Why You Keep Repeating the Same Relationship Patterns | Adam Lane Smith - EP 782

24:58There's an old saying up in Iceland, bear is the back of a brotherless man. If you don't have someone watching you, you're naked back there and something can attack and hurt you. So you're always afraid. Your cortisol is high. It's dysregulated. Of course, your serotonin will be low. And of course, you're going to have depression. I think depression is a natural evolution of the endless fear and pain and disappointment. I don't think teens naturally become depressed. I don't see any other species on the face of the planet that when they go out through their adolescence, they reach a crushing suicidal level of depression.

25:30I've never seen a species on our planet that does that except for ours. Yes, it's normal to have some turbulence that in the ape world where the adolescents go out and attack trees and play and get weird, but they don't get suicidally depressed like ours do. But I also see, I think that we have a natural craving for this biochemistry. We need the bonding. We are relational beings. I don't think a human is meant to be alone and isolated. That's why individual isolation in a prison is one of the most horrible things you can inflict on a human being. If we were not relational beings, solitary confinement would be fine.

26:07You'd kick your feet up and relax for three weeks, right? It wouldn't be an issue. Solitary confinement is one of the most brutal punishments humans can experience because we are relational beings. We're meant for that. So when we have correct chemistry through our relationships, the depression just doesn't appear. We don't see the teens plunging into endless depression and anger and resentment. Yes, they differentiate from their parents, but they don't hate their parents. Yes, they have some sibling rivalry, but kids don't hate each other as if they're fighting for survival in the nest over resources that are dwindling.

26:39You don't see families ripped apart when you're building secure systems. There's a whole pocket of securely attached families that are invisible to the rest of us, and everyone else takes insecure attachment as normal. This is not how humans are meant to live. You're very correct in that. I want to jump to the Gen Z discussion that you brought up earlier. And that is saying more and more Gen Z. People are saying they don't want kids, that they might not even want to get married. What I'm finding through my research is that a large bunch of them don't even want to be in a relationship. And the excuse that they're giving is because they need to do work on themselves.

27:18I'm sure you've seen this too. And I agree that we all need to do self work but what i've found in my own relationships is like how much self work are you possibly going to it to do because it kind of just keeps delaying that need to be in the relationship what do you think is going on here i think that when you are terrified of relationships and you don't think that there's any hope and you're afraid to reach out and open up to other human beings. It is immensely attractive when gurus come along and tell you that all of your work should go internal, that you should sit alone in a room, read books, listen to podcasts, which I love, but that you should just do that for 40 years, that you should watch YouTube channels and just learn and endlessly focus inside yourself as a solitary being forever.

28:09And at some point you'll reach a magical level where you are so perfect, you are now ready to somehow have the most perfect relationship on the planet. And in fact, now they're teaching, the perfect partner will somehow simply appear at the perfect moment without any effort on your part whatsoever. And you don't really need better friendships or better community. Again, it's all internal. So read more books, listen to more podcasts, meditate harder. And then when you're 45, maybe think about starting a family. That's what I'm hearing. And it's catastrophic. This is the opposite of how humans work.

28:43This is in the old days, what they used to call an aesthetic life. This is monastic life. You're teaching people to be a monk in a monastery or a temple. That's what you're raising people to do. Now, nothing against that life if someone chooses that, but telling young people that is the only pathway to being healthy or happy and that everything else will destroy them, that they have to become a 45 year old monk or nun before they'll be ready to even date one time or have one child. I think that's a fundamental misunderstanding about how human biology and brains work. I don't think that will ever make anybody really happy.

29:16That's what I think. It is really interesting what is happening. My son is in his late twenties and he talks to me all the time about how difficult it is to meet someone else now. And I know a lot of the younger generations are using apps to help facilitate it. But when I was growing up, we didn't have those apps. And yet it wasn't that difficult to meet someone else because you were communicating with them on a regular basis because that's how it was done. And oftentimes it was done naturally because of the communities you were in. And that's how you would meet the other person, whether that was a church community or it could be even something like an improv class that you do or an art class that you did together or even a bar environment.

