[00:00] Speaker A: Barriers to communicating. What does this really mean? Dear listener, you have words, a voice, a mouth, a set of ears, even a brain. So what is it that gets in the way?
[00:11] Why can it sometimes be so difficult to communicate in a relationship? Now, if you've ever felt misunderstood or noticing yourself disconnecting or kind of left somewhat confused, or you're even just unsure of what to say and how to express yourself, this episode is definitely for you.
[00:32] We're going to be exploring what emotional barriers mean, why they exist, how they impact your relationship, and most importantly, how to overcome them. And stay with me because I'm going to give you four steps you can take into your life right now.
[00:48] Welcome to the ManTalk Podcast, a podcast of real conversations about life, your life, our life, and the emotional well being of men. My name is Howard Todd Collins. I'm the director of Men and Relationships Counselling,
[01:02] a private counselling practice here in sunny Melbourne, Australia. Thank you for being here. Sit back and relax and join me for this latest episode of Man Talk.
[01:29] Hello, hello, hello, wherever you are, I hope you are doing well wherever you're sitting in the world listening to me.
[01:36] I have been somewhat distracted this last month or so. There's been a very short break in the mentor podcast series. We're coming into autumn, spending most of the summer just coping with the crazy world that we're living in, but also kind of head down creating some new stuff for the practice,
[01:57] but also particularly focusing on training and online courses. And I will give you some more information at the end of this episode about what is now currently available for some personal development training that you can do online with me.
[02:12] And you can do that pretty much from your own home.
[02:15] So stay with me for that because I will tell you more about it later in this episode. We are focusing today on emotional barriers or particular barriers to communication. You know, emotional barriers are like internal walls that we create for ourselves.
[02:31] We build them to protect ourselves.
[02:34] Well, feeling vulnerable or the fear of being rejected or the fear of failing. These are defense mechanisms and within a context of a relationship that can lead to disconnection and isolation, if not escalating conflict within an intimate relationship, but also have a real impact on our own mental health and well being.
[02:54] So what are some of these most common emotional barriers that are going on, particularly for men that I work with? And I'm just going to give you three of them for the moment.
[03:03] The first one is often about fear. Fear of being open and being vulnerable. Now this kind of continues to happen for lots of men who, you know, where we get stuck in this idea that showing emotions is still a sign of weakness.
[03:19] We're fearful of being judged, or we're judging ourselves, or we're fearful of being rejected, or we in fact reject ourselves for feeling what we're feeling. And these are kind of barriers that then get in the way of open communication, particularly with the people that we love.
[03:34] Now, the impact here, of course, is that many of us then share our true feelings or true thoughts. And that leads to the emotional disconnection in a relationship. So, you know, for example, if you're feeling stressed out or you're feeling sad about something,
[03:50] but you're worried that your partner will judge you for those feelings, or that somehow you think they're going to see you as not strong enough or less capable, then it just kind of gets in the way.
[04:02] You may be just thinking that yourself, it may be a projection of some kind, but essentially you're protecting yourself from some of those feelings, fears. The second one, which is very common, is knowing how to identify and express what you're feeling.
[04:16] You know, many of us have not had a great kind of map from our history that teaches us how to identify feelings, let alone express them. It's kind of underdeveloped in most young men and young boys and blokes today.
[04:31] And so it often discourages us from talking about what we're feeling, let alone understanding our emotional experiences, then this can lead to a whole heap of confusion. Confusion for individual men, but also within a relationship, because blokes are closing down as a result.
[04:48] So the struggle here is that you may find it hard to articulate what it is that you're feeling, leading to more miscommunication or no communication at all. So just for example, if you're angry about something and you're not quite sure what it's about, and the root cause of the anger is not being accessed within you,
[05:08] it may well be that you're sad or scared or anxious, but you just get angry first. That makes it very hard to communicate really well with your partner. And the third one as an example is the fear of conflict itself.
[05:21] Many blokes fear that expressing feelings will lead to more arguments or lead to some kind of criticism or therefore rejection in their relationship with their partner. And this fear often stems from a whole lot of history you may be carrying about what you think conflict is about.
