Speaker 1: Hey, fam, I'm Jada Pinkett Smith and this is the
Speaker 1: Red Table Pop podcast, all your favorite episodes from the
Speaker 1: Facebook Watch show in audio produced by Westbrook Audio and
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio. Please don't forget to rate and review
Speaker 1: on Apple podcasts. On this Red Table Talk, it's challenging.
Speaker 1: You're forced and look at things differently. For couples feeling
Speaker 1: the pressure in quarantine, I go straight to fight help
Speaker 1: from world renowned intimacy expert our personal counselor for Will
Speaker 1: and I both Mikhaela Bone Assume the best and not
Speaker 1: the worst. Understand Listen be quiet. Fame pastor John Gray
Speaker 1: opens up about his marriage. I have been forced into intimacy.
Speaker 1: This quarantine life is super hard. I definitely have control issues.
Speaker 1: One of the things that I realize is that I
Speaker 1: don't know Will at all. How your relationship can survive
Speaker 1: the coronavirus pandemic quarantine. I don't my Borkini, honey, And
Speaker 1: it looks fabulous, darling, fabulous. I'm excited about this topic
Speaker 1: today for sure. Definitely. Yeah, I'm really excited about this
Speaker 1: Red Table today. You're going to meet a woman who
Speaker 1: has been counseling Will and myself for years. This pandemic
Speaker 1: is causing serious damage to many partnerships, and the force
Speaker 1: togetherness is like living in a pressure cooker and pushing
Speaker 1: many couples over the edge. Did you guys hear about
Speaker 1: that tweet going around on Twitter that says you can't
Speaker 1: spell divorce without COVID? Did? I refused to be worried
Speaker 1: about spelling divorce anymore in my lifetime. So, yeah, you've
Speaker 1: had enough enough divorce. So I'm just in the place.
Speaker 1: I'm just like, I just want peace. Yeah, and anyway
Speaker 1: you can do that. Just like today I needed a
Speaker 1: reason like getting up and having to come to this
Speaker 1: table able. I said, we would make you feel good.
Speaker 1: I want to feel like I'm going to the beach,
Speaker 1: put on our babe in soon and you look beautiful.
Speaker 1: Let me just say a little overall like because I
Speaker 1: was like, baby, whatever you need to do to feel
Speaker 1: good about what is happening today, do it. You know.
Speaker 1: I find that's really helpful for me to just like
Speaker 1: take a little moment for myself. Yeah, Nanny and I
Speaker 1: are really good with giving each other space and time.
Speaker 1: That's one of the biggest things. Yeah, to help us
Speaker 1: navigate our relationship challenges. During the pandemic is author, teacher,
Speaker 1: counselor our personal counselor for Will and I both got
Speaker 1: to include that exactly. MICHAELA Bone, Hey, MICHAELA. Welcome to
Speaker 1: the time. Oh I wish you could actually be here,
Speaker 1: but welcome, MICHAELA. Thank you. MICHAELA works personally helping couples
Speaker 1: and people navigate through their issues. Mackayla, let me ask this.
Speaker 1: I definitely have control issues. I think Jada probably does too,
Speaker 1: and so I'm finding that that is really kicking in
Speaker 1: for me, Like being in this coronavirus pandemic has kind
Speaker 1: of thrown me back into that wanting to control everything.
Speaker 1: I also think sometimes when you're just under stress, like
Speaker 1: those underlying feelings get in hand enhanced to All human
Speaker 1: beings have a built in nervous system response that is fight,
Speaker 1: flight or freeze, right, So when the going gets tough,
Speaker 1: our nervous system kicks into survival. When you're in the
Speaker 1: fight response, you're not only going to be more aggressive
Speaker 1: than you but also more controlling. It becomes super important
Speaker 1: that your environment is being managed and controlled and so
Speaker 1: that you are creating safety for yourself and those around.
Speaker 1: That's a flight response. Essentially, then there's people who tend
Speaker 1: towards flight. They want to they want to go away,
Speaker 1: they want space by themselves. They get really afraid, fearful, anxious.
Speaker 1: So that's the flight response, and then the flight response
Speaker 1: you kind of just want to receive and you get
Speaker 1: very nervous. Freeze is a different thing, because freeze makes
Speaker 1: you look like you're okay m hm. They are very rational,
Speaker 1: but they're keep it off and that's actually the hardest
Speaker 1: to deal with because it's the hardest to spot. They
Speaker 1: can't listen properly anymore, they don't comprehend what you're saying.
