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Marriage Startup Episode 30
[Intro music]
LESLIE
Welcome to the Marriage Startup Podcast, Episode 30 - The Listener
Feedback Show No. 2. This episode is all about you - our faithful, kind,
wonderful listeners.
LAURA
Today I have a great listener question that I want to dig into.
LESLIE
And we have some new reviews to share.
LAURA
And as always, we'll end with the what I'm going to do for you this week
segment, where we offer instead of ask.
LESLIE
I'm your co-host, Leslie Camacho.
LAURA
That's all you're going to say?
LESLIE
Oh, yeah.
LAURA
You were supposed to fill in the blanks [chuckles].
LESLIE
Well, I'm just reading [laughter]. I'm just reading what's given to me.
LAURA
I just have …
LESLIE
Aside from reading crumpled scripts, I'm known as the Chief Espresso
Officer of the Camacho household.
LAURA
And I am Laura Camacho.
LESLIE
I feel like we should give a warning, a disclaimer and get a little braggy
here at the same time, all at once. It is a beautiful, beautiful day here in
Bend, Oregon, and the kids are at the sitter's. It's Thursday morning and
we have all morning into the early afternoon to work together on Mondays
and Thursdays. We just could not be inside so we grabbed our trusty H6,
got in the hammock with the blanket and snuggled up [laughter], and we're
enjoying one of the benefits of working from home and being our own
bosses.
LAURA
Yes.
LESLIE
Can't do this in an office. For many, many, many reasons. So if the sound
quality is a little sketchy today or if you hear dogs or cars or anything else,
it's because we are enjoying the amazing weather outside here. All right,
anything else you want to add to that?
LAURA
Yes, apologies for the very casual mood that swinging in the hammock
while recording has created.
LESLIE
It's good, it's good, because we're kicking off the second half of Season 2.
Let's not start with heavy-handed, high drama stuff.
LAURA
That's a good idea.
LESLIE
I'm sure that will come up somewhere in our lives in the near future -
LAURA
Knowing us.
LESLIE
- but there is no drama today. Let's just enjoy. Let's just enjoy that.
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LAURA
All right.
LESLIE
Let's get on with the show. Where are we starting here?
LAURA
Okay. So since our heartfelt plea last episode, which was two weeks ago,
we did get five new reviews. We're only going to read one of them
because it's an international review and it’s not visible on the US iTunes,
where most of our listeners are from. The other ones you can see on
iTunes when you go to add your own review. We want to just give a shoutout to the usernames. And I'll let you read those [laughter].
LESLIE
All right. So very big heartfelt thank you from Laura and me to Sarah
Kerner, to “cater9,’ “lynx0333” and to - uh oh, I can't read that last one.
LAURA
I think it's “dedybear.”
LESLIE
“dedybear.” You guys left some awesome reviews for us. That is very
encouraging and helps spread the message of the show and to get that out
there. We're just very, very thankful for that. Then we actually wanted to
read the international review since most of you - most of our listeners do
not have access to that.
LAURA
This one is anonymous and it's a four-star review, and it will explain why.
"This is a twitch behind the curtain of one marriage. The hosts, who are
the two married people, are considerate, mindful and full of purpose. They
are loving to each other without being saccharine, and they are sincere
without making you uncomfortable, and they produce satisfying results
time and again to make you feel hopeful. They are very much real people
with very recognizable problems, and that is part of what I love about it.
The other part I love is the total freedom they have to be themselves.
There's never any tone that implies one disapproves of the other.
The reasons I give it four stars rather than five are this. I'm slightly put off
by their talk of religion. I don't begrudge them their religion but it
nevertheless has an effect on me. The second reason is the man's focus
on material and professional success. While I understand its importance, I
feel he has a slightly obsessive feel for it. These two things will never be a
reason to stop listening, however - it's only my personal view of it. At one
point I had a difficult situation in my own marriage and before I was ready
to discuss it with my spouse, I felt the need to listen to one of their
episodes so I could hear loving and open people talk to each other and be
a role model to me."
