Marie: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to This Complex Life. Today I have with me accredited mental health social worker and certified Gottman therapist and advanced Gottman clinical trainer, John Flanagan. Welcome John.

John: Hey, Marie, how you going?

Marie: I’m good. Thanks for joining me on this special series for Men’s Health Month.

Marie: Let’s dive right in when, uh, when you think about mental health, um, what’s one thing that when it comes to understanding or talking about men’s mental health in specific, specifically that we get wrong.

John: Yeah. That’s a, that’s a nice question off the top. Marie, I do a lot of training. I work with a lot of, you know, social workers and psychologists and therapists and, and I often hear this.

John: That men, um, really struggle to, to be able to talk about their feelings. Um, I actually don’t believe that. I really don’t believe that. I think men are very capable of actually engaging in conversation about what’s going on in their world, what’s going on around them and inside them. I think they can actually talk about their feelings and they do it really effectively.

John: I think sometimes we don’t have necessarily the environments that encourage that type of conversation with men. But I don’t think it’s some sort of genetic flaw that men can’t do that. And in fact, there was this piece of research, you know, because I’m a Gottman therapist, right? And so John Gottman has done so much research about what makes relationships work and fail over 45 years.

John: And his My best friend and research colleague, uh, Livingston, had a look at all the videotapes that John Gottman had recorded of couples, and he looked at the amount of emotion words that were used per minute by men and women, and women used eight emotion words per minute, and men used seven. It was hardly a difference.

John: And that’s certainly been my experience, both working with couples, but also, you know, coming from a family of seven, you know, four boys in that family, having a group of mates where I live, um, having sons. And, and, and their friends and, um, yeah, I think men can easily talk about what’s happening. Sometimes I just don’t think we create the environment for it or when it does happen.

John: One of the mistakes that happen is that we quickly move to problem solving. We quickly move to trying to fix maybe a negative emotion or a [00:03:00] negative feeling or situation, you know, and sometimes, in fact, Almost always, I reckon, people just want to be heard. They just don’t want to be alone in their struggle.

John: So creating that sort of space, I reckon, is really important.

Marie: It’s funny you say, stop trying to fix it, because that’s one of the things that I hear most when I work with teenagers that they’ll share something with their parents and their parents are trying to fix it because they want to take away those uncomfortable feelings.

Marie: And it’s something that shows up a lot in my couples therapy work. And I know we’ve had a conversation about, you know, that idea of fixing it. It’s great when you’re building a bridge. Or a road or putting together Ikea furniture, even, but it’s not great when it comes to feeling.

John: Or if you’re getting a knee replacement, you want the surgeon to fix it properly.

John: Please. But it’s not about relationships though. You know, I learned from her, you know, as a, as a, when my son, who actually just turned 21 on the weekend, we had a party. You know, relatives and friends came to it and I learned, you know, particularly when he was moving into the teenage years, the best thing I could do is to shut up when he started to talk and just to listen and be present.

John: It’s, it was the presence and, and, you know, and, and some curiosity and some open ended questions about what was happening for him in his story. Um, that’s where I learned the most about what was happening in my son’s life outside of what’s being in home. And that goes across the board.

Marie: So it’s not, it’s not an innate lack of capacity, but there are things that I think prevent that from being, um, as I don’t know, easy or natural for some, for some folk.

Marie: What do you kind of notice in that space, not just in a therapy context, but for individuals with their friends, families, partners?

John: There are messages. There are messages that we swallow whole from a very young age that we don’t fully digest. Um, suck it up. Get over it. You’ll be right. You know, like they just come to mind.

John: Don’t cry or I’ll give you something to cry about. You know, terrible sayings that we don’t, we don’t fully comprehend. They’re just inside us. Right. And they act as this. Sort of unconscious or unthought through set of rules that we use when we’re talking to others. Where we use in terms of how we relate or how we think about ourselves.

John: And, um, it’s good to [00:06:00] dispel some of those

Marie: myths. Those meta emotions, really, of understanding the feelings we have about feelings.

John: Exactly, I love that. And, you know, I’ve been in this field a long time and it still confuses me. How do I feel about my feelings? Like, I’m not quite sure if I really understand what that means. But it’s, I, I think, I think what we’re getting at there is, do I think emotions are okay on, do I think expressing them are okay?

