ERP 185: How to Live an Unhidden Life, an Interview With Robert Kandell
Welcome to The Empowered Relationship Podcast, helping you turn relationship challenges into opportunities and setting you up for relationship success. Your host, Dr. Jessica Higgins, is a licensed psychologist and relationship coach who shares valuable tips, tools and resources for you to dramatically improve your relationship.
This podcast is 100% ad-free. To support this show, please subscribe and write a review today. Here is your host.
* * *
Hi, thank you for joining today’s podcast episode. Today’s episode is 185, “How to live an unhidden life”, an interview with Robert Kandell.
If you’ve been a long-term listener, you may know that many of the episodes I deliver, the tools and the tips that I’m giving you, kind of insight into what I see with my couples, or perhaps what I’ve known as far as my research, or information that I’m learning from other experts in the field… And as of late, I’ve been interviewing quite a few people. A while back you may have heard me talk about getting some support to help produce these podcasts, and help my systems, if you will… So I have a team that are helping at the podcast, and really put those out, and now I have somebody that’s helping schedule people that have reached out to be on the show. Many people have reached out and I haven’t had the bandwidth to determine if they’re a good fit, and to schedule that, and so I’m getting some support and I have this influx of people that I’m interviewing…
So I would be interested in hearing how this is working for you. Are you enjoying these interviews, and are you getting value out of these conversations? Because again, the whole intention of the Empowered Relationship Podcast is to support you to feel better-equipped, better prepared in your intimate relationship, so that you can sustain a long-term, fulfilling, lasting partnership. And oftentimes when we don’t gain this insight or we don’t have a lot of support around what all can get activated in a relationship, sometimes we feel at a loss, or we get surprised by what we’re confronted with… And so the purpose of this podcast is for you to have information, tips, tools, skills that you can contemplate and perhaps practice with, and maybe even implement and become part of your relational skill.
And again, I am a true believer that as we practice these principles, not only are we growing our intimate connection with another person, we are also growing ourselves.
If you would like access to today’s show notes, you can find that on my website, which is DrJessicaHiggins.com. Click on Podcast and there you can find all the episodes. Again, today’s episode is 185, “How to live an unhidden life”, an interview with Robert Kandell. Let’s get started in today’s episode.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Robert Kandell is an interpersonal communication expert, speaker, podcaster and the author of the bestselling book, unHIDDEN: A Book for Men and Those Confused by Them. Since 2002, Robert’s mission has been to help people find themselves and use their internal power to live their best lives. He is the host of the podcast, Tuff Love, where he puts his compassionate, hard-hitting insight to work, helping people move forward in their lives with clarity.
Robert, thank you for joining us today.
Robert Kandell: Oh, it’s my pleasure. It’s great to be here.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: I guess we’re gonna talk a bit about unHIDDEN, and just your concept around men and what they’re experiencing in modern day society. Can you tell us a little bit of that framework? Less about the book, but more of just where you’re coming from here.
Robert Kandell: I think the best way to describe it is my own personal journey… Whereas I walked into life, privileged, white, turned out to be tall, upper-middle class, Long Island, New York, and went to a great college, great grad school, started my first job, quickly went up the corporate ladder, married a woman and ended up at 28 with really all the trappings of what a successful life looked like… With some issues. The issues was 1) I was way off my purpose and who I wanted to be in the world; 2) I was married to a woman I did know or understand, or even understand that there was an issue that I didn’t understand. We didn’t have a sex life… I was really living my father’s dream more than my own dream, and that showed up in terms of being overweight, workaholic, and really just disconnected from this woman I was married to. And the worst part was I didn’t even know that there was an issue, I didn’t even know there was a problem. I just thought “This is the way it was.”
Then through a series of really epic events starting at 28, my whole life shifted into a possibility of being more authentic, more real, knowing myself, understanding women and how to be an authentic man in today’s world.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: So based on your story, it sounds like you’ve gone through the transformational process and have come to a place of integration, authenticity, and that you’re sharing about your experience in navigating that.
