Let’s Talk Love Podcast Season 4 Episode 11 with Dené Logan | Transcript

03.08.23

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

Robin Ducharme | Today truly was one of my favorite podcast episodes to date. I shared an enlightening conversation with marriage and family therapist Dené Logan. We talked about how Dené's work with couples has informed the way she sees the nature of our relationship containers shifting. Dené talks openly about her 11 year marriage ending, and how she and her former husband chose to consciously part ways in the most loving way possible. We talk about the five takeaways or realizations she gained from the year after her marriage ended. We talk about codependency and entitlement dynamics in relationships, and also dating with love, curiosity and reverence for yourself and the people that you're meeting. This is a conversation I hope you gain a lot from, just as I did today. Enjoy.

Welcome to Let's Talk Love the podcast that brings you real talk, fresh ideas and expert insights every week. Our guests are the most trusted voices in love and relationships. And they're here for you with tools, information and friendly advice to help you expand the ways you love, relate and communicate. We tackle the big questions, not shying away from the complex, the messy, the awkward and the joyful parts of relationships. I'm your host, Robin Ducharme. Now, Let's Talk Love.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Let's Talk Love. I'm so excited to have Dené Logan with us today.

Dené Logan | Hi, Robin.

Robin Ducharme | We have mutual friends, John and Vanessa. And I feel it as I was preparing for this. And I've been listening to your podcast and on your IG. I just, I feel like connected to you already. And I'm just so excited for this conversation. So thank you, sweetheart.

Dené Logan | I'm so honored to be here. And everyone who we do have several mutual friends. Everyone speaks of you just with so much love and reverence. And so I've been really excited to get to meet you today. Thanks for inviting me in.

Robin | Wonderful. So tell us about your yourself. Your your therapy, practice your coaching, I know you do retreats, I'd love to hear about your professional background, and we're gonna dive into all the juicy stuff.

Dené | Yeah. So as you mentioned, I'm a marriage and family therapist located in Los Angeles. And, you know, my practice started off after grad school being in Santa Monica and working with people in person. And as you know, is the case with so many therapists I've been for like the last three years, pretty much extensively working virtually in terms of like one on one therapy. But I also have a podcast with another mutual friend of ours, Vanessa Bennett called Cheaper Than Therapy. And so we do a lot of, you know, conversations around like what goes on behind the scenes in the therapy room. And a lot of times it's so funny Robin, people will be like, so people just come in and they start telling you everything about your personal lives, like how does that work. And if you've never done therapy therapy can sort of be like a, you know, like, we really want to demystify, like what the experience of therapy is. And so we'll bring people in for live coaching sessions. And we bring in people that we really love in the world of healing and expansion and all of those different modalities. And we talk about those things on our podcast. And then from there, Vanessa and I sort of expanded into running retreats and doing some more in person immersive group experiences. And so while I see people for therapy pretty much, only virtually at this point, I do work with people in person when we do retreats, and things like that.

Robin | And you're also I've seen this your your leave launched your groups, right, where people can come together. So it's not what it is. You are. Tell us about that? Because that's a new thing that you just launched, right?

Dené | Yeah. So Vanessa, and I launched our Cheaper Than Therapy Community, which was basically based on John , Vanessa's partner, The Angry Therapist had started something right at the start of 2020. And when we're all sort of, you know, inside on lockdown, and it was like perfect timing John's kind of intuitive that way. But he thought to start an online community that he called the TAT lab, the angry therapist lab, where he just brought together a bunch of coaches and therapists and healers and started groups and it became this really thriving community where we were running groups at a time when people were so hungry for community and hungry for an opportunity to be together and really connect in an authentic way when we were also sort of at a destabilizing moment and not knowing what was happening. And so we held space for one another. And Vanessa and I were just so moved by the ways that people came together and community and we're supporting one another and started to be like, one another's chosen family. And they were having like friends getting together from like, all over the country and like coming to like, meet one another in person, because all of us just like really fell in love with one another. And then John is busy. So the angry therapists community sort of had to close down and John went on to do some other things. But Vanessa and I were like, just still so hungry to come back together in community and saw how powerful and transformative those groups can be. So we decided to launch our own community based on the work we were doing in retreats, but a little bit more of a, you know, accessible way of doing it. And then also, we bring in some of the people that we really respect and have had on the podcast and love their perspectives and their teaching like monthly groups as well in there. So it's, it's pretty cool. It's been so far a really, really beautiful experience to see people coming in.

Robin | Wow, I really I the impact of collective healing is profound. And you don't realize it until you're in it. And then you step away, and you're like, Whoa, you don't you just don't realize how being together is so it's so healing. collective healing is like, we don't talk enough about it. But it's important. Yeah.

Dené | Yeah, I think there's something about the fellowship of seeing your experience being spoken to by another person, we all kind of think whatever we're going through where, you know, vacuum, and we're the only ones who've ever felt this. And it's never that,

Robin | Yeah.

Dené | We're always so much more alike than we imagine.

Robin | So why did we approached you to come on this podcast, I know, you might have been back and forth with Maia about, like what you would just love to talk about. And I wanted to just start there, because you said, I'd love to talk about how my work with couples has informed the way I see the nature of our relationship containers shifting. So when you when you're seeing this in your practice and with your, with your clients, how do you see relationship containers shifting?