Speaker 1: You think they're not totally there. They might bump themselves,
Speaker 1: so stumble war injury themselves. They're slower, they don't connect
Speaker 1: as deeply as they usually can. But that's hard to spot.
Speaker 1: That's an interesting Yeah, is an interesting one. Yeah. I'm
Speaker 1: definitely in a position of just having to that control
Speaker 1: that you were talking about, because I go straight to fight.
Speaker 1: As MICHAELA knows, I'm really kind of in a position
Speaker 1: where that is really not the option, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, and having to really just take a breath,
Speaker 1: take a minute, sit on my hands before I say
Speaker 1: or do anything, recognizing I'm in fight, so be quiet,
Speaker 1: don't say anything. Then just giving myself time until I
Speaker 1: can get into a different space. But and and really
Speaker 1: having to talk myself down from there's no controlling, there's
Speaker 1: nothing to conquer and beat. This is about understanding. So
Speaker 1: that's that's the mantra I've been trying to give myself,
Speaker 1: MICHAELA understand, Understand, Listen, listen, be quiet, be quiet. All right,
Speaker 1: Well let's open it up for questions. So thousands of
Speaker 1: people around the nation come to see Pastor John Gray
Speaker 1: speak and give counsel. But he and his wife Aventer
Speaker 1: needs some counsel themselves during this pandemic, just like the
Speaker 1: rest of us. During their nearly tenure marriage, John Gray
Speaker 1: has become one of the most popular pastors in America,
Speaker 1: known for his candid sermons. So why are you're worrying
Speaker 1: about who he's sleeping with and who she's sleeping with
Speaker 1: and how she's living her life when you need to
Speaker 1: be handling how you live in your life. Facts and
Speaker 1: his ability to connect to the people. You're talking about
Speaker 1: their luston but your gluttonius, Yeah, nobody want to talk
Speaker 1: about that. Gluttony is a said too, put them downuts down,
Speaker 1: They'll just save me one. Life at the Altar comes
Speaker 1: with his challenges and Pastor John and his wife Avanter
Speaker 1: are still learning a few things about their marriage they
Speaker 1: didn't realize before. My struggle is not the same as yours,
Speaker 1: so please don't judge based on your struggle. Wow. Interesting,
Speaker 1: So what's going on you know with you guys doing
Speaker 1: this pandemic and the same thing that's happening at your house.
Speaker 1: That's right, you know we're trying to figure it out. Well,
Speaker 1: what have you learned? I have to be honest, I
Speaker 1: think one of the things that I realize is that
Speaker 1: I don't know Will at all. You really feel, let
Speaker 1: me tell you. I feel like there's a layer that
Speaker 1: you get to write. Life gets busy and you create
Speaker 1: these stories in your hand. Then you hold onto these
Speaker 1: stories and that is your idea of your partner. But
Speaker 1: that's not who your partner is. Right. So, going through
Speaker 1: the process of having to dissolve all the stories and
Speaker 1: all of the ideas of Will that I've built around
Speaker 1: those stories, right, the thing that Will and are learning
Speaker 1: to do is be friends. Right, Because you get into
Speaker 1: all these ideas of what intimate relationships are supposed to
Speaker 1: look like what marriages are supposed to be. So will
Speaker 1: and are in the process of him taking the time
Speaker 1: to learn to love himself, me taking the time to
Speaker 1: learn to love myself right, and us building a friendship
Speaker 1: along the way. So let me tell you that's been
Speaker 1: something to be married to somebody for twenty some odd
Speaker 1: years and then realize I don't know you and you
Speaker 1: don't know me, but also realizing too, there's an aspect
Speaker 1: of yourself you don't know anything, And that for me
Speaker 1: was the biggest relation I think for for Avinger, she's
Speaker 1: had a consistent role in this marriage while I was
Speaker 1: trying to figure out what my role was. And that's
Speaker 1: not just in the marriage I'm talking about as the
Speaker 1: man I have been forced into intimacy over the last
Speaker 1: four weeks. And when Willow said you can't spell divorce
Speaker 1: without COVID, what what I think is that I don't
Speaker 1: think people are wanting to divorce because of these four weeks.