[05:40] You know, if you're avoiding conversations altogether, this will lead to resentment and built up unresolved issues within the relationship, also within yourself, right? So if you're avoiding discussing something, you're not happy with and you're just pushing it back into the back of your mind.
[05:57] Chances are this will just escalate more and more as time goes on. So what is it about these emotional barriers and why does it actually happen? And usually I want you to think about this from your own past experiences of managing emotions and stress and the pressure, particularly the expectation that you may have that you should just be strong,
[06:19] right? This kind of idea that men have where we should fix everything, we should be able to know how to solve problems almost without speaking about what we're feeling, right?
[06:30] Or you may be worried or scared of being open because it feels a bit risky. You know, this is the fear of being vulnerable and you don't want to expose some of your weaknesses if you like.
[06:41] And maybe you're not sure where to start. It may be hard to put your feelings into words, which is why staying silent seems easier. And a significant part of why these barriers happen is that you may well be holding on to some of your history where you've been hurt in the past.
[06:59] Now, the way to address your barriers is through your own self awareness. How you increase your own emotional intelligence and also therefore improve your communication skills. Now, research shows that men who struggle to express themselves emotionally are more likely to experience relationship dissatisfaction and their own emotional health challenges.
[07:24] So the first step that I want you to consider is to reflect on your own emotional barriers. Ask yourself the question, what beliefs or fears are holding you back from opening up?
[07:37] Now, awareness is the first step towards change, but significantly understanding what is the role of emotional awareness in particular.
[07:53] So how do we bridge the gap between recognising emotions and expressing them constructively? So here are some practical scenarios and some strategies for you to think about. These are scenarios that come up in my conversations with men and women and couples all the time.
[08:09] They're really common and they may well apply to you or something similar that may apply to you. Now the first scenario which is really common is overwhelmed or being overwhelmed at work and how you bring that home with you.
[08:23] Now, there are some people that I speak to that will say, well, they're almost insistent on not bringing work home. Now, I mean, I get that, you know, it's not about sharing every single task of the day that you've been doing at work.
[08:35] It's actually more about the mood and your sense of self that you're bringing home after a long day at work. So just for example, and I'm sure you recognize this in yourselves, that you've had a long day, irritable, maybe Stressed and you're aware it's been a tough day and you're getting home and you can feel that frustration or the grumpy or the reactive part of you maybe fairly quickly,
[09:00] maybe as soon as you walk in the door.
[09:03] So instead of addressing what you're feeling, you're a bit more snappy with your partner. And even if they ask you how your day was, you can find yourself just reacting sort of, yeah, tough day, rough day, just leave me alone.
[09:16] You know, that kind of more irritable response, of course that's just going to create tension, often leading or leaving your partner somewhat confused. Right. So what I want you to think about in this kind of classic scenario, I think, is those three questions that I put in the segment before is reflecting even as you're going home on those three questions,
[09:39] what am I feeling? Why am I feeling this way? And how can I express it constructively?
[09:45] So if you've got a, you know, you're going home after a really long busy day and you can recognize your stress and even if you're saying to yourself, I don't want to talk about it, you know, it's my day at work, I want to, I want to forget about it,
[09:57] the chances are you can do that and it may work, but sometimes it won't because your mood will take over.
[10:05] So what you can say to yourself, and you can do this to yourself as well as to or with your partner when you get home or even send them a text or give them a call on the way home.
[10:14] Then you can say, I've had a really tough day, I'm pretty overwhelmed, I'm pretty tired.
[10:19] So I just want some time to decompress before we get into talking about anything serious or get involved in the evening activities.
[10:28] So you actually become more proactive. And this approach will help your partner understand your own emotional state, but also prevents conflict. Conflict. And it gives you those really significant skills of being more emotionally aware and using those sort of self awareness techniques to check in with yourself first and then talk about what it is that you need.
[10:53] The second scenario, which is very common that comes up in conversations is or are the feelings of being disconnected in your relationship. It's that sense of feeling distant. You're probably very busy.
