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209. The Comparison Epidemic: Don't Let This Disease Kill Your Marriage · The Ultimate Intimacy Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: You are listening to the Ultimate Intimacy Podcast, where we discuss how to find ultimate intimacy in your relationship.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: We believe that, no matter how many years you've been married, you can achieve passion, romance, happiness and ultimate intimacy at any stage of your life.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: Join us as we talk to not only marriage experts, but couples just like yourself and people who are just flat out fun.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: The Ultimate Intimacy Podcast is for couples who have a good relationship but want to make it even better.
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: It's the Ultimate Intimacy Podcast with Nick and Amy, and today's episode is the comparison epidemic the social media disease that will kill your marriage unless you're vaccinated, and we'll talk about how to be vaccinated against the social media disease that will kill your marriage.
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: You don't like that.
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: Did you just come up with that?
• 1:03
  Speaker 3: It's all up here in my head Wow, just totally just off the cuff, didn't even know you were so creative.
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: So people are wondering what is an epidemic?
• 1:14
  Speaker 3: An epidemic definition from Webster's dictionary, the noun an outbreak of disease that spreads quickly and affects many individuals at the same time.
• 1:27
  Speaker 3: An outbreak of epidemic disease or an outbreak of a product, oh, of a product of sudden rapid spread growth or development.
• 1:38
  Speaker 3: See number two worked for this an outbreak of a product of sudden rapid spread.
• 1:44
  Speaker 3: We're going to go with that one because that fits right.
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: So true.
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: So the comparison epidemic.
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: We're talking about social media, how comparing your life yourself, your marriage to others, is a disease that will kill your marriage.
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: And when we say kill your marriage and in divorce right.
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: Or just make your marriage real crappy.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think Amy and I, amy, and I see this maybe even more so firsthand with people that are around us, or you know, I think we have a good grasp on.
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: This is what I'm trying to say.
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: I think we see this really have an upfront seat and it's kind of become personal to us, and so we feel like this is something really important to talk about and something that affects a lot of people, but something that people probably don't realize is having an impact on them.
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: Well, if you ever thought of a disease, how does it start?
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: Kind?
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: of mild, right?
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it starts mild, and then it gets Like pretty much everyone's had COVID now right.
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: So you start out and you're going to get a sore throat, scratchy throat, and then it gets a little worse.
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: And then day three you're like nauseous, you've got headaches, and then day four you're getting the fever and the chills or the flu or whatever.
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: Do you know what I mean?
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: It just it comes slowly, right, and then all of a sudden you're like full blown sick.
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: Full blown sick and life sucks right.
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: Absolutely.
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: So if you wanted to tie this in Unless you, had the vaccine, then you'd never get it, of course.
• 3:24
  Speaker 3: Are you trying to be political?
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: No, I just said it.
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: No, if you had the vaccine, you would never get it.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: No, I'm joking, sorry.
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm not going to say anything to that.
• 3:38
  Speaker 3: I'm going back to the social media aspect.
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: Sorry, would you giggly about that?
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: With social media, you're like, oh, I'm going to download Instagram, this will be great.
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: Oh, I can connect with all my friends, or Facebook, or whatever.
• 3:56
  Speaker 3: Right, let's start with Facebook, because me and Nick don't even really use Facebook.
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: And then you start connecting with friends and it's great.
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: And then it starts sucking your time and you're like, oh, this is going to become a time waster.
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: There's a lot of drama on there.
• 4:10
  Speaker 3: And then it started affecting your mood right, you're getting a little sicker.
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: And then your ex-boyfriend reaches out to you and wants to be your friend.
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: Which has happened to both of us.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: I didn't have an ex-boyfriend, but I had an ex-girlfriend, she had an ex-boyfriend.
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: Thanks for clarifying that, and that was a hard no, we're not friends.
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: And a lot of people can't say no, we're not friends.
