Get answers to your questions about marriage, parenting and family life from experts and parents of 7 children!

Rachel Denning (00:12.142)
Or should we start with a slap in the face? In all sincerity, most of us suck at communicating with other people, especially in our family relationships.

Plus, communication seems like such a vague and broad topic. What exactly does it mean? And how do we improve it? We are not the experts and we still struggle communicating in some relationships or situations. We came to our marriage with giant deficits in communication skills. We both suffered with shyness and we were terrified to even talk to people. And when we tried, it was superficial or strained. When we got married, we struggled sharing our feelings or discussing sensitive or touchy subjects.

But through specific practices, such as growing in awareness or developing the ability to articulate through writing, we've been able to drastically improve our communication skills, especially in the relationships that matter most. That doesn't mean that they're perfect, but they are much, much better than they would be otherwise. In this episode, we discuss specific techniques for developing communication skills for important relationships, such as marriage and parenting.

We'll explain how simple processes like writing can help you learn to think, which can help you better speak to those you love. We'll discuss why the freedom to be offensive and imperfect in your speech can help you discover the truth of what's happening in your relationships. That's how the thinking process works. We need to have grace for one another in order to think out loud in our communication with each other. We'll also cover how sharing the same vocabulary,

can drastically increase your ability to connect and how your ability to communicate or lack thereof ties into your personal levels of growth and maturity. Everything in life is so much easier, better and flows smoother when you can effectively communicate to those closest to you, especially your spouse. So it's worth every effort to improve your ability to communicate. Listen to this very useful episode for strategies to radically increase familial closeness through effective communication.

Rachel Denning (02:18.574)
This episode is sponsored by the Extraordinary Family Life Formula. Discover even more simple tools for better communication, growing an awareness, developing a shared vocabulary, and becoming a better spouse and parent. Plus, gain the ability to persuade and influence your family with diplomacy. Click the link in the show notes to become a member of the Extraordinary Family Life Formula today and meet live with Greg and me every month for workshops covering every area of family life.

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Rachel Denning (02:54.478)
Hey, hey, everybody. Welcome to the Extraordinary Family Life podcast. We are your hosts, Greg and the.

Beautiful, amazing. I'm biting my tongue over here. You're biting the tongue. Amazing. Rachel Denning. Oh, you guys. So thanks for listening. Thanks for being a part of our awesome community. Sincerely, we love this community. We love you guys. And we love the fact that you care, that you care about living great lives and raising great families and being a part of.

the goodness in the world. And I know sometimes it feels like so insignificant. You're like, the world's falling to pieces and what am I doing with my own little life here? But like every bit of goodness, I know this gets real metaphysical and stuff, but every bit of goodness, every effort to be better has an energy. And I think it puts out a positive energy in the world and has a positive effect. So no effort. It was like Aesop said, right? One of the fables said, no act of kindness is ever wasted, however small. And I've...

say the same thing, no act of goodness, no effort of improvement, however small is ever wasted. Oh, that's good. I should write that down. That's good. You just recorded it. Oh, yeah, it's recorded. But I won't. I'll forget this is here. But so thank you. Thank you for being here. Thank you for being awesome. Thanks for being loving parents and good people who want to be better. So today, I can't type and do this.

Do you have something to say, babe? Nothing. I got nothing. What are we talking about? Oh, I got to capture your wasted. OK. Do you guys take notes? I hope you take notes. I hope you have. So one of the great thinkers, authors said, he said, you should always have two books with you, one you're reading and one you're writing. And I actually, I really picked up this habit of capturing ideas. We had a university class. I was.

Rachel Denning (05:01.902)
I love this professor man, he's such a stud. When he started the class, he's like, hey look, everybody's got A's, you already have fantastic grades. And he's like, you'd have to put in a lot of effort to get a bad grade in this class. He's like, one of the things you have to do is you have to keep a pen, some kind of pen, some notebook and some kind of pen with you 24 seven within arm's reach for the length of this semester. And I just want you to capture ideas, that's it.

Like I'm not going to grade the ideas. I'm not going to even look at them. You're going to show me and prove to me that you are just capturing ideas. When thoughts come along, quotes, ideas, experiences, you're just capturing them. And he says, just start paying attention to your thoughts and write down things that seem worth writing down. It was incredible. I just remember I'd be driving all the way like, whoa, I got a poll to write that down. And then I started paying attention to it. And I've been doing that.

ever since and I have I think I have over 3500 pages of my own notes now. Well that's what I was thinking. I remember when you took that class because we were newlyweds and you've been doing it ever since. Like you are the king of capturing ideas. I'll stop in the middle of the podcast. I'll stop in the middle of the conversation. We'll be talking about hold that babe. I have to tell people I'm like he's.

taking a note, he's not really getting, scrolling on Instagram during dinner. I gotta pull out my phone and take notes. And then I have an organized system. And so my topics, and I just have literally thousands of pages of notes and it's fun, it's awesome. You learn so much and you capture things. And then when you go back to them later, like, what? I forgot that I've written that down. So cool, so fun, experiences, memories, quotes, ideas. So write stuff down. All right, but today's topic is communication.

This comes up all the time. And I think the main context we'll talk here is in marriage. Communication, that's so vague in general. It's so vague, right. What are you talking about? We'll dive into how, but can I start with like a bold?

Rachel Denning (07:10.446)
slap in the face maybe, is that in all sincerity, most of us suck at communicating effectively. I'll start with that negative slap. That's how we like to start things off around here. You pretty much suck at talking to people. And there's, I'm not the expert at communication. And in fact, I...

I come from a gigantic deficit. When I, you guys know part of my story, I struggled severely to communicate. I was terrified to talk to people. And then it was, even then when I tried, it was, it was superficial. It was hard to ask questions. It was hard to be interested. It was hard. I really struggled expressing my feelings. I guess there's parts of it here. When you start diving in right away, there's the parts of it is being, if you can even articulate,

Well, even before that, do you even recognize what's going on? Are you aware of your own thoughts and feelings? And some people aren't. They just haven't practiced awareness. They feel something. They think something. And it's like this storm inside. It's all this unorganized matter. And so their brain is just and emotions mixed together. It's like a tornado. And there's things flying past. Like, here goes a cow and then a sawmill. Like, what is going on?

So the first step is awareness. You have to be aware of what's going on and try to settle things down enough to be like, OK, what is that? And start recognizing it and naming it. And sometimes many of us lack the education to even be able to name what's happening. Right. Then. Which is actually a very fascinating idea because, well, OK, another point too I want to make is that writing is a

crucial ingredient for being able to do this. I know that when I started writing, which didn't happen until we were married, in fact, the impetus for me to begin actually writing was I wanted to blog about our travel adventures. So that's insightful there because I actually had something exciting enough that I wanted to write about it. So I want and blogging was brand new. And so I wanted to blog about our travels. So we started traveling and I wanted to write about it.

Rachel Denning (09:37.325)
but writing helped me learn how to think. Like it really did help me to articulate and put my thoughts down and to form them and to edit them. And that is a very key ingredient of learning how to think and learning how to articulate and being aware. And a lot of people just don't do that. They're not required to write for anything like you were talking about earlier. This ties in perfectly with capturing ideas. Most people aren't required to do that except for maybe in school.

and they were given an assignment of something they really didn't care about. And so they have never really learned exactly how to make it miserable. I know we totally have. They've never really learned how to articulate the things they're thinking or feeling or experiencing. And so that's a major missing ingredient for learning how to communicate because you can't share with someone else your thoughts and feelings unless you first learn to articulate them in your own head or on paper.