Robert Kandell: Yes. It’s improper in society to toot your own horn, right?
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Yeah. [laughs]
Robert Kandell: We have to kind of hedge it, like “Yeah, you know, I do alright…” But really, just to be blunt and to demonstrate my belief in self-love and self-validation, I worked incredibly hard, and through that process I’ve just seen my shadows; I’ve seen my programs, I’ve worked on them diligently, and now when I wake up every morning, I’m excited for life and I can tell the truth to my second wife, Morgan, she can tell the truth to me. We continue to do work on our relationship… And from that, I’ve really just fallen in love with myself, who I am in the world and what I’m doing.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: So great. I’m a big fan of being able to speak to the process of — I don’t think we ever really arrive; that’s why I’m struggling for the word… But just the learnings and the vantage point that you’re in, and I think there’s so much importance to hear voices from people who have gone through this transformational process. I appreciate your openness and willingness to share.
So let’s unpack this a little bit. What were some of your wake-up calls? It sounds like your weight, and that discontent… Was there something — it sounds like there was some epic maybe wall you confronted with… What happened for you?
Robert Kandell: There were two major ones. The first one happened at Burning Man in 1998. I was 20 years old… Burning Man, for those who don’t know, is a big festival in the desert, that’s grown. In 1998 it was a mere 18,000 people. I think it’s like 80,000 people now. And my first wife, Carol, wanted to go, and I was like “I don’t wanna go. That’s for those other people; for those hippies, those massage therapists, those doulas… It’s for other people.” She said, “Come on!” and I was like “Okay.” I went for her.
What happened when I got there was that I got out of the car, and it was like dusk, and there was like this wind, and this breeze, and drums in the distance, and these words came to me… And the words were “You’re home.” I was like, “No, no, no. You have those words mistaken. I am a yuppie, I am a normal person; I do not belong here.” And instead, “No, you’re home.” And I just started to see, at Burning Man, who I was, and I started to see that there was another side of me that had been hidden, from myself mostly. Definitely from the world, but from myself. And it just sparked. It was a real incredible three days or four days of just being a different person, in a different environment.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: I love that. I’ve never been to Burning Man, but I do have a sense that there is this intentional space that’s created to really get away from the shackles of maybe the roles which we carry, and just be really in that authentic space, and real permission to be free. Was that your experience?
Robert Kandell: Yeah. They have tenets, and one of the tenets is radical self-expression. I can tell you a fun story that happened there. Two days there, I’m actually having a better time than Carol, which was amusing; not to her, to me. I was like, “Huh. That’s strange.” And then on the second or third day she said “Hey, do you wanna go to this camp, where they have orgies?” And I was like, “Huh. Um, okay. Sure. I would love to check that out.”
The ironic part was that our sex life was pretty non-existent, and very vanilla. Not taking the clothes off in front of each other, making out in the dark, and very limited. So I was shocked. And I also had this very rich secret porn life, of mostly reading newsgroups. This was back in the ’90s, so there wasn’t the free porn that there is now… But I had this secret desire. So I was like “Okay.”
So I’m thinking all day, like “Orgy camp… What’s gonna happen? Am I gonna have sex with another woman? Am I gonna watch Carol have sex with another man? What’s gonna happen?” The tumescence, the building of sexual energy… So you know, 11 o’clock at night, we ride our bikes across the playa, and get to this camp, and I’m expecting to open that flaps and there’s like this Romanesque, wild abandonment orgy. We open the tent flaps and we walk into 300 guys sitting around and three women. There was no orgy going on, there was 300 guys and three women.
