Introduction to the episode and the importance of understanding the root cause of relationship problems

Discussion on unintentional behaviors that hinder connection with wives and the need for self-reflection

Factors leading to relationship issues and the impact of victim mindset on connections with spouses

Effects of using phones during meals and the importance of genuine communication in relationships

So we have noticed that the lack of intentionality with our significant other has to change. To be able to change you have to know how you arrived in the circumstance you are in now. That is what we are going to be talking about this week. What actions did we take to break our connection? ***Warning*** Don't fall into the victim mindset here. You may want to say, "Well, she doesn't try either." "She started it" "She is just cold" "She never liked the marriage to start" or any other excuses. even if she said that to your face, your thoughts are what makes it true. So what was your part in this scenario? When you start being honest that you had a hand in your marriage's doldrums too, you start to see where your power is and you can fix it by changing yourself. Think of the <a href="https://www.yesware.com/blog/law-of-reciprocity/#:~:text=The%20Law%20of%20Reciprocity%2C%20described,someone%20does%20something%20for%20you." target="_blank">law of reciprocity</a> or <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/what-if-you-gave-100-and-expected-0-in-return/" target="_blank">the 100/0 principle</a>. You are the leader of the house. Not the boss of the home but the leader and there is nuance as to how a good leader leads. So what did you do to send your loving sex-filled marriage into the frustrating mediocrity of roommate syndrome? Being a know-it-all Has your wife ever reminded you of something you need to do and you said, "I know"? Maybe you step all over her talking with your own thoughts and views? Many times when we are running on unintentional thoughts we will be Mr. Know-it-all. We are in a hurry to get our thoughts sent out before we forget them and we end up forgetting that we want to connect with our wife. So What do we do? Blurt out our thoughts and not show her the courtesy or respect that is needed for a good connected conversation. We don't have to expound all of our knowledge all at once. Our wife believes we can be awesome and smart. She is also awesome and smart so maybe hold back and if needed write the retort down so you can remember it. Try to fix it She doesn't want you to <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/stop-trying-to-fix-everything/" target="_blank">fix the problem</a>. She wants the opportunity to share her life with you. When she complains about the day she had she’s not wanting sympathy as much as she is wanting to share her life. The problem many of us men have is that we take our wife’s retelling and make it mean something worse. That she is suffering she’s in pain. She is not having a pleasant time and that it reflects badly upon us. Many of us men also have a tendency to become anxious, worried, scared, angry, or some other fear-based emotion That we want to avoid. so instead of listening and connecting with her wife, we want to rush in with our toolbelt and get our wife to be happier instantly. Life <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/why-controlling-others-doesnt-work/" target="_blank">doesn’t work</a> that way how many times has our wife tried to get us to smile and cheer up and it doesn’t work? The same thing goes for her. When we try to fix the problem often, our wife thinks that we don’t care about what her day was about. We want to hurry the conversation along so that we don’t have to connect with our wives. That is the very opposite of what we want. We want to connect with our wife. We want to have a wonderful relationship with our wife. We know that we have to have a good emotional connection with our wife, but we also don’t wanna feel bad. Therefore, we toss all of the work we’re doing out the window. Have your phone out at supper We gripe at our teenagers for having the phone out at times. We really want to connect. These phones that we have today are these wondrous little machines that give us feel-good emotional bumps <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/david-goggins-be-uncomfortable-every-day/" target="_blank">every second of the day</a>. The big problem though is that when we don’t have our phones in our hands, the amount of serotonin and dopamine levels drop which tells our brain that we are bored. Our brain does not like to be bored. It likes that stimulation that it gets from that little rectangular slab of plastic glass and metal. so often when we are being unintentional in our life that phone magically appears in our hand. So what are you do? How do you keep from having that phone out at supper? That’s work right there. You have to get over your thoughts of what boredom actually means. To your wife, the phone being out means the same thing as the phone being out to the kids. She interprets you reading your email looking up some piece of trivia or what as you’re not interested in her. The same goes around for your wife if she has the phone and you want to talk. You know how that feels so you have to start intentionally paying attention to what your hands are doing while you’re waiting for a refill of the bread basket. You can start turning the phone off when you go to eat. You can also take the phone and set it face down on a different table to signify that you don’t have the phone. And then start asking questions. Talk to your wife. Don’t fix as before, but have deep conversations by asking questions. Porn When it comes to marriage, we’re supposed to have sex on a regular basis. Well, that’s what we like to tell ourselves. <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/your-best-year-yet/" target="_blank">Yet often as the years</a> go on and kids come onto the scene lovemaking gets relegated to the back of the closet. we get told through the years of all the times our wife has a headache all the times her wife is too cold all the times her wife is too hot all the times she is angry