Latest / Evolutionary Men / What Season is Your Relationship In? (with Violet Lange)

Transcript

What Season is Your Relationship In? (with Violet Lange) · Evolutionary Men

• 0:00
  Hello everyone, it's Violet and Jason.
• 0:02
  We are so excited to dive deeper with you on your coupledom and asking some questions today about what season is your relationship in because
• 0:12
  Contrary to popular belief, relationship is not always sunny and not always easy, but there are lessons in each of the seasons in our relationship.
• 0:22
  And
• 0:23
  Each aspect of our relationship can be in a different season as well.
• 0:28
  And the idea of seasons is just an easy way to kind of wrap our head around the reality of a relationship that it's not going to be
• 0:38
  Perfect and sunny all the time.
• 0:40
  But it's actually totally normal for there to be seasonal shifts throughout a long-term relationship and sometimes even through shorter-term ones.
• 0:50
  um in these different facets we'll be talking about.
• 0:53
  And in a lot of ways it's important to know because it can relieve the burden of any couple of expecting it has to be the magical
• 1:01
  Disney fairy princess kind of story that it's always perfect and um both partners are, you know, doing exactly as they're supposed to do.
• 1:11
  They never get triggered, it's always sexy and it's always fun.
• 1:14
  And it's just not, right?
• 1:16
  It can't always be summer.
• 1:18
  And there's just a reality too.
• 1:20
  There's different seasons.
• 1:22
  And sometimes, you know, we need to shift a season with a little bit of intention for sure, but
• 1:28
  It's also good to know that it's not a problem if part of your relationship is in more of a fall or a winter, which we'll talk about.
• 1:38
  And this episode you can think of a little bit as like a diagnostic.
• 1:42
  And I think oftentimes because we spend time together as a couple, we think that we're working on the relationship.
• 1:49
  And instead we're just kind of inhabiting or living in the relationship.
• 1:53
  And they talk about this in business and entrepreneurialism all the time that
• 1:57
  As you go along and become more seasoned as a manager or an executive or an entrepreneur, you're expected to spend more and more of your time working on the business versus in the business.
• 2:08
  And I would like us to think about our relationships in that way too.
• 2:12
  Maybe in the beginning you would just be in the relationship and not really working on the relationship because you still had those sexy hormones flowing and
• 2:20
  Um, there was a lot of passion and mystery because you're getting to know each other and you probably weren't living together.
• 2:27
  You probably weren't dealing with things like kids, in-laws, you know.
• 2:31
  shared financial stress, all of that.
• 2:33
  And so as our relationship progresses, similar to as we season in our professional lives, we need to spend more time
• 2:39
  on the relationship, which simply means just getting tools, support, community, guidance, new perspectives about how to make a relationship thrive.
• 2:48
  And
• 2:50
  Unfortunately, a lot of us don't spend more than maybe an hour a month, sometimes two hours, or the time that we do spend on a relationship is maybe like, oh, we're gonna, you know, go to the movies or go out for a drink.
• 3:03
  And that can be nice to relieve stress or connect a little bit, but it's not really the depth that will help your relationship thrive through some of these seasons that we're going to be talking about, like winter and um and fall.
• 3:15
  So
• 3:16
  Anything else before we dive right in?
• 3:18
  Point being it takes some attention.
• 3:20
  That's what we're talking about, right?
• 3:22
  Working, um putting some attention on the relationship rather than just being in it is the reality that
• 3:29
  Sometimes things won't get better or shift unless we put the time and energy in.
• 3:34
  Sometimes our connection won't build, sometimes our communication won't build, unless we're really putting our attention on that.
• 3:41
  And it's very easy.
• 3:43
  To not and just kind of coast by and get stuck in some of these seasons for a long time.
• 3:49
  So just know that it it does take some effort.
• 3:52
  It doesn't have to feel like a ton of work all the time, but it does take some effort.
• 3:56
  Mm-hmm.
• 3:57
  And intentionality.
• 3:59
  So with that being said, let's start with spring.
• 4:02
  As I alluded to earlier, usually a relationship
• 4:05
  So it kind of starts in the sense of spring, like lots of possibility, maybe a little bit messy and muddy sometimes, and days where you're like,
• 4:13
  Oh, everything's glorious, you know.
• 4:15
  And then days where you're like, oh, I don't know, I haven't heard from them in a few days.
• 4:18
  Like, are we still doing this thing?
• 4:21
  And so there's the um starts and stops that we sometimes see in early spring as well.
• 4:26
  And
• 4:27
  The benefit of this season is that there's so much possibility.
• 4:32
  You're in like a new start.
• 4:34
  And this could be, you could be in a relationship for decades and feel a sense of spring, a sense of newness.
• 4:40
  when um you move into a different city or one of you gets a different job or even on the very simplest level like
• 4:48
  When you gets a haircut or you know makes a change in your health, it's like, whoo, something's different here.
• 4:53
  This is kind of exciting.
• 4:54
  This is new.
• 4:56
  Um, the pitfall of spring is that two things.
• 4:59
  One, we want to kind of hold on to it forever.
• 5:02
  Two, we think it's more static than it really is.
• 5:04
  We think like, oh, it was an 80-degree day, so therefore it's just gonna be nice for the rest of the year.
