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.
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Today’s episode is 229 – Eight Dates to Support and Nurture Your Love and Relationship. In the last two episodes, there’s been discussions supporting a date. Dr. Harley’s episode was really talking about the four components of a date in his opinion, based on his research, and Allana Pratt is also offering some connection exercises in the last interview 228. Today, I really want to reference the book, Eight Dates by John and Julie Gottman, also co-authored with Doug and Rachel Abrams, and I have found this book to be particularly helpful because so much of what they offer in their books and articles is research-based, and I love that they pull from their own research, as well as research from others.
If you will, I want to invite you to take a deep breath in, and a deep breath out… Centering. So much of life can feel so busy, and yet as we pause and touch into our inner experience and gain a greater understanding of ourselves, we gain a greater capacity to connect with others. So I’m going to be setting the intention for the Empowered Relationship podcast, and as I do so I want to invite you to just reflect and perhaps check in on your experience right now. Perhaps a question you’re holding, or a challenge or issue you’re contemplating, and just hold some recognition for what you notice.
The Empowered Relationship Podcast is intended to support you in navigating long term intimacy, so that you can cultivate more love, more happiness, more connection, even during the difficult times… And as we talked about on this show, the challenges can be an opportunity for growth and the curriculum for our development. So the conversations here are intended to support you in the challenges, as well as the cultivating more beauty and more bond, and really sustaining a long-term, lasting, intimate relationship. If you would like access to today’s show notes, you can visit drjessicahiggins.com, click on Podcast in the navigation bar at the top; there you’ll find all the episodes. Today’s episode again is 229 – Eight Dates to Support and Nurture Your Love and Relationship. I will make sure to put a link to the book that I’m referencing. Again, Eight Dates: Essential Conversations for a Lifetime of Love with John and Julie Gottman and Doug and Rachel Abrams.
I want to start with reading an excerpt, the first paragraph. “The conversations that matter. Every great love story is a never-ending conversation. From the first tentative questions we ask as we get to know each other, to the nail-biting discussions of trust and commitment, to the most profound heart to heart explorations of our love, our pain and our dreams. It’s the quality of our questions and our answers that allow us to continue learning and growing with one another through the years. And when conflict comes, as it inevitably does, when we weave two lives together, it’s our commitment to being curious rather than correct that allows us to turn toward instead of away from one another in the moments of disagreement.
Whether you and your partner are talkative or quiet, the words that pass between you, as well as the expressions and gestures that accompany those words, will define and determine your relationship. A true love story isn’t a fairy tale. It takes vulnerability and effort. The reward is that you love your partner more on your 15th anniversary than you did on your wedding night. You can stay in love forever.” Much of what they’re talking about in the introduction of this book, again, Eight Dates, is just the recognition that the journey of intimacy can be challenging and it’s yet how we approach that that can really determine the quality of our connection. Now, this is stuff I talk about all the time and actually, when I was reading the intro, I was like, “I swear, I could be writing this.” It’s so, again, philosophically aligned with the discussions here on the show, and I really am in great honor of the work that the Gottmans have done in providing so much evidence-based research on the topic of intimacy and connection. Again, I’ll post the link to this book on today’s show notes.
As I reflect on my journey of applying these principles of intimacy, of personal growth in my relationship with my husband, I can say my experience has been so much that I continue knew to deepen in my understanding in him and in our dynamic and myself and how I show up, which allows for a richening and a cherishing and a reverence for what we’ve cultivated together… And it’s interesting that they’re using the reference point of 15 years, as my husband and I just celebrated our anniversary of being married and we did have a long-term partnership and being very committed to each other before being married, and so that cumulative number is about 15.
They go on to say, “You can spend a lifetime being curious about the inner world of your partner and being brave enough to share your own inner world and never be done discovering all there is to know about each other.” I think this is very exciting, and that there’s always new terrain and new levels and new deepening to expand our experience of knowing and intimacy. It’s funny… In my personal life, when people learn of my work, and perhaps my podcast and the number of episodes that I’ve released, they ask, “How do you not run out of things to talk about? Or how do you keep things fresh when you’ve been talking about relationship for so many episodes?” and it’s funny, because as I stand here in this moment, I believe and I feel how much more I can share. Right now, I have a list of topics that I want to bring to you.
