Marriage: It’s Not What You Thought You Signed Up For

Transcript of a Sage Hill Live Fully Podcast conversation with Dr. Chip Dodd. Lightly edited for readability; speaker labels omitted.

This podcast is brought to you by Sage Hill, a social impact organization. Our mission is to help people be who they're made to be so that they can do what they're made to do. Find more resources to live fully, love deeply, and lead well at sagehillresources.com. Hey. This is Stephen James. Thanks for listening to the Sage Hill podcast. I've got a great guest today. It's a good friend, a great therapist, a wise thinker. His name is Zach Brittle. He's an a marriage therapist in Seattle, Washington. He's, trained in the in the Gottman method. He's written several books. He he has a a different take on marriage, a different, less romantic, but more effective take. I think he's helped hundreds of couples over the over the last twenty years find, why they're married and what they're married for and and the the importance of their marriage. And, I really enjoyed our conversation. You're gonna listen to two friends, who've known each other a long time and kinda make sense of things. I met Zach, over twenty years ago or about twenty years ago, and, we stayed in touch for a long time. He's taught me a lot, and we've learned a lot from each other. And I hope you enjoy our conversation. Also, I want you to know about some Sage Hill, Live Fully workshops that are starting back. We took a hiatus during COVID. These are Friday afternoon, all day Saturday, small, five, six, seven, eight people, therapy intensives where you can come and focus on some issues like codependency or trauma and grief or, being yourself in the world, living fully. If you wanna know more about our upcoming workshops, go to sagehillcounseling.com, and there's some information on there. We're gonna be doing those starting, I think, in September, maybe October. Really looking forward to those. Thank you for listening. And, if there's anything we could do, let us know. We're here to help. Hey, Zach. Hey, Stephen. Thank you for having me. Oh, man. I'm I'm really excited that you're here. I get to do your podcast at some point. Right? Well, yeah. Your assistant

freed you up in December. sorry. Yeah. I was like, I don't think she knows who she's talking to because I'm special. I'm I'm important. But I'm not I'm I'm I'm not gonna hear you. Podcast is a is a like, a lot of people listen to it. Yeah. We're doing pretty good. We have, I think we'll hit 2,000,000 downloads this week, or this month. I don't know. When is this coming out? Whatever. Is it gonna come out in a couple of weeks? We're group we're creeping up on 2,000,000, and, that's pretty fun. And we've done almost 200 episodes, I think. So Wow. And now now kind of famous people are are are agreeing to talk to me. Do you know who I get stuck to? You don't know who I get stuck to, but Matt, who do you get to talk to? Christine Lilly.

The soccer player? Yeah. Like, maybe the greatest of all time. I think she's doing your podcast. She just became the greatest of all time. Well, here but there's a there's a false debate about the greatest of all time between Mia Hamm and Michelle Akers. But they're both, like, almost exclusively offensive machines, powerhouses. I mean, they're they're players, though. You have a midfielder and an attacker. Yeah. Well yeah. And then, but Christine Lilly is, in my mind, the greatest there ever was. And then, of course, the debate changes if you're, you know, 38 instead of 48 or 28 or eight. Why is she doing marriage therapy radio podcast? Because I asked her to. I asked a year ago. It doesn't matter. Maybe this isn't important. But, I'm interested in talking to people who are really, really excellent in their field, their chosen field. Okay. And learning what they have to teach us about kind of the the mundane. Right? Like, everybody's a lot more people are married than our famous soccer players. Or, you know, we had a we had David Wilcox on a few weeks ago. You know? Oh, wow. That's awesome. Yeah. He had a career out of making you know, writing songs and touring. And I think it's just interesting to see, like, what is the what is whatever you learned about what you do relevant to sort of the layperson or the the average person. And so it's been kind of my little pet project to find people who are just really great at their jobs and helping them understand. So we talked to, talked to a Top Gun pilot. Yeah. That was pretty cool. And we talked to What did he teach you about marriage? Well, I guess the core of his message probably was around the idea of you gotta trust your you gotta trust the process, basically, or trust your instrument instruments is his sort of catchphrase. But there are there, you know, there are things in your life and around you that are telling you how you're doing. And sometimes when you're getting data from your body or from your partner or from your, you know, world that it's not going great, maybe just trust your instruments, trust your process, trust the things you already invested in. I talked to a guy who's a professional nerd. He makes these YouTube videos telling you everything you missed in last night's episode of WandaVision or whatever. And, and that's actually where it started because I was watching WandaVision and going, wow. There's a lot in here for couples. And so I just asked him. I was like, hey. You wanna talk about that with me? And so he did. And it was it's just cool to hear people talk about what they love and figure out how to if it makes sense to other people. So

