Episodes
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It’s important for all of us to admit that we have defensive mechanisms and that we do get defensive with our partners at times. Let’s allow ourselves some grace here. Many of you would probably relate to getting even more defensive about getting defensive! It is common to go on the offensive through deflection or blame, which can leave another feeling that their experience is being invalidated.
However that does not mean that someone is being gaslighted. Gaslighting is a much more serious pattern when it is happening, and is a strong accusation to make that can quickly escalate a conversation or conflict. In this episode you will hear the clear distinction between defensiveness and gaslighting so that you can use the terms properly and reduce escalation. By the end of the episode you will hear 6 different actions to take to reduce both defensiveness and gaslighting in your relations. Both of these lead to erosion of connection, love, and emotional closeness.
Relationship Resources:
Join one of the 30 Day Couples Challenges starting Oct 1st, 2024 - select either one with this link: https://www.meetthefreemans.com/challenges. Or see the individual details below:
Level 1 details: “Prioritizing Us” is focused on strengthening your connection, communication, and fun “Love Deposit” ideas. LINKED HERE
Level 2 details : “Rebuilding Us” is focused on repairing and rebuilding after a harder season of marriage. LINKED HERE
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Today we explore the turning points where marriages either survive or fall apart, when they hit that "make it for break it" decision point. We've seen five couples end their relationships recently, one even filing papers yesterday, yet none of them reached out for support from us. Given marriage is what we do, it came as a shock to us when we heard the news.
We know many people have this expereince when they hear about friends ending their relationships. So we want to give you the reasons why couples get to this point and WAYS to work at it. In this episode we provide you with clarity as to the build up that gets couples to this point, but also how they can get THROUGH it together. Not just to survive, but to become more understanding, connected, and stronger as a team to face future challenges!
Relationship Resources:
The “Rebuilding Us” 30-Day Couples Challenge, The Steps to Rebuild a Marriage Guide, and more all LINKED HERE.
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Missing episodes?
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How would you rate the amount of stress in your life right now? We all know that some stress is good stress and that it’s a part of life. Its commonly known that stress plays a major role in physical, mental, and emotional well-being of all of us individually. It’s less known (or at least discussed) how much stress decreases marriage satisfaction and quality!
In today’s episode you will learn everything you ever wanted to know about the effects of stress on your marriage. After listening to this episode you will know:
The 3 sources of stress
How stress directly affects 2 key components in your marriage
Ways to use key coping methods to deal with stress individually and together
10 + positive coping strategies that you can use to better handle the current stressors that you are facing in your life and marriage. So that you can feel relief and be on the same side no matter what stress you face.
Relationship Resources:
1) You can find all of our resources from guides, webclasses, events, to coaching sessions with this link: Best Resources
2)Join us at the in-person Couples Workshop in Arizona on Oct 6th, 2024. Use this as a weekend getaway for you and your partner and attend this 1/2 day event with us to communicate even better and handle challeges as a team. -
When there is tension or an upset in your marriage, it’s easy to point the finger at your partner as the source of the discomfort. But this often leads to further conflict. It also does not address this critical aspect of being in a marriage for a long time… that growth is a part of it! The common question for those that see these events as places to grow is “well, is this a me thing, a you thing, or a we thing”!
Today’s episode is more motivational (and aspirational) about growth in your relationship. You will hear how you can quickly distinguish between the necessary individual work that needs to be done as well as the relationship work that needs to be focused on. After listening to this episode you both will feel more grace for each other with the reminder that you are in this to grow and you are in it together!
Relationship Resources:
1) Discover all our online resources here: https://www.meetthefreemans.com/links
2) Join us at the in-person Couples Workshop on Oct 6th, 2024. As of this episode, the event is 60% sold out so don't wait to grab your seats for this relationship changing event!
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Last week’s episode focused on husbands was a huge hit, so this week we’re focusing on what inner-challenge wives are struggling with and how it’s affecting marriages. In this episode, we dive into the pressure many wives feel to constantly do more, grow more, and be more—often at the expense of their own well-being.
This relentless pursuit can lead to burnout, resentment, and a disconnect in marriages. We’ll explore why it’s crucial to recognize these patterns, how they impact your relationship, and what you can do to create a healthier, more balanced approach. Tune in to discover how you can start making small shifts that will lead to a stronger, more fulfilling marriage.