30:07But that doesn't seem to be happening now. What is going on in this aspect? There's two stats that concern me about this right here. I love that you brought this up. Two stats. One, they're showing that two-thirds of Gen Z men are single right now. Two-thirds are single. One-third of Gen Z women are single, meaning one-third of Gen Z women are dating up into older generations. Not three years older, five, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years older. They're dating way up. So there's a third of a generation of men who don't have available partners at all. There just don't. And their level of loneliness, when we chart it out, the only other population on the planet that has a similar level of loneliness is women who are 70 years plus.

30:51That level of loneliness. There's a tongue-in-cheek joke going around that 25-year-old men should just be with 75-year-old women. It would solve both of their problems. And it's tongue-in-cheek, but it's also the only solution people can seem to find right now. There is not much option apart from that, which is why Gen Z men are largely giving up and checking out. There is nobody to date. Then they go on the apps. remember that in 1995 the research is clear on this in 1995 65 percent of people met through family and friend networks your partner would come through family and friends they were pre-filtered you had 15 or 20 years of data on them already you knew what their toilet training habits were like you knew what their favorite food was you knew if they wanted commitment or not you knew everyone they'd ever slept with you knew everything about their history and they came incentivized to be polite and honest with you because their network would hurt them if they didn't.

31:43So you were safe. That was just 30 years ago. And 20, no, 12 % of them met through what we called at the time, computer dating. Computer dating was 12 % at the time, 30 years ago. Now those numbers have reversed. 12 % meet through family and friend networks now, and 65 % meet through the dating apps. I think the reason for that is not that the dating apps are better, they're worse. The reason for that is that people don't have family friend networks anymore. Like you said, you would date. You'd date through your community. You'd date through your church network. You'd date for yourself. Your friends set you up.

32:13That's what people were doing. And for all of human history, we had what was called assisted marriage. It's not where you're assigned a partner and you're forced to marry them. It's people go, hey, I have someone for you. Do you want to meet them? Yeah, sure. Tell me about him. Well, he's a great guy. He's kind. He's smart. He's thoughtful. He's very gentle. He has three sisters. He's really good with women. Okay, sign me up. Let's see how it works, right? It's those blind dates that we all used to hear about. That's how humanity is meant to find partners. We're meant to source them and filter them correctly through family and friends.

32:44Then we are incentivized to be correct. Now we're dating strangers online with no incentive whatsoever, to be honest with us. And like I said, 65 % of adults now have secure, insecure attachment where they can't be honest. They're just trying to get feelings. They just don't want to be alone, but they don't trust themselves or anybody else. Now we're dating strangers in that network and it's not going well. And that's why Gen Z men, especially are just going, guys, I'm out. I'm going to work. I'm going to grind. I'm going to hustle. I'm going to stack cash. And I'm going to buy a private island where I play video games by myself.

33:14And if I can get a robot wife in 20 years, I'll do that. That's what a lot of Gen Z men are saying right now, because there just does not seem to be an alternative for them. Adam, I want to talk about your equation that I found. Ownership plus skills plus new experience equals positive change. What does each part actually look like in daily life? Maybe we can apply one of the scenarios we've been talking about using this equation. It's very simple. Ownership means I control how I feel, which means I must control how I feel. Many people don't understand that their nervous system is a physical, tangible piece of them.

33:48And that yes, your logical brain diminishes in functioning and your emotional brain escalates, but your hind brain, everything back there, the physical processes that can decrease the agitation on your emotional brain. If you use physical processes to manage your nervous system, most people try to think their way out of how they feel. And that's why it doesn't work. You can't meditate, think, or any of that way out of how you feel when you use physical processes, tensing and releasing muscles, vagus nerve stimulation and vagus breathing, intense cardio. When you use these pieces, that's how you manage your nervous system.

34:21And you bring it down from nine out of 10 agitation to two out of 10. That's where your prefrontal cortex comes back online, you can start thinking clearly. So taking ownership of how you feel and controlling the way your emotions are flowing. This allows you clear thinking. Are we with me so far? That's the ownership piece. Beautiful. When that unlocks, like I said, your prefrontal cortex comes back online. Now you can use all those fancy skills that you spent. Some of my clients spend 20 years in therapy and can't use the skills because they don't have the nervous system set. When the nervous system set, all of a sudden those skills work.

