Honey, we need to chat. Hey guys, welcome back to
another episode of Honey We Need to Chat.
I'm Blair, it's my wife Amy, and this podcast is all about the
importance of communication in a relationship.
And by you being here today and listening to this episode, it
actually tells us a lot about you.
It tells us that you're intentional about your
relationship and that's huge. That's awesome and amazing.
So thank you so much for joining in because we don't want to just
be cruising through this. You know, we invest into so many
other areas of our lives, our career, our schooling, our
hobbies, and how much time do we actually invest in our own
relationship and our own growth in that relationship.
So thank you so much for joining in today.
If you're new, welcome. If you're a regular welcome back
before we move on. This podcast is just one element
of what Amy and I are working on.
So don't forget to like, share, subscribe, all those things is
going to help us out, but also make sure that you don't miss
out on all the other contents that we're coming out with as
well. So welcome back and we're going
to dive into an episode that is pretty important and it kind of
summarises a lot of what we've spoken about on the podcast and
a lot of the reason behind why we have these conversations on
the podcast. It's about the resilience of
relationships. And many couples don't think
about resilience, unfortunately, until they realise that it's not
there, until it's too late and something comes up and rocks
them and they realise all those foundations weren't actually in
place. And now we're really struggling.
So we're going to talk about what happens when life hits you
really hard, what happens when stresses are added to your
relationship, how we can identify where the weak points
might be and what we can do to strengthen those.
So stick around till the end because we've got some really
practical points to help start these conversations to build the
foundations of your relationship so that when stress comes, and I
say when, not if, when stress comes, your relationship is in a
good position to stand through those stressors.
And as I mentioned before, like we, this podcast is one element.
So we don't wanna just be more noise out there.
We don't wanna just be saying words and that be the end of it.
On our website are a lot of great resources for use for you
and your partner or for you to work through yourself to help
give you the tools that you need to work through these different
topics that we discuss. Another area that we focus on is
Amy does coaching with women. So you can reach out there onto
the website too. All information is on there.
It's just working with those more detailed practical things
and personal things. So one on one or group sessions,
there's a bunch of options there to go.
Check that out too. Another exciting thing that
we've started, which we've done one so far, next one, it's
coming out next week, is we've started a vlogging which has
been very, very fun. We've actually really, really
enjoyed it. We did one episode on our 10
year anniversary. That was our first episode
released last week I believe 2. Months after filming.
But it was just a time thing and we've really wanted to bring
quality to you guys, not just quantity.
So which want to make sure that we do that well.
But this was a good experience for us to go through and capture
our thoughts and and see how we come across outside of the
podcast too. And we want you guys to know a
little bit more about us as well.
We talk a lot about specific things, but there's a bit of a
disconnect in who we actually are and what we're like outside
of these interviews and in these in these conversations.
Head over to YouTube, check those out.
They're a lot of fun. It's just it's just a little bit
of glimpse into our lives and what it looks like.
And yeah, we're really excited to keep going and doing.
Yeah, it's it's been really fun to be able to share more of the
real stuff that we're tackling during the week and just the
real life implementation of the stuff we talk about on the
podcast and just real life in a family and in a relationship.
So we've enjoyed it, we've enjoyed documenting it for
ourselves, and we hope that it's beneficial to you guys too.
So make sure you check out the first one and the second one
will be out very soon after. This episode is live.
And we also want to be capturing the journeys that we're on.
So our own personal challenges and how we're navigating and
working through that. We're not just these people that
sit here and tell everyone on the podcast, all right, these
are all the things that you need to do.
We're growing too and we're being intentional with our
growth and we want to journey with you and for you to be able
to see that as well. All righty well, we're going to
dive into this topic of future proofing your relationship.
And there is a little bit of a myth that strong couples don't
have hard things that they're working through or strong
couples don't have difficulties in their relationship.
And I actually really deeply believe it's the opposite way
around. The couples that you often look
at and you think are really strong and the type of couple
that you wish that you guys could be are, are usually the
people that have gone through the most stuff.
They've worked through that stuff, they've had the most
difficulties and they've come out the other side strong.
Strong couples are not just randomly stumbled upon.
It's not something that just happens.
They are that way because they've gone through it and
they've gone through it constructively.
And so there's this myth that if you're having difficulties,
you've got stresses. There's little cracks in a
relationship that has not going well, but actually that process
is part of strengthening your relationship.
I think social media is a big part of that, you know, and
again, another part, while we wanted to show the vlog too, to,
to get a bit more behind the scenes of our lives as well,
because if you're just following on on on our social media, if
you're just listening to these podcasts, you're only going to
get a tiny thing. And we even get the question of
like, you know, I remember you, you had a conversation with one
of your friends one time that's been listening to the podcasts
and and you and she said, like, you guys struggle with stuff
too. Of course we do what we do this
right. And so, yeah, it's so it's,
that's the trap of just being on social media.
Yeah, absolutely. And the, and the truth is that
it's not stress that breaks couples, like it's not hard
things that breaks couples. It's actually whether that
foundation is there underneath the makes or breaks, how a
couple will navigate those things.
And every single couple that's strong has gone through those,
they've built that foundation. That's how they're, they're at
the point that they are. And so you can kind of, there's
a picture you can kind of paint which you can just picture this
really like modern fancy shiny bridge and it looks awesome.
But if the foundation is not solid, if the bolts are rusted,
if the underneath is not strong, doesn't matter how shiny and
beautiful it looks. If something comes up and causes
an issue, it's going to crumble. If there's if there's a big
flood, if there's there's an earthquake, if there's heavy
trucks or traffic jam, that's going to crumble.
And so it doesn't matter how shiny and beautiful the bridge
looks. It actually matters what the
foundations are like. And the only way those
foundations are built is through knowledge of what things causes
structural damage to a bridge. And it's the same with a
relationship. You could look beautiful, shiny,
modern, progressive fun on the outside, but if those
foundations are not solid, it doesn't matter how nice you look
on the surface level, that will crumble when real life happens.
Yeah. And so today we want to kind of
dive into what is that real life?
