The 3 Critical Building Blocks of All Life-Long Relationships EP 1475

0:01Calling all conscious achievers who are seeking more community and connection, I've got an invitation for you. Join me at this year's Summit of Greatness this September 7th through 9th in my hometown of Columbus, Ohio to unleash your true greatness. This is the one time a year that I gather the greatness community together in person for a powerful transformative weekend. People come from all over the world and you can expect to hear from inspiring speakers like Inky Johnson, Jospree Singh, Vanessa Van Edwards, Jen Sincero, and many more. You'll also be able to dance your heart out to live music, get your body moving with group workouts, and connect with others at our evening socials.

0:44So if you're ready to learn, heal, and grow alongside other incredible individuals in the greatness community, then you can learn more at lewishouse.com slash summit 2023. Make sure to grab your ticket, invite your friends, and I'll see you there. When you are doing different, you degrade the other person. They're less important to you. They don't matter. Ultimately, what we feel in relationships is that we matter. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness.

1:26Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

1:34Welcome to this special masterclass. We brought some of the top experts in the world to help you unlock the power of your life through this specific theme today. It's going to be powerful, so let's go ahead and dive in.

1:52What are the challenges that come up over and over that you see? So there's always three questions, right? What's a thriving relationship? A thriving one. Yeah. What can go wrong? Uh-huh. And how do you fix it? Okay. So you started with the middle question. What goes wrong? I think there's a number of things in a relationship that become the kind of cornerstones of the demise. Okay? And I'm not going to list them in order, but they all are part of each other.

2:24indifference and contempt and neglect and violence are probably the four most important okay i'm not talking about big violence microaggressions are plenty indifference when you start to feel like the other person fundamentally is not really caring about you anymore or you don't care about them what they feel what they think who they are what they're about there's a don't care you've lost interest but it's more than losing of interest It's also when you are indifferent, you degrade the other person. They're less important to you. They don't matter. And ultimately, what we feel in relationships is that we matter.

3:01That is the essential reason for connecting to people is that we are creatures of meaning. I matter to you. I'm someone. You care about me. You want my well-being. You're proud of me. You want good for me. You're benevolent. All of that. When you are indifferent, the whole thing goes. And then you start to, there's that coldness that creeps in, that sense of estrangement, that complete disconnect. That. The second one is neglect. Neglect. When people just basically take each other for granted. You know, they take more care of their car than of their partner. Or their dog. Or their dog. Anybody.

3:36Anything. Their yard. Anything. Anything gets attendance. Their business. Their business for sure. Their business for sure. You know, everything gets priority. everything gets reviewed, evaluated, attended to, 360s, you name it. You know, new input. My God, it's like people have this idea that they put it all in when they were dating and then once they seal the knot, it's like as if they tie the knot. It's like now they don't have to do squat anymore and they go into this kind of complete sense of complacency and laziness. It's an amazing thing. They think this thing is just going to live on its own.

4:12Right. Like a cactus. violence violence the abuse the level of of disrespect i mean most people talk nicer to anybody else than their partner when a relationship degrades because you can't get away with it because you can't get away with it because if you talk like this at work you're gone because if you talk like this with the police you're gone because if you talk like this on the street you're being punched but with your partner you have that sense that they're going to be there anyway they're just gonna take it because it's family and family is this kind of this thing that doesn't dissolve so easily so you can just lash out at them and talk to them with a tone and a dismissal that is phenomenal so that kind of violence i'm not talking physical violence and all the other big big things you're talking about aggression or resentment or all of that all of that you know passive aggressiveness all those things yeah all of that and then and then contempt I think is the top one.

5:11Contempt is the killer of them all. Because in the contempt there is a real there's the degradation of the race. It's that complete, you're nothing. You're nothing. I can kill you with that one gaze, that one eyebrow that goes up. You know, who do you think you are? And that's it. You're done. You're done. So how do we even get to this place? After having been so in love It's so romantic, right? Is desire reflect that? Or if we're not desiring the person anymore, then we start to feel one of those categories? Or does that not play into it at all? Look, the truth is this. There's only two relationships that resemble each other.

5:53The one you have with your parents or the people who raise you and the one you have with the people you fall in love with. People can sit in my office all the time and say, I have this with no one else. I don't have this with anybody at work. Nobody among my friends ever thinks like that. You're the only one who speaks like this or thinks this about me or with whom I do this. No, you're the only one. And now we go back in history. And I'm sorry to be the psychologist, but that's really, it is the place where we often learned about closeness, trust, loyalty, commitment, sharing, taking, receiving, asking, all these essential verbs of relationships.