Okay. So I I did a little intro before we started the the podcast, and I mentioned that we've known each other for over twenty twenty years now. Yeah. When did you get to Seattle? Because I got there in Miami. 2001. Yeah. So it's been, you know, twenty years for sure. Yeah. That's crazy. And, I've I've didn't say this in the intro, but I've seen you evolve as a person, and as a husband and, as a human man, a lot in twenty years. Right? And I've I've seen you and I've seen you pretty committed to that process. Like I'd like to think so. Yeah. I'd like to think so. You know, we have so I don't know if you mentioned my wife, Rebecca. We've been married, twenty four years. So, yeah, I've known you most of my married life. So you you're are you not sure you've been married twenty four years? Or I sometimes I don't. No. Sometimes I'm not sure. The the kind of the thing that we say, for comedy, but it's actually true, is we've been happily married twenty two out of twenty four years. Yeah. Because number eight was really, really bad, and number 18 was not that great either. But,

yeah. So that's our that's the that's the way to do. My my thing is we're on our fifth marriage. I've been married five times. Yeah. To the same woman. Right? The same woman. We're we're re we're renegotiating our fifth marriage right now. There's a theory out there that, long term committed relationships are only designed anthropologically to last three years. And so 24, for me, would be eight. I've been married eight. I've been in three different but a lot of where people get in trouble is they don't negotiate, like you said, you know, those with any intention. Right? So if you even just think about three is usually about about how long you're married before you have a baby. It's about how long you're married before you have a second baby. It's when you're done with your children having babies, it's about how long you have until you start to be aware of, okay. This is how I'm gonna operate inside my unit. You know? And so there are some natural kind of parts of it. It's about how long it takes you to buy a house or whatever. I mean, but What else? So three years is about where you become immune to someone's pheromones. Totally. Right? Okay. So the biology of attraction is done, and now you're doing something besides primal relationship. You go. Yeah. So it's so, yeah, fifth marriage, eighth marriage, you know, 22 out of 24. Basically, it's, it's not it's never what we signed up for. Right? We signed up for death till death to be part, and then, you know, I'm not the same person I was when I said those words. So I don't you know, I'm I have no idea what I'm I can say more about that. It's not we signed up for. We signed up for death do us part, and you're not Well, I mean, I for that. I'm I'm keenly aware that when I got married at 24 holy cow. I've been married half my life. Just that math just occurred to me. So, yeah, I'm 48. I got married when I was 24, so I've been married half my life. But I know that I stood up in front of a whole bunch of people at 24, and I said things like well, I said I do to things like richer and poorer and sickness and health and better and worse, and I didn't have any idea what it meant. I had no idea what I was saying. And then I said something like, I'll I'll do this till I die. And I didn't know what that was either because, you know, when you're 24, you're gonna live forever. And now I'm like, oh, oh, I'm gonna die. I'm gonna die. You know? I'm still committed to doing this, and that doesn't that becomes a decision you have to make, like, day over day and not just one that you kind of declare in your twenties and hope that it sticks. And,

so, yeah, that's that's my So you just did your Zach Grotto thing where you said something, like, really profound, but you said it like it wasn't that big of a deal. Yeah. It's so, let's go back. So you just use yeah. You said it's a commitment you make every day, and you make it over and over again. Yeah. I mean, I think so okay. Did you say in the part in your intro that this is my job? I'm a couple's therapist? I did say you're a couple's therapist. I probably mentioned that. Yeah. That's your So I had this conversation with people all the time. Right? I'm talking to people about their marriages all the time. And I'm hearing them talk about what they thought it was or what they hoped it was or what it would be, and I've just become convinced, frankly, that it's just it's ultimately just choice. It's a choice. It's choice. Like, it's not fate. It's not love. It's not endurance. It's not luck. It's choice. Like and so you have to just wake up and decide. Most of us decide unconsciously, and passively that I'm gonna keep doing this, And that can be fine. That's sustainable. You can you can get through your days like that if you want to. But I wanna I don't wanna be in a marriage where I'm getting through my days. Well, but but it but that's why they call it settling down. Right? I mean, I'm just I can settle. I can settle down. Maybe. Or I can wake up and make my choices. Right? I can go, okay. I'm gonna choose to make today different. I'm gonna choose to make today better. You know? Because that's what it is. Right? You talk about for better and for worse. Like, better better than what? Well, better than, I mean, shoot, year eight was better than year nine, but can Wednesday be better than Tuesday? It can be. I just gotta make sure I'm well, actually, year eight was terrible for us. Year nine was amazing.

