Latest / The Psychology of Relationships / Stop Trying to Be More Lovable: How Your Greatest Gifts Can Transform Your Relationships w/ Ken Page

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Stop Trying to Be More Lovable: How Your Greatest Gifts Can Transform Your Relationships w/ Ken Page · The Psychology of Relationships

0:00
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm Julie Kraftcheck, and I'm U.A.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Xu.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This is the psychology of relationships.
0:07
[SPEAKER_01]: What if the things you've spent years trying to fix about yourself are actually the qualities that make you uniquely valuable?
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[SPEAKER_01]: So often we focus on our flaws and what we believe makes us too much or not enough without recognizing the strengths hidden underneath.
0:23
[SPEAKER_01]: In this episode, we're joined by Ken Page, a psychotherapist, author of Deeper Dating, and host of the Deeper Dating podcast.
0:31
[SPEAKER_01]: Known for his work, helping people create more authentic and fulfilling relationships.
0:37
[SPEAKER_01]: Ken shares why our greatest gifts are often connected to the parts of ourselves we've learned to hide.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Together we explore why focusing on our flaws can keep us stuck, how to recognize our core gifts, and how embracing those qualities can help us find partners who appreciate us for who we truly are.
0:55
[SPEAKER_01]: Rather than trying to become someone else to be loved, can offers a framework for approaching dating and relationships from a place of self-worth, authenticity, and connection.
1:06
[SPEAKER_01]: Remember to subscribe to the Psychology of Relationships on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen.
1:12
[SPEAKER_01]: And if this episode shifted how you think about your gifts and finding love with love or reading or review, this is the psychology of relationships and your listening to an episode that just might change the way you show up for love.
1:25
[SPEAKER_01]: Enjoy!
1:27
[SPEAKER_02]: When we're on this journey of finding love, we think about what is standing in our way and sometimes it could be external factors and sometimes it could be us.
1:35
[SPEAKER_02]: There are things that we are doing that is standing in our way.
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[SPEAKER_02]: So today we're gonna have a conversation about what actually is getting in our way of love and what isn't.
1:44
[SPEAKER_02]: And some of those things that we may think have been blockers for us may not actually be the blockers.
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[SPEAKER_02]: So we have the wonderful Ken Page.
1:51
[SPEAKER_02]: We just love hearing your voice.
1:53
[SPEAKER_02]: It's just so soothing.
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[SPEAKER_02]: You should have a meditation app.
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[SPEAKER_02]: You might want to say hi now, because everyone wants to hear your voice.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, everybody.
2:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
2:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.
2:02
[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome, Ken.
2:03
[SPEAKER_00]: So glad to be here with you.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It's a joy to get to be part of your podcast.
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[SPEAKER_02]: So let's talk about what's standing in our way and when we ask anybody this question, what do you think it's getting in our way?
2:13
[SPEAKER_02]: People immediately focus on the negatives of themselves.
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[SPEAKER_02]: Why do you think that is?
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[SPEAKER_02]: Why is it that we're just always going to the negative?
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[SPEAKER_00]: Well, you know, I think that that comes from a problem-solving mentality and a quick fix mentality, which,
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[SPEAKER_00]: Ultimately, it looks like a really sexy, wonderful journey and ends up in the swamps of self-taughts.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So, because it's a journey that is not based on self-honoring.
2:40
[SPEAKER_00]: And if our journey is not based on self-honoring, it's going to bite us in the butt.
2:44
[SPEAKER_00]: It will ultimately create pain and interestingly, it will lead us to be attracted to people who are not good for us.
2:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Because the foundation, the way that we're self-organized around our search for love, is a self-sabotaging one and that recreates itself.
2:59
[SPEAKER_00]: And in my work and the field over decades, I've kind of seen that again and again and kind of built a map out of that of how people can start with
3:10
[SPEAKER_00]: A place of self-organizing, based on honoring who they are, simple, simple, honoring who you are and looking for people who can do the same and where it's mutual.
3:20
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the wise path to love, like in the tiniest, simplest, most powerful form, but dating advice is all about how we have to fix ourselves and change ourselves and change the way we look, change the way that we act,
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[SPEAKER_00]: and now with this totally crazy making addition of, but you have to be authentic.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Like what is completely, completely impossible, so if your goal is love, and you're not doing that search based on the real skills of love, and if it's not originating in self love,
3:54
[SPEAKER_00]: You're kind of gonna be screwed, so, you know, so much advice doesn't come from using love as the medium and intimacy is the medium and that's why I think like it's such a fixation like fix this and you'll get what you want be better and you'll get what you want which is so interesting because that's the definition of a deprivation of relationship if I just fix this I'll finally get the love that I want from this person.
4:19
[SPEAKER_00]: that applies to to our search for love.
4:21
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like you hit on so many big things and just that last, you know, summary of what you did, you know, this whole aspect of self-improvement, like that we have to better ourselves.
4:33
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like that is set up for, you know, failure from the get go.
4:37
[SPEAKER_01]: And then you also talked about how, you know, we kind of morph into the date version of ourselves.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We call this like becoming a dating chameleon.
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[SPEAKER_01]: You know, sinking in and just doing, being like, okay, this is how I act on a date.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This is how I'm supposed to show up.
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[SPEAKER_01]: You said it's so simple, but why do we find this so difficult?
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[SPEAKER_01]: And like, how do we start to show our authentic selves in a way that is digestible and not just buzzwords?
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, so what's the map for that?
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[SPEAKER_00]: What is really the map for that?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And you know, I've done tons of thinking and tons of teaching about that and in my intensive, this is what we focus on for half a year is how to do that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But the path is an inside out approach versus an outside in approach.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And I'll just say something about like the stages that we need to go through to kind of do this in a different way and the first one is the key one and it's what I call the discovery of your core gifts and what does that mean that means a kind of radical authenticity picture a target like a kind of target with a bull's eye in the middle so if you imagine that the closer you get in toward the center the closer you're getting toward your humanity.
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[SPEAKER_00]: you're true authentic self.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The place where you hurt, the place where you shine, the place where you care, the place where you have needs, the kind of beating heart of your humanity, which is not an easy place to live in.
6:08
[SPEAKER_00]: It takes an ongoing journey of being able to bear the heat, the need, the love, the effusiveness, the vulnerability, the sensitivity of those parts of ourselves.
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[SPEAKER_00]: parts that we have tended to be most awkward or timid to reveal are where our greatest beauty lies and where our deepest magnetism lies.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Those parts need to be cultivated and honored and they need to be named.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So in the intensives we spend three of the six months naming these parts of ourselves by looking at what in your relationships and your interactions with the world hurts you.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Even if it's tiny like paper cut hurts that you don't even notice it first like what are the things that hurt you?
