3 SHOCKING Love Tips For the Perfect Relationship | Relationship Theory

the biggest argument you and i ever got in which you know because you were there was over a cup of tea and i remember really being upset like really distraught at how you were handling the situation and you were obviously equally distraught about how i was handling the situation and i remember as because we were on our way to a vacation a very rare at the time vacation and i actually exited the freeway and got back going back home because i was like yeah what's the point [Music] what's up everybody welcome to another episode of relationship theory i am here with the love of my life lisa bilyu and we are going to be talking about three things that we found shocking about being in a long-term relationship these are the things that if you don't get right your relationship is in trouble my friends so here we go we're each gonna throw well i'm gonna throw one out you're gonna throw two yeah we haven't told each other yet no we have not what we found surprising in our relationship yeah this is even super exciting and for people that may not know we've been together for 20 years to give context all right if you don't have what i'm about to say on your list i'm going to be mortified so these better overlap to be honest i'm so curious you ready all right yeah you're going to know the truth of this i'm the first one right you want to go first all right do it um all right so the importance of being selfish word i you're gonna have to tell people what you mean though they're gonna be very so and never thought the importance of being selfish would be one of the most fundamental things that you must have in a relationship i always thought it was the other way around give everything do you think being selfish is more important or is it just surprising that selfish is a part of the equation oh i think it is absolutely the most fundamental thing that you need to do so it's more important to you than what than the unity the coming together the sharing of an experience a life of oh interesting making sure the other person is attended to if i have to if i have to be forced is this like a put your mask on before you yes yes and i know you hate it but it's true why would you think i hate that that's insanity i think you're wrong about the relationship but i get the analogy so here's the thing think about me and you in the times where we were probably at our like most head-to-head it was if i have to really think about it it was when i was really sick so my emotions right so i wasn't stable my emotions my hormones i had such for people i had massive gut issues i just could barely eat so for a couple of years i was definitely malnutritioned and lack of nutrients and things like that so when i think about how i showed up in our relationship i didn't show up as like a happy like excited let's do this and that's just a um almost analogy of if you don't take care of yourself right if you're not looking after yourself if you're not happy if you're not driven have a spark to bring to the relationship what ends up happening i think is looking at our relationship when i was sick was we wouldn't have we didn't have that interconnectedness we didn't have that like abundance of taking care of each other and love and joy and happiness so if you're forcing me while it's not romantic i actually do think it is 100 important to be selfish in the sense of taking care of yourself what makes you happy so that you can show up to be happy in that relationship word it's interesting i think we define the importance of selfish slightly differently so where i thought you were going which i think is also very important is you actually need to carve time out for yourself so not just self-care but like for sanity's sake to be in a relationship and not because to some extent you do become a unit and there is a forfeiture of this sort of self as a solo identity but i think that i mean just at sort of like a basic level there's stuff you like to do that the other person doesn't like to do and to maintain sanity for a long period of time you need to carve out selfishness sort of thought you were going but that is what i meant so that's interesting so then let me say how i interpret if if i had to put different words to what you said um i would say you have to be fun to be around which is something you're saying that's what i was saying i'm saying that's how i interpret that element of a relationship which i think is very important and you taught me that and it was a very powerful lesson about if you're gonna share a life there is some amount of like this should be really fun and that each of us has an obligation not a horrible way but each of us has an obligation to like do the work to make sure that you can show up and be fun to be around um and i do mean that though by being selfish to make yourself happy so do something that makes yourself happy don't care about the other person go and do what makes you happy so me and you we carve out like you said selfish time right so in those two hours yes 100 sorry i get no i get it's just me it's all me i get excited i've spent time with myself so when i say self-care actually don't mean take a bath if you want go take a bath but i just mean do something for you what you enjoy because that makes you happy so then you end up turning up in the relationship happy to be around and fun to be around word so i wasn't sure if you want to go on no i'm i'm about that i think that makes a lot of sense it's interesting one of the surprising things that i discarded was the need to define terms because it's interesting how you can feel like you're you can either feel like you're saying different things where you're actually saying the same thing or you can actually be saying different things and think you're saying the same thing and it causes like a total derailment and so to sneak one in uh i had discarded the idea that defining important terms took me by surprise like i didn't realize just how far people can be miscommunicating all the while thinking they're saying the same thing but anyway that's a cheeky one oh i love that one though i haven't even yes only because we we're limited so the one that i went with was you have to get beyond the t and explain people yes exactly definitely this will not make sense to anybody who is joining us for the first time uh the biggest argument you and i ever got in which you know because you were there was over a cup of tea and i remember really being upset like really distraught at how you were handling the situation and you were obviously equally distraught about how i was handling the situation and i remember as because we were on our way to a vacation a very rare at the time vacation