[11:05] A lot of other things are going on. If you've got kids in particular or you've been very social and somehow you're just not spending that much time together, you may find yourself kind of withdrawing a bit more.
[11:18] You may be thinking about these things, but you're internalizing a lot of those thoughts or you're just becoming more avoidant. You may even be spending more time on your phone or on the screen and avoiding interactions, really.
[11:31] And I've got partners who have asked their partner, everything okay? And they'll hear back, yeah, fine, yeah, just tired and that's it. And you can sort of sense that there's something going on, but nothing's being said.
[11:46] And you know, if you find yourself in this kind of avoidant style of communicating, it will just deepen the disconnection. It actually makes things worse.
[11:55] So again, if we go back to what's more effective.
[11:58] Start to acknowledge your feelings, but also invite your partner to reconnect.
[12:04] But you have to be able to own your own feelings. So you may just say to your partner, I've been feeling disconnected. We've been so busy lately. We've been doing lots of other things, but I really miss the time together.
[12:17] Can we make some time together on a regular basis? Maybe every week or every couple of weeks at least to spend some time to reconnect. Now that shows the willingness to work on your relationship.
[12:30] It may be somewhat vulnerable because you may be unsure,
[12:34] but it's a step towards leaning into your partner as opposed to leaning out or avoiding completely.
[12:43] The third one, which is actually quite interesting because it's more about positive emotions than negative ones. This is this sense of you may feel somewhat appreciative or very grateful for your partner that you're happy in your relationship, that things are going well,
[12:59] and for whatever reason that's not being expressed, expressed clearly enough. You may feel grateful for your partner's support, but you just assume they just know, you know, it's kind of assuming that, yeah, you know, that's just the way it is.
[13:12] It's supposed to be like this, that's good, you know, but you're not saying anything. Instead of expressing appreciation, you're not saying anything at all.
[13:19] So in some ways that kind of need to be more positive is almost dismissed outright. Really, you're kind of not saying it at all now. You know, the most important part of the sentiment in a relationship when it, it's kind of long lasting in a way is both the positive sentiments that are going on as much as the negative ones.
[13:42] You need to be communicating what's going well. So maybe take a moment, effective way of communicating this is to acknowledge your gratitude. Say to your partner,
[13:53] I really appreciate how supportive you've been lately. I love you. It means a lot to me. I really want to know how much I really Value who you are and the way you support me.
[14:03] Now, this strengthens intimacy. It's going to make your partner feel great and you will start feeling better about your relationship as well. So the key parts of the takeaway for this at the moment around what is effective and ineffective communication lies in how you're expressing your feelings.
[14:21] Ineffective communication stems from reacting impulsively or even just avoiding the issues. Completely effective communication involves being self aware, calm,
[14:34] more clear and more expressive. When you're practicing these skills, it will lead to a much healthier relationship. So one of the questions I often get asked is, that's great, but how do we keep that going?
[14:47] What builds lasting emotional intimacy?
[14:57] Building long lasting emotional intimacy actually requires intentional effort. It's the willingness, willingness to connect on a deeper level. So let me give you four actionable steps. These are steps you can start doing right now.
[15:13] This is really important to foster the intimate connection that you're looking for in your relationship. Now, the first step is actually about how you connect with yourself. So we've been talking about this in this podcast episode today.
[15:26] It's about your own self awareness. Take some time to identify and understand your own emotions, your own needs and your own values. And you can start to reflect on your own emotional patterns and how they influence your relationship with your partner, but how they influence the way you communicate.
[15:47] And you can start to practice by doing some journaling or writing some stuff down. Those three questions are raised earlier in the podcast of a way of checking in with yourself.
[15:58] What am I feeling? Why am I feeling this way? And how do I express it constructively? This is really important because these are the steps to begin to tune into yourself.
[16:09] And when you can express your own feelings and needs more clearly, you will build a connection with your partner. The second step is about practice. How you practice some of these ways of communicating to begin to share your thoughts and your feelings and your experiences with your partner without judgment.