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[SPEAKER_00]: What if you could dignify those instead of thinking I just need to be tougher like what if you could think oh?
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[SPEAKER_00]: This hurt me for a reason.
7:00
[SPEAKER_01]: Mm-hmm.
7:01
[SPEAKER_00]: What is that I need that I'm not getting?
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[SPEAKER_00]: what felt not seen in me.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And what can I ask for so that that could be different?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And how does that connect to those beautiful parts of me?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And then what are the things that fill my heart in sex, in love, in intimacy, in communication?
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[SPEAKER_00]: What are the things that make me feel that kind of joy and fulfillment?
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[SPEAKER_00]: That's what we want.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And those are connected to our core gift.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So by answering those two questions again and again, what hurts my heart and what fills my heart.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and then dignifying your answers and thinking this connects to the best parts of me.
7:34
[SPEAKER_00]: When we start to do that, we reorganize ourselves around self-honoring.
7:40
[SPEAKER_00]: And when we do that, couple things happen.
7:43
[SPEAKER_00]: One thing that happens, which is like almost miraculous, is we start being attracted to people who are better for us.
7:49
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The other thing is we start attracting people who are better for us.
7:54
[SPEAKER_00]: This is kind of a miracle, but it also makes sense because we are organizing around authenticity and love instead of organizing around all these defensive fixes that we get told to do.
8:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And when we do that, we shine.
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[SPEAKER_00]: We shine with a light that is our personal light and the people that are looking for someone like us will notice that will recognize that will resonate with it.
8:18
[SPEAKER_00]: and the big big scale, that's like the key here.
8:22
[SPEAKER_01]: So I did a favor to tell you this Ken, but I feel like you did change my outlook with this.
8:27
[SPEAKER_01]: We had Ken a long time ago on our sounding board, and I remember for years, I thought,
8:34
[SPEAKER_01]: being emotional and sensitive were issues like that was getting the wave by dating.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And I've realized that like on the flip side of that is that you know, I'm able to be passionate.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm able to love deeply.
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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm able to open my heart up and really feel.
8:53
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think having that flip was so instrumental.
8:56
[SPEAKER_01]: What are some
8:57
[SPEAKER_01]: other things that you see with some of the people you work with that people go in being like this is getting in the way and then how do you start to see like the positives of it?
9:06
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, that's like the question.
9:08
[SPEAKER_00]: I love that question.
9:09
[SPEAKER_00]: But what I want to say first is those gifts are exactly what you're doing here now.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Those gifts are very few of all that you're giving in all of the two of you who are doing here.
9:19
[SPEAKER_00]: So
9:20
[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes we get to do it a little more easily in our professional life than our personal life Like I know the parts of me that I was most ashamed of as a gay man in this world where my sensitivity my vulnerability But my clients wanted that.
9:34
[SPEAKER_00]: That is funny.
9:35
[SPEAKER_00]: I know
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[SPEAKER_00]: yeah yeah it's not as personal what it's work right that's right that's right like an artist can maybe do great commercial art but they're touching their fine art you know it's like harder it's scarier it's different but an answer to your question some of the key things that people think well how the hell is that a gift that's up
9:56
[SPEAKER_00]: one like you're longing for connection for real connection.
10:00
[SPEAKER_00]: People are ashamed of that all the time.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And don't you think like culturally there's this thing of like God forbid you're too earnest?
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[SPEAKER_01]: Oh yeah.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It'll be needy.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But here's a formula that need shamed turns into neediness.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Need honored turns into dignity.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, that's good.
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[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, can you say that again?
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[SPEAKER_00]: need shamed turns into neediness.
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[SPEAKER_00]: We press it down, we press it down, but the eight gets bigger and bigger, and then it kind of explodes out usually in an embarrassing and awkward way that you don't feel great about afterwards.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Need honored brings us dignity.
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[SPEAKER_00]: There's a
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[SPEAKER_00]: sense of dignity to who we are when we lead with it.
10:41
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's why I tell everybody that there is one central question that their entire search for love should be framed around.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The of course you need to be tracked to the logistics need to work on it.
10:52
[SPEAKER_00]: But the key question, the question that we should actually center and define our entire journey around is, does my soul feel safe with this person?
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[SPEAKER_01]: 100%.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And then when that becomes the question, people feel our dignity.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And then the other thing that happens is that's how we develop a secure attachment style.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Because our deep insights know that we're finally going to be taken care of.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So they can begin to relax.
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[SPEAKER_00]: We don't need to protect ourselves with an armor.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It can protect ourselves with our spine, with our dignity.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And that's why this journey heals our heart.
11:27
[SPEAKER_00]: Need is a really, really big one.
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[SPEAKER_00]: People are like, how is that a core gift?
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[SPEAKER_00]: It's people that really need connection, that nurture connection, and that's how it's a core gift.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The people who are really sensitive to connection and the importance and the quality of connection, yeah, they can get in a lot of trouble, they can get shamed a lot, they can be told that they're too much, or all of that and that does happen to us.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Those of us who care about connection like that are the ones who take the time to build it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: to nurture it, to create it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And John Gottman's research shows that it's the couples that are like super sensitive to when there are breaks in their connection, as opposed to letting it roll off their back.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Those are the happiest, most successful couples, the ones that are like, oh, something didn't feel right.
12:13
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's look at this.
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[SPEAKER_00]: They actually do the best in the long run.
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[SPEAKER_00]: so that's one, like the need for connection.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That's one of the examples, you know, some corgift are obvious, like a generosity of spirit or a joy, but need is one that people don't necessarily see as a gift, a need for safety.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That's another really big one, like people feel like a shame, like what am I just too sensitive?
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[SPEAKER_00]: Am I like too much of a snowflake?
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[SPEAKER_00]: We tame ourselves in all these different ways.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It's the people who really care about safety that care about creating environments that are safe, that care when there's one person in the group that is not feeling safe, and they can see it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So these are deep corgifts, but they're like sensitivities that are bigger than normal.
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[SPEAKER_00]: We're outside the bell curve, and that's where our greatest gift often lie is outside the bell curve.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Another one is ferocity, a kind of fierceness.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Like fierceness for truth, that's one that people get really shamed by.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So if you're someone who really cares about truth, you will make people uncomfortable.
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[SPEAKER_00]: You will.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So we have to cultivate a sense of like why that love of truth is actually a worthy thing and that that fierceness is something that probably most people won't know what to do with, but the people who do are our people.
13:33
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's just one other thing I want to say about this is when you take a core gift and you shape it it acts out just like with children just you know like with everyone so it acts out either by suppressing itself which is a massacism or act out by like lashing out which can get us in trouble.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Then we feel like oh this part of me it's just too much.