Speaker 1: I think truth is being presented and we're finally revealing
Speaker 1: and and being revealed for who we actually are. So
Speaker 1: there's a distance between who we thought we were and
Speaker 1: who we actually were, and that's where the is. And
Speaker 1: so for me, I can be honest to say I
Speaker 1: didn't understand all of the value and the gifts that
Speaker 1: that my wife carried. Even if I could sympathize with her,
Speaker 1: I had not empathized. There's a difference between sympathy and empathy.
Speaker 1: One is like, I feel sorry for you. You're doing
Speaker 1: a great job. The other is I'm putting myself in
Speaker 1: your shoes. And I had never stopped to say, what
Speaker 1: does it mean to be a wife, a mother, an
Speaker 1: executive who's doing all these different things? And for me,
Speaker 1: I don't know how to stay. I would travel a
Speaker 1: quarter of a million miles a year, so for me,
Speaker 1: I knew how to leave, not stay. Anything you said
Speaker 1: trying to understand advent here the wife, the mother, you
Speaker 1: know all of the hats that I wear, but you
Speaker 1: neglected to say just the one and first you said
Speaker 1: all of those things. You see me as the wife,
Speaker 1: you see me as the mom, you see me as
Speaker 1: whatever it is that you need me to fulfill at
Speaker 1: that moment. And I think the hardship that comes in marriages,
Speaker 1: the tension comes in because you have not reconciled that
Speaker 1: we singularly have so much value without all the other
Speaker 1: titles that we wear. I'm figuring that that's what was happening,
Speaker 1: is that you felt like John can only see you
Speaker 1: as the wife, as the mother, but couldn't see your
Speaker 1: value just as you as a woman. I often think
Speaker 1: sometimes we kind of fall into that as well as
Speaker 1: like we can only see them as husband's I know,
Speaker 1: I've I've had this issue. Is like, no, your husband,
Speaker 1: your provider, you're this, and you're supposed to take care
Speaker 1: of me like this and like that, and so I
Speaker 1: could only see in that little box and not really
Speaker 1: see the value of will outside of all the little
Speaker 1: compartments that I needed him to excel in for me.
Speaker 1: Building things together is actually something that is super hard,
Speaker 1: and in this quarantine life, it is super hard. This
Speaker 1: is intimacy, just being able to get to who our
Speaker 1: loved ones are beyond that which we have perceived. MICHAELA,
Speaker 1: this is I mean, we've been here several times, Yea.
Speaker 1: What kind of communication can happen between a couple to
Speaker 1: help them see each other outside of the roles that
Speaker 1: have been perceived. One of the first things that we
Speaker 1: have to always remember is that when we need somebody,
Speaker 1: we don't actually know them, and the first thing that
Speaker 1: kicks in is our projection. Often all right, then that
Speaker 1: comes at moment when the honeymoon wounds over where you
Speaker 1: suddenly realize, oops, you are married to an actual person,
Speaker 1: not to the figment of your um imagination or fantasy, right,
Speaker 1: And the hormonal cocktail wears off, and the bonding hormones
Speaker 1: are not so strong anymore, and suddenly they're looking at
Speaker 1: someone and they're not who you thought they are, and
Speaker 1: they have bad habits and you have bad habits. And
Speaker 1: at that point usually people throw children in the mix,
Speaker 1: so then it becomes even more complicated. You know, ten
Speaker 1: fifteen years can pass, and then they come to an
Speaker 1: impasse because they're no longer the people they were when
Speaker 1: they first met. You have to, on occasion bring the
Speaker 1: relationship current and sit down and go, who are we now?
Speaker 1: Have our values changed? What's the bigger picture? Who am I?
Speaker 1: Who are you? Are we still the people you were
Speaker 1: when we met? The answers always, almost always no, I
Speaker 1: always say in a relationship, there is one partner, the
Speaker 1: other partner, and there's a third partner, and that's the
Speaker 1: relationship itself, which uh has a dynamic and at some
Speaker 1: point the dynamic of the relationship takes over from the
Speaker 1: individuals and at that point, you know, it's it's a
Speaker 1: tough thing because at that point you have what I
Speaker 1: call the always already listening. You already know partner is
Speaker 1: gonna do. You no longer connected to them, the intimacy
Speaker 1: is gone. Oh that point right there, Michaela. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: that is so good. You're connected to the idea of
Speaker 1: who you think they are. Because sometimes you you say, well,
Speaker 1: I didn't do this because you were going to do that.
