The LoveWorks Solution Podcast

Powerful tools to shift yourself out of negative states of mind and situations.

Positive Reframes are are “mind tricks”, simple changes to your thinking that can change a negative situation or mood to a positive one, often quickly, even instantly.

Theses tools can help you when you feel small, powerless, insecure, sad, hopeless, jealous, stuck, or any other negative state.

1. Reframing

Definition - When an undesirable behavior or trait or situation is conferred a positive intention: reconsidering things in a positive, more empowering light. For example, when you say to yourself, "Ugh, I have to go to work", you produce a sinking feeling inside. You assume the role of a victim; as if someone ordered you to do something you don't want to do, but you have to. Like being a kid and having your mom or dad order you to clean up your room. If you reframe this statement to "I get to go to work", you not only produce a more uplifting feeling inside, but you also declare that you are choosing to go to work. You might even appreciate the fact that you have work, and appreciate the fact that your work helps you put food on your table, pay for your entertainment, and much more.

In short, a simple shift of a few words in your mind can produce a vastly different experience and outlook for you. 

Other examples:

• I have to  ➤ I get to

2. Size Matters

Make yourself bigger in your mind when standing next to someone you feel inferior to or less confident around. In your imagination, blow yourself up to equal or slightly bigger than equal to this person or situation. This will equalize your relationship with this person or situation,  restore your sense of power and value, and positively influence your behaviors and actions.

3. Position Yourself

When jealous or insecure or feeling left out, you are imagining yourself on the outside. In your mind, put yourself in the center. Instead of your friends being together and you are on the outside, picture you and your friends all together on the inside. Instead of picturing your partner and your ex together with you on the outside, picture you and your partner together with the ex on the outside. This will reaffirm your position, re-establish your connection, and restore your sense of belonging. 

Listen to the podcast for the full story. 

We received a great question from a listener.

“How long should you wait to have sex in a new dating relationship? It seems that relationships that start off physical tend to fizzle out but holding off seems to add to the pressure and causes some awkwardness.”

How long should you wait to have sex?

You can find all manner of advice to this question by asking your friends, watching movies, or googling the topic.

You might have heard of rules that say you always have sex right away because that way, you’ll know if you’re sexually compatible. You might find rules that say you always wait one month, or until the 4th date before having sex.

My rule is this: There is no rule. But it can be useful to make up your own.

I’m not aware of any data that gives meaningful scientific background to this. Although I did find an article written by Justin Lehmiller, Phd, from Men’s Health Magazine, where he talks about a study published in Journal of Sex Research. In this study, they interviewed about 11,000 unmarried adults, who were in serious relationships. They wanted to see if there was any connection between how satisfied they were with their relationship, and how soon they had started having sex.

Whether the people interviewed had started having sex within one week, two weeks, on even before the first date, did not make any meaningful difference for their relationship satisfaction. Curiously, I did not see an option for people who had waited a month or more.

The article concludes there is basically no hard and fast rule.

That’s my viewpoint too, there is no rule. That being said, it can be really useful to make up your own rules.

The biggest issue with this question is how much anxiety it creates for the person wondering about it. You know that feeling, you’ve just started dating someone, or at least fairly recently, and it’s swirling in your head when the right time is to suggest sex, or initiate sex, or when to say yes or no. The questions themselves produce anxiety and insecurity, which impacts how you show up in the relationship. As our listener said, it can create awkwardness.

Here’s why it can be useful to make up your own rules. I’ll give you a personal example. When I was younger, when I’d go dating or hook up with partners in bars or at parties, we’d always go have sex straight away. Basically, that was the primary desire. Often, we’d wake up, say goodbye and never see each other again, and for a long time, I was fine with that. But as I got older and started to want more emotional depth and connection, I didn’t know what else to do, so I just kept doing what I’d always done. Have sex right away and hope for the best. And the vast majority of my relationships didn’t go anywhere, and even the ones that felt promising based on my sexual experience, fizzled out quickly.

So when I wanted to create a different experience for myself, I made up the rule that I would not have sex on the first date, nor the second or third. I would wait till I felt I knew the person outside of sexual interaction. it was a real eye opener for me. And I got into relationship with a few women who were incredulous, even hurt, that I wouldn’t have sex right away. But it worked for me. I felt good about it. When I met Sonika, I did the same thing.