So we left, really dejected and really disappointed. But what happened next was epic, in that we started to walk around the playa and we had this three-hour conversation about our sex life, about what was lacking and what we wanted. And one truth led to another truth, one intimacy led to another intimacy, and I was like “Oh my god, that’s what you want?!” And things about me I’d never told anyone in my entire life; my fears, my desires, and this intimacy and this excitement, and this unhidden aspect of each other, revealed to each other, started this amazing journey that’s led to the [unintelligible 00:11:34.13] 20+ years later.1
Dr. Jessica Higgins: I imagine as people are listening that Burning Man was the catalyst, but it doesn’t actually have to be going to Burning Man to get in touch with this more permission of free expression, and this opportunity to be real about what we haven’t been really vocalizing. So what other ways to do you think — I mean, now that you’re in this teaching role, what do you encourage around people that maybe resonate with the things you have described about on the outside, having all the measures of success, but internally being so out of alignment, and how to start engaging with more authenticity?
Robert Kandell: Well, I’d say people are moved by inspiration or desperation. We might hear a podcast, we might read a great book, we might go to a therapist, we might have a friend who inspires us. That happens, but not as much as desperation. The desperation is “Oh god, I’m so bored in this relationship. I’m so ungratified in our sex life. I just hate my job. My relationship with my mom and dad is just awful and toxic, and I can’t stand to talk to them.” You get to a point of desperation and you’re just like “I’ve gotta do something.”
From that spot, you have two choices. One is you can stay in what I call mediocrity, the status quo, and option number two is you can just dedicate yourself into having more, having courage and energy and motivation, the agency to say “No mas! I’m not gonna live at this level.” And then from there, anything in the world is possible. I’m not promising anything, I’m just saying, from that spot, “Okay, I’m sick of this. I want more”, and your willingness to do something about that – you can do anything. So the first step is to just be like “Okay, how can I go from this step? How can I optimize my life? How can I make it better?” That’s the first step.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: And I think people like yourself, and other people that are speaking this message are helping give people more insight, or possibility even, to be curious. Because I think there’s a great willingness to lean in, but if there haven’t been very many models in one’s life – like you were saying, you were kind of living your father’s dream… So when there aren’t a lot of examples, it’s hard to trust that process… To be willing, and to kind of use that internal discontent to seek and to explore. So I think that that’s great, that there are examples that people can learn from… Because it sounds like what you’re saying is it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s Burning Man, or anybody in particular, but being able to tune into that desire or that discontent and to be seeking, and that there could be — I think there’s that quote, “When you’re ready, the teacher emerges”, or something. Is that kind of what you’re saying?
Robert Kandell: Yeah. It could be a Tuesday morning, the kids are screaming, your husband is ignoring you, and you wanna scream… Which is a very common thing, especially for women, who are taught to repress their true feelings, to be in some form of servitude in our patriarchal society. It’s that Thursday afternoon, when you’re working out and you just want to ride that bike or do that [unintelligible 00:15:08.03] to exhaustion, because you don’t wanna feel. It’s these little moments, these little voices in your head that say “This is not the way life’s supposed to be”, and it’s listening to that voice, it’s being willing to say “I’m going to throw this security, this status quo of my life, in some form of upheaval.” Now, it’s important to be conscious about this… I’m not saying just throw caution to the wind. I’m talking about building a conscious process and package, and I have frameworks; we can talk specifically how to do this with a partner… But it’s just listening to that voice and being like “Okay, I can’t do this anymore. I need to do something.”
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Great. Before we move on, I just wanna ask if there’s any other indicators… Because you had your specific things that you were feeling, and you were giving us some more examples. Are there other things that people should be looking for, if particularly they’re a man, and perhaps they’re in hiding, or withholding…? What does that look like for men typically?
Robert Kandell: There’s a lot of markers. There’s markers such as addiction to porn, usage of porn, there’s over-eating, there’s depression, there’s numbing… Which usually means that there’s something – either a big desire or big anger that’s not being confronted. There’s kind of like not wanting to go home… I had that experience with a girlfriend that I had a toxic relationship — this was in college, a long time ago… And I realized I didn’t wanna go home; we lived together. I did not wanna go home, and I was like “Huh. That’s a marker that something is afoot.”