LESLIE
That's just amazing. That entire thing is why we started the show in the
first place, is to be an invitation, to model what we can, and modeling both
the good and the bad. I think this person is very, very good at calling us
out on what she doesn't like. How offended are you by that; that she didn't
like some of the stuff about what we said?
LAURA
Pfft. I don't care. I think it's great that she can look past it and see that our
hearts are in the right place even if she doesn't share the same kind of
language.
LESLIE
That's exactly what we want. That's exactly what we value in the
community - the honesty, the transparency, the freedom to be who we are
and the freedom of our listeners to be who they are. So, awesome, well
done, and I admit that this review nails me. I do have an obsessive focus
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with that and I don't like that about me either [laughter]. It's one of the
things I'm working on.
We had a couple other things that aren't questions for us but we did want
to - I guess one is a question but back when we were doing The Miracle
Morning, one of our listeners Randy, who was - he sent the books that
we've talked about and he's also given us some feedback on the
Wordpress site, and has just been a general supporter and champion of
what we're doing and we're very thankful for that, he sent us his Miracle
Morning routine that he started doing. It's pretty different from the one I
described in terms of his approach to it, so I got his permission to share
that here too. This is an example of just how different they can be while
accomplishing the same goals.
Here's his Miracle Morning. He starts with a glass of water and he also
notes that he's never done this before but he thinks it's going to be
important from here on out. Then he does five minutes of silence, five
minutes of affirmations, five minutes of visualization, then ten minutes of
reading followed by five minutes of journaling in an app called Day One,
which is awesome, by the way. If you like journaling on the computer,
that's one of the best ones you can use. Then he does 15 minutes of
exercise as a way to start his day.
It can be that simple. There's nothing complex about it. You don't have to
go into this big complicated thing. You don't have to do the 30-Day
Challenge, like I tend to go over the top on stuff.
LAURA
[chuckles].
LESLIE
It's also not a competition to see who can do more. This is about what
works for you to get you off to your best start. Randy, we really appreciate
you sharing that with us.
Let's see. What was the other thing that we got? Which question do we
want to tackle first?
LAURA
Marco's question about Glimmering. Do you have that handy? I don't - I
didn't ever see that [laughter].
LESLIE
All right. So, Marco just had a general question about - wanting us to dig
into more about the idea behind Glimmering and what we're doing with it. I
want to be able to address that question more in full but it's a little hard to
get into because we don't have it really well defined yet either. So I think
what I'd like to do is spend just a little bit of time explaining the approach
versus the end goal, because I think that's probably the best to answer the
question.
The very pragmatic side of things is that we do need a company to funnel
our finances through. Since there's multiple ways that we make money in
terms of having revenue into the business - you have Wild Goose
Guidance, I do Haywire Consulting, I have one-off sales work and then I
have the odd gig here and there - where not all of those things are under
the same brand or service but we don't want to start five separate
companies with five different bank accounts, the very practical reason that
we have Glimmering is that there's just one LLC that we can send all our
finances through. We just have one bank account set up for it in addition
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to our own personal bank account, so that allows us to have a completely
separate account.
You actually need a business entity in order to have a business bank
account so we're registered with both the State of Oregon and the Federal
Government, we have what's called an EIN number that we use instead of
a Social Security number, and so basically that allows us to easily track all
our business expenses, purchases and financial transactions through the
LLC and then we take a draw from it, which is kind of like paying ourselves
a salary as we're able to. So that's the very pragmatic side of it.
The other side, though, that is much more abstract is that we needed
momentum, we needed forward movement, so we started this year with
some big ideas and some big plans. We went through the goal planning
phase and one of the surprises for us is that our idea last year was that we
would be working on just one thing, putting all our effort into it. That is still
the end goal but we're not there yet, so we needed to pick something that
was thematic of the direction of our lives.
That's why we chose Glimmering specifically. We already owned the
domain name for it, which is another practical reason, but it just symbolizes
the way we live our lives. We like bringing light to dark places, which I
think we talked about, and that is something that we're particularly
passionate about, whether it's solving someone's complex business
problem, whether it's talking about light or dark places in marriage.