What is it that causes those foundations to be a little bit
weak? And we're going to kind of
explore that a little bit. So most couples will say that
they're fine until they're not. And I actually, I remember when
we were in the dating era of life and everybody just seemed
to be in that stage of life. I had different friends approach
things differently. So it was kind of like this,
yeah, we're fine. Like we don't have problems or
we don't, we don't fight. And that was kind of the badge
of honour or something. And then, you know, other
friends that they could never agree on anything.
And it was, it looks quite troublesome.
There wasn't like harmony there either.
So there's two extremes. But the reality is couples that
don't fight doesn't make them better.
Like, it doesn't mean that they're stronger because they
never fight disagreement. And how you navigate that is
actually really, really important because everybody is
different. And when you're navigating life,
you're gonna have moments where disagreement comes up.
And so having that disagreement is not an issue.
It's how you navigate it That is the important factor.
The flip side too is if you're stuck in these really toxic
communication patterns and you cannot communicate through
conflict because you have these toxic reactions like the four
horsemen and that kind of thing. That also is not strong because
then you're not able to get through to the other side where
the constructive rebuilding happens.
It's you're just stuck in the argument about the conflict.
And we've talked about this in our in our clumsy communication
episodes have done over the last few weeks.
You can fall into that pattern. And so it's interesting how
different people will rate, I guess a relationship and what
kind of what kind of criteria they put for that.
Because you, you don't know the strength of a relationship until
you've got those foundations in place.
And a lot of people will say they're fine until they're not.
And so you really don't know until unless you're being
intentional and, and looking inwards and building those
foundations before they become an issue, like trying to
identify these things. And that's why we do this
podcast. We want to have these
conversations and work on these things so that there's a
conversation already happening about almost like the what ifs
in relationships so that those foundations have already started
to be built before you stumble onto that issue or that that
stressor comes out. And, and inflames it all for
you. And so I find it fascinating how
people kind of, yeah, how they rate or how they score the
health of a relationship. And I think as you, you know, go
into longer and longer term relationships, you start to see
the reality of what plays out when you've got 2 individual
people with two very different backgrounds trying to build a
life together. There's going to be stuff that
comes out of that and that's normal.
So we want to be really clear about that.
It is normal. It's also normal that you're
going to have stress, and stress doesn't always look like really
horrible things happening. You might be listening to this
being like, oh, so you're just telling us that, like, life is
going to fall apart. Like, stress doesn't always mean
huge, big crises that are happening.
Stress actually comes from a huge range of things.
So you can have things like grief or you can have things
like, you know, losing a job, financial issues, those sorts of
more obvious stressors. And there's also positives that
cause stress. So having a baby like that is a
huge stressor on a relationship in the best way possible.
It will shift up the dynamics of a relationship, moving house,
buying, selling a house, amazing.
It's an amazing thing, Huge stressor on relationships
because it shifts up what's going on.
And so when we say stress, I'm not trying to be like doom and
gloom, like, oh, you're going to have a really hard life.
Life is hard. There are things that are hard.
There's also things that are amazing, but stress comes from
like a huge range of things. It's inevitable that a
relationship will be put under stress.
And so if you don't have these foundations, doesn't matter, you
will face stress. So you will, they will be made
clear to you. We're just trying to get it to
the point where you're working on it before it's made clear to
you in that way. So there's a reason when you're
a lot of the time when people are getting married, there's a
recommendation to do premarital counselling and we love
premarital counselling. And This is why because there's
a lot of stuff that gets brought up.
I mean, it's how it gets done is so different for everybody and
whatever context the premarital counselling looks like is super
different. But from our experience, they
explore a range of common relationship topics and start
that conversation. It's not like you're fixing it.
It's not like they're scoring your relationship saying you're
going to fail. It's just to highlight the
common things people will have highlighted to them once they're
in a long term committed relationship and start that
conversation before you're getting that outside of your
control. So things like your family
background, things like how you'll navigate finances, how
you navigate parenting jobs, all those sorts of things.
They get raised not to make you stressed and upset or like
concerned about the future, but just to start that conversation,
be like, yeah, how would you navigate work when we have kids?
Like what are we going to, what's that going to look like
for us? Or how would we navigate the
finances? How would we save?
What are we saving for those kinds of things?
That's why that's often a recommended thing when you're
moving into a relationship this long term.
It's funny because a lot of times, like I might share to
someone about, you know, premarital counselling or
counselling or even what we do and some, some people are just
like, why, why do you why would you do that?
Like I think it's not that not that they're these bad people
and wrong people or whatever, but I just, it just highlights
to me how this could be such a little deal for us.
You know, we don't we don't understand or we don't value our
relationship, but we don't value the investment into our
relationship because we might be in a honeymoon period, right?
We might be just dating someone or we might have just got
married. It's just beautiful, amazing
moment and time together. It's like exactly what you've
said. It's not about, it's not about
like you're going to have this bad relationship if you don't do
these things. It's the same like when you guys
go through those hard times, which everyone does, how
equipped are you for that and how, how will you come through
that? And but you do have those
extreme circumstances as well. We've had family members and
friends around us that we, we see, we've spoken to and
approach to investing in their relationship in a deep and
meaningful way. It just hasn't been prioritised
because of the the, the knowledge of the need of it.
Does that make sense? Yeah, Yeah.
It's like it's not, they're not when you're not aware of
something's. And that's why this is such an
important conversation. You're not aware of the depth of
something. Yeah.
You don't think it's important because you don't, you're not
aware of it. It's like a blind spot.
It's not saying like, yeah, it's not saying like, are these guys
are bad at relationships. Or they're naive.
No, no, no. No, it's just that we have seen
again, through our experience, through experience of those
around us, the importance of the investment in your relationship.
And it's not even just a matter of how to invest.
Like now we're going to have a good relationship or we're going
to strengthen that relationship. It actually strengthens us
individually as well. The impact of that feeds
through, you know, there's that saying of happy wife, happy
life, you know, and that's that's true in a sense of like
if your home is stronger, if your relationship is stronger,
you tackling work stuff is easier.
You tackling friendship stuff is easier.
You tackling parenthood is easier because your number one
partner is just there with you and you guys are just stronger
and more capable together which is awesome.
Yeah, I like that definition of it.