Dené | I love this question. And that's a big one. And it's one I'm really passionate about having this conversation around. Because, well, so a little bit further background on me is that I'm a couples therapist, and what a lot of people don't know, from my perspective about therapy and the world of therapists is that people either love working with couples or they won't work with a lot of times. It's it's not everybody's favorite thing to do to work with couples, because even those of us who are trained to sort of de escalate conflict, conflict can be kind of confronting for most of us. So I found that, you know, when we're in our practicum, and then as I came into private practice, a lot of my colleagues didn't really love working with couples, and I loved it, for whatever reason, it just felt like this is my sweet spot, like I could sort of translate to each person what I was seeing in a way that the other person could hear it. And I felt like, for whatever reason, I feel really called to do this work. And so I was starting to build a practice based on the fact that I loved working with couples, and people would send me a lot of couples referrals. And then I was married for 12 years, and my marriage, my marriage ended, and we realize that our relationship needed to change for him. So it was such a like, fascinating juxtaposition to be in the midst of really sort of, like unpacking for myself, like, what was all of this, you know, like being married for all of these years, and all of a sudden, being a single woman, and meanwhile, really sitting with couples attempting to understand what was happening for them and how they could love one another a little bit more effectively. And I started to become like a little bit of a relationship, anthropologist, like obsessed with understanding what was happening here. Yeah, Vanessa, and I come from a depth psychology background, which is a little bit different than a lot of the clinical psychology models, basically meaning depth, psychology is like the psychology of the soul. So it holds like a bit more of a spiritual perspective on the work and the work of therapy and what we're doing. And I think what I started to understand was, there was a way that I was viewing couples work through a depth psychology lens that was a little bit different than so much of the training that I had around couples work. And it's funny, Robin, a lot of people feel like couples therapy, isn't that effective. That's because most of the time it kind of isn't, to be honest. And I started to develop some theories around why I believe that is, you know, most of the modalities of couples therapy really sort of, well, a couple things, first of all, they are they're sort of developed through research that you know, like people will speak to like 40 years of research within this field and a lot of it has been with the goal of maintaining patriarchal structures that are not a lot of times super fulfilling for women. By design, if you think about what life was like for women 40 years ago, a lot of times there are things that are just like shifting and evolving in terms of our ability to take care of ourselves in terms of our ability to like really insist upon fulfilling lives. And what I started to see in a lot of those modalities that I was trained to work within was, you know, they all sort of speak to two things that all of us need a sense of stability, and a sense of aliveness. But what I found was that most of the modalities were really putting an emphasis on the stability, which is very masculine to patriarichal. Yes, but not a ton of emphasis on the aliveness with two exceptions. And one was my mentor Esther Perel talks a lot about like the aliveness and the Eros and why that's so important. But also Ellyn Bader's work and differentiation work and how we are meant to like, evolve and use these relationships as a container for that. And I thought, how interesting that the two people that are speaking to couples work in a way that resonates for me most are women, right. And what I realized was, there's a lot about the way that we have been conditioned to approach couples work, that isn't really addressing how it feels to be in relationship for women really, right. And also authentic fulfillment for men, from my perspective, because there's a lot about patriarchal models that are deeply damaging to men in ways that we don't really get honest about and address and relationships are changing. You know, there's so many ways that I speak too often that there's an unspoken war of the sexes going on that nobody's really talking about.

Robin | War of the Sexes. Hmmm

Dené | Yes. You know, there's, there's like all of these ways, like they've written articles about the rise of the lonely single males.

Robin | Yes.

Dené | And that women are more and more just choosing not to partner or, you know,

Robin | Women are more educated now. Like, if you're looking at the stats.

Dené | They can take care of themselves.

Robin | Yes, yes. The world is changing.

Dené | Absolutely. And so it's, it's requiring that we really take a long hard look at what it looks like to be in relationships in the long term and actually experience authentic fulfillment. And what I started to see in the couples that I worked with was, there's a way in depth psychology, Carl Jung was the first person to really speak to masculine and feminine energetics and that all of us have masculine and feminine energetics within us. But what we've been really conditioned to do is believe that we need to sort of get the energetic that we don't have within us from another person. So if I'm a core, feminine woman, I'm conditioned to believe that I am meant to, like get energy, masculine energy from a core male, if that's what I'm attracted to, and vice versa. But what ends up happening with couples so often is we're attracted to someone who is our polar opposite, but then we feel frustrated for the rest of our lives with them for not being similar to us, right. So men will be attracted to a woman's radiance, and you know, just like the way she shows up in a room, and she's just like, in her feminine essence, and free and sensual, and all these things when he first meets her, but then over time, he will start to feel like, oh, I just wish that, you know, it's always something she always wants to have conversations. She's always like, you know, bringing me a problem,wanting to connect, can we just keep it simple. Can we just make it easy. And vice versa, we do the same thing with men, right? Just really wanting them to talk more and open up more and you know, sort of do connecting the way that we do in a way that sort of

Robin | Was, but you're so let's talk about the opposite of why of like, what would be so attractive, like a woman attracted to a man. And like that patriarchal. Dynamic?

Dené | Yeah. So I think you know, what we are often attracted to, in the beginning is feeling seen and the feminine longs to be seen. And then, you know, we long for a sense of structure, and we long for like within a man like him really having a mission. He'll have really take charge when you first start dating. He'll pursue you he'll plan the date, he'll do all of these things that are just like such a turn on to us as a core feminine woman. What ends up happening in the way that patriarchal structures have taught us to do relationships is once you've landed her, that's done like now it's like

Robin | Oh yeah,

Dené | Forever couples will be like, What do you want to eat? Right? Like they go back and forth.