John: Particularly the, the more vulnerable ones. And um, and, and if I don’t, then I’ll probably keep my own counsel, right? I’ll probably keep it all to myself. And that leads to a stronger sense of. Isolation and loneliness, and we know they contribute significantly to, to poor mental health.

Marie: As you were saying that around, you know, Do I think this is okay?

Marie: I’ve worked with some people that it’s not even a conscious thought that there’s another way. It’s just, it’s fact. And it’s been squished down for so long that it’s not even a matter of, do I feel okay to express sadness? It’s more, this is not okay. And it’s just become so ingrained in their, Communication in their ability to identify it.

Marie: And I see a lot of negative ways of coping with those big feelings. What are some things that you, you notice in your work?

John: In terms of sort of how people cope with bottling that up?

Marie: Yeah. So if someone’s listening to this and they’re like, yeah, Mark, I don’t talk much about emotions cause I don’t know what they are, or I do squish them down.

Marie: I’ve been told to suck it up.

John: Yeah, flip side. Yeah, well, sort of, we’ll know that if that’s your experience, it’s probably your friend’s experience and their friend’s experience as well. So you’re actually not alone in that. And, and it just takes one move. It just takes, Uh, you know, to talk to a friend and go, you know, right, right now, I’m actually not traveling that well.

John: Can I talk to you for five minutes? And if that person is a good friend, they’re going to hold space for you. They’re going to hear, they’re going to listen to you. They’re not going to try to problem solve. They’re going to be on your side. And that, that’s the beginning of a whole new journey. That’s a, that’s a whole new way of moving through your world [00:09:00] where you’re not actually

John: with people, but isolated from them, where you’re actually genuinely connecting. You’ve got to show yourself to actually have a true friendship. You’ve got to show yourself. And that means. That means also vulnerable, vulnerable bits, you know, like, um, Christmas night, right? Um, I live on Gold Coast hinterland and there was a big, um, tornado that hit our place.

John: And in the morning, like the road was cut, all our trees were down. We had a 14 meter branch through the, uh, through the, you know, back roof into the bedroom, you know, through the floor, down, down into the bedroom downstairs. It was an absolute war zone and, um, you know, I’ve worked in the trauma field a long time, but I was certainly going through a whole range of different, my whole family were going through a whole range of.

John: Sort of being in shock and, and, and quite disorientated to, to what was occurring. And, and our neighbors and our friends gathered around and, you know, bought their, you know, bought their chainsaws, right? And, and helped. But also, we’re just checking in, going, what’s happening for you right now? And I really didn’t know, I couldn’t really answer that.

John: But they were asking the question, asking the question. If you see a mate that’s not traveling that well, they’re not going to get worse by you asking the question and holding space, being present, being curious, asking open ended question. Yeah.

Marie: There’s a real call to action for some people if you notice someone’s maybe not okay to ask, but also it’s okay to say to someone, I’m not doing so well.

John: It really is. And in fact, it’s really important to be able to do that. There’s a leap of faith in that there’s a risk in get that, but I think it’s a worthwhile risk.

Marie: I see it. And I’d be curious to, to, um, to see if you notice a similar trend, but I, I do get some, some folks who come and see me and they’re trying to get on top of gambling or drinking, or there’s been like a, what they see is.

Marie: They see it as the primary reason, but I see it as secondary to some of these, um, these themes around not reaching out for support, not even knowing how, feeling lonely, feeling disconnected, and substances or gambling often can be a very painful Tempting.

John: Or pornography use, right? Something, something just to feel a little bit more alive or to just sort of dissipate that real sense of where am I, who [00:12:00] am I, am I completely alone, right?

John: And, and we use substances or, or, or behaviors like gambling because they give us. You know, they, they work on, um, Um, you know, a range of, uh, well, they work on a dopamine response, right? And so dopamine is a feel good, um, hormone. And so we have these moments of feeling okay, but we need these external stimuluses that are often have really quite negative consequences long term to feel okay.

John: Whereas Marie, what we were talking about just before taking that risk. connecting with another human being, that’s way more adaptive

Marie: and,

John: and, and has so many positive aspects for a person’s life. So yeah.

Marie: When you think of your work with couples, what are some of those common, maybe communication issues, it could be related to what we’re talking about, but what do you observe in sort of heterosexual relationships when it comes to communication?