• 5:09
  And if you've lived
• 5:11
  anywhere other than like San Diego, you probably realize that an 80-degree day could be followed by a 50 degree, rainy, muddy day.
• 5:19
  So just because there's all this potential doesn't actually mean there's a lot of mastery yet or a lot of depth yet.
• 5:26
  And so just as we go through the seasons, think about like, oh yeah, our relationship feels like it's in this season.
• 5:34
  or this aspect of our relationship feels like it's in this season.
• 5:39
  I would even say that our our sex life is a little bit like in spring now.
• 5:43
  It's like, okay.
• 5:44
  you know, we've had a baby, but he's not a newborn anymore.
• 5:48
  Kind of rediscovering our passion.
• 5:50
  We have a babysitter, things we haven't we didn't really do with our first child.
• 5:53
  And so
• 5:54
  To me, there is this kind of like newness and then sometimes awkwardness, but also excitement.
• 6:00
  And um, I don't know how you feel about what part of our relationship feels like it might be in spring.
• 6:05
  Um yeah, I mean I would say spring, another way to think about it too in any relationship, whether it's obviously every relationship starts as spring, right?
• 6:14
  Because it's new.
• 6:15
  And things are growing and building is really the word you know I'd kind of associate with spring in in a large way.
• 6:24
  Things aren't done yet.
• 6:25
  There's a lot of anticipation, but you can see things moving, you can feel things moving, you can feel things growing.
• 6:32
  There's a lot of possibility.
• 6:33
  you don't really know what it's going to quite land and look like yet, right?
• 6:37
  It's like, okay, the plants are sprouting, but what are they going to grow into?
• 6:41
  What's the exact shape?
• 6:42
  We don't know.
• 6:43
  necessarily yet.
• 6:44
  So spring has a lot of that kind of fresh energy we're talking about that relationships always do when you begin.
• 6:51
  We've talked about this before.
• 6:52
  They have a lot of polarity, there's a lot of difference, there's a lot of novelty.
• 6:56
  There's a lot of intention in terms of the time you're spending with each other.
• 7:00
  Not a whole lot's usually on autopilot in in that season of a new relationship.
• 7:06
  But like she said, you can have spring in long-term relationships as well through big changes or transitions or trying new things, whether that's um
• 7:16
  in the practicalities of where you're living and how you're living, what's going on inside your relationship, different jobs, health, you name it, right?
• 7:24
  It's all possible.
• 7:25
  And yeah, you know, I'd say for us, we're
• 7:28
  Um approaching a spring in that, you know, over the last couple years, we had things we were moving towards very clearly in terms of uh bringing another child into the world, moving, settling into a house.
• 7:42
  And that's really settling now, right?
• 7:45
  We're not necessarily in that building phase anymore
• 7:49
  And that is starting to free up some other kinds of energy, including space for us to reconnect romantically on date nights, sexually, et cetera.
• 8:00
  And
• 8:02
  You know, I would say even our work together is in a lot of ways in spring.
• 8:07
  Violet and I have done a lot of work independently.
• 8:10
  Um, where I've mostly been working with men, she's mostly been working with women.
• 8:14
  We've done a few things um together, but now that's really starting to blossom in a different way as well, which is exciting.
• 8:24
  Yeah, so then we move into the season of summer, and this is fruiting, right?
• 8:30
  Like this is where not only are there plants, but the plants are growing fruits and there's bees buzzing and it's a time of
• 8:37
  fullness.
• 8:38
  So maybe you've kind of worked through some of those messy moments and now you're in what they would call like the honeymoon phase.
• 8:45
  Okay, things are just really clicking.
• 8:48
  Like I'm so in love with you.
• 8:50
  And um, we're really making something out of this.
• 8:53
  And whether that means like you're making an official commitment or you're planning a wedding or
• 8:58
  you're um committing to something like Jason said with our house or with having another baby.
• 9:03
  It's a time of my herbology teacher always says, like
• 9:06
  The days are long, there's a lot of sunlight, and that means both a lot of enjoyment and pleasure and enjoying the fruits of your labor.
• 9:15
  But it also means you gotta pull some weeds, right?
• 9:17
  Like you have to still be mindful of, oh yeah, that resentment cropped up and I could hold on to that, but if I do
• 9:24
  Like I don't want it to create distance or hardness in my body, I'm going to presence that resentment.
• 9:30
  So there's still kind of
• 9:32
  weekly or regular things that are really important to do to sustain that season of summer.
• 9:37
  Um, Jason mentioned earlier, like just because you're in a certain season doesn't mean it can't shift.
• 9:42
  And pulling weeds, you know, clearing resentments and um
• 9:46
  making time for your own personal practice.
• 9:49
  Like for me, it's Yoni Yegs or self-pleasure or hanging out with my girlfriends and, you know, getting held emotionally.
• 9:56
  So I don't put all of that on my partner.
• 9:59
  We don't become
• 10:00
  codependent.
• 10:00
  Those are just some like maintenance things that happen during summer that don't take actually like a lot of time.
• 10:06
  But if you haven't both gone through some of the ups and downs in the spring season and in the early stages,
• 10:12
  And if you haven't put some of that work on the relationship versus in the relationship, you might miss out on some of these really simple kind of rituals or routines that can keep your relationship thriving the same way that routine.
• 10:25
  can help our garden to thrive in the season of summer.
