Let’s Talk Love Podcast Episode #5 with Dr. Gina Senarighi | Transcript

22.03.31

This transcript is from the Let’s Talk Love Podcast, available in our Podcast Feed.

Robin Ducharme | Today on Let's Talk Love, I speak with author, speaker, intimacy and relationship coach, Dr. Gina Senarighi about how to build meaningful loving relationships. Every time I talk to Gina I learn so much. Gina shares concrete ways we can all show up more consciously and kindly in our partnerships. Most of us are not taught healthy communication skills or how to handle resentment, accountability, and misunderstandings in relationships. I hope you walk away with some new tools for loving better in your own life. Enjoy. Welcome to the Let's Talk Love podcast, where we flip the script on outdated narratives and cliches about love and relationships. I'm your host, Robin Ducharme, founder of Real Love Ready. This podcast is for anyone who wants to be better at love, regardless of relationship status. We will talk about the intimate connections in our lives and the challenges and complexities inherent in those partnerships. Through our no holds barred interviews with global experts we will gain insight about ourselves and learn new skills to improve our relationships. Because when we learn to love better, we make the world a better place. Are you ready for open and honest conversations about love? Let's get started.

Thank you for joining us on Let's Talk Love. Today I am so very excited to be joined by our esteemed guest, Dr. Gina Senarighi. Dr. Gina aka @heyginasena on Instagram is an author, speaker, intimacy and relationship coach and Gottman certified relationship coach. She helps people do relationships better and enjoy their bodies more. Gina is the author of Love More, Fight Less. A workbook that helps anyone regardless of relationship status, learn how to communicate effectively, meaningfully, and lovingly, even intense situations. [laughs] I love this because we all have arguments and conflicts and fights in our relationships, especially our intimate relationships. And I ordered a copy of your book Gina. It is so fantastic.

Dr. Gina Senarighi | Thank you.

Robin Ducharme | And I really wanted to dive into that as we're talking today. You are also the co-host of this SWOON Podcast with your best friend. Right?

Dr. Gina Senarighi | Mhmm. Yeah.

Robin Ducharme | I love that you're working with your best friend.

Dr. Gina Senarighi | Mmhmm. You know, we weren't actually besties when we met. We met for pie [laughs] because we had really admired each other's work. And we just had this immediate connection, you know, when you really, like instantly, I thought it was gonna be meeting with another colleague and we like talked about my infertility and her divorce and like, what dating is like, we just went deep, really fast. And I was like, this is somebody I need to be working with more. And I floated this idea about like, what if we did a podcast? And then it's just like, from there, you know, it's just like grown and I think, you know when you meet people that you have such great energy with it's so wonderful to be able to just create something. You know, whether it be, whatever, you know, other people create, but for us, it was this podcast, and it's been dreamy and then our friendship has just like deepened and deepened and deepened alongside it. You know.

Robin | That's wonderful. It doesn't feel like work when you're doing it.

Gina | No.

Robin | You're creating something that is you're so passionate about and you're doing it with somebody that you admire and just connect with. I love it.

Gina | Yeah. Well, and I could talk about relationships and sex and intimacy all day and so could she. And so, you know, we just get to geek out together on the podcast.

Robin Exactly.

So when I was going through your bio, I have to say I was so impressed with all the experience that you have and the education and all the training. You know when I look through this you've completed all this training with world-renowned teachers and practitioners. You've studied with Dr. Brene Brown, The Gottman Relationship Institute Byron Katie, Esther Perel, Terry Real, Michaela Boehm, to name a few. Right? And so I just wanted to get into that and just you obviously you're so dedicated to your learning but you've thought out, you do say this, that it's a small circle of you know, I think there are many, many people but of people that are really just honing their craft and are continuously learning and updating, but like I'd love to hear more about your journey on this education and training that you've gone through and how that even just unfolded into where you are now.

Gina | Yeah, well, I mean, I've been really fortunate to have enough income that I can afford the trainings like that, is one important part, and have some flexibility, you know, in that I've had parents who were really supportive of my education, and I have a partner, who is in full support of me doing trainings. But I also, you know, I think it would be easy to decide I'm an expert, sort of, and then just kind of like rest on my laurels. And I do really geek out about relationships and intimacy. And, and I think it's really important as a practitioner, who, you know, people trust me with their love lives, that I stay on top of learning and keep broadening my learning. And there are so many incredible people out there who have really refined certain aspects of relational learning or couples therapy. I, you know, love seeking them out, I was just talking about one of the other speakers y'all will have in a few months, Terry Real is somebody I really admire. And I've been really geeking out on some of his trainings lately. But it seems like as soon as I like do a deep dive and do a bunch of trainings with one person, they'll mention somebody they learned from, and then I'm like, "Oh, let me check out their stuff!" And then I'm kind of, on the next journey with, you know, whoever the next teacher is. And to anybody who is interested in a career working with people in their relationships, I highly recommend just like, keep investing in your learning, because every time I do a different training, even after 15 years of doing this work, and a master's in a PhD, there's always more tools out there that I'm uncovering. I'll take a training and be like, "Oh, this is just right, for this couple I'm working with and I could do something like this with these people." And so it really does help me do great work too. You know, and, and our clients are, they deserve that.