I’ve coached a lot of women who feel tremendous pressure to have sex right away, and who feel angry and hurt that their dating partner seems to be focused primarily on sex. I’d say there’s nothing wrong with that, but I also recommend that you make up rules that work for you. For women who’ve had that experience, it can be really useful to make a rule like no sex for the first four dates, or the first month. That way you get a chance to see if your date wants to see you again even if you’re not having sex.

Of course, this all depends on how you feel about sex. For some, it’s no big deal to have sex with someone you hardly know, and for others, it’s a very big deal. Since there are no official rules, follow your own guidance. And definitely don’t have sex just because you feel pressured to do it, or because you think it’s expected.

Also, I would say don’t have sex because it’s awkward not to. That awkwardness could actually be used as part of the excitement of a new relationship. You might consider it part of the foreplay, of getting aroused without the release, until such a time that you decide to have sex.

And the part of our listener’s question, that relationships that start off physical tend to fizzle is another matter altogether that has to do with how you keep your sex life sizzling over time. There are many ways to accomplish that. For starters, go listen to Sonika’s episode about how to have high transcendental sex. It’s episode 13.

If you want to have rules, make up rules that work for you, and then experiment and see how they work.

I’m talking to Tania Choi, LMFT, psychotherapist. Tania specializes in trauma for teens, couples, and individuals. She’s an EMDR specialist and Recovery specialist, and a former tech designer.

We talk about how trauma shows up in relationship and for individuals. Trauma is the unconscious that drives us to do things we know aren’t good for us. Any time you have one of those reactions where you go from 0 to a 100 in no time, you’re in trauma, and not using the conscious thinking part of your brain.

Tania defines trauma as any moment in time where we lost our sense of choice.

When we were children, there’s a little camera in our hearts that always takes pictures of the world, of how people love us, or don’t. As adults, we find someone whose pictures match ours. That’s what has us feels like we’ve known someone our whole lives. It’s also what sets us up to reactivity, because that person’s painful “pictures” are likely to match ours.

Tania says one of the main ways she works with couples is using a tool she learned at LoveWorks, which is to examine the stories and “make ups” we create based on our individual traumas. Simple example: Instead of saying to your partner, “Every time you don’t put the cap back on the toothpaste, you’re disrespecting me!”, you could say something like, “When you leave the toothpaste cap off, the story I tell myself is that ….”.

When you get into arguments with your partner, it’s hugely important that you talk about just the issue at hand - say, someone doesn’t put the toothpaste cap back on - and that you don’t spout off your “trauma soundtrack”, which says, “You don’t love me, you don’t respect me, no one loves me, I never get what I want, I never get the respect I deserve” or some variety of this.

What determines whether a relationship survives or not is whether the partners take ownership of the stories they tell themselves. In therapy, it’s called Narrative Therapy.

Tania says she still practices this in her own relationship with her partner, and stresses the importance of making your relationship a practice. She and her partner still attends LoveWorks workshops every three months. It’s like going to the chiropractor for an adjustment to keep your alignment. Going to a workshop is a relationship adjustment that puts you back in alignment.

When you get too focused on what your partner is doing wrong, on their dysfunction, you’ve have displaced the source of your power. Even if your’e right about your “analysis” of your partner’s dysfunction, you still give away your power if all your attention is on trying to fix your partner.

If you’re a partner of someone who has a diagnosis such as borderline personality, or Aspergers, here are few things Tania says to consider:

• Get yourself in community; find a tribe that understands your situation.

There’s much more on the podcast, such as four steps to check when you’re looking for a partner.

Find Tania’s work at traumatreatedtenderly.com 

Money is one of the topics couples fight about the most. We often have strong values and opinions around money. When we don’t have enough of it, it activates our survival fears and once that happens, it’s hard to think straight and make good decisions.

Some experts say that disagreements over money is the number one reason for divorces. We can’t verify that statement, but we know for sure it’s a topic that causes a lot of fighting and breakdowns. If you don't find a good way to deal with your money conversations, it'll be a source of contention over and over again, because money is not something we can just ignore or let go of. 

