[SPEAKER_00]: Hello and welcome to another episode of the Mark Rose podcast today.

[SPEAKER_00]: I got returning guests and we haven't been doing many guests but we're only special super brilliant episodes.

[SPEAKER_00]: So TIE skips and welcome.

[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you so much for having me.

[SPEAKER_02]: I'm honored to be here with you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, the last episode we did, people fricking loved because I think you just do such an incredible job of walking people through attachment and understanding relationships in such a not only palatable simple way, but an actionable way.

[SPEAKER_00]: So let's jump in.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I feel it.

[SPEAKER_00]: You've been talking about this and I wanted to bring you on in order to dive deeper into it.

[SPEAKER_00]: And this is this idea of six stages of relationship.

[SPEAKER_00]: But how did you come to this and how do, yeah, where do we begin?

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so great question.

[SPEAKER_02]: So, you know, the six stages of relationship, I would say are one of the top contenders for what affects us the most in terms of our ability to have successful relationships.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think first, when we think of what is successful relationship is, we have to sort of define what success is.

[SPEAKER_02]: And when we look at people who report, being not just in the longest lasting relationships, but also report the highest degree of personal satisfaction in those relationships actual fulfillment to me that success.

[SPEAKER_02]: And those people have two things in common.

[SPEAKER_02]: Number one, they're securely attached.

[SPEAKER_02]: And number two, they make it to what I call the everlasting stage of [SPEAKER_02]: So we have six stages, and every relationship has a life cycle, just like most things in our lives.

[SPEAKER_02]: And if we get stuck in one part of the life cycle, we'll start to become unfulfilled.

[SPEAKER_02]: We'll have symptoms in sense, a frustration, resentment, depending on what stage we're stuck in.

[SPEAKER_02]: And each stage of the six, [SPEAKER_02]: actually has a right of passage and necessary to move on to the next stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: So in order to progress, we have to see, okay, and the first stage is the dating stage, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: The first stage is all about vetting and we can go into obviously all the details of each one, but what often happens is people will get stuck, for example, in the power struggle stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: And they'll think, oh, we're fighting more.

[SPEAKER_02]: This isn't working.

[SPEAKER_02]: This is the wrong person, rather than understanding, oh, no, I am just at a pivotal crescendo point of the life cycle of this relationship.

[SPEAKER_02]: And if I just know the rights of passage the exact tools and strategies I need to use to unlock, [SPEAKER_02]: the next stage of the relationship, you would actually move out of the power struggle stage closer than ever, and have the ability to progress into future stages to eventually make it to the upper lasting stage, which is when people will truly be at a place of longevity, but also at a place of personal satisfaction.

[SPEAKER_00]: That sounds magical, and I love this simplicity of right of passage, because of course everyone's like, just tell me how, [SPEAKER_00]: And I also like the normalization of each stage because then when you hit it it's actually a sign of progression rather than a sign of regression.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly, and that's what's so tragic is so many people so statistically most people break up in the power struggle stage of relationships and they think, oh, you know, I just goes through this life cycle most people spend their entire time and relationships with their own successful going from dating stage to honeymoon stage to power struggle stage and then breaking up.

[SPEAKER_02]: and then thinking that relationships are either dating and honeymoon where we've got the rose-colored glasses and everything's great and we're at the infactuation sort of base stages, then into the power struggle stage and assuming everything is chaos and their whole experience of relationships is a roller coaster because they just go from the factuation to power struggle and then things fall apart and they think cut of relationships are so hard when in reality.

[SPEAKER_02]: to actually make it to future stages of the relationship if you're going to be with somebody really long-term in a long-term commitment.

[SPEAKER_02]: What ends up happening is the dating, honeymoon, and power struggles stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: We're actually very, very small portion.

[SPEAKER_02]: It usually lasts for the average individual who can do these things, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: The first two, two and a half years of a whole relationship.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then, if you're with somebody for decades, that became a very small piece of the entire puzzle.

[SPEAKER_02]: until after the power struggle stage, we then get into the rhythm stage, then we get into the devotion stage, and then the everlasting stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: And we'll break down, of course, like each of these stages in a lot of detail in the pain points, and how long they last, and the right of passage for each one.

[SPEAKER_02]: But what often happens is people also assume that the entire life cycle of the relationship is just the first three stages.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so they get go into relation with new people, with a worked perception of thinking, well, I either have these high highs [SPEAKER_02]: And relationship relationships are always so hard.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so as soon as they make it to the power circle, they think, oh, here, we're on our way out again.

[SPEAKER_00]: This isn't one.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, here we go again.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, rather than being able to say, wait, there's actually something I am missing.

[SPEAKER_02]: That's why I keep getting stuck here.

[SPEAKER_02]: Let me find out what it is.

[SPEAKER_02]: Let me unlock those natural keys to move into the next stages.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then we have actual relationship progression.

[SPEAKER_02]: And actually what's so beautiful and we'll get into this.

[SPEAKER_02]: about the power struggle stages that is our huge opportunity to move from more conditionally based love to more unconditionally based love because in the dating and honeymoon stages we got the mouse gone and so we're acting we're showing ourselves with conditions and the power struggle stage one of the things that brings us into it from a rate of passage perspective as we drop the mask we get to we let someone in a little more we get comfortable we show our fears and flaws but that also has an ability to increase the potential for conflict.

[SPEAKER_02]: because we're seeing more deeply into each other and there's a vulnerability there and they're there can be more opportunity for ruptures, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: But I we learned to do those things effectively and in healthy ways and we learned that the tools needed to move out of the power struggle stage we actually leave that stage deeply knowing each other more, understanding each other's fears and flaws and wounds and knowing how to navigate those things with one another and so we [SPEAKER_02]: where we're able to show and know each other without conditions, then in those earlier stages.

[SPEAKER_02]: So it's sort of a crisis and an opportunity if that makes sense.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it makes a lot of sense and to be able to hold the both end in there, because mostly we just think crisis.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_00]: And of course, it's such a different way of even orienting two challenges to think this is an opportunity.

[SPEAKER_00]: The end of the beginning, blah, blah.

[SPEAKER_00]: But we don't usually think that way till we do.

[SPEAKER_00]: It were like a way, what's happening in our relationship is a normal symptomatic art of the stages.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm curious.

[SPEAKER_00]: do the rights of passage so we can get into them.

[SPEAKER_00]: But are the rights of passage is?

[SPEAKER_00]: Are they requiring moving more deeply into secure attachment?

[SPEAKER_00]: Is that sort of the...

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: So those two things will play into one another.

[SPEAKER_02]: So what you'll see as an example at a very high level and I think we'll unpack them in a lot more detail because I would don't want to not do a justice, but as an example, one of the big rights of passengers, there's multiple, but one of the big ones in the power struggle stage to move into the rhythm stage is that we actually have to be able to be vulnerable.

[SPEAKER_02]: and we have to be able to learn to communicate and work through conflict, through leading with vulnerability, being able to actually say to somebody, hey, you know, when the situation happens, that actually is hurtful for me sometimes.

[SPEAKER_02]: Or, hey, I feel that when secure around the situation, can we talk about it?

[SPEAKER_02]: Can we work it through?

[SPEAKER_02]: Can we bring some clarity to it?

[SPEAKER_02]: And if we don't know how to be vulnerable and talk about our needs, then we're going to have a really difficult time moving the on that stage at all.

[SPEAKER_02]: And, and what you'll see, which goes hand in hand, and this is why these two things play off, would be each other so frequently, is that in order to develop a secure attachment, two of our six major pillars to secure attachment are conflict communication, and being able to actually understand and share our needs in a vulnerable way.

[SPEAKER_02]: So, those things, these things actually go very much hand in hand, and depending on which way you look at it, if you're using your six pillars to rewire your attachment style and become secure, [SPEAKER_02]: that will then help you progress through the six stages, but by the same token, if you understand the six stages of relationship and you actually practice the tools and the strategies to move through the rights of passage necessary, you were also significantly more likely to be developing a secure attachment style.

[SPEAKER_00]: That makes a lot of sense because you're witnessing yourself in the behaviors that are necessary.

[SPEAKER_00]: Also, the relationship becomes a product of these [SPEAKER_00]: being good at repair is you're going to find yourself beyond, for example, the power struggle stage because now those ruptures, also it's that that beautiful exposing of authentic self and can this relationship hold the authenticity.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's for a lot of the relationships that can't or we continue to hide our truly authentic self, which would to be expressing needs, wants, etc.