13:53
[SPEAKER_00]: but the more we learn to honor it, the less strident it becomes, the less ashamed it becomes, the more it gets like equalized and we get to be these amazing people that actually integrate it.
14:03
[SPEAKER_00]: So when you do that stuff, you will be like this wisdom data.
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[SPEAKER_00]: You will have a power, you will have a beauty, most people it won't work with, but that's okay.
14:13
[SPEAKER_00]: Because when you have your eyes that I'm what you want, you really save time.
14:18
[SPEAKER_02]: can it make so much sense with the examples you're giving?
14:20
[SPEAKER_02]: But I am struggling with how do you differentiate what is a core gift versus something you're working towards or working on?
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[SPEAKER_02]: So personal example is this radical independence I have.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I've had it ever since I was a little kid where I don't ask for help.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I don't need people.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I don't express the need.
14:38
[SPEAKER_02]: And in partnerships,
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[SPEAKER_02]: that drives the wedge or drives too much space in between.
14:43
[SPEAKER_02]: So I could embrace that as a core gift and say that makes me unique, but it could also be something that I could say, I want to work on that, to not be my core gift anymore.
14:52
[SPEAKER_02]: How would you differentiate the two?
14:54
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's how I would frame it.
14:56
[SPEAKER_00]: You're describing something that's really innate to your character, to your self-organization, to your being, right?
15:03
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's like it's a love of freedom and independent and that fear's need for that.
15:08
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you don't see that first and foremost as a treasure as a gift, because it's like the language of you,
15:17
[SPEAKER_00]: in the world, it's who you are.
15:19
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't, you will self-savitude.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So always the first step is the honoring.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Always, you have to honor that and treasure that because that is so much a part of who you are.
15:31
[SPEAKER_00]: It's how you come up with the questions that you come up with.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So the first step is always the celebration of it.
15:36
[SPEAKER_00]: It's almost pride month and this is like, you know, something that queer people go through is like,
15:42
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I mean, I went through this, I'm 66, so it was surrounded by like, you know, all of this psychiatric kind of model, where I would like sit on the library floor at 12 years old and say, oh shit, I have a close binding mother and a distant father.
15:57
[SPEAKER_00]: That's why I'm gay.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Obviously I have both of them and it was true.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So I had the deepest reason not to honor the fact that I was gay, but I ultimately realized that would never work.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The issues that came with my close-binding mother and my distant father were all issues I had to work on being gay in the world.
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[SPEAKER_00]: They absolutely were, but I had to start with an honoring of who I was.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So that's my thought there in that rawness and that imperfection and in that beauty of your independence, we have to start with that molten self, you know, and honor that and treasure that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Then, secondarily, our biggest insecurities surround our deepest gifts.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Because we get the most triggered there, we don't have the language to honor it and express it and share it.
16:45
[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, my guess is,
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[SPEAKER_00]: that in your journey you have learned more and more in your relationships to make space for that where you need to make space for it and find ways to ask for it in ways that aren't shaming of you or the other person and that that's been a key for you.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That's the journey that's starting with honoring.
17:03
[SPEAKER_00]: Because until we honor it we can't bring it out of its
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[SPEAKER_00]: the guy who does all the great work on ADHD.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He said the two things you need to have a healthy kid are they need to have a felt sense that you enjoy them and you need to teach them mastery.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So your core gift first and foremost need to feel loved by you and dignified and honored.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Then we work on the mastery of those skills.
17:28
[SPEAKER_01]: Does that answer the question?
17:29
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
17:30
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
17:31
[SPEAKER_01]: I think it does, but I have a follow-on.
17:33
[SPEAKER_01]: How do you be comfortable with who you are?
17:36
[SPEAKER_01]: It'd be like, I am who I am versus I know I need to compromise in a relationship and meet the other person's needs, too.
17:44
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, how do you balance that?
17:45
[SPEAKER_01]: Because I mean, I start to go with this, too.
17:47
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like, there's some parts that you're like, you should love me for who I am, but then other times you're like, actually, no, I should adapt.
17:54
[SPEAKER_01]: and take it to a cow at sub one, a little bore.
17:57
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, I don't think it's either or.
17:58
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a curious year thought process.
18:00
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I totally agree with that.
18:02
[SPEAKER_00]: I totally agree.
18:03
[SPEAKER_00]: And that I just see as an art.
18:05
[SPEAKER_00]: That's like this ongoing art.
18:07
[SPEAKER_00]: I remember I was dating a guy and he was gonna make dinner for us.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And I am someone who likes to sleep in on the weekends.
18:16
[SPEAKER_00]: So he said, all right, in order for me to do this, I need to go food shopping, but we need to like leave at like 430 in the morning.
18:21
[SPEAKER_00]: What?
18:22
[SPEAKER_00]: to like get there and I said absolutely not like no way no way and I talked to it was actually my therapist at the time and she said he's not going to spend the whole day cooking like want to give in want to just give in and wake up really early and I thought wow that makes sense and I did and I leaned into it and it was very sweet and he made a fabulous meal for everybody.
18:44
[SPEAKER_00]: that was like an example of that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That was not my inclination.
18:47
[SPEAKER_00]: My inclination was to be authentic to myself and say, you know, oh, no, I just don't do that.
18:54
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, it's such an ongoing journey and I think if you're with someone and you feel in general that you both really care about the other ones well being it's easier to bend in that regard.
19:05
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I mean, maybe that's the key.
19:07
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like knowing yourself and the gifts that you have, but also being able to recognize like when you don't wanna just adapt to a piece of the person, but adapt because you wanna build a relationship with them.
19:19
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, this is something I find is that when I meditate, I often will think, oh, why don't I just soften up a little about that and compromise?
19:27
[SPEAKER_00]: But it comes naturally, it comes as a gift.
19:30
[SPEAKER_00]: because I have a tendency to harden around the things that I want that feel like they might be threatened relationship.
19:36
[SPEAKER_01]: That's a really good point.
19:38
[SPEAKER_01]: The space sometimes takes that space.
19:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, yes.
19:41
[SPEAKER_02]: That's exactly it.
19:42
[SPEAKER_02]: Especially for a lot of listeners who may have been single for a while.
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[SPEAKER_02]: I think many people know their core gifts and maybe don't want a budge around their core gifts and be thinking in this conversation is thinking about it's not so much about
19:57
[SPEAKER_02]: budging or sacrificing.
19:59
[SPEAKER_02]: But it's about how do we keep evolving these core gifts and they could look a little different, right?
