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Tony shares the foundational principles of Dr. Sue Johnson's Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy (EFT/EFCT) from her book "Hold Me Tight." Tony referenced a review from Dan's blog "A Laughing Soul" (https://alaughingsoul.wordpress.com/2012/04/24/hold-me-tight-seven-conversations-for-a-lifetime-of-love/). Tony shares how his "4 Pillars of a Connected Conversation" a key component to his Magnetic Marriage course (http://tonyoverbay.com/magnetic) can significantly help implement the tools of EFT in your marital and personal relationships. The next round of the Magnetic Marriage Course is launching soon! Go sign up now to find out details about the launch.

From A Laughing Soul blog: What Is Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy (EFT)? The message of EFT is simple: Forget about learning how to argue better, analyzing your early childhood, making grand romantic gestures, or experimenting with new sexual positions. Instead, recognize and admit that you are emotionally attached to and dependent on your partner in much the same way that a child is on a parent for nurturing, soothing, and protection.

EFT focuses on creating and strengthening this emotional bond by identifying and transforming the key moments that foster a loving, adult relationship. • EFT has an astounding 70 – 75% success rate and results have been shown to last, even in the face of significant stress. • EFT is recognized by the American Psychological Association as empirically proven. HOLD ME TIGHT presents a streamlined version of EFT. It walks the reader through seven conversations that capture the defining moments in a love relationship and instructs how to shape these moments to create a secure and lasting bond. Case histories and exercises in each conversation bring the lessons of EFT to life.Please subscribe to The Virtual Couch YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/TheVirtualCouchPodcast/ and follow The Virtual Couch on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/virtualcouch/

This episode of The Virtual Couch is sponsored by http://betterhelp.com/virtualcouch With the continuing “sheltering” rules that are spreading across the country PLEASE do not think that you can’t continue or begin therapy now. http://betterhelp.com/virtualcouch can put you quickly in touch with licensed mental health professionals who can meet through text, email, or videoconference often as soon as 24-48 hours. And if you use the link http://betterhelp.com/virtualcouch you will receive 10% off your first month of services. Please make your own mental health a priority, http://betterhelp.com/virtualcouch offers affordable counseling, and they even have sliding scale options if your budget is tight.

Tony's FREE parenting course, “Tips For Parenting Positively Even In the Not So Positive Times” is available NOW. Just go to https://www.tonyoverbay.com/courses-2/ and sign up today. This course will help you understand why it can be so difficult to communicate with and understand your children. You’ll learn how to keep your buttons hidden, how to genuinely give praise that will truly build inner wealth in your child, teen, or even in your adult children, and you’ll learn how to move from being “the punisher” to being someone your children will want to go to when they need help.

Tony's new best-selling book "He's a Porn Addict...Now What? An Expert and a Former Addict Answer Your Questions" is now available on Kindle. https://amzn.to/38mauBo

Tony Overbay, is the co-author of "He's a Porn Addict...Now What? An Expert and a Former Addict Answer Your Questions" now available on Amazon https://amzn.to/33fk0U4. The book debuted in the number 1 spot in the Sexual Health Recovery category and remains there as the time of this record. The book has received numerous positive reviews from professionals in the mental health and recovery fields.

You can learn more about Tony's pornography recovery program The Path Back by visiting http://pathbackrecovery.com And visit http://tonyoverbay.com and sign up to receive updates on upcoming programs, and podcasts.

Tony mentioned a product that he used to take out all of the "uh's" and "um's" that, in his words, "must be created by wizards and magic!" because it's that good! To learn more about Descript click here https://descript.com?lmref=v95myQ

----- TRANSCRIPT -----

[00:00:01] So would you be surprised if I were to tell you that distress in a relationship adversely affects our immune and our hormonal systems, even to the ability to heal ourselves? In one fascinating experiment, psychologist Janice Quico Glaser of Ohio State University had newlywed's fight and then took blood samples over the next several hours. And she found that the more belligerent and contemptuous the partners were, the higher level of stress hormone and the more depressed the immune system. And these effects persisted for up to 24 hours after this fight. After this conflict, and in an even more astounding study called, Glazer used a vacuum pump to produce small blisters on the hands of women volunteers and then had them fight with their husbands. And the nastier the fight, the longer it took for the women's skin to heal. So coming up on today's episode of The Virtual Couch, I'm going to dig into my my old favorite emotionally focused therapy. It's a method developed by Sue Johnson, and it is one of the only empirically based methods recognized by the American Psychological Association. As is empirically proven in the world of couples therapy, F.T.

[00:01:12] emotionally focused therapy for couples has an astounding 70 to 75 percent success rate, and results have even been shown to last, even in the face of significant stress. So the message of VDT is pretty simple. Forget about learning how to argue better or analyzing early childhood or making these grand romantic gestures or even experimenting with things like new sexual positions. Instead, recognize and admit that we are emotionally attached to and dependent now dependent in a healthy kind of way on your partner, much the same way that a child is dependent on a parent for the nurturing, soothing and protection. But what F.T. focuses on is creating and strengthening this emotional bond by identifying and transforming key moments that foster these adult loving relationships. So we're going to learn about that and so much more coming up on today's episode of The Virtual Couch. Hey, everybody, welcome to Episode 254 of The Virtual Couch, I am your host, Tony Overbay. I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist, certified mindful habit coach, writer, speaker, husband, father of four, ultramarathon runner and creator of the Path Back.

[00:02:10] The Path Back is an online pornography recovery program that is helping people reclaim their lives from turning to pornography as a coping mechanism. And if you if you haven't checked out the path back, please head to Pathbackrecovery.com or you can go to Tony Overbay dot com. There's a link there to courses, programs, and you'll find a link to the path back. The reason why I get so excited about this, I've completely revamped the path back. There's an online forum that's pretty amazing. And we have these group calls every Wednesday night that are getting larger and larger. And it is this this group of strength based overcome pornography, become the person you always want to be kind of way calls. And they are just they're kind of becoming the highlight of my week. So if you are interested in participating in one of these calls, want to kind of kick the tires on the program, reach out to me through Tony Overbay Dotcom, and I can give you more information on that. Or you go to Pathbackrecovery.com and there you can find an ebook that describes myths that people often fall prey to when trying to put pornography behind them once and for all. Again, that's Pathbackrecovery.com and I. And today today we're going to talk about emotionally focused therapy, F.T., which is something that I am passionate about. And the reason I'm a geek out a little bit on the concepts of F.T. in general is if you have been listening to the virtual couch for a while, you will have heard me talk incessantly about my magnetic marriage program.