34:53I have worked with a lot of executive men at work. They're incredible communicators. They're calm. They're exact. They're focused. They're considerate. They're empathetic. They listen. They have incredible leadership. And they go home and talk to their wife and it dissolves the moment he walks across the front porch. What do you want? Okay. Yeah, sure. Well, I just, I can't handle that right now. And he's completely at home. Skills are gone. Even if he's trying to talk to her, gone. It's because his prefrontal cortex is offline. If you can take the skills from your prefrontal cortex, learn how to speak, learn how to be effective in your communication, learn how to be measurable.

35:28I teach something called the what, why, and how often method of needs. Not, I want to be loved. Okay, great. What are two things that help you feel loved? Two exact measurable things, observable. And why is that important to you? And why is it important to the relationship so I understand its place? And how often or how much of it do you need? Help me understand how to help you feel loved. And I will do it. The what, why, and how often method. If you can learn to deploy those skills and ask clarifications, then you can generate, that's the skills, then you generate the different experiences. Number three, part of the equation.

36:02So you take ownership of nervous system to keep your prefrontal cortex online to use skills to generate different outcomes. If you have a wife who is saying, I want to feel loved and you say, okay, do you want chocolates, diamonds, like a new car? What do you want? And she goes, no, I want to feel loved. You say, well, what does that mean? She says, well, if you loved me, you would understand, right? And it doesn't. I would love for you to feel loved. Help me understand what are two things I can do. Why do those need to be done? Help me understand that. And how much do you need? Well, it helps me feel loved when you sit with me in the evening for 20 minutes, talk to me about my day and share about your day.

36:41Well, honey, I don't want to share about my day because I'm going to stress you out. No, you won't. I enjoy hearing about your day and I feel closer to you. Okay. That's what you want. Makes me feel closer to you. It makes me feel connected. I will do that. 20 minutes a day. How many nights a week? Five nights a week. Okay. I can do that. Now it's measurable. Now you have experiences. Now you, number one, that's an experience of working together to solve it. Now you have the experience of sitting with her in the evening for a week or two and seeing her affection for you increase, seeing her say, thank you.

37:09You've helped me feel loved. How can I help you feel loved now? And it goes back and it's reciprocal. That's another experience. All of these are experiences that begin reprogramming all those neural pathways where the brain says, closeness with my wife isn't dangerous. She's not unreasonable. She's not demanding. She's actually very kind and she wants to help me feel loved too. It's okay for me to talk to her. This feels good. I should do more of this. And it reprograms the brain to head towards secure connection instead. That's the process. Is that tracking? Is that making sense? It tracks. The one thing I would probably want to talk about a little bit more is the skills element of it.

37:45In the scenario that you described, when the person comes home and the skills aren't functioning, I think what's happening to a lot of people, both sex, sexes, is they come home from whatever they do and they're exhausted. And so that exhaustion is needing a recovery loop of some sort. And so they're not processing the skills because I think they have immersed so much of their being into that work environment that they've come from or whatever it is that's exhausting them. And therefore they're depleted by the time they come home. Do you see this as well? You are exactly correct in that. They come home.

38:32One of them is exhausted. Usually the avoidant partner, they've given everything at the office for 16 hours. and their partner is anxious and desperate for approval and connection and says, you're home. We finally get to connect. And their partner goes, oh, I'm home. Now I have to connect. And they walk in and it's this exhaustion that the anxious person misunderstands as you're not happy to see me. And the other partner is saying, I just need, and they're not saying it out loud inside their head. They're saying, I just need time to myself. Why won't you listen? And they walk in and give one word answers to push the other person away because they don't know how to articulate what's necessary and the other person feels so rejected and abandoned they follow them around like a puppy dog trying to get attention and they just make it worse without meaning to one set of skills ownership would be and skills would be able to sit down with your partner not at that moment but on a weekend and say i've noticed a pattern between us right i'm going to regulate enough to have a conversation with you then i'm going to talk with you and say i've noticed a pattern i come home exhausted i'm out of my mind and i i don't even tell you that I'm tired.