• 10:28
  Yeah, summer alright, it's a time of heat.
• 10:30
  Um it's just warmer.
• 10:32
  There's tends to be more abundance.
• 10:34
  Things are just flowing, blossoming.
• 10:37
  fruiting, etc.
• 10:38
  , and it's kind of, you know, when the good times roll in some sense.
• 10:42
  There's less um
• 10:45
  worry, I would say.
• 10:47
  And it does take some maintenance, but in some ways things are just growing, right?
• 10:52
  Things are going the way they we want them to, oftentimes in summertime.
• 10:56
  There's less things we have to think about.
• 10:58
  There also tends to be, you know, obviously it's different around the world, but in terms of the reality, less variance.
• 11:05
  It's like, okay.
• 11:06
  The weather's kind of just like this.
• 11:08
  It's mostly nice, right?
• 11:10
  It's not going to be a huge drop overnight to that kind of thing.
• 11:14
  It might get a little warm, a little hot, but hey.
• 11:16
  You can always take layers off, right?
• 11:18
  That's one of the easy things about summer.
• 11:20
  Um, that's a little different.
• 11:21
  And the idea, you know, is
• 11:24
  Yeah, we're we're doing work over the summer, but we're not doing heavy, heavy work, right, in terms of like the processing, I would say.
• 11:34
  Everything's already been planted, right?
• 11:35
  Now it's just blooming.
• 11:36
  Now it's kind of a maintenance doing.
• 11:39
  And we're not yet harvesting either.
• 11:41
  So we haven't begun that huge labor of kind of
• 11:44
  taking all that back from the earth.
• 11:46
  So summer, you know, in some sense, oftentimes it is kind of a season where there's maybe a little less.
• 11:52
  We we have a lot more
• 11:53
  um time and energy to be in the experiences.
• 11:57
  Like, okay, this is great.
• 11:58
  Let's do it.
• 11:59
  We're going to go on that adventure.
• 12:00
  We're going to do that thing.
• 12:01
  There's more time together throughout the day just because there's more sun.
• 12:05
  Right.
• 12:06
  So there's a lot of vitality and experience, I think, available in summer.
• 12:10
  And this is just when the good times roll, right?
• 12:13
  I think.
• 12:13
  the the season of summer, whether it's a new relationship or whether you're cycled there in any part of your relationship, it's when things are kind of just working.
• 12:23
  Right.
• 12:24
  Things are working.
• 12:25
  You're making progress, but the engine is just kind of running and it's running really well.
• 12:30
  The connection's there.
• 12:32
  And it's a easy time to grow.
• 12:36
  pretty accustomed to, right?
• 12:38
  And just assume, okay, it's going to be summer forever, right?
• 12:40
  This is awesome.
• 12:41
  This is everything I ever wanted.
• 12:43
  Or I can't believe we finally got here after all this.
• 12:46
  Now it's just easy, right?
• 12:47
  We fixed this or we healed this thing or whatever that might be.
• 12:50
  um can I sometimes be the I think the trick of summer lulling us into, oh wait, it can't be this way always, can it?
• 12:59
  And then we kind of got to remember, wait, there is going to be another season.
• 13:02
  Mm-hmm.
• 13:03
  And also summer, there's just usually less friction, like Jason said.
• 13:07
  You know, the season is a bit more predictable.
• 13:10
  So you can think of what's an aspect of your relationship right now where there's just
• 13:14
  not as much friction.
• 13:16
  And maybe it's not a really relational area.
• 13:18
  You know, maybe it's shared finances, or maybe um it's that
• 13:23
  you guys have built a certain routine around the house.
• 13:26
  Like, okay, one partner does this sort of thing, another partner does this sort of thing.
• 13:31
  Or um
• 13:32
  Maybe one partner is going and taking a trip or doing some personal work and the other person is kind of putzing around the house and it just works.
• 13:39
  Like when you hear couples that have been together for a while and they say,
• 13:42
  You know, it's kind of weird, but it just works, right?
• 13:44
  Like I actually like that my husband is out of town um a few days a month.
• 13:47
  I've heard one of our neighbors say that um because she's like it just gives me some time to myself.
• 13:52
  So it just works.
• 13:54
  In my view, our summer moment is kind of our house right now.
• 13:57
  Like we've moved in, we've gotten, for the most part, like the furniture and everything.
• 14:02
  We have a bit of a cadence.
• 14:03
  There's little things, of course, always popping up that we have to take care of.
• 14:06
  But
• 14:06
  Things are for the most part pretty much working where we live and in our neighborhood.
• 14:11
  So that feels really good, like a summer moment.
• 14:14
  But then the season of fall has a bit of a dualistic nature.
• 14:18
  So the beginning of fall is the harvest.
• 14:20
  That's when you're really gathering in everything that has fruited.
• 14:24
  And at the same time, there's also the falling away.
• 14:27
  So the the leaves are falling and the temperatures are dropping.
• 14:30
  And so it can have a bittersweet quality to it because there is at the beginning of fall so much fullness and so much to
• 14:38
  take in and enjoy and then also this sense that oh wow like things are are really changing.
• 14:45
  Um I would say for us
• 14:47
  at least for me, our relationship with our daughter feels a little bit like fall.