This episode offers a five important ideas to help with your money conversations, and I share story about a boat and what happens when a couple don’t get on the same page before making an important purchase.

Listen to the short episode to get five important ideas to help you with money conversations.

Image by LillyCantabile from Pixabay

We received a great question from a student in our Relationship Mastery Program, and we addressed it on the weekly group coaching calls we host for this group of couples and singles.

The question was, “What do I do when my partner is always is blame or attack mode?”

Can you relate to that situation?

We offer six or seven different approaches to a situation like this, both in terms of how you communicate directly, what to say, and also in terms of seeing underneath the blame and attack, for the purpose of communicating more directly to the core issue.

Listen to the 24-min episode for great tips on dealing with a blaming or attacking partner!

The Gift of Conflict workshop we refer to can be found here ... 

She was crying in the corner. I went over to her and asked, “You ok? What’s going on?”

Through tears, she proceeded to tell me that she didn’t know why she was still single, especially after all of her hard emotional work over the past many months. She was sure it was because there was something wrong with her. She was too old, not sexy enough, too shy and introverted, and she probably wasn’t open enough or fast moving enough for the men she was attracted to.

Another man I spoke to, also in tears, shared his frustration at not being able to create the living situation and career in music he has always dreamed of. “Everything is falling apart and I just don’t seem to be able to do what I have always wanted to do! I feel depressed.”

Several weeks ago, our daughter came home in tears after chemistry class. “I feel stupid. I have to work so much harder than some of the other kids to understand this stuff and get good grades.”

Each of these people suffers from Not Enough Syndrome. In fact, countless numbers of people suffer from this condition.

Not Enough Syndrome stems from the belief that “I am not doing enough or being enough” or “I need something I don’t have in order to accept myself, feel successful, confident and peaceful.” It includes thoughts like, “I’m not smart enough, thin enough, pretty enough, talented enough, loveable enough, rich enough, productive enough…”

Some people with Not Enough Syndrome are depressed, lonely and withdrawn while others are outgoing, friendly and successful. Despite appearances, inside, there is a shared sense of not measuring up to some expectation or standard.

Not Enough Syndrome is best fueled by comparing oneself to other people who seem to have what we think we “should” have or be how we think we “should” be.

I too suffer periodically from Not Enough Syndrome. Thoughts have crossed my mind like, “I don’t have enough friends, enough clients, enough time with my kids. I should weigh ten pounds less. I am getting old. I should have more money saved in retirement. I should be able to pick up the latest line dance steps faster.”

One of the best gifts a friend of mine gave me in my thirties, after I had just sobbed my way through telling her I wasn’t enough, was saying to me, “You are right. You aren’t enough.” I was shocked at first. Then I thought she was joking. But when she said it again with a straight face, “It’s true. You aren’t enough.” I realized she was serious. Then she added, “So what? You aren’t enough. Are you going to let that stop you?”

The more I thought about what she said, the more I saw the truth in her words. Compared to standards and expectations, compared to experts and people more successful than I, compared to my ideal visions and goals, compared to perfection and God, I would never measure up. I would always fall short. I would never be enough.

Accepting that I wasn’t enough and would never be enough brought with it a sense of peace. Instead of fighting it or trying to change it or being resigned to it, I could just let this not enough thought be there. I could bring it along with me like an old friend, and not let it run me or limit me in any way.

When you think about it, don’t a lot of successful people think they aren’t good enough? Didn’t Princess Diana think she wasn’t good enough? And Ghandi? It’s no secret that a whole host of famous people had numerous failures before their big successes: Albert Einstein, Walt Disney, Sir Isaac Newton, Stephen Spielberg, Oprah Winfrey to name a few. It makes sense that they didn’t always think they were good enough either.

And when you think about it, doesn’t Not Enough Syndrome come with some positive useful benefits? Doesn’t it dampen down arrogance, foster humility, promote compassion, and fuel achievement, growth and success?

I have come to make peace with my Not Enough Syndrome, to use its presence in my life for many positive outcomes. It helps me cultivate deeper love and appreciation for others, as well as for myself. It keeps me honest and vulnerable and humble. I use it as a launching pad for helping me grow and expand into new areas I’d like to develop. And it supports me to soften into appreciation and gratitude on a regular basis. 

