Highly Sensitive, Happily Married

126  Is your significant other defensive? If so, you know how hard it can be on your communication as a couple, working through things that need to be addressed, and feeling connected. As I know from personal experience, it can really feel like a divisive wedge between you.

And if you are anything like most of the highly sensitive women I work with, you’d love for that defensiveness to just disappear–so you can communicate so much better about important things and feel like a team in life together.

So let's talk about how to handle it when your partner tends towards being defensive. Because it is very possible to help curb this tendency of your partners’, make it have less impact, and even eliminate it from your marriage entirely.

In this episode we look at what defensiveness is, why it happens, what might be triggering it, and lay a groundwork of understanding about it so you can be set up to prevent it from hurting your marriage.

We then dive into the 7 steps you can take to help interrupt and dissolve this pattern in your spouse and relationship–and even get him on board in doing so.

Even if being defensive is an old tendency of your partner’s from childhood, you still have sway over how much it shows up and interferes in your marriage's wellbeing.

Listen in today to learn how, and start the flow of communication that connects instead of divides.

SHOW NOTES:
Want to know the very best starting place to focus on to improve your unique marriage? TAKE THE NEW 2 MINUTE QUIZ, "I Want A More Loving Connected Marriage. Where Do I Start?"

Want more connection?  Grab Hannah's 7 Most Powerful Phrases To Deepen Connection In Your Marriage For HSPs HERE.

Get More Free Support, Courses and Coaching for your Relationship HERE.

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

• Get the HSHM Podcast Map, so you can quickly identify the episodes most helpful for your unique relationship, by supporting the podcast (for as little as $3) HERE. 
• Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher.
• Leave  a review in Apple Podcasts--we are SO grateful!

A special episode featuring 2 male guests, Casey Desharnais, a Men’s Depth Coach, and my husband Will– just a regular guy– for both you and your (willing) partner to listen to.

To be the most successful partner and have a very connected and loving relationship, it requires the skill of being honest with oneself–of looking at what's going on inside yourself that may be leading to less-than-skillful ways of relating (and conflict and disconnection)– and then being honest and open about it with our significant other.

But, in our modern culture, many men, especially, still have trouble engaging with – or even looking at – the harder aspects of themselves that they bring to their relationship. (This goes for all humans, but men can be especially prone to this.)
 
If, like many women, you are frustrated that your partner doesn’t seem very self-aware, or has a hard time saying sorry, revealing something that you have a hunch is going on below the surface, or being vulnerable about his feelings with you… Or if he gets defensive easily, or tends to deflect problems, turns the blame on you, or simply shuts down in the face of harder interactions with you or others. . .

. . .  it may be because he, too, has not yet learned to be transparent, authentic, and open (TAO) with himself fully yet. 

But he can learn to, and you can learn how to support him in doing so in a loving, safe way…And when you both do, your relationship will grow by leaps and bounds.

Join Casey, Will, and I (in two separate interviews) as we chat about:

• The BIG positive effects that happen when men begin to learn how to look at and engage with the things they haven't wanted to see about themselves before
  
  
• Why it’s so hard for so many to be TAO with themselves, and with their significant other.
  
  
• What women need to understand their man is up against to be able to be more open and vulnerable with you.
  
  
• How you can support your partner to feel safer and more comfortable to engage with the harder parts of himself and open up about them with you.
  
  
• Tips and encouragement for men to begin building this “muscle” of being TAO–and why they’d WANT to bother.
  
  
• Casey and Will’s perspective and personal stories on their own journeys with learning how to do this –and how many benefits they have both reaped from this challenging but rewarding process.
  
  

This episode will shed light on the reasons behind men’s lack of ease with this important skill, start healing rifts and bring in more compassion, and give you tangible strategies for more self-honesty and ownership– so you can BOTH start feeling more intimacy and connection right away – and grow a deeper, more all encompassing love between you.

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

• Get the HSHM Podcast Map, so you can quickly identify the episodes most helpful for your unique relationship, by supporting the podcast (for as little as $3) HERE. 
• Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher.
• Leave  a review in Apple Podcasts--we are SO grateful!

SHOW NOTES
Where to find Casey:
His website (a bit outdated): https://www.caseydesharnais.com/
His coaching via ManTalks: https://mantalks.com/coach

124  Feeling connected to your significant other is key to your marriage fulfillment as a highly sensitive woman, right? But with the very busy modern lives so many of have–with careers and homes to tend to, kids to care for, a social life to keep alive– we are likely to feel disconnection creeping in…

And when we feel disconnected, we can start to feel resentful, and go about trying to feel more connected in ways that actually just exacerbate the disconnection… It’s a vicious cycle–one I know intimately and would never wish on anyone.

But it doesn’t have to be this way! In this episode I share my recent personal experience of this cycle beginning to creep in, and how I stopped it and brought my husband and I back to feeling super connected–and how you can, too.

Dive it to hear me share:

• the 5 steps to keeping that connection with your honey alive, even with a busy full life.
• Common mistakes we make when feeling disconnected or trying to reconnect
• Some of the barriers that can come up to reconnecting, specifically for HSPs– and how to move past the most common one
• All illustrated with my recent personal story…

Even if your life isn't super busy, what I share in this episode is key to keeping connection alive in a long-term intimate relationship, so listen in!