Year year nine was incredible. Amazing because year eight was so bad? Well, the badness of eight created a choice. You know? And we chose to lean in and invest and do some work and do so it became a really powerful and redemptive experience for us. So, you know, I guess it just speaks to the idea of, like, I get to decide what I'm gonna do with the fact that some of this isn't what I signed up for. You know? I I'm so grateful that most of what my marriage is is not what I signed up for. Like, if I got what I signed up for, oh my goodness. Like, like, I did not know how much I needed Heather's loyalty. Like, I did not know it. I was 22. My brain wasn't even developed. You at least had a frontal lobe. I didn't. Okay. But, like, I have her loyalty and, commitment to my to me and our family and the process of being married, and, like, that has been one of the best things that I've ever that's ever happened to me. Right? Yeah. And for me, I didn't know I was getting that. I knew she was cute, like, really cute. I knew she was really smart. Yeah. I knew that she, we shared a lot of core values. I knew I could leverage the relationship to accomplish more. Like, this is a 22 year old state gig. Right? I knew she made me look better than I did alone. I knew I was madly in love with her, romantically in love with her. I was, like, passionately attracted to her. I knew we could have great conversations, and I knew I probably couldn't I knew, Yeah. I I reckoned I couldn't do any better. Right? But, man, her faithfulness, her loyalty, her steadfastness, her long sufferingness, her, resilience, her, depth, her sensitive like, all these things I didn't know I was getting, those are, like, all the things that have meant the most to me and have changed me the most, you know, and invited me to different places.

Yeah. Does does she listen to your podcast? No. Not at all. But maybe miss out on all that stuff. Maybe somebody will tell her I said all this, and then she'll listen to it. Yeah. Yeah. She she lives with the podcast. I've always Elijah said to me a few months ago, maybe a year ago, we're having a big argument in the kitchen as a family. And he said, you only listen when you're talking, which is, like, dad, you don't listen at all. You know? So maybe she'll hear me say something because someone else will tell her, but I'm always talking. I'm really listening. I'm learning to listen more to her, and she's learning to say more. Right? That's cool. Which is super cool. You know? Yeah. Yeah. How has your marriage, like, outside of year eight and thirteen, which are you know, a little bit of your story. Those are, like, epic years. Right? Yeah. Yeah. But I would imagine that stuff was happening before year eight and before year 13. That's just when you became aware you needed to make some intentional choices, and Rev need to make some intentional choices. And Yeah. But how is your marriage? You asked me a question yet. Well, not yet. I'm thinking out loud. How has it changed you? How has it changed how you think about therapy? How has it changed how you sit with clients?

