Relationship Hacks Every Married Couple Must Know with Ajit Nawalkha

the challenge of current relationships is we give up too fast because we don't know where we are going the less you know where you're going the easier it is to give up the key to me and I think key to any successful relationship or at least key to our very successful relationship is there's a common set of values that we have that we can fall back on in times of Crisis and there's also a common Vision that we have in our life that we are chasing it doesn't mean that we have the same visions of our individual selves but it does mean that there is a common or Unified front that we are always chasing and that allows us to be aligned in that by Design relationships are meant to be difficult so it brings the greatest spirituality out of you if they were easy then it's like being with yourself then if it's the same person you're dating that is exactly like you I'm sorry but you signed up for convenience you didn't sign up for Extraordinary you didn't sign up for growth if it's easy it's not a relationship of growth it's a relationship of convenience did you ever think that after you ended your relationship that you would literally be here in the states no but I mean yes and so when my first relationship ended one of the reasons why it ended was because we didn't see the same vision of ourselves anymore what we want to do with life my ex partner was very focused on the let's go to the beach live on a beach you know live the chill life leave live that lifestyle that used to be famous at the time which is retire right and I don't want to retire ever in my life I feel it's really boring and and something that I wouldn't be excited about like I'll freak myself out I think and so I wanted to move towards a more Progressive environment than I was in so I was in Malaysia at the time in the wonderful company Mine Valley I love it and and loved it for the work that I was doing there at the same point of time I wanted to move to somewhere where it was closer either within the frame of mind Valley or in the frame of personal development and internet marketing so I actually wanted to move to us because that was and probably still is somewhere the most Progressive environment to build a business on these fields it's the most research that gets done here the most amount of studies that are being done here or by people that are here and the biggest Market of uh people who want to actually commit to saying yes to their personal growth the easiest to enroll is hair so yes I always wanted to be in the US I didn't know how I will get here I was just going to plan for an entrepreneurial visa and just come here because I didn't know I was single after my first partner for about a year and then what happened and then I made a mistake no I'm joking and then uh we started dating because you were traveling for your first book emotional gret at the time this is like 8 years ago it was 2015 2016 2015 2015 is when I quit being CE of Mind Valley we should really start dating in 2016 so we should consider that as the first year but that was the time when you writing emotional Grid or you were almost about to finish writing emotional grid I think you launched late 2016 I was yeah I was in the middle of writing emotional grit I was slated to actually I I spoke at mine Valley in KL we also spoke at an event together yep in 2016 and that was in Delhi mhm and that's when we rekindled yeah yeah that's where we really really got to know each other like we really spent time together in where we were like really takeing a deep dive pretty much every day because uh you were writing a book I had offered that you should write it in Malaysia because it's a great place and I was never really home so you could just stay at my place and write the book and that's where you started writing or finishing up your book I think you started before that and in that experience we ended up hanging out together a lot more and um yeah a and I found a different side of AUD and that was the biggest mistake that I committed at that time no do you believe that no that's a joke of course uh for people who do not know my sense of humor uh and are only listening to this podcast because you cannot see my face uh you might want to watch it on YouTube actually yeah watch it on YouTube even if you've listened to this episode go back again watch it on YouTube you can find it by Googling the brave table with Drita bushan um and go ahead and do that uh so you can understand the humor in it but anyways it's a joke of course it is one of the biggest blessings of my life uh anybody who knows me knows that uh but that's where we started interacting you first turned me down and then I was like all right at least I get to be friends with this girl that I really like so I did cuz I I think I was also still I was I was definitely still in the healing process in the healing phase and I think I and we were just talking about attachment Styles earlier and I think my attachment style prior to you was this anxious attachment with this underlying belly tone of fear of Abandonment so I feel like but then we were also kind of going through whether we were going to be you know I think you were playing around with kind of different ways of dating and so was I but I think there was just definitely this underlying fear of oh I don't want to say yes to another relationship and you were married before I was also single for a very long time but there was there was something that was you know different because we had seen each other in three different other places around the world before actually seeing each other again in Malaysia and I feel like do you consider kale being a really special time in your life I do consider kale being a really special time in my life I think that's the the place where I really got introduced to personal development before that I it's a joke now but the only book I had read before I moved to quum or on personal development was who Moved My Cheese it's who Moved My Cheese I don't think I ever I don't it's it used to be a bestseller I'm sure it sold like 100 million copies or something is like it's an introduction basically it's a story of a mouse who whose cheese is being moved I don't even remember the story but that was the first lit blackart literally the first first book I ever read before moving to mind Valley and once I moved to mind Valley it was like taking a deep dive in personal development because they were all in they were talking about s method which is the first business I managed so it was my introduction of saying oh life is actually created it's not something that you are responding to at all times you don't have to react to life you can create life and that really changed my perspective on how to approach life so that was definitely a special time for those years and then once once I and that's where I found the part that I was with some of my best friends come from there and I met them there then after that ended K kind of lost its charm because I had also quit being CEO I had quit being like I didn't really have a purpose to be there but then I met you there so that's why it still got a special place uh for for me and I still have friends there some of them at least that are still there and so yeah no kumur has definitely a special place in my heart yeah I think koala lur was a magical time for sure yeah because it was I mean you know we also anchored in some really powerful medicine ceremonies MH and I mean individually I'm saying for me and then of course we collectively did it as well but I think it was just the grounding point of asking different questions and how we were going to or at least for me and I want to hear you know for you how I was going to go into relationship again because remember I gave you that now we do this this exercise and we've been doing it for like seven years now actually eight years cuz we got together eight years ago yeah and but it was our little cheat sheet our cheat code MH of creating our values do you remember that night we did it yeah yeah yeah can you take us through what what happened so I think that actually something it was that night cuz you started crying was it that night it could be I I don't remember the that that part but it could be but the the key to me and I think key to any successful relationship or at least key to our very successful relationship is U I think there's a common set of values that we have generally that we can fall back on in times of Crisis and there's also a common Vision usually that we have in our life that we are chasing it doesn't mean that we have the same visions of our individual selves but it does mean that there is a common or unified front if I may that we are always chasing and that allows us to be aligned in that and that can change year on year it could change 5 years to 5 years and that that's fine but I think the values have stayed present to us and we co-created them or co-found them together so we always have a fall back and I think