at us all the times that she is got other things on her mind. All the times that she is just flat out not in the mood all those times we get told no add up. Eventually, we start looking at porn. Eventually, we will fall into a victim mindset around porn well I just wanna see someone have sex. I wanna know someone’s at least doing it and we use that as an easy to get some type of sexual gratification. However, porn causes major disconnection to our marriage. it’s easier to go to a porn site on the Internet than to have a connection with your wife. It’s easier to look at fake women that it is to talk to the real woman who is in the bedroom down the hall. You’ll hear people say that porn can be addicting. I won’t say that, but it is a very easy habit to fall into because of the reward cycles that happen. You can get away from using porn. And you don’t have to be ashamed of it. You can step away from the dirty movies. But again you have to have thoughts about how you’re going to handle porn and how you’re going to improve the sex life between you and your wife. Playing the victim If you know anything about this site, you know, I am not for the victim. Playing the victim, aren’t you no respect? It causes more suffering than it benefits and makes the victim look like an all-around loser. If you want to have a connection with your wife, pointing the blame that you’re unhappy at her is going to fix the problem pointing the blame that you’re unhappy to anybody else is not going to fix the problem. The only person who can fix the problem is the one who is complaining. Your wife wants a hero, not the victim loser who whines about how everything is not fair. To fix the problem you have to own up to your own shortcomings. You have to own your dirt. This is scary to a natural victim but becomes very empowering as you exercise your anti-victim mindset. Your wife will start seeing you hold your head a little higher as you take responsibility for your actions. You start taking responsibility for where you are in life. And you start changing your trajectory. ￼ Not believing what she says Connection is built on a foundation of trust. And it is very tough to have trust when someone keeps telling you you’re wrong. When the person who’s supposed to have your back, doesn’t believe what you’re saying there’s not gonna be much connection going on. When your wife is telling you something that happened in her day, interrupting her isn’t going to fix the problem if she is talking about something that she sees from her eyes that you’re doing telling her she’s wrong doesn’t help your case. A big part to remember is that she’s going off of how she perceives what’s going on. The same as your world is based upon how you perceive the world so instead of telling her she doesn’t know what she’s talking about when she says you never take the trash out, get curious this is when you really need to be curious in the heat of a of an argument ask the questions and start trying to see the world from her eyes. Doing that practicing the four pillars of <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/effective-communication/" target="_blank">effective communication </a>actually allow for greater connection and a greater understanding of your wife for those times when she is seeing her world in a particular fashion. Being apathetic Many times in our marriage we won’t have the same interest as what our spouse has. There isn’t any enthusiasm and we could honestly care less about what Cynthia in sales is doing with her life. Yet to express that apathy to your wife is the same as just pulling out your phone at the dinner table. You have to show her you are interested. You have to show curiosity and how her day went. You can do this by asking questions actively listening also helps, but showing how apathetic you are severs connections, faster than a hot razor blade through butter. ￼ Letting date night slide It’s Friday night it’s date night. But you really are not kind of feeling good about going out tonight. Rather just kinda stay home and just loaf instead of getting dressed up and taking the wife out. Or maybe kiddos been sick and then the wife got sick and so there’s been two or three weeks of no date night. We’ll do it next week now that is the crack of <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/the-roommate-syndrome/" target="_blank">roommate syndrome</a> starting. Be intentional with your date nights. Yes, they’re gonna be times you're not in the mood to go out yet go out. It’s the small investments in your relationship that pay out in spades. Do those little things that don’t seem to matter. We’re married. I don’t need to date my wife anymore. That’s where you’re wrong. You need to date your wife even more after you’re married than when y’all were single and dating. Being vague Marriage is about the connection. And those connections require specificity. So being vague transmits a lack of interest and also a bit of secrecy. Are you hiding something from your wife? What is it? Women tend to bend to the worst possible outcome. When they start worrying, they get out of control at times. If they don’t feel they can trust you they’re going to pull away that pulling away is going to disconnect you from each other. Go into details when you’re talking about today. This is what your wife wants to hear. When she wants you to open up, she wants you to open up with your day. She doesn’t necessarily mean your emotions. She wants to know the details of your day. Stop being vague about what happened at work and start throwing those details at her. Manipulate her emotions This one is for the <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/truth-about-nice-guys/" target="_blank">nice guys</a>. I get it you are scared of your emotions. Whether you want to admit it or not, your wife’s emotions are just as scary as your own. But let her have her emotions. You have your own and yes, they are not very comfortable at times. However, if you want a good connection with your wife, you have to let her experience her on emotions. When she’s mad at you being OK with her being mad at you doesn’t mean that the marriage is over. Just means that she