[SPEAKER_00]: and then the relationship is even challenged to become what we wanted to be.

[SPEAKER_00]: Let me get to blame the other person, which is brilliant.

[SPEAKER_02]: That's something good for you.

[SPEAKER_02]: Which you just trapped in all of our themes and patterns.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it's interesting what you said earlier, like the crisis and the opportunity, I think every crisis is also an opportunity.

[SPEAKER_02]: I think at any point in our lives to deepen the relationship to ourselves or have new insider, new awareness.

[SPEAKER_02]: So yeah, so should we get into the roadmap?

[SPEAKER_01]: Let's do it.

[SPEAKER_02]: Hey, Jen.

[SPEAKER_02]: So first stage is the dating stage and so many people actually just get stuck here where they don't know how to date.

[SPEAKER_02]: The amount of people we even see like in our membership platform where people will come in and they'll say, I am in a position where I have never had a serious relationship I'm in my 40s.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I've never really had a relationship that lasts more than four or five months before, you know, things.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so people can truly get stuck just here and there's a there's a couple of major reasons.

[SPEAKER_02]: So the dating stage generally lasts about zero to six months.

[SPEAKER_02]: Obviously you'll see that people depending on their attachment orientation will lean us in a specific direction.

[SPEAKER_02]: So if somebody's more anxiously attached.

[SPEAKER_02]: they are more likely to want to dive into commitment right away.

[SPEAKER_02]: And we've been on three dates, and now we're going to be in a monogamous committed relationship, and that's obviously a very different piecing from somebody else.

[SPEAKER_02]: Some of you who are dismissed of avoidant, for example, is generally going to be closer to that six-month mark, where they delaying commitment.

[SPEAKER_02]: They're really at its core.

[SPEAKER_02]: The roots are being able to show up in the dating stage how the least securely and effectively are all about number one.

[SPEAKER_02]: do we actually vet somebody else?

[SPEAKER_02]: So do we go into dating, knowing consciously and with intention, our own standards, our own needs, our own non-negotiables and relationships?

[SPEAKER_02]: Because the amount of people truly, and I'm sure you see this with working with clients, you know, the amount of people that come into dating and they base their commitments off of, do I find this person attractive and do I have fun with them?

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, a lot of people are literally making dating decisions to move into a commitment from that particular perspective.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so you go in.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's almost like you, you go on to apply for a job on indeed.

[SPEAKER_02]: And you're like, I'm just going to apply to the first 30 jobs and see what happens.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it's like, well, one's a welder, one's an accountant, what, you know, we have to actually know what we're looking for in order to date successfully at all.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so in the dating stage of relationship, a couple of things we want to go in primed with and prepared with is number one, your standards, your needs, your non-negotiables, what am I actually looking for?

[SPEAKER_02]: Number two, where am I likely to find these types of people?

[SPEAKER_02]: Because another place people often get stuck in this stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: is they go in, they say they want somebody who is maybe emotionally available and working on themselves and can work through conflict and then they're going to the bar every Friday, Saturday night to find somebody to date and of course, you know, it doesn't mean that there won't be people like that at a bar but you're you're just significantly less likely to find them there than if you go to a personal growth meetup or a conference or some sort of event.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so we want to be intentional about where we're looking.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then we also want to make sure in the dating stage that we are allowing ourselves to be fat hidden.

[SPEAKER_02]: So it's not just am I vetting somebody else and seeing how they show up for me, but am I actually showing openly who I am in the dating stage telling somebody about myself, letting them get to know me to make sure that there's a reciprocal connection because a lot of times people will be so scared in the dating stage to show themselves.

[SPEAKER_02]: They want to people please.

[SPEAKER_02]: That, no, no, no, if you want to date properly, it has to be rooted in authenticity.

[SPEAKER_02]: It has to be a sharing and showing of your true nature and yourself.

[SPEAKER_02]: And if that's not there, then you're actually sending yourself up for failure in the future stages, because eventually we will get more comfortable.

[SPEAKER_02]: If we pretend where somebody were not in the dating stage and where people pleasing and where self-silencing and where boundary results, [SPEAKER_02]: the time.

[SPEAKER_02]: Then by the time you get to the power struggle stage, and we naturally drop the mouse in that stage, somebody's going to have a much harder time getting to know you at that point, and oftentimes will actually feel betrayed by their partner and going, wait, who are you?

[SPEAKER_02]: Like you didn't tell me these things when we were dating.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so, you know, those are some of the key ingredients that we'll set us up for success.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's really interesting.

[SPEAKER_00]: I think the willingness to be vetted, I've never thought of that, like where we are, the responsibility that we have to be truthful, that actually comes with not just presenting your best self.

[SPEAKER_00]: I think it's Dan Savage who would say, like, if you want to keep your relationship together, like, just be your best lie, self.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like, because you lie so much at the beginning, just be that person, because it's the optimized version of you anyways, and I'm like, that's actually a pretty funny.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, to think of the responsibility of being truthful because the other person has to be discerning as well.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's so fascinating though, because so many people are so busy trying to be chosen, that they, they're not actually even, where I see most people get stuck, I think, [SPEAKER_00]: that more anxious lens is that they're not even in their own bodies, discerning relational alignment.

[SPEAKER_00]: They're just like, do I have chemistry?

[SPEAKER_00]: It must be a match.

[SPEAKER_00]: And how does think like where people get so stuck is the other person's not even sure about them.

[SPEAKER_00]: And yet they're sure about the other person.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm always like, well, [SPEAKER_00]: what happened to you that you're certain about people who are uncertain about you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, I love that point and you're hitting the nail in the head because literally people who are anxiously attached, they notoriously underbed.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so you get these polarities where the anxiously attached person, they have a subconscious comfort zone, just like you're talking about around [SPEAKER_02]: chasing because from their childhood they had to chase the tension and affection and so that's what's comfortable and familiar and of course our subconscious mind is dictating 95 to 97% of our decisions and so they move from a place about this feels familiar and thus safe and so that's often where we get the butterflies and the attraction one of the three major things that actually drives attraction is somebody who represents our subconscious comfort zone for how we treat ourselves [SPEAKER_02]: And so, okay, what is the anxiously attached person to in dating?

[SPEAKER_02]: They put themselves last, they self-sign lens, they don't pay attention to their own feelings in need, so they're attracted to people who will mirror that back to them.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then they undervette in relationships.

[SPEAKER_02]: And they think because of their preoccupation of being chosen, that if I win them over, if I'm just people pleasing enough, then I'll be chosen and then they'll fall in love with me.

[SPEAKER_02]: But actually, they set themselves up for disaster and the power.

[SPEAKER_02]: because they literally go into dating and the dating stage and they pretend to be somebody who they're not, or they're too far on their best behavior and people pleasing.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then when they do start to get comfortable eventually and they do lower the mask, they will have a mark to difference of substantially more conflict, substantially more chaos in the power circle stage, and that is where statistically people break up the most.

[SPEAKER_02]: So, even if they think in the short term, oh, by that in less, by prioritizing being chosen by people pleasing, I'm more likely to have a long-term commitment.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's actually exact opposite because by implementing those behaviors early on, what they're doing is they're setting themselves up for a much more difficult, powerful, powerful stage where things are much more likely to fall apart.

[SPEAKER_02]: And this is partially why you see anxiously attaching individuals so frequently, [SPEAKER_02]: go dating, honeymoon, power struggle, breakup, and they go through this life cycle of relationships so consistently, and as people who so deeply want commitment, instead they're sabotaging themselves from day one by not allowing their authentic truth to be shown in the early dating stage and not allowing themselves to be bad at it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, the fear that keeps them in the same behavior, recreates the same experience they fear and keeps them in the same behavior.

[SPEAKER_00]: God, that sucks.

[SPEAKER_00]: Again, I've been there.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and it's the worst because you don't tell you can say, I'm the reason this is happening.

[SPEAKER_00]: As I think so much of it is like, I'm a victim to their inability to see that I'm that I'm not too much or too emotional.

[SPEAKER_00]: But of course, if you restrain all of that self-expression, it makes logical sense that when it comes out, it will be spilly, you know, it will be overwhelming.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the other person's going like, well, you didn't tell me you were like this, like you're you're a lot different.

[SPEAKER_00]: You're representative was much better.