[16:29] And one classic step when you're communicating is owning your own thoughts and owning your own feelings.
[16:37] Use I statements, own it as opposed to blaming or criticizing. And the other part of honest open communication is how you listen, how present you are to what your partner is saying to you, how you maintain eye contact with them, but also how you practice validating their own experiences as well.
[16:59] Why does it matter? Because we know that open communication will build trust and it will help both of you feel understood and valued. The third step is about being present and engaged.
[17:11] Now they're all quite similar, these steps, but the most important part of this is Having quality time with your partner, eliminate the distractions, put away the phone, close the laptop, turn the TV off, and start to show some genuine interest in thoughts and feelings and experiences about your lives together.
[17:30] Try and practice being empathetic, put yourself into their shoes and try and be more compassionate. And again, when you're doing this more regularly, you're creating safety to connect. And these are the essential ingredients for emotional intimacy.
[17:47] And the fourth step is about how you create safety anyway. Creating the safe space where you can hold each other in terms of fears and dreams and hopes and desires and insecurities that you avoid judgment.
[18:02] You stop the criticism, you look at whether you're dismissing feelings and try and resist the temptation to fix problems. And instead you offer support and reassurance.
[18:14] And in your own way, if you're willing to be more open and more vulnerable, maybe it will encourage your partner to do the same.
[18:21] Emotional safety is the cornerstone of intimacy. It will allow both of you to feel more connected on a deeper level level. So if you begin to follow these steps, you can then give yourself an opportunity to break through the barriers that you've got, which are partly emotional, that will change the way you communicate and that will build long lasting connection.
[18:44] Now, a lot of people kind of know this stuff. What I've been thinking about a lot in recent months is how do I offer a kind of training process that will help you and other people who are interested in this to learn something more about the practice of some of these skills.
[19:03] So I want to share with something with you that I have to offer, which is all connected to how you start to communicate better, but also understand yourself even more.
[19:21] Now I know from the thousands of conversations and consultations I've had with men and women and couples over my time that we all, and they all want a happier and close and connected and intimate relationship.
[19:35] And there's all sorts of reasons why things get in the way of that. And we've spoken about some of those in today's episode. My big core work is guiding men in particular to understand their emotional and relationship skills.
[19:49] So I've created a mini course. It's called From Shutdown to Communication for Relationship Boosting Strategies for Men. It's for guys who want to communicate with more openness and more clarity and confidence.
[20:02] It's for blokes who want to increase emotional connection and break through negative patterns of communicating to enjoy a happier relationship, but in particular to learn how to be more in tune with himself as well as his partner.
[20:17] So the course itself has only two lessons it will take you approximately one hour. I'm going to give you four relationship strategies. The first lesson is called Navigating Distractions. I'm going to give you some of the skills to be more present and more aware in your relationship.
[20:36] And the second lesson is called Communicating with Confidence. It's a step by step guide to connect and engage with a partner. Now these relationship skills are exactly the same strategies that I use and form parts of relationship and couples therapy.
[20:53] And usually if you're in therapy working through this, it will be around six to eight sessions. And you know that's approximately 15 to 1600 dollars, now I'm not gonna get you to pay that price, but even if you did and you were gonna implement the skills in the course like that,
[21:10] I'm sure you would agree it was worth it. But I want you to see the changes when it comes to your relationship right now and this program itself I want you to experience as good value.
[21:20] So I'm gonna give you the mini course for $49.
[21:23] If you're ready to start working on your relationship, click the button that's in the show notes to this podcast episode. It will take you to some more information but also te you how to check out and go into the course pretty much straight away.
[21:39] You get instant access,
[21:41] so I'd love to hear your thoughts about the course or about the episode. You can follow me on Insta Man Talk with Howard if this episode sparks more interest in doing some more consultations with me.
[21:54] There's some information also in the show notes of how you can book a consultation with me either online or face to face. Check out the new program program.
[22:06] I'd love to have you involved. Thanks for listening. If you like what you hear, tell your mates. Give me a review wherever you found the podcast and I look forward to catching up with you again in the next episode of Man Talk.