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: So then it leads to talks, emotional connections that shouldn't be there and then all of a sudden a marriage is to a place where it's sick.
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: That's what I was trying to get to right.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: Absolutely.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: It starts slowly, right.
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: And then it festers and feeds and gets worse and worse and worse in your life, and that's the same thing with comparison.
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: Like I mean, we have lots of experiences that we'll share in this podcast as far as, like you know, the parade of homes and things like that, but it really is a disease that can really have a big impact on you and has a big impact on a lot of people.
• 5:11
  Speaker 3: So Well, I think most people start swiping and they're like, oh, my friends, my friends, oh, so fun to see my friends.
• 5:16
  Speaker 3: And all of a sudden they're like, oh, they went somewhere without me, or oh, I wasn't invited to that party, they got a new car.
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: Oh, why don't?
• 5:23
  Speaker 3: I have a house like that or a vacation like that, or I mean we're all either guilty of doing it or guilty of seeing it right.
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: So someone made a point the other day that when you're on social media, we're comparing our worst selves with their best self, right?
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: So on social media they're only presenting the best part of them.
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: You're not seeing the crappy stuff because no one wants to sell that, right?
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: They want you to think that everything's perfect in their life.
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: So we're always comparing our worst self with someone else's best self.
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: Wait, hold on, though.
• 5:58
  Speaker 3: That all comes down to pride, right, like if we always think that we have to put out our best self all the time.
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: That's pride, and that's what people are suffering from right.
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but so we're basically looking at on social media, we're basically looking at someone else's highlight reel.
• 6:14
  Speaker 3: For sure.
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: Like where we're just seeing everything.
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: Good, oh, they got a new house, oh, they're vacationing here, oh they're doing this and we're thinking, why can't my life be like that?
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: But what you don't see is they just put that vacation on the credit card and it cost them $10,000.
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: Right, you don't see that during the vacation they were fighting the whole time and the mom and dad got in a fight and they slept in separate bedrooms, or you know what I'm saying.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: Like who knows?
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: what happened.
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: I'm just saying you're not seeing the other side of things, You're just comparing your life to theirs.
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: So the grass is always greener on the other side, right, and we're gonna talk about that.
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: So here are the reasons why the comparison epidemic will kill your marriage.
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: If you let it.
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: If you let it.
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: So the first is obviously unrealistic expectations, as we've kind of hit on.
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: You know they're creating this perfect picture that everything is great and you should want my life.
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: You should want my skin because my skin is so flawless.
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: Wait, don't you have a filter on that picture?
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: Oh yeah, and every other picture that I've posted.
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: And then we go back to the mirror and hate our skin like super bug.
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure.
• 7:37
  Speaker 3: It's super fake.
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: Well, when you look at all that, you're gonna then start having dissatisfaction in your own relationship, and that's, I think, the key, is the second.
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: You start having those unrealistic expectations.
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: Then immediately you're looking at your spouse in a negative light.
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: Why can't you provide me that?
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: Why can't you provide me a house like that?
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: Why can't we go on vacations like that?
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: You start looking at your kids.
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: Why are my kids not like that?
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: Why do they act differently than what I'm seeing in this picture?
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: You start comparing and you start looking at all the negatives in your life, your relationship, your marriage.
• 8:20
  Speaker 3: Which is very, very easy to do.
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: It's easy to point out negatives.
• 8:25
  Speaker 3: Everyone can point out negatives.
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: It takes a real personality to always look at positives right.
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: An unrealistic expectations are like a mirage.
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: It's like seeing that mirage in the distance and always trying to get there and you're never, ever, ever going to get there.
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: When you have unrealistic expectations and you're chasing those on the realistic expectations, you're never gonna be happy.
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: No matter what you get, no matter how much money you get, no matter what car you're driving or house you live in, you are never gonna be happy because you're chasing that mirage and those unrealistic expectations I mean.
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: A great example is my mom does a lot of humanitarian stuff in Africa and you go over there and half the kids aren't even wearing shoes.