It’s just those things that we don’t confront. If you imagine that we put the blinders on, we don’t wanna see it… When you’re starting to feel things, and you can feel yourself, and negotiating with yourself, or rationalizing with yourself… “Yeah, I don’t wanna go home… But you know, we live in a nice house, so therefore X, Y and Z.” It’s when we start to play these games with ourselves, those to me are very big warning signs.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Well said, I like that. And then what do you describe as some of the long-term costs in intimate relationship of being in hiding? Because you’re talking about the cost of the individual, but what are you seeing as far as relationship?
Robert Kandell: Well, if you look at the statistics, it’s not getting any better for relationships. The divorce rate is still as high… It’s actually drifted down slightly, but this is the reason why. We have more single adults in the U.S. for the first time, than non-single, people in relationships. In 2012 we hit that 50.1%, where there are more single people, compared to 8% to 10% a hundred years ago. It’s incredible. Now, of course, the world was very different a hundred years ago, but there’s been this dynamic change.
The age of getting married is increasing. It used to be 21 or 22 about 40 years ago, and it’s now 27 and 29, I believe. People having kids less… There’s a whole subculture in Japan; I don’t know the Japanese word, but it translates to herbivores – of young men in their 30s, who are virgins and have no desire to have a sexual partner. They are moving to sex dolls, and porn, and gaming. So the whole dynamic of Japan, the social and economic situation of this growing percentage of young men not wanting to produce children as they get older – you can just think about the economic impact of that.
So we’re seeing a very big upheaval in man-woman relating, which is impacting the longevity and the healthiness and the actual starting of relationships.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Well, there’s so much to be said here, and I guess I’m wondering — it sounds like you’re making a connection between living an inauthentic life, and this lack of engagement. Can you tell me more about that?
Robert Kandell: Well, my viewpoint is that men are heading in the wrong direction in modern society. Let me take a step back… If you look at the history of the patriarchy – the patriarchy has been around for around 6,000 years. The patriarchy actually started with a benevolent concept – that of protection for all genders. Over 6,000 it’s very much got skewed into being a male-dominated world that we live in. If you think about patriarchy, for 6,000 – if you go back to women as property, it was not even legally completed until the mid-19th century. If you look at the women’s suffrage moment, women’s right to vote started in 1848, at Seneca Falls. The 19th Amendment for a woman’s right to vote, legally, was 1920; a hundred years ago.
Women in the 1960’s and 1970’s couldn’t get credit cards without a husband’s signature. So if you look at this 6,000 years, there’s been really epic change in the last 40. The domination of women in the schooling systems – it used to be that two-thirds of graduates were men, and now we’re seeing two-thirds are women. Women are moving into the economic system. Really, there’s been this huge rise of women empowerment. A woman running for president in the 1970’s? Not possible. Now we have Elizabeth Warren, and we have Kamala Harris duking it out with Joe Biden.
It’s just this really epic change, and what’s happened because the changes were so quick in the last 40-50 years, women are rising up, setting new bars, saying “This is what I need”, and men are shrinking from the opportunity to step up. They’re moving towards video games, porn [unintelligible 00:21:20.24] Author Michael Kimmel in the book Guyland talked about what’s called “extended adolescence.” Adolescence of men into their thirties. He also talks about men’s aggrieved entitlement; their right to believe that they should have the job, rather than that woman or that minority. So men are getting angrier and angrier, disconnecting, not stepping up to the challenge of the rise of women, and we’re seeing disparity of genders impacting relationships and sexuality.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Well, this is really important that you’re naming this, and really bringing attention to the more collective process historically, and also just where we are in some of the impacts on relationship and disengagement. So what are you seeing as ways that men can step up?
Robert Kandell: Well, first I wanna say to the men who do step up – and there are many; so I’m not trying to create a picture that there are no men stepping up. I actually think about it in terms of the bell curve; remember that from high school? One part of the bell curve there are men stepping up, doing the work, being great teachers, great inspiration. The other end of the bell curve is men who are never gonna change; they’re just gonna follow the scripts of their fathers and grandfathers. I’m talking about the middle, with the largest percentage. That’s the men I’m talking to… Who might not even understand, might not even know what’s happening.