This just all clicks for me right now while you just said that. We both went on a writing journey and that has had a major positive impact in our communication with each other and others. Great. So a huge impact on our marriage and on the relationships with our children because we learned how to articulate things to our kids, which has helped us to have amazing relationships with them. Yep. And then, so I guess writing.

Writing is the bridge between, well, it actually forces you to start analyzing your thoughts and start like, what am I thinking? What am I feeling? What's happening here? What's going on? And why is it going on? So you start writing and I guess if you pull out a pen and you put it to the paper, you're like, what's going down? And if you're honest with yourself and open, you start examining, it forces you to look at it and then you try to articulate, which is the second step. So the first step is awareness of what's happening.

The second step is trying to articulate. And this is still a struggle and perhaps always will be a struggle. You feel something, you think something, but then trying to get it into words sometimes doesn't quite make it. Exactly. All writing doesn't come out. Like I'm not saying what I'm feeling or thinking here. Right. Well, which comes down to practicing. And if you don't practice on paper through writing, then you're basically...

Rachel Denning (12:00.045)
The only chance you get is to practice by talking out loud and very few of us have the opportunities to do that very often. We don't have a spouse we can usually turn to. Our relationship isn't close enough to be able to just talk out loud to them about anything and everything. And there's very few other people we can do that with at all. And so we end up spending a lot of time with thoughts and feelings just tumbling around inside our heads and our bodies, never getting out, never.

being formed, which this goes back to another thing I wanted to just bring up because I think it's fascinating because one of the things Jordan Peterson talks about is he analyzes the biblical stories from a psychological perspective is this entire idea of naming things like the Adam was given dominion and he was named all the animals. It's part of this process of articulating what you see in the world and putting a name to it like giving it the power of the word type thing. So.

It's a similar type process and that's the genesis of it, right? That's why it's called genesis, is that we as human beings have the power to be able to...

bring order to chaos through the use of words and putting things and naming things essentially. And then those ideas and those words have both meaning and energy. Yes. I know it sounds interesting, but every thought, every word has a certain energy to it. And if you express it, sometimes even you just say it, you could say the word love, that's going to have a lot of meaning for people and sex.

and money and dinner and politics and religion or whatever, right? And then you express the idea. So if I'm expressing love that has an energy, if I'm expressing anger or hatred, totally different energy, right? And so then you write, it has this beautiful thing of naming it, identifying it, giving it meaning, and then it comes out in communication. I love this idea you said there of the...

Rachel Denning (14:09.101)
if you're not, if you don't have an outlet for it, then those, those ideas and feelings are just, what'd you say? That it's just kind of tumbling. That's it. That was the word. They're tumbling around in your head and in your heart. It's almost like the head and the heart is kind of, they're kind of mixed and you're right. They're just tumbling around. They're all over the place and they come up and it's weird. And then they kind of go away. They're like circling and then they come back up. They don't actually go away. They just dissipate into your body and then they return. And so some of us keep dealing with the same.

every few days, few weeks, few months, whatever, comes back up, there it is again, because it never got resolved, never got taken care of, never addressed, never got named, never got articulated. And then, and so if you're not writing it down and you're not talking, and sometimes we, the problem with talking out loud is you think out loud and you're fumbling with it. And so you might say something that you didn't quite mean, but you're trying to articulate it. And if you don't have a good relationship with your spouse, for example, and you're like...

I'm going to pull this up and I'm going to start talking here. Oh man, and I drop something on your lap and you're like, you what? And then I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, let me, I was just thinking, no, you said it. And then you're like, okay, now we're in trouble. You and I have, I think have the relationship where we can do that process because we can give each other enough grace to be like, okay, you know, if you need to reword that, great. Like I'm not going to hold you to it.

I'm going to allow you to make the mistake of being offensive because that's another thing Peterson likes to talk about is that this entire idea of free speech is based each to be based on this idea of being able to offend because essentially that's what's required. You have to be able to make mistakes in speaking while you're trying to think and

figure out and solve ideas. And this is one of the problems, obviously, we're facing in society today is that we've lost that ability to be offensive. You can't be offensive to people. You can't use the wrong pronoun or the wrong words because that's offensive. But that actually weakens our ability to think. To communicate. Yeah. And to communicate, of course, as well. But even to be able to think properly because if you can't make mistakes in your thinking, then you can't ever correct it.

Rachel Denning (16:32.077)
that thinking either. Or even try to form an opinion. Yeah. Exactly. And try to form an argument. So thinking this, let me try to say something here. Right. Wow. Great. How dare you? Because sometimes that requires saying the opposite in order to come to correct conclusions. So you have to be able to say things that might be wrong or rude or inappropriate. There's a lot of ground there that you.

should be able to cover in order to then correct your thinking and bring it back to where it should be. But that's the thinking process. It's kind of messy. And I love what you said. We have to have grace for each other. And again, there's some skills here where I can kind of set that up and say, hey, babe, I'm just trying to think through this here. May I just try to think out loud for a minute and just kind of get this out loud? And then that's setting that up for it. She's like, OK, I'm not.

I'm not gonna just take everything he says here and just nail it to the wall. I'm like, let's work through this. And then you reminded me of a super important point of the meaning we each give to words differently and how that can come up. So I might just naturally, because of the way my life experiences, certain words have certain meanings to me. And we make a gigantic mistake if we assume that others have the same meaning.

But it's weird because mentally you're like, well duh, this word means that. No it doesn't. Simple words. Like, even the word marriage. Well, even love. Love. Yeah. And I know that... Intimacy. That's a good one. And I know we have talked about this before in one of the other episodes, I think probably on marriage or whatever, I can't remember. But we've talked about this idea of...

having shared vocabulary because that's another key component to communicating is having the same definition for words you're using. And we have also have had clients and other people talk to us about how that's one of their challenges. It's like, this is the, we don't have the same definitions for words. We're using words and they don't mean the same thing. And so if you can,

Rachel Denning (18:53.709)
generate this shared vocabulary, which for us has come primarily from reading the same books, talking about the same podcasts. And yet we still had to work through it. You'd come to me like, OK, I want to talk about this, and this is kind of what it means. I'm like, oh, man. That's just such a simple elementary skill. But it's important. And I think we dismiss it because we don't realize. And so so many arguments, so many disagreements, so many misunderstandings would be eliminated if we would just say, hey, look, babe, let's talk about.

are the way we're parenting the children. Here's the word I was thinking of, here's what I think it means. I lead like that. And you pause right away and go like, oh, okay, because when I thought of the word discipline, I was thinking this. And I'm like, oh, I was thinking this. Okay, and we don't even, even if you don't want to have a shared vocabulary, at least now I know when you use the word discipline, it means this to you and it means this. And I'm like, okay, let's come to an agreement here.

on what we're gonna do. Because you wanna, this is what discipline means to you and this is what it means to me, maybe from the way you were parented, the way I was parented, what we've seen, and we have all this emotional attachment to it. So we start the conversation of discipline with this framework of what does it mean to you, what does it mean to me? Defining what the word means. Yeah, and like, okay, now we have a framework here. Because so many couples, they end up getting in these terrible arguments around discipline and correcting their kids. What does education mean?