20:05
[SPEAKER_02]: It could look different with different people, depending on who you're around.
20:08
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's good to have that flexibility.
20:10
[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.
20:11
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
20:11
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
20:11
[SPEAKER_00]: That's
20:12
[SPEAKER_00]: really important and I mean that's to me the beauty of a conscious dating journey is that you say oh like you soften or you get insights and then you follow those insights to me that's why conscious dating heals our lives and lead us more quickly to love like if you think back on those aha moments where you had an insight that helped you love better and love deeper those
20:40
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and I think there is clearly a line too.
20:43
[SPEAKER_01]: Someone might fall for you because you have your own life.
20:46
[SPEAKER_01]: You have things going on.
20:48
[SPEAKER_01]: They made appreciate that.
20:49
[SPEAKER_01]: But the line might be that you have no time to spend with them ever if you're always doing your own thing.
20:55
[SPEAKER_01]: So I think that even though we could look at a core gift, I think sometimes we tend to look at holistically, but it's like, how do we dial it down to?
21:03
[SPEAKER_01]: What is the gift here versus what is actually getting the way of being having the relationship I want?
21:08
[SPEAKER_00]: right exactly.
21:09
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you don't start out with the honoring of the gift, if you don't start out with that, your gift will feel protective, defensive, and unprotected.
21:19
[SPEAKER_00]: That's why it's always so good to, you know, you put the mask on yourself first in the airplane like we start with kind of the self-honoring.
21:27
[SPEAKER_00]: And then we can be generous.
21:28
[SPEAKER_00]: But until then, we're not going to be generous.
21:30
[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to be tight.
21:31
[SPEAKER_02]: And I want to remind our listeners what we're talking about here because I want to circle back to a initial question, which was what is getting your way and what isn't and what we're talking about here is it's not about the deficiencies that people have because people often go to that is.
21:48
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not this enough.
21:50
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not this, you know, I am not at this point in my life.
21:53
[SPEAKER_02]: If many examples of what they're not, but what you're saying here Ken is, let's go to what we are embrace those honor those and use those to guide us instead of thinking about roadblocks.
22:04
[SPEAKER_02]: here's like the guiding light for us to get to the people who are suitable for us.
22:10
[SPEAKER_02]: So when people have these thoughts of deficiencies, which is natural, what is some advice you've given to people to not have that be, that first knee jerk reaction?
22:19
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, you know, one thing I would say is in writing my book, deeper dating, I did a lot of research.
22:24
[SPEAKER_00]: I talked to a lot of people, a lot of couples, and in my life doing this work, and I imagine in your life doing this work,
22:29
[SPEAKER_00]: I've seen people fall in love at 90 years old and have the great love of their life.
22:35
[SPEAKER_00]: I know someone who contracted AIDS and had been single forever and it was only when he got AIDS that he fell in love for the first time.
22:43
[SPEAKER_00]: I know if someone who was a quadriplegic,
22:47
[SPEAKER_00]: who fell in love with someone who did not have those challenges, and it happened because of the work that he did.
22:53
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think that I think that the thing to remember is it's not this linear model.
22:59
[SPEAKER_00]: It is not so much a numbers game.
23:01
[SPEAKER_00]: It is not so much that you have this and this and this and this and this and this is what you need to, you know, be on the A list.
23:07
[SPEAKER_00]: It is not those things.
23:08
[SPEAKER_00]: There's some deeper physics here that really, really works.
23:13
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's why people who are like smoking hot, wildly gorgeous have less success often in finding love.
23:20
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
23:20
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's actually people who are more in the range of average looking that have the most success in finding love.
23:26
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not because of those things.
23:28
[SPEAKER_00]: It's that other factors are at work.
23:30
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think that that's just something that we all really need to remember and the other thing is is really true that different people are attracted to different types of people.
23:41
[SPEAKER_00]: And yeah, some amazing people are really comfortable being with someone who have a lot of challenges going on in their life.
23:49
[SPEAKER_00]: they've been unemployed for a period of time or whatever.
23:53
[SPEAKER_00]: There are people who are there for that.
23:55
[SPEAKER_00]: They have wide shoulders, not that you want to live in that state permanently, but wherever you are, as long as if you've got an un-stabilized psychiatric disorder of serious one, you've got to work on that.
24:09
[SPEAKER_00]: If you have an addiction, a serious addiction, you've got to work on that.
24:12
[SPEAKER_00]: This won't work.
24:13
[SPEAKER_00]: These ideas won't work.
24:14
[SPEAKER_00]: Nothing will hold until those things are addressed.
24:16
[SPEAKER_00]: But outside of that,
24:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever your situation is, your employment situation, your age, your weight, where you live, those things are actually less important.
24:29
[SPEAKER_00]: It's this combination of self-honoring, plus bravery and getting out there and let me just say one more thing, go to environments with people who share your values because that will speed the process enormously.
24:41
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that is definitely a lesson I've learned along the way in culture and society tells you that you need to be a certain way and you can really start to get in your head on that.
24:51
[SPEAKER_01]: But what I'm hearing from you is like everyone is datable.
24:54
[SPEAKER_01]: Like maybe there's certain people that need to address things but even if they do address them they can still be datable.
25:00
[SPEAKER_01]: So there's no one out there that is not datable as long as you honor and do the work for yourself.
25:06
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, yeah, and people are attracted to different people.
25:08
[SPEAKER_00]: Different body types, different ages.
25:10
[SPEAKER_00]: There's this fantasy that there's only one type that is the most attractive that's so not true.
25:15
[SPEAKER_00]: That's like an amazing thing about the world.
25:17
[SPEAKER_00]: Is that different people are attracted to different people.
25:20
[SPEAKER_00]: So, a big yes.
25:22
[SPEAKER_02]: Let's get to here.
25:23
[SPEAKER_02]: We know that, right?
25:24
[SPEAKER_02]: I have a friend who's definitely attracted to a certain type that I would never fathom.
25:28
[SPEAKER_02]: The two be attracted to.
25:30
[SPEAKER_02]: She really loves taking care of people.
25:33
[SPEAKER_02]: She really loves them to be unemployed and very dependent on her.
25:37
[SPEAKER_02]: And for the longest time, I was just like, wow, these guys are so lucky because they found someone who really wants to take care of them.
25:43
[SPEAKER_02]: You're right.
25:44
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, the universe works in very
25:49
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and it's very beautiful that way and it's wonderful to think about that.
25:54
[SPEAKER_02]: But to know that, how do we innately start doing the work to embrace our core gifts and to know that we're dataable and to Julie's point, we're all dataable.
26:05
[SPEAKER_02]: It comes from the inside out.
26:06
[SPEAKER_02]: You have to really feel like you are first.