Whatever it is that we do, we notice that that's a common theme in our
lives and our marriage.
It's definitely not prescriptive of how we think other people should start a
business. If I were starting a software company, for example, again this is
not how I would approach it. But for our family business and entity, it felt
really good to have the business name and have a theme behind it so that
as we're working together, even if we're working on separate things, we
know that we're heading in the same direction under the same name, even
though we're implementing that in our own unique ways.
So yeah, that's more the thinking behind it. If you go to glimmering.com
right now, it doesn't reflect what I just talked about. It very much still talks
about my personal consulting services that I offer to businesses and in
particular Web professionals and people in the software industry. So the
eventual goal is in the short period of time - which could mean the next
three or four months - is I want to transfer all that stuff into a different place
and get that all mixed around. I'll spare you the boring details until they're
actually ready for that.
But yeah, that's just the bottom line. We needed something for ourselves
that sets our hearts and minds and I would say even our bodies in the
same direction whilst still allowing us to live out what we want to do in
terms of what we consider our jobs.
LAURA
It's kind of like Glimmering is the marriage of our individual businesses.
LESLIE
Yes.
LAURA
The third entity.
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LESLIE
That would be another good way of describing it. I think we complicated
that [laughter] instead of unpacked it, but that's how family businesses can
be. They could be on the complex side of things.
LAURA
So Marco is I think a relatively new listener. He's still catching up so I don't
know when he's going to hear this episode - maybe he'll skip ahead for
this. But he's been sending us these great feedback notes. Whenever he
has a thought about something that he's listened to, he drops us an email,
which we love. We would love it if more of you would do that.
So Marco is getting highlighted again here. He had an interesting idea for
enhancing the end segment which is I think a lot of people's favorite thing,
where we tell each other what we're going to do for each other this week.
LESLIE
Yes, exactly. You want to read what he wrote here?
LAURA
Sure. I'll read what he wrote and then we'll discuss it together, but you
should start.
LESLIE
Okay.
LAURA
Okay. So, Marco said, "I know that the purpose of this section is to take
the burden off your partner and not force them to answer questions like
'What can I do to help?' and this is amazing and essential. But I might also
recommend a discussion on how previous gifts offered fulfill a need you
had. This would be a good opportunity to discuss and improve those gifts.
I find that sometimes the gift I want to give my wife is the one that I would
like her to have, not necessarily a gift she would want. I have found that
opening up discussions on this allows me to see more clearly into an
aspect of her I might not have seen or better yet, a place where I was
impressing onto her an image that isn't hers."
LESLIE
What immediately stood out to me about this is I don't want to do it.
LAURA
[chuckles] Really?
LESLIE
That was my immediate reaction to this. Then I thought, "Why on Earth
would I not want to do this?" The reason is because what Marco is
suggesting requires a level of vulnerability that we often don't offer by
default. Because what he's really saying is "I found this thing really
valuable to give to you and I actually want to know if you think what I think
is valuable is actually worthwhile to you or not."
LAURA
I see, okay.
LESLIE
So if I gave you a gift and I put a lot of intention or effort into it or it was
very - it's exactly what he says. If it was very meaningful for me to give it to
you but you don't actually find it helpful or meaningful, I'm putting it on the
line for myself. So the reason I don't want to do this is for selfish reasons. I
don't want to - my natural state of things is not to allow that type of
vulnerability, and I have a lot of past baggage with that.
LAURA
Is it a fear of just being wrong and missing someone's heart?
LESLIE
I don't know. I would need to give it some more thought, I think. I don't
want to just ramble about that on air, so to speak, but as soon as I figured
out why I was against it I realized that this would actually be a really
important thing to try. I love the idea because I think he's absolutely right we have a bias. And here, a bias is not a bad word. Bias is just an
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acknowledgment there are things we favor for reasons that are sometimes
good and sometimes bad.
So we have a bias toward things that we enjoy or we find valuable, but that
doesn't mean that our partner, the person we're trying to honor through this
segment, actually shares that, so it's just an opportunity to have an honest
conversation to actually make sure that we're accomplishing what we want
to accomplish, and that's to help each other.