What does faith mean? You can go into so many elements of this and you have to start with a framework of what does that mean to you first? Yeah, I remember when we were newly married and having these discussions or disagreements and at some point kind of feeling like, what are we even talking about? Feeling lost almost. I don't even know that we're talking about the same thing. And I think it really ties into that idea of.

Well, I'm talking about this, even though I'm using this word, but I feel like you're talking about this, even though you're using the same word. So it's like, what are we talking about? We're just like, we're passing each other so that our hands are just kind of crossing and we just miss each other and you feel like, what? What are we even arguing about? I don't even know because it's not clear what we actually mean. You keep saying that, I keep saying this and somehow we are not connecting here. And I think this is one of those critical.

Rachel Denning (21:18.573)
elements of communication, we have to be able to first understand what we're thinking, what are we saying, what are we trying to say, and then what's my spouse or what's this other person trying to say? If you're trying to communicate, what are you really trying to say? And then I think it's important here not to try to correct the other person, not to try to make the other person wrong.

So if Rachel comes and she's like, you know, this is what intimacy means to me. The worst thing I could do is be like, that's not what it means. Right? Because that's what it means for you. Right. There's no change. Especially if I said to me, like that's super obvious, but yeah, sometimes we need to infer that when they say intimacy means this, in your head you could say.

to you it means that, right? Which is great, and it doesn't make it wrong. Yeah, it doesn't make it wrong. Because what's true is true for you in that element. And like, I could go on and on and I, blah, blah, blah, whatever, this, that, and the other. That doesn't help the situation. I just need to go, oh, OK. Especially between men and women, man. Yeah. Especially. Well, and I think that this is where miscommunication really comes into play, because.

couples will spend, and we're talking about specifically about couples right now, but it could apply to parent child as well, or you know, coworkers, you'll spend so much time arguing on the definition as though it's absolutely 100 % concrete. Like, yeah, I get it. There's a Webster dictionary and it has a definition. But if you, like we're talking about, if you have this meaning you give to certain words based on your past experiences, that's not right or wrong. It just is.

And so if you spend all this energy and effort trying to convince the other person that their definition is wrong, that's wasted communication time because... It's futile. Yeah, it's futile. The point is understand, okay, for them that's what it means and then help them to understand that for you it means something different. Which is beautiful because if I understand how you want to receive love or appreciation...

Rachel Denning (23:34.253)
is one thing, and then how you give it, then I can work with it instead of fight it. Where so many of us in our communication, we're fighting it. We're just like, well, it shouldn't be that way. That's not the way I see it. It just shouldn't be that way. You're like, what are you doing? Learn to work with that. Exactly. So if we get to this point where, and again, we have to spend time talking about this.

Mm -hmm. Again, most people don't. That's why we're doing this episode, because we keep running into people who do not talk. And they don't know how to talk, because they, one, they haven't spent a lot of time writing. That's one reason. Or thinking or reading. Because writing is thinking. And two, they just haven't spent a lot of time practicing talking to each other. But I can hear them right now saying, we talk all the time. What are you talking about?

Right, but they go through their day talking about like the logistics. Can you do this? Can you pick this up? Can you go here? We need to get the groceries, get the laundry. Or did you see the latest episode? Or did you know that so and so, the neighbor, blah, blah? Yeah. And so we're talking around the surface. Right, but they're never really digging deep into their thoughts and feelings. Because where the major problems come in is when they're trying to talk about something that's touching, right?

That's why it's called touchy. It's touching a nerve essentially. And they're not accustomed to being able to articulate and share those feelings and those thoughts. And keep control of their emotions when it is touched. And keep control of their emotions when it's happening. And so that's why it's a touchy subject. They're out of practice from doing. And so we avoid them completely. Or when we finally sneak up to address it and...

touch it, oh man, it's just, it's like you have all these open nerve endings and somebody walks up and flicks one of them. Yeah, there that goes. And so then it doesn't get brought up again. Right. For weeks or months or ever, but it didn't go away. And so it's not being addressed. I guess I love talking through this with you because I'm just seeing these glimpses of these moments. We started off our dating relationship by talking about ideas, reading books together.

Rachel Denning (25:59.661)
And then, what does this mean? What does that mean? And again, we were talking about history and philosophy and religion and psychology and communication and relations. We were talking through all this stuff. We were talking through our past and our experiences and stories. We started a whole relationship doing this. And I know some of you are like, you guys are the biggest nerds. That's true. That is true. We're so nerdy. We love learning.

But this is one of the things that gave us such a gigantic advantage is we talked about ideas, concepts. And controversial ideas and concept. Like it wasn't just easy stuff. We liked to dig into the controversial things and try to wrap our heads around them. And so it challenged us to learn how...

how to think about things from all kinds of different angles and then how to put it into words. Well, because we're reading all kinds of different things. And so in reading, you're hearing somebody else's thoughts. They went through the work to articulate. And so it can help you. It helps give you a framework for your own thinking or of a disagreement of a different argument. Right. So going back to the idea when I was saying, you know, one of the things we do is to get the same vocabulary is reading the same books. Like this is that kind of that idea because.

we could read the same book and it would provide this entire framework for a word or a phrase in our idea. And so now all we have to do is reference that and we both know exactly what we're talking about. And it means this whole plethora of things, not just one word, you know, it means a lot. It has a lot of weight because of that shared framework that we have. And we still do that today. Absolutely. So you could grab a book. So those of you listening,

Like, as you're thinking through this and hopefully taking notes and writing things down, one of the things that I think will massively improve communication is just reading books and then discussing them. And it doesn't even necessarily have to be a book about communication, although that could be awesome, but it could be a book. You guys, we've recommended tons of books about understanding men and women and sex and parenting, whatever, but you just grab a book, read it, and talk about it. Listen to a podcast, talk about it.

Rachel Denning (28:22.829)
watch the video, talk about it. So listen to this podcast and then talk through it. And then actually come up with like talking points, things that you would like to talk about, things you need to talk about, just anything you could talk about and start practicing communication. Because I guess I really want to emphasize that right now. This is a learnable skill. Every one of us can get better at this. But you have to practice. That's the only way to get better at it.

If you just keep avoiding or just think, oh, I'm not good at this, I can't do it, you're going to get worse or stay the same at the very least. So some people right now are thinking about this very common phrase that practice makes perfect, which isn't true. Practice makes permanent. Or practice makes improvement. Yeah, hopefully does that. But you're practicing to see what works, to try to make improvements. Some of you...

Maybe pride yourself as being communicators, but really what that means is you talk a lot, maybe too much. And some of you are like, I'm a great listener. And that's true, but you don't say anything. And so that's not communication either. And then some of you might be - Especially if you end up being resentful. Yes. Some of you might - Because you never get a chance to share your thoughts and feelings. Or you get interrupted all the time when you're trying to make a podcast, like right now. Just deal with it.

See all these different elements, see all the things that just come up. And here's what's awesome, is I'll have an idea and I'm sharing it and then you share a different angle, a different perspective, which is so awesome. And we have learned to deeply value that in each other. Because I'll think through something, I'll write about it, I'm like, okay, I'm going to share this. And then she's like, oh, and this and this and that. I'm like, yeah, went and see that.

or didn't think about it that way. And so if you have that openness to be able to converse, and again, we've been doing this for 23 years, and we just keep practicing it. We keep getting better at it. Yeah, we practice this every day. It's not for sure every week, but almost every day.