[SPEAKER_02]: You see him now.

[SPEAKER_02]: The amount of people that I would speak to when I was back in the day when I was running my practice.

[SPEAKER_02]: I would have all these people come in and they would say, and I would hear this all the time in different forms.

[SPEAKER_02]: It would say.

[SPEAKER_02]: I married my wife, and then she turned into a monster, or I married my husband, and then he completely changed, and it was they would speak that way under the pre-tenses or assumption that they got tricked.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that would hear this quite frequently, like maybe around 10% of people, as if they got tricked.

[SPEAKER_02]: And what they weren't consciously understanding of is that we often marry.

[SPEAKER_02]: in the stage that we should still be moving through learning.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so we often, you know, people, if you look at the life cycle dating last zero to six months, honeymoon last another year to year and a half after that, power struggle then hits around the two-year mark, give or take.

[SPEAKER_02]: And you can see in the power struggle forever.

[SPEAKER_02]: If you don't have the right to publish, people can see married forever.

[SPEAKER_02]: a lot of people, absolutely.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so people would get married, let's say they meet somebody, they get engaged in the first year, they have a wedding six months later, they get married, and all of a sudden they're in the power struggle, and now they're thinking, oh, this person betrayed me, they tricked me, they're not how they said they were in reality, they just are now in the power struggle stage, and then there's just more to that story and narrative, and there's things that need to be learned.

[SPEAKER_02]: But to exactly your point, like, we set ourselves up to have the same problems that were so deeply trying to avoid to begin with, [SPEAKER_02]: by using the behaviors that we're using such as people pleasing to try to avoid, you know, losing somebody, but it's actually doing the exact thing that that people are instead most afraid of.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, feels like the power struggle, then what they do is have a kid.

[SPEAKER_00]: And yes, and you should of course be having a kid from the rhythm because the only way, because you're going to get thrust back into the power struggle.

[SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_00]: Wait, this kid just reveals so much more of our stuff.

[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so what is the right of passage out of dating?

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so the right of passage is when you make a commitment.

[SPEAKER_02]: So what you'll see is that, you know, some people will, who are more anxious will people please, and so they will share or move into the honeymoon stage, but not under the right pretenses per se.

[SPEAKER_02]: And by the same token, you know, dismiss some avoidance or more avoiding leaning individuals can also sabotage.

[SPEAKER_02]: um, in the dating stage because they over that.

[SPEAKER_02]: So they flop on, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: So so they will try to find flaws to create distance as a protective mechanism.

[SPEAKER_02]: So we'll see those polarities that way on the extremes.

[SPEAKER_02]: Um, and so somebody may net and, you know, be dismissal of avoidance and also set themselves up per sabotage because they never even get to the honeymoon stage because generally they may start really flaw-finding.

[SPEAKER_00]: Um, looking for all the reasons they could be.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[UNKNOWN]: Even [SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: And also, yeah, and also they can fluff on because they're looking for all the ways, you know, I really believe that a big reason, this multiple points to fluff on is because they didn't get healthy modeling for how to move through conflict and navigate conflict and how to hash things out with somebody.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so they tend to lean on this idealized concept of the perfect partner quote unquote because they think if I just find the perfect partner then we'll never have conflict and that's what I should be looking for because I don't know how to move through conflict.

[SPEAKER_02]: And the reality is it's not about finding somebody you never have conflicts with it's about learning how to navigate conflicts and help the waves right and so the flaw finding is let me look for all the ways that there could be a conflict.

[SPEAKER_02]: let me find my out in advance so we don't have to deal with those things later because they actually just have tremendous learn helplessness around how to navigate those types of situations unless they actually start to work on themselves.

[SPEAKER_02]: So to go back to your original question, so the right of passage is if we do commit and we do make a commitment that becomes now we've entered into the honeymoon stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: So now maybe you're exclusive or you're in a [SPEAKER_02]: And that then brings us into okay now we're only focusing on each other and how are in the honeymoon stage and the rose color glasses come on.

[SPEAKER_02]: So in this particular stage some of the big differences or sort of themes that you'll see number one there's actually elevated.

[SPEAKER_02]: oxytocin, the bonding neurochemical, elevated dopamine, the motivation neurochemical, hence why you'll you'll often see people in the honeymoon stage motivated to get up and go out every evening with their partner motivated to go out on the weekends and make plans and go in vacations, whereas in later stages you may see more of a trend towards comfort and staying in and things of this nature.

[SPEAKER_02]: So, so you've got your oxytocin, the bonding neurochemical, you've got your dopamine, and we also elevated phenylethical element, which is the attraction neurochemical.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so, all of these things together create this sort of neurochemical cocktail that then allows somebody to have their rose colored glasses on.

[SPEAKER_02]: And this stage usually lasts for about a year to a year and a half post-dating stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: And people will feel very happy.

[SPEAKER_02]: They will see things through that that fulfilled lens.

[SPEAKER_02]: They will minimize their partners' flaws.

[SPEAKER_02]: And they will maximize their [SPEAKER_02]: But what is very interesting about this stage is that it also mirrors our childhood.

[SPEAKER_02]: So if you look at our classical engineering experience, you know, we have like the terrible too.

[SPEAKER_02]: Usually in the first two years, we know children are actually shown much more unconditionally based love because they're more helpless.

[SPEAKER_02]: They haven't started to develop and individuate into their own small sense of self and personality.

[SPEAKER_02]: And they're not saying no.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so the first two years of each of our lives give or take again, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: Similar to the stages here at a, you know, children are given a lot more unconditional love.

[SPEAKER_02]: And they're not told no and they're not, you know, getting boundaries set with them.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then when children start to be more active around two years old, again, give or take.

[SPEAKER_02]: Parents have to start the system of classical conditioning, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: You, you're good for doing this, you're bad for doing that.

[SPEAKER_02]: You're right for doing this, you're wrong for doing this.

[SPEAKER_02]: And, and interestingly enough, [SPEAKER_02]: This very much mirrors how we tend to love and treat our partners in adult relationships and it's interesting as well because our primary attachment figure as adults replaces our parent child relationships in our childhood and so you'll see almost these first the first year you're going to have two years give or take we've almost followed the same track which is there's no really conditioning yet.

[SPEAKER_02]: And right around the year and a half to your mark, we start going, well, my partner does this.

[SPEAKER_02]: And my partner frustrates me in this way.

[SPEAKER_02]: And like this law, and there's this fear.

[SPEAKER_00]: You're terrible too.

[SPEAKER_02]: And most interestingly, to me, oftentimes the things we infactuate with the most in the dating and honeymoon stage, unless we actually learn to integrate some of those traits that we have put on a pedestal [SPEAKER_02]: those very things we infatuate with the most follow and infatuation resentment cycle where we then resent the blader.

[SPEAKER_02]: So for example, maybe you date somebody and you're like, oh my gosh, I just love that they're so easy going.

[SPEAKER_02]: And maybe it's because you're attracted to that because you maybe you're more aptite or rigid or you like to follow rules and you're attracted to this easygoing nature because we're often attracted to our opposite.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's another one of the [SPEAKER_02]: But then when the power struggle states where then like they never make plans, they're lazy.

[SPEAKER_02]: They sit around the house too much.

[SPEAKER_02]: They, you know, so the very things that were so attracted to and in the early stages, we will then resent unless we actually integrate them.

[SPEAKER_02]: So then that brings us into the power struggle stage right around the two-year mark.

[SPEAKER_02]: And there's a multitude of rights of passage here, but but one of the first ones is we have to look at all the things that we are so attracted to in a person and we actually have to be able to take on some of those traits to create balance and harmony across the relationship and where a lot of people I think get it very [SPEAKER_02]: wrong is people get so fixated on this idea of staying in polarity, polarity of things like masculine and feminine energy is very attractive in the dating and honeymoon stage, but then we actually have to integrate and find a middle ground with somebody and both become whole within our cells as much as possible.

[SPEAKER_02]: in order to properly navigate our way through and out of the power struggle stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: And if we stand too much polarity from a trait perspective, if we say, you know, and you can think of all sorts of examples, maybe we can pause here for a second to illustrate it, but can you think of times for you personally, where you were really attracted to something in somebody and later on, you resented that thing?