LAURA
I have a question for you.
LESLIE
Yes?
LAURA
Can you think of one of the things that I offered to do for you that totally
missed the mark for you?
LESLIE
No, but I can think of one of the things that I did for you [laughter] that
totally missed the mark.
LAURA
Oh? Do tell.
LESLIE
I think in one of the - I don't remember which episode but very early on, I
had gotten us licenses to a game that we could play together.
LAURA
[chuckles].
LESLIE
And that just never happened or materialized. It was a really good thought
based on some of the things that we did pre-children but I think that if I'm
really honest about it, I just wanted to play the game and thought you might
enjoy it with me.
LAURA
See, that was going to be my example [laughter]. I'm not terribly picky
about gifts because I just like being thought of, so for me the thought really
does count and I love that you thought of it. The sentiment behind it was "I
want do to this thing together" but I got so confused by the sign-up process
and all this nonsense, and then it just sort of fizzled. You never really
helped me make it happen. You just delivered this thing and I wasn't sure
what it was. So yeah, that one kind of fell flat. But I really love that - it was
very nostalgic because we used to game a lot together, so it was like - to
me, the message was "I miss this part of our relationship and our
connection in this way." So that was what I really got out of it.
LESLIE
Yeah, that's why I buy you a videogame every single week [laughter]. So, I
would actually like to try this.
LAURA
Yeah!
LESLIE
I don't think I'm - well, I know I'm not ready to try it in this episode and I
don’t think it would be helpful to do every episode, but I think once a month
or every other week is to just go back and review and do exactly what
Marco's suggesting here - talk about what gifts have had the most meaning
or actually provided the help that we wanted. It's an invitation to really
discuss whether we're actually accomplishing what we set out to
accomplish. I just love that. Thank you very much, Marco, for that
suggestion and we are looking forward to trying that out.
LAURA
All right. I think this is pretty much the last thing. This is an actual question
that we are going to spend a little time discussing. Here's the question.
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LESLIE
This was sent in by an anonymous listener and we're just going to say
"he", just to make it easy on ourselves, so we don't have to say - so we
don't have to try to stop and think about it as we're discussing it.
LAURA
Yes. So, here's the question. How do you handle talking to someone who
deflects blame? Here's the example - "Can you please stop leaving your
clothes on the bathroom floor?" Apparently this happens every day in this
household. The response is "There's a shirt of yours on the floor too." So I
think he's asking how do we get out of this dynamic where he feels like
he's making just a simple request and the other person feels attacked or
blamed or shamed or whatever and is responding very defensively. The
question is how do we get out of this dynamic.
LESLIE
I think for a question like this we need to put our disclaimer a little bit in the
front where we just say as a reminder that our feedback and answer here
is based on our experience, and we are assuming an otherwise healthy
relationship.
LAURA
Yes. Thank you.
LESLIE
So again, we're not marriage therapists, we're not licensed psychologists
or anything else in a field that would apply for actual advice. I think it's
really important to assume that there's a baseline of health in the
relationship.
LAURA
Yes.
LESLIE
I think the second disclaimer is more humorous in nature, is that I don't
think we've ever really had this issue on a recurring basis but I know why
we don't have it.
LAURA
Why?
LESLIE
But we do have it with our kids, especially the eldest one.
LAURA
So why don't we have it?
LESLIE
Let's back up. I want to start with how I would handle it first and then work
backward from there.
LAURA
Okay.
LESLIE
I think that in here, you model the example that you'd like to see. So if that
were me and if I was on that end and I say, "Hey, Laura, you always leave
your stuff in the bathroom. Would you please pick that up?"
LAURA
Incidentally [chuckles] there's a pile of my clothes in the bathroom.
LESLIE
And you say, "Well, your stuff's always in the bathroom too," and you're
sort of snotty about it.
LAURA
That's actually true.
LESLIE
Right. You're derailing here [chuckles].
LAURA
Sorry.