Robin | Right and then your the one making the decisions and then it's like turning it into make a decision. Right, almost.

Dené | You nailed it. And then that's it. Right? So it's like what could be considered like feminine nurturing has sort of gone a little bit overboard and turned into mothering. And what we don't talk about in terms of motherhood is that mothering is actually a very masculine role that we as women step into, when we have babies, it's very like, you know, take charge structure, keep the baby safe. There's tasks that need to be done. And so we would think,

Robin | You're right. Oh my gosh, yeah.

Dene Logan

And so what ends up happening is, especially once we introduce children into the scenario, it becomes a little bit, the woman's masculine sort of takes over. And she can feel like not only do I have to tend to my children, and all of the things that need to be done for them, but I'm tending to my husband, and he feels like another child, which, you know, after a little while starts to lead to a real, real lack of Eros and attraction for one another, because we're not meant to be parenting our partners, right. And so all of these dynamics were sort of playing out in front of the couples that I was sitting with. And I realized, our work is to really bring the focus back inward into integrating our own inner masculine and feminine versus feeling like that's something that we're meant to get outside of ourselves. And that's the work of interdependence from my perspective, right. So we've really been raised within a codependent society, which is like, I'm okay, if we're okay, I regulate my inner world by, you know, controlling the exterior controlling the people around me, where is if I really bring the focus back to me, and we use our relationships sort of in alignment with this as a life school, and what is this relationship showing me that I have to heal within me what is being activated within me that I can take responsibility for looking at and being curious about, and when both people are doing that, I find that there's organic reciprocity, but it's not from a space of sort of depleting one another energetically.

Robin | lright, it's just so beautiful. I love live school. This year, we're launching Love School. And it is that this is what this is what it is right of all about this. So we're speaking the same language today. So

Dené | I love it

Robin | I loved a blog that you posted. And I just wanted to break it down. So you're like, you're just so wise. And it just I love that. So you wrote a blog of five takeaways, or realizations from the year after your marriage ended? And I thought we could just talk about it. Because you and I watched your I listened and watched your podcast with your former husband, Mike. It was really good, like, because you're really good. It is beautiful. And you got like, you got a great story that you share. And you do have a great relationship. You say he's one of your closest friends and you share your son. You've managed to navigate that in such a really tremendous way. So when you say the five things, so let's just talk about this. So when the first thing you talk about is when you're going through this breakup is embrace the redirect. Wow. Because your life is being redirected when you go through a breakup, whether it is a conscious uncoupling or not. And so many of us are afraid about the redirect. It's just you're like stepping into the unknown, right?

Dené | Yes.

Robin | So what guys I've got, I've got lots of quotes that I want to quote of yours. like we could do that. But like you say that they're like the the first year like this year has shown me that there will be detours that take our life in a completely different direction than we could possibly have imagined. But that a new road can provide magic that we could not have dreamed up of our own. We have to be willing to trust the redirect. That's hard.

Dené | Yes, it absolutely is, you know, and to me, being in the space of the unknown is the feminine, that is the wild, untamed circular energy of the soul. And that if we believe this is a life school, and that we are held by something bigger, now I can see and you know, I think it was Soren Kierkegaard who said that life can only be understood backwards. Now I understand why the almost four years since my relationship with my ex husband ended was so divinely orchestrated to teach me things that I was meant to know to really support people in this evolution that we're experiencing in our relationships. And so it feels like, oh, it was so synchronistic. And it was also perfect. But in the moment of that initial, you know, jolt to the system of like, everything I've known for these last 12 years is changing, and what is this going to look like? And I have no idea, that sort of untethered feeling can be really destabilizing. And I think that that is when we are really called to, to use some of our tools and say, Okay, what do I know about life? What do I believe about life? You know, we had a two year old boy at the time and I thought, what do I want my little boy to remember about this time, and remember about our relationship? And so I think both of us decided that he was going to be our North Star and that we were going to be in the space of love as much as possible. I believe in every moment we're choosing between love and fear. And so every moment that I started to feel afraid, I would ask myself what would love say about this moment? You know, like, for example, when he first started dating someone, and she was just like this very young, unbelievably beautiful woman and my fear started like, oh, what if my little boy like wants to hang out with her more likes her more than me, right? Like, all of my ego,

Robin | Natural thing to surface, right?

Dené | Of course, right. And so I decided, well, what would love say Dene and I said, Love would say it's going to be best for everyone if you figure out a way to love her. And she has become such a sacred soul and friend in my life, and they're not even together. Like, really love one another. But I think that in every moment, the fear will come that's a very human response to change and to the unknown. But if we say, if I stay rooted in love, sometimes there can be an outcome that is so much better than what I could have possibly imagined. But that's the work right, like to really stay with ourselves, and attempt to self soothe by finding whatever the path of trust and you know, remembering that we are held moment to moment, breath by breath. But I think that has been so much of a teaching for me over the last few years.

Robin | Yeah. The second thing is differentiating your truth from society's Whoa, this is a big one, you said, Well,

Dené | Yeah

Robin | I think the most challenging part of a marriage ending is navigating what comes up for everyone else around your decision. I get that. Because there's so many people that both of you, your family, your friends, your work, it just it's just it is just this big, like ripple effect of people that are like, oh, no. And it's

Dené | Yes.