Robin | Yeah and I know that from obviously, the work that we do connecting with relationship experts like yourself, just like you said, it's this, this person mentioning this person on their learning journey, it just keeps growing, and you keep learning. So, I so appreciate that. So, every time I interview somebody, I quote, I've got so many quotes of yours. I love so many things that you say, and so I wanted to talk about your book, Love More, Fight Less and one of the quotes in your workbook, your workbook teaches simple tools to reset your defaults, which we all have right? For deeper understanding and meaningful connection. And one of the biggest things that I've learned, obviously in your book is about this is communication skills, teaching communication skills, and you say communication can ruin a perfectly good relationship. Here's the problem: Most of us have not been taught how to navigate conflict in a healthy way. Our role models fail to show us how to handle resentment, accountability, and misunderstanding. These early experiences create a set of default communication patterns, we carry forward in adult relationships. And I guess my first question is, before we dive into all these, more about the defaults, and better communication skills, what led you to write your book? And how have you seen your workbook change people's relationships?

Gina | Well, the first question, what led me to write the book, is sort of twofold. I began working in private practice, sort of when, like, the blog revolution was happening online, so many years ago now. And for me, blogging became this great tool, where I could share so many things that I had learned, you know, getting my Master's or, or working with all these great teachers, I could share it online. And so people who were hesitant to come to a therapist, or who couldn't afford it, or who had, you know, wildly full schedules or whatever, like, couldn't come into the office, could, you know, in the middle of the night when they're Googling "What's wrong with me?" or "What's wrong with my partner?" They could find tools that I could put out there. And so I wrote a ton and had volumes online, and was approached actually by my publisher who said, look, you've written all of this stuff, what about writing for us? Um, and so I had a lot of things sort of like, pre-thought out are lots of little pieces of it already written in blog form and needed to kind of reformat it into a book. And when I wrote a book about relationships, the thing I see so often in my office, is that people really want tools, right? Like, when you're in the middle of the night Googling what's wrong with me, or what's wrong with my partner, you're not looking for like theory about how and why relationships work a certain way. You want to know, how can I bring this hard thing up? What do I do when I have a really big feeling and I don't want to yell at my partner? What steps can I really take? So that I'm not just recreating the relationship I saw my parents have that I know, I don't want, but I can like intentionally do something different. And so writing a workbook made a lot of sense to me because I wanted people to have tangible things they could do to interrupt default behavior patterns, they don't want to keep and or address things that are a little sticky with their partner. And so it's been really lovely. I've heard from many people now over the last two years, who have reached out and been like we're working through this. And I hadn't actually thought about how handy it is, you know, I submitted my final draft on March 13, 2020, right before the world kind of stopped for a little while and I hadn't really, you know, and I had no way of anticipating that all of the couples in the world who lived together, were going to be locked into small spaces, you know, for four to six weeks or longer, and handle some really intense stressors. And, you know, it's been, what surprised me and I'm grateful for is that I've had a lot of people reach out and say, this was our way of doing relationship maintenance over these last couple of years, we, that would have been really stressful but because we had your little guide with us, we could sit down and kind of work through that, to be working proactively on our relationship, instead of waiting until we got really stressed out and full of resentment and distance, and then needed to go into emergency couples therapy or needed to talk about separating. And that part, as I said, I hadn't anticipated it, but that's been really rewarding for me. Having written it.

Robin | Yeah. Right? It wasn't just for six weeks. A lot of us, most of the whole world. Two years, right?

Gina | A lot of togetherness over these last couple of years.

Robin | [laughs] Oh my goodness. A lot of togetherness.

Gina | Yeah.

Robin | I really appreciate the fact that there was something so, like you said, actionable tools that you can implement together. So one of your, I love this, that you say most of us... Well, I don't know if I love it but it's true. Most of us experience intense and chaotic conflicts with the people we care about most. The good news is we just need better skills with simple reflection and skills, you can transform your partnerships, conflict patterns. And one of the skills, skill number three, is learning to interrupt reactivity. And so can you tell us more about this, you say this about really slowing, slowing yourself, slowing down that process, stopping the reactivity, or slowing it in some way.