6:34We learned that at home. We also learned jealousy and all these other things. Possessiveness, vengeance, you name them. The beauty and the not beauty. Yeah, we saw it all as children, right? We saw the fights. We saw the love. We saw the coldness. The lack of intimacy. The intimacy, yes. Yes, and we bring that with us. And we often promise ourselves, I'll never be this one. I'll never be this way. I'll never talk like this. And we find ourselves often much closer to the apple. And then resenting ourselves. The apple to the tree. We resent ourselves. We're like, how do we do that? Why do we get to this place?

7:07And then we feel ashamed about it. And since we don't like to feel ashamed about it, we hide it. And one of the ways we hide it is we blame the partner. That's just one of the ways. We are very resourceful in not owning our shit. Right, exactly. Wow, okay. And where does sex play in all this and desire? So, I mean, one of the fascinating things for me in looking at sexuality is that it's probably one of the dimensions of relationship that has changed the most in a very, very short amount of time. For most of history, and it's still the majority of the world, sex is for procreation, sex is a marital duty on the part of the woman, nobody cares particularly if she likes it and how she feels and if she wants it, and men have the privilege to go and find sex elsewhere.

7:59in a very short amount of time. We're talking 60 years. We have contraception, which is the liberation of women for the first time to free sex from reproduction, from mortality, from death in pregnancy and in childbirth, sorry, all of that. And for the first time, sexuality moves from just biology and a condition to a part of our identity and a lifestyle. In 60 years. In 60 years. The women's movement, which goes after the abuses of power. the gay movement which introduces the concept of identity to sexuality the fact that sex is for connection and pleasure the fact that for the first time we have sex before marriage and many times a lot we used to marry and have sex for the first time now we marry and we stop having sex with others okay monogamy used to be one person for life now monogamy is one person at a time and people go around telling you i'm monogamous in all my relationships and it makes perfect sense okay all of that in a very short amount of time the fact that i choose you to marry or to live together doesn't matter commitment because i'm attracted to you because you give me butterflies in my stomach and the fact that i think that if i don't have these butterflies anymore maybe i don't love you anymore and the fact that sexuality in long-term relationships is rooted in one thing only desire i feel like it i want to not i have to not we want many kids after two kids the only reason to continue doing it with you is because we feel like it right it's fun it's pleasurable we connect it feels good it runs deepens our relationships the whole thing that's it and hopefully it's at the same time and for each other because plenty of desire continues but it's not always at home.

9:50Right, exactly. So this is an amazing revolution. Sex that is confusing all of us. And how do we sustain it? So that's why I became fascinated in the nature of erotic desire and how do we sustain desire because it is the first time ever that we have a grand experiment of the humankind where we want sex with one person in the long haul that is fun and connected and intimate and playful and we live twice as long. Go figure. Right, exactly. For 60 years, you're going to be with them or whatever it is. It's an amazing ideal. So how do we navigate this? If we're going to choose one partner and be with them until we're both gone, how do we navigate the challenge of keeping the desire continuously?

10:39Both men and women. Yes. Because the woman probably sees other men who are attracted to her and vice versa. So it's like, how do both parties do this? Look, we know that women get bored with monogamy much sooner than men. Wow. Is this a fact or is this a - That's research. Okay. That's not just fact. That is, men's desire in long-term relationship goes down gradually. He actually is much more able to remain interested. And maybe just because he's interested in the experience itself and he has a partner there. Women's desire post-marriage romance. Really? Wow. And it's always been translated, as well that's because women care less about sex rather than it's because women care less about the sex that they can have in their committed relationships which is often not interesting enough for them and it often has to do with the fact that the story the character the plot is not in it's not seductive the romance which is an essential ingredient of turn on for the woman often disappears in the long-term relationship it's like when people look at each other at the end of the day and you want to fool around you want to do it you're up for it tonight now this is really not this is not very much of a turn on for most women and the idea that foreplay often starts at the end of the previous orgasm you know and not five minutes before the real thing which for her is not the real thing the whole the real thing is everything else so it's essentially the game yes it's creating a game it's seduction it's a plot it's a coming close it's a mystery history it's what animals call pacing it's that i come to you but i don't overwhelm you i come just a little bit so that you can come a little bit toward me and then i don't immediately answer i actually go back a little bit too have you ever seen animals they do this kind of pacing and it is an essential playful ingredient of seduction and an excitement so women's desire plummets but we interpret it as women are less interested in sex rather than women are interested in probably just about the same kind of things that many men are but women have always known what to choose above what turns them on which was what gives them stability and security safety security family right someone to protect be there right so what people do look this is we want one partner today to give us everything that involves stability and security and everything that involves playfulness and mystery okay that's the grand ideal okay i want to be cozy with you and i want to have an edge and I want you to surprise me and I want you to be familiar and I want you to give me continuity and I want you to give me novelty.