• 14:51
  Like we're really seeing her thrive in the world and make friends and just the the fullness of who she is and all these really adorable moments like when she
• 15:00
  lost her teeth and wears a was wearing a princess costume and like, I lost my tooth and I'm sad and like pouting but in a really, really adorable way, um, dressed up as a princess and
• 15:12
  And at the same time, there's this to me bittersweet quality of like, oh wow, like the magic is only gonna be here for another few years of of believing, right?
• 15:21
  And unicorns and the wonder of the world and all of that.
• 15:26
  Yeah, falls that time where we start to slow down, right?
• 15:30
  That's the main thing.
• 15:31
  Things start to slow down.
• 15:34
  And we kind of start to reflect on the summer and spring.
• 15:38
  Okay, we put all this time and energy to these different things.
• 15:41
  Now, where's it going?
• 15:42
  Right?
• 15:42
  It's a time of transitions.
• 15:45
  I would say, and it's a big one in that it can be bittersweet, right?
• 15:50
  We can feel the warmth, the ease going to be changing, the environment changes.
• 15:55
  And um
• 15:57
  Like in our family, a time we had that, we've had that a couple times, right?
• 16:02
  Before our first child, there's the, there's the kind of autumn of, oh, us is just a unit where it's just us.
• 16:09
  where you can go off and do whatever you want at any time kind of thing.
• 16:12
  There was an audit to that, right?
• 16:14
  There was a letting go of that we we had to kind of grieve and enjoy, you know, at the same time.
• 16:19
  And then even once we had one kid,
• 16:22
  Before our second child came, there was a precious couple of months where it's like, wow, this is the last time it's going to be this family unit of just us three.
• 16:31
  So what does it mean to appreciate and enjoy this and in some sense grieve that it's going to be different?
• 16:36
  Not that it's going to be worse.
• 16:38
  It's just going to be different oftentimes.
• 16:39
  That's awful, really.
• 16:41
  kind of means.
• 16:42
  And it's a time often of great beauty as well, right?
• 16:45
  As things do start to transition and let go.
• 16:48
  But the point is we start to slow down.
• 16:51
  and become a little bit more reflective often of, you know, what worked, right?
• 16:57
  It's a time to kind of look back, well, hey, what was really great there?
• 17:00
  And, you know, okay, maybe there's some different things we could do.
• 17:03
  next spring to, you know, line things up.
• 17:06
  But it it's often a time of um, you know, I would say kind of bittersweetness in a sense of that transition of appreciating what worked and realizing, okay, this can't end forever.
• 17:18
  or last forever and every relationship is going to have cycles of this and knowing that okay winter it's near things are going to be different now and we're going to have to move differently
• 17:30
  And the days aren't going to be as long.
• 17:32
  And our energy use is going to change.
• 17:34
  And I think that's a big thing a lot of couples experience as well, of just, okay, there's been a certain way we've been in the world.
• 17:41
  And fall kind of marks the transition of we're going to have to move in a different way now, right?
• 17:45
  There's just a different type of awareness that's going to need to come in our relationship.
• 17:50
  whether that's the long-term season of, okay, we're a couple that's we've been in it, right?
• 17:57
  We've been in it long enough that um
• 18:01
  We're past just the summer, right?
• 18:03
  It's not just building energy, go, go, go, hot, hot, hot, sexy, sexy.
• 18:08
  It's there's things we have to let go sometimes too.
• 18:10
  And fall in this sense, I think, can be a big time of, oh, there's even things we're gonna have to let go of in our relationship.
• 18:16
  There's things we're gonna have to let go of in ourselves, there's things we're gonna have to let go of.
• 18:21
  um expectations maybe we even had for that partner coming in that okay they're gonna be the da da da wait actually they're a little different
• 18:29
  Okay, right?
• 18:30
  Again, where a lot of people get hung up is that's suddenly a huge problem versus okay, I just have to let go of certain things and learn to appreciate the other things that are working.
• 18:41
  And I feel like as a society, we're kind of in this fall moment in terms of relationships.
• 18:47
  Like what do we want in our romantic lives?
• 18:49
  And maybe it can't just be paradise all the time or
• 18:52
  wow, people do end up getting divorced.
• 18:55
  I do need to take this part of my life seriously.
• 18:57
  Or post-COVID, like I don't want a shelter in place again without a beloved or to go through that amount of stress without a support partner in my life.
• 19:07
  Another cool aspect about fall is that it's the time of year that the plant sends its energy down into the roots.
• 19:14
  And in the wintertime, which we'll get to in a moment, you know, there's a lot that's happening.
• 19:19
  underground and it's a time of rest and rejuvenation and that process starts in fall and so you see everything dying on the outside.
• 19:27
  but it's in order to support new life as the energy goes down.
• 19:31
  So this is a great time as a couple and as individuals to do things like shadow work.
• 19:36
  Jason mentioned earlier, the importance of reflection, the time of thinking about, you know, the year that's been behind you.
• 19:43
  So as a couple, if you're having a fall moment or in fall,
• 19:47
  in terms of a season and a certain aspect of your relationship, it's a good time to send your energy down a little bit, like down into your bodies, down into your physical connection, even if it doesn't necessarily mean
• 20:01
  hot sexy passion.
• 20:02
  It's like, are we having touch?