Gina | Yeah, you know, I, back when I first trained as a therapist, my favorite folks to work with were folks who had certain diagnoses that are kind of famous for high reactivity. So they, you know, their emotions escalate really fast and they express those emotions, often without really thinking about it. And so they could be damaging to the relationship, like calling names, or raising their voice, or threatening certain things, or they were physically violent, they would throw things or break things, or they had really big reactivity. And the model of therapy that I was studying at the time, Dialectical Behavioral Therapy is really, it's specifically focused on helping folks slow their reactive patterns so that you can still have an intense emotion and it's natural for us to have intense emotions. Really big sadness, or jealousy or rage. What the problem comes in, not in having the emotion but in throwing the chair or in calling the name or in threatening I'm gonna leave or saying you're the worst partner ever, whatever. And so if we can slow down enough to have somebody recognize like, "Oh, this is a big reaction. I am not in my best mindset to handle this the way I'm going to want to." The more we can just like back away or interrupt that big flow of energy, so that we don't do damage, we can soothe sort of the emotional response and come back, when we're in a more thoughtful place, when we're in a more collected place. And so a lot of the tools in the book talk about interrupting that like escalation pattern that can come up. You know, and I gave examples of really big escalations, folks can have, a lot of folks also escalate and they shrink or disappear, they like emotionally disassociate, or they flee, they leave, or they break up with you, or, you know, they get really like stone-cold nonreactive. And that's also a way that folks will escalate, and can do damage to a relationship, right? If I'm trying to connect with you, and you're not even responding, I'll feel alone or, or abandoned. Anyway, so the more we can kind of recognize some of our default patterns of reactivity, the more we can work with them, and like work our way through it without having the behaviors that are actually going to do damage. And that, I mean, that is foundational. And very few of us very, very few folks, I have yet to meet someone who says, Yes, as a young person, my family demonstrated for me that you can have big emotions, and you can do it in this healthy way and even if we disagree, we'll work through it and it doesn't have to be dramatic or hurtful. Like, I mean, maybe someday I'll find that person, I have yet to find that person. And I was raised by two, you know, great therapists who teach people how to parent, and even in my family, there are default patterns that you know, come up. And even I've had to like unlearn some of that conditioning, about how I want to react in a relationship. And so you know, I also really can connect with people who are struggling with that, because it's been a struggle for me, too. And I've more often than not seen folks through that struggle. And it's so empowering on the other side when I hear people say, "Oh, my gosh", you know, I had a client just this morning, where we were talking about, like, a year ago, this thing that happened, she would have blown up. And now, you know, she still feels the intense emotions, but she responds with behaviors that she actually feels proud of at this point, you know, instead of feeling shame later, because. "Oh, made a big mess", or "I made it even worse." I could geek out about this for a while. So I'm not sure if I've actually answered your question. [both laugh]

Robin | So Gina, can you give us an example of a self-soothing technique that you would recommend if somebody is, let's say, raising their voice? Which I don't think is, I think that's a pretty common response when somebody is upset, to raise their voice. Well, in some people, right? And so it's not always about, "Okay, let's take five. I'm going to leave the room, you leave the room, and let's come back together." Like what, what if somebody, right? Maybe it's like, is it staying in the moment being like, "Okay, I'm gonna take five deep breaths"? Or what would be an example of something that's just really like, tangible? You're just like, "Okay, I'll do this. I'll try this next time."

Gina | Yeah, I mean, what's great about self soothing techniques, is there are a lot of them, there are a lot of them. And what you want to do is find the soothing techniques that work for you. And I would say, keep a list handy, even. Especially as you're first working with it of three to five, that might be options, right ranging in the kind of like, energetic output they take, right? Like one might be, I need to take a break and go stomp my feet around the block, because I just like, can't even be present with you. One of my clients, just this week, we were creating playlists of soothing music that she's gonna listen to, to help her like calm back down. Some folks do need to have physical space from their partners. And others really need to stay close, but not be communicative. So I've got a couple right now who hold hands and they might be really mad, but they will just sit and hold hands and take deep breaths and think, until you know, like until they're more calm, right. I've got some folks who like really want to express things in the moment and that gets hard because they might say something unkind. And so we've got journals that they sit and they write all their most angry thoughts out. They're not going to share that with somebody but it helps them like just to get it out of them. They say the nasty thing in the journal and they can burn it or rip it up later or whatever. And ultimately just expressing it helps them kind of wind themselves down to like, "Okay, I don't want to say I hate you. What I actually want to say is, I was disappointed when you were late." [luaghs] You know like, but I can't start, I can't get there until I get the like "I hate you" out in my journal, right? So there are a ton of them. What you want to do, actually, I have a list on my website, 69 self soothing techniques, because it's helpful to have them written out. So when you're in a calm state of mind, like three things I might try or five things I might try, because when you're in a reactive state isn't the best time to try and think of like, oh, what self soothing technique am I going to use today, right? I have some of my clients, even like, post them in the places where they are most likely to get into heated arguments, many of them have them on their fridge, some have them up in their bedroom, that can remind them like, “Oh, I'm going to choose Option A, B, or C, instead of, you know, sulking, or instead of doing the thing that's damaging in our relationship.” It's a little like, I mean, our reactive selves are often very childlike. They're almost like tantrumy toddlers. And if I think about my five year old is in this amazing classroom right now. His teachers so great at working with their emotions. Um, but they have up on the wall, they have like a list of like, if you are, if you feel angry, and you want to hit someone, here are the things that you can choose, you can go to the soft zone, and you can mess with the pillows, you can go to the ripping paper spot and you can rip up paper or you can stand just outside our door (they have like, open air area anyways) and you can shout, if you want to shout but we don't shout at each other. You know like, so that they know these are the outlets and I'm using that example because when we get reactive, most of us are very childlike in our reactivity, we cling to people, we want to push people away. We want to yell or stomp our feet or tantrum. And it's not okay to tantrum in a way that is damaging to yourself or others. But you it's okay to want to get that energy out. Weren't we just talking about the conversation I had with these little boys about like how to deal with their anger, right? Let's come up with some options when we're in a calm state of mind. So that I can draw from that when I'm less calm later.