39:34I just try to brush you off because I'm so tired and I shouldn't do that. I also see that you are desperate for connection and you feel like I'm rejecting you and pushing you away. Does that match? Is that what you're seeing? Okay. It is. Here's what I propose. When I come home, I need to tell you how tired I am. Number one, I'm committing to that. I will tell you how tired I am. Number two, I need you to understand if I'm tired, it's not about you. Please don't chase me and make you feel like I'm being mean to you because I feel like I'm being mean to you and And I don't want you to feel that way.

40:02And I don't want to feel that way. So if we can give me a 10, 15 minute window where I can grunt, tell you I'm tired, go wash my face and not talk about feelings for 15 minutes. I promise after that, I can come back and talk about the day and give you what you need as well. Can we set it up this way? You do that conversation on the weekend, that would be a skill. And you set that up in advance. And then when you come home, you go very tired, really grumpy, can't see going to the bathroom. The other person goes, gotcha. Thank you. Love you. And they just like pat you on the shoulders. You walk by 15 minutes later, you come back, go, thank you.

40:35I feel like a human being again. How was your day? Oh, it was great. And you get to talk and share. And now you've both got your needs met. That right there is a multitude of skills that have chained together, but most couples don't know how to have that conversation right there. Adam, are you familiar with the book? What got you here? Won't get you to where you want to go by Dr. Marshall Goldsmith. I am familiar. It's a wonderful book. So earlier in my career, I was younger than you. I was 35, 36-ish. I was working at Lowe's Home Improvement. I was a senior executive there, and they had brought in an executive search firm that had a bunch of organizational psychologists who were evaluating people who had been put on the high potential list for the ability to someday become C-levels in the company.

41:26And we were going through this very comprehensive psychological evaluation that they were doing. And I remember I had my final interview with the lead psychologist who was leading this engagement, and she brought up the book to me and she said, John, you've been on this rocket ship of advancement. I was the youngest vice president at Lowe's, and she kind of said to me, what got you here, which was my intellectual ability to kind of outperform people wasn't going to get me to where I wanted to go. And she was hinting that as I got more and more senior, it was going to be the relationships that I developed and that attachment skill, which was going to ultimately get me to where I wanted to be, which was in the CEO role someday.

42:21And at first I have to tell you, I was really pissed off at her because at the time I didn't see what she was talking about. And now in retrospect, I see exactly what she was talking about is I'd gotten there without the need to develop those relationships because I was able to outperform or outwork people. I understand you recently did a TEDx talk where you went into applied attachment science to the workplace, something that you call bio loyalty, I think is the name of it. If you take my scenario, how can leaders use the same secure attachment principles we've been talking about to build real loyalty instead of a dopamine driven dependency?

43:02That's a great question. Thank you for asking that. A lot of the times what we have is we have our biochemistry in the workplace is also off. Remember that you have people coming in, high performers who come in from families with very low oxytocin, very low emotional, intimate bonding at home. They don't do much vasopressin bonding at home, solving problems together. They solve them alone. Turns them into incredibly productive workers who solve all their problems alone. Don't complain. Don't whine. Don't bring drama into the workplace. They are locked into their office working 14, 16 hours a day without complaining.

43:35They don't even ask about overtime and they don't take vacation. They work like dogs. And they rise through the ranks up to VP. I had one gentleman who rose to the ranks through VP and burned out so hard that two weeks later, he had a mental breakdown and quit with a one-line email and everyone was devastated. They said, how could this have happened? No oxytocin, no GABA, no vasopressin, no serotonin. All that's left is unregulated cortisol. And when you rise through the company, it's something we call the cortisol ladder. It gets narrower and shakier and darker, and you're farther away from everybody else around you so you have no security.