[00:11] Why can it sometimes be so difficult to communicate in a relationship? Now, if you've ever felt misunderstood or noticing yourself disconnecting or kind of left somewhat confused, or you're even just unsure of what to say and how to express yourself, this episode is definitely for you.
[00:32] We're going to be exploring what emotional barriers mean, why they exist, how they impact your relationship, and most importantly, how to overcome them. And stay with me because I'm going to give you four steps you can take into your life right now.
[00:48] Welcome to the ManTalk Podcast, a podcast of real conversations about life, your life, our life, and the emotional well being of men. My name is Howard Todd Collins. I'm the director of Men and Relationships Counselling,
[01:02] a private counselling practice here in sunny Melbourne, Australia. Thank you for being here. Sit back and relax and join me for this latest episode of Man Talk.
[01:29] Hello, hello, hello, wherever you are, I hope you are doing well wherever you're sitting in the world listening to me.
[01:36] I have been somewhat distracted this last month or so. There's been a very short break in the mentor podcast series. We're coming into autumn, spending most of the summer just coping with the crazy world that we're living in, but also kind of head down creating some new stuff for the practice,
[01:57] but also particularly focusing on training and online courses. And I will give you some more information at the end of this episode about what is now currently available for some personal development training that you can do online with me.
[02:12] And you can do that pretty much from your own home.
[02:15] So stay with me for that because I will tell you more about it later in this episode. We are focusing today on emotional barriers or particular barriers to communication. You know, emotional barriers are like internal walls that we create for ourselves.
[02:31] We build them to protect ourselves.
[02:34] Well, feeling vulnerable or the fear of being rejected or the fear of failing. These are defense mechanisms and within a context of a relationship that can lead to disconnection and isolation, if not escalating conflict within an intimate relationship, but also have a real impact on our own mental health and well being.
[02:54] So what are some of these most common emotional barriers that are going on, particularly for men that I work with? And I'm just going to give you three of them for the moment.
[03:03] The first one is often about fear. Fear of being open and being vulnerable. Now this kind of continues to happen for lots of men who, you know, where we get stuck in this idea that showing emotions is still a sign of weakness.
[03:19] We're fearful of being judged, or we're judging ourselves, or we're fearful of being rejected, or we in fact reject ourselves for feeling what we're feeling. And these are kind of barriers that then get in the way of open communication, particularly with the people that we love.
[03:34] Now, the impact here, of course, is that many of us then share our true feelings or true thoughts. And that leads to the emotional disconnection in a relationship. So, you know, for example, if you're feeling stressed out or you're feeling sad about something,
[03:50] but you're worried that your partner will judge you for those feelings, or that somehow you think they're going to see you as not strong enough or less capable, then it just kind of gets in the way.
[04:02] You may be just thinking that yourself, it may be a projection of some kind, but essentially you're protecting yourself from some of those feelings, fears. The second one, which is very common, is knowing how to identify and express what you're feeling.
[04:16] You know, many of us have not had a great kind of map from our history that teaches us how to identify feelings, let alone express them. It's kind of underdeveloped in most young men and young boys and blokes today.
[04:31] And so it often discourages us from talking about what we're feeling, let alone understanding our emotional experiences, then this can lead to a whole heap of confusion. Confusion for individual men, but also within a relationship, because blokes are closing down as a result.
[04:48] So the struggle here is that you may find it hard to articulate what it is that you're feeling, leading to more miscommunication or no communication at all. So just for example, if you're angry about something and you're not quite sure what it's about, and the root cause of the anger is not being accessed within you,
[05:08] it may well be that you're sad or scared or anxious, but you just get angry first. That makes it very hard to communicate really well with your partner. And the third one as an example is the fear of conflict itself.
[05:21] Many blokes fear that expressing feelings will lead to more arguments or lead to some kind of criticism or therefore rejection in their relationship with their partner. And this fear often stems from a whole lot of history you may be carrying about what you think conflict is about.