26:10
[SPEAKER_02]: What is that first step to feeling dataable?
26:13
[SPEAKER_00]: On the broadest level, I think the thing to do if you want to go on this journey of dating more consciously learning self-love is to find an approach and a paradigm that makes sense to you and that feels like it has wisdom.
26:26
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't try to do it alone.
26:28
[SPEAKER_00]: There's all of this material out there.
26:30
[SPEAKER_00]: There are all of these coaches.
26:32
[SPEAKER_00]: There's all of this written material.
26:33
[SPEAKER_00]: There's so, so, so, so much.
26:34
[SPEAKER_00]: Look for what really rings true to you.
26:36
[SPEAKER_00]: and then follow that, but don't follow it alone.
26:39
[SPEAKER_00]: Have a coach, have a learning partner, have someone that you do it with, have someone that you can live through the joys and the frustrations and the bewilderments with.
26:47
[SPEAKER_00]: So those are two general global things that I would say.
26:50
[SPEAKER_00]: In the approach that I teach, which is only one of many, this core gift work is the first step.
26:57
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's saying, I am going to learn to see what is my language.
27:03
[SPEAKER_00]: of living in the world.
27:04
[SPEAKER_00]: What is my language of love?
27:05
[SPEAKER_00]: What is my language of sexuality?
27:08
[SPEAKER_00]: What are the things that fill my heart?
27:10
[SPEAKER_00]: What are the things that hurt my heart?
27:11
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm going to dignify that and name.
27:13
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to name and distill these qualities that are essentially me that probably I have not honored enough.
27:21
[SPEAKER_00]: And now I'm realizing that the more that I honor them,
27:24
[SPEAKER_00]: Happier OB, the richer my life will be, and the more likely I'll be to be able to find and sustain love.
27:30
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that's the first step.
27:32
[SPEAKER_00]: And you know, like I said, I spend half of the intensive just on that.
27:36
[SPEAKER_00]: I spend a huge portion of my book.
27:38
[SPEAKER_00]: Actually, my book deeper dating will guide people through this step by step process of naming and discovering your corgift's learning to honor them.
27:45
[SPEAKER_00]: That's step one.
27:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Step two then is to become a student of your own attractions.
27:50
[SPEAKER_00]: worry a hell of a lot less about how to make yourself more attractive and think a lot more about your patterns of attraction who you're attracted to because we can't force our attractions but we can educate them.
28:03
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's really, really rich and here's an amazing thing that goes with that.
28:07
[SPEAKER_00]: There's been a certain negative type that you have like, if you look back, there's been like a certain kind of quality or two that have been deprivationally that you've seen again and again,
28:20
[SPEAKER_00]: you have not learned to fully honor.
28:22
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
28:23
[SPEAKER_01]: Wow.
28:24
[SPEAKER_01]: Can you show an example or tell a story or sub-lay back and tie that together?
28:28
[SPEAKER_01]: That's so big.
28:30
[SPEAKER_00]: A really good example would be a very sensitive person.
28:32
[SPEAKER_00]: Someone who has real like a highly sensitive person.
28:35
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's a core gift, their antenna for feeling is like very, very, very sophisticated, very sensitive, very work.
28:44
[SPEAKER_00]: So they feel joy, they feel pain, they feel overstimulated, really easily, and all those things that go with being a highly sensitive person.
28:51
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't know how to honor that,
28:53
[SPEAKER_00]: And to me, it's not enough to accept these things.
28:57
[SPEAKER_00]: They have to be treasured.
28:59
[SPEAKER_00]: They have to be seen as your genius.
29:01
[SPEAKER_00]: You gotta be able to look at those qualities like you a what's the genius in your independence.
29:07
[SPEAKER_00]: What is the genius in your love of freedom?
29:09
[SPEAKER_00]: We have to know what that is.
29:11
[SPEAKER_00]: We have to know what that is.
29:13
[SPEAKER_00]: So when we don't do that, we will be attracted to people who tell us where
29:20
[SPEAKER_00]: And tell us we're too much and say, like, oh, God, you got a lot of baggage, you know, or I don't have the bandwidth for all this high maintenance stuff.
29:28
[SPEAKER_00]: When you learn to honor this, you find a better language for it, but you also then if you're asking this question does my soul feel safe with this person, you're not going to stay with somebody like that, right?
29:39
[SPEAKER_00]: And as that happens, this miraculous thing happens where you start losing your taste for people like that.
29:45
[SPEAKER_00]: and you start developing a taste for people that don't do that.
29:49
[SPEAKER_00]: It's an amazing thing.
29:50
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's an example of that.
29:53
[SPEAKER_00]: But now I'll tell you my story that goes back to this other thing.
29:55
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a little bit vulnerable, but I will share.
29:58
[SPEAKER_00]: So at one point in my many, many, many, many years of singlehood, I was at a huge dance club dancing with my shirt off with like thousands of
30:09
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was really pretty buff at the time.
30:12
[SPEAKER_00]: I had worked really hard because that was the currency of the realm, was, you know, being buff.
30:17
[SPEAKER_00]: So I was really buff.
30:18
[SPEAKER_00]: And I, like, just thought I would have no problem at all.
30:20
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I was just at the height of my buff, yes.
30:24
[SPEAKER_00]: So there I am with thousands of people.
30:26
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm interacting with all these different people.
30:29
[SPEAKER_00]: And no one is interested.
30:31
[SPEAKER_00]: No one thousands of people.
30:33
[SPEAKER_00]: And I knew what you couldn't have done any better.
30:35
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, this was it.
30:38
[SPEAKER_00]: And I felt such a profound sense of deflation.
30:41
[SPEAKER_00]: Such a profound sense of deflation.
30:43
[SPEAKER_00]: And I went to my dear friend who was like a guide.
30:46
[SPEAKER_00]: He was like my dating mentor at this time, because he was really good at it.
30:50
[SPEAKER_00]: And I said, all right, I'm going to like tell you about this.
30:53
[SPEAKER_00]: And I fucking dare you to say anything that's going to make me feel one drop better.
30:59
[SPEAKER_00]: Because there is nothing.
31:01
[SPEAKER_00]: This is reality.
31:02
[SPEAKER_00]: This is living proof.
31:04
[SPEAKER_00]: Something is missing.
31:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is what he said he said so look at the guys can every single guy has a shaved chest every single guy is buff and smooth and hairless because this is like what people do you are not you have never done that you are like one of the only guys with like a really really hairy chest.
31:28
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm Russian.
31:28
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm you know
31:29
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, so you don't really fit in here, but if you went to an event for like bears or people that like Terry just guys, you would be so round and I said, oh shit, you just said something that made me feel better.