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: Some of them don't even have shirts.
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: There's kids running around naked because they don't have any clothes.
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: They've never seen a mirror.
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, some of them have never seen themselves in the mirror yet.
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: They are the happiest people on the planet.
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: And you look at that and you say, well, how can they be so happy, like they don't have anything?
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: But they don't have anything to compare to.
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: They're not on social media saying I don't have a TV or I don't have a car.
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: They don't even know what they don't have because they don't know what they don't have.
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: My point is is they're not comparing their life to other people's lives.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: Therefore, because they're not doing that, they're grateful for the lives they have, the things that they have, the family that they have, and they are the most happy people you can ever imagine.
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: I never knew what kind of vacations people were taking until social media came out.
• 10:07
  Speaker 3: Never knew.
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: I never even, yeah, I never-, I never even had anything to compare our life to, because I had no idea, no idea.
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a great point.
• 10:20
  Speaker 3: So if you're having unrealistic expectations and it's affecting you negatively, look at your social media and just think who am I following?
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: What am I following that's making me feel like that?
• 10:33
  Speaker 3: Like, why are we choosing to feel like that?
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: Because if you're not choosing to feel like that, then you wouldn't be following those things that make you feel like that.
• 10:44
  Speaker 3: Like I just and I know we're gonna get into this more, but I just feel like we have more control over our lives and what we're seeing, what we're putting in our minds, than we think we do Like we have control of that.
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: So some things making you feel negative in any way.
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: Don't you have control to turn that off?
• 11:01
  Speaker 3: Like, where is our control gone?
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think we've, I think we lose control right, right when we, when we're looking at that.
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: Absolutely.
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: Absolutely so.
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: Another thing that this causes is jealousy and insecurity.
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: You know, when we're constantly seeing happy couples that look like they have the perfect relationship on social media, you know we can become jealous and insecure about our own marriages, our own relationship, and again, this also breeds negative emotions, which is going to create more conflict with our spouse.
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: I mean, I think I think jealousy is probably one of the the toughest things to deal with.
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: When we're jealous of other people or we envy what other people have, we immediately are ungrateful for the things that we we don't have right.
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: And when you're focused on the things that you don't have, I mean you're in trouble, because so much of life is about perception and attitude.
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: Like you look at people that hardly have anything and they sometimes some of the happiest people in the world.
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: And you look at people that look like they have everything money and fame and cars and this and that and there are some of the most miserable people in the world and you say how?
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: How is that?
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: Why?
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: Why can that be so?
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: Well, let's, let's touch on the insecurity a little bit, because jealousy and insecurity, they kind of go hand in hand, right, so if, if social media is making you feel insecure about yourself or about your life, or jealous or jealous once.
• 12:41
  Speaker 3: Once again, we have control over that.
• 12:44
  Speaker 3: We can.
• 12:44
  Speaker 3: We can fix that.
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: But I think for a lot of people they don't get him back to the dopamine thing.
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: Like you get on social media and you instantly get that gratification so you think, oh, that's a positive thing, but then you don't really think about the things that you're taking in and how they're affecting you.
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: You're, I think we're so concerned about the immediate, the now, getting our immediate gratifications taken care of, that we don't tend to look at like the long terms, like what's this doing to me long term?
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: Or what?
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: How is this going to affect the way?
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: I think well, isn't it?
• 13:21
  Speaker 3: It's an interesting to that.
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: So many people are like against taking drugs right, like we.
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: So many people are like against getting high and like doing that to ourselves.
• 13:30
  Speaker 3: Yet so many people get on social media and get that dopamine high, like there's a high that comes off of swiping that we've talked about.
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: So I think we need to step back and be like Is this good for my health, is this good for my mental health, is this good for my physical health?
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: And start taking more accountability and responsibility.
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: We're adults.
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: We literally Decide to take something and put it in us or not.