[05:40] You know, if you're avoiding conversations altogether, this will lead to resentment and built up unresolved issues within the relationship, also within yourself, right? So if you're avoiding discussing something, you're not happy with and you're just pushing it back into the back of your mind.
[05:57] Chances are this will just escalate more and more as time goes on. So what is it about these emotional barriers and why does it actually happen? And usually I want you to think about this from your own past experiences of managing emotions and stress and the pressure, particularly the expectation that you may have that you should just be strong,
[06:19] right? This kind of idea that men have where we should fix everything, we should be able to know how to solve problems almost without speaking about what we're feeling, right?
[06:30] Or you may be worried or scared of being open because it feels a bit risky. You know, this is the fear of being vulnerable and you don't want to expose some of your weaknesses if you like.
[06:41] And maybe you're not sure where to start. It may be hard to put your feelings into words, which is why staying silent seems easier. And a significant part of why these barriers happen is that you may well be holding on to some of your history where you've been hurt in the past.
[06:59] Now, the way to address your barriers is through your own self awareness. How you increase your own emotional intelligence and also therefore improve your communication skills. Now, research shows that men who struggle to express themselves emotionally are more likely to experience relationship dissatisfaction and their own emotional health challenges.
[07:24] So the first step that I want you to consider is to reflect on your own emotional barriers. Ask yourself the question, what beliefs or fears are holding you back from opening up?
[07:37] Now, awareness is the first step towards change, but significantly understanding what is the role of emotional awareness in particular.
[07:53] So how do we bridge the gap between recognising emotions and expressing them constructively? So here are some practical scenarios and some strategies for you to think about. These are scenarios that come up in my conversations with men and women and couples all the time.
[08:09] They're really common and they may well apply to you or something similar that may apply to you. Now the first scenario which is really common is overwhelmed or being overwhelmed at work and how you bring that home with you.
[08:23] Now, there are some people that I speak to that will say, well, they're almost insistent on not bringing work home. Now, I mean, I get that, you know, it's not about sharing every single task of the day that you've been doing at work.
[08:35] It's actually more about the mood and your sense of self that you're bringing home after a long day at work. So just for example, and I'm sure you recognize this in yourselves, that you've had a long day, irritable, maybe Stressed and you're aware it's been a tough day and you're getting home and you can feel that frustration or the grumpy or the reactive part of you maybe fairly quickly,
[09:00] maybe as soon as you walk in the door.
[09:03] So instead of addressing what you're feeling, you're a bit more snappy with your partner. And even if they ask you how your day was, you can find yourself just reacting sort of, yeah, tough day, rough day, just leave me alone.
[09:16] You know, that kind of more irritable response, of course that's just going to create tension, often leading or leaving your partner somewhat confused. Right. So what I want you to think about in this kind of classic scenario, I think, is those three questions that I put in the segment before is reflecting even as you're going home on those three questions,
[09:39] what am I feeling? Why am I feeling this way? And how can I express it constructively?
[09:45] So if you've got a, you know, you're going home after a really long busy day and you can recognize your stress and even if you're saying to yourself, I don't want to talk about it, you know, it's my day at work, I want to, I want to forget about it,
[09:57] the chances are you can do that and it may work, but sometimes it won't because your mood will take over.
[10:05] So what you can say to yourself, and you can do this to yourself as well as to or with your partner when you get home or even send them a text or give them a call on the way home.
[10:14] Then you can say, I've had a really tough day, I'm pretty overwhelmed, I'm pretty tired.
[10:19] So I just want some time to decompress before we get into talking about anything serious or get involved in the evening activities.
[10:28] So you actually become more proactive. And this approach will help your partner understand your own emotional state, but also prevents conflict. Conflict. And it gives you those really significant skills of being more emotionally aware and using those sort of self awareness techniques to check in with yourself first and then talk about what it is that you need.
[10:53] The second scenario, which is very common that comes up in conversations is or are the feelings of being disconnected in your relationship. It's that sense of feeling distant. You're probably very busy.