I also have a series of episodes that have already been recorded and several that are currently scheduled, and so I just continue to see a deepening and an evolving in what I can offer, and I keep learning. I am today, I’m– some of this stuff, I talk about often, so it’s not new for me, but I do believe the way that they’re offering the frame and the structure of this book of the Eight Dates is extremely valuable and how it’s interwoven with facts and research to support your understanding of relationship and intimacy, and I just get excited about being able to support our journey and deepening in love.
As the authors share about their own marriages, they say, “That doesn’t mean that our relationships are perfect. Sometimes we fight. Sometimes we’re rude or insensitive. Perfection is not the price of love. Practice is.” As you can see, they’re talking about their practice, and if you’ve heard me talk about on this show, I mentioned how I do my very best to practice these principles still, and they still challenge me at times, and they still teach me. I think that this is speaking to the idea of practice. It’s not about judging about what we didn’t do or did do in the past. It’s about looking at, “What’s in this for me? What’s my work? And therefore, what’s the next move in my practice?”
The frame of the Eight Dates that they’re offering is actually based in research, and they talk about who they interviewed and how they conducted their research, and they found that all of the couples, the new couples, the celibate couples, the same-sex couples and the long-term married couples all found that these conversations brought them closer and helps them see each other in new and exciting ways.
I’m going to touch on a few of the Eight Dates in today’s conversation. I might give a little excerpt, a little teaching, but the book actually offers a lot of questions and guidance around how do you construct your date. So essentially, they’re giving you a plan and recommendation and questions to discuss on each of these eight dates. The first date is about trust and commitment, and they’re talking about choosing commitment over and over and over again, even when it’s not easy, even when it’s not convenient, and the quality of this is prioritizing your relationship, your bond and your significant other.
In this chapter, they described a couple that was experiencing a tremendous amount of content conflict, and one of the things that they were doing as their conflict would escalate, is both of them would contribute to some type of comparison, to what they could have or what they should have. “I could do better”, or “I don’t deserve this”, and perhaps even threaten the relationship. As they talk about in this book, this type of behavior can be incredibly undermining and sabotaging for a relationship to thrive and feel secure. They write, “There is no question that committing to a person can be a terrifying prospect. It means putting all your eggs in one basket. There will be no one waiting in the wings if the relationship doesn’t work out. There isn’t a safety net. If things aren’t going well, we go to no one else to complain. Instead, we need to go directly to our partner to work things out. Also, we’re committed. We have given this person everything we have to offer. There’s nothing left for another lover. That’s a risky decision, but it’s essential. Without this level of commitment, love will not last.”
A little later in the chapter, they talk about committing to a relationship requires a certain level of vulnerability, which can be frightening, and they pose the questions that we often wonder. Will she meet my needs? Will he really be there for me? Will she love me for who I am or try to change me? Will she criticize me to others? Will she betray me? Will he love me and care for me when I get sick? Will he leave me? These are all very real fears we may have when we decide to commit to one person for a lifetime.
When we fall in love, we are often on our very best behavior. We lead with the healthiest side of ourselves. But as the relationship progresses, each person gets more real, more transparent, and therefore more vulnerable. None of us have it all together and none of us is without our idiosyncrasies or insecurities, no matter how together we may appear, and here’s where the real magic comes in. The more honest we are, the more we can discover that our partner really loves us for who we are and not the idealized version of us that shows up when we first begin to date. Vulnerability creates trust, and trust is the oxygen your relationship needs to breathe. Trust is built over time and over lots of conversations.
To celebrate our anniversary, my husband and I took a trip to the wilderness area of the Sequoia National Park, and neither one of us had been there and we were very much off the beaten path, and we were hiking and wouldn’t see a soul. So in a lot of respects, it felt like a perfect option, in that we’ve been very conservative in respecting and honoring the recommendations around being safe during the COVID and the pandemic.
So we’re on this hike and my husband is talking about our process together over the years as we’re reflecting on where we’re at and our connection and where we started, and he was commenting about what a process of trust it has been for both of us. As I mentioned earlier, it took us almost seven years before we got married, and part of this, as my husband describes in his own experience, and again, I’m not probably going to represent him completely accurately, but he talked about growing up in the Midwest and how so much of marriage and starting a family was what you just did, and so he very much struggled with feeling herded like cattle, and that he really wanted partnership to represent something meaningful and special versus just doing what you’re supposed to do. So for him, there was a process of building trust in our unique connection and my love for him, for him being uniquely him, not that he just fit the bill.