John: Oh, a lot of things. How long have we got? Yeah, that’s right. You know, we know a lot about relationship communication. Yeah. And there are patterns of negative interaction that happen, you know, John Galtman famously, you know, talked about the four horsemen of the relationship apocalypse of, you know, contempt and defensiveness and criticism and defensiveness, contempt and stonewalling.

John: And these become negative patterns. You know, like you raise an issue, but the way in which you raise an issue identifies the problem to be with your partner or indeed in your partner, a characteristic of their person. And of course, when someone’s getting targeted, right, they’re going to defend themselves.

John: And so it creates this, this sort of negative interaction that happens. And so you may have been fighting about the state of things. The house or the, you know, the yard, but, you know, very quickly, you’re not fighting about that anymore. You’re fighting about something about how we’re treating each other right now.

John: So it sort of becomes a win lose competition and this escalates and creates a sort of more more of these horsemen contempt and stonewalling contemptors. I’m criticizing my partner but I’m being really quite belligerent in this now I’m looking down my nose at my partner. It’s name calling. And that sort of can easily shut the other person down and so they start to stonewall like they build a wall up between, you know, themselves and their partner with the aim to try to stop this awful interaction that’s happening.

John: But [00:15:00] what we know with stonewalling is that it increases it, it increases negativity, you know, um, it increases, uh, the escalation of what’s happening.

Marie: Sorry.

John: What we know, right, for a person stonewalling is that they’re feeling stressed. And so, being able to, to reduce that stress is really important. And for the person sort of using contempt is to talk more about what they’re feeling and needing and stop describing your partner. See, conflict happens.

John: Conflict’s important. We need our conflict. But when the four horsemen are there It creates negativity. Now it’s the negativity in relation, in relationship communication that creates this real sort of sense of isolation and distance and not being understood and your partner not being there for you, but we know what to do about it and so good communication then is about using the general startup, you know, no relationship is absent from conflict.

John: So it’s good to have conflict. It has really important pro social aspects. It weeds out things in the relationship that aren’t working. It actually brings you closer. Um, but we need to use a gentle startup. The way you begin a complaint predicts the way it ends. If I start it gently, it will end gently 96 percent of the time.

John: But if I started harshly, if I started with a name call or a blame, or you never, or you should, or you always, if I, if I do that, it’s going to end poorly. And it’s very difficult to turn that around. So a general startup is, is, is critical around conflict, as is being able to accept influence from your partner.

John: You know, not always being a hundred percent right. Being open to, to valid yet subjective perspectives or realities. There is very little absolutes in relationship. There is your perspective and my perspective. And it doesn’t mean because I have a different perspective. Your perspective is wrong. And so leading into understanding your partner more and, and, and moving to validating their perspective, even if I don’t agree.

John: Critical in a relationship, but you know, Marie, I could really go on a long time.

Marie: I’m just like, I’m scribbling down so many things. I’m like, Oh my goodness. I want to do a whole conversation on each one of these things. I want to [00:18:00] rewind it back just a bit. I think some people listening would have like, their brains might explode at this idea that conflict builds trust.

Marie: And it’s something I talk to people a lot about and they really, they think a perfect relationship, whether it’s a friendship or a romantic relationship, parent child, it doesn’t matter. They think the perfect relationship has no conflict. And I tell them all that’s bullshit. And they say they really struggle with this idea that conflict is funny.

Marie: Even if you were dating your identical twin, you would drive each other bonkers at some point. It’s, it’s not the mark of a perfect relationship isn’t the absence of conflict. Tell me more about that. Because you said conflict is important and it weeds things out and it builds trust. How do you share that with the people that come and see you?

John: Well, see, behind every negative emotion or complaint, right, behind every complaint, there’s a longing, a want, a need, a positive need. And it’s about conflict is about a way of understanding that for your partner, what is their longing? What is their need? What is their positive need on this issue? So conflict therefore is like a GPS system, a navigation system to your partner.

John: It allows you to understand them in a whole lot deeper way. A whole lot better way. And it allows you then to go, Hmm, maybe I could actually meet that need. Maybe I could be part of that. All right. And so you’re back on the same team again. It feels hard. It’s uncomfortable. Oh, they’re complaining, particularly if they’re complaining about you, right?