Yeah. Or I can talk about me pretty easily, and it's actually something I love talking to clients about. So, just as a like a piece of cliff note, we went to graduate school same graduate school, so we learned a lot about humanity and the heart and narrative and story and blah blah blah and all that stuff. I did my postgraduate work in certifications in what's called the Gottman method. It's very scientific. It's very, like, very, like, very specific about kind of this is this is what's bad, and this is what's good. And one of the things that's so that's been really helpful for my career because especially because one of the things that's really bad, again, little cliff notey kinda thing, but, like, he calls it the four horsemen of the apocalypse, predictors of divorce. One of them is defensive. Contempt. Defensiveness. Yeah. Well, defensiveness. Right? And, I am super defensive. I just I just am. Like and, about around about year eight, that was ruining my marriage. I mean, it was ruined along a lot of things, but it was definitely ruining my ability to be in a trusting, growing, maturing relationship with my wife. And, and it almost ended our relationship. Like, I remember exactly what she said to me, where I was standing, and how, you know, how it came about. And because of the the invitation, I guess, you'd have to call it, that she gave me to sort of shape up or ship out, I began to shape up. And I gotta tell you that the last, fifteen years or twelve, fifteen years, have of working on my defensiveness has been the most rewarding thing I've ever done in my whole life. Like and I'll say it in a couple ways. One is, one thing is I've just kinda made peace with the fact that I'm defensive. I'm good at it. I'm really good at it. In fact, we were talking a little bit before we came on about soccer. I grew up playing soccer. I was always the eleventh best player on any team I ever played for, but I was on two teams that were truly remarkably, like like, really excellent teams, and I was a marking back. I was a I was a I was outside defender. And I was really great at it because I was patient and because I played angles and because I I didn't worry about, what you were gonna do when you got the ball because I just made sure you never got the ball. Like, and I never really understood that that that was something I was naturally gifted at until it started, like, kind of, well, let me put it this way. Lately, as I've matured in my thinking around my defensiveness inside my marriage, I do that. I'm really patient. I play angles. I don't get into conflicts because I make sure that you that never happens. The ball just never gets there. And that's not me about me kind of destroying or breaking down my wife, or it's more just about me saying, I could be I mean, again, really crappy defensive people. They jump in. Right? They they don't play. They they they they foul. You know, they get caught they might stop you from scoring, but they're gonna hurt you in the process. Yeah. Or they're gonna, you know They're impatient. Yeah. Or whatever. Yeah. They're impatient. And so I've, a, I've just made a piece of the fact that I'm good at being defensive. Like, I'm I just don't try to fight that anymore. But I I'm I'm getting I I wanna get really good at it. I wanna be really good at being patient. I'm really good at collecting enough information to understand what's actually happening because there's a difference between a perceived threat and an actual threat. Or rather, I'll put it this way. Feeling threatened doesn't mean you're under attack. And so, you know, I've had twelve, fifteen years to really work on this, and I I'm so proud of it. Like and my my, both my kids are defensive and just kind of helping them think about it and being patient in it because they wanna push my buttons. And, I don't know if I'm answering your question directly, but in terms of my practice,

man, I love it when I talk to you. Answering the question of how has your marriage matured you, and it's like Yeah. Giving you a different relationship with your own defensiveness. Sure. Like, it's not stopped you from being defensive. No. No. Right? And I love I love when my clients come in because they come in, she'll say, he's so defensive. I was like, great. Good. That's probably protecting you from a lot of stuff. You know? It's probably protecting you from, you know, the the neighbor that's bark the dog's barking and the financial difficulty that you may face that might protect you from, you know, your mother. The question is, is he gonna get really good at defending defensive so that it's not about it doesn't come between the two of you? You know? Yeah. Because I was really good at defending us from all of those other things, barking dogs, her mother, blah blah blah blah. But I was also, like, really good at defending me from her, and that wasn't helpful.

It it's probably harmful. Otherwise, it was just not helpful. It was harmful. That's fair. So okay. So, you mentioned your training, like and we were both trained in this really philosophical, human centric kind of way. Yeah. I'm grateful for that. Yeah. Me too. And and, and I'm Gautman certified. Also, I'm not I'm not gone on to the multiple levels and work with John. Well, if you'd like me to tell you what you are, but then I because you're not Gottman certified. I've well, I got this You've been trained in level one or you've been trained in level two. Level two. Okay. I'm not completed level two training. Thank you. Well, thank you. I'm a certified government therapist. That's very different, and there's only about I don't wanna be a certified. You're being That's fine. You don't have to. Wanna be a you're protecting John Gottman. I'm just you just can't take my credential away from me because there's only 400 of us on the planet.

Really? That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah. But I And I'm very cocky about it. And I can hear that. And bougie. It's very it's very important to me that I am One of 400. Acknowledged and Unique. No. What do you mean? Oh, gosh. I should have said and I'm very defensive about it. Very That's yeah. That would have been poetic. But but you You were trying to ask questions. Got some really technical training on the other side of that. Like, I I got like, for me, back when I was doing a lot of therapy, like, I I got level two trained in Gottman. And then went and did a bunch of stuff with David Schnark. And then I went and did Yeah. You know, with Esther Perel's stuff before she was popular. Like, I was reading that stuff and trying to understand. You know? And, I've seen tell me what you think of this. I've seen with couples the couples that I still kinda work with off and on, those technical things really help me frame a human encounter.