For me, if you’ve listened to my story, it had a lot to do with trusting that he was going to be there. It wasn’t so much him and his character and was he trustworthy? That was also true, but more significantly, “Can I rely on you?” This has to do with my previous pain of loss and abandonment. Losing my biological father when I was three months old and losing other very significant figures in my life at a very early age. So there’s been this kinesthetic, real felt sense of fear of loss and fear of abandonment. So my process of trusting him, and even reading the chapter on commitment, I could still feel that fear living inside me, of that all in. It’s interesting because the way that I show up is absolutely all in, but it’s the frame around it that has scared me in the past. Even so much that as I was reading vows on our wedding day, there in the backcountry of Rocky Mountain National Park, surrounded by friends and family on a very beautiful August day… I was reading my vows and in every part of my being, I had been committed to that for years. It felt like it was more of a declaration of what had been true and being witnessed by family and friends.
So on this hiking trail, as my husband and I were discussing our process of trust, he remarked that it was a process of unfolding trust in ourselves, of perhaps even letting go of previous pain or past paradigms and mindsets and opening to being present, to learning how to trust each other… And I just loved that he was able to recognize that and that we were to discuss that. Even as we’re looking back about our process of trust, I can tell you that we are active now in developing more trust and softening to each other in a few aspects of our lives, and so there’s still a process of developing in trust and commitment.
In the chapter, they emphasize the importance of prioritizing our significant other, and that when we don’t prioritize, it can often feel like a betrayal, and they list many different types of betrayals, and also what to do when trust is broken. One of the things that seems really notable from their research is the act of cherishing. They write, “Commitment is actually built on thinking and then communicating to one’s partner that he or she is precious, and not replaceable. In one’s mind as well as in communication, we build commitment by nurturing our gratitude in what we have with our partner. We think to ourselves that no one can hold a candle to our partner, and in our mind we magnify the positive qualities our partner has and we minimize the negative qualities. We think and communicate that no one out there, real or imagined, can compare to our partner. On the other hand, betrayal is nurtured by communicating to one’s partner that he or she is lacking certain qualities we simply cannot do without, and therefore is highly replaceable.”
As I mentioned, each chapter has prompting questions to reflect on, exercises, as well as a date plan, and how to prepare and locations and all of that stuff.
Date number two, and I’m going to go into a little bit of excerpts and descriptions in this chapter, and then I’ll probably do a couple of short ones, and then list the other dates, and then go into a little more depth around one other one, but I’m not going to really try to attempt to cover this whole book in one episode. Similar to what I often discuss on this show, the Empowered Relationship Podcast, they write, “The important thing to know is that relationship conflict is natural and it serves a purpose. What is the purpose of conflict? Does conflict even have a goal? Many people think that conflict is pointless and harmful. Not true. Conflict is necessary, because we inevitably run into speed bumps in our ability to love one another, and when we hit one of those speed bumps, we need to slow down and proceed with care. Mutual understanding – this is the healthiest and most productive goal of all conflict. Conflict helps us love each other better over time, understand each other at a deeper level and renew our commitment to the relationship.
Our research has shown that most relational conflict is not resolvable. Each relationship comes with a set of problems because each person is unique and different from others, and some set of problems is going to be there no matter who the other partner might be. This is to say even if you find yourself contemplating or fantasizing about another partner, that regardless of who you’re partnered with, you’re going to have a set of, as they would say, perpetual problems. Perpetual problems are not going to be resolved. These are problems that center on fundamental differences you have in your personalities or lifestyle preferences.” They write, “And the great gift is that within these conflicts, within these perpetual problems that you can’t ever seem to resolve lie the greatest opportunity for growth in intimacy. When you discover what lies beneath those problems, you uncover something that is at the core of your partner’s belief system or personality.”