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, like I love my wife's organization, but I don't like when it's trying to organize me.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah [SPEAKER_02]: Remember me like hot that's amazing like how does he I remember we were sitting in a restaurant and his old boss Happened to be there and he said oh, I want you to come back and work for me And I remember he sitting at the restaurant and he said I would only consider it if you paid me X amount of money and just said it like off the cost Just oh like no until long just so in real time [SPEAKER_02]: Well, like, he just has no problem, like taking up space, and I remember just finding that so attracted, but at that time in my life, I still had boundary issues.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so here I am, so attracted to that and kind of mesmerized by that.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then that quickly became an out in our power struggle stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, geez, he sets all these boundaries with me.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I'm the one always being flexible.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I'm the one always know.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so these very things that we start off being so attracted to in the early stages, we then actually have to integrate some my way of healing that.

[SPEAKER_02]: and allowing us to move through this trait piece, which is one of the top four rights of passage out of the power circle stage, was I had to learn to be healthily assertive, including with him, and he had to learn to integrate a greater sense of flexibility.

[SPEAKER_02]: And when we were able to navigate those things together, we both became more whole and healed as individuals, because we now had access to both sides of the whole sense of self, [SPEAKER_02]: And it then allowed us to have a much greater sense of connection and depth and harmony in the relationship of the makes sense.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so you resolve the things that normally keep you in that stage is that the right of passage through there.

[SPEAKER_02]: One of them.

[SPEAKER_02]: There's a few in the power struggle.

[SPEAKER_02]: So the first one is really to see like what are our pain points and what are our major differences where because every relationship tends to have these sort of sticking points, I call them trigger cycles, where we get triggered by the same types of things.

[SPEAKER_02]: And if you ask yourself what are each of us [SPEAKER_02]: as traits, you know, how are we each behaving in this particular instance by uncut by decoding what that trait is?

[SPEAKER_02]: And then actually coming to center, you know, interdependence there on those things, it's one of the things that will fast track away out of the power struggle stage first.

[SPEAKER_02]: So for example, sort of going back to that.

[SPEAKER_02]: it was like, okay, I'm getting frustrated because, you know, for me at that period of time, I was like, well, I feel like I'm always the one making the compromises.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I felt very frustrated.

[SPEAKER_02]: And one of the signs that you're in the power struggle stages, you'll start to experience resentment.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I felt resentment.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I knew I was not going to make space for resentment in my relationship.

[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't want any relationship filled with resentment.

[SPEAKER_02]: That was a non-negotiable for me.

[SPEAKER_02]: So it was like, okay, well, what is the resentment about?

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, it's about that I'm being the flexible one and he's the assertive one and while I respect that, I need a little bit of harmony around that I need a little bit more give and so then I was able to come to him have that conversation request those things.

[SPEAKER_02]: I also had to develop my own healthy sense of saying no and boundaries because at the time I was very much stuck in a cycle of doing things out of kindness and love and people pleasing and then feeling like, wait, like what about me and feeling kind of left out in the consideration process.

[SPEAKER_02]: How will I ever be polished?

[SPEAKER_02]: And so every single thing that's irritating us is showing us something It's polishing us if we if we look at it through that lens and so in that particular case It was like well, what is what are our traits here?

[SPEAKER_02]: What are these polarities where we're at two extremes and how can we come to center?

[SPEAKER_02]: And by as defining that and then having that conversation and both working on that would actually solve with him Which was beautiful is is his relationship strength and really dramatically where he [SPEAKER_02]: had more flexibility in room and compromise and you could see them almost like open up a lot more as a person and and in a rich a lot of his relationships as a whole and for me I had to learn healthy assertive as still at that point of my life and by doing that I suddenly was in a position where that strength and a lot of relationships for me I had hard conversations I had to have.

[SPEAKER_02]: I opened up deeper relationships where I felt more seen because I was sharing my truth and my [SPEAKER_02]: one of those first major pillars of getting out of that is to find where you're too far in polarity and that's creating pain points to address the needs necessary in that conversation and to be able to come to center to create wholeness in each of yourselves individually.

[SPEAKER_00]: that's awesome.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's so great that to know that the what is it if I get irritated by every rub how do I become polished?

[SPEAKER_02]: How will it be polished?

[SPEAKER_00]: So good.

[SPEAKER_00]: Is it really contextualizes then again?

[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.

[SPEAKER_00]: This thing is coming forth for me so that I can resolve it.

[SPEAKER_00]: So we can [SPEAKER_00]: build the integration individually.

[SPEAKER_00]: So we can actually move into a space of rhythm.

[SPEAKER_00]: So that's, and you said there's more than one rider passage.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.

[SPEAKER_00]: So that's a big one.

[SPEAKER_02]: That's a big one.

[SPEAKER_02]: So that's a, and that's one of the major ones.

[SPEAKER_02]: And, and you know, the other one, the next big one is vulnerability.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that's inherent with what we just spoke of, you know, because there has to be an ability to recognize your patterns and to talk about them, but vulnerability and communication are the next two and the second and third.

[SPEAKER_02]: And we have to get really good at it.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I think it's funny because you know when I were kind of discussing this topic earlier, but I think that sometimes we get so scared.

[SPEAKER_02]: that because we have differences, it means we are just different and that creates a separation or a distancing, but I think truly when we learn to ball ourably share our differences and communicate about them, it's actually a really profound joining.

[SPEAKER_02]: And, you know, what I would see over and over again is people go through these stages of dating, honeymoon, power struggle, and so their entire snapshot of relationships is, you know, this infactuation, and then fighting, and then it ends.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so people fall sort of prey to this concept that, you know, as soon as we're in the power struggle, everything's going to end.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, as soon as we're fighting more, oh my gosh, things are on the way out, we're going through a rocky stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: That's an inherently negative thing.

[SPEAKER_02]: But truly, the power struggle stage gives you an opportunity to be seen without conditions.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that's loved more unconditionally.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so within this stage, you have to actively take off your mouse.

[SPEAKER_02]: And if you're doing it, [SPEAKER_02]: you know from from unhealthy communication if you're saying you never spend enough time with me you don't care instead of hey I'm feeling disconnected I'd love to spend more quality times together let's plan a fun day on the weekend you know if we're speaking in you know almost behind every criticism there's a need right so if we're speaking in criticism [SPEAKER_02]: and we miss actually stating the need through vulnerability, through openness, through authentic communication, then we end up in a situation where we can't make it out, the power struggle stage, and you'll see the power struggle stage will then look like for people in the long haul, and truly people can stay in the power struggle stage for decades.

[SPEAKER_02]: They can stay married and stay in the power struggle stage the entire time.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, poison, poison, and the actual right of passage is to be able to, in order to unlock anything, you have to learn to be vulnerable.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so a lot of people are looking to start this.

[SPEAKER_02]: One of the first exercises I often get to people is to sit down and to actually write out all of your frustrations and the relationship on your own, not in front of your partner, on your [SPEAKER_02]: and then draw columns down your page and then the column next to it be like what is my actual fear here and what is my actual unmet need that I'd like to request and then when you can package that together so if you say somebody says oh my my partner's not texting me enough they're not communicating consistently enough.

[SPEAKER_02]: So maybe your criticism to that person is they don't talk to me enough or they don't care or whatever it might be okay so what is the actual fear?

[SPEAKER_02]: Well my fear is that maybe they're not in it the same way I am maybe I'm unloved or abandoned.

[SPEAKER_02]: What is my actual need?

[SPEAKER_02]: Okay well my need in this particular case is to have more consistency and communication.

[SPEAKER_02]: Good.

[SPEAKER_02]: Now you've actually packaged something that's productive for a relationship.

[SPEAKER_02]: Now you can go bring this to your partner and actually have a conversation about it and see progress.

[SPEAKER_02]: And what that allows us to do is move out of thinking about our partner and the relationship in terms of grievances and frustrations and move into thinking about vulnerability.

[SPEAKER_02]: This is what I need to lead with here.

[SPEAKER_02]: Here's my feet or here's what I'm afraid we're growing apart.

[SPEAKER_02]: I'm afraid that that, you know, we're not on the same page or here's what I'm needing and looking for.

[SPEAKER_02]: All of a sudden, we're integrating traits, like we talked about earlier, we're starting to move out of these extremes and into wholeness, both as individuals and within the relationship, and then we're able to communicate and hash out conflicts in really healthy, productive ways.

[SPEAKER_02]: And in doing that, all of a sudden, we actually start to see the needle move.