Rachel Denning (30:39.885)
And then we're practicing it by listening to things, by reading things, by writing things, by bringing all kinds of other people. We have people over at our house. We go over to other people's house. We're connecting to people. We're speaking. We're doing retreats, leading trips. And all of that is coming into it. And so we're seeing things and understanding things and trying to express things and then hearing it expressed back to you, which is actually a really good practice. Listen and then say, I'm going to try to speak back what I thought I heard. And often it's like, whoa, I was.

way off. All right? You're like, is this what you're saying? You're like, no, that's not all I said. So what you're saying is... Wow! Yeah, exactly. And you might... And be open to that. Be like, can I make an attempt? Are you saying this instead of... So you're saying this. No, I'm not. And you totally misunderstand things. So that's probably the best practice right there, is repeating back what you think you heard. Because you could be saying one thing, and this has happened so many times in our marriage, we've lost count. You're saying something or I'm saying something.

And what you're hearing is not what I'm saying. Right. So either I'm not good at articulating it or we have different meanings to words. And so I'm hearing something that's not being said. Yeah, because because of our inevitable differing viewpoints and backgrounds. That's just going to happen. You're not going to be seeing it or thinking about it exactly the same way. And so I think especially if you're trying to practice and there's a lot of confusion.

miscommunication going on that is a very great practice just to do this repeating back like so are you saying this because

That gives them a chance to clarify. You're not making assumptions. You're not assuming that, oh, that's what you meant. And then you go on in your day and you're like, but you said this. No, I didn't. Never said that. Exactly. That happens so many times. So as I'm thinking about this, I have another idea that I want to address here is because sometimes I've heard people tell me, well, I don't know what.

Rachel Denning (32:49.677)
say we'll be talking about something maybe it's something important or just something that needs to be addressed and my spouse will say something or they'll change the subject and my mind just goes blank right so you're trying to communicate about important issues

but you don't know what to say. You literally don't. And so part of this whole communication process involves this following up, I guess in a way. Cause some people they'll just, they'll leave it like, Oh, that never got resolved. The subject got changed. We just move on and we never go back to it. That's something you and I never do. Like at least me, I think you're good about this too. Um, I follow up, I make sure that it gets resolved. And by resolved, I mean,

we return to feelings of adoration for each other, basically. Like if we're not in a state of constant adoration, something's off for us. And we, for us, we put everything else on hold until we get back to that. We stop working, we stop. I was just sitting here thinking how difficult it is to report a podcast with you because I adore you so much.

You're very distracted. We have to put it on pause. We have to focus. No, but it's real. I guess that's what we want to emphasize. You and I are in that constant state pretty much. Because it's a gigantic priority to us and therefore a standard that things have to be settled and good between us. Like we're not just going to go on for hours or days or weeks or months or years. It's never gone days even. I don't know.

No, it's like this is maybe hours getting addressed. And sometimes the only reason it goes that long is because you literally are gone or. Right. I'm like, so I have to go. I have to do this. Yeah. But otherwise, because we've already learned, we know that when our relationship is in tip top condition, everything else in life is easier. Like it just is. Everything in life is so much easier because we're in sync.

Rachel Denning (34:59.021)
The parenting, the homeschooling, the business, all of our energy, emotion, focus can go to those things because we're not stressed and worried about the relationship. It's not being interrupted. And so if the relationship is off at all, we put everything else on hold. We'll stop the homeschooling. We stop working. Like everything else stops until we fix that relationship. We have the advantage. We work from home, so we don't have to go to the office. We can just...

take care of it. We can just put everything on pause because that to us is the top priority and it needs to be resolved. But doing so, I mean, seriously makes so much, seriously makes everything so much better. Right. And so it has to be a legitimately top priority. What's interesting though is that, well, it forces you to have a skill set to resolve too because,

if we're like, okay, this top priority and it takes us 10 weeks to resolve it, then your life would fall apart. Which I also get that because I do feel sometimes that's what it was like. Sometimes I felt like that of like, oh my gosh, we don't have time to do this. We weren't as good at it. And it took us longer to resolve issues. And so it felt like it wasn't wise to do.

because it was taking so much time. But doing that helped us practice so that then we actually got better at it. So now we can do it faster. Maybe you could almost, I don't know if I dare even say this, but what if you like put timelines on it and say, look, let's discuss this and let's have it kind of, let's make progress, maybe even have it settled in an hour.

Because you're like, if we're just going to sit here and blab for the next seven hours, the kids are going to starve to death and burn the house down. And so you've got to put some parameters on there and like, OK, let's be concise. Let's be, you know, I keep thinking as we're talking about this and I'm listening to you is like, communication all plays into your own development. Like where you're at in your own journey of development and your own maturity. I think.

Rachel Denning (37:14.381)
way to see this is like, well, when most of us are underdeveloped communicators and it might be because we have underdeveloped, I don't want this to sound rude or mean anything. We just have underdeveloped intellects or underdeveloped character or underdeveloped emotional mastery. And so you come in and you have some feedback and you come and say, well, Greg, I, um, kind of, may I share something that I would like you to improve on? Well, if I'm Mr. Ego maniac and Mr. Sensitive and all that,

you know, it's all, I'm just as fragile as can be. What? A porcupine. I'm the porcupine. There's a book, How to Hug a Porcupine, about disagreeable people. Oh, or I'm disagreeable. I'm just saying I'm fragile. And so then, like, I put up this barrier, this shield, and I'm like, I want to be a good husband. Okay. And then you offer some kind of feedback and it just shatters me. Shatters me. Yeah. Or I just turn around and...

Oh yeah? Well let me tell you things that you suck at. Right? And there it goes. And all communication is broken and ruined and done and now I've just trained her like, boy she can't make any suggestions for my improvement. Which is gentlemen, the worst thing you could ever do is make your wife afraid to tell you how you could be better. Because ultimately that's actually the point of marriage. You...

Marry someone. Aren't you just supposed to love me as I am? No, I'm not. You marry someone so that you have someone close who can see your faults and point them out and tell you how to improve. Like, I honestly feel like most people don't realize this. They don't realize that that is the point of being married. To help you grow and improve. Because they want to escape into this safe place where I can like hide my weaknesses. Let myself go. Yeah, just...

Just deal with it. Can you just love me as I am and not want me to change you? Like, are you crazy? Marriage is the perfect place for improvement. Right. And that attitude is the foundation for a miserable marriage. Because if you both say, well, just love me the way I am, which means I can be my worst self, well, yeah, of course you're going to have a miserable marriage. That's the perfect storm. So when we realize that la -

Rachel Denning (39:35.213)
marriage is a laboratory for personal growth and development, then we start to be grateful for our spouse pointing out our weaknesses because, I mean, you know, kind of grateful, but we are, we're grateful that. I have gotten to a place where I am sincerely and genuinely grateful for the refining process that you bring to my life. I genuinely am.

there were times early on where I felt fragile, I felt like I was being attacked. And I'm sure it was the same for you, like we're trying to figure this out. But you have to outgrow that. Be like, this is exactly what I want. What I want from you is to share ways that I can get better.

What I want from you is your criticism. Yeah. And now that doesn't always make you right about me, nor me right about you. So we have that. We go, OK, well, that's interesting. Can I share my perspective? And then let's work through something that we can work this out. But many couples we talk to, they feel like they can never bring that up with their spouse. We get messages like that all the time. Like, hey, there's no way I can talk to my spouse about this. Can you address it? Can you just? I'm like, whoa, why?