Recently, I had the awareness that my husband and I were having tension and conflict and I was like, “Oh, this is one of those perpetual problems”, and that I tend to be a little more comprehensive, I try to give my very, very best to when I’m planning any trip or details in the logistics. I’m willing to put a tremendous amount of effort to do the very, very best that I can, where my husband is usually approaching any type of planning process with the lens of valuing efficiency and simplicity.
ow I will say, having been together for such a long time, that I have learned the value and gift of simplicity and efficiency, and I will say that I think he has also learned and benefited from what I have brought in the way of planning in that there’s a little more upfront work, but the ease and what we’re able to appreciate along the way, he enjoys. So for example, we went on this trip that I was describing into the wilderness area of the Sequoia National Park and National Forest, and I put a lot of energy into thinking about where we were going to stay and preparing food and thinking of the logistics, and he was really appreciative, and I think he sees the value, because at one point I was like, “I just feel so grateful all of our needs are met”, and that’s not an always easy thing to feel when you’re out in the wilderness.
So this is an example of a perpetual problem, and I experienced this just even on a smaller scale. If we have a day excursion somewhere – and this hasn’t been recent, but I will want to prepare and get the water and the sunscreen and the snacks and the lunch, and he’s just like, “Can we just go already?” and he likes to just feel the simplicity and the ease of just being able to pick up and go. And again, what we’ll experience is some conflict. He’ll push back or he’ll resist or he’ll comment on like, “Ugh, I don’t want to do this.” So we will sometimes have to negotiate and really work together, and again, it’s something that’s likely not going to really change that much in the course of our life together, and it’s something that we can learn to work together, because again, it’s reflective of our values or our personalities.
Date number three is about sex and intimacy. Now, I’m not going to share very much, but I will say that there’s a excerpt in here around what he’s talking about is normal, and that, “80% of couples have sex a couple times a month or more, and that 32% of couples report having sex two to three times a week, and 48% report having sex a few times per month.” So in total 80% of married couples have sex a few times a month or more, and really what he’s talking about here is finding your own normal. There are many ways in which couples express their sexual intimacy and there’s a spectrum, and really finding what is best suited for you, and that some people have the expectation or perhaps judgment that it should be passionate and deeply romantic, and where at times the reality is that it might be more of a quickie, if you will.
So one of the things he’s addressing here is the importance of talking about sex. He cites a study of 70,000 responses from 24 different countries, and that they’ve compiled a few different things that couples do that have a great sex life. I’m not going to read them; they’re in the chapter. Again, this is out of the book, Eight Dates. But bottom line, they say, “Great sex is not rocket science. It’s very doable, but you have to be able to talk about it and you have to be able to make it a priority in your relationship.” One other notable thing I want to comment on that I just thought was interesting that, “Research shows that over 70% of people, both men and women, use indirect strategies to ask for sex. A direct method would be, ‘Hey, sweetheart, let’s make love. I want sex. Do you want sex?’ But only 30% of couples married or otherwise use this direct approach. Most people will indicate they want to make love with a touch, a cuddle or a kiss, and they will do so in what we call a face-savinging way, meaning really trying to manage rejection.
The fourth date is about work and money, and really looking at work as a huge source of our time investment, and what that can do for a relationship, as well as looking at money and our tendency around money and our behaviors around money and using that as a starting point, because really, again, similar to these perpetual problems, that the money is symbolic. If we look at what it represents and we access the deeper layers, the deeper core value, that’s going to be more meaningful… And when we can have that discussion, it helps us have a deeper understanding and really be in a better position to work together if there is a difference in how we approach work and money.
The fifth date – family. I want to read one excerpt from this chapter, as they are really inviting a much more inclusive definition of family, which I love. “Family means different things to different people, and the singular definition of family as a like-minded husband and wife, with two children and a white picket fence is as outdated as pagers, VCRs and calling the operator for information. Today’s family is ethnically, politically, sexually and religiously diverse. Families can consist of biological children, stepchildren adopted children, foster children, no children or your husband’s best friend who still acts like a child. There are also more families with same sex or trans parents. Family may just be you and your partner, or it could include extended family, your pet or your close friends. Family can be defined as whatever and with whomever you feel love, belonging and a sense of home.”
Date number six – fun and adventure. University of Denver, Psychology Professor and Co-Director of the Center for Marital and Family Studies Howard Markman says, “The correlation between fun and marital happiness is high and significant. The more you invest in fun and friendship and being there for your partner, the happier the relationship will get over time.” They’re talking about the importance of play and adventure isn’t a luxury, that it’s actually necessary for a successful and happy relationship, and they’re also talking about the neuroscience that if we look at the beginning stages of relationship and how exciting and new, and people are putting a lot of energy into special dates and going to new places and they’re learning about each other, and we’re getting all these huge doses of neurochemicals, and there’s oxytocin and dopamine… And dopamine is a part of the reward system in our brain, and when we experience something new and unfamiliar and exciting, we get this boost of this feel-good hormone, and it drives us.