Right? Yeah. Sure. And in my own marriage or my own parenting, like, I could totally see what's happening with, like, hasty startup or defensiveness or Yeah. I could see I was doing it with my kids the other night. And, really, at the end of the day, it's me kinda going, hey. I was just a jerk. Like, I'm really sorry. I I got scared, and I raged at you. And, can we reattune? Or can we be like Yeah. Can we do this can we do better? Yeah. That's lovely. I think yeah. Thanks. I think what I'm asking is, in your practice as a therapist and in your life as a human, like, in your work as a husband, like, the technical and the human and the philosophical, like, how do you feel like those play out? Like, what's happening with you any given moment? Yeah. It's it's it's probably the challenge in my marriage right now. I mean, I've certainly publicly done the podcast. I'll say,

professional expertise is not the same as personal mastery. And, you know, Rebecca doesn't listen to the podcast anymore. She kinda got tired of hearing me pretend like I had it all together and didn't, you know, she's fond of saying that the cobbler's kids have no shoes because it's it's work. I mean, I I can come in and talk to you about marriage all day long. I can really help you with yours. But, you know, I'm I'm just I'm not unlike a general contractor who goes out and works on houses all day long, comes home and finds out that he's got a leak in his kitchen or, you know, the molding is falling off of his floorboards, and he doesn't wanna do that stuff. He doesn't wanna, like, okay. Here I go. I'm gonna get my hammer and my nail and do my stuff. I wanna relax. So there is a little bit of a challenge to try and kind of knit that stuff together, but I I I find that my own personal therapy, my own personal work has been more, helpful to me in terms of just, like, taking some of the stuff that is factually and systemically helpful around couples' work and trying to integrate it authentically and humbly. Because I it there's no way I can come in and be like, well, let me talk to you about this lesson that I can pull out of my pocket and give you the reason why gentle startup is going to be the helpful thing. Like, there's no room for that in my house. I just have to go, hey. I totally understand that I I blow it and I'm coming from a different place, and I'm not trying to talk to you as an expert right now. Like, there's just I think there's a measure of, like, intentionality and explicitness that I have a special responsibility for in my house because to ignore that is to veer into some kind of, like, grandiosity that I'm not interested in fueling.

Do you think I think this. I'll say I think this. I like to instead of asking you a leading question. So I think that in marriage, we have the same fight over and over again. I've not had a different fight with Heather, like, ever. It's just different versions of the same issue. Yep. Sure. Do you is that true, or is that just me in denial? Denial? Yeah. No. It is. I it's a 100% true. There's a there's a woman. She wrote a really great book. Her name is Claudia Graf Ground, and the book she wrote is called, We've Had This Fight Before. And it sort of starts with the premise that couples don't have 300 fights. They have three fights. And she outlines the three fights, and she talks about the remedies. The thing I love about the book is, a, it's written for people who have kinda have a little bit of ADHD, a lot of bullets and cartoons and, you know, short chapters and, but, b, it's extremely well researched. She's done a really great job of bringing in lots of different perspectives to kind of coalesce into this one space, so I'll just give her a shout out. But, it is just true, I think, that we have patterns that we get into where if we if we really paid attention to the pattern, and that's a lot of the work that I do in my practice, is I wanna understand the pattern. Because, generally, you can lift out the topic. I can lift out work life balance or sex or how to load a dishwasher and put Money. Yeah. Something else in there. And I'm gonna have the same basic, system or same basic,

argument. And that is The same core issue. Yeah. Yeah. Which is really about who you are and how you talk to each other. I've learned and I've come to I've come to appreciate that there are very, very few things that are universally right, wrong, up, down, left, right, good, bad. You know? It's it's not there's not a right way to load the dishwasher. And at the extreme level, there's not a right way to practice monogamy or nonmonogamy in your relationship. There's only the way the two of you negotiate terms as you come to grips with your preferences and styles and values and core sets. And, you know, of course, I have opinions personally, maybe even therapeutically, but at the core of it, it's really about does the couple have the skills to navigate difference from benign to extremely significant and malignant. Right? Like

So let's talk about those skills. Let's get, like so I would think the the, like, the core skill would be, like, self leadership or self regulation. Like My ability to, like, maintain my own emotional posture and Totally. Regulate myself. To couples lately, like, this is my new profound thing that I say, like, it's no big deal. But it's like, healthy couples are made up of healthy people. Sexy couples are made up of sexy people. Fun couple fun fun marriages. That's what I mean to say. Fun marriages are made up of fun people. Adventurous marriages are made up of adventurous people. Mature, wise, whatever. And if you desire that, fun, healthy, sexy, mature, whatever, and you're not those things, then, yeah, you gotta do some work about overcoming the resistance that's keeping you from those things. You know? Yeah. Because you can't have the thing you want if you're not committed to being that thing.