Instead of the just appease the woman, make her happy at all
costs and then you'll be happy, which is kind of the normal,
normal interpretation of that. But yeah, if your family, if
your family unit is strong, then everything else is easier to
navigate. It doesn't make it easy, it just
makes it easier to navigate because your family unit is such
a unique part of life and it's, it's there as a foundation, it's
there as a, as a like core that you can fall back to when
everything else feels hard. So if your family unit can be
prioritised, everything else has that foundation in place, you
can tackle that as a team. And that's why the flip side of
that is if your family unit is not strong, if you're struggling
in that place, you'll often find that just like leaks into
everything else, it makes everything else complicated.
Yeah, it's not about people that don't find, don't, haven't
thought about this before, are really stupid because they just
don't think it's important. We have a unfortunately unique
view of this because we've navigated this in our family
relationships as kids growing up, and we've also navigated in
our relationship and it's something that we're very
passionate about. So that's why we do this to help
bring these conversations to people that may or may not have
thought of it this way. So that's what this this purpose
of this conversation today is about.
It's just a gentle but important reminder or check in for
everybody listening, including us, about how the foundations
are going, the things that we're not seeing every day, but the
things that will be the most important when those stresses
come up. I think another thing that is
really hard and it's something I struggle with because of who I
am just personality wise. It's really hard to rock the
boat when things feel fine. It's really hard to find a good
time to bring up heavy things when things feel fine.
So I, I fully understand and have lived that life of being
like, I don't want to talk about this really horrible thing when
it's not happening right now or even like if there's concerns.
We've talked about this a number of times on the podcast before,
but like concerns I've had about you or about our relationship
and like, I'll push it away because I just really don't want
to just come out and be like, actually, it really frustrates
me when you do this or this has really hurt me previously.
And then that's caused more issues because then when it
comes out, it's so much bigger and so much more complex.
And so avoided conversations for whatever reason, whether it's
because you're trying to be kind and loving or gentle or it's
just uncomfortable, you don't know how to do conflict.
Whatever reason, those conversations are avoided.
Avoided conversations actually cause cracks in relationships.
And so that's why if you can strengthen the muscle of having
these conversations and navigating these topics,
especially when you can strengthen that muscle of having
them outside of the stressors, like even better then even
though it's uncomfortable, it actually reinforces the cracks.
It strengthens up those cracks in your relationship.
It's, you know, things like money, the roles in your
relationship, mental load. That's why we talk about mental
load a lot because it's a huge crack that runs under the
surface for many, many couples. Long term expectations, family
expectations, disappointments, all these things that are going,
those things are really easy to avoid, but those avoided
conversations actually cause cracks.
So if you're skipping those conversations because they're
uncomfortable, because you're unpracticed in conflict, because
you have past experience that make it difficult to navigate,
because they feel unnecessary, because you've got built up
resentment, it actually shows up down the track in more
disconnection, in panic, more damage.
So that's, that's the topic we're going into.
I feel like we just like, it's a really big one.
It's a, it's a really big one because it underpins all of the
stuff we talk about. So what does resilient love look
like? And this I think also falls into
there's a bit of a, maybe a myth around it.
Resilient love or future proofed love or whatever you want to
describe it as is not shiny and pretty imperfect.
It doesn't look polished and perfect on the outside.
Resilient love, a real example of resilient love is love that
is flexible, adaptive and honest.
So we talked about premarital counselling.
There's a side of the coin, which is you have something like
premarital counselling or you have these conversations that
you're beginning the beginning of your relationship and you,
you decide we're going to be a couple that does this.
We're going to navigate finances like this.
We're going to navigate children like this.
And you make your, you have those conversations.
Awesome. But you then make rules and
those are rigid rules and they become how your relationship is.
That is actually not an example of resilient love either.
Resilient love is, is flexible because as we've talked about,
life happens, stresses happen. Things that we don't ever expect
will happen will happen reactions that we never thought
we'd have to just normal things will happen.
And so if you have a, a rigid rule based approach to these
things, you're like, oh, back before we had children, we
decided you were going to stay home with the kids and I was
going to work. And that's what we decided.
So we're just going to do that forever more.
It doesn't matter that your mental health has struggled,
doesn't matter that our finances are out the window, doesn't
matter that blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And you've stuck so strongly to those things that you, the one
conversation you had and you decided on it and it hasn't been
flexible. That's actually not resilient
love. That's inflexibility.
So you have to be careful with how you define this as well,
because it's not about look at us.
We, we, we're on the same page about everything.
We've had this, the conversation and we've decided how
everything's going to look. And this is how we are and this
is how we'll always be. And we're going to like, what is
it? Tight knuckle or whatever white
knuckle, white knuckle it through because this is what we
decided we're going to do. Like that's not resilient
either. That's actually setting yourself
up for the same exact issues because your foundation is rigid
and fragile and it's going to crack under pressure.
A resilient love is one that is constantly checking and it's
constantly curious, is constantly flexible with how
life happens. Understanding you will change.
Understanding life's going to happen in a way you don't
expect. We are so different now to who
we were when we got married, so different.
Even personality wise were so different.
Everything has changed. I remember you, you always make
fun of in a, in a not a picking on way, but just a kind of maybe
a shock way. So my brother got married before
I met you and you've seen a video of me giving a speech.
At the wedding. At the wedding and even just the
way that I spoke was so different to the way that I
speak now. And that's The thing is like,
you know that that growth, like understanding the journey is
really important and giving yourself grace for that journey.
So commitment to each other, commitment to the journey.
So you mentioned before about avoided conversations caused
cracks, right? And how you didn't want to bring
stuff up because it would, you know, things are good now and
we're while, while we're going to rock the boat.
But now over the time, over the years, now you bring stuff up,
it's like, well, no, that's what we do.
Like we do bring stuff up now. And it doesn't mean it's easy,
but it's expected. We now navigate that through
that so much better because of the investment we've had over
the years. So now that we've worked on our
stuff, I'm actually better equipped for my work.
I'm better equipped for my family, my parenting, because we
work together. So that journey, the commitment
to the journey, the commitment to the coming back together is
is really important. And you need to journey like you
need to change and grow because if you stay the same as you were
whenever you got together, which a lot of people's in their 20s,
if you stay the same for the rest of your life, something
would be wrong. Like that's not how we're meant
to be as humans. And I want to say too, though,
like we're talking about you just said then like people in
our like usually get together in their 20s.