44:10All that's left is dopamine, which diminishes because you can only get so many bonuses, so many vacations, so many attaboy emails, so many awards in the company, and they all diminish in the hit that they give you till you get to the top, unregulated cortisol, no relationships, and no dopamine hits anymore. This is where people flame out. This is where loyalty dies. And most companies are running this exact equation at every level of the company. That's why you lose your best talent. The research now is coming out that the younger generations from about 35 down, they are massively prioritizing workplaces that give them the rest of the equation.

44:46They want vasopressin of working together successfully as a team and celebrating those wins. They want the oxytocin flow, not the, we are a family here feeling that HR tries to do, but the, we belong together. We are a tribe. We have shared identity. We spend time away from stress, talking, eating together, not pizza parties, but real meals, where we actually share, where we connect. We regulate with GABA so cortisol goes down. We release serotonin because we are so connected and bonded and we have such deep wins and celebrations together. Now the full chemistry is on display. Now you're regulating that cortisol ladder and preventing mental breakdowns.

45:27Now you're having your executives at the top actually working together seamlessly instead of feeling like they're competing against each other for prestige. Now you have your best talent staying and they don't, even when headhunters call them and say, I'll give you a 20 % raise if you jump ship, they say, no, thank you. Because now it feels like a loss if they leave your company, because this is their tribe. This is what we're trying to build. This is the correct structure of building an actual company that will hold together and stay together. And if you want to rise through the ranks, if you want to be the kind of guy who becomes CEO, you have to foster that chemistry in yourself so that you feel it and experience it and you can stay balanced.

46:03Otherwise you flame out at 45 with cancer and spend everything you made. And you have to foster that chemistry in the people around you. The point of leadership, the very point of leadership is balancing that equation of those six chemicals. Leadership balances and optimizes everyone else in the company for their chemistry so they stay together and are highly productive. The research coming out says that you get a 30 to 50 % productivity increase when you implement this equation correctly. If the equation is not implemented correctly, either bankruptcy or massive turnover rate, one or the other.

46:36And let's take this back to where we started the discussion, our childhood. Do you think the amount of people who are living that condition at work is growing because of this pass down that you talked about over the past 110 years that's happening from one generation to the next? and then this is causing even more and more people who are in these work environments to have these identity gaps that we've been discussing? I think it's not just getting worse. I think it's what's been informing our corporate growth culture over the last 110 years. Avoidantly attached people become the highest performers.

47:14They build companies, they give jobs to other people. They get a bad rap for being unemotional, but they actually provide so much optimization and so much wellbeing for other human beings around them. We need them during difficult times. So with the rise of industrialization and corporate culture, they built a lot of that. But a lot of it was then informed by people who don't understand what oxytocin or vasopressin bonding feels like. They are very robotic. They are non-sentimental. They don't care much about family or connection in that regard. They care about family like humans, but they don't have the empathetic connection of intimacy.

47:48So then they build corporate cultures that is work yourself to death and at least leave your family some money. That's what they're really focusing on. And that's the corporate culture. If you aren't willing to give everything for this company and die for this company, then you're not the person who's right for this position. It's here's paid time off because we have to follow the law. But if you take it, you are betraying the trust of this company. It's the American corporate culture. And it's been crafted by avoidantly attached people at the top. And yes, it's also now getting worse and people are burning out on it.

48:18This is why we're seeing. So the workforce collapsing and they're saying, I'm not going back to work, especially post COVID. This is why we're seeing the younger generation saying there is no hope. Why even try? We're seeing a collapse of willing workforce absolutely because of this problem. And I want to talk about a couple of things that you've described here. I really think that if you look at this, it goes even before 110 years ago. I really trace this all the back to the industrial revolution where our sense of selfhood, our sense of mattering was extracted to us because the work environment shifted to treating us as a utility.

48:57So oftentimes I think of Robert McNamara and how he was running the war in Vietnam as success was body count. But isn't that kind of what's happening in our work environment? Is it's when you're measuring everything from shareholder value, financial metrics, and you're not taking the person for such a long period of time into account as success in modern environments, isn't that going to be exactly what happens? Is you're going to start valuing your employees based on the utility and what they're delivering, not on the emotional elements that we've been talking about. Do you see similar things?