Robin | And navigate, you, and you say that decision might make those around you feel understandable sense of disruption. Someone in their inner circle has changed the boundaries of this relationship you have with them. Right? And that can be deeply a deeply steeped, destabilizing feeling.

Dené | Absolutely.

Robin | And so what do you, how do you? How did you navigate that with the people around you? And how do you coach other people to like to figure that out?

Dene Logan

Dené | Yeah, you know, we're so societally conditioned to see a marriage, certainly, but any relationship ending as a failure. I don't see it that way.

Robin | I don't either.

Dené | Yeah. And I think the, the idea of holding it as a failure really creates a lot of resistance to being honest, you know, I remember I heard. So when I love Mark Groves, say something once about like, the really the relationships, I'm sorry, in relationships, the conversations we don't have, are the ones that actually end up creating the distance and the ruptures that we can't reflect repair from, right. But so often, the things that we think we can't say, because if I say this, then it's gonna, like, you know, hurt this person, or they're gonna push me away, or they won't be able to tolerate hearing it a lot of times, those are the things that we can't repair when we've gone so long without saying so much. But a lot of that is about our deep fear of If this ends, that means a failure. I think there is nothing about my relationship with my ex husband, that is in any way shape, or form a failure has been one of the most sacred and continues to be one of the most sacred relationships of my lifetime. We have the most beautiful child and co parenting relationship. And it's taught me so much, you know, both in the years we were together and outside of that marital container. But that being said, you know, when we ended our marriage, I remember that, so much of what was hard about it, to be honest, was not our relationship. It was everyone else's reactions and how everyone else feels like, you know, you've let us down or like that, you know, it's a little bit like, why though, you know, he's a good man, you guys aren't like fighting all the time, why it's really hard for people to wrap their head around.

Robin | Yes, I just can't figure it out like, well, it's not yours to figure out.

Dené | A little bit that's what does that mean about like, my sense of stability and where I've been resting in terms of my relationship if, if there's nothing wrong, like because a lot of times people will want to hear the what happened. So I can avoid doing that or so I can avoid having the same experience. But if there's nothing wrong, except that we've both decided that we want something different than that feels destabilizing and not within the structures of what we've been taught will keep us safe, right. Like you just you get married, you buy a house, you have some kids, you retire, like that's their trajectory. And if we stay within those boundaries, we'll be safe. But the truth is, the safety is always an illusion. You know, we always are putting our trust in something holding us and that none of us are promised anything. None of us are promised tomorrow with anyone that we love. But I think if we're willing to hold our relationships in our lives that way, we're able to bring a different level of reverence to life and a different level. have presence and that every relationship isn't promised, but that makes it sacred. And so we can really love the people that we have in our lives while we have them in our lives in a different way. If we say, I don't know that I'm going to have this person here tomorrow. So let me be as present as possible, you know?

Robin | Yes. I think there's also so much still in our culture, around longevity. Right? around like, a longer relationship is a better relationship. So I don't know if that's if that's, if that's changing. Right? It's like,

Dené | I would love for it.

Robin | Yeah, right. It's like this judgment around.

Dené | Yeah.

Robin | Well, if you added to your relationship, well, it really wasn't that kind of relationship, or, instead of like, our lives are just going in different directions. And that's okay.

Dené | Yeah, another thing that my mentor speaks to a lot is that, you know, we sort of, we hold that, like a life story versus a love story. The life story is what is valuable. And some things are meant to be love stories, love story, but that doesn't make them any less valuable. You know, I think sometimes we can be with someone for like, a couple months, that we are just deeply impacted by in a way that we're forever changed. And sometimes we can spend an entire lifetime with someone not evolving and being challenged and curious and growing. And you know, there's that thing, you know, when you go to weddings, sometimes it'll be like couples dancing, and the couple that have been married the longest, everyone sort of like claps and celebrates their union. And it's like, but we don't know anything about

Robin | Absolutly not

Dené | They're really been fully living. Why are we celebrating that, whereas two people who were together for a short amount of time and then life took them apart. And for whatever reason, that love story didn't continue for a lifetime. But I think it's still often such a beautiful love story. But sometimes we need to really know the difference between which is what whether it's a life story, a love story, but not really putting value on one above the other from my perspective.

Robin | Yeah, I agree. So the third thing you talk about is you will transition imperfectly forgive yourself and begin again. Right? This is we're not looking for perfection here. But I think I know myself. It's like, it's funny, because I know, Terri Cole, she's one of my friends. And she says she's a recovering perfectionist. I'm like, I'm totally recovering perfectionist.

Dené | Yes, absolutely. Yeah.

Robin | It's you say our work, becomes to hold ourselves compassionately in the loss of a relationship just as much as we would any other loss. There's that this actually just makes me think of whether this is two people deciding this isn't right for us, whether it's one person, even if you're the person that says I need to walk away from the spaceship, I need this to end, it's no longer the best in my best interest, which means that it's not in either of our best interests in the bigger perspective, but that doesn't, that that doesn't lessen the pain for the person that's choosing to walk away. Right. That's the other thing about our culture, that's not we're not talking about is the understanding that grief can be so deep, even if you're the one that's making that decision for both of you.