Our parents are changing so much, right?
It's not, it's not an age thing. So we, we know we've had
writings actually from people that are older than us and
that's awesome because like, you know, even then we, we have
people in their, I think they were in their 60s wrote in as
well and gave some positive feedback on the podcast.
And that actually was so great to us.
It's like even people in their 60s are still working on their
communication in the relationship.
And that's fantastic. That was so encouraging to us to
be like, yeah, OK, this isn't just a phase for Amy and I.
This is what we do. This is how we do relationship
is through that commitment and growth and communication and and
we're going to do that forever. Yeah, I think if you like, if
you think of it like this and you had a form and you had to
fill out what type of relationship you are.
A healthy relationship is not the kind of relationship that
would fill out a form and say we are a couple that have two
working parents and we're a couple that like to do walks
every day. Like they wouldn't have
specifics like that. What they would have on it is we
are curious about what's going on for our we are, we will
always come back to communication.
Those kinds of things that are Evergreen in terms of keeping a
relationship healthy. Not the things, all those other
things that make up who you are are awesome, but they're not the
things that are going to get you through if you don't have the
foundation in the right place and if you don't have the right
perspective. So you should be growing and
changing. You are growing and changing.
The reality is you are, regardless of if you, you want
to or think you should be, you are.
And, and so if you're, if you haven't set up how you interact
as a couple to also grow and change in a healthy way, in a
respectful way and in a, in a constructive way, then you're
going to struggle because you need to have that flexibility
for that. So a resilient love is flexible.
It's adaptive with the seasons because the seasons are going to
bring different challenges. And it is honest because you
need that honesty that that communication intentionality,
the ability to be uncomfortable for the longer good of the
relationship in order to adjust as you're going.
It's not just something that is decided on at the beginning.
And then it just stays rigid and disciplined with no change.
So some of the things that I think you that are fairly like
obvious, I guess when you're thinking of what's a resilient
or strong couple, what's a future proofed couple is things
like having regular emotional check insurance.
We talk about that all the time on the podcast, regular check
insurance. So you're checking in with each
other about how you're going as a relationship.
You're checking in with each other about how each other are
going share decision making, Your team when you're now
navigating life, you've got shared decision making and
you're moving together forward, as we said, in an adaptive way
to the different seasons and a willingness to grow, learn and
change together. Those are three things I think
most people are like, yeah, that makes sense.
You're willing to learn together and like we said, be flexible
and be adaptive. The things that might not be
quite as obvious about what might make up a resilient
relationship is taking turns and being strong.
And that's something we've absolutely navigated.
And it wasn't that. I don't think we didn't think it
was important before. We just hadn't had to have it
flip flop so much. But rotating the support or
rotating who is strong at any different point, and we had that
when you burned out like that was the biggest, I think example
of this is we, we've been cruising along fairly chill like
not much had been. It had been rocked in different
ways, but that was the big rock to how the dynamic was.
And it was not comfortable, but it's important.
And when you're committed to somebody, you commit to being
with them in sickness and in health, you commit to being
their support, regardless of how well they're doing.
And so all of a sudden I had to step up big, big time and I had
to support Blair so that he could pull back big time because
he needed to heal. And then you've also had to be
that for me 100% and so. Babies.
Babies, that's a really good example.
Like you have to be able to take turns in being strong.
That's something that. When Amy had babies, that's what
I meant by babies. When I had babies, yeah.
Yeah, you have that. That's part of life is there's
going to be times where most hopefully most of the time it's
not that way, but there will be times where things feel out of
balance. Things are very much leaning one
way or the other with one of the partners not being able to be as
present or strong or as engaged. And that's part of a resilient
flexible. Like we talked about
relationship curiosity over assumption.
Huge. We talk about that all the time.
That's our little tagline. And we we don't just say it on
the podcast. We talk about it with our kids.
We talk about it with each other.
We talk about it when we're navigating conversations with
friends or at work. Like curiosity over assuming,
assuming. We say that because people keep
bugging inside on how we say assume.
I literally was practising this earlier and I was like, assuming
I can't do it, I'm not going to do it, so it's going to be
assuming, yeah. It's assume.
Anyway, curiosity over assumption, let's just say that
keep learning each other. So curiosity will always set you
up better, will always set you up better than trying to preempt
or trying to assume or trying to fill in the gaps.
Without that information, curiosity is always better.
We've actually done this with our kids, as Amy mentioned,
briefly mentioned. So they've just been really
dubbing on each other. It's like, oh, they're doing
this thing. They're doing this thing and
it's the most innocent thing. They're just looking for
anything they can to DOB and they're assuming and they're
doing bad, right? And what we're saying is like,
look, they're not even doing anything bad.
Before you get to that point of, you know, they're doing this
wrong, find out like what? Why are you doing that?
Have have an attitude of curiosity.
Like, yeah, we say that with our work.
We say that with our kids. We say it everywhere.
It just, it will, it will just be such a good approach to life
in so many ways, even just in helping you learn, like, like
learning, having that in your development as a professional
and that kind of thing is huge. So yeah, that's a good sign of a
resilient relationship is curiosity over assumption,
letting go of old rules, which is what we talked about as well,
letting old rules expire. So things that don't work
forever. And that's OK.
And that's not to say it's a, it's a delicate balance because
you don't want to be someone who's like, like super
undisciplined and that's, you know, be like, we've decided to
be really healthy. And then we're just letting that
go. And we but letting go of the
things that you either verbally or like we spoke about unspoken
contracts in one of our episodes.
And that's actually really relevant to this.
Like there might be patterns that you've fallen into in an
unspoken contract that will not serve you anymore.
And that is not the sign of something's fallen apart.
It's actually really healthy to be able to adjust as you need to
in a constructive way when the season brings up different
things. Pre forgiveness, So assuming
imperfection and making space for it.
So assuming that your partner is going to make mistakes because
they're going to make mistakes because they're a human and
they're going to. And so when you can have an
attitude of you are pre forgiving them within reason for
being a human being, that's going to disappoint you at times
instead of having your ex expectations set so high that
every disappointment feels like a slap in the face.
You're committed to a human being just like you are a human
being. And so having the attitude of
there's going to be imperfection here is going to set you up
better than having this attitude of there's imperfection here.
