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Sofa Series | The Science of Love: Navigating Relationships with Dr. Wendy Walsh
61 Plays3 months ago
Join us for another engaging episode in our Sofa Series on The Ripple Affect, where co-host Isa "Nibby" sits down with Dr. Wendy Walsh, a PhD in Clinical Psychology and America's Relationship Expert. As the host of "The Dr. Wendy Walsh Show" on iHeartRadio's KFI AM 640 for almost 10 years, Dr. Walsh brings deep insights into the complexities of love, attachment, and the underlying science of romantic behaviors. In this episode, she provides practical advice on breaking unhealthy relationship patterns, the importance of therapy, and how to set boundaries that foster respect and self-esteem. They also delve into how understanding our attachment styles can lead to healthier connections. This episode is essential listening for anyone seeking to deepen their understanding of love, relationships, and personal growth. Enjoy!
For more from Dr. Wendy visit: www.drwendywalsh.com
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Transcript
Introduction to The Ripple Effect Podcast
00:00:04
Speaker
You're listening to The Ripple Effect with your hosts Cheech and Nippy, a podcast that explores how individual change has the capacity to affect the whole. From neuroscience to donuts, we're two sisters with a deep curiosity for ancient wisdom and modern knowledge, and we're obsessed with learning alongside you because we don't know. Let's dive in.
00:00:27
Speaker
Welcome back to today's episode of the Ripple Effect podcast. This is your host, Issa, aka Nivey. And today I have a very exciting episode for you. Today's guest is the biggest name we've ever had on the podcast. She has a stacked bio that I'm about to share with you, and the episode is full of advice and words of wisdom, and I'm just really excited to share it.
Meet Dr. Wendy Walsh, America's Relationship Expert
00:00:59
Speaker
so Today's guest is known as America's Relationship Expert. She is a well-known talk radio host, an Emmy-winning journalist, a psychology professor, a TV host, and if all of that wasn't impressive enough, she was named Time Magazine's Person of the Year 2017. Who is she? She is Dr. Wendy Walsh. A doctor of psychology and media commentator, she is known for her expertise in the science of human behavior and attachment. She is currently an adjunct professor of psychology at California State University Channel Islands.
00:01:38
Speaker
As an award-winning television journalist, radio host, and podcaster, Dr. Walsh has authored three books on relationships and garnered a substantial social media following, including over one million on TikTok. Holding a PhD in clinical psychology, she hosts the Dr. Wendy Walsh show on iHeart Radio's KFI AM640. With a versatile career, she has been a former Emmy-nominated host of The Doctors and could occasionally be spotted hosting entertainment tonight on Extra. Her career spans from news reporting in the early 90s to hosting national TV shows, making her a prominent figure in both academia and the media landscape.
00:02:24
Speaker
She is an amazing resource in today's relationship climate, an outstanding professor, and has a pure heart for helping empower others to improve their lives. This conversation you're about to hear was early on in our podcasting escapades, and I forgot to have Dr. Wendy put headphones on. so there was a little crosstalk and it does get a bit distorted. But we, okay let's be honest, Kiara did her best to clean it up. So apologies about that and I trust you can give us grace and still get value through the distortion.
00:03:03
Speaker
All right. Enjoy this episode. Happy listening. See you next week. Hi, Dr.
Understanding Love and Therapy with Dr. Wendy Walsh
00:03:10
Speaker
Wendy. Thank you for being here today with me on the Ripple Effect podcast. I'm really looking forward to gaining some of your wisdom and knowledge. I know you have your show and you go into a ton of detail. on relationships and the science of love and evolutionary psychology when it comes to love and relationships. And I'm really excited to dive into some of that, but I'm also excited to just get a little more personal outlook from you and some advice for individuals before they get into a relationship. Sure. um'm My pleasure to be here.
00:03:46
Speaker
Thank you for being here. Thank you. um We have a bio for you that listeners will listen to, but is there anything that you want to share about yourself before we jump in? but you know I think ah if I had to do bullet points about my life and what's important is i'm I'm a mother, I'm a woman, I work Canadian and American, and I've been obsessed with the science of love since having my own attachment injuries and trying to find out why I couldn't stop while I was dating sort of the same guy over and over and was breaking my heart. And then I realized, Oh, I was choosing that person. And so I'm a big proponent of therapy being the beneficiary of some great therapy. And I just continued after so healing myself to continue to read about it so that I could share this knowledge. I think everyone needs to know this. I really do. Yeah. I would agree. I think I'm a big advocate for therapy as well. And looking to yourself first is, you know, so, so important, not only in love and relationships, but just in in the world in general. So starting with yourself in that sentiment that
00:04:52
Speaker
You know, we when we think about love, it's it's so romanticized, but it also holds so much power. There's you know songs about love, and there's this this notion that kind of love can save save the world. you know That love, you know if we're from that space, we can We can do things that are unthinkable. We can come together as humanity. We can help each other. We can, for lack of a better term, heal our traumas and things like that. But starting with ourselves first, do you have any advice for what the first steps of a healthy relationship from the inside out?