Dené | Absolutely. Yeah, I think that there's so many ways that, you know, it's, we don't do grief well as a culture in general from my perspective. I think there's just so many ways, we shy away from acknowledging endings, really holding with deep reverence what it is to grieve and that grief really brings in different level of reverence for life in general, you know, I think collectivist cultures and cultures that really held space for one another in the process of their grief. And you know, there are still some religions that do that a little bit more than all of us collectively know how to do today. But I think there's something about what we learned from grief. I think it's, it's really hard to fully live. If we're shying away from the experience of grief. And I think the only thing that is certain in this life is change. And I think

Robin | Yes

Dené | We're just like defending against the change at all costs. We're not really present for the experience of like, what am I feeling really what is happening, really, and we're really sort of shying away from ourselves by attempting to numb the feelings of grief that inevitably will come with different life stages and periods of change throughout our lives. But I love what you said about that even if this is the choice that I'm making. I think there is there's a lot of bravery. I find a lot of times and being the one to walk away because as you said there's no such thing as one way liberation. That's something Glennon Doyle speaks to in her book So, if this is, if this is liberation, for me, it is liberation for both of us for whatever way, even when we can't see it yet, that is the larger truth I find in our partnerships. But to be the person who says, I gotta call this, I gotta say, this isn't serving either of us anymore. I think we really sort of villainize that person and make it like, you know, this is the choice that they're making to hurt someone. And I think that it's oftentimes, like, just as destabilizing and painful for that person. But also, I think it it takes a lot of bravery to sometimes say the thing and take that difficult step. And we don't hold it that way off. And you know,

Robin | Yeah. And that leads us into number four, walking into walking into the fire of your greatest fear, which is where you'll find your superpower. This was really good Dene, because you talked about how you didn't realize how terrified you were going to feel being alone after your separation. And you said, you're extremely, extremely introverted homebody who never experienced a moment of FOMO in your life, I thought this is also like, yeah. But the cultural conditioning of what it means for a woman of a certain age to be alone runs deep. Wow.

Dené | That's right.

Robin | When I read that I was like that is so there's so many things about this, your experience that a lot of us can relate to, both personally and like societally, right. How it's like, oh, I don't know how old you were when you separated, but you know, I'm your, whatever, 30s 40s. And you're like, Oh, well, now I'm alone. And you know all those stereotypes that go along with oh, no, how are you gonna find somebody? You've got a two year old son, and like, all that BS, right. But then also just being absolutely alone, and living on and just figuring that out, right?

Dené | Absolutely. So I was 41, when we ended our marriage, which you know, societal standards, I'm like, past some sort of prime like, would be the narrative that society would hold about where I was right. And it's fascinating, because, you know, my ex husband as his marriage ended, or his marriage armor, he sort of jumped right back into dating, and, you know, he was like, prime fish back on the market, whereas societally, that's not necessarily how women are held in their early 40s, with a child as a single woman. But, you know, I decided to really well, first of all, I think I didn't realize until my marriage ended how much I was defending against the fear of being alone. And not just because of what society holds about women who are single, but also just the fear of me being able to take care of myself and what that would look like to live alone and do all of the things that you don't think about when you're married. For a long time.

Robin | Nobody else taking half of the load, right? In a lot of ways.

Dené | Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, the paying of the bills and the like figuring out the things that come up that you know, you need to tackle even like little household things that all of a sudden, it was like this thing is broken down. Oh, my responsibility, right. But even things as simple as sleeping alone in a bed after so many years, having someone laying beside you, I remember and I share this sometimes with like everyone singlehood groups for a while. And I would share that like one of the most like victorious moments for me. And this sounds silly, but it was big was when I didn't climb in the bed at night and turn on the television, because there was something in the beginning about being alone that felt scary in a way that I was sort of surprised by and I would keep the TV on to sort of keep me feeling a little bit safe or comforted. And when I got to the point where for whatever reason, I think I was on a trip and there wasn't a TV in the room where I was staying. And so I just like climbed in bed and didn't turn on the TV and just went to sleep. And I was okay. And I think that's so often the case about whatever the fire is that we're afraid to step into the moment that we actually step into the fire. We actually are okay, in the present moment. It's sort of like the anxiety around what's going to be that's actually creating the suffering, but I realized it's dark in here and I'm alone and I'm okay.

Robin | Oh. That is just so like, that is so many things. It's great.

Dené | Yeah, really, it is, you know, it's that moment of like, realization, I'm here and I've got me and I'm okay. And I think there's been so many moments where that teaching has consistently been, whatever the thing is, I surprised myself with what I'm capable of. And I believe now, so much of what I've experienced was because I was meant to hold space for women in really choosing themselves and knowing that we will be okay even in the moments that it feels terrifying to choose ourselves and it feels terrifying to stay with ourselves but that like my trave I've got me can be the thing that we bring ourselves back to as we walk into the fire eyes wide open.

Robin | And I just, you know, that to me is just amazing. So you also said this, I'm you said, I was surprised and delighted to find how very much I like to my own company, how many things I have been longing to do and was able to do now that my life belonged only to me. Oh, so inspiring. And liberating.

Dené | Yes. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, it's sort of forgotten about that.