LESLIE
Then my response would be, "You know, you're absolutely right. Let me
pick that up right now," and just defuse it. Just acknowledge that, "Yeah,
you're right, I'm being hypocritical about this. My end goal here is a clean
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bathroom and we're working together to achieve that so here, I'm picking it
up right now. Is there anything else you see in here that you'd like me to
help clean up and do right now?"
The person could have a really unloving response to that, or it may just
defuse it and you would want to play it by ear. But in a loving relationship
when stuff like that happens, you just want to model what you see and
what you'd like to see happen. Because it's so much easier for me to take
the humble posture than to try to force you to do it. If it becomes a clash of
wills instead of an exercise of showing grace and kindness then I think it
can go south really - it can go badly really quickly.
The caveat to this is if you're in a bad relationship, this is a great way to be
taken advantage of on a regular basis, which you absolutely do not want. I
would say that if this is something you do and it leads to a great
conversation and a discussion where the modeling of behavior leads to
something - and here it may happen multiple times because changing
habits takes time, so you may have to have this conversation and have
that response over the course of at least three months. If this is a lifelong
habit, especially if there's some baggage behind it, then my expectation
would simply be if this was a behavior I want to see change, I know that
behavior change usually takes a minimum of three months, sometimes
longer.
So as long as those repeated interactions have a positive response and I
don't feel like it's leading to we're enabling or I feel like I'm being taken
advantage of - for example, if I model that for you and you then
reciprocate, then it's a positive outcome. Even if I have to model that same
behavior for three months and you reciprocate the majority of the time,
that's a great result and I just have to have the patience, grace and
perseverance to keep modeling that until it's not an issue anymore. That
may take time, so then it's on me to just show the patience and grace and
understand that real change takes time, even something like this.
I was listening to a podcast this past week called The Mindset Zone. I
can't pronounce her name so I won't even bother but I'll link it in the Show
Notes. She was interviewing someone who is a licensed psychologist and
an expert on change. She bills herself I think as a change coach. One of
the things she said in that podcast really struck me, is that here what you're
looking for is not the word change but a shift. You're looking for a slight
shift in behavior that leads to the direction and outcome that you're looking
for.
A change - I think when you're asking someone to change, it puts a big
mental burden on somebody. If you're asking someone to make a small
shift and you're willing to also make that shift then I think you can have a
meaningful way forward so long as you acknowledge that it's going to take
time to really become a rooted habit and a non-issue. So there's my initial
thought on that.
LAURA
My initial thought is with the way the question is asked, "How do you
handle talking to someone who deflects blame?" I wonder if that choice of
vocabulary is perhaps indicative of the tone that's being taken when he's
asking. If it sounds to the other person like blame, another thing you can
do - and this is somewhat what you're saying - is change your tone,
change your words.
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I mean, the example, "Can you please stop leaving your clothes on the
bathroom floor?" is a very universal statement of, "Hey, you do this, stop
doing this," and instead asking for specifically what you want in that
moment, and maybe do it using inclusive language saying, "Can you help
me pick up these clothes?" Instead of, "[accusingly] Could you please
stop?" say, "[calmly] Can you help me pick up these clothes, please?" And
maybe saying "these clothes" instead of "your clothes".
There's lots of little shifts in language you can take that can help.
Someone who's maybe already on the defensive about being sloppy or
whatever, there's a dynamic there. To help reduce the amount of blame
they actually hear in your request.
LESLIE
That's a very good insight and I think that goes back to what we said at the
beginning of this; that we're assuming a baseline healthy relationship. That
doesn't mean individually we're all healthy. I think that we're [chuckles]
very transparent about our own particular struggles in that, but I think in our
case our relationship is way more healthy than either of us are individually
in that sense. I think also when we hear a question like this, it's usually
indicative of something much bigger.
LAURA
Yeah.
LESLIE
So the other thing I would want to know is what is the person's situation at
work or in life? If this is me talking to you and I'm always getting a
defensive response, are you in a job where you get blamed a lot or are you
in a high stress job where people are always asking things of you and then
you come home and it's just more things asked of you? I know back in my
CEO days that was something I really struggled with.
LAURA
Oh, yeah.