Speaker 1: You don't know. Today I might do something different, but
Speaker 1: I didn't get the opportunity to because you've already decide
Speaker 1: how I was going to respond to that. And that's
Speaker 1: that's so good. My question for you, Michaela is this,
Speaker 1: We've had some amazing uh you know how I would say,
Speaker 1: based on our faith, come to Jesus moments in this
Speaker 1: quarantine where it was like, huh, the light goes off.
Speaker 1: But it's because the business of life is not present.
Speaker 1: So we've had the opportunity to sit with it, to
Speaker 1: digest it, and to put it into practice. Now, what
Speaker 1: do we do when life goes back to some sense
Speaker 1: of normalcy? Where you don't have this forced time, you're
Speaker 1: gonna be running in different directions. You But but I'm
Speaker 1: saying the very real reality of life, returning to the practical,
Speaker 1: the practical things. What can we do to stay in
Speaker 1: this place of epiphany, this place of awareness? Not's a
Speaker 1: very good question. The first thing I think is because
Speaker 1: we're still in that kind of a lockdown situation. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: and you can definitely make notes. I don't know that
Speaker 1: I can afford that. So I got to get this
Speaker 1: when a kid. And because you had that moment you
Speaker 1: know that comes to Jesus moment where you realize some things. Um,
Speaker 1: you have the chance to now rediscover yourself and each other. Right,
Speaker 1: So as much as you can treat part of this
Speaker 1: like a honeymoon, I discover the person that you've just
Speaker 1: discovered a little bit more in depth. And yeah, you
Speaker 1: have children and business and all of that. But but
Speaker 1: imagine that ever so often you have a honeymoon moment.
Speaker 1: What makes a honeymoon moment a honeymoon moment? You sit around,
Speaker 1: you talk a lot, you exchange ideas, you have great
Speaker 1: plans for the future. You're deeply connected the things we
Speaker 1: know all we're doing. We're really busy, So that will
Speaker 1: of course also mean that some old resentments are going
Speaker 1: to come up. Right, You've got to have trust issues,
Speaker 1: You're gonna have um things that have never been said.
Speaker 1: I would say for the time being, leave that aside.
Speaker 1: But for right now, what you want to do is
Speaker 1: you want to anchor the positive feelings. You want to
Speaker 1: have as much of the epiphany and the honeymoon, the
Speaker 1: lightbulb moments in your body and with each other, so
Speaker 1: that when you go separate ways, you have positive memory
Speaker 1: that overrides a lot of the negative memory. Michael important
Speaker 1: that right there? Can I just tell you I want
Speaker 1: to just illuminate that one more time. To take this
Speaker 1: time to focus on what is going well, what is work,
Speaker 1: what is working, and strengthen the parts that are working
Speaker 1: and stay in those areas. I'm telling you it's a lifesaver. Literally,
Speaker 1: he said, don't think about a honeymoon. What do you
Speaker 1: do when you are me and you don't really want
Speaker 1: to present the totality of yourself Because you don't. There
Speaker 1: are areas that have still not been attended to. When
Speaker 1: I got married, I hadn't realize the fatherhood wound, the
Speaker 1: daddy wound that I had from an absent father, and
Speaker 1: how that has played into my need to be validated
Speaker 1: from outside sources. And so I would leave because I
Speaker 1: never saw a man provide for the household. So I
Speaker 1: thought I was doing good by providing for my household.
Speaker 1: But my wife said, it's not the stuff I want you.
Speaker 1: But I never saw me as valuable, and so I
Speaker 1: wouldn't give her what she wanted, which was me, because
Speaker 1: I didn't think me was worthy of her. And before
Speaker 1: I can be what she needs, I need to figure
Speaker 1: out who the heck I am. There's two layers to this.
Speaker 1: There's what you can do for yourself, and then there's
Speaker 1: what you can do for each other. What I'd like
Speaker 1: for you to do is that you individually sit down
Speaker 1: and you make an inventory of what is good about you,
Speaker 1: so your strength, your positive attributes, your accomplishments, your personality traits,
Speaker 1: UH and that's everything, right, everything that's good about you.
Speaker 1: And you do that separately. Then you go and make
Speaker 1: the same list as to what is good about the other.