John: It’s harder when they do that, but you know, some deep breaths and, and, and, and really trying to understand what’s underneath the complaint. What is it that they really need, the positive need, right? So think about conflict as a navigation system to your partner. A way of knowing them more. Also know this piece too.

John: In all relationships across the world, good and bad, 69 percent of conflict across all relationships is what we call perpetual. It’s ongoing. What you fight about in year, you know, in the first six months, you fight about in the next year, the next five years, the next 10 years. Now that’s neither good nor bad.

John: That’s just [00:21:00] what happens in a relationship. Most conflict is perpetual in nature. The reason for that is that as you were saying, even if You were almost exactly the same person. You would still have conflict, right? Um, because we have different upbringings, childhood experiences, personalities, values, beliefs, dreams, desires.

John: You know, we are, you know, a relationship is two minds rather than one. And so there’s going to be difference. Difference is normal. And so, you know, messy, tidy, adventurous, safe, extroverted, introvert, you’re gonna have difference. That in itself is not a problem, but what can happen is that these perpetual issues, some of them can get stuck.

John: Can become gridlocked, like two fists in opposition to each other. And you keep spinning your wheels on the same issue over and over again. Most couples have a one or two, five or six gridlocked perpetual issues, right? And again, What’s needed in that is to be able to unlock the deeper purpose and dream that exists in the position that your partner has.

John: See, we don’t get stuck on issues and we don’t stay in our position just to be stubborn or belligerent. Although it feels that way, and certainly I’ve been used to that, um, but we, we stay in our position because there’s something deeper there and we may not even understand it, but it’s through it.

John: Conversation and dialogue, trying to move to that deeper understanding of what, what is that, what, what are the deeper values that we have? What is our dream that exists within the position that we are, that isn’t being met, that needs to be met? And they are, you know, that is my most favorite part of work.

John: The beauty that exists, the dreams that exist within that tension, within that gridlock with couples and seeing, seeing that really come to the surface and that realization, uh, that

John: both of our perspectives when we, when we dive down on it are completely valid. And then we work towards how do we incorporate both [00:24:00] of our dreams in that

Marie: so many ways to take this. We could really do a whole series. Um, as you were saying around trying to find, you know, behind every conflict, there’s a longing and trying to find the positive need. It made, it kind of did a one 80 for me to what you said earlier around this idea of trying to fix it. And I want to just touch on that for a moment of sometimes the need.

Marie: It’s to feel heard and validated, not to fix the actual thing. So if someone’s having a really shitty day at work, they don’t need their partner to say, well, why don’t you just quit?

John: Yeah. Well, why don’t you tell them off? You, you, you shouldn’t take that. Or maybe your boss has got a point, you know, like you are late a lot.

John: You do have a loose association with time,

Marie: like

John: siding with the uneven, you know, like, whoa, don’t do that. I’ve seen that blow up. Big time, almost exactly word for word, like, and it’s, and

Marie: then it becomes a fight about that partner’s response on top of the already stressful work day. So that person feels alone, unheard, invalidated, and then criticized by their partner when they’re trying to get a need

John: met.

John: Yeah, that’s it. And so the outside pressures, the outside world and all its complexity now is leaking into bleeding into the relationship and creating pressure there. Whereas just holding space, validating, not siding with the enemy, being your partner’s cheerleader, reflecting back, empathy. Yeah. Being curious, that creates a fortress around the relationship.

John: And so those external pressures don’t bleed in. In fact, We’re looking out of a shared window to the world, shoulder to shoulder. It is that what we’re just talking about right now is, you know, just such a key, uh, um, strength in a relationship. And, you know, when couples, you know, come and do therapy with me, um, when they really lock in on that sort of stress reducing conversation, as we were just describing, they do a whole lot better.

Marie: And

John: they don’t really, yeah.

Marie: You mentioned validating doesn’t mean you have to agree. And I, I feel like sometimes I am trying, if I, if I could just get one message across to, um, to parents or I find dads really find this one much harder for some [00:27:00] reason, I’m not sure why, but if, you know, it’s a message that comes up a lot.

Marie: Um, how can we explain that to listeners? So one of the examples I give, um, I’m just thinking of something recent when I was running a group and we did a role play on a kid coming home from school and saying I got in trouble by the teacher. An empathic response would be like, Oh, that’s sorry to hear that.