Robin | Yes. When you were saying that, that was the first thing that came to mind, is that we are often in our child mind. And getting those self soothing techniques allow you to just say "Okay, I need to get grounded here so that I can speak in a loving adult way that I like the person I am." Right? It's like, I'm no longer that child.

Gina | Well, so often our inner dialogue in those moments like our reactivity, our emotional intensity kind of rises up, and our inner dialogue because it starts to be like part like, I'm mad at you, I'm dealing with that. And then also, I'm wrestling with myself. So there's like a fight that starts in our brains of like, "Calm down, why are you reacting this way?" or "Speak up! Why can't you just say this?" or "What's wrong with you that you're crying? Stop crying." Like we have really nasty inner dialogue that comes up and so it like, heightens the reactivity. Now we've got like, not only the conflict I'm having with my partner, but the inner conflict I'm having like wrestling with my emotions. And my hope is nobody who was listening would speak to an upset child like that, right? Like we wouldn't say to a tantrum child, like, "Calm down, what's wrong with you? Stop crying, it's terrible." I mean, that's not advisable, to speak to an upset child that way. What we might hope is to say like, "Oh my gosh, you're having really big feelings. Let's figure out a way to deal with that." So we can, you know, but like, a much more compassionate like, "It's okay to be disappointed. We have pepperoni on the pizza tonight, like I get that's really upsetting to you. And we still need to eat dinner, let's figure out a way to work this out." Right? Like that might be a more compassionate way that we would talk to a child. We can internalize that and speak to ourselves in a more compassionate, less judgmental, argumentative way, at least it will change so I'm not dealing with two arguments, the one in my head and the one with my partner. I'm now just able to like regulate a little bit better, and focus back on what I need to with my partner. But that internal wrestling match, Whoa, is that debilitating for most of us.

Robin | You talk about expansive relationships. Can you explain that to us, please, about what exactly you would, please tell us more about what expansive relationships are all about. What does that mean?

Gina | Yeah. Well, on one very literal level, part of that was coming out of this work I've done for over a decade with folks who are practicing ethical non-monogamy, or open relationships or polyamory and what I was seeing over and over again, were folks who wanted, just wanted more out of life not necessarily they needed to have orgies or sleep with a ton of people, but just they were wanting to explore more parts of themselves, have more friendships, have more really deep and meaningful conversations and yes, sometimes sex too. But that as part of like expanding their own experience of life, expanding their experiences of joy or having more adventure. And a lot of the couples I was seeing were folks whose relationships over time had become sort of insular, really kind of isolating, right? Like, often there's this narrative that like, you're my one, and only, you're my everything. And it's good to get a lot of needs met in your relationship, we want to be friends and lovers, we want to be great at sharing responsibilities. But what I see so often is folks stop investing in their friendships, their own hobbies, their independent learning interests, their self care, over time in a relationship, and they lose themselves. And then they come to me 17 to 20 years down the road and are like, we're bored with our sex life, we barely know each other, we don't know ourselves anymore. We're just bored. And now we're talking about non monogamy. And non monogamy aside, what I was finding is those folks, you know, whether they started dating other people are not, they were craving just more out of life, right? They, they weren't feeling intellectually fulfilled, or spiritually fulfilled, like they were when they were a single person and they used to go to their spiritual group or their Bible club, or they or you know, or they were interested in pottery or taking poetry classes or whatever, they've stopped doing those things. They're no longer in the softball league that they once were in and now all we do is get up, go to work, feed our kids dinner, and then sit in front of Netflix, and then go to bed. And we do that day after day after day after day. And so, so, aside from non monogamy, or in addition to the non monogamy work, I really wanted to help couples build relationships where they still had autonomy and independence, and fueled their personal passions and invested in their relationship. So it wasn't as much of an either or, like all us or nothing, but a little bit of like, let's be independent humans who choose to be together. And what we find is, you know, couples who have that sort of like desire fatigue, where we've lost the passion. A lot of times what they really need is a little more autonomy, a couple girls nights and a trip to go camping and you know, some more of that, like cultivating personal passion brings them back some intrigue and mystery and desire between us, right, you come back from your camping trip, and I'm like, "How was it? Let's talk about that." "What were you gonna go next?" "How are your bros?" Right? And, and vice versa. Like what was you know, you went to a wine tasting, "What was that like?" "What did you learn?" Now we're, like, compelled to continue growing together too, because we're also invested in our personal growth.