[00:03:28] And that is because we have finished my buddy Preston Buckmeier and I have finished our first round of the magnetic marriage course. And I will I you'll hear so much about it in the coming weeks. There's gonna be some testimonials, some interviews with people that were actually in the first round of the course, but will be opening up that cart around the mid to end of April. And Preston and I are going to start a a podcast series beginning next week that is going to take you through some of the finer principles of the magnetic marriage course in hopes that you will go to Tony Overbay, dotcom, magnetic and just just plug your name in there, find out more about when this card is going to open. And we'll try to make it a little special for people that show up there early or the people that are in line waiting in line early. So, again, go to Tony Overbay, Dotcom's magnetic and you can be one of the first ones to learn more about the magnetic marriage and the magnetic marriage course is where if you've heard over the last I don't know, it's been excuse me a couple of months, but talking about the four pillars of a connected conversation, and I make no secret of those, are based on the principles of emotionally focused therapy.

[00:04:29] So I've been talking so much about four pillars of a connected conversation and this magnetic marriage course. And I've been given examples and the feedback has been phenomenal. But I thought before I jump into this podcast series with Preston, before we jump into another magnetic marriage round, so to speak, I wanted to just do one big geeky episode on F.T. Again, emotionally focused therapy, because everything from this magnetic marriage course is based off of this empirically proven, evidence based couples model, emotionally focused therapy. And as I have said on numerous occasions, whether it's on my show or when I'm being interviewed on someone else's podcast, I would not be doing couples therapy had I not stumbled upon F.T. emotionally focused therapy. Because when you come out of the when you come out of grad school, you've learned some reflective listening skills. You've learned some more skills of when you have a couple in your office where you're maybe saying, all right, reflect back what you heard. Sally, you know, would be Sally and reflect back what what Jim has said. And she'll say, well, I'm hearing him say that he thinks that I'm lazy or I'm hearing him say that he thinks that I am not appreciative. And then you say, OK, Jim, is that what you're conveying? Jim will say, yeah, this is how I'm feeling. And then you'll have them reflect back to one another. And then the therapist kind of and I'm oversimplifying this, trust me, I understand kind of sits back and says, all right, well, now that you've you've heard each other, how how do you feel about that? And it just doesn't feel very satisfying.

[00:05:49] And quite frankly, when you don't have a couples modality to work from, doing couples therapy can be extremely uncomfortable and it can be scary. But when you have a method, a framework like emotionally focused therapy, which has led to an even greater framework in my magnetic marriage course and the skills and tools you learn in this magnetic marriage course, couples therapy is actually a very, very satisfying, exciting thing to do is a therapist. And as I mentioned now, in any given week, I can see anywhere between 10 to 20 couples and I'm still seeing individuals in that sort of thing. So I found a great summary of emotionally focused therapy. And I want to give credit always where credit's due. And what's fascinating about where I found this is there's a blog. This is a good old fashioned WordPress blog called A Laughing Soul. And when you dig a little bit deeper into who the laughing soul is, it's a guy named Dan. It appears that Dan is not necessarily a psychologist. And this blog post was from years ago. But he interviewed he reviewed the book Hold Me Tight by Sue Johnson, which is one of the best books to get. If you are really just wanting to learn about the concepts, the conversations around emotionally focused therapy, and that will give you a nice framework.

[00:06:57] It doesn't. Replace good therapy, or if I'm being completely bowled, what the magnetic marriage course has done is taken these principles of emotion, emotionally focused therapy, and we've we've added a whole lot more to that and made it more of a tangible here's how you put this into action kind of a program. But I still love so much of talking about the principles of emotionally focused therapy, because a lot of times I feel like when I have couples in my office that they don't even know that there is a framework around there. They don't even know that there is a framework that could help them now implementing the framework. Completely different thing and reading the book. Hold Me Tight is a great start. And I realize now I'm starting to sound like quite a big sales pitch. But and I'm OK with that because the magnetic marriage course, as I often say on a lot of the interviews I've been doing, we've cracked the code or figured things out of how to then implement emotionally focused therapy to have these difficult conversations so that you will then come out of a conversation feeling very connected. But I digressed quite a bit in this blog and I'll throw a link to it. Dan, who writes for this laughing soul, has broken down the book, Hold Me Tight beautifully.

[00:08:01] So I'm going to use that as a little bit of a basis or a framework of what I'm going to talk about today, because I want to go through EFT, as I mentioned in the opening of this episode, that it has an astounding 70 to 75 percent success rate and the results have been shown to last even in the face of significant stress. And I have seen that even where I have couples come into my office and I'm and you know what? They're couples where they learn to communicate more effectively and still may find out that they don't feel their marriage is necessarily viable. But even the skills around emotionally focused therapy helped them become incredibly good parents. While I do feel like it can literally save a marriage, I feel like there is nothing wrong or there's nothing negative about learning more about emotionally focused therapy. Even if you feel like you're the only person in the relationship that is putting forth effort, the effort principles are amazing in a relationship, but in not just a marital relationship, but also in the relationship with your kids or coworkers is just people out and about. As a matter of fact, very true story. I had someone in my office yesterday and they listen to the podcast. They'll know this is a good keeping it confidential, of course, but they will, I think, appreciate this. But they were talking about once the principles of emotionally focused therapy really solidified with them, that now they said it's you can't unring that bell.

[00:09:16] You can't undo now hearing things from an emotionally focused therapy standpoint and F.T. standpoint. And it does almost become frustrating to watch or communicate with other people who aren't working from the same emotionally focused place. And we'll talk more about that here in a bit. Hold me tight. This book by Sue Johnson is it's a streamlined version of emotionally focused therapy, which is why, again, I thought would be really fascinating to put this out here and then walk into this podcast series over the next few weeks that Preston and I are going to do about the magnetic marriage course, because I think that you'll hear some fundamental needs that we have as individuals and why we couple why we marry. And then Preston and I, over the next few weeks, we'll be talking about how to make that happen more effectively and more efficiently, using a lot of the things that we put forth in this magnetic marriage course. So it's a streamlined version of what it the book called Hold me Tight, walks the Reader through these conversations that capture these defining moments in a love relationship. And it really does instruct them on how to take these moments and create the secure, lasting bond. And here's a couple of quotes, some excerpts from the book, Hold Me Tight. Asou Johnson says that love is in actuality the pinnacle of evolution, the most compelling survival mechanism of the human species.