31:43
[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't even know that there could be anything that made me feel better.
31:46
[SPEAKER_00]: And I found out he was right.
31:48
[SPEAKER_00]: I found out he was right.
31:49
[SPEAKER_01]: That's just one example.
31:51
[SPEAKER_01]: So like surround yourself with people that appreciate you is really what I'm getting.
31:55
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, yeah.
31:56
[SPEAKER_02]: So yeah.
31:57
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's in a very physical sense.
31:59
[SPEAKER_00]: Like there are people that are going to be attracted to your type, but you're an environment where people are not necessarily attracted to your type.
32:06
[SPEAKER_00]: I had never thought of that.
32:07
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought there was no way he could say anything to get me out of this pit of pain.
32:11
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
32:12
[SPEAKER_01]: and that goes so much further than physical too.
32:15
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
32:15
[SPEAKER_02]: I thought you're going to say that he was going to tell you as a straight club, which also wouldn't make sense.
32:21
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
32:22
[SPEAKER_00]: You're just right.
32:24
[SPEAKER_02]: You're like, no one here is a track.
32:26
[SPEAKER_02]: Have you all seen this meme on Instagram that keeps circulating?
32:30
[SPEAKER_02]: It's this story about how this father passes down this coin to his daughter and says, before I give
32:41
[SPEAKER_02]: So she goes to like a pawn shop and pawn shops like this worth nothing.
32:45
[SPEAKER_02]: I'll give you five bucks.
32:46
[SPEAKER_02]: She goes to like a coin store and they're like this is nothing.
32:49
[SPEAKER_02]: I'll give you like ten bucks and she goes to this.
32:52
[SPEAKER_02]: Finally, this like antique shop who recognizes this is a rare coin from a rare, you know, kind of a rare collection.
33:00
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like this is worth five million dollars.
33:04
[SPEAKER_02]: And the moral of the story is you want to go where people find value in you.
33:11
[SPEAKER_02]: do that and why would you want to be around someone who just thinks, oh, you're just another coin.
33:16
[SPEAKER_02]: That's worth nothing, right?
33:17
[SPEAKER_00]: That is an amazing story.
33:20
[SPEAKER_00]: I've chills that really like captures so much of this contest journey.
33:25
[SPEAKER_00]: That is great.
33:26
[SPEAKER_01]: Save a question for you, Ken.
33:28
[SPEAKER_01]: Like we talked earlier about the two questions you can ask yourself to understand your core gifts.
33:34
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
33:34
[SPEAKER_01]: What other ways do you go about understanding them and then how do you move from understanding to celebrating?
33:41
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
33:42
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so here's what happens and this is something that I have witnessed, you know, from doing now 17 intensives where I work because when I do one on one therapy, which I don't do anymore of close my practice, but it's not linear whereas in the intensives we follow up this curriculum.
33:58
[SPEAKER_00]: So what I have seen for people is that the very act of naming these qualities and celebrating them in cherishing like doing a lot of work to say, what is the beauty in this, what is the genius and this, what is the value in this?
34:10
[SPEAKER_00]: How does it feel when you're in a relationship that deprives that quality of oxygen?
34:15
[SPEAKER_00]: That steps on it, that neglects is really important to know the shitty, terrible taste of being in that kind of relationship.
34:23
[SPEAKER_00]: And like what it does to your sense of self and where it makes you go and how familiar that is.
34:29
[SPEAKER_00]: It's really important not to run from that, but to remember what that tastes like.
34:35
[SPEAKER_00]: So you could become finally as allergic to that taste
34:41
[SPEAKER_00]: So that act of thinking like, what does it feel like in me, what do I tell myself, what is that place where this part of me is being dishonored?
34:47
[SPEAKER_00]: And then what's it like when that part is being celebrated?
34:51
[SPEAKER_00]: Like with those precious people that this part of you can come to life?
34:55
[SPEAKER_00]: What's that like?
34:56
[SPEAKER_00]: Who do you become when that happens?
34:58
[SPEAKER_00]: We need to ask ourselves these questions to reeducate ourselves.
35:03
[SPEAKER_00]: And then the remembering of the relationships where that's there and the relationships where these parts of us got stepped on.
35:09
[SPEAKER_00]: And as we do that, we actually start becoming allergic to people that step on those qualities.
35:15
[SPEAKER_00]: It actually starts happening.
35:17
[SPEAKER_00]: The other thing that starts happening is we start noticing the people who honor these qualities.
35:23
[SPEAKER_00]: And solid research shows that when somebody meets an important goal of yours, you'll be more likely to notice them and be attracted
35:32
[SPEAKER_00]: things begin to shift.
35:34
[SPEAKER_00]: You just get sick of those other kind of things.
35:36
[SPEAKER_00]: You lose your taste for them and you start developing this taste for this new kind of person.
35:41
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think that it's like this journey that happens kind of organically, but because it's so profound and it involves such a deep reorganization, it's best not to do it alone.
35:52
[SPEAKER_00]: It's too hard to do it alone.
35:53
[SPEAKER_01]: So I totally hear you on all of that.
35:56
[SPEAKER_01]: I think the part that I'm still struggling with though is like, what is the line?
35:59
[SPEAKER_01]: Because like, I know even for me, for example, like my partner fully embraces that I'm emotional that I share what's going on for my needs and you know, very communicative that way.
36:11
[SPEAKER_01]: But then sometimes I feel like maybe it can be too much.
36:15
[SPEAKER_01]: Like not saying that like I am too much and I never said that, but like sometimes I do feel like I need to regulate my emotions more.
36:22
[SPEAKER_01]: And that is work I need to do.
36:24
[SPEAKER_01]: I see it as a strength and I think he sees it as a strength, too.
36:28
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's not like he's saying you need to regulate your emotions, but I've learned that from doing therapy and couples therapy and all the works that two maintain this and this is work I need to do.
36:38
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's how do you recognize the core gift, but then also recognize the further work that you need to honor the gift and have people honor the gift, but also not to overstep the gift.
36:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, and to modulate that gift and also to develop its complement, we always need to develop the complement to our gift.
36:56
[SPEAKER_00]: So if we're generous, we need to also learn how to say no.
36:59
[SPEAKER_00]: If we're very sensitive, we need to learn how to self-regulate, like you've described.
37:04
[SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, again, that's like such a yes.
37:06
[SPEAKER_00]: I think, again, the first step is always to honor.
37:10
[SPEAKER_00]: Just like with the child when you're trying to change behavior, you want to honor who they are, but then there's a need to change behavior.
37:16
[SPEAKER_00]: And then I guess the other piece is just to really remember that our deepest immaturities revolve around our greatest gift.