[SPEAKER_02]: And in doing that as well, I think people think sometimes that, [SPEAKER_02]: When we're in the power struggle stage, we have to talk about everything.

[SPEAKER_02]: There's all this effort.

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, yeah, there is.

[SPEAKER_02]: Because you're merging two different invisible worlds, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: Like part of a relationship is one person has an invisible world, and all of their conditioning, and all of their ideas about what a relationship should look like, and their needs, and their fears, and so does somebody else.

[SPEAKER_02]: And there's work.

[SPEAKER_02]: You have to break down those invisible walls between the two of you merge those invisible worlds together.

[SPEAKER_02]: And through doing that over time, [SPEAKER_02]: all of a sudden you stop having to talk about things so much.

[SPEAKER_02]: So let's say you have a partner who's sensitive to criticism and a partner who who really needs more presence in their relationships more, more attunement.

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, the person who knows that their partner is sensitive to criticism they'll actually start practicing, to hashing this out, through having these conversations, they'll actually start practicing being more mindful in their delivery.

[SPEAKER_02]: Right?

[SPEAKER_02]: And if they then share with their partner, hey, I'm also needing you to be a little bit more present than a tune sometimes than that partner.

[SPEAKER_02]: If they show up and do the work with them, they become more present and more attuned.

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, those were early conversations in the power, circle stage, those don't have to continue to be conversations over time.

[SPEAKER_02]: If we practice them, we integrate them into the relationship, then they become a part of the actual foundation of the relationship itself.

[SPEAKER_02]: I'm a big believer that we are always conditioning people all the time.

[SPEAKER_02]: We're always being conditioned and conditioning and everybody's conditioning.

[SPEAKER_02]: They're partner and vice versa, whether we're consciously aware of it or not.

[SPEAKER_02]: So it's either happening on autopilot or we actually actively share our needs.

[SPEAKER_02]: We speak fallnourably about what our requests are and we practice those things and eventually they get conditioned into the fabric of the relationship.

[SPEAKER_02]: And now all of a sudden, you just have a natural rhythm.

[SPEAKER_02]: Now all of a sudden things are flowing effortlessly.

[SPEAKER_02]: You don't have to talk about these things.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that's when you know, okay, I've made it out of the power struggle stage.

[SPEAKER_00]: Ah, it's like the nice, the nice space where you're like, where your wounds aren't driving you anymore, your adaptive strategies are no longer blocking unconditional love.

[SPEAKER_00]: To be able to, I love those rights passage because to be able to set the mass down the collection of one of the four or many of the four horsemen that that we use as a way to protect ourselves that now we've actually.

[SPEAKER_00]: through repetition and conditioning, learn that we can go past those and actually swim in the space that's beyond, which as you were saying, like a couple could spend their whole lives in the power struggle because they're so terrified of what lives in the rhythm, like what lives alongside the rhythm, which is the pain that creates all the behaviors.

[SPEAKER_00]: So the rhythm sounds great, but we got to move out of it, [SPEAKER_02]: I wonder why do I want to leave it exactly it's so funny that that's one of the biggest things people will say it's like I never want to leave the honeymoon stage and it's like well the honeymoon phase is great.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's great, it's great, but it's still conditional, right there's so much like, oh, I'm on my best behavior reality.

[SPEAKER_00]: Anyone is like, I can't even poop around them.

[SPEAKER_02]: So you know, there you go.

[SPEAKER_00]: You probably don't want to do that in the romanticized everlasting, but you know what I mean, safety.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, the comfort, the comfort level.

[SPEAKER_02]: Sure.

[SPEAKER_02]: So what you'll see is sometimes we'll think, OK, that's the state.

[SPEAKER_02]: We want to, like, you see here and stay stuck in, but it can keep us stuck instead.

[SPEAKER_02]: So once you get out of the power struggle stage, some symptoms of believing it, [SPEAKER_02]: are that less conflict happens, less having to talk things through, you'll start seeing that you naturally take each other into consideration, not in the way that you would have considered the person, but as you've learned to consider them.

[SPEAKER_02]: So I think this is really important to highlight and it's very nuanced, but [SPEAKER_02]: We all before handling the power circle stage correctly, if we don't know how we all project from our perception.

[SPEAKER_02]: So we'll try to give to people what we would need.

[SPEAKER_02]: And remember having this client at one point and she said she was anxiously attached and she had a dismissive of wouldn't partner.

[SPEAKER_02]: And they'd been dating for a few years.

[SPEAKER_02]: Then we just walked in the power circle stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I remember she was a curse second session with me.

[SPEAKER_02]: And she said, [SPEAKER_02]: we got into an argument over the weekend and he said he needed space for the rest of Sunday.

[SPEAKER_02]: It was on a Sunday and it's space.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so I cooked them a nice meal and I wrote them a nice note and I surprised him.

[SPEAKER_02]: And you know it's such a great example of her giving love as she would need it.

[SPEAKER_02]: And she was so sweet and just so lovely and just trying her absolute best.

[SPEAKER_02]: But part of what we have to get right and that comes through mutual vulnerability in the power struggle is we have to learn to [SPEAKER_02]: And in doing that, we can actually honor each other's needs more.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so we'll see that by moving out of the power struggle stage, one of the things we've had to have learned to do through that vulnerability, through that communication about our needs, is that we'll have had to learn the person as they are.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then we can properly consider them.

[SPEAKER_02]: So maybe you know, and I'll use myself as an example.

[SPEAKER_02]: I know I'm an INFJ and I like my space and time.

[SPEAKER_02]: But I know my husband does more maybe even like 5% more than I do.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so, you know, I know.

[SPEAKER_02]: Let's do it.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I noted check in with him and say, like, hey, you know, I'm ready to hang out the work days over, but it's usually a little bit of time to yourself because I could use some too, but how much do you want?

[SPEAKER_02]: And we kind of check in about things like that.

[SPEAKER_02]: And he knows, for example, that, you know, I am a little more physically affectionate and he'll be like, oh, I have do enough today.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like, you know, and he'll check in with things like that because we've learned those things and ingrained that learning over time.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so it's natural normal.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's not things we have to consciously think about.

[SPEAKER_02]: the existence of the fabric of our subconscious mind.

[SPEAKER_02]: Those are just natural things we'll last or talk about throughout the course of the day.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that's happening to everybody in one way or another, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: It's either happening through you naturally judge somebody or get frustrated at them or tell an old story, look, they're doing this again or we naturally have broken through those things through practice and then those are a part of our new set point or a new foundation of how we see each other.

[SPEAKER_02]: So so we know what you'll start to see is that it's almost like a [SPEAKER_02]: You, you see like dating honey moon and the, oh, it's on the up and up and then you get this like peak of the power struggle and peak conflict, but then you'll actually see like almost on the other side of the parabola starts to go back down.

[SPEAKER_02]: So this is conflict lessons, you naturally know each other, you naturally consider each other, you're in a rhythm and and you'll feel the sense of again more unconditionally based love and the rhythm stage and you can almost think of the rhythm stage is being the catcher breath stage like you just been on this.

[SPEAKER_02]: You just been on this like oh my gosh, we were so infatuated and then we were fighting and then we had to hash everything out and talk I've been through and it's this merging of your inner worlds and now it's like oh, okay We're here like if it's got it way easier and now we can like breathe on the head and so you fall into this natural rhythm But the rhythm stages actually usually very short-lived [SPEAKER_02]: So it'll usually be about, yeah, about three to six months and from the rhythm stage, we then move into the devotion stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: So the devotion stage is, and, and for people who have lived this and I know you've had this experience is when you've lived this, what's really cool about it is that when you're in the rhythm stage it's very, you take a breather, but you also settle in a little bit.

[SPEAKER_02]: And you feel comfortable and there's a sense of, you know, I don't want to say complacency because it's slightly too strong about word, but there's a sense of saddledness like, oh, everything's easy now we can just take it easy, but the sneaky part of the rhythm stage is that we can sometimes confuse ease with an unnecessary degree of effort.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that's really where we move into the devotion stages that they're still as with anything, whether it's a job or a career or a relationship to keep things ticking along.

[SPEAKER_02]: Everything's either growing or it's dying, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: And it's extremes.

[SPEAKER_02]: Everything we're always either growing together, growing apart.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so the right of passage is now that you learn each other to then start stabilizing in these devoted [SPEAKER_02]: habits and structures.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I like to think of the devotion stages as, you know, how do we start devoting to longer term commitments?