Robin | Yes.

Gina | Yeah.

I just dream of like more of that for everybody a balance of autonomy, and connection, expansion, and security. Right? Like, we can balance those two. It's really beautiful.

Robin | It sure is. I think you probably see that so much is people, like you said, they lose themselves but it's so important when people are examining their relationship or really looking back at your relationship you have with yourself, so that you can bring that, your whole self back to that relationship.

Gina | Yeah, absolutly.

Robin | So when you're looking at the interactions between couples and examining, right, let's say you've got a couple of your office. The tiniest moments are the ones that make the biggest impact long term. And you talk about bids, right? This is a Gottmans term, and a teaching and I wanted to talk about that, like it's the tiniest moments, the biggest that make the biggest impact long term and true meaningful connection is made in those smallest moments. What are the types of bids and those tweaks that people can make when it comes to their way they're interacting? Moment by moment?

Gina | Yeah, well, the beauty of, okay, so this, this teaching about the bids. It's super simple, it is not rocket science, but be being able to pay attention to it, it's transformative in relationships. And it's simply, can I can I describe it a little bit?

Robin | Please.

Gina | It's simply that like in relationship and in any relationship, romantic or intimate relationships, there's a, there's a greater ratio of the kinds of bidding ratio we want to have. But this is true in relationships, parent and child and colleague relationships and friendships, we, we bid, or we, like make an attempt at getting someone's attention all the time. We might do it by making eye contact, we can do it by nodding, or gesturing, we can do it by sending a text, we can do it, you know, by saying something, right. And most of us don't even realize how often we're doing it. And in really healthy relationships, folks bid and respond a lot, like hundreds of times in an hour. And that is one of the things I watch for when I have a new couple. Come in, I watch the way that they bid and respond. And so it's almost like this bid is, is like, I can imagine it like I'm tossing a ball, right? Like, if I toss a ball your way, verbally, I might say like, "Oh, it's a really gorgeous day outside." And you in response have four options, right? Option one is you can give me a negative response. You can be like, "Gina that's distracting. Why are you talking about that in the middle of our podcast? That's stupid." Right? That would be a pretty negative response in our relationship. You could give me a neutral response. Like right now you're giving me great neutral responses. You're kind of like nodding and you say "Mm hmm." Right? It's not necessarily positive, it's not negative. And that keeps me going. You could have a really positive response. You could say, "Oh, I love beautiful days, let's talk more about the weather." Right? And want to engage with me, right? So that's Option three. Or option four is you could have a non response, right? And when we look at the overall strength and health in a relationship, you would think, often we think that the negative response is the most detrimental to a relationship and it's certainly not great for relationship help, but the non response ultimately is the most problematic. We can think about that, like, it comes up a lot in texting, right? Like, "You didn't even respond to this text." And I then have, if I'm the person sending a text of "Oh, it's nice weather." Let's say that's my bid, and you don't respond. I'm left with a gap to fill. "What's going on for her?" "Did she think that was a silly thing?" "Did she not get my text?" "Is she okay? Is she hurt?" "Does she not care about me?" "Does she think I'm an idiot?" Right? Like, I can fill it in and I'll often fill it in, in our culture with a lot of critique, a lot of kind of like negative anxious assumptions, we tend more that way. Meanwhile, maybe you just didn't get my text, maybe you're having a busy day, maybe you are super overwhelmed, and you know, needing help or support instead of talking about the weather, who knows, right? It could be totally innocent on your end. Or another example might be I could call out to my partner right now, who's out of the room? And I could say like, "Can you help me with this?" And if there's a non response, I can run a whole resentment racket in my head thinking, he never helps me. He doesn't care. He's not listening. He's not a helpful person, whatever. Um, and maybe he just has headphones in. Right? But I now have run this whole, like, resentment narrative or critique narrative that I'm holding on to and if we don't have a response, it doesn't really get resolved. So what we see with really healthy couples, is they pay attention to the bids enough that, you know, he might, he might come back and say, what they do is they circle back. So he might say, "Hey, were you saying something just a minute ago? I think you said something, and I didn't quite hear it." That's a way he might circle back. Or with you, I might send another text and be like, "Hey, dude, are you okay? I haven't heard back from you." Right? There's a way that I might circle back. Or I might repeat myself and say, Hey, did you not hear me What's up? And that's a way that we can close that gap. So that I'm not making up stories. You don't care about me or whatever. And it's not kind of like building room for resentment in the relationship. So we see couples circle back a lot of talk about that some in the book. And we see couples who kind of really pay attention like, "Oh, this is an opportunity for connection and I'm not going to miss it." They might not even be doing it consciously. But they're responding to bids either positively, neutrally or they're responding and coming back to it to circle back later. Again, I could geek out about this all day.