If you are a woman and you suffer from Not Enough Syndrome, I encourage you to join me for my upcoming Women’s Retreat: For Women Who Want More. At this retreat, you will get to explore your Not Enough Syndrome, become aware of its impact on your mood, relationships and productivity, and learn how to counteract its negative effects with positive uplifting practices.

Rest assured, Not Enough Syndrome is curable. The first aid response includes a solid dose of love, acceptance and appreciation. The long-term treatment plan includes a heightened awareness, a restructuring of beliefs, and a series of positive uplifting practices that will support you to keep going for your dreams with healthy confidence and power.

Not Enough Syndrome doesn’t need to take you down or out!

The woman who was crying about not being enough for a relationship? Well, she was left knowing she is a beautiful soul and appreciates her innocent desire to find love. The man who wanted a lucrative career in the music industry was empowered to go for his dreams. And our daughter, well – she is feeling pretty good about acing her Chemistry class!

Here are a two tips for counteracting the Not Enough Syndrome. Listen to the podcast for 7 more great tips. 

1. Instead of comparing myself to those who have more or have accomplished more in their life, I compare myself to those who have less. This practice has me feel grateful for what I do have and what I have accomplished.

“LoveWorks is the information I wish I’d had when I was 20. I wish I’d had it when I was 25, when I was 30, when I was 40”

Today I’m talking to Jordan Fisher-Smith, author of Nature Noir and Engineering Eden. Jordan Fisher Smith is a Northern California writer and a Loveworks workshops participant for over five years. He has written for the New Yorker, Men’s Journal, and Salon.com and many others. His second book, ENGINEERING EDEN, won a California Book Award and has just been released in paperback.”

There are many fascinating aspect to Jordan Fisher-Smith. Like the fact that he was a California State Park Ranger and law enforcement officer for 21 years, or that he wrote a noir-genre book about being a park ranger in Auburn State Recreation Area; that he narrated and featured in the the movie Under Your Skin, or that he restored a beautiful Victorian house from the ground up.

From the perspective of what we do here at LoveWorks, there is a different kind of fascinating fact about Jordan. He hated workshops. As he says, “I had a strong aversion to it … I would have thought myself the least likely person to end up in a workshop”.

And yet, he did find himself in a relationship workshop and has been coming back for five years.

As he said, “LoveWorks is the information I wish I’d had when I was 20. I wish I’d had it when I was 25, when I was 30, when I was 40”You’ve been very skeptical of workshops … what changed your mind?”

Listen to the podcast to hear what a staunch workshop skeptic has learned and why he finds it valuable enough to keep coming back.

"We're supposed to get married but now I'm not sure ... We have a great relationship, we function well together, but our communication could be deeper and the fire isn't burning so much anymore. So How do we balance doubt with commitment? How can we know if and when it's the right choice to commit or marry someone despite our doubts?

Our listener asked this question before she’s gotten married. But we get similar questions from couples who’ve been married for 5, 10, or 25 years.

We’ve saved many marriages from divorce, and sometimes, we even save marriages before they happen.

When you’re looking at tying the knot, it can be really heart-wrenching to have these doubts, because of course you want to make the right decision and no one wants to go into a marriage that might not work out. We respect that!

As relationship coaches we never tell anyone that they should or shouldn’t get married, or divorce for that matter. There are definitely relationship coaches and counselors who do dispense such advise, but we feel it’s much too important a decision for us to make it on your behalf. It’s a decision that has to be sourced from inside you. We instead use or coaching and expertise to empower you to make that choice. Besides, if someone else makes the choice for you, it’s likely you’ll still have doubts. So let’s see if I can offer some tips that will help you get more clear about this.

When you ask this question, I’m going to assume you genuinely love each other. I figure if you didn’t we wouldn’t even have this conversation, you would have just left the relationship already.

In this situation, there are things you can do together with your partner, and there are things you can do by yourself. Let’s start with what you can do with your partner.