and i actually exited the freeway and got back going back home because i was like yeah what's the point so to give a very quick context i wanted a cup of tea before we went on our trip you were annoyed that i wanted a cup of tea before we went on our trip and just from a blanket that's what we argued about for intensely to the point we were screaming at each other so much guys that literally he turned the car around on the freeway on our way to a vacation that's how bad the argument got very true so in that moment that i turned around i realized it's like finally that voice in your head is screaming so loud like there's something wrong here there's no way that you're this mad about a cup of tea and i was so worried that we would miss that opportunity for the weekend that i started running like a thought in my head like what am i i actually am upset like i'm not being um internally inconsistent with if you understood the way that i understood the world you would feel the same way it was one of those moments where i'm like no no this really does make sense but it isn't about the t and so realizing that when you're arguing you're almost never arguing about the thing you're arguing about you're actually arguing about something else right so getting to that thing which is almost always a base assumption or an insecurity like you have a base assumption about the world right i believe the world should be this way in a relationship people should be this way when you go on vacation that you rarely take you should get out the door immediately so that you can make the most out of the money you spend started right you can make the most out of the money that you spend and for you it was like i just want to decompress and have my cup of tea and i love it and so that was revolutionary in our relationship first of all because now we catch that so fast where it's like hey you obviously have a base assumption that's different than mine so we'll even say in an in an argument now usually before it escalates to something that we would call an argument a disagreement where we'll say what's your base assumption or we're at the t right where what is this really about like and we have gotten to the point where we've gotten so good at articulating either the base assumption or just being like yo you're making you're triggering my insecurity around this and the fact that we can say that out loud because we never weaponize it was a game changer and that's one that i'll always be like oh man i'm so glad we came to that relatively early on because if we didn't and that's what i want to kind of emphasize the importance of that because if we didn't you end up just keep on arguing about the tea and the next time it's about the coffee and the next time it's about whatever but you never end up actually figuring out what the problem is and when you're in a relationship for 20 years that's what ends up i think breaking the camel's back right where it's like yeah you don't get to 20 years if you stay at the team yeah but you don't actually ever understand you're like we're always arguing like he doesn't get me or she doesn't get me or she is spiteful because it when like when i looked at what you were doing through my lens it seemed so disrespectful and so like i said i was being internally consistent like i felt justified in my reaction like i was thinking through nope it is what she's doing is as crazy as i think it is because we were going on vacation because i assumed you saw the world the way i did but once you realize the person doesn't see the world the way that you do they have a different base assumption like so for me it was all about like i never take time off work and to optimize vacation in my world which i had never realized i even had an assumption or rules around it it was all unconscious but in my world if you take a vacation when you rarely take a vacation and you have very little money and you're spending money on a hotel like you better call ahead make sure they'll let you into the room as early as humanly possible that you time the drive so that you leave so you can get there like five minutes before they let you in the room so that you're getting the most out of every dollar right but i didn't realize that i had this sort of group of assumptions so now imagine if you did see the world the same way and you're still drinking the tea and now you're just like burning money what [ __ ] looking over you know your tea at me it was like i can't believe it right so the second you realize oh my god like they just they have a whole different set of assumptions about what a vacation is wanting to start relaxed suddenly i could see like yeah my way actually doesn't make sense like i'm so tense about maximizing the vacation that like i can't even relax and have fun but when it's an automatic program running and you don't realize you're doing it it all just and i say this a lot when i'm teaching people are mistaking an emotion for objective truth and i just never questioned my emotion it just seems so real it seems so self-evidently true that i should be upset about the t and so it becomes that death so how would you then advise people to start um knocking down those assumptions like if we're saying right like we didn't expect that that was one of the one of the most fundamental things for us to be able to have a 20-year relationship um how would you even suggest someone starts with it are you ready i i don't think the world agrees with me on this one you might but i don't know you have to distrust yourself what do you mean by that i got this idea from jordan peterson and i thought it was brilliant and he said when you're thinking about world war ii don't think that you would hide anne frank in your addict assume that you would be a nazi guard and i was like oh god but all of a sudden when you realize that you can be stupid that you can be blind that you can be ignorant manipulated all of that then it's like whoa you start to just look a scance at i feel like this is right and then now i'll pair it with um ray dalio and his idea in principles and you know he builds this huge hedge fund only to go broke and like just goes on national tv and calls his shot ends up being so catastrophically wrong that it destroys his entire business's reputation everything and he realizes i have to start asking myself a fundamental question i think i'm right but how do i know i'm right and so in an argument i distrust myself so when i feel right right like there is no way there's nothing she could possibly say like i've run all the scenarios there's nothing you could say that will make me realize the error of my ways when i feel like that i'm at my most distrustful where i'm like guaranteed you're missing something and so