SHOW NOTES:

Learn all about and sign up for The Closer To Your Husband in 7 Days Challenge here. 

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

• Get the HSHM Podcast Map, so you can quickly identify the episodes most helpful for your unique relationship, by supporting the podcast (for as little as $3) HERE. 
• Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher.
• Leave  a review in Apple Podcasts--we are SO grateful!

Get More Free Support, Courses and Coaching for your Relationship HERE.

123  Feeling heard by your partner matters to most highly sensitive women in a big way–when it comes to the smaller daily interactions, or those bigger important conversations. We also tend to love it when our partner opens up to us and shares what's going on for them.

In other words, we tend to really love having a culture of great listening and open sharing in our marriages.

But it’s easy to unintentionally make some small mistakes that prevent that great communication exchange, or simply to not be doing what you can to promote it.

If you don’t feel like your partner is super great at listening or big into sharing and you want to encourage more of both, dive in. A few tweaks can make a huge difference.

In today's episode you will learn the 5 things NOT to do, and 5 things to start doing right away to bring about a culture of great listening, hearing, and sharing between you and your significant other.

These changes are really simple and easy to implement, so dive in and get learning and applying right away to make real changes in the depth and ease of communication and intimacy in your marriage.

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

• Get the HSHM Podcast Map, so you can quickly identify the episodes most helpful for your unique relationship, by supporting the podcast (for as little as $3) HERE. 
• Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher.
• Leave  a review in Apple Podcasts--we are SO grateful!

SHOW NOTES
Grab The free 7 Most Powerful Phrases To Deepen Connection In Your Marriage HERE
Get More Free Support, Courses and Coaching for your Relationship HERE.

122  If you feel stuck and in the same old patterns of pain, recurring situations or emotional reactions that never seem to improve your relationship–or you are just ready for faster positive change- this episode is for you.

One of the hardest things for so many people is stopping patterns of interaction that hurt their relationship (like reacting super strongly, or being snippy with your partner) and starting ones that help!

Even if you know WHAT to do differently, you may find you can’t quite DO it in the heat of the moment.

This is simply because you haven't fully developed your power of what I call Sensitive Awareness.

This simple powerful skill is the key to being able to change things that feel hard to change! And luckily you can easily learn to develop it starting with this episode.

Today we dive into what Sensitive Awareness (SA) is, why it is foundational to making any real change in your relationship and life, and the power you gain access to in your marriage and your emotional realm (including emotional contagion –like I promised last week!) when you slow down enough to use it on purpose.

Then you will learn two specific ways to put SA into practice in order to put an end to painful patterns and develop new ones that generate connection and supportiveness–all  illustrated with personal and client examples. You’ll also learn what to look out for in terms of the obstacles that may make SA harder to do.

The power of Sensitive awareness is huge, so listen in to this important episode!

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

• Get the HSHM Podcast Map, so you can quickly identify the episodes most helpful for your unique relationship, by supporting the podcast (for as little as $3) HERE. 
• Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher.
• Leave  a review in Apple Podcasts--we are SO grateful!

SHOW NOTES
Grab The free 7 Most Powerful Phrases To Deepen Connection In Your Marriage HERE

Get More Free Support, Courses and Coaching for your Relationship HERE.

121 Our natural empathy as  HSPs can be a beautiful gift or big challenge in our relationships. I’ve heard from many a client that they feel their empathy is overwhelming and drags them down. I have seen how it can also lead to resentment and hard times in relationships.

If you've ever had that experience,  the good news is your natural empathy can actually be used to build greater intimacy in your relationship–once you’ve learned a few simple ways to work with it.

Today, we dive into how empathy can lead to the deepest intimacy in our relationships, and also how it can come with a dark side–emotional contagion--what I think of as disempowered empathy. 

Then you will learn how to shift into what we can call an empowered empathy, which actually benefits both you and the other person, instead of draining you.

Listen in as I share stories and the high empathy strategy that all HSP’s should know!

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

• Get the HSHM Podcast Map, so you can quickly identify the episodes most helpful for your unique relationship, by supporting the podcast (for as little as $3) HERE. 
• Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher.
• Leave  a review in Apple Podcasts--we are SO grateful!

SHOW NOTES:
Find Hannah and all her offerings at Lifeisworthloving.com

Get More Free Support, Courses and Coaching for your Relationship HERE.

#120 Today, we are re-visiting a foundational topic–one that many other marriage professionals do not address, but is essential to understand as an HSP–because it is the very SOURCE of so much that goes awry in our marriages--and the source of what makes them amazing, too.

As humans we all come into this world having inherited a “set of equipment” that can make things really hard in love –if we don’t understand it.

We can use this genetic inheritance for or against us in love. How we relate to it and work with it makes ALL the difference in our marriages.

To understand this in a basic way is to start stepping into your capacity to steer your marriage where you want it to go, instead of feeling like you are at the mercy of your own, and your significant other’s, negative feelings and behaviors.