And then it's like what? And we'll help you recognise as
well. I think that we've spoken about
this culture of cancel, the cancel culture in the world
right now where imperfection is not viewed very well.
There's a very intolerant culture for imperfection and
change in growth. And when you translate that to
relationships, you set yourself up for a really tough time
because there are some things that are obvious.
They're really serious mistakes or really serious decisions and,
and things that you have to navigate.
And I'm not talking about those kinds of things.
I'm not talking about infidelity or, or abuse or anything like
that. I'm talking about just being a
human being that's going to disappoint another human being
because we're people that make mistakes and having that kind of
attitude of like we are working together as a team.
I'm not expecting you to be Mr Perfect in order for you to be
worthy of my love. And we'll work on those things
and we will come become stronger because of them instead of me
being like every little thing you do builds this picture that
we're getting weaker and weaker. And this is also something this
last one is something we try to do quite a bit, which is micro
repairs. So little repairs rather than
having these huge big moments like we've talked about how I
struggled to communicate things. So when I would then communicate
them, they would usually come out like all this pent up
frustration because of something I hadn't communicated about and
it would become a big deal. And then it would require a big
repair. So slowly over the years, we've
worked on micro repairs. So little moments like a tending
to things in the moment as much as we can.
And it's still a muscle that I'm trying to work or we're trying
to work on so that it's a little micro repair rather than a
massive big thing. So you're, you're using soft
words when you could be harsh or you're doing check insurance
when you think something's up. And we've spoken about that so
much like how are you? What are you feeling?
How are you feeling? What's on your mind?
Those kinds of things to to see when you're feeling like
something's going on instead of adding to the story going on in
your head, following up after your conversation, so, so
important instead of having these disagreements and blowing
up because you didn't communicate well.
And then me like we can't communicate well.
And that just builds into the story.
We have found the most constructive times is actually
when we've come back after a disagreement.
Most of the time the disagreement itself has not
necessarily been the most constructive process.
And I think that's normal and fine.
It's the micro repair or the repair that happens afterwards
coming back to whatever it was addressed so that you can find a
constructive way to move forward and just working on your tone.
That's part of micro repairs as well and a huge on.
So we've had sarcasm, passive aggressive tone that we have
really had to be careful of when we're navigating disagreements.
And just being aware of tone and navigating tone has made those
conversations so much easier over the years rather than
having that be our default to and just kind of doubling down
in them. So that's what resilient Love
Actually looks like. Something's obvious.
You probably would have listed all of them.
Some of them maybe not so obvious to everybody and are
also really important parts of what it takes to make a
relationship resilient. So we're going to move on to
signs. You might not be future proofed
in a minute, but before we do, you might notice my get up here
DDG. This is our the organisation,
the nonprofit organisation that Amy and I work for called Dad's
Group. Dad's Group also hosts A
fundraiser called Men with a Pram.
The whole purpose behind this is to raise funds for programmes
and research for for dads and families in the perinatal
period. The perinatal is before birth
and after birth. We've spoken a lot about
communication and how you get these stresses in your life.
The first month after baby is born is such a significant time
and a significant stress for many, many families.
We hear of stats on how many mums can receive post Natal
depression and there's a lot of research, there's a lot of
support and there's a lot of awareness around that, but
there's not much awareness around one in 10.
Dads also suffer from personal depression.
Our mission is to support dads so they are better equipped to
be able to support their families.
Remember the pram is a national walk around Australia.
Actually it's not even in Australia now.
We are in the UK and we're expanding UK and New Zealand as
well where we're just going. We catch up as families.
So family events will be barbecues, there'll be games in
some locations as well. And then we just go for a walk
with our man with the pram shirts on, our hats on, just to
bring bring that awareness for that need of support for dads in
that perinatal period. It happens on the Father's Day
weekend every year. Also, if it sounds like
something you would like to do with your family on Father's
Day, feel free to hop onto the website which will link into the
description of this episode and sign up for your own walk.
You can make it a Father's Day activity and it's actually a
really nice thing. If you've got nothing else
planned yet to take your family to a park, go for a nice walk
with some other families and then enjoy a BBQ afterwards.
A really beautiful Father's Day thing.
So we'd love your financial support, but we would also love
of any families that want to join to be doing their own walk
in their own location. Fatherhood is a life changing
experience and you don't have to do it alone.
Yeah, all righty, so let's get back to the episode.
We're going to dive into signs that you might not be future
proofed. And I really want to be careful
that this isn't just a bit like I don't want this to be look at
us. We're in a horrible place.
As we've said on this episode, future proofing is future
proofing so that you're becoming aware of things before they
become an issue. So anything that gets raised in
this segment and we've got things that will come up in this
little part where we're talking about is actually a positive.
It's it's a positive little noticing for you to address
these areas. It's not a sign you're not in a
good place. It's just a sign that these
might be conversations you might want to have because eventually
things might rock that area of your life.
So not something to be down about, something to be equipped
through. So one thing is if you have one
partner making all the long term sacrifices, that might be a sign
that you're not future proofed at the moment.
So that could be one partner, as we said at the beginning that
you decided we'd stay home when you had kids.
And that hasn't been checked in on, it hasn't been addressed.
It hasn't been something that you've been flexible about and
seen how that's gone through the seasons.
If one partner has been doing the long term sacrifices and it
hasn't been checked in on, that's something you want to be
checking in on. Could be the partner that's
decided to work for the family and it could be someone who's
put off a goal because they haven't been able to do that for
your life stage. Whatever that sacrifice might
look like. If there's one partner that's
got a long term sacrifice and you haven't addressed that,
again, it's an area to be aware of.
Not having a shared financial vision or values is really
important. If you don't have the same
approach to finances, finance is a really common relationship
stressor. We don't have the same natural
approach to finances. We've got very different natural
approach. But it's a conversation we've
had to have a lot. And we've also had times where
we've adjusted who is responsible for what to match
strengths so that we're working towards the same goal.
Because my approach is very different to Blair's approach
and and my strengths are very different to Blair's strengths
in this area. And so we've had to, we set it
up one way and then we've had to adjust as we've gone because
we've figured out that the the roles we've fallen into in that
or the responsibilities we've fallen into in that have not
been helping us move to towards our shared financial goal.