because i distrust myself i open the space for me to say what's this really about what am i real can i articulate it because if i can't put words to it and my sort of pact with myself that we do with each other is i'm actually going to say it out loud to you i'm angry because oh actually i'm angry because you're making me insecure you're making me feel unloved unwanted un powerful whatever my shtick is right so and wow that's interesting you um slamming my refrigerator door makes me feel you know xyz way like wow that's so interesting now i know why i'm actually annoyed this isn't about the refrigerator door this is about something else and it comes from a very tactical distrust i'm not crippled by distrust i love myself i know i would never be a nazi guard but it's like when you operate from a position of like it's probably best to eye this with through the lens of you're probably wrong at least like run that thought experiment hey if you were wrong why would you be wrong yeah i got i love that so much the tricky thing is or not tricky but this comes back to partner selection right because you have a partner that wants you to do good so it's not that i'm like yeah you're wrong and like trying to highlight it because if you were in a relationship where someone would do that i would understand why they would never ask why am i wrong because now everyone's just looking for you to be wrong it becomes a blame game and that then doesn't solve anything so i think that's so strong when you're with someone that can also be the voice of reason that you know you can trust in saying if you were right and wrong versus um not for their own ego but for the better of the relationship how many preach that is gospel gospel all right that was two right that was two all right what's your third all right um i wasn't quite sure how to frame this but it was something that i was like it's almost let go of all expectations go on yeah i wasn't sure how to frame it but um so it's in fact two competing ideas let go of all expectations and have a couple of really strong ones that you never let go of so my why so my expectation for instance maybe expectation isn't the right word is when i marry you i expect you to never hit me and never cheat on me those are my expectations that i have on you i will never let go you over betray either of those you know i'm out the door but every other expectation of what a husband should be what a wife should be what type of life you should lead um i think can lead people into a life that they actually don't want so for instance i had every expectation that my first year of marriage was going to be the best ever really everyone says the first year marriage is the best who says that what it's like oh yeah the honeymoon phase you're right you're right you're right i take it all back clearly just because for us for us it so wasn't so like i've built this model of the world where like who on earth would think that first year was [ __ ] terrible not terrible but it was hard yeah so but that was the thing right so it's and then when i think about general expectations i think it sets people up for failure so when i think about mothers for instance there's been you know as soon as you have the baby you're going to love it it's going to be the eyeball of your eye and then the thing that i found is a lot of women have to bond with the child and it's not that first moment and so the expectation of it makes them feel shitty makes them start to think am i not a good mother and the same thing in a marriage is that if you have a certain expectation of that marriage and it doesn't match it you stop for me start to wonder is he i didn't think are you the right person but it was like this is supposed to be amazing like if my first year isn't amazing what the [ __ ] like all these other expectations and then it becomes almost fearful so for me knew though our marriage our first year of marriage wasn't the best it was in fact one of the worst and i think i think it was the worst year of our marriage but it's like it was still i mean amazing isn't the right word but it like right it wasn't like we were ever like god did we want to keep doing this but looking back yes it was the hardest year of our marriage and especially because i gave up so much to move to america so there was a lot that came with that that didn't come with you right so first year marriage for me wasn't just being in a relationship and married in america it was i left my family i have zero friends i can't drive i don't have a job i literally would sit there and wait for you to come home every single day because i had nothing else to do and so that became i think a bad setup for our relationship of me just depending on you to bring home an emotion for me to feel so it's like oh that's [ __ ] heavy i don't think you've ever said it like that like i get it i've always understood that but that is almost poetic i'd dig it thank you but i mean now it's like it's it's easy to look back and say that but it was very hard um if you were in a bad mood you came home then i picked up your bad mood and if you're in a good mood then i was in a great mood um but it was very difficult and having an expectation of what a marriage is um i just didn't think set me up for success and then just going into more of our relationship as we were together for longer and longer me having or having the expectation that i was going to be a wife and a mother and then having to then go oh well i actually don't want children like but he expects me to have kids now because we spoke about kids and so now that expectation is like almost forcing me to not be who i truly want to be and so that's why i was like wow it's not just a little moment it really does span our entire relationship money that one was money i wasn't sure in the beginning i'm not gonna lie but you got me there you got me there in the end that was really good all right guys this is what we're doing we're trying to help you guys learn easily what we learned through a lot of blood sweat and tears if you haven't already be sure to subscribe and until next time my friends have an amazing life relationship we need an outro but there it is all right everybody peace out until next time later you

Channel: Relationship Theory

Views: 86,560

Keywords: Relationship Theory, Tom Bilyeu, Lisa Bilyeu, relationships, couples, marriage, engaged, dating, relationship advice, advice, be selfish, selfish, long term relationships, secrets of a long term couple, marriage secrets, marriage advice, dating advice, tips for relationships, tips for couples, make your relationship last, make your marriage last

Id: Nx3chKuqqDc

Length: 20min 47sec (1247 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 12 2021