The first step for them on what to do is to say “Okay, my life’s not going the way I want it to. I’m not engaged with women the way I want, I’m not in the job — I followed my father’s script and I’m just not happy.” Just that awareness, the confrontation… And I say “confrontation” in terms of waking up and pulling down those blinders, just to say “Huh. I want more.” That is all men need to do. I’m not looking for men to jump wrong where they are to masters in one minute. I am talking about taking on the practice, the desire, the belief in oneself to say “I want more. I’m going to have more.”
And I can tell you two things. One, that women love men who just say “I want to improve.” That will put you one significant level up from men who are saying “Everything is fine.” Women who see a man who’s willing to engage and to improve is very attractive. The second thing is if a man does play, this is the best time to be a man. This is the most exciting time. We have women with their own financial resources, their own empowerment, the open of sexuality, we have technology… There’s so much potential to be the best party in town. So if men would just get off the couches, let go of Netflix, stop watching porn, it could be the best time to be a man.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Yay, I love that. And I’m also listening to you and I’m just thinking about the expression of a man, and how that looked a certain way, and there were certain roles that were really defined at one point…
Robert Kandell: Sure.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: …and now there this big, extreme change in gender dynamics and norms in society and relationship. Are you finding that men are grappling with perhaps this new level of what a man looks like, and the expression of that?
Robert Kandell: So confused.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: [laughs]
Robert Kandell: So confused… And this is not men’s fault. I’m not blaming men for this. I don’t even blame men if they wanna stay on the couch. I get it. I get how confronting it is to just… Be. The world is changing really quickly, and you don’t learn about this in school. You learn about sexual violence, you learn about #metoo, you learn about how not to be a man… That’s important stuff, and I’m a huge fan of the #metoo movement, which is coming on two years, by the way, this month… But no one gives the model of “Okay, learn empathy. Invest in emotional intelligence as much as you would do your intellectual intelligence. Work on your emotional intelligence (EQ) as much as you wanna learn how to play the piano, or hit the fastball, or drive that little ball into the golf… Whatever it is.”
I’m just saying, there’s so much available, if men are encouraged and know that the potential to be really happy includes taking on these different parts… To engage with our internal feminine. Every person has a mix of masculine and feminine; our willingness to look at our feminine side… All these pieces are the keys to live a balanced, mature, exciting life.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: I’m just listening and I’m thinking the unknown is often very, very scary, and that what you’re describing is letting go of some of the external markers or achievements as success, and really looking inwards and accessing “What is my purpose, and how do I be more authentically expressed, and how do I develop more parts of myself? Because maybe historically learning emotional intelligence wasn’t the most necessary thing, and it wasn’t what I needed to develop most.” So there’s this fuller expression that’s being invited, but again, the unknown is probably pretty confusing (back to your first point).
Robert Kandell: Yeah, the term emotional intelligence is I think from the 1960’s. So these are new terms, these are new concepts. A man’s emotional ability would get him into danger in the earlier generations, and still do. We know about the negative communications we make to young boys – “Don’t be a baby. Don’t be a girl. Don’t be a pussy.” All these things that we’re continuing to reinforce in young boys to put their emotions second, or not at all, to be tough, to produce – all these things are still the external validation of being a man… And to me, that’s why I say men are heading in the wrong direction, and it’s not men’s fault; it’s because society is still telling men to man up, to be some John Wayne, very antiquated tough guy. Being a John Wayne antiquated tough guy is great for a portion of the time. We just wanna develop the skills for all the other things needed to be a balanced, integrated man.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Yes, well said. Because I’m even thinking the idea of “Step up” could even sound like “Man up” without having the fuller description behind that. So you have some framework to offer us… I guess I’m curious if we wanna pivot towards that.
Robert Kandell: Sure. There’s the framework for communication and the framework for change. I’m not sure exactly which one you wanted to speak about.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Change as related to…
Robert Kandell: Everything. Okay, I’ll give you that one. I’ve come up with a framework that I use with myself, first and foremost, and second with my clients. This is a framework that you can use on any change you wanna make in your life. it could be about your physical weight, it could be about your job, it could be about your sex life… It’s really generic. It’s well-defined in the book, but I’ll give the highlights.