What has happened that you're not allowed to talk about things? Right. Yeah, we get a lot of people saying their marriage is in trouble, they're having problems, and we recommend a book. And I can't talk to my spouse about that. Well, obviously, that's why you have problems then. If you can't talk about these basic things, that's the source of the problem. That right there is why you have the additional problems.

You're right. And that's, it's fascinating to me. We'll get things like, we'll recommend a book. They're like, I could never recommend that book. Or why don't you guys listen to this podcast together or watch this video together or do this. No, I, there's no way I could even bring that up. Like, whoa, that's so insightful to me. Like, wait a minute. You can't even say, hey, let's read this book together. Or, hey, babe, I really think you should listen to this episode or, hey, let's talk about this thing. And you can't even do that.

Rachel Denning (41:50.221)
That's a gigantic indication of the current state of your communication. Well, right, because you're wanting to resolve a certain problem, whatever it is, but that will never happen until you can do this thing, until you can bring up certain topics and discuss certain issues together. I don't, I honestly don't think there's any hope.

in you solving these other bigger issues because they are a result of your inability to discuss and talk about things. It ultimately comes down to this. And that's, you guys, that is literally why we were doing this episode today, is to talk about these communication skills that are absolutely essential, indispensable to having a great marriage. In fact, so many of you, even if your communication is okay and you're listening to this and like, oh, we don't have really any troubles, I promise there are new heights.

new levels of possibility, new levels of extraordinary that we've not reached yet because of limitations in our communication. And even if you're an amazing communicator, I promise there's another level of amazing communication that gets even higher, even deeper. Like Rachel, I've been married 22 years and we feel like we know each other. I promise there's still so much we don't know. And we feel like we've talked about it all.

I promise there are things we haven't talked about yet and levels we haven't talked about yet and and communication deep deep communication that we haven't reached yet. And and we were actually really good at body language and in all the other types of communication that's there and yet there's new heights to this. So let's let's dive in specifically to hard conversations and getting to hard conversations.

Okay, I like what you just said. They're getting to hard conversations because I think for some people they're having a hard time even having a conversation and maybe because it is actually a hard conversation. Like they can talk about the groceries but they can't talk about their sex life or they can't talk about...

Rachel Denning (44:06.989)
parenting problems, or they can't talk about, you know, anything that's touching. The food problems, and yeah, like, yeah, whatever, or even, you know, all the touchy things, politics, religions, behaviors, habits, addictions, your past, your family, whatever, all these things. So then, right away, I'd say the first step for, and I'm sincere about this, and man, if you don't hear anything else from this podcast, but this, hear this, drastic, dramatic improvements will come.

in your communication if nothing's off the table. If everything is available for discussion. And people of course are like, ah, that's terrifying. Fight or flight mode, right? Well, this reminds me of another point because one of the keys to great communication is to say what comes to mind.

But if you have something that comes to mind, but you can't talk about it, you can't mention it, you can't bring it up, then naturally that inhibits your communication. I think that is honestly one of the reasons why people get into troubles because they feel like, oh, I have a thought that comes up and I can't share it. Or I don't know how to share it because just because it comes up doesn't mean you have to say it exactly that way. You know, editing is fine and.

Diplomacy is awesome. Right. That definitely comes into play there. But if you're not allowed to say the things you think and feel, then you are naturally going to have communication problems. So obviously, be tactful. Be diplomatic. Some of you, again, I'm going to be blunt here, just in our observations. I think frankness is helpful. Speaking of communication, be frank. And many of you.

really struggle with diplomacy intact. You just burp on the people you're talking to. You vomit on them and you're like, okay, had you said that a little more kindly or you can still be direct and kind. You can say the exact same thing with a question instead of an exclamation mark. Totally changes everything. So you can speak about it. But back to what we're talking about, maybe if you picture communication as this whole pie, right? You do a little pie chart.

Rachel Denning (46:28.301)
communication is the whole pie. And if everything is open for discussion, you got the whole pie and this full, whole communication. But if I'm taking out huge sections of the pie, major pieces are blocked out, you can't talk about that. Don't you dare bring that up again. And this is off, and all of a sudden, what it's doing is limiting communication, therefore limiting our relationship. Yes.

So whatever you take off the table, and this is how you, I really want you to conceptualize this. Whatever you take off the table, either overtly or covertly, like whether you do it consciously and deliberately, say don't talk about this, or you react a certain way, boy that trains your kids and your wife, like don't ever bring that up. Then you are limiting your life. You are limiting the quality of your relationships and the quality of communication. Right, well besides that, I think you're,

Ultimately limiting yourself as well. Absolutely. Because one of the reasons why it can't be brought up is because it's still unresolved in your own life. You don't want to talk about this issue because you haven't processed that issue. And that's why it's off the table. And it's painful. Exactly. So it hurts you and of course they can't bring it up and you want to put it back on them. A law of proximity like my pain. So you come up and you say, hey, what about this? And I haven't done anything about it. Oh baby. Whether I want to or not, it's going to explode on you.

Right. It's the analogy we've used before of like the thorn in the flesh. You've got this wound that's painful, but instead of pulling out the thorn and letting it heal, you just cover it up and protect it and don't let anyone turn to the side and don't let anyone bump into it or touch it. That doesn't actually solve it. It just still there festering. And so I'm, I'm inviting you with an, I'm

I mean I wish we were like in person and with with total love here. I'm inviting you to be able to allow your spouse especially but maybe other trusted people in your life. Let them walk right up and say I see you have a thorn.

Rachel Denning (48:45.133)
Pull it out or let me help you pull it out. Let's address the problem and get it healed. And I know some of you are just maybe crying right now or wincing at least like, wow, but you've got to be able to do that. I can't keep anything back from Rachel or I'm limiting myself and our relationship. So everything's on the table and she can come up to me and bring out anything and say,

let's talk about that. Now, if it's something that I have neglected or avoided or whatever, or I haven't processed, there's gonna be some pain there, but that's part of the process. It's like, this is back to the obstacle is the way, the impediment. The very thing you're avoiding is the very thing you need to go to the next level of your life. The thing you're not talking about, if you'll talk about it, that'll be the thing that'll take you to the next level of communication.

And so I know that some people are saying, well, what if I'm willing to do that but my spouse isn't? What if I try to talk about their thorn but they just backhand me? Sucks to be you. I knew something like that was coming. No, obviously that's going to happen too, right? But again.

It's rarely ever completely one -sided. That was one thought I got. That one spouse is like, I'm an open book. I'll talk about anything. It's you. Right. Well, you are the problem. There's something there. And maybe it's tact. Maybe it's diplomacy. Maybe it's conditioning from interactions with you before. Where you're like, I never did that. But maybe unconsciously now they're like, I can't trust you. Right. Oh, do you remember that beautiful part of The Scarlet Pimpernel?

I love that book so much and that movie. And he overhears something and misunderstands it. And because he misunderstood something, he heard his wife say he couldn't trust her. And so he wouldn't open up, he wouldn't tell her anything because he thought he couldn't trust her. So it's an example of a misunderstanding where he's like, yeah, that just shut off communication and total openness and transparency. And of course, intimacy into me you see, right?