Speaker 1: And then you come back together and the first thing
Speaker 1: that you're going to do is you're going to exchange lists.
Speaker 1: Avenger you're going to give him the list of what
Speaker 1: is good about you and the other way about. Then
Speaker 1: you're going to sit with each other and you're going
Speaker 1: to tell each other and praise each other for these
Speaker 1: things on their list. And while you do that, see
Speaker 1: how that lands. Because that all kinds of stuff will happen.
Speaker 1: You're both gonna go, well, that's not really true. You
Speaker 1: know that there's things that are that are going to
Speaker 1: happen that are very very educational. Right, But that's how
Speaker 1: you start. You give the person across from you the
Speaker 1: praise for the things that they think are good about you.
Speaker 1: Then you give them the praise of the things that
Speaker 1: you think they're good about that, and then you go.
Speaker 1: You can go back and force and that will be
Speaker 1: one of those things that opens your heart to each other,
Speaker 1: and more importantly, even it will open your own heart
Speaker 1: towards yourself. That part, I will say that one of
Speaker 1: the things that MICHAELA has taught me we really do
Speaker 1: have to work on our personal self worth in order
Speaker 1: to have workable relationships. I think that a lot of
Speaker 1: us look to other people to make us feel a
Speaker 1: certain way, to buy us up in a certain manner,
Speaker 1: and we really have to be able to come to
Speaker 1: the table to know that we are worthy of love,
Speaker 1: because I know for me, I've just learned that I
Speaker 1: am learning how to love the people around me as
Speaker 1: I'm learning how to love myself. The reason why this
Speaker 1: conversation is so impacting to me is because as a
Speaker 1: man of faith, what what sometimes happens with a theological
Speaker 1: construct is that we think that our higher power will
Speaker 1: somehow fix it all. And sometimes prayer is not enough.
Speaker 1: Talk to somebody that has walked through things that you
Speaker 1: don't know. I need this because there's some areas of
Speaker 1: unattended manhood that need to be addressed. You know what,
Speaker 1: Thank you guys so much. We're gonna have to do
Speaker 1: a follow up show after the car see to see
Speaker 1: what gains you guys have made, because this was really enjoyable.
Speaker 1: We can physically have you at the table we want.
Speaker 1: I don't want to sit at the red table. I
Speaker 1: want to touch the table. It was good talking to
Speaker 1: you guys, and you know we over here rooting for
Speaker 1: you for sure. You so much. Love so MICHAELA. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of pressure happening right now. How do you
Speaker 1: think men and women release that stress differently? Good question.
Speaker 1: In the olden days, man had very different roles than women,
Speaker 1: so our biology is somewhat hardwired for survival in different ways.
Speaker 1: So man tend to get into kind of general seal
Speaker 1: t mode. Often they want to make sure that they
Speaker 1: are the best providers they can be, and that can
Speaker 1: look like hoarding by all the pripping equipment. They can
Speaker 1: get quite sharp and quite hard at times because they're
Speaker 1: essentially in an army situation in their own body. They
Speaker 1: might get a little bit more controlling than usual. They
Speaker 1: might get really controlling or get downright horrible and nasty.
Speaker 1: On the positive, and men typically cope by getting things
Speaker 1: done problem solving. When the stress level rises in men,
Speaker 1: because of the way the body is, will get very
Speaker 1: narrow focused. They focus on something and that's what they
Speaker 1: want to get done. In women, because traditionally we have
Speaker 1: to maintain pregnancy and pobu nation and rest feeling and
Speaker 1: all these things, what we do when the going gets
Speaker 1: tough is we want cards. M Yeah, so we want carbs,
Speaker 1: want comfort, want nourishment, cuddling, um. We want to gather
Speaker 1: everyone around, make it so uh that we are protected,
Speaker 1: can keep the things that are important to us going
Speaker 1: we're a lot more relational, while men get more operational,
Speaker 1: and that yelf causes a huge problem in the situation
Speaker 1: like this, Wow, our next married couple has come to
Speaker 1: the red table with their quarantine struggle. Hasien and Gerard,
Speaker 1: what's going on with you guys during this time. Well,
Speaker 1: everything's coming to the surface and glaring in technicolor, and
Speaker 1: in this quarantine, we just start responding to it differently.