Marie: Or that must’ve been really embarrassing or, Oh, you were looking forward to doing something on Friday night and now you’ve got a detention. You don’t have to agree that they did or didn’t deserve. to get that attention. It’s actually just empathizing with their feelings. But what parents do, they’re like, well, why’d you get detention?

Marie: What did you say to the teacher? Well, that makes sense that they would say that. And then they go off into that critical bit. So how can, how do you explain this to people? How do you get that buy in to really get them to understand that empathy doesn’t mean you agree or you endorse or condone it. I get what, based on the information you have, that makes sense how you feel.

John: Look, let me take it out of the parenting role, because it, it brings up too many memories for me coming home from school, getting in trouble, having to tell my dad, who was like, you know, a detective inspector, you know, of the Queensland police force. So I was, if I told him I was going to get in double trouble.

John: He would always back the teacher. So I’m going to take it all, I’m going to take it away from that. And um, you know, validation is, and a really good way to validate is to validate the feeling that someone has when someone is feeling hurt, sad, or alone, deed, happy, or excited, or, you know, validate that, you know, it makes sense to me.

John: That you’re feeling really sad, right? So what we’re, what we’re really talking about in validation is validating the experience of the person because it’s that person who had that experience. So you’re validating the person.

John: And I think John Gottman said this. So, and particularly in relationships, right? Um, you can validate, be connected, or be right and be alone. So, you know, do I want to disconnect with my partner by moving into my subjective value, my subjective experience, my opinion, and then placing that opinion onto them.

John: I’m not living their life,

Marie: right?

John: They are. And so if I want to be part of that life, if I want to be connected to [00:30:00] that life, um, then I’m not necessarily going to go, my perspective is more correct than your perspective. That only leads to disconnection. You know,

Marie: How about that? How might we give people some language for that?

Marie: So one thing I, I see people really struggle with is that multiple things can be true at So if your partner has to go away for work for a weekend, let’s say, um, let’s say me and my partner has to go away and I can say, I’m really sad that you’re going to be away this weekend. They could respond with hostility or anger or, you know, I have to go for work, blah, blah, blah.

Marie: Or, but you got to go last weekend. Like there could be all these responses. What might a more connected response look like? So, you know, I’ve said, I’m really disappointed. You’re going to be away this week. And I was looking forward to some time together.

John: And so we can even gentle that statement, even a little bit more, right? That’s a pretty general statement that you just made. You know, I understand that you got to go away for work. And you told me that before. I know that, but you know, I still actually feel a little bit sad that you’re gone. And that I was, you know, I would really like to be able to do things with you today or on the weekend.

John: And then the response to that is, yeah, no, it sucks, doesn’t it? I feel the same, right? And so now we’ve got a different connection happening, but what can happen in that is that the, the partner feels blamed for having to go to work. Right. Now, you may not have used blaming language in it as well, but there might already be a little bit of guilt about that by the partner.

John: And so raising that elicits that guilt and then defense occurs because of that. So I can’t stress enough how important it is to really think about when you bring up fake feelings. With your partner to think about how do I say this in a way that’s going to land for them? How do I say it in a way that I’m going to be heard and they’re going to be okay with it so they can, they can hear it too.

John: And so I like the notion of a preemptive repair. Hey, I just want to talk about what I’m feeling right now. Now this mightn’t come out right, and I’m not blaming you. It’s not about what you’re doing. I just need to tell you how [00:33:00] I’m feeling. So can you just hold that space for me a little bit while I do this?

John: Right? And of course the answer is going to be, okay, I’ll try. Right? You’ve got a chance. You’ve got a chance for your message to be heard. Of course. So here’s the thing, right? No one does it perfectly all the time. I know I don’t. And um, sometimes I’m tired, feeling a bit strung out and I can get sharp, right?

John: But here’s another thing I reckon that’s just essential is the capacity to make repair is really important.

Marie: So they finally get to fix it. The repair. That’s it.

John: That’s right. Yeah, that’s right. Yeah, but you’re repairing the feelings. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we don’t declare war on problem solving, but it’s just not as needed as what we think it is.

John: Hmm. Yeah. You know, government predicts that. When you, you’re together with your partner, uh, you’re only gonna be really attuned to each other around 50% of the time. The other 50% of the time, you’re sort of in your head, or you’re distracted, or you know, tired, whatever it might be. And so if, if it’s 50% for you and 50% for your partner, then the probability of that lining up is 25%, meaning 75% , 75% of the time is ripe for misunderstanding, miscommunication.