[00:10:29] And she says not because it induces us to mate and reproduce. We do manage to mate without love. People do that all the time. But because love drives us to bond emotionally with a precious few others who offer us a safe haven from the storms of life, which that's where Sue Johnson in a follow up book called Love Sense, and it's my favorite quote of all time, says that we are designed to deal with conflict and emotion. Are we are designed to deal with emotion in concert with another human being. So we are designed not to just figure it out on our own, but to process things in a healthy way with someone else. So we have these precious few others that offer us a safe haven from the storms of life. She says that love is our bulwark designed to provide emotional protection so we can cope with the ups and downs of existence. So she also goes on to say this drive to emotionally attached to find someone who we can turn to and say literally hold me tight, is wired into our genes and our bodies. And it's this basic need in life that that's part of life and health and happiness. And it's as normal as the drives of food or shelter or sex that we need emotional attachments with a few irreplaceable others to be physically and mentally healthy to survive.

[00:11:39] And E40 is based off of attachment theory. And we're talking and we go all the way back to the psychologist Bowlby, who in 1944 published the very first paper on family therapy. It was called, funny If you think about this, the family therapy paper is called 44 Juvenile Thieves, in which Bowlby noted that, quote, behind the mask. Of indifference is bottomless misery, and behind apparent callousness is despair. So Bobby's young charges were frozen in the attitude of I will never be hurt again and paralyzed in this desperation and rage. So along with his studies and observations, Bobby was impressed by Darwin's ideas of how natural selection favors responses that help for survival. So we, in essence, present ourselves in a way that we feel we have to do to survive, even if that includes shutting down. If we feel like we are emotionally not safe in a relationship, then we're not going to continue to put ourselves out there. We're not going to continue to be emotionally vulnerable if we feel like it is only going to get us hurt. So it's it's this way that we have adapted to survive, even if that adaptation is a negative one, even if the adaptation is for us to pull away from someone. And that's where the first principle of the my four pillars of a connected conversation is this kind of assuming of good intentions or giving someone the benefit of the doubt, which means simply that if someone is withdrawing or pulling away, that is their adaptation of how they feel.

[00:13:02] This is the only way I can survive. This is the only way I can get my needs met is if I withdraw, which is it's kind of a fascinating concept. We came to the conclusion that keeping precious others close is a brilliant survival technique that is wired in by evolution. So I mean, that is where we are trying to find someone that we can count on that that is wired in because we need this love to survive. But we're also intensely afraid of being hurt. So you can see the paradox there. So along with his these studies, the Bobby went on to say that the majority of children are upset when their mothers walk out, that they will rock themselves, cry, throw toys. But some do prove to be more emotionally resilient and they can tend to calm themselves more quickly and effectively. They reconnect more easily with their mothers when they return, and they can resume playing while checking in to make sure that their moms are still around. And we've probably seen that. I volunteered with my wife in a nursery and church for a number a couple of years, and it was pretty fascinating calling as a therapist, I have to admit, because you got to watch the almost this healthier, secure, attached kids that would play and kind of would check in on to see if their parent is still around.

[00:14:12] You would also see the one that would not leave their parent's lap and then you would also see the ones that would basically want to effectively give their parent the hey, how about you hit the bricks? Now, I got some play to do, you know, that kind of a vibe. So you get to see a little bit of all of it. But, you know, you've got these people that are still kind of checking to see if their mom's around or they seem confident that their mothers will be there if they need them. There's there's the key. And the less resilient youngsters are anxious or they're aggressive or detached and they're more distant even on their mothers return. And the kids who can calm themselves usually have wormer or maybe more responsive mothers, while the moms of the angry kids are a little more unpredictable in their behavior. And then the moms of detached kids seem to be a little more cold or dismissive. And these are observations of Bowlby, not me, in the nursery and in these simple studies of disconnection and reconnection, Bulbasaur love in action. And so we begin to what he would say, code its patterns. And so he discovered that these isolated infants were so hungry for connection that when given the choice between a, quote, mother made out of wire who dispensed food and a soft cloth mother without food, they would choose this squashy rag mother almost every time.

[00:15:16] And generally, Harlow's experiments showed the toxicity of early isolation, which shows this why it's so important that we have this early attachment. And and he did this with primates. So physically healthy infant primates who were separated from their mothers during the first year of life grew into socially crippled adult primates as the way that he put it. Some of these monkeys have failed to develop the ability to solve problems or understand social cues of others. They became more depressed, self-destructive and and oftentimes unable to mate. And I don't want anyone that has had these these lack of secure attachments in that first year of life to feel like, oh, my gosh, I'm doomed. This was just some of what Bobby recognized with primates. Now, primates also don't have the ability to verbally communicate and they don't have as large of social circles or connections. The since that time, people have gone on to to challenge and want to say debunk some of Bobby's theories. But the concept of this early attachment, though, that's where the where F.T. takes off. That's where it gets its genesis. So the overall conclusion was that he said a sense of secure connection between romantic partners are actually now working into Sue Johnson, that a sense of secure connection between romantic partners is the key and positive loving relationships and this huge source of strength for people that are in those relationships. So among the more significant findings from emotionally focused therapy as that, when we feel generally secure, that is we are comfortable with closeness or confident about being able to depend on loved ones.

[00:16:37] The better we are seeking support, the better we are giving it. And then those who felt like their needs are are being met or that their needs were accepted by their partners, were more confident about solving problems on their own, and we're more likely to successfully achieve their own goals. And this is where the emotionally focused therapy or EFT principles are huge. I feel like when it comes to even things like parenting. So my wife and I talk about this a lot, especially the last several months, so if you have a an example of a parent who really feels like they need this tough love approach where they don't want to, they don't want to, they don't want to feel like they're enabling their kid to to have too much at their hands or in their disposal and worried that they will create this dependent codependency that a lot of times those parents are saying that, OK, if I don't push my kid out of the nest, then for some reason, then they will eventually they will stay in the nest for the rest of their lives and they won't be these independent, healthy adults. Where what what Sue Johnson or what Bowlby or what some of these attachment theory therapists posit is that actually that secure attachment is being able to have this.

[00:17:44] Hey, I've got your back. I'm here for you. If you need me in so much that you can go out and try things in the world. And even if you fail, you can come back and you're not going to get a I told you so or you're not coming back here anymore, that it's almost that fear that if we allow our kids that much rope that they are going to not be successful when what attachment theory says is OK, that's actually almost the complete opposite. The complete opposite is true, that in allowing our kids to go and fail and come back and know that we're going to be there to say, hey, tell me more about that. What was your experience like that they are going to have a secure attachment which is going to allow them to actually thrive instead of thinking that, OK, if we allow them to come back, then they're going to just stay here forever and and never be a productive member of society. So we've kind of got that wrong from an attachment standpoint. What I opened the podcast with today was the study by Janice Kikka Glaser of Ohio State, and that one was just fascinating. So just to go back to what that what that study was, is that distress in a relationship adversely affects the human, the immune and hormonal systems, even our ability to heal. So in this experiment, she had newlywed's fight and then took blood samples over the next several hours and found that the more belligerent and contemptuous the partners were, the higher level of stress hormones and the more depressed the immune system was.