is not happy with an action word that you said. We have to <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/stop-trying-to-fix-everything/" target="_blank">stop trying</a> to manipulate our wife because her emotions matter to her she may not like them and she’s gonna do things that cause her to avoid her own emotions, but let her cope with her emotions and you cope with yours. Don’t talk When relationships really start to crumble, and roommates syndrome has got its claws dug deeply into a relationship. The big indicator is when you aren’t talking with each other anymore. This lack of talking can stem from too many fights the avoidance of fighting the manipulation of each other‘s emotions The lack of communication is a desperate sign because both sides are pulling away and there is hope that the relationship can get better but it’s going to take effort lots of intentional effort on your part. Being OK with trying something and failing and having to step back and Try again. Not intentionally spending time with each other Many times us getting together requires that you actually have to schedule time. Sounds weird sounds so unromantic but yet when y’all were dating, you scheduled date night. He scheduled other parts of your life. So scheduling reconnection time is also critically important for you and your wife. This can also go for scheduling sex. Now, many people cringe at that thinking that sex should be this spontaneous event that erupts yet ask yourself why has the sex died down? 90% of the time it’s because other things have come up y’all gotten busy you hadn’t connected.￼ Life happens. Being in emotional childhood We talk about people being reactionary and being somebody who reacts to circumstances and an emotional way and often runs around, believing that emotions just happened to them. They believe that emotions just float through the air and you somehow just run face-first into them. This is emotional childhood. When you think emotions just happen to you without any cause. You are unbearably just a victim of your own emotions. When you are in emotional childhood, that’s what you’re thinking. Emotions don’t just happen to you. Emotions require thought to happen before you can feel any type of emotion. When you comprehend the fact that your emotions come from you you enter an emotional adult and you are able to understand why you <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/why-we-need-pain-to-feel-happiness/" target="_blank">feel happy</a> sad or whatever. When you are in an emotional childhood though you want to think that your wife makes you happy or your wife makes you sad. If your wife is in emotional childhood, she thinks you’re supposed to make her happy and that is impossible. You have no power to make your <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/the-folly-of-happy-wife-happy-life/" target="_blank">wife happy</a>, you can show her Waze that you love her and she then has the choice to believe that thought you shared or rejected out of hand. This is why so many marriages fail these days they think their spouse is supposed to make them happy yet their spouse isn’t even happy if they can’t figure out how to make themselves happy how are they supposed to make you happy? Overly critical Dogging on your wife, your wife’s friends or anybody else who is close to your spouse is a good way of breaking up a connection. Because if you’re critical of those around her, how critical are you of her? You both are supposed to know everything about each other so if you’re critical about your wife’s friend, that’s probably going to tell you that she’s been having thoughts that you’re overly critical of her. Being critical of other people causes them to close off from you. Why do they want to open up to somebody who’s just going to be very critical of what they think of what the hell they act of what they do? ￼ Using her as your therapist Another way, you separate the emotional connection you want from your wife is by using her as your therapist. No, you’re not supposed to use your wife as an emotional dumping ground. That’s one thing a lot of counselors get wrong. That you’re supposed to open up emotionally to your wife. You’re supposed to tell her all your fears and your concerns and the times that you’re anxious and everything else that’s farthest from the truth. Women want to know about your day they want the details of your day. They want to know how your day went in gritty minutia. The more they see you caring, you show them that you want to include them in your day. They don’t want emotional vomit thrown upon them. When you are dumping all your emotional baggage upon your wife, you’re not helping build a connection you’re tiring her out she’s supposed to be able to come to you to dump her emotional baggage. You’re the <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/are-you-man-enough-for-these-3-tests-women-run-on-men/" target="_blank">man you’re strong enough</a> to handle it. you’re also supposed to have other men around you so that they can help you with that load your band of Brothers your community is where you do your emotional unloading and the other man in your group will help you do that in a healthy manner not just stand around going well I feel really anxious today doesn’t help you become a better husband for your wife telling her how scared you are of every little thing around you And how your dad was not caring of you doesn’t help her. See you as a better man. Talk to your band Brothers about the emotional stuff. Take your wife’s emotional baggage from her and share it with your men. They will bring positive masculine energy to you to be able to share with your wife and kids.   <figure><figcaption></figcaption></figure> If you would like to reclaim your bride and leave the mediocrity of roommate syndrome behind, then it is time to take the next step. <a href="https://www.relaxedmale.com/coachingoffer" target="_blank">Take The Next Step</a>

Bryan Goodwin

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The Relaxed Male

Oklahoma

How We Break The Connection With Our Wife

relaxedmale@getalby.com

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