49:39Yes, especially if you've been raised at home as a child, that's how you were treated. You believe everyone in the world thinks that way. So non-sentimental thinking. I will serve my employees by maximizing profits. And if we can't eat from the profits, we will eat our employees instead. And at least we will survive with the largest number of employees who still have jobs. And if they have jobs, that's good enough. Even if they don't get to see their kids, at least have food to eat. That's that mentality that's coming down from the top of justifying treating your people as cogs in a machine. When you de-empathize them and dehumanize them, you at least rationalize it by saying, I'm not a sociopath.

50:15I'm going to be very clear, They're avoidantly attached people, not sociopaths. It's not that they don't care about humans. It's that their brain is in such a hardcore survival state that their brain says, we must triage everything down to the bone. And if we have to sacrifice one for the collective, then we do that. Even if I have to sacrifice my health and well-being, I will sacrifice me. It's endless triaging in systems that don't make sense. We live in artificial scarcity right now with an artificial scarcity mindset where there's actually abundance that could be shared and deployed. And that endless scarcity grinds teams down to the bone.

50:51People will abandon you and leave you, and then you'll be angry at them saying they were disloyal to you. But in reality, you burned them out and treated them like a useless cog in the machine that could be rotated out without problem. That's exactly the issue that we're seeing. Yes. Adam, I want to spend the remaining time giving the listeners some things that will allow them to apply what we're talking about here. So first, how can someone who's listening quickly identify their own attachment pattern? I do have a quiz on my website for this if you want a longer version, but the short version is this.

51:24Do you have a difficult time opening up to other people about your needs, your feelings, your concerns, and solving problems with them in the relationship? If so, you probably have insecure attachment. If you have insecure attachment, Do you struggle to believe that you have self-worth? You have low self-image and you think you are not a good person no matter what? Do you think people will abandon you? Are you afraid of abandonment? Are you craving approval from other people? And when you get that approval, does it finally feel like everything is right and safe and you experience euphoria? If so, that's anxious attachment style.

51:57If you struggle to trust other people and believe they will never be loyal to you, if you think other people will get dysregulated and stressed out and betray you inevitably, whether they're good or bad. You may not think they're evil people, but you just don't think they're trustworthy. If you think you have to keep everything inside and if you share any emotions, it's a weakness. And if you think everything you share will be used against you by other people, let's avoid an attachment style. Now, if you have a blend of those two, it's probably what we call disorganized, meaning cannot be neatly organized into either category.

52:28Disorganized can come in the freeze response of internal focus where I don't share anything and I just lock down and I'm afraid and I have low self-image, but I also am avoidant. Or the explosive outward version, the loud disorganized. My feelings are everything. I am ruled by them, heavy addiction focused usually, and everyone will know how I feel all the time and I will use that to navigate my world. That's loud disorganized. That's how they break down into those different styles right there. And where's the website they can go to get the quiz? Thank you. AdamLaneSmith.com. If you click on resources, there is a free attachment styles quiz in there to find that.

53:03Okay. For the listener who feels completely unlovable or like they've heard today's discussion and they think I can never change, what's the single most important mindset shift you would want them to take away today? You don't know that you can manage your nervous system and how you feel, so you need other people to help you. Instead, first, learn to manage your nervous system, but purely through physical techniques, not mental techniques, number one. And then number two, reclassify the way you make decisions. Right now you make decisions based on reducing friction and making other people happy so they don't abandon you.

53:38Instead, start making decisions toward a North Star goal that you have in your life and your principles and ethics. So principles and ethics and goals. Those are the two ways you make decisions. You calm, you breathe and say, okay, how does this align with my goals and my ethics. And then you make that decision and you inform them of how you're making it. And that's how you build self-respect. That's how you trend towards secure attachments, what I had to do when I was at the beginning. And I understand that you are getting into the coaching world right now and have been in it. What kind of breakthroughs do you consistently see through the coaching programs you're implementing?