00:05:29
Speaker
Would look like well i want to address something you said about how the world has sort of set itself up for these myths around romantic love. We are put on the planet to reproduce human bonding isn't watch evolved instinct and indeed some of the things you mentioned like music and art. were designed to help ah that reproduction take place, to help attract a mate or keep a mate and create the romantic myths. The myth of romance comes from the fact that when people fall in love, their brains get assaulted with a host of neurochemicals that feel magical.
00:06:07
Speaker
And so there is this idea that love just happens, but you also address something else that love can conquer all. So in that definition of love, love is about something you do, something you sacrifice in order to make things right. But the scientific definition of love, it has biological pieces, psychological and social pieces. ah It is more of um Partly that neurochemistry that brings people together then a whole lot of psychology a lot of relationship skills and also sociology whether this person can fit into your world and you could fit into their world. If you think that love all in itself can cure all. Then you don't know what love is is love after initial attraction is a skill set and it's a skill set that could be learned so now to your question.
00:07:07
Speaker
what can we do internally well We weren't all raised with a good internal working model for love, a good roadmap for what love is. Some people fortunately were, and they can't explain to you why they married their college boyfriend and stayed together for everything forever and everything's running hunky dory for them because it's so natural to them. You see, with love, we don't actually seek out pleasure. We say that we are. We seek out the familiar. And the if the familiar involved pain or abandonment or criticism or loss, that will feel like love to us. We will come with passionate. We have passionate fights and then we get together and we have great makeup sex.
00:07:53
Speaker
That's not a secure attachment, right? That's something that mimics something that happened in your past. So the answer question is simply um deal with the shadows from your past first. Do the work to find out if the model of love you were raised in and um is one that is suited for adult romantic attachment or whether it will bring you back to the scene of the crime over and over again. And how would you suggest someone start doing that work of discovering what their attachment style is and what was truly modeled in in their childhood? I know for me, it took going to ACA and CODA meetings, to which are adult children of alcoholics and dysfunctional families, and then codependence anonymous.
00:08:35
Speaker
to really break denial around what model I did grow up in and what patterning had come of that out of coping mechanisms. So that was my pathway into learning deeper levels of what was happening and why I was repeating patterns. What was your path to discovering that?
Exploring Personal Growth and Boundaries
00:08:53
Speaker
But of course, what every girl in the 20s does, I read every self-help book that was available on the model. And then, I started writing them. And then, and then I got in the hands of a good psychoanalytic licensed therapist, who, you know, we went through my childhood with fine tooth comb, and looked at every detail, and she challenged some of my belief systems. And, you know, it's not like one day you go,
00:09:20
Speaker
um I get it now. All I have to do is just choose a nice guy. It's actually stages of change. Get better and better at choosing different people or better and better at expressing your needs. um And so my favorite metaphor for the four stages of change, and I think this is based on a very famous ancient poem. is about the hole in the road. So if you consider that the hole in the road is your disorder or your faulty way of dealing with life or romance, um you walk down the street and you don't see the hole in the road and you fall in it. And that's stage one where we're largely unconscious of those processes. Then you start to go to therapy and then you walk down the street and finally you see that hole like there it is and you still fall in it.
00:10:11
Speaker
Right this third stage is that you you walking down that street you see that hole you recognize it you very carefully use different ways of being to step around that whole very consciously. but Stage four is you take a different street. And so eventually you go through stages of growth where you just get better and better at choosing partners, at being a better partner. And that's how we grow. Yeah. And I think it's important to to highlight the fact that it, although it is progression, it's not over always linear. You know, you can see the whole go around it and then the next street down, there's not a hole and you fall again. Three steps forward, two steps back. Yeah. It's not always linear.