As you listen, make sure you sign-up for the upcoming 30-Day “Prioritizing Us” Couples Challenge so you can:
Fill each other’s Love Accounts
Strengthen your connection & communication
And consistently feel like your marriage (and your satisfaction) is a top priority
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Men are facing an inner-challenge that is also affecting the marriage. For men to feel a sense of meaning, empowerment, responsibility, value, and achievement they have to show up in the eternal world a certain way. Whether this be in business, profession, managing finances or contracts for the family, relationships with family/friends; men are supposed to show up as warriors, lions, unstoppable, and unshakeable in their pursuits…
But at home that same mentality causes issues and conflicts. Men are then supposed to be understanding, supportive, slow to anger, quick to listen, and in a loving attitude to meet their spouses needs. But without knowing how to transition back to being a partner; men can be defensive, quick to react, withdrawn, and with poor coping and communication with their partners. In this episode you will hear about how men can navigate this internal conflict so they can both be the warrior and protect the family in the outside world, and be a loving partner and father.
Relationship Resources:
Level 1: “Prioritizing Us” is focused on strengthening your connection, communication, and fun “Love Deposit” ideas. LINKED HERE
Level 2: “Rebuilding Us” is focused on repairing and rebuilding after a harder season of marriage. LINKED HERE -
Are you able to have a disagreement with your partner without fighting against each other? To be honest many couples view having a disagreement as a fight, because anytime they disagree and there is a little bit of emotion, it always turns into a fight. We are here to tell you that you can disagree while staying on the same team and moving down the decision making path together to find the best route for both of you and your future.
In this episode you will hear 6 different tools/skills to implement in a moment of disagreement that will keep you on the same side and avoid it turning into a conflict or fight. This is a significant and powerful episode as you cannot avoid disagreement in a marriage, but you can use that to gain understanding and make even better decisions as a couple, rather than have it turn into a fight.
Relationship Resources:
1) Visit our top resources for the season you are in, find anything from guides, to challenges, courses, and even attending an in person workshop: https://www.meetthefreemans.com/links
2) The Next Couples Workshop is Oct 6th, 2024, in Arizona: http://thecouplesworkshop.com/
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This is the second half of that age old question “what do men want” in a marriage? If having a successful marriage is directly related to meeting each other’s needs then it’s quite important to know what those needs are. This episode is the followup from last week about women's needs right now.
With the amount of coaching sessions we do, we have a great insight into the common needs that are going unmet for couples. There are themes that seem to show up in general, so even the specific needs we hear from men in one season, will not be the same in another (though admittedly more consistent than women’s it seems)!
In this episode you will hear the top 3 needs we are hearing from men right now. A little different from the start of the women’s needs episode, you will also hear 3 key traits that also need to be present in the marriage for there to be willingness and receptivity to these needs. Get ready for a great episode for insight into men’s needs (and the critical element of integrity)!
Relationship Resources:
1) As mentioned, get the Family Meeting Guide as a free bonus when you start the Priotitize Us 30 Day Couples Challenge for $1/day.
2) You can also get the Family Meeting Guide by itself for $19.
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It’s the age old question “what do women want” in a marriage? If having a successful marriage is directly related to meeting each other’s needs then it’s quite important to know what those needs are. This episode will be a two part series that will follow up with exploring the needs that men have as well (so don’t feel left out guys)!
With the amount of coaching sessions we do, we have a great insight into the common needs that are going unmet for couples. There are themes that seem to show up in general, so even the specific needs we hear from women in one season, will not be the same in another.
In this episode you will hear the top 3 needs we are hearing from women right now, which are especially related to the longer a couple is together. As you will hear from the beginning, these needs are more like categories than specific actions. If you look at them this way then it won’t seem like a moving target from one season to another. Focus on these 3 categories and you will find more flexibility and effectiveness in meeting the needs in the years to come.
Relationship Resources:
Want fun, simple, and sweet ideas for feeling more Prioritized by each other? Make sure you take advantage of the 30-Day “Prioritizing Us’ couples challenge that is starting less than 2 days from when this is posted. Go to MyCouplesChallenge.com
No matter how busy you are, these prompts are realistic but shake things up a bit and get you out of the routine in your interactions. Just read the testimonials and you’ll see why over 32,000 couples have loved our challenges.
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The success of your life and marriage isn’t as much about the things that happen to you, but how well you can course-correct. This goes for bigger life decisions about where to live, send your kids to school, and where to spend money. As well as the amount of time to pass before initiating repair after a conflict, the attitude you wake up with, and even the thoughts you let your mind focus on.