• 20:04
  Are we having time for reflection and shared um grieving in some some ways, like grieving expectations like you mentioned, grieving things that just aren't
• 20:15
  aren't working as well as we hoped that they would.
• 20:17
  You know, for us that was as we've talked about many times, the fertility journey that we were on and and other things.
• 20:23
  And I think in a weird way in our relationship, we were
• 20:27
  Thrust into a big fall moment in 2018, which was the year after we had gotten married, and just a few months after we had gotten married, was um we got married in late 2017.
• 20:39
  But
• 20:41
  That post-honeymoon phase, you know, summer is kind of like the honeymoon, fall is like, whoa, reassessing, bringing our energy downward, getting real about things.
• 20:51
  and letting go and the harvesting that happens especially in early fall and then is celebrated later in the fall.
• 21:00
  Is about gathering.
• 21:01
  So this is also a time of gathering resources.
• 21:03
  Like, oh shit.
• 21:04
  We are not gonna get through the winter if we don't have.
• 21:08
  a coach or a couples therapist.
• 21:09
  You know, I don't know if we're going to make it to the next season if we don't talk about these blocks to our sex life or these things that are coming up emotionally.
• 21:18
  So
• 21:18
  It's getting real, it's getting grounded, it's getting resourced so that you can get through the winter phase without losing your relationship or losing your connection to yourself.
• 21:29
  Yeah, taking stock is another way to think about it.
• 21:31
  Taking stock of what has been working, what worked during the summer, what didn't work during the summer, and now
• 21:39
  How do we need to adjust to likely get through a period of, you know, less resource in some capacity because before it can be spring again?
• 21:49
  we do have to move through winter.
• 21:51
  So if we're going to have less resources available to us, less um
• 21:58
  Ease in that sense, okay, it's going to take a little bit more intention.
• 22:02
  It's not that things can't work, but you know, one of the differences between summer and fall and winter really is uh how intentional do you have to be, right?
• 22:11
  In summertime, you can often just kind of walk out the door, right?
• 22:14
  And you're going to find stuff.
• 22:16
  You're going to find abundance.
• 22:17
  You're not going to have to worry about shelter as much
• 22:20
  But in the winter you're gonna have to be a lot more cautious, right?
• 22:24
  There's not as much uh abundance around.
• 22:28
  And hopefully, you know, you've cultivated enough and harvested enough in the fall to get you through that period of
• 22:34
  Okay, it's gonna be hard right now.
• 22:36
  So in some sense, something like when we say winter, it it doesn't even mean it's like necessarily dark in a bad way.
• 22:45
  It's just
• 22:47
  It's hard right now.
• 22:48
  We have to pay attention.
• 22:49
  Our resources are going to be stressed and strained in some ways.
• 22:53
  So even just having a child is like that
• 22:56
  If you've never had one, right, you kind of learn pretty quick, okay, that first three months is kind of intense.
• 23:02
  It's crazy, right?
• 23:03
  The expectation of ease is something you have to let go of.
• 23:07
  It's we're not gonna have a lot of sleep.
• 23:09
  We're going to be stressed.
• 23:11
  Um, a lot's gonna be shifting really fast, and we're gonna have to manage our time really carefully, right, with this new life in the world.
• 23:19
  And so it takes a little bit more intention.
• 23:21
  Now the beauty is, you know, if you prepare well and invest in each other, getting these resources, harvesting things, setting up your systems, if you've done good building.
• 23:33
  You can kind of ride through that, right?
• 23:35
  We've got some stuff in place to help us weather that storm in essence.
• 23:40
  That's really ideally what you're going into winter with.
• 23:43
  And then in some sense, if you've built the right structure.
• 23:46
  It's okay to really slow down and get quiet and go inside with each other and not be so out, but be a lot more introspective.
• 23:59
  And winter is also a time of dreaming.
• 24:01
  You know, a lot of traditions around the world, um, there's everything from psychedelics to just fewer daylight hours, you're spending more time sleeping, um, a lot of
• 24:12
  People conceive in this time of year because there is more intimacy, there is more dark and more closeness, and a lot of babies then are born.
• 24:21
  I think it's like New Year's Eve is the highest rate of conception or day of conceptions.
• 24:25
  A lot of babies are born, you know, in September, October timeframe.
• 24:30
  And it's the time of dreaming a new dream, right?
• 24:33
  So fall is like, oh, okay, this is what worked really well.
• 24:36
  I'm gonna savor that, celebrate that.
• 24:38
  Here's what we need to change and shift and grieve and work through as a couple and do our shadow work.
• 24:43
  And then in terms of the earth, you know, the earth is sleeping.
• 24:47
  Like nothing is happening above the surface.
• 24:50
  The seeds are just waiting, waiting for the right conditions in order to sprout.
• 24:55
  And so it can feel like a time of waiting, but it doesn't have to be painful.
• 24:59
  It can be like, oh, you know, it will be really nice when we whatever take that vacation as a family, or it will be really nice when we
• 25:08
  have more time for our sex life.
• 25:10
  You know, maybe you and your partner are going through a stressful time and you what's not working is your intimate connection.
• 25:15
  You can still take the winter time to dream a new dream and to get really intentional about your vision.
• 25:21
  And I like that New Year's time is happening right in this winter time because it isn't necessarily about going out and crushing your goals, even though that's how our society frames it.