I was talking to a friend I was sharing this with you uh a couple of days ago and we we walked for almost two hours and this particular friend was kind of struggling in their relationship and one of the one of the key suggestions I made as a mentor as a coach as as a friend was you need to do this exercise you need to know what you both stand for so because there is no relationship that will not go through a lot of chaos yeah that's just never never going to happen like you will go through it's the like our friend Colin says it's the ones that really makes your 10 exciting by one it means the terrible times the hard times the challenging times The Impossible times those are the times that sets the standard for how you celebrate the 10 which is you're exciting and fun times if you're not good to experience ones it's very hard to experience a 10 so in a relationship it's the same the reason why you get to celebrate the highs is because you have gone through the lows but most people quit on the lows we were researching this data together where 25% I think 28% of men over 40 in the United States have never been married yeah I think that's shocking and and that's it's shocking and it's not shocking at the same time you know this is the pure PE research Arch study and because I think that like relationships are hard they're not you know they're not easy we're not given this Playbook I think and and this is going back to you know we we were like you were my guinea pig but I knew and I feel like you were so open to it too so the second thing is is like be open and be curious as to how to figure out two pieces of puzzle kind of like fitting you know together not becoming one whole mhm because you know and I'll I'll I'll link back to the roomy poem and I'll also link the the exercise that we did together that's literally absolutely do it yeah Been Everywhere I'll link it in the show notes for everyone because I think that if you don't have a standard of what your value systems are and even what your belief systems are because how many of the things did we bump heads on in the beginning I think still we bump heads on things but I think that's the that's why those values are important those those agreements of saying what is it that we foundationally agree to what is it that we are actually going towards and the paths will be different and you will bump on things but that's just living and I think that's what we don't understand about at least from my perspective I feel that's the challenge of current relationships is we give up too fast because we don't know where we are going and the less you know where you're going the easier it is to give up so I think if and this is true for business as well this is true for health as well if you don't have long-term Clarity I think you fall for the short-term chaos and the short-term chaos will always be there because that's just life it's today is different than yesterday And it's different going to be different than tomorrow there is no way you can handle that it changes with the weather sometimes you know so that's going to happen there is no way today's chaos is not going to be there but you can handle today's chaos if you know what's your long-term Clarity what you building towards what you're creating then chaos doesn't matter because you just see it as a thing you don't see it as the thing as a bump in the road yeah you just go this is what happens it's a relationship what do you want well and going back to that study you're absolutely right I feel like people are afraid to put in the work and because we're being fed this idea of it's supposed to be in flow and it's supposed to be easy and relationship supposed to like he's just supposed to get me and I want to just have a hot take on that because like let's spill the tea on it's not going to be easy yeah easy is not a path to extraordinary easy a path to mediocre and average well and I think what we you know and again we don't have it all figured out where we keep making mistakes every single day but I feel like I was so I I was I was very persistent and on this one thing and it was okay how can I be curious about ait's evolve evolvement like we are consistently evolving beings and which means that we're going to take all of these quizzes do you remember when we did I mean I had you take like human design uh what were some of what were some of the other ones of course you're human design we've done astrology we've done we did the the love quiz that that you know that Netflix series had on you know oh yes the quality time the Love Languages Love Languages but the other one too the one the erotic blueprint yeah the erotic blueprint we've done tons of them like human design like you already said there's tons we've done Colby we've done I mean we even did Myers breaks which I don't agree with anymore but we did Myers breaks entire certification yeah we did that I forgot we did that certification on one weekend yeah but I think this was all this was all because we wanted to really have the full understanding of our differences in personality types and and to be fair and honest we both grew up in very different parts of the world y I mean we might be theyy but can you break down like how different we are oh we are very very different I mean what parts like it's it's like uh yeah if if you meet us individually you would not think we would be together uh we we are very different as people it's uh just to give some highlights because I'm guessing that is relatable to other men at least if not if not for and I'm guessing for other women as well well do we have to be alike though no we have to be that there it's boring as hell if you're alike actually that's the relationship that you don't want uh relationship like you said you you said it somewhere where you said relationships are difficult but that's by Design relationships are meant to be difficult so it brings the greatest spirituality out of you if they were easy then then it's like being with yourself then if it's the same person you're dating that is exactly like you I'm sorry but you signed up for convenience you didn't sign up for Extraordinary you didn't sign up for growth it's just not there if it's easy it's not a relationship of growth it's a relationship of convenience we grow the most when we are open to the chaos in the relation ship it's not that you're looking for inconvenience sorry and sometimes it can be reflected understood that way but it's not that you're going oh let me find the most difficult person to date that's not what I'm suggesting here we're not trying to find like you know you know what is it called the white night syndrome like you're not trying to date the drama actually those are red flags we we'll get into later on like what the red flag signs are but I feel like for somebody that's listening to this and they're at a crossroad or and they're at an intersection we are at supposedly our seven-year itch in relationship it's literally a thing and I think and I want to kind of just you know bring this up because this seven-year itch have you heard about this um only before this episode that you were talking about it and you were trying to give me research on it and I like I don't know about that it's interesting I I mean this is just on Wikipedia but listen it says it's quoted as having a psychological backing that happiness and marriage or long-term romantic relationship declines after around 7 years and you know this is interesting because you know of course there's so many different um articles on this and why you know there's a top Google research of just basically in the search bar of why is the seventh year of marriage the longest or why is it that the the first seven years of marriage is is hard and we're we're in that seventh year of marriage mhm do you believe that seven was like when do you believe that that was like the hardest year of our marriage so for which year I should I don't know which will be the hottest year and seventh year has kind of just kind of started or it's in the way or something I think right now like I mean marage marriage right we we really got married in 2018 we got married in 2017 oh okay then we are this is the seventh year yeah this is seven year yeah yeah so I I don't I don't necessarily believe about itches and whatever timelines because data is I've manipulated enough data to know that all data is manipulated to fit a condition that is sellable seven is a great number to sell people and that's why price points are at $7 or $7.99 this is where your marketing it's like I seven is a number that sells so it's is it really a seven-year itch or the itch is whenever you want it to have or whenever the situation gets tough so for the situation got really tough about right around the time when Isa was born because they were like everything that happened at the same timeline it wasn't because when I started this podcast two years ago yes it was it was just it was just it happened to be that everything that could that good could happen happen at the