Robin | Yes. I love it. I love that. This what we're doing! [Gina laughs] We're geeking out about all of it, Gina.

Gina | Yeah.

Robin | One of the skills and I think this relates back to what you're saying about resentment, and how that can build up over time if these bids are not being received or responded to. But one of the skills that you talk about, which I was like, "Oh, I love this one." is giving the benefit of the doubt.

Gina | Oh yeah.

Robin | You say, generosity is an inside job. It's about choosing trust, over insecurity or resentment. And, really, this is a big one, right? Because it's almost like you need to clear away. These built up resentments. Because resentments are just, it's like heaviness and it's about the past but giving the benefit of the doubt. Wow.

Gina | Yeah.

Robin | I mean you can give that to your children, I can give that to my children very easily. And I think that when it comes to my partner, sometimes like, oh the doubt is there, it's like, oh, right? You're thinking the worst thoughts. I think that's comon. [laughs]

Gina | Yeah, I think it's a really important mental exercise, like I was saying, we're sort of conditioned to have more of a negative interpretation in our culture, we're kind of anxious or we're a little insecure, or, you know, and we will fill in those gaps, more often than not with a negative interpretation and so it's a really important mental exercise to nourish your relationship and to notice, am I just filling in with negative interpretations here? And can I practice simply giving two more options? Right, like, what else could be happening? That's a more generous assumption, it still could be, you're a jerk and you're not listening to me. That is, it could be true. Also, it could be true, you have your headphones in, it could be true that you're distracted, it could be true. There was a day, I was like calling around the house for my partner and thinking like where is he? Why isn't he listening to me? He wasn't even here, he was running errands somewhere. And I just hadn't checked to see if the car was here, right? Like, there are a lot of options available, that are much more innocent, and kind and generous. And one of the measures, you know, we can look at to see how much resentment or contempt is built in a relationship is how easily a person can switch to a more generous assumption, right? Because over time, our resentments kind of concretize, they like become really solid and rigid. And the more rigid they become, that's dangerous territory for the relationship. And so you know, as a clinician, that's one of the things I look at, like, can you come up with a generous assumption? Can you assume the best about this person? Because if not, we need to look at some of the trust issues that are there, right? Like you're not able to extend goodwill towards your partner. That's not like red flag territory, but that is definitely something that needs to be addressed if you're gonna move forward with this person.

Robin | Yeah. Your skill number 16 in the book is shifting from blame to personal accountability. And you say, "Getting stuck in a blaming mindset is one of the most common ways we sabotage our relationships. When we start conversations from a place of blame, it's likely your partner will respond to defensiveness." Of course, that's only natural right? So do you have some words that you can share on how to be accountable? Even if you feel like you really haven't done anything wrong?

Gina | Mhmm. Yeah, yeah.

Robin | That is a skill right there.

Gina | Oh, yeah. Well, and it's, oh, it's tricky because often, what I see, when we get stuck in blame, we're really wanting the other person to take some accountability. But if I, if I begin from a place of like, demanding accountability, which is also blame, usually, like you, I don't know what, well, my partner was a little cranky this morning. I'll give you this example. He was cranky. And I could start a conversation with like, "You were cranky, and it started my day off poorly." Right? How likely is it that he's gonna respond positively to that and be like, "Well, you're right. I was kind of a jerk." Um, it is not likely, right? Like, if I start with blame it's far more likely that our conversation is gonna, he's gonna get defensive, and then I'm gonna get defensive, and we're gonna have a conflict, right? Instead, I could either give him the benefit of the doubt and say, it was a pretty early morning, and I know his meditation was interrupted when our two year old got up and that probably threw him off. There's my generous interpretation and I know for a fact that's what happened now. But like, you know, in the moment this morning, I didn't know that. Um, but so I could give a more generous interpretation. Or I could say, "Hmm, is there anything I could have done differently to shift the way, you know, his crankiness affected me or showed up this morning?" Right? Well, I was truthfully trying to lay in bed a little bit longer, while one of our kids was fussing and didn't think about the fact Oh, this is his, my partner's one and only quiet time of the day, and he tries to meditate during this time, I could get my lazy self up out of bed and that would have head off his meditation getting interrupted. Or another thing I could have done, I could have offered help more quickly. She had wet the bed and I could have been like, "Oh, hey, where can I step in?" Right? So it's not my fault he was cranky. It's not my responsibility that he was cranky. But are there ways that I could have adjusted my interaction? I can take accountability for like, "Oh, I could have done this a little differently." That if I start from there, like, "Oh, hey, you know, this morning, I could have set us up better if I had gotten up more quickly with the baby" or "I could have, you know, I wish I would have offered help more quickly" Right? Still that might be like 5% of the interaction, and 95% of it was him being cranky. But if I start with some accountability, he is far more likely to join me in being like, "Yeah, alright and I was kind of a jerk. I'm sorry about that." Right? And so that's, that's what we look at when we say starting with personal accountability, instead of focusing on the other person. Is there anything I could have done differently? Any way that I contributed to the escalation of our conflict? Or the, you know, the, like, misunderstanding that we had? Maybe I could have brought this up at a better time of day or could have asked your consent before I, you know, dumped a bunch of emotional stuff on you. There might be ways that I could adjust. And I'm going to get a softer response.