Robin | So well written and so well said I love it. So the fifth, the fifth thing is Love is always the answer. And you have you already said this to be before about, you know, in when you're in doubt, when you're in question, you know, maybe you're in strife when you're in the heat of the moment with somebody. And you're, you are reminding yourself and all of us to think, what would love do now? What would love say? So, can you give us an example of, you know, this red said, You're in fear? And you're like, Okay, if you turn it to love, what would how would that be different? I know, that's a little bit probably is like, kind of an abstract question. But,

Dené | Yeah, ya know, you know, I think to me, so often, what that comes down to moment to moment is something our friend John, The Angry Therapist says a lot is seek to understand before seeking to be understood. And that phrase has been a game changer in my life, and certainly in my relationships, and something that I come back to with couples. So often, what ends up happening in our moments of activation in any of our relationships is that our inner child is feeling scared, needing to defend itself, you know, drawing from the past about something that's hurt me in the past that feels historic in this moment, and I feel like I need to defend right. And so we're so sort of preoccupied with our fear and how this feels for me and defending myself, that we're not really able to drop into empathy for how this feels for the other person. But that's why, you know, if we stay in the space of like, I come back to tending to myself first, really getting curious about what the fear is naming the fear, that sort of alchemize is the fear the moment that we name it for ourselves, and it takes some of its power away. But if I can identify, okay, I'm afraid right now, with anybody, when they're afraid, all of a sudden, we're able to show that person a little bit more compassion, whatever the thing is, right? And we can do that for ourselves first, we can say, okay, yeah, you're afraid, it makes sense that you're afraid, this is scary, this is different. This is, you know, this person is saying something that's making you feel less than or whatever the thing is, in the moment. But once I tend to my inner kiddo, and I sort of say like, you're good, I've got you, then I can see that other person. And if we bring it back to the example of me and my ex husband, I find that so often, if I'm able to drop into empathy for what this must feel like for him, it's sort of like de-escalates, whatever the thing is. And so that ends up being a lot of the work that I do with couples, can I bring the focus to Me first, really notice what's coming up for me that I'm defending against with this other person. And then once I've tended to myself, my inner child, then I'm actually able to see that other person and attempt to empathize with what this feels like for them. Because so much of what ends up happening in our relationships I find is it's like two inner kiddos, just like battling out to your kids are not good.

Robin | No, not gonna solve it.

Dené | And it's just like, no good comes of it. We're just like, both in our space of activation, really not acting from our highest selves. And, you know, I always say to couples, like somebody's gotta go first. You guys were sort of like, I want that other person to like, acknowledge how I feel what I want you to acknowledge how I feel. And it's like, well, each of us can only take responsibility for our 100% of how we're showing up in this dynamic. We don't get to control other people, unfortunately, that's lifetime, in my experience. And so if I take 100% responsibility for the way that I'm showing up the energy I'm bringing into this dynamic, all of a sudden something alchemical happens and the energy between us starts to shift. But again, somebody's got to be the one to go first. And I'm always like, you know what, no part of me is ever diminished by saying I'm sorry, saying that wasn't, you know,

Robin | That part right there is coming from love.

Dené | Yes, absolutely. And in love for myself first really is when I say no part of me is diminished by admitting that I was wrong or that I wasn't, you know, the best version of me. That's me saying to myself, you don't have to be perfect to be worthy of love today, like you get to be a human being and still be enough and still be worthy of love.

Robin | You know, and something that you you do you talk about is which I just I just really appreciate is you want be proud of yourself and feel good about your actions, and you're, right, that's loving yourself that's giving yourself the most reverence so that you can walk away at the end of the day and going like, Actually, I did well, like, you know, like, it's good. That's kind of like, if I think about my children, and I'm like, when I see them acting for themselves, I'm like, I'm so proud of you. That was frickin rock star, like way to go. You know. You just want to feel better about yourself.

Dené | Yeah, it's, it's not something we're necessarily taught to consider, like the importance of being proud of ourselves. Like, it's very, like, we're a very, like externalized focused society. And there's so much power in saying, I see me I acknowledge me, and I'm actually proud of me in the way that I showed up in that boss, you know,

Robin | Yeah, that's great. Yeah. So this is, this is I'm sure what you said. You were leading Single, sinhgledom? Is that what you call it Dene? Workshop?

Dené | Well, we are a stats single head crew. Yeah.

Robin | Okay. Okay, so this is, you know, my, like, this is so much about like, manifestation and calling in the one and all these things, right. So we're doing the learning. Let's say you've been, oh, first of all, I want to ask this question when you're working with people or even yourself, like, did you have you said that your, your ex, he stepped into the dating world, like, right away, right. And he was going for it? But what is first of all, like, what is your approach on that? I mean, you yourself, are you you're still single? Right?

Dené | I am.

Robin | Is that right? Is that a very personal question? I'm sorry Dene? I didn't mean to put you on the spot. There's no there's nothing to be embarrassed about. I'm just wondering, but did you have this idea, numver one about being single for a period of time before like to do your healing? You know how ...

Dené | Yeah.

Robin | Okay. How do you coach people on that first, and then let's talk about the approach of trying to find somebody new after you're going through all this learning and healing.

Dené | Okay, well, I love this conversation. Yeah, it's, you know, so first of all, I am extremely introverted, which is a factor and I love to when I work with single clients, and it's so funny, Robin, for whatever reason, I started to get this juxtaposition of clients were either work with people that are like single and really struggling with their singlehood. Or I work with couples that are sort of figuring it out. And so I will speak to each subset about well, like, the grass is not always greener. On the other side of what you're going through, so just know, like, everybody's got their stuff, right. But, um, yeah, but I definitely I think when I first you know, I, when I was married, I would talk to my friends and like, I've since gone back and apologize to my single friends about I would just be like, Oh, just go on the dating apps that looks so fun, just like for yourself.

