened again was blah, blah, blah. I'm like, yes, we did say that, sweetheart. You're right. So if he hadn't have come on this journey with me,

I don't believe for a second that he wouldn't have. But, you know, growth and development in relationship is so important. We just think that we find this person, build a home, maybe have kids, and we're done. That's not true. You have to be growing and developing

and learning new skills and learning new techniques your whole journey. You said that you work with younger couples and older couples. Do you think that the older couples are harder to work with because they're probably setting their ways a little bit?

Yeah, but the older couples have so much to lose. The older couples have so much to lose. They have to make a work. They're maybe my age and they have teenagers and they're like, I'm not going on Tinder. Like, wise up. You know, I'm not saying my kids' friends on Tinder,

absolutely no way. We've 30 years in the bank here. We want this to work. I coach couples who are coming up to retirement. Their kids have left. And they're like, okay, I don't think we're aligned anymore. I don't think I want to retire and I want to go on a cruise and I want to do this.

And maybe their partner's like, no, I have no intention of retiring soon. You know, so just working through those sort of things in detangling that a wee bit, you know. Did you say 30 years, you've been married? I've been married 28 years. I've been with my partner 34 years. Okay. So in 28 years of marriage in 24, 25 or 24?

But don't go. I'm hoping. Since we're 8, we got together and we're both 52 now. So in all that years of commitment, we'll say, what do you think are some of the, most important lessons or advice, any new couple would need to know in terms of a long-term commitment with someone. What do they need to know? I'll tell you what works for us, but then I'll tell you what the data says. So for us, our primary love language is time. So for us, time is so

so important. Carving out time for connection, intimacy, emotional connection, talking, having the same ideas about things, but also still challenging each other, not just. just being like happy wife, happy wife, happy life. You know, not, you know, actually being intellectually stimulated by each other, that sort of thing. But what the data tells us we need is to be kissing every day, 90 minutes a week of serious conversation. Like that doesn't have to be serious, like, boring, but like hopes, dreams, holidays, house renovation, you know, not like, did you get milk? Did I get milk? Why is the fridge not working?

you know, 90 minutes of the guys tend to ask me if they can split that 90 minutes into three sessions. Like if you have to start there, okay. But sometimes when we sit down and talk to our partner, it's amazing I haven't actually talked about those really important things. And I'm constantly putting on Instagram, you know, things like doing your Fanos test, things like check-ins with each other. Because people don't have the words to get started. So if I can give them just a wee like, here's a wee weekend check-in, you know, how do you think we've done this week? you know, what could we do better next week? Things like that just get people started.

So kissing every day, 90 minutes a week. Also a date night on top of the 90 minutes, okay? And if you have small children or you're really busy or you're saving and money's an issue, just have a date night in your house. It's not a couple. And there's another one. I don't remember. Oh, but my one that I like to add on is, and this is not database, this is just me based.

No technology in the business. better. That makes sense. Something that this isn't a coaching session for me, but something that used to wind me up all the time now we're going to be invented, but when I would sit with a partner

and she, and like my big thing is like I love movies and I love seeing people experience new movies and stuff like that. And if someone's beside me and they're texting instead of watching the movie, that drives me insane. But like, is that something that I would need to work on her? Do you think that's something that like a real should be set? So do you know who the Gothmans are?

No. So the Gothmans have been running the Gothman Institute for 40 years in America. And they have done research onto what makes a successful couple. And they can determine this to like 96% now or something, Matt. Okay. So one of the main things, they're the ones that come up with the criticism, content stone rolling and defensiveness, not in relationships. The other thing that they have come up with or they've observed is couples responding

to each other's bid. for attention. Okay? So they've put couples in... I was going to say Love Island. No, they've put couples in apartments with video or, you know, that they can surveil them. So say your partner says, oh, oh, look, your man got a new car.

And your partner goes, really? Did they? That's not responding to that person's bid, okay? Oh, your man got a new car? Oh, did they did well? Isn't it well for so? Oh, what's that? Very nice.

they're doing all right. Connection. Connection. Okay. Now, look, I have grown up children. One of them is the other side of the world at the minute. If she messages me, I'm freaking answering my phone. I don't care if it's the best movie I've ever seen in my life or I don't even care if I'm in the cinema and have to walk out to take a face time from her. I'm doing that. You know, she actually rang when I was doing a podcast other day. I was mortified. You know, but, you know, if you've had a desperate day at work or something's happened or you've, look, I'm going to have to check my phone. If your man rings or your woman rings, I'm going to have to get this absolutely, problem but you're in an experience with somebody and they start this like imagine if I was sitting with you and I was like yeah what were you saying there and oh yeah you're in an experience with somebody

enjoy that experience yeah that's told off for this a few weeks ago we were in an experience but I wasn't enjoying the experience as in this movie was hopeless and I didn't like it and so I picked up my phone so what we should say is like I'm not enjoying this but if you're liking it that's fine like I'm gonna just go over here I'm gonna do it do that but I didn't say it's just go over here I'm gonna do it but I didn't say any of those words I'd lifted my phone. I started answering DMs at 10 o'clock at night. And my husband said, what are you doing? I was, I'm just getting this work done before tomorrow. And he said, do you think that's a really good example to be setting to your people? Analyzed. The people had become the master. So I wasn't happy. Put my phone down.

I wasn't happy. My nervous system was activated. I didn't speak. I just let my nervous system calm down and sat and did a bit of breathing. Humble pie. And I was like, yeah, he's right. Right. I know. He's right. Wasn't the right thing we teach him.

You know, that I'm available at 10 o'clock at night, dancer DMs. It's not healthy. Where can people go if they want to find out a little bit more about what you do? Maybe they want to book in a session. Where can they find you? relationship dot coaching.n.i on Instagram and then I think it's relationship coach nI um website. I always put up, just put up free stuff on my Instagram. People stop me. So I live just outside Belfast. People sometimes stop me in Belfast and they say, I've been using that that you said on

your Instagram and it has changed everything. And I'm like, free advice, just changed your relationship. Now, obviously they weren't in a terrible place. But she's like, we've just started doing that. thing that you said. We've just started or we've stopped using the U word and it's just changed everything. You know, lovely. Love it. Absolutely love it. If those free tips are not helping and changing, you need to book a session and it's all there. It's all on the website or it's all in my link tree thing. It's all there. Well, even what you said, even with the free stuff that you give out, like exactly what we said earlier, like a crate and awareness is going to be the key to change with any of this. Also, if your partner will not come for a couple's session.

or come to the mentorship program, I have two online courses. One is called Starting Strong. It's three videos about healthy conflict, sex intimacy, communication. And there's a bit of homework to do. And the other one is called revive. So that's more if you've been in a relationship for a while and you've just noticed things aren't good. That's a bit more expensive. That was a bit more expensive. But more expensive. I think it's like $130 or something like these are not going to break the bank. and it's maybe I think there's seven or eight videos on that and then a little bits of them work so if your partner will not come

start there. Lisa, there's been unbelievably insightful, great episode. Thank you for your knowledge or experience for speaking to us today. Thanks for watching. If you like that episode

and you want to see more content like this, make sure you're subscribed and I'll see you on the next one.