Robin | I really like this, Gina. I'm learning so much. This is so good! This is why I do this! [laughs] For our community as well, for all of our relationships, right? So can we talk about consent? You talk about emotional, establishing emotional consent.

Gina | Yeah.

Robin | And so what is this? Yes. So what does this mean? This means really like you really want to ask your partner before you have... Maybe you explain it!

Gina | Yeah, well, I mean, we don't talk about consent enough in our culture. You know. And if we ever do, we might talk about it around like sexual intimacy. But emotional intimacy and vulnerability can be, we can violate that just, you know, and do just as much damage. And so I think about, I often, like, use this metaphor with my clients that like, my partner walking into the room and saying, "I can't stand the way you behaved this morning!" Let's continue that, like, let's say, he marched in here and said that in the middle of my workday, I'm in the middle of, you know, having an interview right now. If he just stormed in that way. It's the equivalent of him like, storming in naked and being like, let's have sex right now. Right? Um, that would be shocking to my system too and would totally throw me off, right. But sometimes we have this expectation, especially in live in relationships, but in our intimate partnerships, that like, I can just emotionally dump anytime I want to with you. And I can just, like, lay all my vulnerability out there, and you have to be ready to catch it. And the truth is, you know, he's got a job, I've got a job, we've got kids, I've got a dog to walk with. We're like doing other things sometimes and we're not in the best place to respond to emotional intimacy, just like, I'm not in the best place to respond to sexual intimacy right now. Right? I would want him to say like, "Hey, are you available? Are you in the mood?" Right? Like, "Is there anything I can do to help you be in this mood?" I would want the same kind of checking, the same kind of consent checking around emotional intimacy. And it helps me so that if he, you know, were to show up and be like, "Are you in a place where you can hear me out about an argument we had or about how much I hate my job?" I can say, "Oh, my gosh, I am right in the middle of an interview right now. I can't do it right this second. But we'll probably be off in about a half hour. Can we talk then?" or And then we're gonna go right into dinner. "Can I talk to you after we get the kids down tonight?" "Can we bring the stuff when we have coffee tomorrow morning?" You know, like I can say, "I'll be in a better place, I just got in from my commute. I can't, I'm totally frazzled from the traffic. Okay, I'll be in a better place in five minutes." "Can I shower first?" I can negotiate for consent so that I can show up better to receive the vulnerability, the emotional intensity that he's going through and be a better listener and a better partner. Or I can negotiate like, "Cool, I can't probably do much problem solving, I don't have any energy for that but I can give you a lot of empathy, I can give you some physical affection, like can I rub your shoulders. That I can show up for." And, again, it helps us sort of negotiate what sort of intimacy we're both available for and we can offer. Similarly to like, "I don't know that I'm into this kind of sex right now but I can make out and slow dance with you for a little while." You know, "We could kiss for a little while, and then we could check back in." Right? It's a way that we might negotiate consent around sexual activity. So it's not a perfect parallel, but it helps me have like, examples to draw from of like, you're not gonna walk in here naked, I hope he's also not gonna walk in here and emotionally dump and vice versa.

Robin | I really, I really appreciate that. I think that's just awesome, awesome advice. We only have a little bit of time. We've had so many community questions, but I wanted to ask a few if that's okay with you.

Gina | Yeah. Great!

I'm emotionally available for that.

Robin | Okay, wonderful. [both laugh] This question is from one of our community members. "I found out my boyfriend of one and a half years doesn't want children and is adamant about it. I'm honestly heartbroken, as we always joked about kids." Maybe joked, hmm.. "He told me he wanted them multiple times and now he's very stern, no. He has two kids from his previous marriage and his ex wife has turned them against him in very cruel ways, unfortunately. He loves his children immensely. His excuse is, he's too old. I cannot force this as it is his decision and I must respect that. I'm absolutely devastated as I really want children and he knew it. I feel like he's led me on and our relationship is perfect but this has thrown a spanner into the works and I'm in shock. I don't know how to handle this, as it's such a fundamental incompatibility."