John: And so, you know, given the probability, it’s good to learn how to repair, how to say sorry. I know some people have problems with saying sorry, but I can tell you that it’s an essential skill in a relationship to take responsibility, to understand, uh, the impact maybe your crankiness had on your partner, to take responsibility for that and then to atone for that, to say sorry.

Marie: Yeah. Yeah, that’s huge. That accountability, um, especially one of the scripts where you, you know, the aftermath of a fight is really being able to do that. It doesn’t mean this, the circumstances, they might not change if you’re sleep deprived or you’re working huge hours or there’s financial pressure that might not be able to be changed immediately.

Marie: And you can still say, I was tired and I was snappy and what you said really upset me, but how I responded was not okay. And for that, I’m sorry. Like, it doesn’t have to be a blanket, but I’m sorry, because I think actually that does more harm. I’ve had some couples where one’s like, well, I’ve said, sorry.

Marie: It’s like, I’m sorry. [00:36:00] But that in there, sorry, wasn’t a, I see this bit I wounded in you and I take responsibility for it by naming it and acknowledging it is part of what makes that a beautiful apology for the receiver.

John: That’s it. Um, uh, so, you know, it is. Understanding the hurt of your partner, taking responsibility of your actions, and some sort of rationale about what was going on for you, and then, and the, the, the sorry then, that sorry then is connected to something way more meaningful, as opposed to, I’m sorry, I said I’m sorry, I’m not going to say it again.

John: There’s no healing in that. Right. And, you know, we, we, we need to be each other’s, um, you know, bandage sometimes we need to be able to help heal each other sometimes.

Marie: If someone’s listening, if, um, they’re listening to some of this stuff, they’re like, I wouldn’t even know where to start. It’s like, just feels too foreign or too scary.

Marie: Where can, where can people get started? So one of the things that I talk about in my work is. The retention or firstly, the men attending therapy and help seek that help seeking behavior is very low, much lower than we would like. And the retention rate is appalling. So something like 50 percent don’t come back for the second session.

Marie: So we’ve got a culture that maybe squishes emotions down, suck it up. Blah, blah, blah, pull up your socks, all that stuff. And then a gap in the representation of gender diversity in those therapy roles. And then something between either expectation and the delivery of service not quite matching up. So.

Marie: It’s, it’s not super easy to get these conversations happening and people, um, picking up some of those, those skills or knowing where to start, where could someone start if they’re just starting from scratch and they’re thinking, actually, maybe I’m not okay, or I’ve noticed some of these patterns that I do in a relationship and I want to do it different.

John: Yeah. Well, you know,

John: say, you know, my, my area of expertise is in relationships, right? I, I mean, I would start by getting onto YouTube and, and watching the, the multitude of clips by, um, John Julie Gomm, talking about what makes relationships work and what makes relationships fail. Um, I can’t stress enough, and I really do believe [00:39:00] that.

John: One of the strongest antidotes for mental health symptoms is a secure, loving, attached relationship. I think it’s really quite a significant piece of the puzzle, if you’re lucky enough to be in a relationship, of course. Um, so, you know, that’s a beginning. That’s a beginning point. Um,

John: There are, and I, I, I see this selling emerging in my community. Like, you know, on Mondays and Thursdays I go to a boxing group at six o’clock in the morning with a group of fellas and it’s body sparring and we, you know, punch each other. Nothing like your relationship fellow, you know, having a good left hook and, um, uh, but that.

John: That sense of connection and support. There’s not a lot of talking, but there is some talking, um, that level of support I value a lot, right? You can get support in your community without necessarily having to go to therapy. Um, but it, you know, but that fluctuates depending on the community that you’re in.

John: Um,

John: um, there are some incredible, uh, books also, um, you know, on relationships, um, and audio books and being able to listen to them together with your partner. It’s fantastic. There’s a free app, the Gottman Card Deck app. Right, that you can download on your smartphones and that has a whole range of different activities that you can do.

John: Um, but when it comes to specific mental health services for people, I would probably leave that to you, Marie, to be able to talk about more effectively. I’ve had such a narrow, uh, vision over the last 12 years running relationships Institute Australasia and early head psychology and relationship planning.