Rachel Denning (51:09.293)
Oh, that's good. Yeah, well, that's from one of my, in our, in a, I interviewed this guy for my podcast and he shared that. I'm like, yep, that's it. It's like, it's seeing into us, everything. It's all there. It's open. Right. And so he wouldn't do that because of this misunderstanding. And so it was kind of her fault, his fault, right? It was too side of this. I guess that's my point. It's like, it's rarely like this. Like, well, I'm not opening up because I don't know if I can trust you. And so he has to be able to trust you. So I, I can share everything with Rachel.

because I have this trust in you. So maybe, listener, you haven't earned that trust yet, interestingly. That may be one of the elements. Well, because as we've talked about before, we have conditioned those around us to treat us and to respond to us in the ways that they do. So while you're saying, oh, my spouse won't open up to me,

Well, the truth is you have trained your spouse to not open up to you. And again, it's not necessarily consciously. Very often it's unconsciously. We don't know most of the time. We don't know what we're doing that's actually causing these problems until they become a problem. And then we're like, Oh, how do I fix this? Same with our kids. Yeah. Same with our kids. We condition and train our kids whether they'll talk to us or not. Right. And so,

If your spouse is not willing to talk about the thorns in the flesh, you know, especially their own, you have to begin by talking about your own thorns, I think. Like, I think it has to begin there, which is hard because it requires you to be vulnerable without reciprocation very often. And that's scary. That's very frightening. But... That can open a gateway. It can.

And I would in some ways say there's no guarantees, of course. That's partly why it's so terrifying. But we have to risk it. But we have to risk because if not, you're risking the complete loss of the relationship. That's really the only other option. Either you risk total and complete vulnerability or you risk losing the relationship. Right. So if we're going to bring up really difficult things and I'm going to approach Rachel, there's a risk there. There's a risk that this may.

Rachel Denning (53:30.093)
really damage our relationship. But the other risk is we just go on and on in this mediocre existence. Mediocre, although more likely to... This is hypothetical, of course, because our relationship is amazing. This is a hypothetical. Oh, I thought you were just talking about people in general, not us specifically. But I guess what I was saying is mediocre, although likely to continue to lead to something worth it. Like you always say...

You know growth is an uphill journey. That's not exactly how you say it. That's the idea and you're either progressing or you're digressing you cannot stay static and that means If it's mediocre, it's likely the only to continue to get worse if it's already bad It's likely going to end in divorce like that's just the natural path for things in life. So

if we don't take the risks necessary despite their pain and consequences and consequences, um, the other consequences are as painful truthfully because you can end a divorce or you can open up and be vulnerable and still risk that. But at least you're taking the chance of creating something getting to something higher.

Yeah. So, man, as I'm thinking about this here, I think the first place to start is...

This is always the case. Start with yourself first. It always is. And so if I'm sitting here saying, it doesn't feel like Rachel is completely open with me, let's say hypothetically, then the first place I'm going to look is me and say, what could I do so that she feels safer in being able to talk about anything? Right? And like, look at yourself honestly, it might be.

Rachel Denning (55:37.325)
something about you that's actually preventing your spouse from, even if it's painful for your spouse to bring it up, you've gotta do that. And I can think of lots of things. This trust thing keeps coming up. If you just share everything under the sun with your mom, for example, I'm like, I'm never telling her that, because she'll just turn around and call her mom, and then her mom will tell everybody, and then that's never coming up, right? If that were the situation. Or if...

if I'm afraid of your reaction. But I'm like, man, if I bring this up and she is gonna blow a gasket, I can never bring it up. Isn't that interesting? So some of you might be listening, well, my spouse is sharing and your spouse is sitting there saying, I would, but. And so it could honestly be something you're doing that they're looking at saying, I can't bring that up. Right. And more honestly than not, more honestly, more realistically than not, that is the case exactly.

you're not aware of your own blind spots that are actually contributing to the unwillingness to share or open up. And so then, and then ironically your spouse might be like, gosh, I need to talk to him or her about how they just tell everything to the neighbor or to their mom or whatever. Like that's gotta stop. But you bring that up like, are you talking about my mom again? There we go. And so it's this ripple effect, right? It's this cascade.

Like I want to tell you stuff, but I can't because you blab. But I can't even talk to you about how you blab with your mom. But whatever, I'm just coming up with examples here. But you see this cascade effect of communication. And so it's - Right. And so people are there saying, that's where I'm at. What do I do? This is a mess. How do I fix it? How do I solve it? Yeah. I would say, and I'm sincere in this, like listen to this episode with your spouse. So it becomes a catalyst for conversation. That's all it is.

Let this episode be a catalyst for conversation or just start practicing. Maybe sit down and write out a list of things you'd like to talk about and just grab one. And I don't know. I know a lot of people don't have this open frame conversation. Like if with you and me now, I just want to be like, hey, babe, we really need to talk about this situation. And I remember, do you remember this early on, we would be like, we need to talk.

Rachel Denning (57:59.405)
And I would get this sick feeling every time. I'm like, oh no crap, here it comes. And then sometimes it would be like, there was a serious talk and I dreaded it. I'd have butterflies, be sweating. Like it ruined my whole day. Like, hey, when you get home from work, we need to talk about it. I was like, ah. And then sometimes it'd be like, hey, we need to do this. I'm like, that's what I was worried about that all day long. And that you said, we need to talk. And it's like, ah. And those were like trigger words.

And then sometimes they were painful and hard and like, ugh. But now we're like, hey, let's talk about it. It's like, OK. Well, it's kind of funny because I would say now I actually am excited. When you say we need to talk, I'm like, oh, OK. Yes. What? What are we going to talk about? I'm so excited. And obviously, that's completely related to our development as people. We've been developing ourselves and growing and handling more things. And even if problems come up, like, hey, we got a real problem. Let's talk about this. OK, let's sit down and look for solutions.

instead of afraid of our problems or afraid of our insecurities or whatever comes up. Well, so that reminds me of another thing because I know some people are saying, well, I tried that. I tried to open up. I tried to be vulnerable. I tried to talk to my spouse and it didn't work or I just got hurt or you know, whatever. It just, it just didn't work. And I'm sitting, you know, as I'm thinking about people saying that to me and they have,

I'm like, well, how long have you been training quote unquote, training your spouse to respond in this other way? It's likely been years or decades. And now you expect to try something new for days, weeks, months, even, and it's going to be a good reaction. It's going to change that. Right. And then going back to that trust thing, like your spouse is sitting there thinking.

I don't know if this is for real or if this is long lasting or if this is legit. I don't know if you've actually changed. Yeah. And so we can't expect as painful as it is as.

Rachel Denning (01:00:05.453)
raw as it feels, like we can't expect that it's going to change quickly. It's been developing for years. It will likely, and this sounds depressing, take years to fix. But what's your alternative? I hate your slow approach to lifestyle. But you forget that they're dealing with mere mortals, okay? They're not married to Greg Downey. Come on!

So, and my perspective of that is like, okay, you're right. Some of it may take years, but some of it may happen immediately. Destination overnight, but you can change direction. You've changed the direction, but it might take time for your spouse to catch up to you. One of the things I was talking about with one of my coaching clients this morning, we had a really special session and it was talking about like literally showing up tomorrow as a totally different.

version of yourself. A completely upgraded software. I'm actually gonna do a whole episode on this. You know how Safari used to be like, they did Leopard, and no, Apple, I mean, Apple did like Leopard and then Snow Leopard, and then all of a sudden they're like Yosemite, and they're like, what? What? I thought we were doing Cats. And now it's like, because it's a whole new system. It wasn't a patch, it was like, oh, here's a little update fixing some bugs. And oh, here's a little upgrade. It was like, boom, new software.