00:11:01
Speaker
In that analogy, in those in those stages of change and growth, I think somewhere in there, there's always an acceptance of what is. Well, you have to deal with some feelings of loss. You have to grieve. you have to grieve losses from your childhood. And you have to go to a therapist's office for a while. And like on your walks and at night. And yeah I think it's it's, I'd like to normalize the idea of um grieving, grieving, however, grieving looks so different for everybody. But I think, yeah, that that that work that you do, it is, it's not fun. It's painful. And it's, um
00:11:39
Speaker
And it's heard it's hard. It's really hard. Sometimes I sit in therapy and I i tell my therapist, it just sucks. I know I'm doing the right thing, but it's just hard and it sucks. you know um But it's really fruitful. And I think that's hard to hard to express to somebody who hasn't gone through it. i think what's important is that we understand the distinction between grieving and wallowing. So ah Carl Jung said that neurotics can't be healed through talk therapy because they wallow too much. In other words, they go to therapy and just whine and complain and get the consoling with their therapist and never really grow, never come in to report their independence. And I do think I see in our culture today
00:12:28
Speaker
too many people attached to the victim archetype and they really feel like somehow life owes them something. Whereas for some, somewhere along the way, I just reframed my thinking and believe that life is a series of problems to be solved. And every day you wake up and say, what you got for me today, universe, is nobody really does owe you anything. You're not guaranteed to have a ah good life. It's what you make of it and what you do and your perception of it because it is so easy to reframe some of the negative things and go, you know what? I dodged a bullet with that one. I'm glad I got out of that relationship in only three months. That's a good thing.
00:13:11
Speaker
perspective shifts are so powerful and it's funny how like you're saying that wallowing, we can just stay in that wallowing and and there's it doesn't facilitate that jump of growth and I think and think putting on your radar exactly where you want to go, not in this like I see it a lot. It happens with like manifesting and goals and money where um people have this idea of they if they just hold this thought and this vision and then they can get what they want. And I think when it comes to like therapeutics, that's just so
00:13:48
Speaker
It's so harsh to to to use that model because it just doesn't operate like that. But I do think it's important to, you know, from that but pain that you could choose to wallow in or maybe your pattern is to wallow in it, to have a reason you're going through that. you know You know, do you want to have healthier relationships? Do you want to feel more comfortable in your own skin? Do you want to relate to your children better? Like what, you know, what is that End of the road or like middle you know middle ground you're going towards i think it's important to like highlight that for yourself. And i think the work is in the learning to express and finding the language for emotions and that happens sometimes in the tears but also learning to express.
00:14:34
Speaker
feelings of pride. you know We were told um to be humble. We were told that pride was a dangerous, negative, sinful thing. Whereas you know in order to have some self-esteem and a backbone to go into a relationship, you have to be a little proud of yourself. You have to look at what you've done right as well as the mistakes we've made. yeah self-esteem is I would like to to dive into self-esteem a little deeper because um that's something that I'm working on right now. and I ah heard a really nice phrase about setting boundaries and building self-esteem through boundaries, that every time you set a boundary for yourself and then you reinforce that boundary, you grow self-esteem in yourself.
00:15:18
Speaker
And I like that, that notion. Do you have any other ideas ah around self-esteem or tips for developing self-esteem or that, that, you know, being, becoming comfortable and being proud of who you are or the acceptance process? Yeah. I mean, what you just said is beautiful. I mean, boundaries actually shape the person. We're not an individual if we have no boundaries. We're just a piece of everybody else and what they want and their needs are. And having a boundary is able to say, Hmm, this is what I can't tolerate. This is what I won't do. If people mistakenly think that having boundaries is trying to get other people to change their behavior, which is not true, right? Having a boundary is saying, this is all I will accept. And I decided this will be the consequence
00:16:07
Speaker
if I am presented with that behavior from somebody else again. So you have to make some hard choices and women are particularly hard on that because there's lots of document documentation research to show that women have more empathy, women worry. In fact, well some of the research shows that one of the reasons why women stay in abusive relationships is because they don't want to hurt their partner. but Even though they're taking all this emotional pain, they don't want to give emotional pain to anybody. And so my favorite line around boundaries is, you have to give somebody the gift of pain. The gift of pain, which might mean, might look something like this.
00:16:49
Speaker
but you know I noticed that whenever we go out, you are always late when you show up. I end up getting ready and sitting around for an hour, an hour and a half, not knowing where you are. I start having feelings of abandonment waiting for you. I'm going to let you know that the next time you're late, I won't be here because once I'm dressed up, I'm going to go out and enjoy myself. And so that means the person has no boundary exists unless it's been tested. There's no rule in the world that is a rule until it's been tested. So the next time they try to make a better effort and they show up 30 minutes late.
00:17:24
Speaker
But you're at the neighborhood bar having a cocktail by yourself, treating yourself because you got dressed up and you're not gonna waste this time. They're gonna come back later and go, you gotta give me a break. I mean, I'm usually like an hour, hour and a half late. So I'm only three minutes late and you still punish me. And you said, yeah, but my policy is? You know, I do a five minute waiting period. You decide what it is. That's an extreme example. But you have to have a consequence when you set up a rule. And women are really bad at doing the consequences. Yeah, that's something I learned in Alan on another 12 step program um is is, you know, setting, so making empty threats is super unhealthy behavior that that you say I'm going to leave next time and then you don't leave that that just diminishes your own.