Speaker 1: And there are moments where I wasn't sure who I
Speaker 1: was even married too. I totally get that. When the
Speaker 1: CDC put out a notice, and I mean it was
Speaker 1: way before quarantine, the kids were still in school. Gerard's
Speaker 1: sort of like booted up and put on his like
Speaker 1: gear and like it was like I'm going to buy
Speaker 1: supplies and groceries, and he got like really intense and serious.
Speaker 1: I work in healthcare, so I know how bad viruses
Speaker 1: can get. I think I was probably the first panic.
Speaker 1: Shop was definitely the first. So I geared up, went
Speaker 1: down to the grocery store, got two grocery carts and
Speaker 1: just started, you know, putting in lentils and rice and
Speaker 1: all the stables, shelf stable stuff that you could pretty
Speaker 1: much live off of for a month for a family
Speaker 1: of four. Prepare for the worst, hope for the best
Speaker 1: was my motto. So I just came home with a
Speaker 1: ton of groceries and uh, I think my wife thought
Speaker 1: I was nuts, well because the kids to panic. Our
Speaker 1: twenty year old was like, dang with the receipt. He
Speaker 1: was like, we could have bought a car, you know.
Speaker 1: And then my ten year old was like, Mommy, is
Speaker 1: everything okay? And I'm like, God, We're gonna be okay.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, everybody, stay calm. But like, when you
Speaker 1: see these parts of your mate, how do you not
Speaker 1: see them again? No, it's very good. Well, yes, the
Speaker 1: thing you can't see it, but you can't reframe it.
Speaker 1: Somebody else who is not in your mindset has a
Speaker 1: totally different relationship to that. I'm listening to this and
Speaker 1: I'm going, damn, I want him at my house. He
Speaker 1: is actually doing the thing that he's built to do.
Speaker 1: He is supposed to make sure that his family has sustenance,
Speaker 1: and he's a great provider. This is just one extension
Speaker 1: of being a great provider. That's what a great provider does,
Speaker 1: make sure that his family has what is needed. If
Speaker 1: you don't phrase it as panic, and everybody got nervous
Speaker 1: and we don't want to live in fear. But say,
Speaker 1: we don't have to live in fear because we have Gerards.
Speaker 1: He's gonna take care of the stuff that might be
Speaker 1: an issue. And then you have refriendsed that and you
Speaker 1: can look at him and go, I am married to
Speaker 1: a great provider. I'm married to somebody who cares about
Speaker 1: his family. And he went out there and did things
Speaker 1: before the going got tough, and that's really really a
Speaker 1: positive thing. You have a guy at home who can
Speaker 1: take care of business. So that's how you can rephrase it.
Speaker 1: Instead of assuming the worst, you assume the best. You
Speaker 1: know what, MICHAELA, I so love that that the idea
Speaker 1: of reframing it, because you're right to have someone like
Speaker 1: Gerard gives the family the ability to not have to
Speaker 1: live in fear, you know, And that's a beautiful way
Speaker 1: to look at that. I love that. I'm gonna use that.
Speaker 1: You know what, Gerard, you keep being um that fears
Speaker 1: provided that you are. That's awesome. A couple of thousand
Speaker 1: had like an elk over my shoulders coming through the
Speaker 1: front door. I love it. Well, thank you all for
Speaker 1: winning us. Next up husband's Alex and Zack from Miami
Speaker 1: are cruise industry employees, but due to the coronavirus, are
Speaker 1: now working from home. My name is Zack and my
Speaker 1: husband name is Alex. We are now working from home
Speaker 1: in the same space. And that was a very dramatic
Speaker 1: switch for us. I've been working from home all day.
Speaker 1: I like to have that alone time, you know, a
Speaker 1: decompression time. And from my side, I figured, since we're
Speaker 1: working all day, why not was full in the evening
Speaker 1: together maybe or to movie together and maybe cook something together.