[11:05] A lot of other things are going on. If you've got kids in particular or you've been very social and somehow you're just not spending that much time together, you may find yourself kind of withdrawing a bit more.
[11:18] You may be thinking about these things, but you're internalizing a lot of those thoughts or you're just becoming more avoidant. You may even be spending more time on your phone or on the screen and avoiding interactions, really.
[11:31] And I've got partners who have asked their partner, everything okay? And they'll hear back, yeah, fine, yeah, just tired and that's it. And you can sort of sense that there's something going on, but nothing's being said.
[11:46] And you know, if you find yourself in this kind of avoidant style of communicating, it will just deepen the disconnection. It actually makes things worse.
[11:55] So again, if we go back to what's more effective.
[11:58] Start to acknowledge your feelings, but also invite your partner to reconnect.
[12:04] But you have to be able to own your own feelings. So you may just say to your partner, I've been feeling disconnected. We've been so busy lately. We've been doing lots of other things, but I really miss the time together.
[12:17] Can we make some time together on a regular basis? Maybe every week or every couple of weeks at least to spend some time to reconnect. Now that shows the willingness to work on your relationship.
[12:30] It may be somewhat vulnerable because you may be unsure,
[12:34] but it's a step towards leaning into your partner as opposed to leaning out or avoiding completely.
[12:43] The third one, which is actually quite interesting because it's more about positive emotions than negative ones. This is this sense of you may feel somewhat appreciative or very grateful for your partner that you're happy in your relationship, that things are going well,
[12:59] and for whatever reason that's not being expressed, expressed clearly enough. You may feel grateful for your partner's support, but you just assume they just know, you know, it's kind of assuming that, yeah, you know, that's just the way it is.
[13:12] It's supposed to be like this, that's good, you know, but you're not saying anything. Instead of expressing appreciation, you're not saying anything at all.
[13:19] So in some ways that kind of need to be more positive is almost dismissed outright. Really, you're kind of not saying it at all now. You know, the most important part of the sentiment in a relationship when it, it's kind of long lasting in a way is both the positive sentiments that are going on as much as the negative ones.
[13:42] You need to be communicating what's going well. So maybe take a moment, effective way of communicating this is to acknowledge your gratitude. Say to your partner,
[13:53] I really appreciate how supportive you've been lately. I love you. It means a lot to me. I really want to know how much I really Value who you are and the way you support me.
[14:03] Now, this strengthens intimacy. It's going to make your partner feel great and you will start feeling better about your relationship as well. So the key parts of the takeaway for this at the moment around what is effective and ineffective communication lies in how you're expressing your feelings.
[14:21] Ineffective communication stems from reacting impulsively or even just avoiding the issues. Completely effective communication involves being self aware, calm,
[14:34] more clear and more expressive. When you're practicing these skills, it will lead to a much healthier relationship. So one of the questions I often get asked is, that's great, but how do we keep that going?
[14:47] What builds lasting emotional intimacy?
[14:57] Building long lasting emotional intimacy actually requires intentional effort. It's the willingness, willingness to connect on a deeper level. So let me give you four actionable steps. These are steps you can start doing right now.
[15:13] This is really important to foster the intimate connection that you're looking for in your relationship. Now, the first step is actually about how you connect with yourself. So we've been talking about this in this podcast episode today.
[15:26] It's about your own self awareness. Take some time to identify and understand your own emotions, your own needs and your own values. And you can start to reflect on your own emotional patterns and how they influence your relationship with your partner, but how they influence the way you communicate.
[15:47] And you can start to practice by doing some journaling or writing some stuff down. Those three questions are raised earlier in the podcast of a way of checking in with yourself.
[15:58] What am I feeling? Why am I feeling this way? And how do I express it constructively? This is really important because these are the steps to begin to tune into yourself.
[16:09] And when you can express your own feelings and needs more clearly, you will build a connection with your partner. The second step is about practice. How you practice some of these ways of communicating to begin to share your thoughts and your feelings and your experiences with your partner without judgment.
[16:29] And one classic step when you're communicating is owning your own thoughts and owning your own feelings.