They write, “Our sense of adventure and need for play never goes away. It may go dormant or in hibernation, but it’s still a fundamental human need that’s always there just waiting to be acknowledged. As partners, you can ask yourself these simple questions to figure out if your relationship is suffering from a lack of adventure. When was the last time you felt excited or curious while you were with your partner? When was the last time you did something new together? When was the last time you had the feeling that something wonderful was about to happen?” I thought this was interesting. “One indication that adventure is lacking is when one or both of you are seeking substitutes for the dopamine response and end up feeding the need for a play and adventure, dopamine, with sugar, chocolate, junk food, and for some, alcohol, prescription drugs and other mind-altering substances, whether illegal or legal.” They say, “In relationship where there’s no shared adventure or no adventure of any kind, there’s a deadness, a lack of vitality that sets in, and the relationship becomes a series of tasks. It becomes mundane, and there’s no surprise, and you lose the spark that play and adventure naturally bring into the relationship.”
Recently, going on this trip with my husband, when we haven’t done anything new or exciting since January and granted, I think we all can look to the pandemic and COVID as a big reason for perhaps feeling incredibly restricted in our sense of adventure, and at the same time, experiencing something new and being adventurous with my husband, it was palpable, the excitement between us and the real presencing and the attention and the focus… But again, the rush of feel good, of playing together, it was really beautiful and such a good reminder and really, for me, inspires me to want to do smaller versions. We don’t need to take a trip to experience something new. It could be trying a new recipe or doing something new online together, or it could be going to a beach we’ve never been to, and that we live in Santa Barbara and we’re on the coast so we can do that, but going to a new park or a new part of town, and it doesn’t have to be something super extravagant or luxurious. It’s just anything new that creates that experience of learning and excitement together.
Date number seven is about growth and spirituality. I’m just gonna just briefly describe the last two here, and this one has a lot to do with the meaning-making, and then also the type of rituals and the way that two people create a sense of significance and sacredness together, and it’s whatever you choose to put priority on, but together sharing in that sense of meaning-making.
Date number eight – dreams. This has to do with supporting each person’s individual dream in life… Whether or not it’s passion, or a sense of purpose in the world, or whether or not it’s a bucket list item, and that how a couple works together to support each other’s dreams, and that it might entail some sacrifices at different phases, and that usually, it requires one person to prioritize the other person’s dream and then being able to reverse that… So then the person that was in the support role now becomes the one to get more attention and support for pursuing their dreams.
This is so powerful, because when we think about the couplehood, and the way that partners can support each other, and we look at the bigger picture of life, and how usually we have an individual pursuit, a purpose, a passion, a dream, and if we can support each other in fulfilling those dreams or pursuing those dreams, what a powerful partnership. Usually, we look at — in a life well-lived, it’s living full out, and not holding back on our dreams. This is where Brené Brown has done such powerful work to really encourage that bravery and really getting in the game and really having the courage to risk and be vulnerable to pursue what matters. So if we can be partners in believing and supporting each other, it’s such a recipe for such happiness and fulfillment.
Again, I am referencing in today’s episode, the book, Eight Dates: Essential Conversations for a Lifetime of Love by John and Julie Gottman and Doug and Rachel Abrams. If you would like access to today’s show notes, you can visit drjessicahiggins.com, click on Podcast there at the top navigation and you will find all of the episodes. Today is Episode 229. Again, Eight Dates to Support and Nurture Your Love and Relationship and I’ll have the link to this book, and it is an Amazon affiliate link which I will get a few cents if you decide to purchase it through that link. Again, that will be found on today’s show notes, which is also on the website drjessicahiggins.com. There you’ll also find other resources, articles, other interviews, other podcasts and book recommendations, as well as a link to how to work with me if you’re looking to go a little deeper. If you’d like to self-study, there’s also courses for you to access, for you to go deeper with these principles in your practice.
Thank you for listening and until next time, I hope you take great care.
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