When one person has doubts about a relationship, in this whether to get married, it often looks as if it’s only that person that has doubts, and the other partner is totally committed and ready to move forward. But that’s deceiving, because in my experience, each person owns a share of the doubt as well as a share of the commitment. It’s just that the doubt gets expressed through one person on behalf of the relationship.

Sit down with your partner and both of you answer these questions: What part of you is fully committed? And what part of you is not sure? Both of you look at where you have doubts. Both of you look at where you are committed. And you’ll very often find that you are much more on the same page than you think. The very act of sharing your doubts openly with each other helps to create connection and clarity. Besides, isn’t that what you’re wanting in a marriage anyways? A place where you can share everything, even the difficult parts? Don’t wait till you’re married, start right now.

If you need help to facilitate a conversation like this, that’s perfectly ok. Reach out to us for coaching, or ask someone else you trust.

And when the issue is - as our listener said - that communication isn’t very deep and the fire isn’t burning as hot as is desired; that can be worked on. That can be remedied. As an example, we just led our Sex Workshop last month. There was a couple there who hadn’t been sexual at all for several years! After the first day of the workshop, they went back to their hotel room and made love and connected at a whole new level.

One of them shared with us, “Thank you for a wonderful workshop. I feel like I am walking on air ... Not just because of the sex. but from the breakthrough in our relationship. We had an epiphany about why sex matters to us which is where we were stuck and not communicating. The closeness and intimacy generated in the workshop led us to discussing some things that influenced the dynamic in our relationship overall.”

And communicating at a deep, intimate level can absolutely be learned. Sitting down for a talk like I suggested is one way to communicate at a much deeper level.

Now, for what you might do on your own. First, you could do what I’ve already suggested, simply by yourself. Write down, or at least look at, where you have doubts, and where you are committed.

Secondly, given that you’re reaching for clarity, and I assume, commitment as well, notice that in your very questioning is a good deal of non-commitment. The questions you ask are questions asked by someone who is not committed in themselves. And it’s painful to live with doubts in your mind. It’s like sitting on the proverbial fence; it starts to hurt your butt pretty quick. Except in this case, it’s your head and heart that hurts.

Try to redefine commitment. Instead of committing to someone else, or to the marriage, think of commitment as a declaration that you will be able to handle anything that shows up; that you will make good on anything that comes your way. The doubt in your mind reflects a fear that you won’t be able to handle what might show up in the future. That you’ll regret your choices. What if your commitment was a commitment to yourself that you trust you’ll be able to deal with anything?

Most of all, here’s what I suggest you try on. Commit fully. Step in with both feet and your whole heart. It is in throwing yourself fully into the relationship that you’ll have the best chance of discovering if it’s the right relationship for you. You already said it’s a great relationship, so we know some things are working well. We know you must like and love each other, or you would have probably been out of there a long time ago.

When you’re plagued by doubts, you are not fully engaged in your relationship. You’re not fully engaged with your partner. And that impacts everything. That by itself makes the relationship seem less alive and passionate. Doubts make you less passionate. So jump in with everything you’ve got. You could even postpone the wedding date if you need more time to test this out. There’s no rule for when you should get married.

Give it everything you got. Come do workshops with us to deepen your communication and elevate your passion. Or find another class or coach to figure this out. What you learn will serve you forever. Even if you decide down the road that this relationship is not for you, your new skills will make your next relationship so much better. By you putting yourself in all the way, even if you decide later this relationship is not for you, you’ll know you gave it all you had, that it wasn’t because you didn’t put your heart into it. And that brings its own sense of clarity.

More than likely, though, if you commit yourself, if you do what you need to do to learn deeper skills of communication and how to fire up the passion, you’ll find the love and clarity you’re looking for.

How much do you like it when your partner or someone else, criticizes your behavior and tells you what you should be doing? Not very much, I’ll bet. No one likes being told what to do.

On this short podcast episode, I want to present just one simple idea to you. Yesterday, in my coaching and also on a call that Sonika and I lead for our Relationship Mastery Program students, we talked about the very common experience that most of us have had in one relationship or another, that our partner gets ON us about something. He or she might be telling you, stop being on your phone all the time, etc.