LESLIE
Actually, even before me being a CEO, when I was just lead on customer
support and sales, my entire day was trying to solve people's problems,
just being on the receiving end of stress and blame from the moment I
started work all the way to the moment I ended work. Then if you asked
me anything it was like, "Why are you even asking me this? How come
you just don't do it?" Suddenly the tone I would never have taken with any
of my customers, I felt -
LAURA
Safe enough.
LESLIE
Felt safe enough unloading on you the rest of my day when you're just
asking me to do something really easy. You're not asking me how do I do
this thing in whatever really complicated technical question; you're just
saying, "Hey, can you take the trash out?"
LAURA
Yeah, and you used to just freeze.
LESLIE
[chuckles] Yes.
LAURA
I would be yelling at you in my head, like [chuckles] "What is your problem?
It's this tiny thing," and then eventually I would just stop asking because I
didn't want to have to deal with your attitude about it.
LESLIE
So what I want to make sure to say here is that we're not looking to excuse
the other person's behavior.
LAURA
Right.
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LESLIE
What we're looking for is an explanation or some sort of foundation on
which we can build a response that shows grace, that shows love,
compassion. I really like your example of being invitational and "Hey, can
you help me solve this problem? The problem is that our clothes are on
the bathroom floor. Can you just help me pick them up?" I think it goes
back to if you're willing to let yourself be vulnerable and really be able to
explain a need or want that you think is valuable, and the way that you do
that - if you can do that in a compassionate manner and sometimes an
even intimate manner.
There's been times where you've defused me in a situation just by giving
me a hug and pulling me close and saying, "I would really love," but you're
whispering it in my ear in this very intimate way that really shows [laughter]
how much you would love it. It's not an offer of a trade.
LAURA
No.
LESLIE
You're not saying, "Hey, there's sex later if you do this now," because we're
not fans of that.
LAURA
No?
LESLIE
But we are fans of being vulnerable and really showing our hearts and
inviting a response that is modeled after what we're showing in there. I
think that if you put yourself out there, you make yourself vulnerable, you
model the grace and compassion that you want to see, you attempt some
of these things, and you are still getting cold, hard, defensive responses?
Then the very next thing I would say, assuming this is a friend-to-friend
relationship here we're talking about, like if you were at our house and we
were serving you dinner and we were having the conversation, and we had
that same conversation four months from now and you'd tried all these
things, we would just say, "Yeah, it's time to see a professional."
LAURA
Yeah.
LESLIE
Because it's very unlikely that it's about you or just you. Usually we are not
equipped in the same way that a therapist or a marriage counselor would
be to help you unpack those things.
Anything else you want to add to that?
LAURA
Can I tell you the reason why [chuckles] my clothes are on the bathroom
floor?
LESLIE
Sure.
LAURA
Because I don’t usually leave my stuff around - that's your job [chuckles].
Because I'm a little bit behind on the laundry and the basket down the
laundry chute is full, and if it keeps piling up then it starts falling off the
back of the shelf and behind the dryer.
LESLIE
Are you feeling some guilt about having stuff on the floor?
LAURA
Well, slightly because I like having the floors clean.
LESLIE
Are you asking for help right now?
LAURA
Sure. We could go do that.
LESLIE
Yeah, I'd be happy to help you with that.
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LAURA
Cool, thanks.
LESLIE
In some way. This is not a - I don't have the solution to this but if you tell
me after the show how I can help with it, I'd be happy to.
LAURA
Yay!
LESLIE
So I want to go back and answer your question. The reason that I don't
think that this has ever been a big issue for us is we are really good about
being vulnerable with each other and we're really good about assuming a
good heart. I think that if there is a secret to the success of our marriage,
that's one of them. We assume good intentions from the beginning so that
if we're finding something annoying or if one of us responds badly to the
other in an unexpected way that's hurtful, we assume that there's a
misunderstanding or that there is some block or preventing the default
response of love and compassion and grace that we've come to expect
from each other. That's a default posture that is very intentional by choice
but it's also been backed by experience. It's a very hard posture to take,
especially if only one of you is doing it.