00:18:09
Speaker
given the power Yeah, exactly. But the reason we should understand the reason why, so the reason why many women I'm putting gender on this because I see it more often at a women when they where women followers who comment with this is um women are fear abandonment. If I see that newly, so they're in like these vulnerable early stages of a new relationship. And that's the most important time to exert boundaries, by the way, because the relationship system is set up at the beginning. So they think I'm going to be nice and accommodating until I've got them. Then I'll be an individual and tell them who I am and what my needs are.
00:18:44
Speaker
No, no, no, no, no. Works the other way around. From the beginning, from the first text, you can say, I'm sorry, I don't really text that much, but I'll be happy to take your call when I see your number. Like, boom, start to train them. Start to say these things, but think, well, she might leave. Then he should. He's not right for you if he doesn't respect your boundaries. It is a gift. if you run You should do the touchdown cheer if you settle the boundary and somebody runs away. Thank the fucking Lord. I don't have to stretch that out for a year of pain.
00:19:17
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's ah boundaries are so helpful. in And when when you start to develop boundaries, I think for me, what was helpful is is learning how I felt. I think that that sounds really basic and silly, but as somebody who chameleoned for a long time and you know from childhood patterns found that you know it was It was my role to accommodate, and so um breaking that habit and starting to go, do I feel comfortable in this situation? Do I like what's happening here? what Do I want to stay here? Do I want to leave? like And then actually honoring, that's how I feel, and then creating a boundary from that place. Actually, I don't want to go with you to that place.
00:20:04
Speaker
I'm going to do this instead." And it's so basic, just doing that, standing up for yourself essentially at at the beginning stages of a relationship. and And then that might be honestly easier because nope they don't have ah data to go off of you previously like pushing your your gate down and bending. Whereas you know your friends and your family who have known you for so long, you set a new boundary and it's like, you've disrupted the system. you know um At the beginning of a dating relationship, you are creating the system. and Indeed, it is up to women. you know Someone called in my radio show yesterday and had a question. Why is it that men want to have sex before they'll decide if they want a relationship with you? and I'm like, who's deciding this? What about you want to have a relationship before you allow him to have sex with you? You're in charge.
00:20:53
Speaker
Yeah, you you have this you had this quote on one of your shows that I listened to and I laughed out loud and it really made me think a little bit deeper. It was, if you don't trust him to come over and take care of your house plants, then don't have sex with him. yeah Many women who wouldn't give a guy a piece of their apartment to come over and water their plants while they're out of town, yet they'd expose their eggs and their bloodstream. to a stranger yeah that bad hit that hit me i was like oh my gosh well when should you have sex with the first time when you trust them well how do i know if they trust them if you don't know you don't trust them right like when you know you know exactly seven done all the right things to earn your trust and yes there are men out there who are tricksters and that's why it's women's job to be
00:21:45
Speaker
selective and careful and choosy. Yeah, you know, there's that saying that I see on Instagram and I hear around of like, you can only love someone to the degree you love yourself. and And I think that goes with, you know, having self-esteem and having boundaries and um knowing yourself. but But I'm curious what you think about that quote, because part of me kind of rebels against that. And I think Well, it's way easier to sit there and and love somebody else and accept them with all their flaws than it is to turn that mirror around and do it to yourself. Well, I take exception with the word love because it means so many different things to so many people, depending on what their model for love is. Right. So I would rather take it more specific, like um I
00:22:34
Speaker
can't respect someone else's body unless I respect my own body, right? Whether it's self-care and exercise and nutrition, whether it's being more choosy with your exposure bloodstream to, yeah, I think if you think of specific actions instead of this global world of love, think about like, I can't expect someone to be on time if I'm never on time. I can't expect someone to be impeccable with their word if I'm not impeccable with my word, right? ah I can't expect someone to be open and emotional with their feelings unless I'm willing to be open um and emotional with my feelings.
00:23:15
Speaker
And those are all components of love. Right, right. And you talked to you touched on that earlier, the the components of love and the science of love and that it's a, you know, an emotional and physiological and a social combination.
The Biopsychosocial Model of Love
00:23:32
Speaker
can you Can you go over that a little bit more? For me, I thought, you know what's beyond the norepinephrine and the neurotransmitters that are going on in your brain? But I realized that not everybody even knows that that that's happening. So I just got done reading the, um what's it called, The desire Evolution of Desire. It's not an amazing book. It's an amazing book. Yes, that book is amazing. It really shifted the way I thought.