same time but good comes with a lot of work a lot of intensity a lot of things that need to be delivered so you started your book was coming out you started a podcast we had a new baby uh our business started to blow up like my Val coach started to blow up we started another thousands of students every cohort we started a new business like everything happened at the same time in that one year pretty much and we moved to Austin like and pretty much every area of life that I'm saying right you think work life you can think about love life everything so guess what when so much is prioritized love is deprioritized yeah right because everything else is getting prioritized not because it's by design it just happens to be that's why it became hard well and I want to give people a framework to kind of think about because you know this goes into kind of our seven categories that we go back to every year in our seven categories of our quality of life the way that we prioritize our family and our friendships and our love relationships I feel like many times people bundle all of those things together and so adamant that those things need to be you know separated and then of course you have careers and you have finance and you have your health and your spirituality but I think in every single aspect of life everything was being I guess triggered and changed changed we were doing completely new things and a lot of those things we didn't really we we butt heads on yeah and a lot of things where we were doing together which effectively means you'll have disagreements right and so and and I had you know people ask me this before how do you work with your partner how do you guys make it work and that was actually I wanted to get into some of the questions people submitted today uh to to bring to the to bra table and maybe we can start with this one but how do you how do you work with your spouse and how have you guys made it work sometimes it has worked sometimes it hasn't worked um just being real at least from my perspective and then you'd give your hot take on it but I think the the only way it works with partner is to have very clear boundaries to what you're going to do what I'm going to do and restate it again again and again even if it's annoying as hell is to say you're the CEO of this business so you're doing this this and this and my job is this uh and and that's it and then stay out of each other's way except asked to interject I think the second rule that works for me is don't talk about work with me after X hours of the day right so if it is this time of the day after that unless it is like urgent something's burning down that's a different thing otherwise don't talk to me about it the third thing that has work for me is set up time for work like for example we every day pretty much every day except for like Wednesdays or if it's a shoot day or something we have a set time 12:30 in the afternoon for 30 minutes we check in and that involves any work checking that needs to happen so it kind of gets it out of the way and you don't have to ask the question or crap when do I discuss this and so it happens to not go home as frequently and as often as it would otherwise go um those are some of the things that works for me uh definitely I do think the problem is if that's the only thing both of you have it's going to be very hard and they'll always go home and that's the thing that we don't have we we have our things and then we have together things and our things are our things nobody needs to interject and and beat around on that and our together things is where we discuss and there's agendas and Clarity and boundaries and everything so it makes it easier and I think that that in the beginning like I like we started doing small projects together and you know I'm the one that's like oh my gosh let's do everything together I love you know I love spending time with you I love figuring out new things and and and brainstorming and then we're like oh okay then we had kids we had one and then we had another one and then you're not sleeping and then you know hits the fan and life happens things get you know harder so no it's not going to be rainbows and Roses all day I don't want to sell anybody that dream but I think it's a constant we've prioritized communication so much and I want to kind of bring up even you know how we fight and what we've learned about repair and Reconciliation yeah so I mean the way we fight now is emotions are emotions they are emotions like there's there's no way to regulate them until you're aware that they're happening at least that's my perspective on it and whenever you get aware of it is is one of two responses either you calm down that's what we do at least either we one of us Cal down and both of us calm down and then we can talk about it but most of the time it's Hakuna Matata because emotions are high we all racing on the emotion and it's just not possible to talk in that moment and so we would go Hakuna matara which effectively means let's talk about this later when we have more more regulated we can have a real conversation about it and idly that conversation happens within the day or at least that's my experience of it usually me or you whoever's ready first kind of brings it back up and we say let's talk about it now uh and then we talk about it and talk about it like how one would talk about but it doesn't just go like here is pointers to talk about I think it goes this is how you made me feel or this is how I felt uh in that particular situation or in that particular event of conversation and then we go into okay so what can we do about it right and what what is what is the next good path from here and that usually resolves pretty much any situation that we might have because it doesn't come from you did this it comes from this is how I feel this is how it's making me feel and now let's work on and it's for both of us I mean not only me but you also and then it helps us really find a solution because now we know how the other person is feeling versus uh you know just something that is top of mind and so you're going at it it's like no what's the deep deep thing that's actually affecting the person well and I feel like there is there's a way to bring things up and I think that many times you know well many times most couples are fighting about finances or why is the dirty laundry like at the end of the bed again or why didn't you empty the dishwasher I told you the 10th time you know or or you know the don't fight for those things surprisingly I know we don't fight for those things but and we I kind of want to go into you know we're we're we're not the perfect couple by any means but I feel like we end up fighting about dishwasher you shouldn't either but I think it's also because we value cleanliness at a yeah but I mean this is a subtle comment on that's an easier issue to solve like what what is it behind the dishwasher problem find that and you will not have that fight no that's very that's big fight it's a bigger F but most people fight about the finances yes finances that's that's a huge One finances and you know sex that's another one and so but I think that you know during that time we had to figure out what our safe word was going to be and I want to talk about safe words because you're right when things are so high it's like I'm not listening to you you're not listening to me we're going to be screaming or shouting over each other so why bother mhm and now that you have now that we have little kids you know I I feel like we've had that personal agreement that we're not you know sometimes things happen and then emotions get wild but one of us knows when to say a safe word so brave table fam if you're listening to this and you don't have a safe word with your partner maybe that's one of the things that you figure out today is what is that safe word um I know that now we have even with Ari yep like if we are on our phones yeah he'll say you know pineapple pizza mhm and then I'm like okay I know that he needs my attention now pineapple pizza mama okay I'm off my phone um and with us it's been Hakuna Matata yep for years now actually since we started since we started our our journey together and I feel like that has been probably the biggest shift for any relationship that you know I've been in and I you know and I think that for us now now we're trying to teach Isa to have a safe word but it's not going to happen she's two and a half MH yet I think that even when you're sharing about these Brave conversations in order to repair and reconcile we have to be courageous to actually bring the thing up without you know coming from that place of I feel resentful or I feel hurt or I feel angry what would you say about that I agree and I think most fights are pure emotions it's got no rationale in there it's completely emotional and that's why it needs to be paused uh for you to get into your rational mind and go what's actually important uh and why are we even fighting um and often at least in my experience what I