13:12That's it. As if it's a, right? And no Victoria's Secret is going to solve that. Yeah. Right. So then there becomes, what is desire? Desire is to own the wanting. If you ask people a question that goes like this, I turn myself off when. I turn myself off by. Not you turn me off when and what turns me off is. You're going to hear I turn myself off when I do emails, when I spend too much time on the phone, when I overeat, when I don't exercise, when I have bad days at work, when I don't feel confident, when I numb myself, when I feel dead, when I don't feel thriving, when I'm not alive. You will really hear that it has very little to do with sex.

13:58And when you ask people, I turn myself on when or by, I awaken my desires. Not you turn me on when and what turns me on is, which is you're responsible for my wanting. What people will talk to you about is when I'm in nature, when I'm connected with my friends, when I get to do my sports, when I play music, when I listen to music, it's stuff that that gives me pleasure, that is alive, that is vibrant, that is vital, that is erotic in the full sense of the word as life force. And from that place, people remain interested in having sex with somebody else for the long haul. Not because they've scratched their arms for two seconds.

14:40You know? It's, I feel good about myself. The biggest turn on is confidence. Confidence. You ask people, when do you find yourself most drawn to your partner? Every description has to do with when they're in their element, when they're on stage, when they're doing their sport, when they are radiant, when they are in their studio, on the piano, on the horse, you name it. It's when they are in their element, i.e. they don't need me to take care of them. They're not depressed and down and lonely and sad. They're not needy. They don't need me because desire is about wanting you. love is also about needing you caretaking is a very powerful experience in love and it is a very powerful anti-aphrodisiac so how do you experience love and desire at the same time you calibrate it so sometimes you're it's the same as when you walk you have to move from one foot to the other a balance is not about staying on one side a balance is the ability to see right now we don't need caretaking we can be mischievous we can be naughty we can be playful we can break our own rules we can stay home and not go to work at eight o 'clock right and now we are in a playful zone now we are feeling that we are bringing our own little transgressions home we are alive we're not just being dutiful responsible good citizens right it's that it's very small yeah you know i mean i always think when i go and i see people at lunch and you see them talking and they're well dressed and they're awake and all i see who is here with their partner because you can see them they're engaged they're giving the best of themselves that's erotic no the majority are not there with their partner they're not with their friends with their colleagues their partner is going to get the leftover when they come home at night sorry you know what forget the night date meet at lunch when you actually have energy you know when you And in the middle of the day like that, when you're awake, when you have something to offer, it's a very small thing, but they don't do it.

16:46They don't do it. And you say, why not? Why not? Why don't you stay an hour extra at home in the morning and not just because when you have a headache and just say, this matters to me. All in all, you know, committed sex is premeditated sex. It's not just going to happen because whatever is going to just happen already has. So you're going to make it happen because you say we matter. We're important. Let's do this. It doesn't mean if you're going to make love or have sex. It just means we're going to take this hour and there's nothing else that matters in this moment but just you and I to be together, to check in.

17:21And then we'll see what unfolds. That's the erotic space in which sex may happen, probably will, doesn't have to, but it is the place from which it is much more likely to emerge. But people don't do that. They do the responsibility. That's the love, right? The citizen, the commitment, the caretaker. the burdens, the safe. And then they say, I'm bored. I would be too. Exactly. There's no mystery. There's no risk-taking, right? Exactly, yeah. There's no risk-taking. That's the word. If you want desire, it's risk. And the risk is an emotional risk. It's not about sexy risks. It's really a risk on the emotional front is that I bring something else to you differently from the way I typically present myself.

18:07Sure. You know, how can I do this? What can I do today that will be different from the ways that I've done it until now? How can I do something that I think would actually improve our relationship? Me, right? Not something that I want or that you want, but that I think would be actually good for us, that third entity, the us, right? And you check every time. How often do you just go on the tried and trodden, as in it works? Sex that just works for most people is really not interesting enough. Because what does it mean it works generally? Right. What about the people listening who are saying, man, that sounds like a lot of work, that every day you have to change, do something different and unique.