[SPEAKER_02]: That's when we start thinking about longer term commitments if we move through the stages appropriately, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: The devoting states shortage two and a half three years in.

[SPEAKER_02]: By this time, if you move through the power struggle stage pretty effortlessly, [SPEAKER_02]: And now it's like we're making long-term commitments.

[SPEAKER_02]: We're talking about marriage, kids, a future.

[SPEAKER_02]: We're having those types of conversations.

[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe we're actually behaviorally enacting them at this point.

[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe you just got married or you just had your first child or these types of things.

[SPEAKER_02]: But at this stage, it's also the stage of habituation.

[SPEAKER_02]: So we've started to know the things that naturally work for us.

[SPEAKER_02]: and maybe for somebody who's an anxious attachment style and I dismiss them a point in it, maybe they've learned that we have habits where we give space to each other for a few nights of the week and then we do active things twice a week.

[SPEAKER_02]: We go on a date night once a week and we watch an interesting documentary or show the other one night of the week.

[SPEAKER_02]: And the more we have the chewy things in this stage, [SPEAKER_02]: It's honestly one of the biggest tricks to moving into the upper lasting stage because when we have these habits that are naturally there, it also is preventative when we have these new stressors that come into our lives a job change or first child, you know, starting a business, whatever it might be.

[SPEAKER_02]: You've just learned each other, you've developed the rhythm, but then you've actually created supportive, habituated habits for the long run that then allow your relationship to weather the storms of change.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that's all going to be what takes shape in the devotion stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: Does that, does that all make sense?

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it makes a lot of sense.

[SPEAKER_00]: That devotion stage that feels like a like where you really start to experience the level of grace that can happen in love.

[SPEAKER_00]: that this deeper level of devotion, because I think marriage as a sacrament or practice, really lost its sort of sacrament or sacred aspect and it became a legal function, which I understand the reasons for that.

[SPEAKER_00]: But that we would get married in the honeymoon phase or in the power struggle as a way to avoid dealing with the power struggle.

[SPEAKER_00]: or maybe in that rhythm stage, which would be probably ideal, you know, as you get in there.

[SPEAKER_00]: So it's like, I really think there's a shift energetically that becomes like we're just going to continue to lay everything at the altar of relationship.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's such a different way of being when two people are doing that.

[SPEAKER_02]: That is a beautiful thing.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, like they should teach these in schools, you know, [SPEAKER_02]: And, and you, you actually spoke of something so important.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's funny.

[SPEAKER_02]: I was just thinking about this as you were saying it, too, which is that we will know or in the devotion stage because it's mutual and reciprocal.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so I love the ways that that, like, lay everything at the altar, because you'll get to the devotion stage and you'll know [SPEAKER_02]: They life can be art sometimes, but I have full faith and trust that we're going to move through anything that comes our way because you've done it enough and because you've seen it enough in practice and it feels like you're able to communicate and move through things with grace and effortlessly and there's a deep understanding that there's a mutual devotion and sometimes what happens is people will be trying to kind of [SPEAKER_02]: subconsciously create a relationship based on things that are seeing outside of them in the devotion stage where let's say they're in the power struggle stage and one person's dragging their feet on making a commitment which would generally happen in the rhythm or devotion stages and they're dragging their feet on making a commitment and the other person's forcing a commitment pushing it.

[SPEAKER_02]: As the subconscious strategy or time to get to that devotion stage because you're seeing that another people but actually oftentimes one person's dragging their feet because they're not actually feeling devotion they're not actually feeling rhythm and so they're ready exactly having gone through the stages.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly and so so people will take that as oh they don't care about me and and you know you'll usually see people articulate that at that point by saying things like I love this person.

[SPEAKER_02]: I see this as my forever person, but just I'm not quite ready at or something's holding me back and they can't quite put their finger on it and a lot of times it's actually because [SPEAKER_02]: they haven't moved into that stage of feeling that devotion, having that rhythm.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so there's a fear, and I think it's actually a righteous fear in a sense that, well, if we commit from this place to a devoted relationship, what if we're still having these these things we haven't worked out yet, and these fights, and these arguments, and until we actually see our ability to move through and navigate those things, it makes sense that there's a reservation from one or both people, and along this commitment.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's really beautiful because what if let's say one person is is inviting the devotion, the commitment.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I'd like to get married.

[SPEAKER_00]: The other person's anxious has a tent.

[SPEAKER_00]: In order for devotion, even be available, as you're saying, we must move through the stages before.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, my wife and I we always talk about how like what's coming up for one person is coming up for the other they just don't know it yet and I find that someone who's more let's say anxiously attached there's a natural tendency as you were saying to not that and so.

[SPEAKER_00]: They're quick to move and try to accelerate the relationship as you were saying to try to get to a place, and the other person is anxious or hesitant.

[SPEAKER_00]: Even if that person is afraid of commitment, quote-unquote, there is a brilliance even in that hesitation because there's still not ready for devotion anyways, even if they're like avoided a dismissive, all the things, it's like they have to be willing to move through it.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so if they're not willing to move through it, [SPEAKER_00]: Falker, are you doing devoting to them?

[SPEAKER_00]: I do not, I'm saying, so that both people have to mature through those rights of passage for devotion, even be possible, otherwise it's just fake devotion.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: And like you said, as well, there's this attempt to create this devotion or pressure into devotion at times or push to get to this outcome.

[SPEAKER_02]: But there's a missing of the whole journey, which is that we haven't learned the tools yet, or there's no body in devotion.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.

[SPEAKER_02]: So that's where we have to be able to be like, well, then if we're not at the devotion state where are we stuck, are we not communicating openly in the power struggle?

[SPEAKER_02]: Have we not found the rhythm yet by integrating these things so that we actually get into the rhythm and the new conditioning of a relationship together that [SPEAKER_02]: that has, you know, trade integration, where we aren't operating these extreme polarities, there's more fullness, that has the ability to communicate and be vulnerable about our fears and needs, and then actually move through and get to the other side of that, actually hash out the communication and come to resolution.

[SPEAKER_02]: And if we haven't learned to do that significantly and consistently enough, that it now is the ingrained way of operating in the stage, and we're not even in the rhythm.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so once we do it consistently enough, we will through conflict, we do it with ease, we know we can navigate our things together, we know each other more deeply, the mask is off, we're vulnerable openly and it feels comfortable to be that way, okay, now we're habituated, now we're in the rhythm and now devotion is just the natural next right of passage from that place going forward because that's okay, well we enjoy this relationship now, we're connected over these things, let's do things to habituate and let's talk about the future and that's where [SPEAKER_02]: will feel an actual reciprocity from both parties, and that's where you know, interesting, what's interesting to me is that at that point, if you make it to that stage, you're kind of beyond an attachment diagnosis, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: And obviously you don't get a formal diagnosis for attachments, but at that point, you're dominantly securely attached anyways, because you've done those things necessary to get to that point.

[SPEAKER_02]: which is communicate openly.

[SPEAKER_02]: Know your fears and flaws and how to navigate them.

[SPEAKER_02]: All these things are right to passage on them pathway to becoming securely attached as well.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so at that point, it doesn't really matter as much what somebody's attachment style is because you're naturally gonna feel that devotion and you're naturally on that path to secure attachment because of how you're operating and showing up in connection.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's beautiful.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then if we bring it home, how do we get to ever let what's the right [SPEAKER_02]: that is the space that we end up knowing that this is how we're showing up, this is how we're navigating things, and we're actually taking action in our devotions.

[SPEAKER_02]: So it's not a talking about the things we're going to devote to.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's acting them out, playing them out, being early in real humans.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: So, so there's not always to get married.

[SPEAKER_02]: We should think of having kids.

[SPEAKER_02]: We should move the in together.

[SPEAKER_02]: We should start a business together.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's that you are actually in a state where your lives have truly merged in that way.

[SPEAKER_02]: And there's a rootedness and a foundation and there and a fulfillment in there.

[SPEAKER_02]: And, you know, what I really like about the everlasting stage, and this is what you'll hear people report it as is, you know, this sense of, I'll tell you a story for a second, but I think now I get to just, I remember my parents went through a hard time, uh, [SPEAKER_02]: particularly hard time where there's some infidelity and I caught it and I was the one to find out I was a teenager.

[SPEAKER_02]: I had a math tutor at the time and I remember I go to like this after school math tutor and high school and I remember telling her what happened randomly.