And it has not been leaning on our strengths.
And so we've been flexible with that.
Another sign that you might not be future proofed is avoiding
tough conversations like we spoke about before having
conversations you're actively avoiding because they're too
uncomfortable, because they're too difficult, because they
don't feel like the right time can be really important
conversations. Everything's like sex,
resentment, parenting, the roles you've got in your relationship,
boundaries that are being pushed avoiding them because of the
discomfort rather than finding a constructive way through them is
not a great sign. Having a fragile reaction to
stress. So finding yourself reinforcing
fragile reactions to stressors that have come up, shutting
down, snapping the four horsemen is a perfect example of this.
If you're finding a pattern of reaction to conflict that is not
constructive and just doubling down on that, not addressing
that, that can be a sign that it's a weak spot for when things
do come up. Yeah.
And this is definitely something that I've, I've had to really
work on. We've we've both had to work on
in different ways. But you know, the, the reactions
to stress, like whether it's the kids or if it's at work and I
leave work and come to the kids, kids or whatever else I'm
putting. And we've had to really learn.
And so the Four Horsemen episodes have been huge for me
to go check those out if you haven't already, where it's just
giving you the tools to work through like, all right, this is
my reaction. But that doesn't have to be my
reaction. You know, this is how I normally
react if I don't put these boundaries in place, if I don't
put these healthy habits in place.
Or I'm not aware of exactly, just do it out of default, yeah?
Because we don't like the answer of, oh, it's just who I am.
Yeah, it's not, it's not true. This is just, this is just how
you're reacting, you know, like that's not who you are.
It's how you're reacting. Who you are is so much deeper
and more complex than that. And we're just wanting to grow
in who we. Are, yeah.
And those are patterns that are built from your experiences.
So we're all just a big mix of our experiences, every life.
So nothing, not much of us is static and doesn't change.
Yeah. Yeah.
The other thing too with this is everybody, everybody, everybody
goes into fight or flight when danger is is on the horizon.
That's just what our body does. So it makes sense that you have
a bad reaction to stress. Stress is not a positive thing.
So your body will go into fight or flight and your natural
reaction often. And that is it shuts down your
logic centre and makes it a lot harder to have clarity around
those things. And so it's just like you've
said, it's about learning the techniques that help you
regulate in those moments and recognising, oh, I really shut
down when things get really hard.
I really, really shut down. And so I need to you find a way
to regulate before I shut down. And there are so many tactics
you could like a quick Google search will help you with these
things. But yeah, it's, it's normal to
react badly in stress. What you're responsible for is
how you regulate yourself through that so that you can be
constructive and keep moving because otherwise you're just
like, I'm in danger and I'm just going to like crumple on the
floor, which doesn't help when a lion is chasing you.
Yeah, that's not good. Yeah, this is a really good one.
I love this one and I think this is really practical.
If this alone is the only thing you take from this really
helpful little check in for yourself.
If you cannot name your partner's current bigger biggest
stressor or your partner's current biggest goal, that's a
sign that you might not be future proofed.
If you don't know what your partner's current biggest stress
in life is, or your partner's biggest goal in life is, then
you're probably not checking in with each other enough.
There's something missing in that communication.
Could you say, well mine are. Yeah, 100%.
Well, your, your, your biggest stress is your work.
Yeah, 100%. And your biggest goal is our
family business. Biggest goal?
OK, you tell me. No, this is the thing.
This is now our relationship is under stress.
No, no, no, no, that's that's right.
It's a big, it's a big thing for us to be able to do this job.
But my biggest goal is our family dynamic, like just the,
the, the culture in our relationship, you know, with our
family that that's the biggest goal.
This is a part of that goal, not the goal.
Yeah. We, we often know what is
important to our partners as hopefully you know what's
important to your partners. You want to know what's kind of
coming up as we go like what's the relevant thing going on for
them right now. So yes, that's that's good.
And now next time I. Well, no, you're right.
And I think this is just good and this is just part of the
conversation. I wanted to ask that question so
we can see again, assumptions. We don't want to assume.
And also like it's the conversation like you were right
to a point, but like if you only thought my biggest goal was, was
the the contents that we're creating, you've actually
missed. The core, the.
Core of it, and the core is what's so valuable to me, you
know, so that's my biggest drive.
What makes it important in the 1st place?
Yeah, that's good. Yeah, Yeah, that's good.
And biggest driver, that's a good one to add in there as
well. Like what's the biggest value or
yet driver motivation? So if you don't know those
things, ask, especially the stressor one, because our stress
and it's tough because there's times where you're stressed
about things that you it's just too hard to communicate about.
And so it's not that you need to know every detail about the
stress. That's not trying to be like you
don't know everything about their work stress.
Yeah. Yeah.
It's actually just more like knowing what is going on for
them. Yeah.
And it's a conversation starter. And after this episode, I'll ask
Blair what mine is anyway, that I'm your biggest goal.
No. I'm your biggest stress.
Yeah, well, both. I'm just kidding.
That's not true, all right? We're just different.
Sorry, this is the next one. So if we're just different, and
this is kind of what Blair just said before, if we're just
different becomes an excuse to disengage instead of a reason to
explore. It becomes a reinforcement of
difference rather than a point of curiosity and connection.
And that's why I've popped that in there, because we are so
different in so many ways. We, I actually think we need to
adjust that. I don't know that we're so
different anymore anymore. We're so different when we first
got together and if we had just used the excuse of we're just
different and we didn't. We hear that and it frustrates
us a little bit because of what we've worked through and you
know when the people and you don't know the full details,
right? But when people say like, we had
to finish our relationship because we're just too different
in our eyes, we're like, wow, you've missed out on this.
Some amazing opportunities together.
Like huge value in that. Huge, huge.
I'm being Trump anyway. Keep going.
OK, yeah, sweet. Then there you've thrown me.
But yeah, cool. It's huge.
Yeah, you've missed out on huge value because.
Yeah, well, I think This is why I like this so much.
Is just so important. Just not the we're, we're just
different or whatever. Just that attitude of curiosity
is just just so there, you know, and, and I love this where it
says instead of a reason to explore, exploring each other,
exploring what that means. Like I don't want a job where
you're not a part of anymore because I know the value that it
is, it brings because you fill the gaps in what would I do
right? And and now it's like, I need
you there in a good way, not in a like dependency way.