When someone corrects your behavior or criticizes your choices, there’s a translation that happens in your mind. The actual message coming out of your partner’s mouth might be something like, “Are you still on your phone. Put it away and be with your family”. The translation that happens in your mind makes this message much more personal. In your mind, it sounds more like, “You’re bad. You shouldn’t be doing what you’re doing. You’re making bad choices. You’re not good enough”.

And because there’s a part of you that fears they might be right about that, you instinctively fight it. Because you don’t want it to be true that you’re a bad person, and that you’re not good enough. So you resist, you tell your partner to sod off or mind their own business, or if you’re less direct, you say, ok fine, I was just resting a bit, alright, alright, I’ll get on it. You make a change in your behavior because if you don’t, he or she is going to get very upset and you make the calculation that it’s not worth it, so you do as they say.

But the thing is … when you make a change to your behavior that’s only fueled by someone else telling you to change; or you change simply to avoid being criticized more, the change you make tend to not stick.

That’s the simply idea I want to give you is that if you want to make any sort of real change to your behavior, you have to change because YOU want to.

I suggest an experiment: When your partner says, “You’re always wasting time on your phone, why can’t you just be with me!?”

Put their criticism aside this time. Take them out of the equation.

And then simply ask yourself, How do I like what I’m doing? What do I think of my behavior? Do I have any desire to change how I’m showing up?

If your genuine answer is that if you’re fine what you’re doing; if you feel your behavior is in accordance with the person you want to be, then great. In my opinion, you’re better off just owning your choices and not pretend otherwise.

But if, on the other side, you look at your own behaviors, and like the client I was coaching yesterday, and you conclude that your behavior is not a match to who you want to be, and that you really do want to make a change, great. Now you have some ownership. Now you have some skin in the game of your own change.

So the simple and hugely important idea is this: If you want to make any real changes in your behavior and in your life, YOU have to want to. YOU have to be the one to say you want to change.

Now you can go about making some actual change. And hey, if you realize that your partner had a point about you wasting a ton of time, it wouldn’t hurt to tell them.

Image by Adi Goldstein on Unsplash.com

We often make a sharp distinction between work and play. We think of work as serious, as drudgery, as something we have to get through or something we should do. At work, we go through the motions only half engaged, present and expressed, doing what must be done. Play is what we do later, after we are done working and accomplishing the things on our logistics list. Play is separate from work.

When we think about improving our relationship, at making changes in our love life, it often seems like work. Hard work. Something we don’t look forward to. Talking about problems can seem like a negative endeavor with no real reward at the end, so why bother!

What if everything was play? What if we could bring an attitude of playfulness to our work? To chores? To our relationships? Just like children who play all day everyday, what if we played while driving the car, played while cleaning the kitchen or folding laundry or making the bed? What if we played at interacting, flirting, and making love instead of having everything be so serious? What if we had fun discovering each other in conversation? What if we had fun creatively coming up with solutions to our disagreements and problems?

If single, what if we played a game to collect dates, to not stop asking for phone numbers until we had three yes's? What if it was fun to flirt when out at singles events?

Playing shifts our mood. Playing shifts our stories. Playing opens us to new possibilities. We are less afraid and take more risks when we play. We are more engaged, more present, more fulfilled, more creative, more connected.

Ask questions when you are resisting something or not looking forward to something. What am I thinking about this? Did I choose this thought? What could I think instead? How could I make this more fun?

A woman shared today that she took on a goal to work 1-20 minutes a day cleaning her office. Instead of thinking, "This room is disgusting. It is going to take forever", she now playfully thinks, "Hmmmm…. I wonder what am I going to get to clean today?" 

Another woman shared that she is playfully initiating intimacy and sex with her husband after spending a weekend at a dancing event. “I feel sexy. I am shimmying while folding laundry, knowing I am cleaning off the bed for later.”

A man shared how much more fun he is having with his fiancé since he took time to learn how to express himself. 

Bring play to your work. Bring play to your chores. Bring play to your dating and relationships. Play in the face of adversity. Play with manifesting miracles. Play with creating new habits. Shimmy while you fold laundry. Play music and sing while driving. Do dance breaks at work. Notice what shifts!!

If you want to have a more enjoyable time improving your relationship, have a serious (:-) look at our Give Yourself To Love workshop ...