[16:37] Use I statements, own it as opposed to blaming or criticizing. And the other part of honest open communication is how you listen, how present you are to what your partner is saying to you, how you maintain eye contact with them, but also how you practice validating their own experiences as well.
[16:59] Why does it matter? Because we know that open communication will build trust and it will help both of you feel understood and valued. The third step is about being present and engaged.
[17:11] Now they're all quite similar, these steps, but the most important part of this is Having quality time with your partner, eliminate the distractions, put away the phone, close the laptop, turn the TV off, and start to show some genuine interest in thoughts and feelings and experiences about your lives together.
[17:30] Try and practice being empathetic, put yourself into their shoes and try and be more compassionate. And again, when you're doing this more regularly, you're creating safety to connect. And these are the essential ingredients for emotional intimacy.
[17:47] And the fourth step is about how you create safety anyway. Creating the safe space where you can hold each other in terms of fears and dreams and hopes and desires and insecurities that you avoid judgment.
[18:02] You stop the criticism, you look at whether you're dismissing feelings and try and resist the temptation to fix problems. And instead you offer support and reassurance.
[18:14] And in your own way, if you're willing to be more open and more vulnerable, maybe it will encourage your partner to do the same.
[18:21] Emotional safety is the cornerstone of intimacy. It will allow both of you to feel more connected on a deeper level level. So if you begin to follow these steps, you can then give yourself an opportunity to break through the barriers that you've got, which are partly emotional, that will change the way you communicate and that will build long lasting connection.
[18:44] Now, a lot of people kind of know this stuff. What I've been thinking about a lot in recent months is how do I offer a kind of training process that will help you and other people who are interested in this to learn something more about the practice of some of these skills.
[19:03] So I want to share with something with you that I have to offer, which is all connected to how you start to communicate better, but also understand yourself even more.
[19:21] Now I know from the thousands of conversations and consultations I've had with men and women and couples over my time that we all, and they all want a happier and close and connected and intimate relationship.
[19:35] And there's all sorts of reasons why things get in the way of that. And we've spoken about some of those in today's episode. My big core work is guiding men in particular to understand their emotional and relationship skills.
[19:49] So I've created a mini course. It's called From Shutdown to Communication for Relationship Boosting Strategies for Men. It's for guys who want to communicate with more openness and more clarity and confidence.
[20:02] It's for blokes who want to increase emotional connection and break through negative patterns of communicating to enjoy a happier relationship, but in particular to learn how to be more in tune with himself as well as his partner.
[20:17] So the course itself has only two lessons it will take you approximately one hour. I'm going to give you four relationship strategies. The first lesson is called Navigating Distractions. I'm going to give you some of the skills to be more present and more aware in your relationship.
[20:36] And the second lesson is called Communicating with Confidence. It's a step by step guide to connect and engage with a partner. Now these relationship skills are exactly the same strategies that I use and form parts of relationship and couples therapy.
[20:53] And usually if you're in therapy working through this, it will be around six to eight sessions. And you know that's approximately 15 to 1600 dollars, now I'm not gonna get you to pay that price, but even if you did and you were gonna implement the skills in the course like that,
[21:10] I'm sure you would agree it was worth it. But I want you to see the changes when it comes to your relationship right now and this program itself I want you to experience as good value.
[21:20] So I'm gonna give you the mini course for $49.
[21:23] If you're ready to start working on your relationship, click the button that's in the show notes to this podcast episode. It will take you to some more information but also te you how to check out and go into the course pretty much straight away.
[21:39] You get instant access,
[21:41] so I'd love to hear your thoughts about the course or about the episode. You can follow me on Insta Man Talk with Howard if this episode sparks more interest in doing some more consultations with me.
[21:54] There's some information also in the show notes of how you can book a consultation with me either online or face to face. Check out the new program program.
[22:06] I'd love to have you involved. Thanks for listening. If you like what you hear, tell your mates. Give me a review wherever you found the podcast and I look forward to catching up with you again in the next episode of Man Talk.