[00:19:07] And so these effects persisted for up to 24 hours. So the immune system was depressed and those stress hormones were still elevated for up to 24 hours. So when people feel like, OK, you know, just give me a few minutes and I can get over it, if they don't have a secure attachment, that can take a long time to have those chemicals completely leave the body and for people to feel a little bit more in control or calm. Now, that isn't what I'm not saying that then everyone needs 24 hours of a cooling off period. In actuality, the more that you get these principles of emotionally focused therapy down. And this is where I will go back to a sales pitch of the magnetic marriage course. When you're able to implement what what I call these four pillars of a connected conversation, then you know that you are going to be able to get back to a conversation sooner because you have this framework that's going to allow you to have a productive conversation. And maybe this is a great time to talk about those four pillars. But this is where if I know if I see that my spouse has been withdrawn and that they just haven't, I feel like they haven't really been there for me over the last week month, however long it is.

[00:20:10] When I the reason I love these four pillars is that four pillars of a connected conversation is that pillar one is to assume the assume good intentions. That can be really difficult when you feel like the person is doing something to harm you. But if this person is withdrawn, I have to assume that they are not waking up in the morning and thinking, I know what, I'll do all this withdraw. That's that's how you know, that's how I'll show my spouse is that I will withdraw from them. I will become emotionally distant. So I have to assume, OK, they're they're not doing that to hurt me. And so if I approach them and I say, hey, I'm noticing that you are, you seem a little bit withdrawn. This is where I feel like anyone can jump into these four pillars of a connected conversation and become either the speaker or the listener. So let's jump in and say that let's say that I am having a conversation with my wife and I say to her, hey, I feel like you. I notice that you've been withdrawn. So at this point, if someone is following these four pillars of a connected conversation, part of my magnetic marriage course now my wife is the listener has to assume the good intentions that I didn't think, OK, I know what I'll do.

[00:21:07] I'll come throw this accusation at her and and that'll really get her goat. That'll make her frustrated or mad. So she has to assume those good intentions that when I bring something up, I had noticed that you're withdrawn, that I'm not trying to hurt her. And the second pillar is I can't I can't put off this message that I don't believe you or you're wrong, because at any point if we jump off into any one of these, we violate one of these pillars. Then the conversation is going to it's going to devolve. And at this point, if we walk into a conversation, assuming bad intentions or assuming that our partner does want to hurt us, then we're already going to be defensive. We're not going to be leaning in. We're not going be very empathetic. So back to the scenario. My wife would then have to say, OK, I have to assume that he's not trying to hurt me. And then the second pillar is, I can't just say I don't I don't buy that. That's a load of garbage. I can't say that you're wrong. And so that would lead to pillar three, which I say is questions before comments instead of her. Saying, OK, you're absolutely like, this is ridiculous, and I can't believe you're saying that, but OK, go ahead. Tell me what you're noticing. You can see where that would shut down a conversation. So Pillar three is asking questions before making comments, asking questions of saying, OK, I may not feel like I'm withdrawn, but tell me more.

[00:22:14] What are you noticing? Help me find my blind spots. How long have you been noticing this and what does that look like to you? And then pillar four is that she couldn't go jump into her bunker. She would have to stay present. She would have to then not say, OK, fine, I guess I'll just not do anything that I want to do. And I will be at your beck and call so you won't feel like I have abandoned you. So you can see how any one of those four pillars, if we are not sticking to those, then the conversation will tend to devolve. And so I say often that if you go back and look at conversations that didn't go well in your relationship and your marriage, that you will find one or more of those pillars that has been that is that we've broken, I guess. So then if my wife has been this listener and I feel heard now because she didn't assume that I was trying to hurt her, she didn't tell me I was wrong. She asked questions and she didn't go into a bunker. Now I become the listener. The rules apply to me now as well. So now with that information, I want her to be able to say I appreciate that. That would be difficult. If if you really do feel like I've been withdrawn, then I can understand that that would be frustrating or hard or that would feel lonely or isolating.

[00:23:15] But then if she gets to share the same thing, if she just says simply, I I didn't realize I was doing that, then I have to do the same thing. Can't I can't assume that bad intentions and I can't say seriously, like you don't notice this. It's that pillar two. I can't say you're wrong. I can ask questions of OK, you know, if you don't feel like you've been withdrawn, then I can understand why this is a bit of a surprise to you and then I can ask the questions. Hey, so I noticed that you've that you really haven't been communicating more recently. So tell me more. Have you noticed that? Or and because then those questions, if she's going to stay in this, I feel the world of these I feel statements, maybe it is OK. I didn't realize that. But now that I feel heard or now that I feel safe, maybe she's going to share with me that, yeah, maybe I do feel like I've had a lot on my mind. And I was even aware that that you felt like I had been withdrawing. And then I can't then go into my bunker pillar for I can't then say, you know, I shouldn't even brought it up. It's no big deal. I definitely digressed. I went a little bit of a tangent there, but I feel like this is where the being able to communicate about things effectively is what can help us get out of that.

[00:24:16] It takes 24 hours for this stress hormone to leave our body kind of a state, because that really is worst case scenario in the study that we're talking about, where people felt like they got their dander up. They felt like there was this disconnect. There was a fight in the relationship. And this is saying that they don't have those tools to be able to come back and communicate. And that's why often when people do have distress in a relationship, then they after a day or two and nobody's really processed anything, nobody's really communicated or made sense of what even happened to cause this disruption or this argument. And all of a sudden the waters are calm. Then people typically put their toe back into the waters of the relationship. And then if it seems OK, then they just go about their business and maybe we're OK. Right. And that's where I feel as a marriage therapist. I hear this so often where people don't resolve things, but then when things are seen, seem to go better and they don't have the tools or the framework to even go back and communicate about what that rift was about in the first place, then how often they feel like things are OK now. Now it's a Saturday and we're out doing some things.

[00:25:18] I want to bring up anything that's going to make things go south. So when they don't have those tools to be able to communicate even about things that have happened in the past, then we typically just tend to just move forward. And then over time, then that's what starts to really drive a wedge in the relationship. So back to some of this data, simply holding the hand of a loving partner can affect this profoundly and it can literally calm these jittery neurons in the brain. So contact with a loving partner can literally act as a buffer against shock and stress and pain. And the quote in this article now is saying, love is not the icing on the cake in life, but it is a basic primary need, like oxygen or water. And once we understand and accept this, we can more easily get into the heart of relationship problems. And I talked again about this study at Ohio State. But the more belligerent, contemptuous these partners were, the higher level, the stress hormone and the immune system. And again, I just shared that that state in the immune system for up to 24 hours. But in an even more astounding study that I mentioned in the intro as well is that Glaser used a vacuum pump to produce small blisters on the hands of women volunteers and then had them fight with their husbands. And the nastier the fight, the longer it took for the women's skin to heal.