Robin | No problem

Dené | Right? Oh, my God, I have no idea. You know, it's, it's so many things. It's, first of all, I think, unbelievably dehumanizing. The way that it's just sort of like we're like, John's is like shuffling baseball cards. It's just like, swipe, swipe, like, they're not even people. And then, you know, if you are introverted, it's a little bit of, I don't know, it's kind of like job interviews, to be honest. Like, and I am not someone who has done a ton of online dating, the dating that I've done has been more, you know, organically meeting people or people setting me up with people. But I think you know, when you would like meet someone in a bar, or you know, out in the wild, as I like to say it like you would have already a sense of like, oh, there's an attraction here where there's connection, and so we should continue this, we should keep dating. Whereas with dating apps, a lot of times that you show up with this person that you've been texting back and forth with and it's like, you're just asking each other a series of questions. And it's like, really uncomfortable when you realize like, two minutes into it. Like, this is not my person, you know, and so it's just, I like to joke with singles. It's like the wild wild west.

Robin | Just get ready for the wild wild West. Yeah.

Dené | But I think that, you know, I love to say if you can hold it, like, a lot of times, we will be like, Is this my person? I don't know, if this is my person I hear a lot of times my single clients will be like, I mean, he's on a skateboard. And I could never date a guy on a skateboard. So like, swipe, and I'm like, well hold up, like, first of all, he could be an amazing friend. You know, he could be someone that you have a really amazing connection with, who has a friend who could be your person, and you're just like writing people off as is this stuff, like, it's not possible to sort of keep your heart open to whatever it might look like. Yeah, but so maybe it's a sacred friendship.

Robin | Yeah. So tell me when you like, did you decide consciously, I am going to take six months to a year to just be by myself.? Like was that something that you and is that something that you coach people to do?

Dené | Well, I think you know, it's so it's very personal. I was in a very unique position and that there was like a global pandemic as soon as I ended up a single woman and so I was very much in the space of that wasn't something I really had to negotiate as many people do. That being said, I think that everybody's different. And I don't believe in mistakes. And I don't believe in like wrong answers. So I think, get in there if you feel called and see how it feels. And if you realize like, Oh, I'm not ready for this great, that's information now, you know, right. But I think that there aren't any sort of like, hard, fast rules. I think if I'm using this as a distract, as a distraction to not be with myself, then maybe be a little bit curious about that, right? Like, I remember when I became single, all of a sudden, there were all of these things that I felt hungry to like rediscover about myself, like who was I before I started like the chase to like land a man, you know, that like period when we're like an adolescence and all of a sudden, as girls, all of the focus becomes on the boys and whether they like us and all of those things. And I was like, Who was I before that girl, you know, I want to go back for her,

Robin | Oh, I love that.

Dené | I want to like rediscover her and what she loved in that space. And for me, it felt like liberating and exciting to like, No, I kind of love this solitude, I kind of love falling in love with myself. So I really encourage all of my clients to like, be open to that space as well. I believe we should join in partnership when it's justified, not because we're incomplete. And so when I meet someone who the experience of being with them is so incredible, that it's better than my solitude, then let's talk partnership, but not like I'm single, because you know, I'm just waiting for the person who's gonna come along, and I can finally exhale, because I don't have to be single anymore. Like I think we got to reframe that societally.

Robin | I really liked that Dene, like, when it's so so good, that because because you're you're in a place in your life where being on your own is so fantastic, right. It's not like you're like missing this other person that's going to complete you that whole complete, you know.

Dené | That's right

Robin | So what about this, though, so I know that you share openly about how you know, which is so common in relationships is like this codependent dynamic. Already, there's boundary stuff. And so you have figured that out, you've identified it. Now you're on your own. How this is, you know, it's like this whole idea about like, attracting, like you. You don't want to bring in that again, that experience again.

Dené | Yeah

Robin | In a different package. So like, That's tricky.

Dené | Yeah.

Robin | Right.

Dené | Absolutely.

Robin | It's just so tell me, how do you like because I think people would be scared of that, like, repeating and other patterns?

Dené | Yeah, I don't think that we attract what we want. I think we attract what we are. And so I think that it is really important for us to really dig in and do our work and meet moment to moment, whatever is coming forward with curiosity. I think that, you know, I love to normalize for the single clients I have that you will attract people who aren't going to be the best fit for where your life is headed. And I believe the universe will give us tests, but it's not like punitive, like pass or fail. It's sort of like, the universe gives us opportunities to walk our walk

Robin | Oh yeah

Dené | And demonstrate to ourselves that we believe what we say we believe, right? So if I attract someone who's, you know, bread crumbing me and not like, sort of like in alignment with the things that they've said they want, and then they sort of are hot and cold. And all of those things, the universe gives you an opportunity to say, you know, what, not really in alignment with what I want for myself, and that's okay. It's like, it's no shade, no fault. It's just not the right fit for me. And so I, you know, again, it comes back to, for me if this is the Life School, and everything is meant to teach me the lessons that I meant to learn. If it's all the perfect curriculum, then there's no like, you know, you're not doing it wrong. You're gathering information. And so every relationship that we have is information about me and sort of sifting and sorting through like, what's a good fit. But yeah, I think the codependent dynamics are really what we have been conditioned to do and believe that we need to keep ourselves safe. But the more that we come into right relationship and a sense of security within ourselves, I believe those things start to fall away a little bit more, and we don't need it because I'm pretty secure in who I am. I really, like have that solid foundation of knowing myself well. And knowing what I like and knowing what doesn't feel right for me and all of those things, you know,

Robin | Oh, wow. So you and John had done a podcast episode about entitlement.