Yeah. I say the my biggest problem in my marriage is me. Like, Heather's biggest problem in her marriage is her. Right? But, like, if I can do me better, there's a pretty good chance that the relationship, like, is gonna be better. Yeah. I I'll sniff that out pretty fast in therapy too because if I hear a couple tell me their story, I'll I and sometimes I go, so wait a second. Hold on, Heather. Let me see if I get this straight. If we fix Stephen, we fix the marriage, because that's what she's saying. Yes. And she's like, no. And I go, oh, because that's what you're saying. So I I just wanna tell you because I love you, and I don't wanna waste your time or your money. That's not gonna work. Like, Heather needs to be worried about Heather. Stephen needs to worry about Stephen. And then when the two of you are ready to do that, we can actually work on the relationship. We can work on the, like, the work. So I am in agreement with you. Yes. That number one is you gotta take care of your your side of the

equation. Yeah. And do you do you also I think, I'm really practicing not asking self referencing leading questions and just tell you what I think and you can respond. K. Because I'm it's so annoying when people ask questions that they're really are statements. So do you I can't even do it. I think marriage then is my greatest teacher of how I need to grow and mature. Parenting would be my second for me. Is that common, or is that just Stephen? I don't know. I don't know if I've really ever thought about it like that way. I mean, obviously, your wife and your kids are the the primary mirrors that you have in your in your house. I was showing you, dear listener, who's not here right now, I was showing Stephen my office, and he was like, why do you have a mirror? And I was like, oh, there's a there's a why I have a mirror, but, like, mirrors, they tell us what's real. Right? And, or at least they show us things that we need to grapple with. And that is, yes. Our wife and our kids do that more than probably anybody else. Yeah. Because we're not I mean

So that's number two. So I work on me. I'm I'm the better version of me. I've been Yeah. Number two is we are protecting us from those things that are out there trying to get in between our commitment to us. You know what I mean? Like, it's a it's a it's a plural pronoun posture. So So we even prioritize the we, the us. Totally. Yeah. And I even think about, like, when I teach people about the four horsemen of the apocalypse, which let's say you said contempt and defense, and this is also criticism and stonewalling. I'll do exactly that, which is I'll say, you almost have to imagine that there are four horsemen outside your home circling your house with torches and spears trying to get inside your house. What would you do? Oh, we'd call 911 or we'd, you know, unlock the gun safe or we'd store our valuables and make sure the kids are okay. We'd we would protect us from those things out there. Now, it's possible that you have a guy that you marry someone like me who's very defensive. I bring that to the relationship. You have nothing to do with it. Well, Rebecca still has a posture an opportunity to choose a posture of we wanna protect us from that thing that you're bringing to the relationship. And so when I get defensive or when I get defensive, particularly, say, as I've been maturing about it, she can join that by saying, hey. Is it happening again? Or, hey. I understand that there's that this may feel like I'm trying to make you feel small or sad or angry, but I'm really just trying to solve a problem. Like, she can protect us from that defensiveness or help protect us from that defensiveness by just knowing me and trusting the work that I'm doing. And I might do the same for her. Right? Like, defensive people generally find their way to criticism critical people. And I would put Rebecca in that category. And she will come in, and she'll complain about something. She'll criticize me about it. And I part of what we've matured through over the years is I've learned how to say, hey. Sorry. Sounds like you're like, something's going on, and I'm about to get really pissed off about it. Are you trying to ask me a question? Could you could maybe could you just ask me a question instead of because I think I think it you know what I mean? But that's me protecting us from that thing out there called criticism, or us protecting us from that thing. So number one is you protecting yourself from her. Well, number one yeah. Sure. Exactly. Number one is take care of your stuff. Like, do do your work. And number two is let us protect us from those things. And, incidentally, when it just speaking of parenting, like, I think kids are on the list of things you need to protect yourself from. Like Oh, they're they will they will destroy you. They're happy to. They're happy to. Want to. Yeah. But they want to. And I I I talk to new parents all the time. I'll say, if you ask your infant or your toddler, hey. Hey, baby. Would you like a 100% of my love and attention and affection and care and energy? They'd be like, yeah. Well, I'm not gonna have any leftover for mom or dad. No. I okay.

I'll still I'll take it. I mean, I prefer like, the I had this revelatory moment as a parent, as a human, is, like, my kids need a thousand percent of my attention, and it's still not enough. Right? Like, they would they would want everything that I could give them, and they they probably need it. And it's still not enough. They would still want more. Right? It's like Yeah. Watch me jump off the diving board, daddy, again and again and again. And they really want that. Right? Who doesn't want that? You know? Yeah. And yeah. So in I've noticed in most marriages with children, somebody has a primary concern for the kids and some I think somebody has a primary concern for the marriage. It's rarely the same person.