18:52Not every day. Not every day. Not every day. but what you can do every day is just a quick check with yourself you know is there something that i should notice is there something that i can be thankful for is there a little note that i could write is there you know just a way that i can show up a time it's small it's really small um here's the thing there is work and then there is the creative work you know i'm talking about a level that is creative and that elevates you and that actually gives you you feel you feel taller you just feel like you're engaged you feel awake rather than this this is the other seated position it's comfortable it's great but nothing happens here sure this this is alert here is the essential word is curiosity when you're curious you lean forward and you watch you're open to the mysteries of life this is please don't bother me with anything because i don't want any stimulation i've had my share i've been you know and this is the position that most people have at home so when people say it's too much work um i basically say look you you if i was to say this in your business would you say this is too much work Or you would say, that's very good advice.

20:20This is high rate consulting fees. It's like, excuse me, but you don't think for a minute that your business would thrive if you let it languish like that. Never. You have a reward system. You have incentives. Bonuses. You have bonuses. But there is no incentivized system in the private domain. So people just think, why bother? Right. And that's the difference is that the ones who have good relationships are the ones who created their own internal incentivized system. What are some of those incentive systems that you've seen over time that really work or are effective for long-term relationships?

20:58I would say the first thing is almost one of the first things that our parents teach you. Please and thank you. Do you know how many people stop thanking their partners? Thank you. Thank you for doing this for me. Thank you for picking up the shirts. thank you for, you know. Making you feel appreciated. Yes, appreciation. Appreciation is huge. Gratitude, acknowledgement of the presence of the other in your life. Not, did you do this? Did you call? Did you pick up? Do this? You know, half the time. Expectations. Expectations. Of course, you know, expectations is often a resentment in the make. With the expectation comes the fear of it's not good.

21:41Thank person. First of all. And because it also makes it feel like this is not a given. Nobody owes you squat. You're not owed anything. You're not that important. You're actually quite replaceable. Right. And with the divorce rate that we have. What's the rate at right now? We have 50 on first and 65 on second. 65 on second. Wow. It's not good. Right. It's really, you know, it costs a lot of money. It's not good for the health. I mean, it's just like, you know, it's not good for the jobs. It's just, it's like, okay, now you could say maybe people should marry, but it doesn't matter if it's marriage legally or, the idea is that we can do better.

22:24We can do better in general. I really think that the quality of our lives depends on the quality of our relationships. I mean, nobody's going to write, you know, you worked 60, 70, 80, 90 hours a week. and you know no they're gonna say he was there for people when they needed to he was there at every game he was there at the party he's the guy who when you were in his presence he had charisma not because he could stand in front of a huge crowd but he had charisma because when I was in his presence he made me feel special it's a different charisma so appreciation gratitude thank you little things to go out of your way rather than just to do the minimum a lot of people start to do the bare minimum just so that they can't be scolded.

23:11Go an extra thing. On occasion, just do something for the other person just because it matters to them even if you couldn't care less. Right. Rather than, it's not important to me. I don't need this or I don't care about this. Give each other a lot of individual space. Not everything needs to be shared. People have different passions, different interests, different friends and they need those separate spaces to exist. admiration I think is huge because admiration is also that you kind of really see the otherness of the other person. Don't try to make your partner into one person for everything.

23:52There is no such a person. Find multiple sources of connection, of intimacy, of friendship so that you can have a group of people support you and don't have one person who has to be there for you for everything, especially when you're in the dumpster. Stuff like that. We used to have a village of people to do that. Now we just expect one person to be the village, right? Yes, yes, yes. One person for the whole village. That is a unique... And then we're upset when they don't fulfill the mandate.

24:22When you have been through, as you date, and you go through relationships, and you've been through betrayal, and heartbreak, and hurt, and pain, you can become pretty cynical about love. And if you're not careful, that cynicism can really be a hindrance for you because you cannot be a cynic about love and expect to attract it at the same time. Ooh, snap. That's true. So how did you keep your heart open after going through breakups and maybe after challenging things happening in relationships where that hurt you? How did you stay open to love? I had to reframe my thoughts and ideas and my perspective about the past.

25:16What did you think about them then? I had to learn to allow the past to stay in the past. I didn't want someone to come into my life and I make them pay for something they had nothing to do with. Yeah that's tough. In my past. Yeah, that's tough. And when I got married, who did I want my husband to meet? This bitter, broken down woman who had been through the ringer in all these years and all these relationships? Or did I want him to meet someone who, because we're always in the process of healing. We're always in the process of growth and our emotional health. But did I want him to meet someone who was committed to that growth and that process?