found is what you're fighting about is what is not actually the fight the fight is actually something else completely and that's why the the resolve process that we have and much much much thanks to you to come up with the resolve process or work on the resolve process with me is is to say okay let first experience as to what are you experiencing because of which you're even fighting like your you're going to have your own experience and I need to be mindful and respectful for your experience yeah it might be completely opposite to what I was experiencing yeah but I still need to honor that that was your experience yeah and that that that helps you create a baseline that actually works because suddenly if you love someone you do care for their experience you do care how they feel in that particular situation and because you do care suddenly inste of acting from me me me now you're empathetic about oh what's up with you right now I can lean into your experience there's an experiment that was done long time ago um some psychologist I don't remember who I think it's in the book us I could be wrong though uh what they did is they they they they got two sets of couples over 40 like people who have been married I think 10 years and over and and they said all right one set a couple was to journal their experience of when they were having arguments these were the couples that were deciding to split like I think there were 40 in total 20 were asked to do one side of the experiment which was go and do journaling right journaling is is great journaling is supposed to heal everything right that's at least what the what a personal growth author will tell you and so go ahead and journal your experience every time you have a fight so you're writing I feel pissed I'm mad she did this again he did this again whatever it is right so they're journaling their experience right the other group was told hey you are journaling too but you're not journaling your experience you're journaling what happened and what you think happened from every perspective right which means you're writing from the perspective of your partner you're writing from your perspective and you're also watching writing it from a perspective of as if you were watching a movie and you could look at both people's realities right and they found I think they did this experiment for 30 or 60 days in 60 days the group one which is just doing a personal experience had no change in their desire to separate or reduction in fights absolutely nothing journaling didn't help them the second group had a 100% change which effectively meant that none of them were fighting as much or or wanted to get separated in any ways right all they did both of them journaled they just Journal differently what we learned or at least my experience out of that or learning out of that was it's not about knowing just your experience yeah it's about knowing their experience and because in that process that we just talked about the first almost the first thing that you're discussing is your experience and by your it means you are asking my experience and I'm asking your experience suddenly I am dissociated from just my story that I'm telling myself or how you are doing wrong to me or how this is or whatever it is I'm more leaning into oh that's what's oh that's what's happening oh now I get it right now I can see it it's easier for me to now go oh that's how you are feeling and see this is how I am feeling now we can be how we are feeling but otherwise I'm just in my head and I'm just thinking about and that's what happens with us right even when we take a break a lot of us are just thinking about the same story a thousand times over and now that situation is worse than before you said let's take a break and that's what happens with I mean look at yourself look at your own thoughts anybody uh any situation that has impacted you is basically you told that story of how it has done wrong to you a thousand times over yeah it's it's how we make those beliefs and those meanings in our in our head yeah and so if we think oh I can't believe he did this I can't believe for the 10th time he left his socks on the floor yeah now you're riling yourself up right you're just ring yourself up yeah so you're just going it's again it's happening again it's so mad I'm so piss they they do not respect me they do not and then you it's all about you but till the time it'll be about you you'll never be able to resolve the situation because you just think everybody's doing you wrong right instead of having empathy at the end of the day having empathy and I think that has been you know why of course you know we're we're lovers of personal growth but I think you know the the other big thing that I wanted to also kind of peel away in that exercise specifically is that we're always looking for the good in the other person cuz they're your home team like you are my home team I'm going to always look for the good in you I am not going to think that this person tried to be malicious because this is my person this is my human like why would they want to do anything maliciously okay so they forgot the sock theyig they're probably struggling themselves they're probably struggling or they probably need more support you know and I I think now that if Ari has forgotten I don't know his socks on the floor quite a few times I'm going to say all right love let me help you let me help you pick the up and then change of course the strategy of of how we're going to shift that and the reason why I'm bringing the kids involved with this is it is it goes back to communication and setting boundaries and I feel like it's so easy for us to a take things personally in relationship and B get stuck in the story of our mind of that person instead of thinking that okay every day every hour so you're done with this podcast every hour where you have an opportunity to think differently to change that story to change that narrative yeah that's so true will we yeah so where do you think we B bump heads the most now because I feel like before when we got together s years ago there were a lot of differences I think it was you know you were from India mhm and while our my family is my dad's side is from India too and feel culturally I have you know a lot of the things from being there it was just very different and we bumped heads on even sometimes the intonation of how I would speak MH uh we would bump heads on finances on some family things yep I think I think we there's we would still bump heads on some of those things they're just different things now like within the frame of that thing like for example we I I think uh we still have our disagreements on how we approach finances because we just have different Financial styles true and and I think it's perfectly okay till the time we understand that that's like I understand your financial style and I think you understand mine so it doesn't bother us anymore in the way we approach especially because we communicate you go hey here's why I'm doing this and you go here's why I'm doing this and so there is a middle path that's not always in agreement with me or never always in agree agreement with you but it's a middle path and both of us go this is the together path and then there's individual ways of Behaving around finances there's uh approaches that are not wrong they're just different and that I think is is the understanding that you build it's the same thing around family or what is considered for example respect in India which is very different to what is considered respect in us or any Western culture really and I want to Spill the tea on that though because we did have we were what three weeks in India yeah with your family yeah who I love deeply dearly and and and bu was there too yeah and even in that because our side is from We're Punjabi yeah AF yeah so for anybody who doesn't know for for all the non-indians who don't know what Punjabi is it's basically uh I'm trying to correlate as to what culturally insensitive I can say we're just really we're just really loud we're loud and family you know families are supposed to be loud and and they party a lot and at least that's what I know they're very family oriented same as punjabis they're very very much like that and then Jan's or you know you're from Rajasthan so you guys are very like you're like the British you're like very Royal and it's you know even the way you speak has a so much respectful tones the women only speak at a certain octave level I think men or women especially my family we only speak at a particular level we very soft spoken as one would call them or we don't like we we have no wises really in our culture Nobody Drinks nobody eats meat they're all vegetarian they if you go to really the old times which let's say my mother more is aligned to that uh is they would eat before Sunset right uh you know they they do fasting like very very uh saic is the word that we use in India I'm trying to correlate that word it's very clean living one may call it it's just very