[00:26:30] So that cortisol, that stress hormone that is elevated when we do not feel connected with a partner, that it literally suppresses our immune system. So that says something about how desperately we are to connect with someone that it can even affect our health. So when marriages fail, that it's not that increasing conflict is necessarily the cause, it's that this decreasing affection or this emotional responsiveness can offer. And be the culprit, so the lack of emotional response rather than the level of conflict is typically the better indicator of how solid a marriage will be several years into the marriage. So the demise of most marriages starts with this growing absence of a response to intimate interactions. So the conflict typically comes later. But the more that we aren't showing up or being there for our partner, then the more that that void starts to grow and then the more that we feel like our partner is not there for us. I think one of the things that's pretty fascinating to notice is that both people are often having that similar situation where they both feel like the other person is not there from them. So in the book, Sue Johnson says, as lovers, we we we poised delicately on this tightrope when the winds of doubt and fear begin blowing. She said, if we panic and clutch at each other or abruptly turn away and head for cover, the rope sways more and more and our balance becomes even more precarious.

[00:27:55] To stay on the rope, we have to shift with each other's moves, respond to each other's emotions, and as we connect, we balance each other. And we are more in this emotional equal equilibrium. Isolation and the potential loss of a loving connection is coded by the human brain into this primal panic response. And that is a significant bit of data. The need for safe, emotional connection to a few loved ones is wired in by, we believe, millions of years of evolution. So distressed partners may use different words, but they're always asking these same basic questions. Are you there for me? Do I matter for you where you come when I need you? Will you come when I call? And so there's some fascinating data that I have talked about in some previous episodes that show this this neural overlap of emotional and physical pain of why you can feel a physical pain, physical response, a physical pain response to emotional struggle or emotional strife. And so that is where it taps into this primal panic of this feeling, isolated or alone. So this longing for this emotional connection to those nearest to us is the emotional priority, and it even overshadows the drive for food or sex. And that's why when people really feel emotionally disconnected or they're going through some really, really heavy relationship related issues, what happens? Oftentimes they don't eat for days.

[00:29:15] I mean, so it literally overshadows this drive for food. And the drama of love is all about this hunger for this safe emotional connection. And survival becomes this. It's imperative that we experience this connection with another human being or these this close group of human beings. So a loving connection is the only safety that nature really ever affords us. So what Sue Johnson has or she refers to are these demon dialogs that they are these desperate attachment cries. And so most of the blaming and these demon dialogs is it's a cry that is a protest against disconnection. And it can only be quieted by someone moving closer emotionally closer to hold and reassure their partner. But we get into these patterns where it is scary to put yourself in a position of vulnerability to to lean in to someone that is so emotionally frustrated or emotionally flooded that they may often not say the kindest things which that is why as much as I love the book, hold me tight. I love her follow up book, Love Sense that the magnetic marriage course. And we provide a lot of these tools that allow people to to be able to or have the tools to reconnect even when things are hard or when things have been difficult. Sue Johnson has an acronym that's are A.R.E. and the A is accessibility. Can I reach you the hours responsiveness? Can I rely on you to respond to me emotionally and IA's engagement? Do I know you will value me and stay close? And so I wanted to talk a little bit and we'll start to wrap this up.

[00:30:53] But in the book Hold Me Tight, she talks about these seven transforming conversations. And I honestly, I promise you, I did not realize that this would become more of almost like this commercial or advertisement for my magnetic marriage course. But I have realized in being able to do and I have I have easily worked with over a thousand couples now over the last 15 years. And so I, I feel like there is a way to have those conversations using hold me tight and using the the principles of emotionally focused therapy. But it can be really difficult and it can be sometimes emotionally overwhelming or emotionally exhausting. And so I want you to know that even as you hear, if you go buy the book, hold me tight. If you take a marriage course, if you listen to a podcast I've done on four pillars of a connected conversation, I understand that you may walk away from even this podcast today and feel like there's some hope that there is a there's a thing there's a thing we can do and there's a framework that can be had that will help us communicate more effectively. And there absolutely is. And I want that to give people hope, but also know that you are trying to.

[00:31:57] Sometimes reverse years, if not decades, of not being able to communicate effectively by reading a book or by hearing a podcast, and it can take a lot more effort than that. But just know that that is a normal part of the process to find out some data, discover something new, something that that gives you a little bit of hope. And then as you start to explore what this is that you're hearing emotionally focused therapy or my magnetic marriage course, that your brain is still wired to go back to the path of least resistance, which is to protect itself and get in the bunker and be want this emotional connection, but also not know how to get the emotional connection. So all of that is so normal. So Sue Johnson has things broken down into these seven transforming conversations. She says, recognizing demon dialogs. In this first conversation, couples identify the negative and destructive remarks in order to get on the root of the problem and figure out what each other is really trying to say. She often talks about that or what I'm dealing with couples in my office. It's the, hey, how do we get here? And some of these demon dialogs fall into some pretty, pretty regular patterns. The tit for tat, the. You did this. Oh, yeah. Well, you did this. There's another one where it's the withdraw and the pursuer, where oftentimes the more that one person pursues, the other person withdraws and that gets into attachment styles.

[00:33:09] I did an episode of my podcast a few months ago with Jennifer Finlayless and five talking about anxious and avoidant attachment, and that was big. I put a lot of effort and into that that podcast episode because I really feel like that was where I was really starting to understand these attachment styles and how I find it. In most marriages, people fall into this pattern of one being more of this anxious attachment. That's me and my relationship, where if I walk in the room and my wife isn't jumping up and down and waving pompoms, I say, Is everything OK? Yeah, that's my own attachment. And then if 10 minutes later she's still kind of just doing her thing, then I'll say, hey, did I do anything, you know? And the more that I push with my anxious attachment, the more that can because of what I what I love. One of my favorite things is the concept of reactance, psychological reactance. This instant negative reaction of basically being told what to do. As the more I'm saying, hey, did I do anything. Are you cool? Will you tell me if I did anything? Is it almost drives that avoidant attachment? In this case, it would be my my wife where the more I'm fine, I promise you I am good to the point of where you almost feel that that wedge that can be driven in between there because most of us fall into this anxious attachment, avoid attachment pattern.