00:23:59
Speaker
We require reading for every 22-year-old in the world. i Agreed. Agreed. that's ah It's a great book. And it it really kind of demystifies a lot of what we're doing in everyday life. So can you go into you know just some of what's happening when when we fall in love or when we when we experience love? I can give you sort of bullet points of the biopsychosocial model for love. First of all, love as a relationship is an exchange of care.
00:24:31
Speaker
That care can take money forms. It can be financial care, sexual care, ah domestic responsibility care, emotional support care, intellectual stimulation care, et cetera. Who are we on the outside to judge if a relationship is fair? If it feels fair to them and they're exchanging care fairly, then it's a healthy relationship for them. Now, having said that, there are biological, psychological, and social pieces that bring people together. Biologically, Yeah, there is a thing called chemistry. There is research to show that people who have different immune system cells, which is um expressed through their olfactory response, will be more attracted to each other. So therefore, in our anthropological past,
00:25:15
Speaker
if, uh, well, and also to keep you from mating with your brother, I guess, if, uh, a new hunter walked into the encampment and he smelled absolutely delicious to you. It was because his immune system could fight off different diseases than you. Now, usually when you mate with somebody and create an offspring, you might take brown eyes from one long legs, from another curly hair, from another except immune system chains. They can buy to create a stronger human. So one of the things, if you look back on your hottest sexual relationship, you might say, are they smelled so delicious? And that's why. So that's one piece of the biology. Another piece is simply that mother nature has designed for us to have a contact high at the beginning and the feelings of lust do feel magical. Love is literally the best drug we have when you mix oxytocin, serotonin, norepinephrine and vasopressin together.
00:26:10
Speaker
there is an explosion of this person can do no wrong there so perfect sadly there's also research to show that we're not good at discerning the faults in the lover at the beginning because we do look at them through rose colored glasses that's why it's important to listen to others around us who are seeing stuff we cannot see at that time. And then the psychology, you know, relationships are, we try to roadmap what happened in our childhood. We don't look for what is pleasurable. We look for what is familiar. And if we've had trauma, then we're going to have traumatic bonds later on. Like it's as simple as that. That's the psychology piece. But also in the psychology piece includes some skill stuff. Like did we learn how to fight? Do we give our lover ah the silent treatment? Do we have an anxious attachment style where we're just going to chase them away all the time with our neediness?
00:27:00
Speaker
uh or avoidance right one or the other but then there's the social piece which is that person can be hot as anything and you got the chemistry you both have a secure attachment style but you know they're from the other side of the tracks they're just not gonna work in your social world in your zip code Too many people think that love is about luck not skills so they go on these dating apps and they try to find somebody at a completely different zip code but the social problems come up. ah Whether they're from a different culture a different country even a different city a different job whatever it's all sounds exotic at the beginning when you meet them on the app.
00:27:36
Speaker
And then you're like how are you gonna make this work socially with different politics or different religion or different family styles or different ah money you know i grew up with money and i know someone who recently broke up with this guy because should we been together a year but he inherited his money and he just doesn't work. And he doesn't need to and he doesn't understand why my work comes first that's a social problem. yeah Yeah, or language. I think about my niece Carly. She she met her now husband and father of two babies um in Myanmar when she was traveling and they fell in love. They you know they got pregnant and now they're you know raising their kids together and they had to go through the growing pains of, okay, what country do we live in? Because he was from Poland and she was from the United States. and
00:28:24
Speaker
you know, they beautifully navigated it. I will give them a lot of credit. They landed in Spain, which is it's great for them and their family. But or even my own parents, you know, one from from Guatemala, one from Santa Barbara and the language barriers and the, you know, adaptation to to another person's world. You know, it there's sacrifice in love as well. And there's compromise and all kinds of all kinds of stuff. So you did a wonderful job. Thank you for going through the the stages of love and how it affects our our brain and our bodies and how we have these complex elements that go into to relational love. But what about your mother and you you have you have your babies? What about um the love that we share with with our children or our family members?
00:29:14
Speaker
Well, it becomes a programming, right? So I practice something that's called attachment parenting and psychologists used to laugh and go, isn't that just parenting? um Meaning that we're all supposed to have close attachments with our um babies and our toddlers. They're not meant to be out running with the tribe. ah We have one of the longest periods of child rearing before we let our kids run with the tribe. You know, A baby horse a colt is born it's off running with the herd within a few hours but a baby human we don't let them run with the tribe until kindergarten that's five years right and during that time in fact in the first year the brain triples in size is most important that children have secure consistent attachments.