25:58and going forward, being committed to the same commitment, which is what really success in marriage boils down to, being committed to the same commitment. Because when I was younger, I thought it was about this involuntary feeling of love. And then as I got older, I realized it was a conscious decision to love. It's not just, oh, I have this attraction to this person. I feel love towards them. It's a conscious decision. Because you're not always going to feel love. You're going to go through ups and downs and peaks and valleys. And if it were about a feeling, you'd be all over the place emotionally.

26:37Up and down, yeah. It's about a decision. And so when I talk about earlier, when I talked about separating your feelings from the facts, that's what I mean. Like you're going to have a range of emotions. But the fact is, this is a person that I've committed my life to. Yeah. This is a person I've committed to grow with. So I made all of these commitments to this person. And then you go forward with that in mind. Did you have fears around getting married? I had a fear of the unknown. What is marriage really like? You know, I see other people who are married, some of them happy, some of them not.

27:14Obviously I see a lot of people getting divorced. So what is it about marriage? What makes it work? Do I know what makes it work? Do I have what it takes to make it work? So it was the fear of the unknown because I hadn't done it before. Marriage by nature changes you. It's the closest relationship you'll ever have. It's very different from the parent-child relationship, every other relationship. Friends, everything, yeah. I wondered how it would change me. From being in a relationship and dating to then being married, what have been the biggest differences and changes? Allowing someone to see me at my most vulnerable state.

27:54Did you allow that during the dating process? I allowed it to a certain extent, but I didn't live with my husband before we got married. That was a choice that we made. Really? We did not want to live together. And so when we got married and we moved in together, I had not lived with anyone since I was in college for 20 years. So again, it's that adjustment in life, just sharing my space with another human being every day. And how to handle that. Yeah, and you got married a week before the pandemic in 2020. March 8th, 2020, you said. So what was that, I mean, that takes a lot of guts to not live with someone beforehand in the modern world, to not fully see the person who they are.

28:39So I commend you on that. So what did you learn going through a pandemic for the last two years, getting married a week before, and then moving in together and sharing a life during arguably one of the scariest, uncertain times in the last 20, 30 years? Everything changed in the blink of an eye. We got married on March 8th in Los Angeles, big wedding, all of our family, all of our friends, hugging, high-fiving, kissing, had no idea what was about to happen a week later. And I do look back on that day because I thought, you know, when we were talking about our wedding, do we want to do something small?

29:21Do we want to, you know, we ended up just inviting our people and everyone came out. And now I look back on that day and I cherish it so much. Yeah, because people haven't been able to do that for a couple years. Right. And I haven't seen a lot of those people since. So it just made those memories even more special to us. But also, yes, a week later, the world shut down. So we decided to take a mini moon. We weren't we were going to do a big honeymoon over the summer. So we just went to Newport Beach and we were there for a few days and we were in a bubble. We didn't know a lot about everything that was happening in the world until we came out of this bubble.

29:59So we came back to LA and I mean, there was no toilet tissue on the shelves, the grocery store. I mean, it was just empty. Everything was empty. I'd never seen anything like it before. And I was like, oh, so you mean to tell me I waited all this time to get married and the world is about to end? It was crazy. So what did you guys create? Did you guys come together and say, let's build a strong foundation during this time? Yes. Did you, do you feel like it's made the relationship stronger? Absolutely. Has it been stressful living with someone for the first time in 20 years? How have you navigated it all?

30:37We adapted really well. And during that time we had every day and all that time to spend time together. And the pandemic, you know, it challenged all of us in different ways, but it also presented us with an opportunity. and for us it was noise cancellation headphones through the first few months of our marriage because we got to really sit and be together and be still and be quiet you know my husband is an r &b singer he travels all over the world and he had he was leaving a week after we got married to start traveling again of course that that didn't happen and so we got to spend a lot of quality time together and i will tell you what i learned about him yes what i talked about earlier about when you see the true measure of a person and how they handle adversity and how they handle difficult circumstances.

31:28And cause all of his, you know, live music was impacted greatly. That's how you make most of your money. Shut down completely. And I never heard him complain, not even once. And I saw him be a source of encouragement to a lot of other of his artists and musician friends. And I mean, I was even shocked. I was like, okay, we're all about positivity and wake up happy every day. But really? You really wake up this happy every day? Sure. And it was inspiring to see. And I knew in those first few months that because you always, you know, love is about taking a risk. You know, we talk about that fear because it's a risk.