• 25:32
  It's more about
• 25:33
  feeling into with intention and awareness, like what do I actually want to create this year in my relationship?
• 25:41
  And
• 25:41
  I don't think we set enough relational goals.
• 25:44
  You know, we have like aspirations because we put people on a pedestal or something, but if you and your partner got really
• 25:51
  into the nitty-gritty of like, how do we want to feel the next next year?
• 25:55
  What can we realistically take on, you know, as a couple?
• 25:59
  And who in our orbit
• 26:01
  needs resourcing, right?
• 26:03
  Like there are times where maybe the priority is your kids and they need X, Y, Z.
• 26:09
  Like one of your children might need to go to therapy or um have a sports team that they're joining and there needs to be resource there.
• 26:15
  But I think
• 26:16
  Too often as couples, we we always prioritize the kids and then there's cracks in the relationship.
• 26:22
  And that impacts the kids more than it would to not, you know, be on the hockey team they wanted or to not um
• 26:30
  get some of the additional support.
• 26:32
  So I can't remember, I think it was our pediatrician who was telling us about, oh, you know, Ruby could go check out some of the you could check out some of these therapies for Ruby at some point.
• 26:42
  And we didn't, we never did that.
• 26:43
  You know, I remember telling her like, oops, sorry, we never looked into that.
• 26:46
  And she said, yeah, well, it makes sense because Cedar, your youngest, is kind of taking the resources now.
• 26:52
  And then
• 26:53
  As we alluded to when we were talking about the time of spring and like us kind of rekindling our sexual or you know passionate relationship.
• 27:01
  Now is a time where we're actually investing in ourselves, like investing in our babysitter and investing in doing programs together and
• 27:09
  everything that that looks like.
• 27:10
  But where I'm where I'm going with this is before you jump into action, you need to have that deep, deep, deep dream time.
• 27:18
  to gestate, to rest, to kind of putz around and in your relationship and like, oh, it's it's nice to just spend some of this
• 27:28
  um chill on the couch time, right?
• 27:31
  Netflix and chill time.
• 27:32
  I think that sometimes though, not only do we not prioritize or invest in a relationship for the sake of the kids or something else, and then
• 27:40
  it has a much bigger impact than we expect.
• 27:43
  But we also can get trapped in this sense of winter where we're just sitting on the couch both on our phones and not really connecting.
• 27:50
  And sometimes that's okay.
• 27:51
  Like that's all the bandwidth you have.
• 27:53
  I would say for me, our emotional connection is in a little bit of a winter time.
• 27:57
  You know, we're not doing a ton of like relational practices.
• 28:00
  We ask each other, you know, about our work and
• 28:03
  drop in from time to time, especially when we have our date nights, but it's different than other times in our life relationally where we've really been going deep and doing shadow work, or we've really been, you know, taking lots of adventures, or we've really been um
• 28:18
  making like the emotional connection paramount.
• 28:21
  And the cool thing about winter is because we have done that work in other seasons.
• 28:27
  we do get to coast a little bit.
• 28:29
  We do get to say like, oh, you know, it is nice to just have deeper trust and have a stronger connection emotionally.
• 28:35
  And we don't have to be doing um
• 28:39
  Yeah, we don't have to be doing quite as much of the depth right now.
• 28:43
  We can trust that the rest is okay and doing less is more.
• 28:48
  Yeah, in a lot of ways you can think about winter too is the the benefit of it in a relationship, right, is you know, summer is peak.
• 28:58
  We in our energy are out.
• 29:00
  We're out.
• 29:00
  We're out there.
• 29:01
  We're pointed out at the world, experiencing, adventuring, enjoying, moving.
• 29:07
  a lot.
• 29:07
  And winter really causes us to kind of slow down and literally and metaphorically go inside, right?
• 29:14
  So the energy shifts from being kind of pointed out there to, okay, who's here?
• 29:19
  Who's here?
• 29:20
  And what does it mean for me to slow down and drop in?
• 29:25
  Including in our intimate relationship, right?
• 29:28
  To really kind of just be with each other.
• 29:32
  And
• 29:33
  dream and vision and take stock and enjoy, right?
• 29:38
  In a different kind of way, even than autumn
• 29:42
  And and summer, which are pleasurable in their own right, unique ways.
• 29:46
  But that energy, yeah, I think the big shift is it's coming back here.
• 29:51
  to to enjoying connection, even if it's just sitting around the house in a sense, that's different from, well, we're going to this concert and then we're doing this thing, then we've got a barbecue and then
• 30:01
  You can just feel summer energy tends to be a lot more on the move and out.
• 30:05
  There's just more energy in the world, in a sense.
• 30:08
  In winter, it really is about slowing down.
• 30:12
  Now,
• 30:13
  There's a couple ways you can do that.
• 30:15
  You can slow down and totally numb out, which I think is what a lot of couples will do on autopilot and just kind of hope, okay, we're gonna get through this.
• 30:22
  But there's also, yeah, let's use this time intentionally.
• 30:27
  to really get clear on who are we now?
• 30:29
  You know, we just shed all this.
• 30:31
  So what do we want this next phase to be as we start to
• 30:35
  um not only reflect, but also really look forward to the future.