37:24
[SPEAKER_00]: So all of us need to then ask, what do I have to learn here?
37:28
[SPEAKER_00]: What are the skills that I don't have yet?
37:31
[SPEAKER_00]: What are the skills that never got developed?
37:33
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I didn't start out honoring this enough.
37:35
[SPEAKER_00]: So I developed defenses instead
37:38
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, right.
37:39
[SPEAKER_01]: There's so much to unpack there.
37:41
[SPEAKER_01]: But I think what I'm seeing from this is just how important is to hone in on this.
37:47
[SPEAKER_02]: And instead of just push it away is what we typically do or say like I need to do self improvement and focus another area can what are some of your corgives that you've recently discovered where it came from some of your immaturities or sensitivities.
38:04
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, well, I'll tell you one that I've been working on recently.
38:07
[SPEAKER_00]: There are two things that are difficult parts of my personality that I have been regularly unhappy with and have shame around and have just felt like these are really, you know, character defects.
38:20
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I have been thinking, what is the core gift there?
38:24
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's taken work, but I feel like I've come to what they are.
38:27
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'll give those as two examples.
38:29
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
38:30
[SPEAKER_00]: And they're kind of really opposing things.
38:32
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm going to start out with what I experience as a deficit first.
38:36
[SPEAKER_00]: And then describe the gift in both of these sides.
38:40
[SPEAKER_00]: So the deficit that I have lived with for a really long time is a kind of timidity, a timidity that I have where I might be guilt driven and afraid to speak my truth.
38:51
[SPEAKER_00]: I might be worried and ashamed that what I say won't be received.
38:56
[SPEAKER_00]: I might be worried about being too much.
38:58
[SPEAKER_00]: All these different things kind of have kept me timid in ways that have hurt me.
39:03
[SPEAKER_00]: They've hurt me in multiple realms of my life because I also have a strong personality.
39:08
[SPEAKER_00]: It pisses me off to be timid like that and then
39:12
[SPEAKER_00]: think what I want and then afterwards say why didn't I that you know so conflicting so conflicting yeah so there's you know that to middity has been a problem because it hasn't been authentic it's been guilt driven and shame driven and fear driven embarrassing awkward not thrilled about it what's the gift here what is the gift here and is it all a gift?
39:31
[SPEAKER_00]: No.
39:31
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a matrix.
39:33
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like a matrix of gifts and wounds.
39:35
[SPEAKER_00]: That's like what it means to be human.
39:37
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not strengthened weaknesses.
39:39
[SPEAKER_00]: It's this matrix of gifts and wounds.
39:42
[SPEAKER_00]: So those are the woundplaces that I described with the gift is that I also have an inequality of humility.
39:48
[SPEAKER_00]: There is a way that I have a humility that gives people space and that's a soul gift that is a real quality.
39:56
[SPEAKER_00]: I have a power animal.
39:58
[SPEAKER_00]: I've done worker and like what is my power animal.
40:00
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a sparrow.
40:01
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a little tiny brown sparrow.
40:04
[SPEAKER_00]: there is a way that humility speaks to me so deeply and so profoundly that's the gift there.
40:09
[SPEAKER_00]: The timidity, shame, the guilt, I couldn't call those gifts, I would call those wounds, but they come from the same matrix because if I was an organized differently, I would default toward more arrogance, you know, but because this core gift of humility is there, I defaulted around that.
40:28
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's one and the other is a need for attention.
40:31
[SPEAKER_00]: which is another thing that really embarrasses me.
40:34
[SPEAKER_00]: So how is that a core gift?
40:35
[SPEAKER_00]: The need for intention?
40:37
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I don't like it when I'm not getting attention.
40:39
[SPEAKER_00]: I need a lot of attention.
40:40
[SPEAKER_00]: This is like, how am I gonna be proud of that?
40:42
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, the core gift, if I think of it as a matrix of gifts and wounds, the core gift is I'm a teacher.
40:48
[SPEAKER_00]: And I got a lot to say, and I'm bursting with that.
40:53
[SPEAKER_00]: and there's a need for an arena for that.
40:56
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the core gift.
40:57
[SPEAKER_00]: Does it discount the fact that that need for attention can actually be a problem that I have had to work on and do after work on?
41:05
[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.
41:06
[SPEAKER_00]: So these are examples of how it ends up being a picture of humanity.
41:10
[SPEAKER_00]: But if I can't treasure my humility, I don't know who I am and I don't see the beauty in those
41:16
[SPEAKER_00]: And if I can't honor like the power of my expressing, I'll just think that my need for attention is nothing more than a problem and an maturity.
41:25
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that just hit this whole conversation home for me of the matrix of the wounds and the gifts.
41:32
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that is what we've been trying to like, you know, kind of unpack a little more of like, what's the line of being like, I'm awesome versus.
41:38
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
41:39
[SPEAKER_01]: I have some work I need to do, you know, and I think that that is it like that is the way to look at it and how much of this is coming from, you know, instead of saying like I need to just forget the side of me, it's really owning it and taking it and I love your thoughts on this, but I'm starting to connect the dots of authenticity as we started this conversation of, you know, you're just told to be authentic, but what does that actually mean?
42:06
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think authenticity comes from understanding yourself, the good and the parts that need improvement, I won't say the bad, but we're all works in progress and being able to tell someone to like, this is my need, but also, okay, I understand like this might be coming from a wound and I need your support and I need to like have patience with me as we work through this.
42:30
[SPEAKER_00]: Beautiful, beautiful.
42:31
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
42:32
[SPEAKER_02]: The takeaway for me is this.
42:34
[SPEAKER_02]: We can be in therapy for 24 hours a day.
42:37
[SPEAKER_02]: For 10 years and if we're not doing the work, we're not going anywhere.
42:41
[SPEAKER_02]: All we're doing is just reiterating who we are, but not doing the work does not help us get to what we want.
42:49
[SPEAKER_02]: I had a conversation with a friend last night and she's like, you know, nowadays because therapy is just so trendy.
42:55
[SPEAKER_02]: People love putting on their dating profiles.
42:57
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm in therapy.
42:58
[SPEAKER_02]: I've been in therapy for years, but the real question is, and I encourage everyone to ask this on dates, is what are you currently working on?
43:07
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a journey driven question.
43:09
[SPEAKER_02]: It shows that we're all works in progress, but also it shows the progress.
43:13
[SPEAKER_02]: people have who can answer this question have been thinking about what are my core gifts and what is the work that I'm doing.
43:20
[SPEAKER_02]: I love that you've painted this picture of a pure human experience and I hope that we all know that we're just walking matrixes.