Gina | Mhmm. Yeah. I read that one. You sent it to me and I felt a little heartbroken for that person. And I hear, I hear one question is about like, do we or don't we have kids? And it seems like they have some, at least he has an answer about that. She maybe wants to think about like, does that mean she's gonna have children elsewhere? Or is she gonna stay in the relationship? But there's this other question around the betrayal of trust. That she felt led on, right? And I think if they're going to stay together, that piece is going to need to be addressed. Right? The feeling like, "I thought we were on this trajectory and turns out, we're not." You know, "Did something change? Maybe something changed, or maybe he's gotten more sure of something that was true all along." I don't know but in order for her to feel like we're on the same team, we're moving in the same direction, again, that sudden shift or that surprising shift, we've got to find a way for them to address that. So that when they're making other plans moving forward, she can trust, "Oh, this is something we're going to follow through on. This isn't something that's gonna change." Because I would be worried if they stay together aand don't address that betrayal, she'll always kind of be wondering like, are we really, let's say, we decide to get married. Are we really going to go through with getting married? We're gonna buy a house, Oh, are we really going to buy a house? Or you gonna change your mind? And that's not to say, like, people do change their mind or, or get more clear in their plans. It's not that there's something wrong with him doing that. But for whatever reason, there's a huge gap in their understanding of where they were at and we really want partners to feel like, "Oh, we're on the same page about what we're doing together." Right? Especially around big stuff like kids, housing, moves across the country, that kind of stuff. Yeah.

Robin | Well, I would not, of course, this is why you're so good at what you do. You're a therapist, you're a specialist in this, but I would have thought, Okay, the whole discussion is about kids, and "Okay, I really want them. You changed your mind. You don't want them now. Okay. What am I going to do?" Right? Yes, there's that piece but like you said, there's that betrayal of trust. I mean, he did say originally he wanted them and now he doesn't. So where else could that show up in a relationship? And I think, wow, that's very fundamental. Great point.

Gina | Yeah. Well, the other part is that, you know, it sounds like this is a big loss for her. And so if they stay together, she's going to need to grieve and mourn, you know, this big mental adjustment for her not having the kind of family that she had envisioned. And for her to go through that, and him not to have compassion or empathy, I don't know that he wouldn't. But like, they're going to need to find a way for her to process that, that they can stay connected through. And this is one, I often recommend couples therapists for. This kind of like a major, major difference of how we're gonna orient our life. There are very few decisions as permanent as having children. You know, and so you can always change your career, you can always sell your house, but once you're a parent, you're a parent. And once you decide not to do parenting, it's not really a decision you change your mind from often. So, it's a big one, I would definitely find someone to process that with.

Robin | Yeah. Well, I can't believe our time went so fast. Gina. And every time I talk to you, I learn so much and I'm so happy we had this time together. You just give so many, this is all about learning to love better and I think all of your advice and just how you approach these situations with individuals and couples, it really is giving us tools to really just step back, go inside. Right? And like, How can I approach this, in my thoughts and my actions in the most loving kind way? Really, that's what this is about. Right?

Gina | Yeah. Well, and I do think it is about learning. Like, these are lessons that we don't often get taught growing up, we might learn how to add and subtract and read, but we're not really taught like, Oh, what are emotions? How should I deal with them? What happens if we have a disagreement and I'm disappointed? You know, like, we don't learn a lot of that stuff. And so I think it helps me a lot because then I don't have to judge anyone like, Oh, you are a jerk? No, you just haven't learned this is the way that relationships work. That this is how trust gets built, and it really helps me in my work. You know, I see people through all kinds of things. To know like, "Oh, you just need to learn. This is how this could work better for you." Right?

Robin | Yeah.

Gina | It makes it really fun to teach.

Robin | And so you... Tell us about the courses that you’re teaching and the work that you're most passionate about right now?

Gina | Yeah, well, I have been moving more into like formally teaching some courses and they're both on my website, heygina.com and bloomwithus.com but a few of them are around, like talking about, right now my most recent one that I came out with was around talking about sexuality. It's such a vulnerable topic and most of us never learn how to identify what we're interested in, and then say it out loud to somebody we care about. That's so risky. It's so, you know, it's just like so vulnerable. And so I created this course to help people kind of walk through that, identifying it, and asking for it in a way that feels confidence-building and connection building, instead of super risky and unnerving. And I have a number of other communication skills-based courses around communicating compassionately through conflict. And the like, inner conversation I was talking about earlier, being kinder to yourself so that you can be more kind with others. And there are quite a few now actually because I do, I geek out about this stuff and love teaching. So if folks are interested, they can find those on my website.

Robin | That's wonderful. We'll make sure we add links to your website and Instagram, socials in the show notes. And I just want to thank you again, Gina. It's always such a pleasure. And I know we'll connect again soon.

Gina | Yeah, definitely.

Robin | Thank you.

Gina | Thank you!

Robin | Enjoy the rest of your day. [laughs]

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Transcription by https://otter.ai & edited by Anna Lafreniere