[00:34:16] So the second conversation that she talks about is finding the raw spots. And this this is some difficult work, but it's very powerful. And that is here. Each partner learns to look beyond the immediate impulse of reactions and figure out what the raw spots are. They're being hit. And this is where I find that doing couples therapy and this is, again, probably the 500 plug of this episode of my four pillars of a connected conversation. And the magnetic marriage course is we may now feel like, oh, OK, I get attachment theory. That makes a little more sense. It's nice to know there's a way to be able to communicate and that having all this data you're learning today and then we feel like let's jump right to the rough spots. And in my MagneGas marriage course, I identified these levels of charged topics and I've got four different levels of charged topics. The highest charged topics are often things like it's sex, it's parenting, it's finances, it's religion, it's politics. And so often, even when we get a shiny new tool or toy like emotionally focused therapy or my magnetic marriage course, we want to say, OK, let's jump right to these things that are really bothering us and it can be difficult. So you have to practice more of a connection with the lower charged topics because those same principles will go with you as you talk about these higher charge topics.

[00:35:29] But finding these raw spots, because I find that so often is the case where a couple comes in and they're going to break down the week and they're going to talk about how we really got into it on Wednesday and they'll look at each other and think, OK, what? I came here with the I remember what we were fighting about, but but we were really charged. And it's because it's not about the the particular topic per say. And when we touched on a raw spot, then we jump down into our bunkers and we're using these demon dialogs. We're throwing out the tit for tat or the PSU withdrawal or the freeze and flee. We just hunker down and wait till everything's over. We freeze and we run away. And then we hope that everything's OK. So we've been able to find those rough spots and communicate about them. Is one of these other transforming conversations is what Sue Johnson talks about in the book Hold Me Tight. Revisiting a Rocky Moment. This can be so powerful. This conversation provides a platform for deescalating conflict and repairing rifts in a relationship that build emotional safety. So this is where we don't talk about things, as I was mentioning earlier. And then we we go about our relationship. And then when things really start to get rough or you feel disconnected from your partner, now we bring back things from years ago and then the personal, oh, here we go again.

[00:36:35] You're bringing up the wedding. Are you bringing up the move or you're bringing up the vacation? Are you bringing up the family reunion? And obviously what that says is that we never process that. So we need a way to go back and revisit one of these rocky moments. And with these my four pillars, you can actually go apply those to a an old wound or an old conversation. They're there literally was. An example not too long ago of a couple that had had a rift at a family reunion a few years ago and we went back and we've applied these four pillars onto this rift, onto this family reunion situation that had happened years ago. And what that looked like in broad strokes was a husband that had really put himself out there to make it to a family reunion, but had also had to give up some things at work that were pretty important and also had a pretty big financial ramification. But I've been hearing that if he did not show up at this family reunion, that his wife really felt like he was not there for her, that she didn't matter to him. And so neither one of them communicated this effectively. And here we were years later. And we're in my office talking about this. And when we went back and applied these four pillars back to revisiting a rocky moment, what we realized was, as is typically the case, there was a lack of communication.

[00:37:46] And so people didn't even know what was going on and the other person's world. So the wife had really said, I really need you here. I'm taking the kids. And it's a lot of work. And my family is not the nicest people in the world. And this is a reunion. And everyone else is coming with their their spouses and they're going to look like everybody's living happily ever after and you will not be there. And so the husband at that point is shut down. And he went and then here we were talking years later where he he had been working on some project at work and had tried to communicate to his boss and to things did not go as well. And he ended up losing a particular position which had a financial implication. And so then he had been carrying this resentment for two or three years. Now, who was right? I don't know. It's not my job at have that power to say I, I now deem you is the correct one to one of the spouses. But one of the brilliant things about emotionally focused therapy and my magnetic marriage course and hold me tight is the goal is to be heard. It's not necessarily to resolve, which can be a very difficult concept to wrap our heads around. So in this situation, it would have been nice just for the two of them to be able to communicate because they're both, in essence, saying the same thing.

[00:38:47] Are you there for me? Do you appreciate me? Can I count on you? Do you have my back? And I believe truly, had they both been able to process that and in real time, back when the event occurred, when this family reunion was happening, that it might look something like this. So let's say that the husband is going to now assume the role of listener and the wife is going to be the speaker. The wife is going to communicate to him that, hey, I am really it's hard for me. I'm frustrated because I feel like you are not making this family reunion a priority. So he has to then pillar one have to assume good intentions. She's not saying this to hurt me. And this is a way that she feels that she needs to express herself to get her needs met, goes back to that attachment stuff that I mentioned earlier. So if she is expressing that, then he can't say that's absolutely ridiculous. He can't Pillar 2, I can put out that message that you are wrong. And three, I need to ask some questions. And that's where had they had those tools at that time or been working with the therapist at the time that was skilled in EFT, then it might have looked something more like her being able to express that.

[00:39:47] I feel alone. I feel like I'm being I feel like comparisons. I'm watching everybody else around me. I feel like all of their marriages are perfect. I feel like I'm being judged all of these things. And for him to then stay in there, ask those questions and then not jump into his bunker pillar four, stay present, he can't say, fine, I'll just go. But to say, man, I appreciate you sharing that. And then for him to then be able to say, all right, I can understand now, thank you for sharing that, that would be really difficult. And then I would work with him to now be the speaker and to stay in the good old I feel statements. I appreciate that, man. I feel like I've put in a lot of work in a particular project. And I worry that if I am not showing up that this might be detrimental to my career and our financial future. And we want we have all these hopes and dreams of kids through college and vacations. And and I just I'm worried that if I don't show up in this particular situation at work, that that could impact us negatively. So if I am working now with him being that speaker, her now, assuming he's not saying those things to hurt her and not saying that, that's ridiculous, you work super hard and no one would ever think that she can't say, hey, you're wrong. And then she's asking more questions and then she can't go into her bunker and say, okay, fine, you don't have to come.

[00:40:57] It doesn't matter. I'll just do everything on my own. But when people feel heard, that's when we're more we're more able to work toward a resolution or even some sort of compromise where in that situation maybe there is the ability for him to be there a little bit and to her understand that, well, you know, I really want him to feel like he can provide and succeed at work and him saying, I really want to be there for her, because that would be really difficult if she's feeling judged or if she's feeling like she's less than. And so in that scenario, we then I always joke that the fight becomes turning toward each other. You know, the fight becomes more of once we feel heard. And and I'm not saying this is the way it works out every time, but then that fight becomes more of something like than him saying, but you know what? I hear you and I want to be there for you and I'll do whatever it takes to her saying, no, no, I appreciate your sacrifice and I'll be OK just knowing that you're there for me. Maybe we communicate more effectively while I'm gone or he's able to come for a couple of nights or whatever that looks like. But we're going to get to that resolution more when we are able to recognize these raw spots of I feel like you aren't there for me.