And it's like, no, we're just Better Together.
Yeah, there are some people that are more similar.
So we do have friends that are that are married and they're
very similar personalities. Yeah.
And so I don't know what that's like because we haven't walked
that. I don't know what challenges or
benefits that brings necessarily.
But it doesn't really matter how similar or different you are.
As long as you have the same attitude of curiosity and you
want to explore those things, it's awesome.
It doesn't matter. The strength that I see if we
were similar, is that the things that we want to work on, we're
both working on it. Like that's the that's the big
part there and you're doing it together.
Like that's where that's I think the strength comes in.
You understand the challenge of doing that.
Yeah, more where you and I have had to spend a lot of time of
the understanding side. Had to understand exactly.
So that's probably it probably could go both ways.
It probably could be either we're just two different
becoming an excuse or we're just two the same becoming an excuse.
So whatever it is, if it becomes an excuse to disconnect rather
than to explore each other and be curious, and that's that's a
future proofing red flag. Serious things are joked about
instead of spoken about and or or not even joked about Serious
things are, you know, whatever you want to put in there held
less importantly or communicated less seriously about.
That's fully up the clumsy conversations episodes we've
been doing, the way you navigate serious conversations and the
tone that you bring to it. That can be a sign of future
proofing strengths or weakness. And it's it's because we're
avoiding those conversations. Again, it's because of how
there's important conversations that every couple needs to
navigate may or may not be had in a constructive way.
So if serious things are just joked about, we've found this
like we have found ourselves in that joking pattern, especially
because humour is a big thing for both of us, but it can also
be a defence mechanism. And it's easier to be jokey than
it is to be upfront. And humour has its place.
But yeah, if it's if the serious things are just joked about
instead of communicated about, it's just another way of
avoiding those conversations. This is my heart.
Take last one as well. That might be a sign.
And I this has a disclaimer to it because obviously we always
the disclaimer is a do some manipulation different topic.
We're not talking about that. We're not going there.
But if the hot take I have is if you're having a serious doubt
creeping in about did I choose the wrong person?
I feel like sometimes that's a future proof thing.
And, and I and I have talked to people that have had that
thought in their head where they're like, I just don't know
that I chose the right person. Hot take.
I don't think there's one right person.
I don't think Blair was the right person.
There's a lot of stuff about how we ended up together that is
actually funny because I don't actually think that that
normally happens. Like it just, it did really seem
quite intentional. And I definitely think there are
people that are easier to end up with than others, but I don't
think there's one person that's right or wrong.
And I think if you're sitting there like, I think I just chose
the wrong person, I, my hot take is I think you're focusing on
the wrong things. And my hot take is I think any
two people that are both willing to learn to love each other can
make a strong and beautiful relationship together outside of
we're not talking about abuse. That's why I'm setting that
aside or horrible patterns that are outside of your control.
I'm talking about any two people that are willing to put this
work in can make a beautiful relationship.
And we've just flagged all of that in the different signs like
it doesn't matter how different you are or how similar you are.
So if you've got a doubt creeping in, did I choose the
wrong person? I think that is a future
proofing red flag. And I think that is an area to
challenge because the grass is always greener and it's so easy
to look at these relationships or other people and think
they're so strong when they're so easy.
It would be so much easier with this person.
That's not true. The exact same things you're
challenged with with one partner, you would be challenged
with another. You just would have more
experience under your belt because you've gone through it
and now you'd know, Oh, that's important.
So that's my heart take. Last one on the list.
If you're having that doubts creep in, question it.
We're going to move on to how to strengthen your relationship in
these things. We've just talked about things
that might have flagged and been like, so that's actually maybe
something we need to work on. How do you then strengthen those
so that you are future proofing? So if this feels confronting,
that's a good sign. It means that you're caring
about this. It means that you want to be
intentional and it means that you're in the process of
assessing. And that is you're already like
leaps and bounds ahead because once you become aware of these
things, awareness is the biggest thing.
Like once you're aware of these things, you're already in the
process of working on it. And that's amazing.
So being scared of this thing because you know, it's a factor
is actually not, it's not something to be too scared of.
It's actually something to be celebrating because you're aware
and you can then put these things in place.
So asking yourself, this is really important.
What would expose our weak points?
And it's something I actually want to do with Blair later.
Like what is something that would expose our weak points
right now? Just be a bit creative.
Is it time? Like time stresses, money
stresses, parenting imbalance, emotional load.
Be creative thinking. What is something that could
expose the weak points in our relationship?
And it can be think it can be a bit painful to think about, but
I guarantee you that this forward thinking is a whole lot
less painful. Like this kind of creative
forward thinking is a whole lot less painful than it would be
and a whole lot more helpful than it would be avoiding
thinking about this and then finding yourself actually having
those weak points exposed down the track because of a stress.
Then you're navigating the stress and you're navigating the
weak point. Future focused check insurance
that don't feel heavy. We love this.
We've talked about this a lot and we have a resource on the
website for this. Having a check in night where
there's and just like download the resource if you want this as
as a structure, but something that's not super heavy, but
you're not having a big moment of like sitting down and be
like, this is the thing I need to talk about, which is has its
time and place. But if you want to just start
gently working on these, scheduling a check in night,
scheduling a fun, make it fun. We've talked about like putting
board games, nice drinks, desserts, something like that
doesn't have to be out of the house.
It can be if that works for you can be in the house after the
kids are down or something like that.
Be creative with how it works. Do not let the practicalities of
it stop you from doing it is essentially the point.
And have a check. I just asked some of these fun
questions, like make them light and fun.
So the question could be just for fun.
Where do you imagine us living in five years?
And then you can start to work on future goals.
Or if we lost one of our incomes, what would we do?
Creative thinking. The kind of questions Blair
loves me asking right when he's about to fall asleep.
What part of our life feels unsustainable right now?
Is there anything you've been carrying that we haven't talked
about? I know these aren't fun, fun
questions, but you can do them in a light way.
That's like if I was a Caterpillar, would you still
love me? If I murdered someone, would you
help me hide the body? We had an argument about that
one time. Do you remember that?
Yeah. Yeah.