clean very very simple very simple living probably yeah there's nothing is loud nothing is over the top uh everything is very uh yeah gentle um which of course it's neither is right or wrong it's just different styles of living it's different so then when our families come together it's it's funny actually quite hilarious yeah yeah it's completely different styles and so it kind of is like a um it's like anything anything anything that I would anything that we would ask our family or my side of the family for and two even when we go Hey listen we really want to do this with you they would go no it's basically the default default answer is no we don't need that uh like like I remember this just happened right because they live in a wonderful house but we like hey now we come with two families me and my brother both bring our families together for this one big holiday that we do in India which is effectively that puts around 10 to 12 people in the house so like can we get a farm where we can all go and you know we can really enjoy every holiday we don't have to rent out places for it because we just don't fit the house where just to of you live and so can we buy one and they're like no I was like but you like living on a farm they like no too much responsibility I was like okay why somebody's taking care of you you're not doing anything yeah no so I was like wow that is uh they definitely approach life very differently then let's say bua which is your side of the family she's like uh bua we going to India for like 4 days literally which is literally happening in 2 weeks let's stop by in Dubai and do shopping she's like yes let's do it she's like let's go here let's go here let's go here why aren't we doing opposite yeah I mean it's it it is interesting and I I have you know while we've definitely bumped heads you know on this many times I feel like just as a uh outspoken female uh you know they see female and I think that cuz there's certain times where people are like well why are you sharing that M how could you share that oh my gosh why are you telling the public about your private life and that shouldn't be a thing and I I don't want to ever put people in a or I'm not you know judging them for whatever their beliefs are that's fine obviously this is kind of what we do for a living right to pave the way for other people and I just remember even me sharing about my divorce you know a very long time ago that definitely put things at odds with certain family members whom I honestly didn't talk to for years and and I think that for anybody who is in that situation who feels like oh and am I is my voice being shut down is my you know is my light being dimmed or you know is my spouse not accepting of me or is my spouse's family not accepting of me I think that you know because you know it is we we are brown at the end of the day like we do respect what our families kind of say to a point you know I think that we're not we're not very traditional in the sense that we're not going to do or stop living our life because so and so said something no and I think having the you know the we can have it both we can have the respect and we can go after our dreams we can be Unapologetic and be mindful at the same time what are your thoughts on that I think that's true I think there's the disagreements that if if you really want to talk about it the disagreements we have is with between us is I I'm sensitive to the culture that they are in and because I understand because I grew up there there is just I just know of that culture and it is hard to break your social structure until you're ready to break it because you have to break it nobody else can do it for you so I think certain things that we disagree with family on are their cultural norms and so it becomes harder for them to be able to do that and I think that's what causes disagreements is because they think culturally it doesn't make any sense for them to want to accept it or or any desire to accept it and that's I think completely their choice uh there's there's it's fine if that's what they want in their lives but at the same point of time I do think that we we don't have to fit it into that that structure because that's not it's like we we are breaking the norm we want to break they don't want to break a norm that doesn't mean they are wrong they just means that they have an understanding of the world that is different than our understanding of the world and an experience of the world that is different than our experience of the world I don't think either of us especially are are in in any way called average right we we don't fit any mold we don't fit a story line we've done things that are completely counterintuitive to a person that has lived mostly in the world we are in the chase of extraordinary us doing this podcast is as much as there are a million podcasts on on um on Apple iTunes or whatever number is let's say there were 100,000 podcasts that were actually active and live there is uh 8 billion people in the world there's only 100,000 people that decided we should have a podcast right so you're already like Point some % of the world that actually has the courage to do these kind of things right to have a talk and so it becomes a responsibility for us to actually have a conversation till the time we are comfortable with it right we need to be comfortable with it first well and I think you know and which is why we've had so many of these Brave conversations because I think that we you know before and this started way back you know 2020 when we were in the pandemic kind of twiddling our thumbs with our what Ari was about two at that time but just having these conversations around our you know living room table or dining room table back then to say how can we have more of these Brave conversations with our family members to say okay I love you but I don't really agree with you this way I mean of course in the beginning it didn't come out like that it was like why are you saying this and why don't you understand me and I just want the best for you you know and I you know I don't want to sugarcoat it and and have people think that we didn't go through some of those dark days cuz we went through many of those it still happens it's not it's not I mean happens much less it happens much less but we still get heated for sure and in in family Dynamics as well and I but I think that you know it's one of the reasons why I created the brave table conversations anybody can check it out we'll link it in the show notes because to have and find that finesse to be able to bring up those scenarios conversations situations challenges that most of the time would you say that we shove it under a rug I mean not we but generally people we also sometimes shove it under the rug and yes generally that's whates yeah because it's uncomfortable it's uncomfortable and and you don't know what's the outcome that you want and you know that most of the time it'll get rejected especially if you're talking to someone who is at least in our culture is older than us and because culturally they think they know it all can you break that down with the elders and how we view Elders so Ian not just our I I don't know how much it's applicable in every culture but I know in most at least Eastern cultures your elder or whoever is older to you is is like the Elder of the house or Elder of the village as it used to be and so you listen to the elders you don't necessarily argue with the elders necessarily you don't challenge the elders and that's new for the elders to be challenged that way because they they're not used to being challenged they never challenged their Elders like I remember still that anything my grandfather would say would be the word of God in the family like in the word of God of in the house if he said no you're not going to meet your friends today you're not going to go meet your friends today you won't go but why right so that and that was true that was true you will be back I still remember and this is going to sound so ridiculous on camera I'm sorry Dad I love you uh but I still remember there was a curfew my father had after he had two children he had to be back home by 10 10 p.m. he had to be back home by 10: p.m. and I remember because I was old enough that we would go oh we have to leave we were at like some friend's house like my parents friend's house and we all kids were playing and we would be the first to leave the party because we had to be back home at 10: p.m. because that was curfew time my father was probably in his 40s at the time he was following a curfew time in his 40s because he wouldn't go against Nar now think about that person who SE and conditioned like that until his 40s and of course until his probably his 50s as well because that's when my my my my grandparents passed and he was the one putting on curfew now right because he was the eldest son uh which he didn't put any so which is great but at the same point of time think about somebody's perspective of life is they believe that's how