• 30:40
  Winter is a powerful season, you know, and it's a season I think a lot of times too, where that
• 30:47
  um in terms of the overall trajectory of a relationship and a couple too, there's that deep relaxing into each other in a sense of, you know, we kind of see it in the elderly, but I think it can happen in relationships of they are just kind of who they are.
• 31:02
  And I could fight, you know, my partner to be different, or I could learn to just be with them and enjoy that and use that energy for other things in a sense.
• 31:12
  And so I think it can be a beautiful season for couples where you can just feel they're really kind of in their bones relaxed into each other.
• 31:21
  Doesn't mean there's not going to be tumult and whatnot and that there won't be more seasons, but there is just this overall settling into, I think, is one of the great
• 31:31
  gifts of winter.
• 31:32
  And again, don't have to just be in a relationship long term for that, but winter might just be the part that is not energized.
• 31:41
  right now in the relationship, right?
• 31:44
  Meaning, you know, for us um over the last year it started to change, but you know, when you have a new kid
• 31:50
  What's not energized is going out and being with community, right?
• 31:53
  Like being with friends, being investing in relationships.
• 31:57
  That was in winter for us for a long time.
• 31:59
  And now it's starting to shift.
• 32:01
  um out of that, like we've talked about.
• 32:03
  And we knew that was coming.
• 32:05
  So it wasn't a problem.
• 32:06
  And we had resources around us.
• 32:08
  But now it's enjoyable to kind of shift out of that.
• 32:11
  And other things, you know, will come into um
• 32:14
  winter for us at different times where it's like, okay, this thing has really run its course, whatever that might be.
• 32:20
  And maybe there's just a pause, right?
• 32:23
  There was a time where our um
• 32:25
  Life on the West Coast was in winter.
• 32:27
  It was like, okay, yeah, this just it's really not the the the um season
• 32:34
  of abundance anymore in a sense.
• 32:36
  It's like this is coming to a close now.
• 32:39
  This is the end of it.
• 32:40
  It's not working here and we're going to need to adjust that kind of thing.
• 32:44
  And one of the pitfalls of winter is like we talked about kind of numbing out or um not staying connected as a couple as you're going within to each other and to yourself.
• 32:56
  But the other one is that
• 32:58
  It can feel like this is the time where nothing's really happening.
• 33:02
  Now, I've been in partnership and I imagine Jason would say the same about his long-term partnership.
• 33:08
  my first marriage where there was a time where just nothing was happening relationally, sexually, um, we just weren't really connecting.
• 33:17
  And the problem is that we hadn't really done the deep work and fall to get clear about who we were, to speak our truth, to clear resentments, to learn how to fight well.
• 33:27
  to um look at like what have we taken on from our lineages, what patterns are we carrying, and can we let some of that go?
• 33:35
  Is that really serving us?
• 33:36
  Like
• 33:38
  And so I think in my mind, I wanted us as a couple, this is with my ex-husband in my 20s, I wanted us to kind of always be in this spring energy.
• 33:48
  Like I wanted to always feel fresh and new.
• 33:50
  And
• 33:51
  And we were never really quite there.
• 33:53
  And so I started seeking spring energy like in my work more.
• 33:56
  Like, oh, let me try this thing.
• 33:58
  Or um
• 33:59
  pushing myself really hard.
• 34:00
  So getting my spring and summer needs met in my work life.
• 34:03
  And then there was a lot of imbalance because my relationship was like fall, winter
• 34:07
  My professional life was like spring summer.
• 34:10
  And then that became a vicious cycle that just continued until there was really no kind of seeds left in the soil.
• 34:17
  My ex-husband and I hadn't planted
• 34:19
  um, I shouldn't say planted new seeds, but we hadn't taken care of the soil of our relationship, the foundation of our relationship, and never really learned how to do that from the beginning.
• 34:29
  So there was
• 34:30
  There was nothing left to come up really when it came to the springtime.
• 34:35
  So fighting well in quotations in the fall and really
• 34:39
  And throughout the seasons, but like really learning how to do that deep work around conflict and repair and resiliency is so important.
• 34:47
  Um and
• 34:49
  It seems sometimes like when you're in winter that spring will never come, right?
• 34:53
  Like, oh my gosh, like when is this gonna shift?
• 34:56
  But part of it is
• 34:59
  The more not only that you set things up in the fall and the systems in the summer, like we've talked about, but also the more that you keep
• 35:07
  Stoking the fire of the dream.
• 35:09
  So there is this shift that happens around like middle of February, and it kind of coincides with Valentine's Day.
• 35:16
  In the Celtic calendar, it's Beltane, which is February 2nd, where
• 35:20
  Even if the earth isn't fully warmed up yet, even if the seeds haven't cracked out of their shell and started their journey to sprout, you can feel that the things are shifting.
• 35:30
  You can feel there's a little bit more passion, a little bit more momentum.
• 35:33
  So
• 35:34
  That's where again it comes back onto each individual to do a little bit of their own practice.
• 35:39
  Like let's say it feels dead and quotations in the relationship or nothing's really happening.
• 35:45
  Can you do some of your own work so that you can bring something novel and new and juicy to the relationship as a devotion or as a sacrifice or as an honoring of the seasons that you've gone through?
• 35:56
  Because I strongly believe that when one person shifts, the relationship shifts, but it's more likely it'll shift in a positive direction when both people are putting their awareness and their intention into it.