Okay. I'll I'll pay attention. That's not a thing that I would necessarily observe, off the top of my head. But, just And then somebody has a primary concern for themself. They're not thinking in the we. Yeah. They're thinking in in a transaction. Yeah. Not a not a collaborative, like, we're doing something. Yeah. Totally. So what's the third thing? I think we're making a list now. Let me go back to the list. I like the list. Oh, there is a third thing necessarily. Unless I put it in this category, which is it may be the thing because if we're if we're just stick if we're if we're writing a book and we wanted to talk about the three things, and I'm we started with I and then we went to we, Then, naturally, we'd have to talk about the you. Right? There's gonna be That's where I was going. Absolutely. Eventually, there's gonna be a you. And I lately, I'm just of the posture that I think those first two give you the you have to earn the right. I have to earn the right to talk about you. And I can only do that if I do the first two. Right? If I do if I do me and then I do we, then I can talk about you. And I do think that there's something to be said for, particularly, if we're gonna go back to sort of this every three year thing or I've been married to the same person for five years, to look at you and say, hey. This is what I need from you. Like and I can demand it, which isn't gonna go well necessarily, or I can articulate my desire and just say, this is these are things that are important to me as I try to imagine death doing this until I die. Because that was a lot easier to imagine when I was never gonna die. But now that I might die, I'm like, I'm gonna need some stuff. And I think that's fair. I think that's fair to ask for when you've cleared the first two hurdles. Or maybe I I I wouldn't even say I wouldn't even say clear the first two hurdles. I'll I'll say when you're when you're when you have confidence that you're interested in clearing the first two hurdles and your partner does too. Like, I got lots of hurdle clearing left to do. I haven't arrived. We haven't arrived. But if we're both confident that we're going It's like, I do me,

I do we, and then I can help you do you. But that really didn't force me to actually look at me more. Help you. I'm gonna help you I'm gonna help you do you. Like, that's like that's like feedback. Does anybody want feedback? Can I give you some feedback? Feedback. No. I don't want any feedback. Well, I do think there's a perspective that a spouse can have and such an intimate perspective that if it's they're like, hey. I see you every day. I see I see things about you you don't see Oh, lord. Yeah. I mean, she knows me. She knows better than I do. Do more like, when I'm when I'm having a bad depression she what? She knows better than I do when I'm having a bad depression or something or if I'm especially anxious and I'm kinda still trying to function at the normal level, she's like, no. Like, can you go read a book or something? Could you just and then, again, that's that's her helping protect us from that thing that's out there that's trying to make it harder.

And so Sometimes it's her also wanting more for you than you're willing to want for yourself. Like, you're just trying to survive. That's fair. I mean, it's it's, it's a very it's a very generous thing for you to say, but sometimes she just wants me to get out of her faith. Well well, one of the things you taught me is that it's always better to believe the best of my spouse than it is to believe the worst. So I think generosity goes a long way. Right? Like, to give them the benefit of the doubt and believe the best. That's a tool you actually taught me as an aside one day in a conversation about ten years ago. And Hold on. Cool. Yeah. It's really helped me. I think I remember, believe the best was the thing I used to say a lot. What do I say now? I think I say something more clinical, like assume benevolent intent or Oh my gosh.