Your capacity for having ever-deepening love in your life as an HSP requires understanding this--and keeping it forefront in your mind.

So revisit this topic with me (or listen in for the first time) to begin to do so, and to become way more more compassionate towards yourself and able to harness the power you have to make your marriage the loving one you want it to be.

SHOW NOTES
Thinking about working with Hannah? Learn all about the place to start now: Foundations of Emotional Well-Being for HSP's,  HERE.

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

• Check out the Start Here Podcast Pathway for a suggested route through the most important episodes to start with or review — the ones that will help you feel calmer, more secure, and more hopeful in your relationship. 
• Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher.
• Leave  a review in Apple Podcasts--we are SO grateful!

119  If you have been listening to this podcast and seeing only small improvements  (or none at all ) in your relationship, today’s topic is likely the crucial missing piece for you.

Sadly, this really important topic tends to be MISSING from the conversation about having the kind of relationship we sensitive women really want with our partners–to our marriage’s detriment!

We need to talk about and be honest with ourselves about how much we are investing (and what types and levels of investment are realistic and doable for us personally), in our marriages in order to really make and sustain the changes we want in them.

Because there are different types of investment ( time, energy, $, etc) that we can and need to make to have a great (or even just decent) marriage. 

But the reality is not all of us have the same resources available to put into our marriages. 

So today let’s:

• breakdown the types of investment necessary to have the marriage you want,
• talk about why "investing" is essential for lasting love and great relationships 
• take an honest look at what types of investment you personally have available to you right now, 
•  go over how to make best use of my (or other marriages experts) free teachings and/or my paid programs, 
• and look at expected results that come from the different resources and levels of investment

...so you can decide what the best way for YOU to invest in your marriage is at this point in time…and be able to bring it alive with the love, connection, support, and fulfillment you deserve. 

This surprising episode may be the pivotal moment for many of you that finally sparks the kind of change you may have been trying make, but have not succeeded in fully yet–until now.

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

• Get the HSHM Podcast Map, so you can quickly identify the episodes most helpful for your unique relationship, by supporting the podcast (for as little as $3) HERE. 
• Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher.
• Leave  a review in Apple Podcasts--we are SO grateful!

SHOW NOTES:
LAST CHANCE TO SIGN UP for both:

• Hannah's Free Workshop: 3 Invisible Steps To Deeper Love Than Ever Between You And Your Significant Other (Saturday, May 20th)
• Hannah's 6 month intimate group marriage coaching program for highly sensitive women: Treasured; Enlivening Your Marriage and Deepening Your Love --where REAL change happens. Doors close Monday May 22.

Get More Free Support, Courses and Coaching for your Relationship HERE.

118  If you want to avoid falling into a “rut” – or are already in one in your relationship–this episode is for you.  

We dive into a short review of why ruts (what I call "disenchantment") happen, and how they are actually just a phase that can, with your help,  propel you into something better than ever in your marriage: What I call "Real-Enchantment".

This is a more mature, evolved, deeper, and more genuine love than you’ve known before, where you feel more love and connection and sense of being a team in life than EVER.

It’s what you’ve always wanted– and what I want for you. Listen in to learn:

• What it will be like when you get there, 
• What it takes: the 3 simple things you must get good at to guide your own marriage there
• What someone who is on the way to Real-Enchantment–or who is already there– is DOING on the regular
• A specific example to illustrate these things from a clients real life
• The next steps to learning these things
• And why you, as an HSP, are best suited to shift your marriage into Real-enchantment.  

It’s so important to have a visual–an idea of what it looks like in real life–to make your marriage into the loving, lighthearted, connected one you want. This episode provides that, and gives you the next tangible steps to take to make this come alive in your own life. 

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

• Get the HSHM Podcast Map, so you can quickly identify the episodes most helpful for your unique relationship, by supporting the podcast (for as little as $3) HERE. 
• Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher.
• Leave  a review in Apple Podcasts--we are SO grateful!

SHOW NOTES:

Sign up for the Free Workshop: 3 Invisible Steps To Deeper Love Than Ever Between You And Your Significant Other 

Click to learn about and enroll in Treasured.

Get More Free Support, Courses and Coaching for your Relationship HERE.

In this special bonus episode, you’ll hear directly from the mouths of past Treasured participants and clients (normal highly sensitive women just like you) about what things were like before coaching with me and how things changed in their marriages by working with me.

Listen in to these inspiring stories and hear their words of encouragement to you!

I hope you’ll leave this episode feeling a lot of hope, a sense of excitement for what’s possible for you ,and some extra inspiration and motivation to make these same kind of changes yourself.

NOTES: If you want to make these kinds of changes yourself,  join Treasured. Enrollment ends May 20th. Enroll today.

ENJOYING THE SHOW?

• Get the HSHM Podcast Map, so you can quickly identify the episodes most helpful for your unique relationship, by supporting the podcast (for as little as $3) HERE. 
• Don’t miss an episode! Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher.
• Leave  a review in Apple Podcasts--we are SO grateful!

Get More Free Support, Courses and Coaching for your Relationship HERE.