you approach an elder and that's how they did and because of that that's how they expect you to be MH right not because they're trying they don't think it's constraining they think that was for protection right come back by 10: p.m. because after that the roads are silent and quiet and so you're unsafe you're walking with your wife and kids that was probably the logic of my grandfather but my father and and my father probably understands all of that but at the same point of time he has to like now my father has the other problem he cannot go to sleep until everybody's home and you know this yeah because he would be like yeah it's okay just call me I'll open the door he'll lock everything and he will open at 1:00 and stay awake we at home until we say hey we're not coming home all night and so we're going to go sleep at a hotel or a friend's house or whatever and then it's like all right we can party till late otherwise you have to be home by 12: or 1 in the night because you're like dude like he's not going to go to bed until we are home yeah it was sweet I mean this past time even here in Austin that's true here even here in Austin but we were just in India and we were in jaor and you know we had gone out to meet friends for dinner and you know of course as things do people late in jetpur but he was he was waiting for us at the gate you know open the door it it took me back to like being a teenager with my dad standing at the at the at the door waiting for me to come home I mean it's it's very sweet and I I think and I it's so great that you're giving perspective to this because I think that you know in the west it's so easy because most people live on this individualism and they're probably even like thinking and watching this saying like well how do you let your Elders run the show and I don't think we necessarily think of it that way yeah and you're not letting Elders run the show I think the society has changed it's not like my dad saying your curfew time is 10: p.m. and he wants me to adhere to it he's simply saying I'm adapting to your needs I understand you want to be with your friends but I have my conditioning and I can't get over it and I don't want to get over it more importantly uh and so I'm going to be up I'll open the door you don't have to worry about it yeah nothing impacts you you can still get to live of your life what I'm what I'm really bringing attention to here is if we have disagreement with somebody who has had a certain experience of life and that's true for elders or that's true for anybody it's because we are not trying to understand what they are going through we are keeping the understanding limited to what I want to experience the moment we switch the perspective say okay what do they need in this situation like my father needs to feel safe about his children that's what he needs so text him it's fine tell him hey I'm getting a little late which I do right have you seen me do it right 11:00 hey going to be late probably around 12 12:30 and he then feels safe he doesn't have to have the anxiety of the kids are not home right and I think that's kind of what the more developed you become it is somebody's code and our our common friend and my business partner Vision was was saying this on on one of the seminars we were doing live and and and I'm going to probably butcher the code but it's a Neil do and Walsh code where it says once you don't have to the most evolved person is not the one that needs to forgive it's the person that understands right it's a Neil Don wals code maybe we can put the right one there because it's probably butchered completely what I said but the essence was that is that you don't even have to worry about anything once you once you start just understanding that that's what is happening on the other end your parents what I found and it could be true just because of my upbringing and the way I understand parenting is to me even me as a parent right now all I am trying to do is the best for my kids does it always mean that they see it as the best for themselves no mhm right and I think once we get to that place where we go whatever they are doing even if it's messed up even if it's sounds racist or whatever it is it's a sense of safety security and sense of and I'm not saying every parent is like that but I think most are most are saying hey what's the best I can do for my kids whatever that looks like because think about it a parent has invested what 20 30 years of their life to get you from 0 to 20 right why would they destroy 20 years of work why would anybody right they're doing I mean they're doing the best that they can with the resources that they have at the time and even today they're doing the best they can with the resources they have even if they sound crazy to you yeah you don't no no no I'm I'm just sighing because I I think that it's it's reminding me of literally one of my you know it's one of my still top rated videos on YouTube and it's how do you deal with your Asian parents literally it's the top and it's I think I recorded that like super early on in my YouTube days I mean you guys can go check it out and and laugh at me but it's like a 2-minute video it's so not polished I think I was like doing a rant but it was like in 2015 or 2016 that still gets so much search volume how to deal with your Asian parents and I think that you know it just goes back to they're having their own experience and it's it's going back to really our thread for this conversation is to really have empathy on you know now and remember I don't know for the parents out there it's like your parents said well you'll never understand this until you have your own kids oh hell yes and I'm like oh yeah I know that hit because many times now I think back on my parents when they were reprimanding me or when they were getting upset or if I wasn't listening and now I see my two full-blown you know toddler kids us and we're like oh man they did the best that they could like how could I how could I blame them for whatever their parenting is and while we are trying to individuate and have our own experience and I'm talking about you know for us who have kind of Eastern cultures embedded or strong family cultures or you know we're in the US so it's like you're you're you're children of immigrants and you're trying to have that dichotomy and respect for everything that your parents did for you to come to a different place yet you're you're also trying to find your yourself in the process I don't think that ever stops and you know now I I mean you know it'd be great to even have your parents in bu round T discussion on all of this that would really be spilling the tea that would be spilling tea I would I would wonder if your if your parents would say yes to it TB to be continued TBC I want to get into our final round because usually I will ask you our our questions that I ask every single guest but today it's going to be a little different because we had people kind of write in questions and I want to uh they want to Spill the tea on on us so all right let's get into it you ready yeah okay how many hats do we have oh boy I want to I know one two three I'm trying to count the ones in my office so four five 6 7 8 9 10 there 10 hats in the office so at any point I have 10 hats to switch from just in the office between us maybe 12 because there might be a couple of them in your office and then I feel at the house we have at least 10 more I would say at least eight more so let's round it anywhere for sure hat closet we need let's say anywhere between 20 to 30 hats not including caps and then I have maybe another 10 or 12 caps so I was saying total the collection of headgear probably is around 45 to 50 yeah when we travel it's a it's a deal we're protecting those hat we have to get a bag and it's broken and then we have to really pick which ones we're going to it's it's a whole thing it's a whole thing there's a there's a bag for hats and do you remember the first time that I introduced you to hats yes I do you want me to tell the story of yeah uh so first time was because you were wearing a lot of hats because the Hat thing comes actually from you it's not my thing it's become my thing and now all of my students wear hats so it's become a thing you who started the whole hat thing huh I said culture shaper over here yeah you are you are I mean I'm not I don't think you're surprised about that you're a culture shaper in many things but hats definitely one of them that's why you see so many coaches with Hats it's all credit to naita in case you are a coach you think you did it no you were looking at me and Nita's videos and eventually you got sold that this is a great idea and now you wear hats okay we might have a hat line soon maybe that's coming comment on that and share it on your social profiles and credit na bushan for your hat collection um anyways you said no I did say no that's what I was start coming to so initially I was like what is this this is a dumb idea and and then uh I think you got me a hat or it