And I want to invite, and I'm going to do it again, I'll do a whole episode on this. You can show up tomorrow as a completely better version of yourself. You can, in a moment, it's possible.

to totally change to a better version of you. And if you show up differently, that can have immediate positive consequences. So if I've always been hyper sensitive to anything you say, and I show up and I apologize for that, we actually did this, I would go up and I'm like, babe, I'm really sorry that I haven't been this great of a husband or father in this thing.

Rachel Denning (01:02:17.677)
I genuinely want to be the best. What do you see, what do you observe that I can do better? And I mean it. So I apologize, I acknowledge that I've been sensitive about it, I've been void of whatever. I know you've said things before and I reacted, I promise no reaction here. I want your honest feedback how I can be better in this thing. And she's, oh, I was nervous, like, oh boy, do I dare?

and she says something and I don't react. And I say, thank you, I'm gonna start working on that. And in her mind she's like, yeah, we'll see, right? This is what I love about the feminine. The feminine always tests the masculine. Like, I come in and be like, babe, I'm gonna do the different, and she's like, uh -huh, we'll see how long that lasts. It's awesome, that's the feminine attribute, it's awesome. And I don't react. And she's like, whoa, okay, I just gave him direct feedback and he didn't.

overreact, wow, maybe this has opened up a new level of communication for us. So this is one, like a specific example of like, I come in as a different person and now I go away and I actually work on it. And then I come back and I say, babe, I've been working on that. Thanks for your feedback. Is there anything else you'd like me to do better, differently? Or, hey, I know we've always had some conflict around, whatever, money.

kids, faith, politics, whatever. Can we address that now? And because I have come from a different approach, he's like, you know what? He didn't blow up last time. Maybe we could actually talk about this. And you keep your cool. Yeah. And I think one of the best ways, at least for me, to do that, because I know it can be difficult. And I think especially,

if your spouse is not already on board with responding in a great way or whatever, like it can even, it can be even more difficult. But if you can pay attention and simply, it was this, I don't even know if it was a quote or just something I heard somewhere. It's like, whatever you think, think the opposite. And for some reason that stuck with me and I do like to use that so that when you go into this situation and you feel,

Rachel Denning (01:04:45.805)
tempted, let's use that word, to behave in your normal ways. If you simply think, do the opposite, that at least breaks the pattern. Like maybe you don't do exactly the opposite thing, but it breaks the pattern of like, okay, what could I do instead? This is what I normally do. What would change this? Maybe you want to withdraw, but instead you reach out and hold the hand. Ooh, that's so good. Cause some of you are runners. Yeah.

You just totally withdraw. The topic comes up and see you. Doors are slamming and you're on the run. And now you just stay. And it can be hard because I think we honestly get prideful or, you know, our ego gets in the way and we're like, oh, I don't want to do that. I don't want to hold his hand. But if you do it anyways, you make yourself do the opposite. That starts to break down those boundaries and it interrupts that drama triangle that's going on because suddenly...

their brain is like, whoa, this is different. They're responding in a new way. Wow. What's going to happen? Right. And so if you're a fighter and you don't fight, or if you're a fleer and you don't flee, you could even approach it like that. You might even go up to your spouse and say, hey, babe, we've always kind of, it's gotten hot around this topic. Like, let's try to like have this, let's bring it up and kind of do it as like third party observers. Let's kind of just detach.

So all of our emotional stuff, we'll set it over here in the corner. Let's just talk about it. I just want to understand you and no emotion here. Let's pretend we're talking about other people. Yes. Let's bring, like, whatever it takes to just emotionally like, hey, we're in disconnect and we're just going to talk about it. So I know a lot of couples really get emotional, sensitive around. We've mentioned these topics several times already, but sex is one that comes up a lot. Or health, like if one of you is overweight or out of shape or exercising.

or the kids or your past or addiction, right? If you have bad habits and like every time I bring this up, like, hey, let's just try to just talk about it. And again, we both agree to check the emotions at the door. We're not gonna get into that. We're just gonna talk through it. And you have to keep your word. So you might approach it like that and be like, babe, okay, this has been really sensitive. Let's just talk about it.

Rachel Denning (01:07:07.981)
And you might literally be like, keep my cool, keep my cool, I'm gonna do some breathing over here. Looks like I'm doing my labor breathing. But keep your cool and stay in the game. Yeah, all of that is a part of doing the opposite thing because you're breaking these habitual patterns that you've been stuck in, these ruts, that you've been stuck in for potentially decades. And so, yeah, it interrupts that drama triangle, you know?

Maybe, well, one thing I thought of is like, you know, if your spouse is the fleer, and this, I think this can sometimes be common for the women. They flee. And they run to the master closet and they get in a fetal position behind the clothes and they cry. And the man doesn't like to pursue that a lot of times. Oh no, he's like, you can go. Yeah, you go hide. You little mess. But the woman loves to be pursued.

She wants to chase. Even though she says, leave me alone. It's part of the testing of the masculine, right? Will you actually chase me down? So that's part of interrupting those patterns, I think, is if you've been in the past just like, okay, you let them go. And again, this could go by both ways. Pursue them, you know, and let them know that I love you. I want to talk about this. I don't want you to just run away. Now.

Sometimes we you know people legitimately need a break sure you need some time to think about it or to cool down and you know Or go right and maybe you ask you know do you need a break right now? Do you want to take some time to cool down? Or do you want me to come after you? And how do I know whether to believe you or not? I know it's complicated. It's so complicated. The challenge is because it is so complicated if you don't practice

You're never going to figure it out. I guess that's part of our message too. Like you were saying, there are so many levels, so many more levels of awesomeness, but you have to pass the lower levels first to get to the next level. It's like a video game here. You have to level up. Can we never use video games as a good metaphor? But it's one people understand because while I was listening to someone,

Rachel Denning (01:09:33.037)
probably Jordan Peterson, obviously, because who else do I listen to? Talking about it with someone and they're like, people like video games because it's a world they understand with rules they understand. You know, it's contained. It's like playing a chess game. You know what the rules are. Video games are similar. You know what the rules are, you know what the levels are, you know how to level up. And a lot of people don't do that in their own life because they don't know what the rules are.

That's a perfect example in communication. Yeah. Because you don't know. And so you don't know what you're going to get or what's going to happen. Or the rules are arbitrary or crazy or ridiculous, honestly. Or it feels like they change. We can't talk about money because it's so reactive and there's so many issues around it. Like you have so much baggage. We're married and we can't have a civil, mature conversation about money. That's ridiculous. And so it gets infuriating. Yeah.

and feels uncertain because we don't know all of these rules and someone has different rules than we have. That's another part of it. And so it does feel so uncertain, which is one of the psychological reasons that people are turning to video games because there's more certainty there. There's more clarity about how to succeed.

pseudo -circumstance, imaginary world because you don't have it in your own world. When you feel like you can't master your own world then you have to get this sense of mastery and significance and that that can come from playing the video games especially when you're not getting in your own world. Wow, wow. So I'm gonna hold up an ideal again that I want, I want to invite you to pursue that you get to this

You're pursuing the ideal of being able to effectively communicate about anything and everything that needs to be addressed. You move beyond the superficial, the transactional to the transformational. Anything's on the table and there will be emotions, of course, and we should, there should be, we should have feelings. There will be some pain. Stuff will come up and it will hurt.