00:30:00
Speaker
because then they will take that model for love and unconsciously apply it to their mate choices when they get older. but and how did it How do you think it changed you? oh so I also know there's three different research studies that I've read that show how you can heal your own attachment style in adulthood. ah One is through a therapeutic alliance with a therapist. It's not so much that amazing intervention where they go, but You know what I see in you? You have an anxious attachment. Well, what the hell do I do with that, right? No, challenge doesn't heal. What heals is the relationship. It's the consistency of the therapeutic alliance. Unconsciously, the patient believes this therapist is good mother or good father or whatever. And the fact that they are up there and available for them in a consistent way, Friday mornings at 10 a.m., it starts to calm down the angry, anxious baby. So it is the relationship that heals.
00:30:58
Speaker
Sometimes because i mentioned social pieces somebody will fall in love with somebody because you know socially they're really really desirable and that person actually has a secure attachment style. And so if you pick at least one partner within it a secure attachment style you can help heal the other nothing that they do consciously but it goes like this so assuming that. There's somebody with a really anxious attachment style who's like coming and going and trying to create drama to make them run away because all they know is being abandoned. So if they're not being abandoned by somebody who's stable, they do all kinds of things to make the person abandon them. It's all unconscious. And so somewhere with the secure attachment style goes, babe,
00:31:39
Speaker
Babe, I'm here. You're cute when you're doing that, but okay. You can't see you can't see it now, but but dr wendy Dr. Wendy has one of her fingers and it's spinning. That's the anxious person. And the other hand is just a palm that's holding very still and reflecting back, ah not moving at all. And then the avoidant person, of course, feels easily smothered. So there's the secure person trying to give some love. And the avoidant person goes and dashes away and the sea person goes, Oh, that's too much. okay Okay, I'll just wait until you feel like it's safe to come back. Right. And so that can heal. And then the third is parenting.
00:32:21
Speaker
If a parent does what I did, and I think it really healed me, I read all the books on attachment parenting, slept with my babies, or my babies, um worked very little so I could be with them in the early years. You know, kids don't leave. They don't abandon you. Trust me. especially they're all inters They never leave. And so it heals the driving issues. because they're there. and And I think I recall, you know, when you are saying saying the things to your children, like, you know, that I love yous and that, you know, I'm here for you. There's another child's brain in the room and it's yours. And you get to re-parent yourself in that way and give yourself the things that maybe you didn't receive in childhood. and
00:33:04
Speaker
And so for you personally, you did that that process for yourself with your children to to make sure that they had a secure attachment model and that you got to work through that as well. And did you see the change from from parenting? Did that change, that process change you into potentially, you know, having healthier relationships outside of of your of your home, of your nuclear family? What, you know, decades later, ago when I entered the mating marketplace again, I took a different straight, went right to the kind, loving, caring. I mean, the biggest problem in my relationship right now is that we're both fighting to care for each other at the same time. It's like, do you need this honey? No, do you need that? No, let me do it. Let me do it. It's wonderful. We're just an abundance of care going on. And when I was younger, I would say, this is how anxious and avoiding people talk. Oh, he's too nice. I know I'm not attracted to him. He's too nice.
00:33:59
Speaker
And I'm like, Oh, no, no, no, nice. It's great. Cause there's two kinds of niceness, right? There's niceness that comes from insecurity. If I don't do everything for her, then she's going to broaden me. And maybe that's what I was sniffing out. And then there's the niceness that comes from security. I love myself enough that I could share that love with others. Yeah, and that is that self love does create stability and security in ourselves. hu Yeah, because it's boundaries. You know, you know, as much as I would do, I would say I would do absolutely anything for my boyfriend. I wouldn't do absolutely anything for him.
00:34:33
Speaker
I know what my boundaries are i know how much i could you know i set a boundary yesterday it's very funny we we're sitting down to branch that i was making i was pretty finishing touches i have made some crepes and laid out all this stuff and you know how you do a whole creek bar there for sunday brunch and i was making my latte he doesn't drink latte so it's making latte for me and he sat down and i watched him take his crepe and start stopping it and doing stuff and i turned and i just said excuse me i need to have a role If i could get dinner i can't be rushing around the kitchen and you have way finish and already digging into the fruit. You can sit there if you want to get there early as i'm laying out the table but nobody can take a bite until the cook six. And he's like oh i didn't know that bother to drive me crazy and he said okay.
00:35:19
Speaker
So, what would be the boundary if the person, what would be the consequence if the person didn't deny i have a boyfriend, of course, who, what do you think he did? He jumped up and made my latte. But adapting. quickly but But if the person ignored that boundary, then you'd have cooked for them. When they say, where's brunch? You say, oh, I'm sorry. I don't like the way I'm treated when I cook for you so you can fix some for yourself. And that's so scary for someone who you know has a ah model of love that was fleeting. you know That's a really scary thing to have to stand up and say, I'm not going to do this because you don't know that on the other end of that line there is somebody who will stand up and make your latte.