was something we picked a hat together or something and I wore it for one or two lives that I was doing like live teachings or something and people just loved it and then I caught on to it and then I couldn't just let it go because I loved hats then suddenly but it was absolutely you they L it H why and how is Ajit so calm and confident I live Bita that is really the answer you think you can shake me meet my wife uh no it's I don't know about con here's the thing I think everything in life is a skill and so calmness is a skill that I built pretty much all my life because I lived in a chaotic house I had 23 people around me at pretty much all times and the people who had the most sanity was my grand grandf father and my father at least to me and both of them were incredibly calm people like you could not shake them yeah your dad is the most yeah you never met my grandfather he was Next Level he was he's even he was even more and he's the one he's one of the reasons why I'm a coach is because of my grandfather because my grandfather was the Elder of the society nearby he like the Elder of the village in a way and so people were come for guidance all the time to him and so that's where I think subconsciously I got wired to want that because it was really inspired by him because he was just such a Storyteller and he was like super like he was really a coach but but coaching was not a thing at the time um so so so that was him and I think that was that is one of the things that got developed because I had two very inspiring figures nothing could shake them and I lived in the house like literally and this is no joke my exams would be on and there was because we lived in the join family there was one particular character who was having her own trauma I'm sure and so they knew all the kids are about to have exams and they would play blaring music all day all day like loud music Across the entire house and so we all had to study while loud Bollywood music is playing on the back and doing math and chemistry like things that are hard like we would have to learn and practice those things while all of that is happening so you had to be calm like you learned how to be calm so that's I think that's a learned behavior for life and confidence I wasn't always confidence but there is a point in time where as more and more I coached the more and more I realize that everything can be developed like a scale everything and confidence is included in that so I am very confident or seemingly really confident because I've developed a skill I know how to get into the state of it anytime I'm in front of camera or in front of an audience or just in life every day yeah I do love that about you it is yeah it is so endearing uh who's the better cook I am % it's me I am the better cook but naita is the more creative cook because the way naita makes anything I don't think anybody in the world can pull off she can start with a cold pan and still come out with a dish that you have no idea how it came together but it is delicious as hell but if you want certainty of here's the thing you're the chef when our friends I'm the cook you're the chef I'm the cook when friends come they asked specifically for me to cook hey they do don't lie I'm going to get friends to like comment it on on our post is like we should have a cook off because my food is actually it's really good what are you doing I'm not saying your food is I'm saying who is better as a cook I am cleaner I am faster I am more organized absolutely you finished the kitchen and somebody has to come with a cleanup job like cleaners have to come to clean it up it takes more time to clean up than it takes for you to cook hold on I think we actually when we were playing around I think we did like a school of grit video in the kitchen we're gonna have to dig that up we'll have to dig that up 100% you cook with 87 pants I cook with three and the same amount of dishes oh we're kti sitting right there she's nodding she's like that is true it is all cleaned by the end of the day excuse me it just takes way more pens okay oh this is a deep one what do you find most challenging being married to me what this it's not a challenge at all to be married with you I think it I think it is so in my experience how I see it is I chose a growth experience in my life I there's a lot of people and I did hear this online it's like there are men who say why would I get a wife that is you know challenging me in some way my answer was always different my life I see it as an opportunity to grow like I don't want to live in an experience that is you know I can predictably say what will happen tomorrow I want some level of certainty but beyond that the only thing I chase that's why I'm in business for that matter I mean look at the career I chose it's basically signing up for uncertainty any business any person that decides to be in business is saying I don't want any certainty in my life okay basically I'm okay with uncertainty and to me uncertainty is the path to growth and so it's not a challenge I don't see it as a challenge at all I see it as an opportunity for me to get better because you the reason why I I was so hellbent in being with you was because I know you will never settle in life because it's true like you just don't like if if you it's not you're chaos addicted because sometimes people can confuse that but you're growth addicted like you go hey how how can we do this better or how can we do X or whatever that is and it's not only about business everything in life how can we be a better parent how can we be a better uh you know Cooks how can we be a better host how can we be better everything is about every question is oriented towards how can we make this vertical better how can we better our relationship with our elderly how can we make our relationship better with our kids our friends like pretty much everything in life our businesses our business partners that question is always there and so it challenges me in a way of growing me it doesn't challenge me in the way of where I feel like this is crazy no that's not that's not what I'm thinking pretty much ever so baby lfg yeah yeah I'm I don't I it's true it is true yeah it's true yeah what do you find I mean I do sometimes say this is crazy but that's out of love what do you find most most fulfilling being married to me what is the most fulfilling part of it's a difficult question mostly because why do I have to pick one I mean this is the question it's it's so one has to understand one thing about me to understand why it's so difficult is because I am a person and that's why sometimes it is annoying to be with me I think more than it's annoying to be with you is I'm a hot glass half full which means it's very hard for me to see a negative I'm a I'm a mismatch which means when I'm talking about a uh action step I would look for all the gaps in that action and I'll be able to solve them but in life as approach I am just generally very positive like I can see negative it's just my I'm blinded to it and maybe it's a thing that I built over time but it's just I cannot see negative I don't see it and so if you say pick one of fulfilling I like pick anything is fulfilling right because to me everything is great it's very rarely that I would go oh no that's not good M so I'm a glass half full guy yeah you're glass half full for sure how do you keep the polarity and the fun and the spark in your relationship um so how do we keep it alive is by actively I don't know if this we are polar we have natural polarity yeah we have natural we do make an effort towards dating each other oh 100% and because we make efforts toward dating each other you create polarity if it's not any like for example I I know where we would go or you would go or I would go and we'll create uh surprises for each other right and we'll go or date nights you know it's like oh you don't know what you would go and even on date night sometimes it's like question like what can I do to surprise her like even if the date night is over like yesterday is date night because it's Friday and we had a date night yesterday towards the end of it I was like what would we like juiciness added to this particular segment of our life how can we add it and we come up with a couple of ideas so next dat night is going to be surprise for you because it's going to be like oh all of them or some of them have been added in this different unique way well and I want to just get it's a weekly process and I want to add context to that because I think we changed our date night structure now I want to say a year ago yeah almost I almost year and a half because yeah maybe it was a year ago or a year and a half ago definitely more than a year it was after Isa was born and we're like okay we need to like juice things up spice things boring yeah and so the idea that I was playing around with I was like okay and ladies this is for you anybody who feels like their husbands or spouses or Partners or not you know doing the thing then it's like all right let's