John: I’m sort of out of the loop a little bit when it comes to those individual resources.

Marie: I mean, I. I’m a convert to relationship therapy being probably more effective, I think, than some mental health treatment, because everything we do is in relationship. And Depression, anxiety, some of those, uh, really common mood disorders are [00:42:00] signaling something to us.

Marie: And it’s often, I don’t feel hurt, seen, connected, I’m worried about getting something wrong. They’re relational skills and individual therapy can be amazing. And wow. Couples therapy if done well and done early, I think as well can be life changing. And so maybe it’s, it’s letting people know we’re not going to be a referee.

Marie: Uh, we don’t in couples therapy, uh, Have a couple sit down and then turn to one person and be like, great. So now that you’re here, you ought to blame for these. You ought to, I think people are really scared of copying the blame or that they’re going to get blindsided or that we’re just going to tell them what they’ve done wrong.

Marie: Like there are some really big misunderstandings around the process of even couples therapy.

John: The neutrality of the relationship therapist is critical. As is the capacity of the therapist to need and structure a session. Um, uh, unstructured relationship therapy doesn’t work. And so if you go to a, you know, an emotionally focused couple therapy, you’re trained, well trained, or a Gottman therapist, well trained.

John: Um, you will move into, uh, structures that are about the couple really being able to, in a really safe, unescalated space, being able to talk through, um, the deeper issues that are occurring in the relationship. Um, you know, in our work in Gottman Therapy, um, we do a really thorough assessment and a feedback session in which we, uh, strategically.

John: Uh, are able to identify what the key treatment goals are required for the relationship to get back on track. And we have a range of different interventions and homework tasks that will be used. We, we tend to master therapy, so you’re not in therapy forever, but we like to do a reasonable amount quickly, um, and then we fade it out, right?

John: Um, but we will have sessions in, you know, three months, six months, just for an hour, right? Just to make sure that the work that was done and the change that has occurred has stuck. So we’re preventing relapse, like any other medical, um, uh, medical condition, um, So, you know, like, I’ve just seen such wonderful outcomes, uh, um, by many good therapists, by many therapists as well, really helping relationships, you know, it’s a bit of a cliche, but [00:45:00] we really do see it in, in terms of, um, you know, world peace, one relationship at a time.

Marie: I, yeah, I mean, I’m on board. I think it, it can change a whole community and a whole ecosystem. And with my. Focus on relationships and families, a happy couple is happy children, role models for them. What’s a happy relationship that flows on into like an entire community can be really shaped by how well a relationship is going.

John: 100%. There’s a ripple across. No, no question about that.

Marie: So for people, uh, who want to kind of find out a bit more about your pop links to all your stuff in the show notes and a link to the Gottman Institute’s YouTube channel, the Cardec app, which I love, um, and some of the books. My, my go to at the moment, I’m just going to pick on my bookshelf.

Marie: I think I’ve got them at work, but I think I’m,

John: everybody’s getting

Marie: a copy of eight dates. That’s been one of my, one of my most current, um, ones that I absolutely love. Is there one that you kind of think? Top of your mind that’s like, yeah, actually, this is a pretty good one. Nice, easy, gentle start in.

John: Yeah.

John: Well, you know, um, John Gottman just, you know, and Julie did a new book called Fight Right. And that’s a really good summary of everything that we know as well. Um, the seven principles of making marriage work is a classic document. Really worthwhile. I think that’ll give

Marie: us a

John: lot.

John: Good. Um, there’s this great book though, just one more book, there’s this great book on, on sex and intimacy and relationships called, um, come as you are by Emily, and, um, and I think that’s a must read as well.

Marie: Yeah, I think for some people, if you’re just starting out

Marie: the eight dates or the card deck could be really good because they’re smaller. But I mean, I I’m reading come and you see what come as you are and it’s. It’s, it’s not easily digestible to kind of smash out in one kind of go. It falls a lot and it can really blow your mind. If you don’t know anything about sexuality and sexual health, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s pretty profound.

Marie: It can really bust a lot of myths there.

John: Absolutely.

Marie: Well, thanks so much for your time. Hopefully folks find this helpful, um, in the series of, of conversations for men’s health month.

John: Pleasure. Thank you for having me. [00:48:00] Bye.