[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know why.

[SPEAKER_02]: We're talking about her day.

[SPEAKER_02]: That reminds her.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm posting.

[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.

[SPEAKER_02]: I remember her saying to me, I said to her.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I had a lot of wounds to work through and did a lot of work on this.

[SPEAKER_02]: I remember saying, like, somebody's always going to cheat and leave in the relationship.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like, it's always that way.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I remember saying, [SPEAKER_02]: I know my husband would never cheat on me, and I know that was certainty, and I remember challenging her as a teenager.

[SPEAKER_02]: This wounded teenager that I wasn't saying, I said, yeah, but you say that, but how could you ever possibly know that?

[SPEAKER_02]: You can't know that.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I remember saying that to her, and I remember that moment sticking with me so much, because I, she was very, like, very, this strong, kind of tough lady.

[SPEAKER_02]: I kind of admired her in a sense, and she was very, like, had it together and just, you know, in it, [SPEAKER_02]: I remember thinking that she was almost the opposite of my Eve.

[SPEAKER_02]: She was not a naive or not be a word I would give to her.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, to describe her at all, it would be on the very end of the list.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I remember thinking, well, she's not naive, but how can she know how could she know that?

[SPEAKER_02]: And I remember grappling it really, I thought about that for years after.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it wasn't until I was actually in a relationship like this myself, you know, after doing so much work and healing and with my husband where there is this deep true sense of like nothing's going to come between us and you just kind of know that and and you know you trust that you'll navigate and weather storms and you'll move through hard things together and there's this deep knowing about that.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I think it's because of this deep way that you've learned to operate where it's like, well, when something hard comes, we know how to address hard things.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so there's just a faith that you'll move through it and a trust in that.

[SPEAKER_02]: And if I had, you know, said that to my 15-year-old self, I would have been like naive, [SPEAKER_02]: What a joke, you know, and but and and what I would hear from Kleine after Kleine or people in our programs are all these things when you know working with people is that people will report almost that same thing.

[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, yeah, I have full faith like I just know we're going to be together for a long time.

[SPEAKER_02]: I just know that and there's a certainty and it's not from naivete it's it's from a place of like you know how you're operating and what you're rooted in and and I think that that's actually a reflection quite honestly of having [SPEAKER_02]: almost like a tree where you get a little sapling in the dating and honeymoon stage and it has these shallow roots and a storm or a windstorm would come and tear it out of the ground easily and and you nourish it and you water it and there's sunlight and it happens so many times over and over that the tree gets nourished that the roots grow so deep.

[SPEAKER_02]: that you know, okay, well, no matter how big the storm is, it's not going to rip the tree out of the ground, and I think that there is a sense of moving truly by the everlasting stage from conditionally based love to much more unconditionally based love where you know that if something happens or there's a mistake or a concern, you know, well, we'll figure it out, we'll navigate, it will move through it, and then there's a sense of that being there, and I think as well, [SPEAKER_02]: for anybody whom, you know, was maybe like me when I was younger.

[SPEAKER_02]: who also used to have, I used to have this really strong thought process of like, yeah, well, you like the person now, but in 10 years, you could get bored, or in 10 years, they could get bored of you, or in, do you never know how could you trust the future?

[SPEAKER_02]: And, you know, that was a reflection of where I was at that point in my own life.

[SPEAKER_02]: And, and now, you look at something and you protect it for so long, and you invest in it for so long, and you nourish it for so long, that like, [SPEAKER_02]: you don't even want like a crack to come, you know, you won't even let something come near that to crack it or to hurt it because when you invest in something and it's been so great for you and you're so you develop so much enrichment from it, well, you won't let anything come to hurt it.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so this idea that you'll get bored or change your mind of something you've invested so much in and care so much about is almost this silly frivolous thought.

[SPEAKER_02]: Um, by the time you're at the everlasting stage, whereas in earlier stages dating Honeymoon, when everything when you're a whole love relationship is in factuation based, well, somebody else could be infatuated with somebody else, there is a fragility to that that that goes away over time as you progress with the future stages.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and if you move through these, not try to accelerate too fast, but go at the natural pace, you know, I [SPEAKER_00]: I think when we start to actually discover the right pace in the right space for our own individual, because of course, that's going to be different when two people's worlds come together, especially for someone who's more avoiding that want to take a little longer, and for someone who's more anxious, they want to speed it up, but it's actually in the mergers and the understanding of those worlds that you find a pace that works to get there.

[SPEAKER_00]: And it's like, if you can move through these stages and the rights of passage, and I love what you're saying because we get to this place where it's like, well, if my wife and I, we had a kid so, of course, in that process, it's more stressful, life's more stressful, everything's different.

[SPEAKER_00]: You go from being a couple to being a family, your old world where you could just watch TV together, is that's dead.

[SPEAKER_01]: So.

[SPEAKER_00]: you, but there's just like a knowing that this is a season and because because we are devoted and in that place of like, I think you probably naturally, in the everlasting, then when you do meet a new power struggle that will come from the revelation of more stuff that you just naturally move through all those processes because as you were saying, you have these ingrained skills.

[SPEAKER_00]: that are like, oh, I'm really frustrated.

[SPEAKER_00]: And this is really, because you've learned how to advocate for yourself or how to be more flexible.

[SPEAKER_00]: But my wife and I have very similar patterns that you're talking about, except I'm you and she's your husband.

[SPEAKER_00]: Just in terms of flexibility, which is very normal.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm more likely to.

[SPEAKER_02]: There's usually one that leans one directly.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm like, it's generally women who are one way versus, although there's a lot of interesting stuff on women who are coming much more avoidant now, which is, that's a whole other can of herbs.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, absolutely.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so, um, so to your point, what happens a lot is you can have these temporary regressions back into the power struggle stage, but for the most part that's so much more rare because you have the foundational skills to navigate your way.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it's almost like, [SPEAKER_02]: If you deal with something so proactively, it just doesn't have the same capacity to faster.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, there are a lot of power struggles.

[SPEAKER_00]: They're just regular relational.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: Now, there will be extreme exceptions.

[SPEAKER_02]: So you may see that somebody goes to a really traumatic event in their family.

[SPEAKER_02]: They go through a lot of loss and grief and then they sort of unravel.

[SPEAKER_02]: And of course, our personal patterns will play into relational patterns.

[SPEAKER_02]: Personal trauma or grief.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly, it'll change the relationships.

[SPEAKER_02]: So in extreme cases, you know, I can think of one couple that I was with, for example, and they saw me, they were sucking the power struggle.

[SPEAKER_02]: They then came through that moved into the everlasting stage.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then [SPEAKER_02]: revisited with me, you know, this kind of a tragic story, but revisited with me three years later because they'd lost one of their kids and one of their kids had passed away and so, you know, the huge tragedy and then they had to really, they were in a power struggle because the the inordinate amount of grief and stress and just kind of broke them both and now there's a rebuild in really extremes and not the really extreme case, but in hard, hard situations, [SPEAKER_00]: breaks people up a lot of course yeah especially like how we hold grieve you know if one person's more of a provider there's not a lot of option to to go deep into the I mean there's so much to that but I really agree there's it's like the traumas or the losses or whatever it is we'll bring forward a re-invention of self [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: The things that will, yeah, the things that will tear us to pieces a little bit.

[SPEAKER_02]: Right?

[SPEAKER_02]: Because then we, we have to restart from somewhere.

[SPEAKER_02]: It's almost like we're rebuilding ourselves.

[SPEAKER_02]: And that's the relationship we'll be rebuilt.

[SPEAKER_02]: So in that case, I will say in their case, they actually were able to really reconnect and heal and grow and those are a nice outcome, despite how tragic it is.

[SPEAKER_02]: But, you know, so extreme cases, it's a really extreme case, [SPEAKER_02]: shadow people a little bit for a period of time can regress completely back into the power struggle, but then you'll still know the skills and tools needed to then rebuild again and if both you want.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's super well-arresting.

[SPEAKER_00]: That may mean think about how the collective trauma of COVID actually really thrust so many people back into power struggles.

[SPEAKER_00]: because now it's like, well, what do I believe in, who am I, what do you believe in?

[SPEAKER_00]: Who are you?

[SPEAKER_00]: Which I think it was weaponized in a lot of ways, but it like almost like artificially thrust people back into power struggles, where there was synergy and now they created things that created opposition, interesting.