take turns planning the dates yeah and it was I'll take you know the odd numbers of the months of the year so January March so every other month so January March you know May so on and so forth and you would take the even months of the year so February etc etc etc and we pick our day which is Thursday and we have a series of it's it's three themes that we can choose from so it's adventure sensuality connection so you have the three themes for the whole month and so if you want Adventure whatever you want to do and i' I've done CU I know that you wouldn't pick this so when it's my time to plan I'll do hot yoga was one I mean hey adventure and you get a workout in two was renting bikes cuz I love bike riding and you know we did like a really hard hike that was a that was Date Night mhm and then for connection it could be like you know the restaurants that we go to or you know intimacy it could be pretending like you know we're having a station and we're going to a hotel that's like in the city or you make a date night outside of the city something like that but so that it kind of is a there's polarity because then you know there's role play if you want there's there's all the different Dynamics and I think that there's it can actually add to the different dimensions of our relationship like even at work like everybody calls you AJ I call you AJ but when we're at home it's AIT or Dada yeah you know dep I mean it depends it depends depends on who's calling me depends on who's calling but I think it's also um it's one more thing that I think helps our polarity is while we have together things they're not together things like events that we do by ourselves things travel places that we go to by ourselves and what it does is it creates a new experience that is an interesting experience for the other person so if I go to an event where you're not part of that event and rarely I will go to some of the events with you because I think that and we've had this conversation I by design it actually helps it helps you because then you get to do you and then you're like NE I'm not going to go to any events you go to so that you can you can do you and and also when you come back now you have something else to talk about because it happened out of the container and it didn't you didn't get updated on it for like a week let's say if you're were away for a week like right now you're going to India and then Dubai and you're doing your own thing for like 8 or 10 days whatever length of the duration that is and and then before that you're taking the kids to Chicago so you have a whole almost 15-day period where I'm not actually going to be a part of that experience at all and you will grow by the time you'll come back and I'll grow differently because I am doing a whole athletic thing while you're gone so I'll be a different person by the time you meet me and so it'll be interesting polarity by Design by individually growing in areas but I think the important part of it is to have that also veed into your life is go grow by yourself so you can stay interesting to your partner otherwise you won't be interesting to your partner and if you're not interesting to your partner of course it becomes boring yeah it kind of becomes flat H yeah it becomes flat it becomes flat which is why most relationship after five or 10 years or whatever the seveny year itch that you talking about is because for seven years you were boring well I mean let's or you were the same so here's the thing about that though I want to kind of circle it back because with that seven-year itch I feel like and you know there was a study also indicated there that most couples between that 5 to 10 year mark they are having kids they are buying houses they are kind of stretching themselves financially and they're kind of growing in their career so naturally you will have a lot of this strife and new identity shifts and when you add a kid Brave table fam I've already done many shows on this so you can go back and listen to those but it does change you it adds a different dimension of stress and so you know to also ask others for support like we have our crew of healers and therapists and coaches you know that we hire to actually keep our sacred container sacred absolutely and stress is an opportunity to grow if you let it yeah right so I'm not not saying when you're stressed of course you're are in that emotion it sucks nobody's saying that's exciting but there is a point where you get out of it it can take one day it can take one month I'm not saying how long it'll take but it will take the and that's why when we were initially talking about these research including the research data of you know 28% of men over 40 are are single all of the data usually is about average or below average because data is compiled to find where the state of society is if you're listening to this podcast it's more likely that you are not in the average so don't make it your standard if you're fitting that standard it's because you've chosen to be extraordinary in one area of your life but have chosen not to be extraordinary in the others right and that's a choice you think money is more important so you became an extraordinary and that usually is the trend is you became extraordinary in career and then you go oh crap I don't have a partner or me and my partner don't have a relationship or we don't go to date nights whatever the thing is the reason is not because you can't do it the reason is because you've chosen not to do it and you have unconsciously chosen because usually you will fall to whatever is the greatest fear of your life right so if your greatest fear of life is I'm going to be broke because let's say my family was or whatever it was so I'll keep working hard right or I will not give time to anything else so now yes you're in a situation where you feel uh that oh yes yes you you're successful financially but your life kind of sucks and happened with me is why I have this awareness towards it is that you will always fall for your greatest fear so either you work on it and then you're aware of it and then you go okay crap that's my greatest fear which means I have to consciously be aware to not fall for it and more you do that the more balanced and by balance it's completely subjective to what your balance means to you the more balance the life gets right it's not the same number of hours it's the quality of time that you give to things that are important to you right so so I think that's where we really fail we fail to dimensionalize every piece of information and say what's most important to me and what is the cost of it that I'm willing to pay or cost of it I'm not willing to pay because it'll change the way you approach it but but yes data is useful because it brings awareness but it also mostly is telling you are you close to the average or below average or are you living extraordinary life so if you are having the 7 to 10 year you know my marriage sucks kind of a situation it's not big because it's a 7-year thing it's because you haven't given it attention you can probably fix it in the next one or even after listening to this podcast if you're watching this on YouTube put down in the comments what are you going to focus on what is the intention what is the card that you're picking today based on you know everything that we've talked about and we've gone through a whole ride of topics see this is this is so fun this is fun this is fun it only took us two years to get here again we are with each other every day no but I'm saying to you have just way more important guests that show up on table hey if you're listening to this episode go check out the previous episodes because you'll see the quality of guests naita has gotten in the past and you'll realize yeah it's kind of like you know no but everyone's been waiting for this all right let us know what you think and of course everyone's going to be obviously following you so where can everybody learn more about my boo I am at Instagram at real Coach AET that's the place to follow and if you follow naita you're following me anyway so you have all my life updates so go ahead and follow at na bushan okay one final question mhm what word describes the season and Stage that you are in um I think slow down to speed up it's not it's not a word but it's a phrase but slow down to speed up I think yeah I I need a little slowdown in my life right now at least at the time of interview that we are we're talking time of recording of this yeah I love this I love how you show up in the world I love how you are a beacon of light for so many people and thanks for being my co-pilot my number one fan always of course thank you so much for having me

Channel: Neeta Bhushan

Views: 697

Keywords: Neeta Bhushan, Dr Neeta Bhushan, BraveConversations, BeBraveBeYou, BravingMarriage, HealthyArguments, RelationshipGoals, EmotionalRegulation, RepairingRelationships, FightingFair, SafeWords, RelationshipAdvice

Id: X20v7CoJNFw

Length: 75min 1sec (4501 seconds)

Published: Wed May 29 2024