43:31
[SPEAKER_02]: And we're complex.
43:33
[SPEAKER_02]: We are all so complex.
43:35
[SPEAKER_02]: And there is no black and white to what we are, but there is the gifts and the trauma and the wounds that we've all carry with us.
43:44
[SPEAKER_02]: So I hope this creates just more empathy for all of us when we engage with each other, especially on dates.
43:50
[SPEAKER_02]: You don't know what someone's going through, but you can always ask.
43:53
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and you can always take someone along for the ride and in a partnership, these are wonderful questions and discussion points totally with your partner talk about yeah, what what do you think are my corgives these are what I think your corgives are and how can we encourage more of this celebrate this and honor this even more so thank you for bringing that to the forefront of this entire conversation it's it's just this human experience is complex the most we can do is just help each other along the journey.
44:22
[SPEAKER_00]: And what you said, I think captures the way we want to be able to do this because knowing this then the question becomes how do you hold that matrix can you hold it with kind hands can you hold your matrix with the gifts in a way where in an essential way the gifts first feel celebrated.
44:43
[SPEAKER_00]: And then the work has to come, the work comes second like that holding so that the innate parts of you feel treasured and honored, but also respected like now you get to do the skill building work, which is, you know, that's a deep self respect to be able to say that to yourself.
44:59
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, now I need to do that kind of work and, you know, what you described as you just said, those are the skills that are going to help you keep love alive when you're in a relationship.
45:09
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, we touched on it.
45:10
[SPEAKER_01]: I think needs is something we feel very strongly.
45:13
[SPEAKER_01]: And I personally, I did not express my needs for years.
45:16
[SPEAKER_01]: And when I finally did, that was what changed my love life.
45:20
[SPEAKER_01]: We could go into like a whole conversation about needs.
45:22
[SPEAKER_01]: But I think at the end of the day, our core gifts, you know, you said they do stem from our needs.
45:28
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's sharing that, appreciating that with a partner.
45:31
[SPEAKER_01]: Of course, if they are just like, I can't meet these deeds, or I don't appreciate your core gifts.
45:36
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's not the right
45:38
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, but then there's also going to be a lot of great area too where like we're saying with the Batureks, some part is a core gift that's very much appreciated.
45:47
[SPEAKER_01]: Some parts might be detrimental to the relationships.
45:50
[SPEAKER_01]: So how do you work on this and just keep the open conversation?
45:54
[SPEAKER_01]: But the only way to do that is knowing yourself if like you don't even know your core gifts or your wounds like how do you
46:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Just either dismiss everyone or you spend time with the wrong people and that's a really important point because until you have words for your needs, you will create walls.
46:12
[SPEAKER_00]: What's called primitive defenses in other words, your deep psyche knows you're not going to be able to take care of it.
46:18
[SPEAKER_00]: So it puts up a wall because it knows you're not going to be able to take care of it.
46:22
[SPEAKER_00]: And so then the more that we do just what you described of being able to honor self-trisher, find a way to express our needs.
46:31
[SPEAKER_00]: Until we do that, our psyche will put up a wall.
46:34
[SPEAKER_00]: It will not let us choose healthy people or stay with them because it won't be safe because we won't be able to take care of ourselves.
46:41
[SPEAKER_00]: When that deepener part of ourselves begins to relax,
46:44
[SPEAKER_00]: because we're doing the work that you just described.
46:48
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a beautiful unfolding that happens.
46:50
[SPEAKER_01]: I think the last, like, final takeaway I had, you hit it of safety.
46:54
[SPEAKER_01]: This is not something that's talked about in terms of writing qualities.
46:58
[SPEAKER_01]: You're looking at it in a relationship.
47:00
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like, oh, are they six feet?
47:01
[SPEAKER_01]: Or are they, you know, went to this college?
47:03
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like, okay, as if you don't feel safe with them.
47:06
[SPEAKER_01]: That is so important and so under-value and I, yeah, and like I think from doing this podcast for years I was in my head and doing the mental checklist of all the criteria and then when I finally got into like feeling in my body that's when things change for me and I think for so long you think of feeling like oh I just want to like feel the highs of our relationship but most of it is like do I feel safe and secure with this person?
47:32
[SPEAKER_00]: It is because then we get to flower, then we get to be radical, then we get to take risks.
47:38
[SPEAKER_00]: And when we feel safe and you can take risks with your authenticity, it's scary, but that scaring is build arrows so intensely.
47:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Especially if your partner can hold that and appreciate it like that builds arrows fiercely.
47:54
[SPEAKER_02]: Ken, every time we talk to you, I just want to grab a fuzzy blanket in just in a corner and journal.
48:02
[SPEAKER_02]: I feel absolutely taking care of in this conversation.
48:07
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, thank you for doing that.
48:08
[SPEAKER_02]: You always have this magical way of providing that for people, providing the safety for people to feel how they feel.
48:17
[SPEAKER_02]: So thank you for that.
48:18
[SPEAKER_02]: If people want to find out more about you or even to work with you, where can they find that information?
48:24
[SPEAKER_00]: Sure, so one of the quickest easiest ways is just to go to deeperdatinggift.com and there you'll get like a collection of an audio mutation, a personal journal for this work and a beautiful ebook.
48:36
[SPEAKER_00]: You can also go to deeperdatingpodcast.com.
48:39
[SPEAKER_00]: In both of those cases, if you sign up for my mailing list, you get those gifts and you get to hear about my events that I do and the workshops that I do and my intensives, which are for small groups of people and I only do them a few times a year,
48:53
[SPEAKER_00]: And of course, in all social media, under either deeper dating or can page.
48:57
[SPEAKER_01]: That is definitely your core gift is.
49:00
[SPEAKER_02]: You're the gift that keeps on giving.
49:02
[SPEAKER_02]: You're all those gifts you're giving just from your website.
49:05
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, well, thank you so much.
49:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And you know, I got to say, like speaking with the two of you is such a joy, because you are such in-trepid adventurers and documenters and explorers of this wild terrain, like your people that I just keep coming back to for what you do.
49:20
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm excited that I'm going to get to interview you, too.
49:23
[SPEAKER_00]: and here are kind of your big key insights and take away from all the work you've been doing.
49:28
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's just very mutual admiration society.
49:32
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, Norman Fuzzy's all around.
49:36
[SPEAKER_02]: Final thank you for you.
49:38
[SPEAKER_02]: Final thank you for our listeners for coming along for this lovely journey.
49:42
[SPEAKER_02]: And if you haven't done so yet, subscribe to the psychology of relationships today.
49:47
[SPEAKER_02]: So you don't miss an episode.
49:48
[SPEAKER_01]: Bye.