LAURA
It's unhealthy if only one of you is doing it.
LESLIE
Yeah. So again, that goes back to if you model the behavior and it's not
reciprocated, see a professional. But I think that is a goal, is to just - you
want to get to a place in your relationship where if there's a
misunderstanding, if there's something hurtful that you experience, that
your history and the posture and the level of trust you have of one is,
"There has to be something going on that's not about me that's eliciting this
hurtful response so I need to let my guard down or I need to shift a little bit,
or maybe it's even let it sit for a while and revisit the issue when it's not
immediate and we can have that intimacy. Maybe it's over dinner later or
quietly before bed or in some other time to talk about it, because I know it's
not about me in that situation, or it's probably not about me. So I just need
to wait until there's a time to go and discuss it."
I will say every relationship I had prior to you, it was a major, major issue.
Just because I haven't experienced it with you, I do have a history with
that. I don't think it's a relationship killer, I don't think it's something that
can't be overcome. I think it is a real thing but we have our own issues,
this just isn't one of them.
All right, I feel like we're rambling. Anything else you want to add to that?
LAURA
No. I think we're done, unless you wanted - did you want to talk about because you kind of were going to go on a bird walk about our children.
LESLIE
No [laughter]. Let's not go there. I don't want to give that example
because I don't want to equate it that this is childlike behavior.
LAURA
Right, right, right, yeah. That's true.
LESLIE
So even though what we just described we do try to model with our
daughter, because that is a place where we experience it, I definitely did
not want to imply that this is childlike behavior in that someone just needs
to grow up.
LAURA
Right. It's very human. It's very human.
LESLIE
Because most of the time that's not the case.
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Transcript by Siobhán at SED Transcripts ([email protected])
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All right. Let's take a quick imperceptible pause to our listeners and we'll
come back with what we're going to do for each other this week.
LAURA
All right.
LESLIE
And we're back with what we're going to do for each other this week. This
is the part of the show where we're proactive about giving something
meaningful to the other person. I'll start this week.
I will take charge of prepping us for the barcode discussion, to be able to
catalog the gifts that we've given in the past, to set a structure for the
discussion and guide us through that as part of the next episode.
LAURA
Nice.
LESLIE
I would love to do that and arrange that for us.
LAURA
Thank you. I would love to have you do that because I was thinking about
having to do it, and getting tired [laughter].
What I would like to do for you this week is actually this weekend, I am
going to organize, arrange and be the motivation behind getting us out of
the house for some kind of adventure. I know that that's something that's
hard for you to get on board with but that you really love it when we do it.
LESLIE
Yeah, yeah.
LAURA
So you bring a cheerful attitude as much as you can and I will do the rest.
LESLIE
[chuckles] Deal. Is it Iron Mountain season yet?
LAURA
Not quite.
LESLIE
Yeah, not quite. I'm looking forward to that.
LAURA
But honestly, it could be because it's been so dry. I'll do some research.
LESLIE
Okay. As always, thank you, guys, for listening. As you can tell we really
value your feedback, we value your advice, we value your questions, and
most of all we value your relationships and for going on this adventure with
us, for making yourselves vulnerable to improving yourselves and the
quality of life. I don't know, I can't think of a better thing to do with our time
than make life better.
All right. To give feedback on this particular episode, if you have a
comment that you would like to leave us, you can do that at
marriagestartup.com/30. That's the secret shortcut to leaving feedback on
any episode, you can just do marriagestart.com/[the episode number].
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[chuckles] Yes, I'm getting to that. We'll always ask your permission first so
if you want to share something private, like some of the anonymous
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and we've gotten a few emails over the last couple of shows that we don't
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have permission to share but were very heartfelt and meaningful, and we
incorporate that into future shows in terms of topic ideas without sharing
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Last but not least, if you want to help promote the show, if you're asking
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To do that, the fastest way is just go to marriagestartup.com/itunes and that
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All right. Thank you, guys, for listening and we will see you next week. As
always, be kind to each other.
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Transcript by Siobhán at SED Transcripts ([email protected])
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