The first step of the framework for change is to confront. What that means is just to see and to understand what’s happening to you; to take off your blinders, to stop rationalizing. Just to sit and see.
The second part of the framework is to investigate. We live in the biggest time or the most opportunity for information. We have Google. So you can go on Google and you can search anything you’re interested in. You have Facebook groups, you have meetups, you have all this information that’s available to you, no matter where you are. So investigate. What is porn addiction? What is depression? What does a healthy relationship look like? Just go and take the fear of that “I’m the only one with this problem”, the terminal uniqueness, and go and get some validation that there’s other people facing this problem.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: I love that.
Robert Kandell: The third step is to commit. And I put this here because I think it’s the most important step, up to date. You’re just gonna commit. “I am no longer going to be a victim to my lack of acknowledgment of my homoerotic desires. I am going to look at this, I am going to see how this impacts my life. So committing – you’re not committing to anything specifically, you’re just committing that you’re going to work on this.
The fourth step is to create a practice. I recommend short-term practices, usually a minimum of 28 days, but not much longer. Just set a practice. Sometimes you need a coach, a therapist, a physical trainer, a nutritionist, something of that ilk, to help you form this practice. This can be very difficult to do by yourself, but set a practice. “I’m gonna go to the gym three times a week. I’m going to go to 12-step meetings every day, my first 90 in 90.” Whatever it is, set a practice. In that practice, set up an accountability buddy; have a willingness to change if the practice is too intense or not intense enough, be willing to modify, and then just go through the practice of that time. When that practice is done, the last step is to acknowledge the completion, celebrate, regardless of the results, look at what you could have done better, and then decide if you want to do it again. And that’s it. Those five steps are really the way to take your life on any topic from point A to point B.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Great! I love just how practical it is, and relatable, and current, given our current society and what we have available to us, and just being willing to take the best next step, and being willing to commit to that longing, or that discontent, and make a step and show up for ourselves and follow that thread. It sounds like there’s no long-term life commitment here; it’s just being in the practice. I love the having the accountability, and then the celebrating. I don’t think we take enough time to celebrate our efforts and achievements.
Do you have an example of what this could look like as it relates to relationship?
Robert Kandell: Of course. Let’s say you have a long-term relationship, it’s been two years; your relating was connected, and intimate, and funny, and sexy in the beginning, and after two years you’re just kind of passing each other the night, or you have your routines… This happens a lot when you have children. Children are very challenging to relationships. Wonderful, but really challenging for the intimacy, unless you have a really strong foundation and help in today’s world.
So let’s say you’re two years in, and you just feel yourself disconnected from your partner. The first step is to confront. To be like “My god, I remember how it used to be, and I can feel what it is now, and I can really feel the impact of these years and what it’s done to our relationship.” So confront it.
The second thing, before you even talk to your partner, investigate it. Go on Google and look up “disconnected relationships”, “where did our sex life go?” Just go and read. There’s hundreds of thousands of articles, and blogs, and YouTube videos, and Facebook groups… I mean, there’s so much information. Prove to yourself that this is important to you by just going and looking and reading.
Then, again, without even talking to your partner, make a commitment. “I am committing to myself, for the health of my own well-being, for the health of my relationship, for the love of this person I’m with, for the benefit of our children, I am committing to work on this. This is gonna become my top priority. It’s gonna be more important than golf, it’s gonna be more important than my job even. It’s just gonna be in my psyche. I’m committing to change.”
Then sit with your partner and say “Listen, I’ve been thinking the last couple of weeks, I’ve done a bunch of reading, a bunch of research, I bought this book unHIDDEN, by Rob Kandell…” Sorry, sorry. “You know, I’ve just done the work, and I wanna work on this with you. I want to improve our relationship. I want to do something. Are you willing to work with me, to take our relationship back into intimacy?” If they say no, well, that’s a communication about the status of your relationship. If they say “Maybe”, then ask “Okay, what’s inside the maybe?” and hope that they’ll just say yes, and then together find something together that works for you. Is that a life coach, is that a couples therapist, is that a workshop? Just go and build that practice together.