I just because I think then you said whether it's accurate or not, it will help your marriage. I I'll give you a little mini lecture on that because I do think this is true. I think when you can attribute okay. Okay. Okay. Sorry. This is real this is one of my favorite things to do because it's a cool trick that people can use in their relationship, especially if their partner is not helping, which is, you can make you can make an attribution inside your brain. Sorry. Is this gonna be helpful right now? I don't know. Okay. Good. This is unscripted. I like this part. I I I like teaching about this because it's like it's like people are like, woah. That's really true. So let's say, Stephen, that you and I are having, you're late. You're fifteen minutes late to this meeting that you invited me to. You could hop on to Zoom, and I could be like, of course, you're late. You're always late. You're always fifteen minutes later than whatever you say. I don't even plan to see you because that's what like, it's just like, I'm giving you a character flaw. Meanwhile, what happened was you're on your way to the meeting. There was an accident. You got out of your car, saved a baby from a burning car. Like, I'm posturing of course do. I'm posturing you to get defensive. Like, I'm I'm I'm giving you I'm actually helping you get defensive even though you're a good Samaritan. Now let's say that you were just late because you're just lazy and late, and I go, oh my god. Are you okay? Everything okay? Did you is it is it alright? Like, did did you is there traffic or something? Like, do you need a minute? And you might have been like, no, Zach. Totally. I dropped the ball. I I totally I failed you. I'm a bad friend. Well, I did that in my brain. In my brain, my attribution that I gave to you about your negative behavior set you up to either be defensive or or humble. And I love that I have that power. Right? And even if you did something really amazing, like, if you did something really amazing, like, hey. By the way, there's somebody knocking at your door. Right? That'd be a bad one. That'd be pretty incredible. But you do something positive. I'm like, what why why did you do this? What do you just wanna have sex later? Not you and me, of course, but, like, that's really different than, like, you're really thoughtful. And then maybe maybe she goes, well, actually, I was just I gotta help him. You know? You know what I mean? Like, if I but if I say, oh, gosh. This is really amazing. You're so thoughtful. But she's like, I just wanted to get out of my car. There's it's been in there for a month, and I just needed I I figured if I gave it to you, it'd be you know, like Yeah. I think in our brains, we can set our our partners up, and I'm like, why not do that? Why not just set them up to give you the response that you're looking for, which is the non defensive, noncritical, non, you know, contemptuous response?

So as I'm thinking about our conversation, these two themes kinda keep coming up in the background for me. Like, fear, shame, fear, shame, fear, shame, fear, shame. Like, that it sounds like a core of what keeps us apart in marriage or keeps us from staying connected is either, like, my fear of something or my shame about me. Like, those those seem to be at at a core of what we're talking about. Like, am I gonna be okay, or are you really gonna see me, or can I really fulfill can I really give you what you need? Like, I think I have a clue what you need, and I don't think I can do that or wanna do that. And I don't want you to know that I can't do that or want that. There seems to be a element of fear and shame at the heart of marriage problems.

Well, you do like to talk about fear and shame. That's like deep down and better stuff. I just may maybe maybe I'm fitting it into my grid. Maybe. Yeah. Because I listen. Here's Maybe it's the problem. It's a problem. It might be true. It might be whether or not it's true, it could be now, this is why I don't do individual therapy because I don't I don't I I'm not very gifted in those spaces, like, around fear and shame, but I I'm really gifted in spaces around the system and the and the prop and the the levers and the the leverage points in inside of, you know, my big thing, especially with clients, is I just wanna know what your agenda is, and then I'll hope and then I'll join it. And, you know, the benefit of those of us who've been in these kinds of roles for ten or fifteen years or almost twenty years or whatever is I've gotten to see hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of couples do it hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of different kinds of ways. And that actually does really help me go home with kind of an open mind about how are we gonna do it tonight. And it's just gonna be a choice that I get to make. You know? Have there been some couples that have not made it that have surprised you? Obviously, there have. And there have been some couples who have made it

that and it make it, like, because sometimes it's just good and right and holy and true for this couple not to stay together. 100%. Right? 100%. And then staying together is the harshest thing that they can do to anybody. Yeah. And it's sometimes it's like you're working with a couple, and it's like, man, they're, like, almost right there. And they could be so fulfilled with each other. It'd be so meaningful. And they're like, I think I'm gonna get a divorce now. You know? Well yeah. I mean and, ultimately, this is where my theory about choice comes to because, ultimately, it's they don't wanna make the choice. It's not important. It's not valuable enough to them. But, you know, the cost benefit analysis isn't there. And I I try to say that as reflect that as graciously as possible because I I'm just like, you know, maybe it's just not worth saving. Clearly, you don't wanna work that hard, and that's not a criticism. That's just like, you know, you don't, which your personal trainer would tell you if you came in and you hadn't lost any weight at all. And he was like, why not? And you're like, because I love ice cream, and I never exercise. He's like, well, maybe stop paying your paying me. You know? Like Yeah. I'm like, oh, thanks. I'll keep my money. You know? Come back whenever you need. So it's part like,

you brought it all the way back around to what we started with. Like, there's the we make a choice to be married. That that that's that's my gift. I bring it all the way. I can I can do that? We make a we make a choice to make marriage mean more than just A 100%. You have to. You have to. Or else, like, you're just gonna let yourself, you know, sort of trust things like fate or love or commitment. And those are all good. You know? Luck? Nothing wrong. A little luck helps a lot. But, like, you know, you can't just settle down. Thanks, Zach. Yeah. Yeah. No. You're welcome. Thanks for talking to me. I love talking to you. It's my one of my favorite things.

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