I'm not going to tell you who said what.
Just so you know, I had the better answer.
Anyway, look at the if you want more examples of this, Google
has 500 different resources to. Even better, at our website
we've got a free resource you can download for a check in
night. These can be casual.
They can be in the car on a walk.
They can meet a check in night. They can be while you're folding
laundry. They can be when your partner is
about to fall asleep. Don't recommend that.
Just build the habit of thinking together and not reacting
separately or not trying to process these separately.
You're just having casual chats about future concepts and things
where you're doing it in a low pressure time.
You're not doing it when you're not doing it in the middle of a
crisis. You're doing it before in a nice
easy time. Another thing too is sometimes
having these conversations, depending on how the
relationship is, it can feel a lot, especially if you haven't
kind of done this. So another thing you could do is
implement a rating scale to just check in very quickly at a
glance at how each other are going.
Can be about anything. It could be like out of five how
you're feeling or out of 10 how you're feeling.
That's what we do with work. I've started doing something
with someone in my life. Anymore with coaching.
Oh, coaching. Yeah, I do with coaching.
Yeah, yeah. And just like ask.
The question like, well, how are you feeling about this
situation? And they might say 4, Right.
And then this is just the example that you shared with me.
And then you ask that same question a few weeks later after
you've been working with them. It's like, well, how do you feel
about it now? And they're like 8.
Yeah. You know, so it's that's the
sort of gauge of and you can bring that into your everyday
life like it could be. You do it with your kids.
Yeah, we do it. Exactly how do you feel?
How, how are you feeling today after school out of 10?
And they give us a number and it just helps you know how to gauge
that conversation then. Because if you keep giving a
four, well, I'm not going to drill them like the kids about
all their details of homework and school and all this sort of
stuff. I'm going to be more actually
curious about why they are 4, but also if they give you a 10,
I'm going to be curious on why would they attend and let's
celebrate that. That's awesome.
And tracking it over time is good to be like oh you weren't
so great last week but now you're doing better And it it
releases them from having to explain it or like our kids hate
answering what they did. I don't know why it's such an
annoying question. The number was annoying when I
was in school. And so having this kind of
easier check in point can be, can be really good.
So implementing that if it feels too hard to have actual
conversations, just implement a check in could be out of five,
even if if out of 10 feels too complicated, make it easy and
sustainable for you. And then there's the other
factor of this too, is if you're the one that's noticing that
cracks first and your partner's not quite ready to be on board
or not quite on the same page as you, you aren't without
practical stuff you can do. So these are some things you can
do in that situation. Your awareness matters.
So like I said before, your awareness of the crack is
already putting you ahead. So just be reassured by that.
Your awareness of a crack is really important.
It even just gives you words to things when when things do come
up, you can try some soft introductory phrases to your
partner. So things like I heard this
episode podcast and it made me think, or can we talk about
this? Not because it's a big issue,
but because I want to like work on this for the future, just
like something that really sets them up knowing this is not a
huge issue. I'm just curious about this
thing. Even if they don't respond right
away, you're starting to plant these little seeds of
conversation. You're starting to plant a seed
of culture in your relationship where they're recognising.
All of a sudden my partner is really curious about me and
they're asking me things and they're trying to check in.
And it might not be comfortable or natural feeling at first, but
that little seed and your willingness to do that speaks
like volumes and will be helpful down the track.
The other thing that's really important, we say, we say this
in so many contexts, but people love to talk about themselves.
If you don't have a culture in your relationship where it's
super easy to have these deep conversations and you raise
things that you're struggling with and your partner is really
receptive to it because you haven't gotten to that point,
don't be dismayed. Like that's a muscle that's
strengthened. Instead, why don't you start by
just asking them about themselves, removing yourself
from it, as hard as that can be sometimes, and just being really
curious about your partner because people love to talk
about themselves. So I've been thinking about how
much pressure you're under lately.
Is there anything that I can do to help with that or you've got
so much going on, Is there one thing I could take off your
plate? Something like that?
Being curious about them instead of trying to at the beginning
make it about you or make it about this big heavy thing that
if they're struggling or they're not used to, it is really hard
to take on board to make the opening about them.
It's not about you and it creates safety and it creates
space. It also that fight or flight
reaction we talked about earlier, it relieves that so
that their brain and their logic centre is still on instead of
them being like, oh, they're bringing up a really heavy thing
and then they just shut down and then they fall into their
reactions and that sort of thing.
There's still things you can do even if you're doing, you're
navigating this on your own at the beginning and your partner
is not quite on the same page and not really ready to do
conversations back and forth. These are some of the things you
can do to introduce this new pattern of this new culture of
exploring these things. So you're future proofing your
relationship. Future proofing is so much
harder to say than I thought it was.
Future proof, yeah. You say it right now, see.
Yeah. Everyone's like, no, I said it
fine. Anyway, that's future proofing
your relationship. Big one, Foundational one.
Good one. Good one.
I think it's really important. Some little closing thoughts for
us here is you don't have to fix everything overnight.
These things that flagged for you in this episode are not.
You're not like on Dire Straits. Sometimes I say things and I
don't know what they mean, but Dire Straits, it's just a
conversation to start. It's just something to be aware
of. So don't feel overwhelmed
because you've had things flagged for you.
Just allow them to be moments that you're like, yeah, and then
you're aware you're already steps ahead.
You can start to implement these things.
Not everything needs to be fixed in one go.
In fact, trying to do that would probably be counterproductive.
These moments of honesty are strengthening.
So these little moments of checking in, these little
moments of curiosity changing how you approach your partner,
all of those things are strengthening and are future
proofing in and of themselves. So be reassured with that.
You can share this with your partner.
You can implement a check in night if that's something that
they're out for, you're up for. And if you're not sure where to
start, just pick one of those checking questions we listed in
the earlier things and just do it today.
Just make it nice and easy in a moment where you're together.
I did joke about it, but don't do it in a moment just before
they fall asleep because that will not be helpful and probably
make you all frustrated. But just pick one of those if
that's if that's what feels manageable to you, and start
there. But this is something that I
think is important for everyone to be aware of, so we're not
just floating along until something comes up that's more
difficult. Cool.
Thanks guys. Thanks guys.
That was a good one. Good chat.