The extent of that practice could be one weekend of going to a workshop on intimacy, or it could be a three-month commitment to go to a couples therapist to work things out. Build that together, complete the cycle, debrief, talk about what worked, and then say “Okay, let’s go deeper. Let’s take level two of that workshop.”
Dr. Jessica Higgins: “Let’s celebrate before we do that…”
Robert Kandell: Yeah, exactly. Celebrate. Celebrate the power of your commitment and your change.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: I love that, thank you. That’s super-helpful, because again, it’s really practical, and it doesn’t necessarily have to be super-grandiose; it’s just being willing to show up and just follow that thread and do the best next step.
I’m listening and I’m wondering if you’re open to sharing, Robert, just — I’m hearing that people might be scared as it relates to relationship. Like, “If I start confronting this, is it gonna rock the boat?” And as you were describing, in your marriage, going to Burning Man – it really was this catalyst for a deeper level of dialogue and communication, but you also shared that you’re no longer with her. So I guess I’m just wondering if you can speak to that at all.
Robert Kandell: Oh, for sure. Yes, it’s gonna rock the boat.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: [laughs] Yeah.
Robert Kandell: Yes. So by its very nature, if you put your attention on something, it’ll change. Imagine — do you remember [unintelligible 00:36:40.09] If you think about your relationship as a sine wave, it’d have a very low, and it’s not exciting, it’s mediocre; that sine wave is going up and down in a very small range, like a heartbeat. It’s just going in a very small range. When you put your attention on it, you’re going to hit higher highs, but you’re going to hit lower lows. You are gonna rock the boat, and it could mean the end of your relationship. I’m not here to sugar-coat it. I’ve coached many people out of relationships.
My job as a coach is not to keep people in relationships. My job, that I advertise and hold, is to have more authentic relationships… And sometimes that means migrating from marriage into co-parents, or co-parents and friends. There’s no guarantee. So just know, when you put your attention on it, it’s gonna change.
What happened with Carol, my first wife, who I hold in my life as one of the most important, dynamic people in my life; I’m so, so grateful for her, because she’s the one who actually was my white rabbit, that I followed down the rabbit hole, into where I am now. And we met when I was 24, she was 26. We got married two years later. We spent three years never fighting, living together, living in San Francisco, having a really vanilla life, as I described… And then we started to do the work, and we fought for like four years. Like, fought. Non-stop. Not non-stop, but again, it was higher highs; we had the best sex of our relationship, we also had the biggest drag-down fights. And what happened by us starring to pay attention to our authentic insides was that so much was revealed to ourselves and each other about who we really wanted to be.
Then we got to a choice point where we had the option to create an organization that was eventually called OneTaste, which was a very risky endeavor. I was a total yes to it; she didn’t wanna do it. So from knowing our authentic desire, and we were more committed to being ourselves than to be in marriage, our marriage ended. And I can tell you, my life got better. Her life – she’d have to express; I don’t wanna say that for her, I don’t know the answer to that. But my life got better because we were more authentic, we were more unhidden, we were more real… And again, I’m so grateful for her positive impact on my life.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: I love it. And then now your current wife – I’m imagining your principles and personal practices around this really set you up to have a more conscious relationship and practices dynamics together.
Robert Kandell: Totally. We’re nerds, and we just talk, and talk, and talk, and explore, and open… We’ve explored the edges of sexuality, and non-monogamy, and sex parties, and things we liked, and didn’t like… We explored plant medicine, our expansion… She’s very deep into ascension codes, and non-linear living; she’s building a center called The Rose, where women can come and have these experiences… So it really is this honest — I mean, sometimes brutally honest, but real, authentic, dynamic relationship, that is incredible. Bigger than I ever thought was possible.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Really beautiful. I come from the vantage point that so often when we can connect with what’s real and true, and even if we are in a place of difference, that there is a place of exploration that can evolve into a win/win. Sometimes that’s pretty uncertain territory, and sometimes it’s not even that win/win; sometimes there is that disconnect, and to honor that. And I’m also a really, really big fan of just the attachment research, and really having that secure base. Is there anything you and Morgan do to nurture that security in each other, and the bond that you share?