Rachel Denning (01:11:49.133)
And don't just shove it back down because a bleeding wound that never heals will discontinue indefinitely. It's not healthy. It is not healthy. And so let it come up, address it, fix it. Like if you want to have an extraordinary marriage and a great life, learn how to communicate through everything. And I would say that there are levels to that as well because...

One thing you can definitely do starting talking about starting with yourself is to practice writing. You can begin writing about everything on the table, right? All of these issues, even if you don't feel like you can bring them up to your spouse yet, or you try and it doesn't work so well yet, you can write about it. Yes, that's such that's the that's the place to start. Yeah, start with paper.

So it just, all the motion comes up. And maybe you have to write it. Especially all the hate and anger and resentment, all of the really ugly stuff. Yeah. Which is there, you don't want to vomit that on your spouse right away. So if you take it out on paper, not on people like we say, and maybe you do it a couple of times where you process it, and then by the third or fourth time. And take the edited version. Yeah. And by then, you've let go of so much pain. And you're like, OK, wow, that was.

that was way less emotional this time than last time, like, I think I'm to a place where I can talk about it now. And then do that. So that's my recommendation. So whether it's you or your spouse, write about it. The sensitive thing, just write about it. And maybe you guys could even do that. Rachel, I've done that a couple of times. Not often. We've done a couple of times where we're like, we want to talk about something and talking about it was a little too sensitive. We would write about it. Or email each other. Yep. So you send me an email. No, and that's a great idea. I'm going to draft an email and send it over to you. And you write it all up and it helps you again.

Think through it. So writing process helps you think through. You send it over. And then the person, I'm not right there with you looking at me. I get to read it and respond and have my emotional responses, my mental responses. And I get to process it, oh, OK, without you being there. Sometimes it's too sensitive. It's too much. There's too much pressure from whatever. And so you get to process it. Like, OK, and think. And maybe you write a response, but don't send it. Wait a little bit, and then reread it. And like, oh, that wasn't quite right. And then go through it and let.

Rachel Denning (01:14:06.861)
Just start practicing that. The responses and what you want to say and how you want to feel. Man, this is critical. Indispensable. You've got to practice this. It is. And I know that you might be sitting there thinking like, oh, there's just so many roadblocks in the way. But they are opportunities. Yep. Every one of them. Because the obstacle is the way. And every one of those.

This is what people don't understand that I just wish I could implant into their brain. Like, Hey, get this. Every one of those challenges and obstacles is an opportunity for you to grow and for your relationship to deepen. They really are. And we're afraid of them because we're afraid of the pain, but the pain will actually bring you closer together and will strengthen you. So practice engaging, starting.

facilitating, engaging, staying engaged in difficult conversations. I know some of you literally are like running and slamming doors, others are fighting. Some of you are like literally hiding under your pillows or like looking away or ranting and raving like a little child, like just stop. Or avoiding. Or avoiding, yeah. Or rolling your eyes or making sounds or like sitting back. Like your body language, your posture, all this fighting. So like.

Practice. Like I'm engaged here. Being an adult? Yeah. Practice some, again, it's maturity. Not saying that you're an immature person, but there is a level of maturity and development here. Like practice being mature. Practice being developed. Like you're not sitting there looking at your phone or looking away or fidgeting with something. Like you're engaged. You're engaged. You're there in the room with them mentally and emotionally. And I'm genuinely trying to hear and understand you.

seeking to understand. I'll worry later about being understood. First, I'm seeking to understand.

Rachel Denning (01:16:12.237)
Then I try to repeat back and see if I'm understood and keep doing that. Okay, I feel like I understand you. And then like me, I share what I think the perspective and be okay with different perspectives. Rachel and I are very, very different, you guys. We're vastly different. We get along wonderfully. We don't have to be the same. We don't have to see things the same to work well. Right? I love this stuff. So reach out to us if you have.

specific questions about this, because this comes up every day, doesn't it? Some element of communication comes up every single day, not only in our own marriage and with our kids, but with our clients and the wonderful people with you guys, with the wonderful people we get to work with. We get questions about this or issues about this, and it's often we'll be like, yeah, that particular challenge would be so much easier to resolve if there was open communication about it. Well, all of the challenges in your life.

are easier to resolve when there's open communication. Back to this idea, when we're in sync, everything else is easier. It's easier to make decisions. It's easier to move forward on our goals. It's easier to help our children. Every single thing is easier and simpler when we are able to communicate effectively about them. So true. Love it. OK. Practice writing.

Writing is the huge one. I don't know if I could recommend that enough. Practice writing. That's going to be your first practice. And it's so risk free. Yes. Just practice. I want to talk to my spouse about this. Write out everything you want to say, and then write it again, and then write it again, and you get it all out. And you're going to be so much better off. And even ask your spouse, if it's been sensitive, say, why don't you write your thoughts down about it? Just get in on writing. And let me read it. Or just write it and then throw it away, or whatever. Let's just.

Let's start the process. And then practice these things. And if you guys have questions about specifics or challenges, or actually if you practice it and let us know how it goes, this has to be a priority. And as always, if you haven't subscribed to the podcast yet, subscribe to the podcast. Share this with friends, families, colleagues, anyone who's married or communicates in any way with any human should hear this episode. And get it out there because.

Rachel Denning (01:18:39.149)
this has to be part and again, want to like reemphasize.

The, how do you describe it? It's magical. The magical element of connection in marriage and with your kids. I mean, we're specifically emphasizing and focusing on family here. I guess I just want to share this one little thing because I think it's an illustration of the magic we have created.

which began obviously with our marriage because when the marriage is magical, then the family life becomes magical. Just last night, we were all over at my aunt's house and you know, we just had dinner and stuff. And then because of our schedules, we ended up having four vehicles over there. We had our van, the truck, our Audi and the motorcycle. And so all the teenagers were like, let's caravan home together, right? And so we all drove home together and...

I was driving behind my son on his motorcycle and we were talking about, we drove from Alaska to Panama once and we want to, someday we want to finish that trip and drive all the way to Argentina. And I'm like, yeah, we're gonna drive Alaska to Argentina. But when we got home, our 18 year old son was just like, that's just the best. We just have so much fun. We're the best, we're the funnest family. We have such a great time, you know, just.

And all these big dreams and they were talking about like, we're going to get our Land Rover Defenders all decked out on motorcycles. And so it was just fun because more and more, especially our older children, are voicing this kind of magic we have in the family of that we do have great relationships and that we do have fun and we achieve our goals and dreams and all of these kind of things that they're starting to notice not everyone has. And...

Rachel Denning (01:20:33.645)
A huge part of this, of course, is this magic we've created through communicating in our marriage, which then radiates out to the entire family. Everything else in life is somehow either directly or indirectly connected to the quality of our communication. Yeah. And then, man, just this morning I heard about this family without traveling and they're...

communication is just broken. It was so sad, just fighting, fighting between parents and kids, between siblings against each other, between the parents. It was just, it just radiates, it's just obvious. There's just so much fighting and so much bitterness and so much sorrow. And you take that and you contrast that with what we have, for example, just the magic that's possible. Oh, that's why I'm sharing this. Like you guys, there's so many levels.

of pure awesomeness that is available in almost every aspect of life if we will practice and learn how to communicate better. So start today, work on it, do something and watch how it begins to have that cascade effect and starts trickling over to every other part of your life as you are learning to communicate more effectively. Bye guys, reach out for it.

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