54:14So the breakthroughs, when we look at that, what we tell people a breakthrough is, it's when you can do repeatable and reliable changes that give you the experiences you're looking for to remap your brain. It's not a giant clouds parting and the sun bursting through and you rend your garments and scream aloud that I finally have overcome. That's not the breakthrough we're looking for. You're looking for a hundred breakthroughs that over time, repeatedly break down the pathways in your brain and change them. So a breakthrough you're looking for is I can finally tell my wife how tired I am after work.

54:46And then I need 15 minutes to cool down instead of causing the same fight over and over. I can finally ask my husband to help me feel loved by spending time in the evening with me. I can finally tell my son how much I care about him instead of feeling like the words get choked in my throat because I don't want to be sappy. I can finally have a boundary with my mother instead of letting her steamroll over me all the time, but I can do so in a way that she still feels loved and we don't fight about it. I can tell somebody no at work and build the professional relationship without dismantling it so I don't feel like I'm in danger.

55:19I can connect to the people I'm leading and actually connect to them and make them feel connective, bonded, secure, and want to stay in the company even as I'm still managing them correctly. I don't dissolve the hierarchy and become their best friend. I lead them correctly. All of those would be breakthroughs. I am finally capable of doing X that before was too hard for me to do. Those are the breakthroughs we look for. And then lastly, Adam, for people who want to learn more about you and some of the things that you offer, what would you like to tell the audience? Best thing is adamlanesmith.com.

55:52That's L-A-N-E like a road, adamlanesmith.com. Me and my entire team of certified coaches are on there. We have the Attachment Breakthrough Program. I'm leading a retreat here at the end of April, but my coaches are always year-round on standby, ready to help you achieve those breakthroughs and overcome those barriers for good. Find us on adamlanesmith.com. Adam, such a great conversation. Thank you so much for joining us today on PassionStruck. Thank you for your time. That brings us to the end of today's conversation with Adam Lane-Smith. What I hope stays with you is the realization that many of the struggles we experience in relationships are not signs that we're broken.

56:29They're often signs that we're operating from patterns we may have never consciously examined. The ways we seek love, handle conflict, pursue approval, respond to uncertainty, and build trust are often shaped by attachment systems that were formed long before we understood what was happening. Those patterns can quietly influence our relationships, our careers, our parenting, and even the stories we tell ourselves about who we are. But the good news is this. Patterns are not destiny. The moment we become aware of them, we create the possibility for something new. Awareness creates choice, and choice creates the opportunity to build healthier relationships, stronger connections, and a more authentic life.

57:08As we continue the Connection Crisis series, I'll be joined by Spencer West. For years, Spencer found himself living according to expectations that never truly belonged to him. Like many of us, he spent time trying to fit into a version of success that looked right from the outside but felt disconnected from who he truly was. What followed was a remarkable journey of self-discovery that ultimately led him to challenge limiting beliefs, redefine what was possible, and build a life rooted in authenticity and purpose. Together, we'll explore why so many people become trapped by identities they never consciously chose and what it takes to break free from expectations, assumptions, and stories that keep us from being who we're meant to be.

57:51It's a powerful conversation about resilience, identity, belonging, and the courage to follow your own path. Asking yourself the question, why am I here? And really leaning into that. And stop worrying about what life is and start wondering what it could be. I think those are the two things that as when I was writing this book that really resonated and I hope people will pick up on is to really just pause and take a look around you and why am I here and what do I want? And then having that ability to wonder what could be because part of the framework also for this book is this idea that we have to have self-trust and self-confidence, the self-trust to be able to listen to what's in here and what we want and the self-confidence to believe that you can actually achieve.

58:34whatever that is. And so to do that, I think we have to start with those questions. If today's conversation gave you a new lens through which to understand your relationships, please share it with someone who may benefit from hearing it. And if you haven't already, leaving a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify is one of the simplest and most impactful ways you can help others discover the show. Be sure to subscribe on YouTube as we continue exploring the connection crisis and how we find our way back to authentic connection. Until next time, remember this, the quality of our relationships is often shaped by stories we didn't write, but we still have the power to revise.

59:10I'm John Miles, and you've been PassionStruck.

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