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: do that, yeah right and exactly and when we say the comparison Epidemic, the social media disease that will kill your marriage.
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: I'm reading a book with um on social media, with someone we've done previous podcast episodes with that we're gonna have him on in February and do another episode and I'm only probably 30 pages into this book, but already it's like mind-blowing to me and it's completely changed the way I look at social media and technology and even news and the different things that we take into our life and how Addicting it is.
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: And I cannot wait to have him on.
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: We can't wait to have him on and share those those things in the book because it's just it's incredible I mean it's it's amazing the impact that it's having on relationships.
• 14:49
  Speaker 3: So I would like you to tell our audience why you've chosen not to have social media in your life.
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so I well, hold on.
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: Let me just and um.
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: Nick decided he didn't want Instagram and tick tock and Facebook.
• 15:04
  Speaker 3: He just doesn't want it, and I would love for you to share why yeah, so obviously, I mean, I have an Instagram work account, ultimate intimacy.
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: We also have a tick tock account.
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: I have a Facebook account.
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: I I can't figure out how to turn it off, but I think it's probably been six, seven years since I've got on to it.
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: Um, maybe like 12 years, yeah, or however long it's been, but um so but I mean, like personal accounts, like why have you chosen?
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: I mean, we do our Instagram business, but why have you chosen to not be on social media on a personal level?
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so this will this will answer that question.
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: So I mean, I used to love to go to what we call the parade of homes, where here in the area You're going and looking at homes that are five million dollars, six million dollars, and you go through and you look at it and you're like, oh my heck, these houses are amazing.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: And every time I would leave there I'm like I want a house like that, like why is my house not like that?
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: What can I do to make more money this and that?
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: And I found myself like Enveying and getting ungrateful for what we do have, like aiming.
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: I live in a nice house, we live in a nice neighborhood, we've been very blessed, but I find myself going into those, that parade of home, and being less grateful for what I have and focusing on what I do, focusing on what I don't have.
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: So I told Amy, I said I I don't want to go to this anymore Because I just don't like the way it makes me feel.
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: I don't like the, the way it makes me want more and want more and want more and be ungrateful, and I think that's the reason why I try to.
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: I stay off social media as well.
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: I don't have any interest in social media Is because I think social media makes you feel the same way, like you always see people, like we said, you know on vacation or you know look like they have the perfect life or the perfect house or the perfect family or things like that.
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: And I don't want to feel like that.
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: I want to focus all of my attention on Amy and my family and what we can do to strengthen our relationship, and I I've said this before too like when you fill your mind with junk or other things, then it, it, it makes you start thinking about those other things and less focused on the things that matter most.
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: Now I'll be the first to admit that I like reading the news and getting on and and I do have some time Wasters and things like that but, um, to kind of get me away, but yeah, as far as social media and things like that go, um, I just didn't like I could notice a difference in how it made me feel and since I don't get on that anymore, I feel like my mind is clear, I feel like I'm full of gratitude, I'm very appreciative for the things that I don't have.
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: I look, I feel like my attitude is, I look at life From a positive standpoint, as to where I'm looking at all the good in life.
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: I'm looking at the things that I'm grateful for.
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: I'm happy with what I have.
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: I'm grateful.
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: I feel like I'm a very happy person versus the more I was going and doing those things like the parade of homes and Um social media.
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: I think it takes away a lot of happiness.
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: That was a long answer.
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: I took like 10 minutes I've done on my talking for the podcast.
• 18:27
  Speaker 3: No, you know, you just began.
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: So, it was.
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: It was great.
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: I just I think that we can do better job, all of us at Focusing more on our families and our spouses and our marriages and what we do have, versus obsessing about other fake lives and some of them are real, but we all get different hands in lives, right?
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, and it's so hard, like when Amy and I do Posts on our social media.
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: Like a lot of times it's hard for me to do posts, especially if we're like doing a post like we're in Mexico or things like that because the very first thing I think is, oh, are we gonna come across as we're trying to portray something or show off or things like that?