Robert Kandell: We listen to each other. [laughter] I think that’s the most important thing. We just listen to each other, and we are authentic in our response to what we hear from each other, and then we throw the information, the conversation, the intimacy ball back and forth, allowing each of us to grow and expand. And who we were when we met, four years ago – we’re very different people now, which is wonderful. And we allow for each other’s evolution.
So the best way I’ve found to create secure attachment is not to lie to my partner, and to make it really safe for her to tell me anything. Like, anything. She can tell me things she doesn’t like about me, she can tell about desires, she can tell me about how she wants to travel, she can tell me about this guy she saw, and how much she got turned on by him. We can share that authentic and truth. And then she doesn’t have to do the math of “What can I tell Rob?” I don’t have to do the math of “What can I tell Morgan?” I don’t have to keep track of the lies that most people do, because to me withholding is lying. When we withhold a lot from our partners, in that withholding we create distance, we create chasms, and…
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Rejection, just endless–
Robert Kandell: And I’m not saying this is an overnight thing. Again, we’ve built a practice around this. We started really strongly, and had a lot of training in this, but start with the conversation of “I wanna tell you more truth. I want you to know me more. I wanna know you more”, and then create a practice or a game around how much truth you can tell, how much truth you can receive, how safe you can make it, and that to me is how to create the most attachment in a secure way.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Beautiful. And my last question before I pivot to how people can learn more about what you’re offering is is there anything that you would encourage in a heterosexual relationship where a man is embarking at looking some of these things for himself, how she could support him?
Robert Kandell: The first is patience. If your man is willing to be one of the very few men to step out of his habits, his scripts, his conditioning, he’s going to make a thousand mistakes. He’s going to slip. And if you just see that he’s willing to work on himself, and to encourage him, to say “I’m on your team. Let’s do this together, to be the authentic reflection. Okay, great. Now, when you did that, when you touched me like that, I liked that. But when you touch me like this, not so much.” If you would just slow this down a little bit, and then create approval, have curiosity. Just become a teammate to him. That’s the greatest gift you can give a man.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Thank you. Alright, Robert, so what would you encourage people to look up, or buy, or engage with with getting to know you and what you have to offer more?
Robert Kandell: I published unHIDDEN last year. It really was a fun project, and all these viewpoints I wrote in what I call a pragmatic guide for men. The book is “unHIDDEN: A Book for Men and Those Confused by Them.” So really it’s for everyone.
My book is probably the best way to get these concepts. I have a physical, Kindle and an audio version that’s available, and all of that can be found on Amazon, or you can also look up my website at RobertKandell.com.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Wonderful. And you also have a podcast.
Robert Kandell: I do. It’s called Tuff Love. It’s straight talk like this, it’s interesting guests, with interesting practices, and that can be found on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher… All your favorite podcast apps. That’s Tuff Love, and again, RobertKandell.com will point you in the right direction.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Wonderful. I’ll make sure to have all of these links on today’s show notes.
Robert Kandell: Thank you.
Dr. Jessica Higgins: Robert, thank you for being a guest today and sharing all of your wisdom and knowledge today. I know we just scratched the surface, but it’s such a gift.
I hope you have enjoyed today’s episode. Again, “How to live an unhidden life”, an interview with Robert Kandell. If you would like to access today’s show notes, you can visit DrJessicaHiggins.com, click on Podcast, and you can find all the episodes there. Again, today’s episode, 185.
Until next time, I hope you take great care.
* * *
You’ve been listening to Empowered Relationship, your relationship guide. Remember to take a moment to write a review and subscribe today. You can also get your free relationship gift by visiting DrJessicaHiggins.com.
0 Comments