[SPEAKER_00]: I was just thinking about that.

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I think that it's opening it now that you said that I actually think that the root I never thought of this until this moment of is like, so why what is the actual root and I sort of always put it in my mind is like, oh, extremely traumatic events, but I actually think it to better summarize it.

[SPEAKER_02]: It would be events that create an identity crisis because then if your individual sense of self has been completely disrupted or fragmented because of a specific band and everything you believed has changed.

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, your your condition relationship and the fabric it's built upon has to do with two whole answers of self.

[SPEAKER_02]: what the hack, you know, a lot of people were like, well, everything I believe has maybe been challenged or questioned or changed.

[SPEAKER_02]: And a lot of cases, maybe some people clung on more strongly to their opinions.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it's the one person has an identity breakdown.

[SPEAKER_02]: It will break down the dynamic of the entire relationship with us.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, family systems, cultural systems, it's interesting.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not saying if I was into social engineering, [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not saying it would be great social engineering, but if you were into social engineering, it would be brilliant to bring forward something that is more allies and triggers values because that would cause a rupture and a power struggle in almost all couples.

[SPEAKER_02]: 100% and I think and families yeah families societies view group dynamics communities.

[SPEAKER_02]: I also think that what's interesting is I read this book at one point that was recommended to me when I was investigating some of these sort of like social cultural phenomenon around [SPEAKER_02]: Disasterous events and how people respond to them and I believe if I'm not forgetting the title was a few years ago now It was called disaster disaster something and I'll have to look at that But the whole concept was about the way that people choose to give up their rights And freedoms is only when something is disastrous enough that they're afraid enough that they'll be willing to do so [SPEAKER_02]: And to your point of the social engineering piece, it's almost like at a macro scale.

[SPEAKER_02]: If there's the personal identity crises that happen because everything we've been challenged has been now a speak question.

[SPEAKER_02]: Everything we've been believed is being questioned and challenged.

[SPEAKER_02]: And then on top of that, there's a disaster where we're confused and we're afraid.

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, okay, now we sort of end up and you see this on a micro level.

[SPEAKER_02]: When people have a weak sense of self, like you think of people who have borderline personality disorder [SPEAKER_02]: Most common features of somebody with BPD that's important to recognize is they have an unstable sense of self as what it says in the DSM.

[SPEAKER_02]: And it's because they don't have a sense of personal boundaries or parameters or they've had the people please and give themselves up so much to survive their childhood that they don't have a sense of self and in people with an unstable sense of self or [SPEAKER_02]: more often going to be controlled for a period of time or end up in controlling an abusive relationships.

[SPEAKER_02]: So it's interesting because on a macro scale, if you play that out, you create a collective identity crisis and then there's the opportunity to feel very afraid, well now we're going to be much more apt to go with the flow of what's being told to us because we don't have a leg to stand on.

[SPEAKER_02]: We don't have a sense of self to really guide it and help us navigate those challenges.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's interesting because if you frame it like that first part, the honeymoon phase and then the power struggle, you end up with the similar thing culturally again, because now we're in our words, we're separated, we have to find a way out, we have to find a way through operating from like giving up our sovereignty or choice, it makes us much easier saying like if we're if we're predisposed to people pleasing, [SPEAKER_00]: We would more likely be manipulated by that.

[SPEAKER_02]: 100% 100% you know, it's so interesting is like on the, you know, I, when I would work with a lot of people who came out of abusive relationships, one of the big themes I would always see is that they, if you sort of look back on like their themes and patterns, you would see they tended to first be quite critical of themselves.

[SPEAKER_02]: they would manipulate themselves to please others, they would empathize with other people so much but kind of at the expense of themselves, and they would struggle to set boundaries.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so they were some conscious match, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: Because we, one of the big features driving attractions is we're attracted to people who treat us the way we treat ourselves because we see it as familiar and that's safe.

[SPEAKER_02]: So what you see is people would get into relationships with the use of people.

[SPEAKER_02]: They're conscious mind would quote unquote no better.

[SPEAKER_02]: All I saw the red flags, I don't know [SPEAKER_02]: I knew it wasn't right that they talked to me that way, but I loved them, you know, and it's no fault of their own right that the person is victimized by being an abusive relationship, but a lot of times they first treat themselves in an abusive way and so the alarm else go off.

[SPEAKER_02]: So, conscious mind says, oh, yeah, you know, this isn't healthy, but they are also criticising themselves.

[SPEAKER_02]: They're also, you know, people pleasing so they're giving up themselves to please others.

[SPEAKER_02]: And there's always this sort of set of subconscious patterns and means where people have roots in their willingness to do that, that then make them more likely to be subject to those types of painful.

[SPEAKER_02]: events and relationships and so yeah we tend to go back to what we know and how we learn to survive things when we're having an identity crisis and so when everything's being questioned in challenge so we go back into real coping skills and mechanisms on less we've really done a lot of work on those subconscious needs.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, it shows you that if you were to move through all these stages of relationship with someone else, if you do encounter something socially engineered or a traumatic collective experience, too, of course, that can happen.

[SPEAKER_00]: You are less likely to go back to being enslaved by your wounds because you have already moved through them relationally.

[SPEAKER_00]: So your nervous system would even know a different way.

[SPEAKER_00]: Although it would be our natural default to like in high stress to like want to go back to it Just through automation.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's actually a learned interrupt.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's like wait.

[SPEAKER_00]: No, no, no, no.

[SPEAKER_00]: I see what I'm doing here.

[SPEAKER_00]: I didn't navigate it that a lot of recognizing that my people pleasing interpersonally as it got resolved [SPEAKER_00]: then I noticed where we're showing up more collectively like in my self expression on social media.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so I was just like spending my healing in a lot of ways.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I thought it was resolve romantically, but because I've done the groundwork romantically, it needed to be resolved collectively too.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, and I like her a lot of sense.

[SPEAKER_02]: I love that though, because to your point, [SPEAKER_02]: I think it's a pattern interrupt, but I also think it's a re-conditioning that happens.

[SPEAKER_02]: I really think that there's a lot of deep changes for sure, interesting.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's so powerful.

[SPEAKER_00]: It seems like the healing of the collective would be through this work.

[SPEAKER_02]: I 100% agree that like relationally, and I know we were talking about this earlier, is like almost that quote, right?

[SPEAKER_02]: Like everything shows you to yourself if it was irritated by every web, how will I ever be polished?

[SPEAKER_02]: Well, if you do the work in relationships first, there's enough reconditioning that happens with the new as a person that then you're primed to step out of your patterns if things happen in a different form and the collective.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_02]: And so it brings this really interesting discussion point that's like, well, [SPEAKER_02]: look at the collective now.

[SPEAKER_02]: Like there's all this divisiveness, everybody thinks they're on these like polarities, there's so much division in our world, which actually is a lot less in people think.

[SPEAKER_02]: You know, there's this idea of the silent exhausted majority who are like almost 70% of people are somewhere just in the middle that would agree on way more things.

[SPEAKER_02]: But if you haven't learned to navigate conflict and communication and vulnerability in your interpersonal closest [SPEAKER_02]: Well, then you're not actually quite to go and navigate those challenges properly in the collapse.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: Which you wouldn't even know that nuance exists because you've never experienced it.

[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.

[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_02]: It would be like an unknown unknown.

[SPEAKER_00]: God damn.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's good.

[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.

[SPEAKER_00]: Everybody, go learn more about the six stages of relationship.

[SPEAKER_00]: We need to do it for humanity.

[SPEAKER_00]: Guys, I love our conversations.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks so much for sharing all these incredible insights.

[SPEAKER_00]: And you just have, again, as I said at the beginning, a way of walking people through something that they're experiencing and labeling it and being able to humanize it and then also practically move through it.

[SPEAKER_00]: So where could people find out more about you, your work, and the six stages?

[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so people can find out more about me at the personal development school.com.

[SPEAKER_02]: So personal development school.com and we have a 60-J's relationship quiz that'll be on there.

[SPEAKER_02]: And I'll hold a whole in-depth course about it and the rights of passage and I'm also on YouTube.

[SPEAKER_02]: At Tase Gibson, Dash the Personal Development School.

[SPEAKER_00]: She puts out a new video at three days.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's incredible.

[SPEAKER_00]: So everybody go check those links out.

[SPEAKER_00]: Tase, thanks so much for being here.

[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you so much for having me.