Dené | One of my favorite words, how people don't love it when I say that word.

Robin | I know. I know. But so how does that like, let's talk about that. And how does that show up when people are in relationship and there's there's entitlement going on?

Dené | Yeah, you know, something that I came to understand in doing this work with couples is that we are really raised in a societal framework of like an ownership template of relationships. Like when someone is my partner or my husband, my person, they're mine, they belong to me. And that ownership template says, I own you or you're nothing, right. Like you do something that is sort of like out of alignment with the contract, the agreement we've made. It's a wrap. Right. And is that love? Right? Like, that becomes the question that we really need to ask ourselves. And again, this is sort of that like Soul work on a soul level, I believe that love now, like my definition of love has become, your soul is safe with me. And that means that I'm going to hold your soul journey.

Robin | So beautiful.

Dené | Yeah, that I'm going to hold your journey with reverence. Even if we're not together, you know, I believe my ex husband, like a part of our, our soul journey in the way that we were safe with one another was when to know like, when it was time to let go, and change course. And I think that there's a way that when we own something, it's like, think about like, I don't know, anything that you buy that you own, all of a sudden, like in the beginning, it's new, and it's exciting, and I love it, and then I start to take it for granted a little bit, maybe I don't care, and I don't even notice it on the shelf or whatever, right. Like, I think we start to do that a little bit in our relationships, from what I've seen, we start to feel just like really entitled to this other person. And I get to control this person, and I get to make them behave the way that I think that they need to behave.

Robin | Right. And control, installation manipulation.

Dené | Totally. I had this moment when my marriage ended, where I don't remember what my ex and I were in conflict about something right? I wanted him to do something. And he was like, annoyed with me and left, and I just had this moment of like, well, he, and like, I realized, like, oh, he doesn't owe me anything anymore, except like showing up for our child. And you know, staying within the boundaries of what we've agreed to. But I don't get to control him anymore. I don't get to manipulate him anymore. I'm not entitled to anything from him. And that was always sort of the case. But I believed you know, he was mine, he needed to fall in line with what I demanded of him because he was my husband. But all of a sudden, I didn't have that ability to control him. And it hit me like a ton of bricks that I had felt really entitled to him in a lot of ways in our relationship. And I see that a lot with couples, I will say like, the entitlement thing is one of the most prevalent things that sort of like chips away at us loving one another well, and I think you know, it's it's not a fun word for us to hear and own. And yet, it's there, you know.

Robin | Wow. So let's talk about one last thing before we close is I want to talk about values. Because I think that I know myself, it's like as I'm getting older and maybe just more self loving and more aware, is I'm getting way closer to what it looks like, this is a deep value. And know, and it's like, and if you're not aligned, let's talk about alignment of values. First of all, how do you help people identify what they truly truly value? Because that's really important to know about yourself. And it could be that some of the things that let's say the relationship is not jiving, we could do we could you have the greatest communication skills in the world with somebody like you, we have all the tools on board from this book and that book, and I look like right. And I statements in the world aren't going to fix the fact that your values aren't aligned.

Dené | That's right. Yeah. You know, I say often to couples that I think our relationship needs three things in order to thrive. Inspiration, meaning, the way that this person is showing up for life and evolving and growing makes me want to be a better version of myself and like rise into that space with them and meet them there. The second thing is respect. I fundamentally, like respect who you are, and the way that you move through the world. And that, to me speaks a little bit of values and that like, we have a shared way of you know, and we're not always going to be in alignment with everything, but like, fundamentally like who this person is, and the way that they show up for their life. I respect that in them. I respect what they're doing. And the last one is a shared mission. And so that sort of becomes like, yes, we're walking this path side by side, but like the horizon that we see in front of us, like we're moving in the same direction, we want similar things. And I think that there's a way that what I see in terms of how we're evolving in relationships is more in alignment with that shared mission, which is a little bit I think, what you're speaking to, and sometimes that to me is when we need to be honest about where things have expired in terms of the relationship contract, and that it's, you know, I think that there's no fault in that sometimes, but that like the mission of what we're working towards, and what we want to cultivate, with this one wild and precious life that we have is no longer in alignment. And that's okay. But we've got to be, as you just said, really clear on what is, you know, most important to me in this life? What are the values that I hold most sacred? And if that's something that we are in alignment with, and that's how we know that this is the right fit, you know.

Robin | Oh, my gosh, Dene, this is so great. I really love that. Oh, thank you. I just like love talking to you. And this is not going to be our last conversation sister we'll continue, continue working together and getting to know each other, I just, I still value our time and all the ways in the shared with us today. So thank you so much.

Oh, my gosh, such a gift. Thank you.

Dené | When you say and it sounds so beautiful.

Robin | Thank you so much.

Dené | Thank you.

Robin | Please visit realloveready.com To become a member of our community. Submit your relationship questions for our podcast experts. At reallovereadypodcast@gmail.com. We read everything you sent. Be sure to rate and review this podcast. Your feedback helps us get you the relationship advice and guidance you need. The Real Love podcast is recorded and edited by Maia Anstey. Transcriptions by otter.ai and edited by Maia Anstey. We at Real Love Ready, acknowledge and express gratitude for the Coast Salish people, and stewards of the land on which we work in play, and encourage everyone listening. Take a moment to acknowledge and express gratitude for those that have stewarded and continue to steward the land that you live on as well.

Transcription by https://otter.ai & edited by Maia Anstey