00:36:02
Speaker
Who will respect that boundary? If you've never seen that model, if you've never experienced that, you just don't know. But I think it's important to reiterate. You have to have boundaries at the very beginning because that's the test. Mike, do they respect the boundary? And if they don't, like, you know, right away and you can go, this is great. I don't have to wait six months getting dressed up and going on on dates with this loser. Right? Yes. Thing as simple as I prefer telephone calls to text. Women are afraid to say that they keep texting. You prefer telephone calls and you want him to call and not just text. The very last text you should write is
00:36:37
Speaker
Hey it's so nice to hear from you i'm not really a texture driver'm more of a phone call person i'll definitely pick up the phone when i see your number and she writes back will be where i'm always working where i can't talk out of cell phones are off where i'm due to. You don't respond you just said i know tax so tax. If you keep rewarding him with texts, then he doesn't need to call. Yeah. its it and Okay. So in that that that frame of focusing on yourself, like I call it my hula hoop, right? Like i I imagine a purple hula hoop around me. And I think like any, everything inside this hula hoop is my responsibility right now and everything outside of it. Like I'm not giving unsolicited advice. I'm not like trying to pull things in or, you know, like I'm just dealing with what's inside the hula hoop.
00:37:21
Speaker
So in that regard and and setting healthy boundaries and say the example is someone didn't honor your boundary and and you had to cut them loose in the very beginning. Do you have any any tips for for healthy activities to to build your own your own boundaries in yourself if you're not in a relationship? So I think it's easier when you're dealing with relationships to to to use them as a mirror, to use them as a healthy playing field to practice communication, to you know stand up for yourself and and care and love another person. But when you're not in a relationship,
00:37:56
Speaker
ah How are are there ways to try and nurture and grow and and change without being in love or in a relationship? Well, I do want to say this about, you know, you set a boundary and somebody abandons you, you need to reframe that because what happens is people sit there wallowing in the loss because the loss is the old feeling that belongs in their childhood. So if we can learn to reframe it and go, saved from that one, that would have been a rocky road down there, literally regarded as a gift when they leave early. That is important. Now, I'm talking to people who have weak boundaries. okay There are people out there whose boundaries are so strongly protecting themselves from intimacy all the time. They're saying, no, no, get out, get out. I'm not talking to do with those people right now. I'm talking to people about people who need better boundaries.
00:38:46
Speaker
So you're single, you want to get, quote unquote, stronger and more self-esteem for relationships. Sadly, not dating is not the way to do it because that's avoiding. You need to practice. You can't have a relationship. You can't learn relationship skills without being in a relationship. So you got to get back on person riding. But what about self-love? Self-care, right? So self-care is saying, I'm going to take this time to go to the gym and meditate and eat well and make sure that I'm in touch with all the other social support because your romantic relationship shouldn't be your be all and end all of your emotional bucket. So I'm going to be volunteering. I'm going to be making sure I celebrate my friend's birthdays and I'm going to be there.
00:39:35
Speaker
doing as much as I can to make sure I get all that social support. But the only way to learn how to have a romantic relationship is to practice having romantic relationships with people who aren't appropriate. Being able to recognize that. The earlier you recognize it, the better you are. like I used to have this can, I had a system right when I found my boyfriend, which was, um but go on the dating apps. And by the way, you need to take breaks from the dating apps too, because they're they're not designed to find you a relationship. They're designed to get you addicted to the app. ah So never match with more than two people at once because you don't want a box of twenty people that just but you know structure ego but they're not real relationship not meeting in the real world your goal is find a relationship so you chat with two people until you can eliminate one.
00:40:19
Speaker
and Send four or five texts and then at give them your phone number and say, I'd prefer to talk to you on food. And then after that phone conversation, again, don't be in love with hope. If it didn't go well, I used to have a canned text that said something personal first, like, good luck at your daughter's wedding next week. It was a delight to chat with you. I don't think romance is in the cards for us, but um I'll keep you in mind for a friend. Nobody ever wrote me back and said, you bitch, how dare you do that. Usually they wrote back and said, how nice of you not to ghost me, that's sweet. You're a good person. But you know you got to understand that all these humans on the apps exist in your zip code and you could walk into a business meeting the next day and that person would be standing. but It happens.
00:41:01
Speaker
so um and Then do a brief 20-minute coffee date. If you like the phone call, you like the texting, you like the phone call, do a brief 20-minute coffee date. If that doesn't go well don't do a first date and all just eliminates all should be a process of eliminating early based on who and i am what do i want not how can i get them to like me it shouldn't be that if all you're doing is advertising yourself and trying more yourself into something you think people want and you've lost. You've lost yourself. You want somebody who celebrates you. And in order for them to celebrate you, you got to show them who you are, your authentic self. Because again, you're not looking for 40 likes on an app. You're looking for one person to go, you are what I've been waiting for my whole life. Yeah, we're not, we're not too deep. You know, we're not these like flat images of ourselves. We, you know, we have so much more.