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: And I never, I never want to fill that way, and so I, I, I think we're always careful about what we post, just because, like I said, we don't ever want to come across as portraying.
• 19:26
  Speaker 3: What we're sitting here talking about we feel like can destroy marriage, and I do feel like we have a great marriage, and I have had comments where, like you guys must be fake because your life looks, your marriage looks, perfect.
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: We went through a lot of really, really hard times and, though our marriage isn't perfect, it's pretty awesome, but we put so much work into it.
• 19:47
  Speaker 3: We put so much work into it, which is why we're trying so hard to help other people's, because of all the stuff that we've learned right.
• 19:53
  Speaker 3: Absolutely, and the hard times that we've been through.
• 19:55
  Speaker 3: But it also get other comments on social media on our business accounts sometimes that are that say so funny that you're on a on here telling us how bad social media is, but you're on social media.
• 20:06
  Speaker 3: I Would love for people to get off social media.
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: If you're gonna be on it, at least be like helping your marriage.
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: Helping your marriage or or looking at accounts that brighten your day or uplift you.
• 20:19
  Speaker 3: I mean, you can get on social media all day, as long as you be careful who you're following.
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: If you are listening to, you know church leaders that uplift you or Whatever like positive quotes or I.
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: I don't know if you ever noticed, but I'm like obsessed with puppies.
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: I follow puppy and dog accounts make me smile, like if I'm gonna get on there for 10 minutes.
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: I want things that make me smile.
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: Yeah if you're like, why would you say get off of social media or be careful in social media, but yet you're on social media.
• 20:50
  Speaker 3: We're not plenty of accounts that are trying to help people, and those kinds of accounts are great to follow, but I would love it if people turned off social media altogether.
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: My husband has turned it off altogether personally, and I would love every husband or wife to do that.
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: But we're not even saying completely get off social media.
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: What we're saying and if, again, going back to the title of our episode, the comparison epidemic we are saying be careful about what you're following or looking at or doing on social media.
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: Like Amy and I talk about all the time like, get off your phones.
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: But if you're gonna be on your phone, get on the app and do something that's gonna help your marriage.
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: Do something that you're on together, do something that's fun.
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: There are great things that are on your phones.
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: There are great social media accounts.
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: We're just saying, if you're gonna be on there, follow someone that's going to be helping your marriage, or follow someone that's gonna be uplifting you rather than Making you feel like you're worthless and your marriage isn't good enough and you know your life sucks compared to everyone else's because You're just just really be careful about what you're following be intentional and realize what social media is doing and just be careful.
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: It really just comes down to being intentionally careful about what you're doing, right?
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: And I think, to simplify, there's always good and evil in anything.
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: You can find good and evil.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: Anywhere you look, you can find good on TV, you can find evil.
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: You can find good on the internet you can find evil.
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: You can find good on Podcasts you can find evil.
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: Same thing with social media you can find the good things that are gonna be positive.
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: You can find the evil things absolutely so Getting back into it a Lack of privacy.
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: You know, sharing too much about your marriage and I'm gonna stop here because Amy's Amy share a lot about our marriage and each other on social media.
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: But we're in agreement on it, right, our goal is to help people.
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: But if you're sharing too much about your marriage on social media, yeah, sure, sauce ok, but yeah you're your, your I invading that privacy.
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: Just be careful about what you're, what you're sharing, what should be private and what what's okay.
• 23:10
  Speaker 3: Which really comes down to creating boundaries together, right.
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: Correct Yep.
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: Another thing about social media is the pressure to appear Perfect.
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: I mean I think we've already hit on this that everything looks perfect.
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah filters you have.
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: You can take videos in a perfect way with filters to make you look like you're 20 years younger and things like that.
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: Just it's.
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: It's I don't know.
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: It's frustrating.
• 23:43
  Speaker 3: It's a fake world, so just remember that, right.