• 36:07
  So winter, yeah, you know, it's something we can learn to make the most of and not just numb out and go on autopilot.
• 36:16
  Ideally, it's a place to actually rest and restore.
• 36:18
  in the connection with each other and start building that vision that doesn't have to, you don't have to start actually building it yet, but you can start thinking into it, dreaming about it, right?
• 36:30
  And and knowing that
• 36:32
  There'll be a time to hit the gas and start to build again, but right now let's enjoy what's here and let's just start to feel into what might be next.
• 36:40
  Mm-hmm.
• 36:41
  So we would love for you to just be thinking about, maybe even journal about what season is your relationship in.
• 36:49
  and which aspects of your relationship are in different seasons.
• 36:52
  And if you're not listening to this podcast with your partner, which you know most likely you're not, forward it to them and see what they think.
• 36:59
  Compare notes.
• 37:00
  You know, you've
• 37:01
  been listening and finding out that Jason and I didn't have any of the same answers about what season we thought that our relationship was in and what examples of that.
• 37:09
  And that's okay because we're not about
• 37:11
  trying to get you and your partner to be the exact same or about discovery.
• 37:16
  Like what can you discover that will enhance your connection and how can that ripple out to everyone else in your life?
• 37:22
  And just some of these arenas you might want to think about, right, are obviously your physical connection, intimacy, your sex life, your emotional connection, how's that feeling, spiritual connection if you have one of those?
• 37:35
  Um
• 37:37
  Where's community at in your relationship?
• 37:40
  Are you kind of more of an isolated pod?
• 37:41
  Are you plugged into other things?
• 37:44
  If you're a
• 37:45
  Cohabitating couple, you know, where are you at financially?
• 37:48
  Like what's the financial season for your family?
• 37:51
  What's the season of your um actual family life with your kids?
• 37:55
  Like where are you at with that?
• 37:56
  There's lots of different ways to kind of track this.
• 38:00
  And again, you can be in different fees seasons and different aspects of your relationship.
• 38:07
  And all it is is a tool to create more awareness, this idea of, okay, what season is this in?
• 38:12
  What season is this in?
• 38:13
  And because once we know what season we're in, we can start to really emphasize and put our attention on the gifts of it and know, okay, well, what is this season do
• 38:24
  eventually going to give way to.
• 38:25
  So how do we start preparing for that as well?
• 38:28
  That's one of the great useful
• 38:32
  aspects to doing this kind of audit in a sense.
• 38:35
  And, you know, another way you can just think about all of these things, because the the beauty of seasons and
• 38:41
  you know, these bigger energetic shifts is they're often mirrored in different ways.
• 38:45
  And we even have it just within the day, right?
• 38:47
  We have high noon, that's kind of summer.
• 38:50
  We have the sunset, it's kind of fall, you have the middle of the night, it's dark, that's winter, then you have spring, the sun is rising, right?
• 38:58
  Things are starting to warm up.
• 39:00
  And we go through this cycle
• 39:02
  every day and then every year.
• 39:04
  And relationships will often do that too.
• 39:06
  So a cycle for some things might just be over a couple days and other things be moving at a bigger trajectory as well.
• 39:12
  So it gets kind of wild to really think about
• 39:15
  the different ways these energies play out.
• 39:17
  But just knowing that it can't always be summer, right?
• 39:21
  That's just the simple truth in any relationship.
• 39:25
  That doesn't have to be a problem.
• 39:26
  That can actually be a type of liberation that, okay, great, we can relax that.
• 39:32
  It's okay maybe if we're not having as much sex as we used to.
• 39:35
  It's okay if we're maybe not having as many adventures as we used to, because our energy, our resources are somewhere else right now.
• 39:41
  So this season's here, it's more in fall, winter, and but there's other things that are that are really springing into summer and and
• 39:49
  That's all going to change again at some point anyway.
• 39:51
  And so it's really just important to uh have these conversations.
• 39:56
  And you know, we're certainly here to help.
• 39:58
  You can definitely check out our free kind of connection webinar for couples at uh evolutionarycouples.
• 40:05
  us slash evolution of us.
• 40:08
  And you can join any of our programs at evolutionarycouples.
• 40:12
  us as well, our Evolutionary Couples Cohorts or our 12 Epic Dates, which you can just do at home at your own pace.
• 40:19
  Yes, 12 of big dates is kind of perfect for that winter season where you're cozying in, you're dreaming a new dream, you're getting really intentional and fostering that spiritual connection between the two of you as well is great.
• 40:31
  for winter time.
• 40:33
  And our live cohort, evolutionary couples, is great also for the fall time where you're like, wow, you know, we need to really reflect on things.
• 40:41
  We need to retool some things.
• 40:43
  how's our conflict and repair process going or or not going?
• 40:47
  But we also add in a lot of spring and summer type stuff too because there's a focus on polarity and sexual connection.
• 40:53
  And if you come to our free webinar, Evolution of Us.
• 40:57
  you will be led through a process where you'll get to do an even kind of deeper cut of diagnostics and we will support you in some of that fall season, real time, or on the replay.
• 41:08
  And if you come to that, you'll also get a taste of summer because we're going to be doing some embodiment and polarity practices, which are going to be really, really fun.
• 41:16
  So definitely check us out, evolutionarycouples.
• 41:20
  us.