00:41:57
Speaker
behind the screen that is never translated in an app. Yeah, I'm getting a text from my kid. We're just filling out something. You need something. I'm sorry. You're going to have to edit part of this app. No, you're fine. No worries. yeah All right, so just a few more questions and they pertain to change. um You know, this podcast was started because my sister and I wanted to explore how changing ourselves could have the potential to change the wider world around us.
The Role of Boundaries in Personal Change
00:42:29
Speaker
And um so what is something that you know or feel about change that you think others could benefit from knowing?
00:42:38
Speaker
You know we've been talking about boundaries so that i want to stay on this tool boundaries essentially the word no and change involved saying no. to some friends, like literally shedding friends who aren't right for you and not feeling guilt about that. It means saying no to some social invitations that are just going to take away your beauty sleep. It means saying no to jobs that aren't right. It means learning to say no to people and then the change will happen. You know, my therapist had the best metaphor for this. She said, when a sculptor creates a masterpiece,
00:43:15
Speaker
It chips away. He or she chips away at what is unnecessary to reveal the monster piece inside. And that's what change is about, getting rid of what is unnecessary. Yeah. Thank you for that. Thank you for sharing that. I agree. And I think it goes back to kind of getting into unpeeling that onion and getting deeper into yourself of who your true true self is and what that true self really wants in this life, you know, with that inner child, you know, going into that inner child and and giving her what he or she needs. And then going from there in order to say, yes, you have to understand what you need to hang out to. Yep. And I think saying, saying, saying yes to building healthier friendships, healthier community, healthier habits, healthier and not healthier in the, in the manner of like one size fits all, but like what's healthier for you as an individual?
00:44:14
Speaker
You know, where are you right now taking inventory? Where am I? You know, what is all the stuff on top of my sculpture? What's your best piece of advice you have for embracing change? It is this. We live in a world that is constantly changing and it's moving around us. There will be problems that come up on a regular basis. And sometimes change is about being active. literally getting out there and going, I'm going to make a difference. I'm going to do this. But there are other times in life that you need to just lift the paddle and let the river take you and see where you're going.
00:44:53
Speaker
Instead of constantly fighting the world to change, I want them to do this different. I want a different relationship. I want a different job. Just relax. Lift the paddle and see where this river is going. And then you can make better decisions for yourself. The wait and see approach is my favorite approach. Thank you, Dr. Wendy. Thank you so much. Okay. I think we did it. Listen. I don't know what we did, but we did it. Look, unattainable ideals are overrated. We're way more connected and deserving than society's false sense of separation dictates us to be. You're not just one person, you're enough. Your effort is enough and change is possible. Question the standard that says otherwise because what if almost is good enough? Just by tuning in, you're a part of our clan.
00:45:51
Speaker
Not in a call-to-way though. We don't know how far this ripple can go, but we're going to keep showing up. And we'll never get to perfection, but we're all going to be okay if we let the process be the solution and we see the value in the attempt.
Embracing Change and Conclusion
00:46:07
Speaker
Thanks for listening to another episode of the ripple affect. We're looking forward to exploring a different facet of change with you next Tuesday. Same time, same place next week. For show notes and additional resources, check out our website at rippleeffectpod.com. That's affect with an A. Kia ora has worked diligently to make our website interactive. Please visit it so it wasn't all for nothing. In all seriousness though, there's a ton of resources there. DM us directly at rippleeffectpod on Instagram and let us know what you liked about our show or any of your own ideas.
00:46:43
Speaker
We're really excited to hear from you. We value your feedback because it helps us make the pod better and it's our way of including you in our process. Okay, so ratings aren't the point of why we do this. We really want to make a change in the world. But in the matrix, there are algorithms. So yeah, every single review we get helps the ripple go farther. To help us out, please take two seconds, find the ratings and review section on whatever platform you're listening from, click five stars, wink, wink, and leave a review.
00:47:16
Speaker
We know you're busy, so just saying hello or literally hi as the review helps us hack the matrix. We sincerely appreciate it. If you want to become officially initiated into our clan, again, not in a cult-y way, hit the subscribe button wherever you get your podcasts. And as always, we're in it with you. Keep questioning. Stay curious. You got this, clan.
00:47:43
Speaker
A special thank you, love and credit to the magnificent Mia Casasanta for this beautiful music you're listening to right now.