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: but I'm not gonna just create a bunch of pressure, though, to make you feel like You've got to present this picture perfect mirrors, this picture perfect life.
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: I'm trying to hide any struggles or anything like that.
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: And I think a lot of women that I have reached out and stuff feel like their self-esteem has gone down because of social media.
• 24:10
  Speaker 3: Like you've got to remember, there's a lot of fake stuff out there.
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: There's, I mean, makeup covers things, hair extensions cover things, filters covers things, like.
• 24:18
  Speaker 3: Like, if you're feeling jealous or Not good enough or insecure any of those negative feelings, just just unfollow some of those accounts.
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: Just be very careful about what you're watching.
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and if you're constantly comparing your marriage to others, it's it's gonna have a negative impact on your emotional and physical intimacy in your relationship.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: I mean, you're gonna be more focused on Someone else's relationship and the validation there and less on the connection with your spouse.
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: And we, like I said, we see that all the time.
• 24:50
  Speaker 3: Oh, Another thing to point out is social media, like if you're trying to get validation from other people Because you're not getting it in your marriage I've heard that from like a lot of couples, which is really really sad but Go Express to your spouse how you're feeling and that you need that validation from them, because I think that's really important and a Problem that some people are having.
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: Don't you think?
• 25:17
  Speaker 3: Absolutely Absolutely your validation needs to come from your spouse and nobody else.
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so kind of summarize You're gonna be ungrateful if we're looking at what others are doing and Comparing our lives to theirs.
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: We're gonna be ungrateful for what we have.
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: We're gonna be impatient.
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: We're gonna be wanting things.
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: Now we see a lot of people that go out and get debt on all these things because they want things now.
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: Like no one ever saves up Anymore for anything, everyone just goes out and buys it now.
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: It's gonna create impatience and their neighbors got it exactly.
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: And Then the comparison obviously is going to make you feel like the grass is greener syndrome, which is oh, if I were with someone else, I would be happier.
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: If I had this, I would be happier, or, you know, if I had what they had, I would be happier.
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: And that is a very, very Bad and destructive way to think water your own grass.
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: It's what we're trying to say, right?
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: I like that if your grass isn't green, then water it.
• 26:26
  Speaker 3: If your neighbors looks better, then take care of your own.
• 26:29
  Speaker 3: That's, that's what marriage is.
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: If someone has an amazing marriage and you want that marriage, do the things that they're doing to implement Into their marriage like it takes a lot of work and you have no idea how hard someone is working at their marriage.
• 26:44
  Speaker 3: Like that's what it takes is really hard work, right and intention.
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: So the most important thing is how can you avoid the comparison epidemic?
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: How can you keep this from infiltrating into your marriage?
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: First thing you need to do is set realistic expectations for your marriage and your relationship and and Whatever those are.
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: Every marriage and relationships going to look different, but focus.
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: Start focusing on your relationship and Set realistic expectations of what you expect in your relationship as a couple, and stop comparing your relationship to others.
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: Your life and your experiences are going to look completely different than someone else's because You're different.
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: You have different.
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: I Mean you have different qualities, you have different Hobbies, you have different interests.
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: You have different backgrounds.
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: You have different jobs.
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: Like Everyone's life is going to look different.
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: Practice gratitude.
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: Take time every single day to reflect on the positive things that you have in your marriage and in your life.
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: And then go say thank you to your spouse for what you do have and for what they do do.
• 27:54
  Speaker 3: Absolutely like practicing gratitude means expressing gratitude, like we hear from so many couples that say my wife or my husband Just doesn't ever appreciate me, like I don't feel appreciated in the marriage.
• 28:07
  Speaker 3: If you want strong emotional intimacy, you got to practice.
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: Practice gratitude by speaking gratitude.
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, if you literally take a little bit of time, a couple minutes each day, and focus on the positive things in your life and in your marriage and practice that gratitude, it'll completely change how you think about things and your perception on things, and then, obviously, create boundaries around your social media use.