So then what does “course-correcting” actually look like in regard to these decisions? That is exactly what you will hear in the episode. You are going to hear 4 questions to ask yourselves that will help you to determine whether you are on path or off path, which greatly impacts your satisfaction in your life and marriage together. (So yes it’s pretty important!)
Relationship Resources Mentioned
The Level 1 “Prioritizing Us” 30-Day Couples Challenge (you get the popular Family Meeting guide as a bonus gift with this)
The Level 2 “Rebuilding Us” 30-Day Couples Challenge (repairing and rebuilding after a harder season of marriage)Additional Guides - https://www.meetthefreemans.com/links
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Whether you’ve been in a funk as a couple, or things have just felt pretty routine with your “adulting” responsibilities, this episode will help you SPARK more fun together!
The truth is, life is short. And we don’t believe we’re meant to just let the weeks pass by and survive our busy schedule. Of course there are challenging days (and you hear us talk about that), but let’s enter into a season of more fulfillment, connection, and play together.
You will hear 5 very tangible and actionable ways to spark more fun together, so dive on in!
We often hear couples say, “we get inspired and motivated to create these changes for a few days, and then we forget or get off track.” And that’s exactly why we created the 30-Day Couples Challenge!
Relationship Resources (pick between):
Level 1: “Prioritizing Us” is focused on strengthening your connection, communication, and fun Love Deposit ideas. LINKED HERE - https://mycoupleschallenge.com/
Level 2: “Rebuilding Us” is focused on repairing and rebuilding after a harder season of marriage. LINKED HERE - https://mycoupleschallenge.com/rebuilding -
Talk about things before they become a bigger issue. On our vacation with family, I brought up the topic of intimacy (physical specifically) and it sparked a great conversation between us. Now for many this could be a conversation that isn’t brought up and turns into a bigger issue later. This is when it can turn into a “weed” that impacts your marriage. Or it could be a conversation that causes defensiveness and conflict. Neither of these are positive options.
You see, we want to talk about how we’re feeling and what we want BEFORE it starts to affect you and the connection, trust, or openness you have with your partner.
In this episode you will hear us discuss:
What’s a “seed” in the relationship vs a “weed”
What happens when we don’t discuss things soon enough
How to think about bringing these things up and making it a productive conversation
Relationship Resources:
The Level 1 “Prioritizing Us” 30-Day Couples Challenge (you get the popular Family Meeting guide as a bonus gift with this)
The Level 2 “Rebuilding Us” 30-Day Couples Challenge (repairing and rebuilding after a harder season of marriage) -
You’ve likely heard of the now popular Attachment Theory about having a secure, safe, trusting, and connected relationship. If you have, likely what you’ve seen is quite conceptual and you are not sure how to use the information. If you have not heard of this theory it simply describes how you connect and bond with a partner and how that was influenced by your parents (or primary caregiver) as well as other romantic relationships you have been in (primary attachment figures).
For us Attachment Theory has become so popular online, rightfully so, but without the right experts describing how to use this theory to make a difference in your own relationship, or how to actually change your style. In this episode you will hear from Attachment Theory expert, counselor, PhD, author, and founder of Personal Development School, Thais Gibson! You will hear her cover:
The 4 Attachment Styles (quickly)
The 5 Pillars and traits of each style
How to reprogram your conscious mind (where attachment needs and behaviors come from) with tools like autosuggestion to change your style
Relationship Resources
Take the FREE Quiz to determine your Attachment Style: https://attachment.personaldevelopmentschool.com/quiz
Learn more from the Personal Development School:
https://university.personaldevelopmentschool.com/
Join our 30-Day Couples Challenges (level 1 or 2) starting July 1st, 2024
https://www.meetthefreemans.com/challenges
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Many communications between couples can cause misunderstandings. This leads to more expectations and further frustrations and upsets. Then these upsets can turn into conflicts. Though it seems simple to just “listen better”, listening is not the same as hearing.
Listening is the requirement for understanding, but even then, it does not guarantee complete and accurate understanding of what was actually meant by your partner.
Though much of this has to do with the listener's role, there is also much to say about the speaker and how they deliver the message so as to not create mistranslations.
In this episode you will hear:
Mistakes the speaker makes
Mistakes the listener makes
5 tips for more productive conversations
Plus the psychology principles that can prevent communications from being misunderstood or turning into conflicts.
Relationship Resources:
1) Join the upcoming 30-Day Couples Challenge “Prioritizing Us”, proven to improve your interactions, help you understand each other more, strengthen your connection, and fill your Love Accounts. https://mycoupleschallenge.com/
2) For links to our top resources and guides: https://www.meetthefreemans.com/links
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“I’m sorry” - 2 little words that can not only be challenging for some partners to say, but also can mean MANY different things.