[00:41:57] And then revisiting a rocky moment and being able to apply these these principles even to things that have happened in the past. So the fourth transforming conversation from Hold Me Tight is literally the words hold me tight. Sue Johnson said the heart of the program. This conversation moves partners into being more accessible, more emotionally responsive and deeply engaged with each other. The fifth conversation she talks about is forgiving injuries. This one's powerful. This one I do a lot of work with in the world of the concept of betrayal. And when one person has betrayed the other person, when there's been infidelity, when there's been addiction that's been exposed or or those those types of things, that injuries may be forgiven, but they don't they don't disappear. So instead, they need to become integrated into a couple's conversation as demonstrations of renewal and connection and knowing how to find and offer forgiveness empowers couples to strengthen their bond. I've never done an episode on what's called an attachment injury apology, but I need to do that at some point. An attachment injury. Apologies when someone is triggered. Oftentimes when I have a couple in my office and there has been some sort of betrayal, then when the person the betrayed is triggered and they're going to be triggered by a lot of things, they're going to be triggered by memories, sounds, music, smells, locations, you name it, that they'll often feel triggered and then they will immediately start to shut down and their partner may not even be aware of what's going on.

[00:43:16] So what hold me tight and E.F.T. and my magnetic marriage course is amazing for as being able to work on how to forgive injuries, how to forgive betrayal. And the key and this is, again, one of those things that can seem scary and it can maybe even seem counterintuitive at the time. But this concept of an attachment injury apology, I have given the example often of where let's say that there's been infidelity and it has happened around a particular you know, let me just like to stay away from being too insensitive. Let's say that the wife has blond hair and the husband had was was unfaithful with someone with dark hair and maybe a completely different body type or size. And so then they're at a store and then here comes someone that maybe fits more of what the what the affair partner looked like. And then nothing is said. But this uncomfortable silence spreads into the room and the couple is now standing there, even in a supermarket. And it just you can just feel the energy. Leave the room. What an attachment injury apology about is being the wife, being able to say, man, you know, that that's really hard for me when I see someone that walks by that that kind of looks similar to your affair partner and instead of the husband saying, OK, I don't know what I'm supposed to do with that, but forgiving injury and attachment injury, apologies for him being able to know what to say in those situations and be able to say, I appreciate you sharing that with me and I am so sorry I put you in a spot where we can be out and about and someone walks by that has long dark hair and now your mind immediately goes to this betrayal.

[00:44:40] But I'm here for you. I want you to know I'm here for you. We're working on this. I'm committed to you. And that goes back to these principles of EDT. Are you there for me? Can I count on you? Do I matter to you? And so being able to have this ability to forgive injuries is one of these key conversations that is is part of this emotionally focused therapy model to more. One is bonding through sex and touch. Here, couples find how to emotionally how emotional connection creates great sex and good sex creates a deeper emotional connection. And but that has to be done through a tell me more connected conversation style, not just a world of expectations and things that expectations and assumptions. Sexual intimacy is not a place for expectations and assumptions. It's more of a place where people need to be able to communicate effectively, because even when it comes to situations around intimacy, we all have our own experiences going in and that's a very vulnerable place.

[00:45:33] So we need to have these tools and skills to be able to communicate even about things of a sexual nature or of an intimate nature. And the last key conversation from the book Hold Me Tight Keeping Your Love Alive. This last conversation is built on the understanding that love is a continual process of losing and finding emotional connection. And I love how Sue Johnson says that, that we continue to lose and find emotional connection because we're all dealing with a lot of stuff. We are, on a day to day basis. And so it's normal for even the most emotionally healthy couple to lose, lose sight of each other from time to time. But now we have these tools of learning how to reconnect. That example I gave earlier about, hey, I feel like you've been a little bit emotionally distant then. We now have these tools to be able to communicate effectively and to be able to reconnect. She said that this this keeping your love alive conversation ask couples to be deliberate and mindful about maintaining a connection. So this goes back to the the blog. What Dan has put as lessons learned, he says from all couples therapist. He says, Our need for others to come close when we call to offer us a safe haven is absolute. The second one, emotional starvation is a reality. Feeling emotionally deserted or rejected or abandoned sparks physical and emotional pain and panic.

[00:46:47] This third point is that there are very few ways to cope with our pain when our primary needs for connection are not met. And I believe that is so true when our primary needs for. Are not met, then our emotional pain can can move into the area of the brain that is right there with physical pain, so when we feel emotionally alone, it can feel like a physical manifestation of pain. The fourth one, emotional balance, calm and vibrant joy are rewards of love. And and I love this comment. Sentimental infatuation is the booby prize. So saying that we often chase this sentimental infatuation. But what we really are desperate for is an emotional balance or this calm and vibrant joy that those are the true rewards of love. Next, there is no perfect performance in love or sex. Obsession with performance is a dead end, and it is being emotionally present that that is the key emotional presence is really what matters in a relationship. Six and relationships. There's no simple cause and effect, no straight lines, only circles that partners create together. And we pull each other into these loops and spirals of connection and disconnection. The next one, emotion tells us exactly what we need if we can listen to it and use it as a guide. And I love that concept of our emotion or our emotional response is there as a way to get our needs met.

[00:48:02] This is an episode on stress and anxiety not too long ago. And what I talked about extensively in that episode was that even anxiety is our body trying to say, hey, you need to watch out. You need to be aware. I need to warn you of impending danger. So even the concepts of anxiety is our brain trying to say, hey, I'm looking out for you. It just might have it might be anticipating a few too many events that will most likely never happen. But the concept is that our body is literally trying to do us a favor by either telling us that we're need to be weary or afraid of a situation, or it's also doing the same thing where it's our emotion is telling us what we need. If we can listen to it, use it as a guide. Our emotions are telling us I need you right now to our partner. I need this emotional connection. Are you there for me? The next one that that he writes are we all hit the panic button at times and we may lose our balance and slip into anxious, controlling or numbing and avoiding modes. But the secret is not to stay in these positions. It's too hard for you or your lover to meet you there. And this is the part where if our way to get our needs met is to withdraw and bless our heart, if that's where we're at right now, that's a pattern that we've created, that being able to have the tools to come out of your bunker and express your needs is ultimately being it's using your your put your big boy pants on and showing up with your adult coping mechanisms and adult coping skills.