Speaker 1: So obviously our expectations are different. How are you We
Speaker 1: are so used to traveling and being away from each other,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, you know, we got stuck
Speaker 1: in together twenty four seven. So we went from not
Speaker 1: seeing each other very often, being able to handle that,
Speaker 1: being able to be used to that too. Now suddenly
Speaker 1: we're on top of each other every day. But I
Speaker 1: enjoy a little mean time our social guys. So I
Speaker 1: love party and I'm a life of the party. But
Speaker 1: then at the end of the night, I enjoy above
Speaker 1: the better andrew that the time. So from my side,
Speaker 1: you know, a more different in personality, are more introvert,
Speaker 1: so I'm not necessarily the one that goes on and
Speaker 1: red night. What we're trying, what I try to do,
Speaker 1: is and spend some time together. So we obviously probably
Speaker 1: show love and affection enrollmance in different ways. We're trying
Speaker 1: to see how can we bring that together. That is
Speaker 1: a tough one. You can really here in the both
Speaker 1: of you. You have great love for each other and
Speaker 1: you have a good thing going, and suddenly all the
Speaker 1: things that have made the relationship work great are gone
Speaker 1: and here you are. So there's a few ways you
Speaker 1: can handle it, right, Because this is a bit like
Speaker 1: ground talk day right now, you know, you could just
Speaker 1: take alternate days. Right. One of the biggest markers of
Speaker 1: long term success in relationship is generosity and generosity not
Speaker 1: as in giving each other gifts, but giving each other
Speaker 1: acts of generosity. How I would go at this for
Speaker 1: the two of you is I would alternate days, and
Speaker 1: then whose every day it is? The other one will
Speaker 1: generously make that happen. So one day, whoever wants to cuddle,
Speaker 1: you know, is going to pour the bath for the
Speaker 1: other one and actually give him the time away and
Speaker 1: say I poured your bath. Here's your beverage of choice.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna put some music on, I'm gonna go away enjoy,
Speaker 1: and then the next day you're gonna go I found
Speaker 1: the movie Come, Let's sit together. And so then that way,
Speaker 1: you're not in the I'm not getting what I want.
Speaker 1: I'm not getting what I want. So you're gonna give
Speaker 1: each other the thing that the other person wants. You
Speaker 1: both get your needs met, but it's not just getting
Speaker 1: your needs met. You're actively engaging with each other from
Speaker 1: a place of generosity and love and giving, and that's
Speaker 1: ultimately going to make your relationship much stronger by the
Speaker 1: time you go a party. That's beautiful. That's really beautiful.
Speaker 1: That should just be in practice anywhere exactly. That is
Speaker 1: a great suggest Wow. Thanks Alex and Zach. I hope
Speaker 1: that works out for you guys, because I'm telling you
Speaker 1: we're gonna put that into some practice. Over Please let
Speaker 1: us know how you're doing and stay safe. Okay, all right, goodbye. Wow.
Speaker 1: I really like that. That was great, So MICHAELA. And closing,
Speaker 1: what is some overall just wisdom of how couples can
Speaker 1: make it through this quarantine. Communicate your needs clearly, Yes,
Speaker 1: your partner cannot read your mind. MICHAELA. Yeah, yes, you
Speaker 1: know it's so important. If you have a hard time
Speaker 1: doing it in person, write it down and send it
Speaker 1: to them as a text or something. But you must
Speaker 1: be self responsible and communicate what you really I think
Speaker 1: that is like, that is the number one thing for
Speaker 1: me that that is really important in relationships is communicating
Speaker 1: but also recognizing that it is not my responsibility to
Speaker 1: know what you want. It's your responsibility to share that
Speaker 1: with me. In order to keep peace and harmony, you
Speaker 1: better just look at you. That's the only person that
Speaker 1: you can change. That's the only person that you have
Speaker 1: control over is yourself. If there's a problem, it's typically
Speaker 1: with me. Yeah, Like I have to look at me.
Speaker 1: And I think that's a great term MICHAELA. Self responsibility
Speaker 1: because I do believe that in intimate relationships, we tend
Speaker 1: to believe that there's this there's this kind of underlying
Speaker 1: understanding that I don't need to be responsible for myself
Speaker 1: because if you really loved me, then you would you know,
Speaker 1: you would know how to love me, you would know
Speaker 1: how to take care of me. You wouldn't know how
Speaker 1: to make me feel good, right, And it's a very
Speaker 1: it's a it's a deeply false, romanticized idea, so that
Speaker 1: that idea of self responsibility is imperative. I just want
Speaker 1: to thank you, and we'll have to do this again
Speaker 1: as well, but actually have you here with us, I
Speaker 1: too want to touch the red table. But thank you
Speaker 1: so much. You really this was this was a very
Speaker 1: healing table today. Thank you, thank you so much. Thank you.
Speaker 1: To join the red table Talk family and become a
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