So in today’s episode we cover:
Several specific reasons apologizing can be harder for some (self-awareness)
Why couples can battle over whether the ‘I’m sorry’ is deemed “necessary”
The different meanings of “I’m sorry” and how to expand your language for more things to say in these moments
How to get better at apologizing, big or small
We encourage BOTH of you to listen to this episode and talk about how you can both be better. Because these little moments truly can strengthen your bond or erode your ability to respect each other. We know, strong statement, but respect is tied to this.
As you listen, make sure you get our popular Making Up & Moving Forward guide. These repair steps prevent re-triggering a conflict, having to re-hash the details, and ensures you both feel resolved. -
“How do I get my partner to _____?” This is one of the most common questions we get. Obviously this is referring to wanting a partner to change a behavior in a certain area of the relationship. Underneath that question is the real question of “what is going to motivate my partner?”
If you have ever had this experience of wanting your partner to change something, but they didn’t, you likely felt discouraged or even burnt out. This was likely because you have been asking for things to change for some time now, but nothing did.
In this episode you will hear about the process of motivation and being able to achieve a result you have been wanting to have in your relationship. You will get the 6 steps of the decision making process and how to overcome the motivation threshold so that you do not feel that same burnout or discouragement from not seeing a change happen. In the end you will realize there was something even better for you than the goal you initially set out to achieve!
Relationship Resources:
1) For use in your "Evaluation Step" from the episode, here is the link to the Family Meeting Guide - https://thecouplesexperience.com/family
2) Start the level 1 Prioritizing Us 30-Day Couples Challenge and get the Family Meeting guide as a free bonus. - https://mycoupleschallenge.com/
3) Start the level 2 Rebuiulding Us Couples Challenge - https://mycoupleschallenge.com/rebuilding
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We said to several couples last week: “The ultimate sign of a secure marriage is knowing that even if one of you says something at the wrong time, in the wrong way, or with the wrong tone, the other person will be responsible for their reaction.”
And this is the ultimate goal for so many couples.
So dive in today as we cover:
The 4 D’s that derail conversations and destroy your connection
3 strategies for being responsible for your reactions
Further understanding of the brain so you don’t act from 2 of them in unproductive ways.
As you listen, get 2 of our popular guides:
De-escalating Conflicts & Regulating Emotions HERE
Making Up & Moving Forward (repair steps after conflicts) HERE
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Do you know what you need in your relationship? Whether you do or not right in this moment, knowing what you need is certainly a requirement for being able to communicate and act to fulfill it. This is the basis for having a satisfying relationship.
In this episode we go deeper into explaining our process for effectively communicating your needs and what being assertive really means. But you will also have a new perspective on whether you really know what you need or not. It is not as simple as you think.
Relationship Resources:
Both of the 30 Day Couples Challenges start on Jne 1st.
The Level 1 - Prioritizing Us Challenge
The Level 2 - Rebuilding Us Challenge
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Can you count on each other completely? Not with just the BIG things, but also with the small daily things in your life?
Building and living a great life with each other is only possible if you can count on, TRUST, each other. When you see the word “trust” it’s easy to think of big things around feeling physically safe or being truthful in what you say. But this conversation gets way more into your day-to-day experiences that either lead to doubting each other and losing trust or increasing the reliability and foundational confidence you have no matter what comes up.
Being attracted to each other, feeling connected, being intimate, and having fun together, is only possible if you can COUNT on each other as partners and that you each are operating as people of integrity to these 4 things…
Relationship Resources:
It is the last week to attend the in person Couples Workshop with us in Arizona on May 26th. Check out the details and reserve your seats here: http://thecouplesworkshop.com
If that date is past, or you are looking for immediate resrouces, like the Making Up & Moving Forward Guide: you can see all the resoruces here.
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Which of these 7 stages of marriage are you two in right now? Knowing this not only gives you perspective about navigating your current season, but also what’s ahead of you in the bigger picture of being married for many years.
It is unrealistic to think that every season of marriage should be the same, or will be in the same order as another couple’s. But also, we should be able to navigate some of the harder stages more quickly so they don’t last too long or rob us of joy and fulfillment in living life together.
RELATIONSHIP RESOURCES:
Meet us in-person at The Couples Workshop in Arizona at the end of May.
Start the Prioritize Us 30-Day Couples Challenge and see why over 25,000 couples have loved these prompts!
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