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: Like Amy said, talk about who you're gonna fall or determine who you're gonna follow.
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: If you're following things that are bringing you down and causing you to compare and feel those feelings, get rid of those things.
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: Decide who you're gonna follow, how much time you're gonna spend on social media each day and what you're gonna put into your life and your brain.
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: It's funny how we like teach our teenagers how to use Like phones right.
• 29:00
  Speaker 3: So, like my two older kids, I let them they were actually against social media because they've kind of like learned enough about what it does to people, but we let them get be real, which is a little more realistic and there's no filters and it's I don't know.
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: We felt like that was a safer option, since they're getting older, but we still have like once a week where I'll say how, who are you following and how?
• 29:27
  Speaker 3: Is there anyone that makes you feel less of a person or that you feel jealous or envious towards, or makes you feel bad or not invited?
• 29:35
  Speaker 3: Is there anyone that you like the comparison trap is hurting you like?
• 29:39
  Speaker 3: We're asking our teenagers this, like?
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: These are the kind of emotions that you need to be Conscious about and aware about that, this affecting your mental.
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: You know, and we have these conversations with our teenagers, trying to teach them what's good and what they should be putting in their, their mind and stuff.
• 29:57
  Speaker 3: But isn't it interesting how we try and teach our kids that yet we're kind of ignoring that ourselves.
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: We have no filters.
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: We have.
• 30:04
  Speaker 3: Like we should be every week asking our spouse or asking ourselves Is there anything that's bringing me down?
• 30:10
  Speaker 3: Is there anything that's causing me these uneasy feelings or not feeling invited, or jealous I mean, I don't care if you're 405060 or 20.
• 30:20
  Speaker 3: Like we still all have feelings of jealousy and insecurities.
• 30:25
  Speaker 3: Like we, even if though we're like double the age or whatever than our kids, like we're still new at this to adults, are still new at the social media thing.
• 30:34
  Speaker 3: We're still learning all the time how this is affecting us to we still don't even know.
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: We still don't even know what this is doing to us.
• 30:42
  Speaker 3: We're starting to figure it out, the damages that it's causing.
• 30:46
  Speaker 3: But I think it's important to not just think I'm teaching my kids about social media.
• 30:49
  Speaker 3: What am I teaching myself?
• 30:50
  Speaker 3: How am I doing this?
• 30:51
  Speaker 3: How am I taking this and being careful myself?
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: yeah, great.
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: I think the final thing is focus on your relationship.
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: Spend more time focusing on your relationship and less time focusing on others.
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: I think that's just Pretty pretty self explanatory.
• 31:07
  Speaker 2: Do these things and you're gonna have a pretty pretty good grasp and put up the right boundaries to protect your relationship in your marriage From this comparison epidemic which really is destroying a lot of marriages.
• 31:23
  Speaker 3: I'm just gonna throw out an ending challenge.
• 31:24
  Speaker 3: I challenge you To go look at your phone right now and have your spouse do the same and look at your screen time and see what you're spending on social media each day, and then I would like to compare that to what you're spending in quality time with your spouse each, each day.
• 31:41
  Speaker 3: If your social media use on your phone Is more than the time, the quality time, quality time you spent with your spouse that day, I challenge you this week To swap that.
• 31:56
  Speaker 3: I challenge you to make sure that your quality time with your spouse is way higher, even more double, than what it is on your social media use, and to just reevaluate Is your mood affecting your marriage at all from being on social media?
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: Love it.
• 32:16
  Speaker 3: I'm gonna take that challenge.
• 32:17
  Speaker 3: Let's take that challenge Absolutely great challenge, business, personal, I don't care what it is.
• 32:21
  Speaker 3: If you can be on your phone, you can be spending more time on your marriage, for sure.
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: So we hope all of you enjoyed the podcast and until next time we hope you find ultimate intimacy in your relationship.