[00:49:27] I've done so much in the last few episodes around attachment and abandonment issues, and that withdrawal is truly our childhood abandonment or attachment wounds manifesting into adulthood. You know, it really is that ability when we are when we are withdrawn, we are we're kind of saying, OK, if I withdraw, then people will come find me. But then that's a bit of a rigged system because we're also putting ourselves at danger of if people don't then find me when I am withdrawn, then that means something is wrong with me. So those are those childhood coping mechanisms coming into adulthood. We need to get to a point where we can then put ourselves out there because we want what is best for us. We are in charge of our own ship, so to speak. And so we need to have the tools and the voice to be able to put ourselves out there and say, hey, I need you right now. And that's OK. Key moments of bonding are when one person reaches for another and the other responds and it does. It's difficult. It can be it takes courage and it is emotionally vulnerable to put yourself out there at the risk of your partner not responding.

[00:50:28] But I will tell you, the alternative is not going to be the way to a true emotional connection. That's where we're talking about if your go to move is to sit in your bunker and wait and hope that somebody comes to rescue, then that is going to lead to a lack of satisfaction in the marriage. So having the tools, the skills, this is a general plug. My magnetic marriage course or program of being able to put yourself out there is absolutely key. I've got a few more here and I'm realizing as the world's worst promoter, let me quickly toss in an ad right now for Betterhelp.com. And the reason why I feel like it would be appropriate right now is if this is emotionally focused couples therapy. And if you are finding that right now, you're saying I want to do these things, but I have a lot of my own stuff I got to deal with, then I highly recommend at times you may need to go take care of some of your own insecurities or vulnerabilities to be able to show up in a couples situation. If your spouse is not interested in couples therapy right now, maybe the best thing that you can do is go raise your own emotional base line through some individual counseling. And that can be really difficult, because I will tell you as a therapist who has a very, very long waiting list and I'm grateful for it and all those wonderful things, now that we are breaking the stigma around mental health and we're just coming off of one of the craziest years in the history of the universe, there are a lot of people right now that are trying to find help.

[00:51:53] And so if you are unable to find a therapist, a counselor in your area, then really go to Betterhelp.com virtual couch and you can do now what well over a million people are doing. You can find help and even up to 24 to 48 hours and it can be done through tella therapy. And we're talking on the phone, the computer, there's even text therapy. Betterhelp.com has a pretty fascinating article on its website that I've sent to a few people of where people are literally able to text each other and the way here's what I mean to sound like my first get off my lawn, old man moment. The way kids text these days tell you what you know, they can literally have conversation, they have conversations, these kids on their phones with their fingers. And so you can have this this experience as well through Betterhelp.com. So go to Betterhelp.com, slash virtual couch. You get ten percent off your first months, these first months costs. And they have a really impressive onboarding system assessment tool where you fill out a series of questions and you can find someone that specializes in some of the things that you may be struggling with, whether it's anxiety, depression, OCD and and you owe it yourself.

[00:52:56] Please go find help either through somebody in your area or if you can't, they are real licensed professional counselors and therapists that are at Betterhelp.com virtual couch. OK, so let me get back to there's a few more of these. The tenth thing that Dan shares on his blog is forgiving injuries is essential and only happens when partners can make sense of their own hurt and know that their lover connects and feels that hurt with them. So this is where we're designed to deal with emotion. In concert with another human being, a lasting passion is entirely possible and love. The erratic heat of infatuation is just a prelude. But in attuned, loving bond is the symphony. How beautiful is that quote? Neglect will actually will absolutely kill love. Love needs attention. Feel like this is where love needs watering. You must nurture love knowing your attachment needs and responding to those of your lover can make the bond last truly until death do us part or throughout the eternities and beyond and all the cliches. About love, when people feel love, they're freer or more alive or more powerful or absolutely true, they are more true than we could ever imagine, that all you need is love. Love is the answer. All of those cliches, when you have this type of a relationship, when you have one that is founded on these principles around emotionally focused therapy.

[00:54:06] And we're seeing this, the Preston and I, with this first round of the magnetic marriage course, the feedback again, it's been pretty phenomenal of people now realizing that there is a different way to communicate, that there is a way to stay connected, even if they've been married for a very long time and felt like that fire, that flame was was dead. And this is one of those things that I don't know why it took me a long time to see this, but I'm in my office, I'm doing couples therapy. I've got this model, this emotionally focused therapy model that I'm using as a therapist again, which is now having me love couples therapy. And it hit me a few years ago that I'm talking to people that don't know what I'm talking about. They they basically have come in to learn how to listen and fight better, or they come in to have Mirrool to hear who is said what. And then I get to tell them who is right and who is wrong. And so I really feel like that, you know, it dawned on me that people don't know that there is a different way to communicate if they didn't see that model with from their parents or if they have not had that in their relationship, which I think is why every time I put out a podcast on emotionally focused therapy or my magnetic marriage or course, or these four pillars of a connected conversation, the downloads are thousands of downloads more because people hear this and say, wait a minute, there's a there's a way that this could happen, but it is not easy and it does take work.

[00:55:25] And you can read a book like Hold Me Tight or you can read her next book, Love Sense, and you can go see a couples therapist, but you need to find one that really knows what they're talking about. Or again, what a what a plug for TonyOverbay.com/magnetic. And we put these tools in place in my magnetic marriage course. So all the cliches there. True. So the conclusion the simple truth is that we feel securely connected if we feel the secure connection with our partner, we feel, if we feel emotionally attached, that we are better able to manage the the unpredictable nature of life and whether it is personal, whether it's professional, whether it's in our relationship as a couple, whether it's in our jobs, whether it's with our kids, that we're more resilient and we're able to manage the ups and downs of life more and we're less prone to develop these mental health concerns, if we can stay in tune with our person, our partner, if we can stay attached, securely attached to the person that is there for us, that we need to be able to feel like that person is there for us, that that we matter, that they have our back, that that they will show up when we call for them.

[00:56:28] So that is my hope to you. I appreciate you letting me take you on this emotionally focused therapy journey. And I will I will have some bonus episodes coming up. I'm going to do a little bit more with some parenting. I'm going to have a bonus episode in a week or two. It's a replay of my first episode that I did with Jennifer Finlaysonfife are actually the second one where I talk about high desire, low desire partners in a relationship. We're going to talk about how to teach kids empathy. We're going try to put a lot of content out in the next few weeks, especially leading up to the next round of this magnetic marriage course, which has been a game changer. So thank you so much for joining me today. Don't forget to go to Betterhelp.com. That would be great. If you're still listening and you happen to I'm going to put this up on my YouTube channel and close to a thousand subscribers. It would be wonderful to kick over that mark because then YouTube gives you different tools to work with. So if you are YouTube person and you go over, find the virtual couch channel on YouTube and give it a subscribe, that would be great. And I will leave us with, as per usual, the wonderful the talented Aurora Florence with her song. It's wonderful. I will see you next time on the virtual couch.