April 21, 2024 • 66 mins
In this episode, Kimen and I share how we met and the challenges we have encountered in our 18-year relationship. We talk about the importance of doing our own healing work so we can show up for each other and not repeat our parents' unhealthy marriages. We also share the non-negotiables in our marriage.
As always, advice from Your Chinese Auntie, Yiyi, is at the end of the episode.
Give up everything you think you know about relationships, and listen to your partner.
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Kimen's podcast
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:03):
Hello everybody, this is PatriciaPetersen, Conversations with your Chinese
Auntie podcast, and today I'm joinedby my lovely husband, Kimen Petersen,
who hosts Conversations with Kimen.
And we've had a few requests to talkabout our relationship, our marriage,
(00:24):
and we will see also what topics come up.
One of the teachers.
I took a couples counseling.
Training with, he said that couples lie.
I don't agree with that because I think.
What is more true is that.
We each have our version.
(00:47):
Of what happens because ofour lived experiences and
what we perceive to be true.
You'll hear that.
In this podcast, when, we both talkedabout how I found my place after my.
Ex and I broke up.
(01:08):
And we remember different things.
The.
Important thing is.
To remember.
I think it relationship is.
No relationship is perfect.
I work.
Marriage is not perfect,but we work on that.
Relationships are hard.
You need to work on it.
You need to be there for your partner.
(01:30):
And you need to showup as your truest self.
So you can hold space for your partner.
Kimen said.
. Said something really.
True in this episode.
Is that.
When you enter a relationship.
give up everything.
You know, About relationships,everything you think, you know, Because
(01:52):
the person standing in front of you.
might.
not meet all that those expectations.
Also your partner cannot be the end.
And be all for you.
It's a lot of pressure to put on somebody.
They can be the rock for somethings.
(02:14):
But you should not expect yourpartner to be there for you.
For everything.
This is why we have community.
This is why we have friends.
This is why.
We have therapists
we need to.
seek support from other people.
Besides our spouse, our partner.
(02:36):
Now in this episode.
FairWarning the topic of suicide.
Comes up childhood abuse.
and unhealthy marriages.
We don't go into much details, butI do want to name those topics here.
I hope you enjoy thisconversation between Kimen and I.
(02:59):
And stay tune at the end for advicefrom your Chinese Aunty YiYi.
So we're going to start off with howwe met, and Kimen is going to go first.
Yay!
(03:21):
So I'm going to go back a little bitbefore I met Patricia, and I was in
a, probably a transitional periodof my life, and I'd gone to this
10 day Vipassana silent meditationretreat, , and I realized this was a
way to, , fulfill a few fundamentalimportant things in my life.
(03:42):
One was to,, make a difference in theworld, and two was to help people.
And So I decided that I was goingto give up everything and become
a monk,, which seems interesting.
The first thing I had to dowas start to get healthy.
And at the time I was, , This,like I said, this was a bit of,
(04:03):
a bit before I'd met Patricia.
So I was actually a smoker at the time.
So the first thing I did was quit smokingand I was already a little bit overweight.
So when I quit smoking,food got really tasty.
So I got even heavier.
And in the end, I had a manualmanual , , with springs and such
(04:27):
like, that went up to 290 pounds.
And when I stepped on it, thepin went past 290 and there was
a stop pin, , about three inchespast 290 and it would hit that.
So I was over 300 pounds, and I realizedI needed to do something about this
because,, if you want to become a monk,you're going to have to take care of
(04:51):
your financial well being, your health.
There's a lot of things you need to do inorder to be in the right place to be that.
So I talked to a friend of mineabout going to hot yoga, because I
thought, well, I tried it once before,And it was pretty intense workout
(05:12):
and I thought maybe it would help.
So we talked back and forth andfinally they agreed that we would
go to a place called YaletownYoga in downtown Vancouver.
So the first day I went down there, , wegot in the doors and , I think they said
it was like 16 for one session or wecould pay 20 for a full week of Unlimited.
(05:37):
There was a 30 day challenge going onwhere you do a 90 minute hot yoga class
every day for 30 days and I was like,Ooh, , can I decide after in that class?
It was pretty rough.
Cause I did not likewhat I was looking like.
I could not look at myself in the mirror.
And by the end of that class,I knew the only choice for me
(06:00):
was to do a 30 day challenge.
So I signed up and basically built mylife around doing hot yoga classes.
I made it to the 30 days, and at the endof 30 days, the scale was at 290, so I'd
lost a substantial amount of weight, soI decided to keep on going, and I think
(06:22):
in the end I went to 96 days and, myweight was down to two 60 by then, and
I'm not sure exactly when it happened, butsomewhere in the middle of that, like 96
days, I came in and I sat down and therewas this new person sitting at the desk.
And we just struck up thisconversation and she was funny and
(06:49):
cute and fun and like engaged andsomething in me said, Oh my God.
And I never believed in like knowingthe first time you met somebody
that would be a possibility.
I didn't think that was real.
But something in me said,yeah, I could spend the rest
(07:10):
of my life with that person.
And then somewhere in the conversation,, it turns out she was engaged.
And that same little process inmy head that said I could spend
the rest of my life with thatperson also said, that's okay.
The plan is to be a monk anyway, so,, just need this person in my life and
(07:30):
we'll let them define what that means.
We became friends and I remembermy friend I brought to yoga one
time Patricia and I were goofingaround my friend just berated me like
you shouldn't be flirting with her.
She's engaged I'm like, I'm not flirting.
It's like you're flirtinglike I guess that's right.
(07:52):
I guess I was maybe
so we became friends and After a periodof time, and I can't remember how long
it was, it was probably a year anda bit,, their relationship broke up.
My understanding is Patricia was outlooking for a place to live, and the
(08:16):
story I always tell is she was walkingup around the area where I lived at
the time,, probably because her Chinesemedicine school and the Starbucks she
worked at was at the corner of Broadway.
, And Granville.
And the story I always say is shecame around the corner and there was
(08:36):
somebody bringing a for lease sign out.
And she said, oh, yougot a place for lease?
And I said, yeah.
And he took her and showed her and it wasa reasonable deal, , close enough to work.
And basically, she moved a halfblock from where I lived at the
time, or it was a block and ahalf, I can't remember exactly.
(08:58):
And, , I helped her move.
Then, I say I waited a full yearand the reason I waited a full
year because the last thing is Iwant, I don't want to be a rebound.
If it was going to be, I'm goingto be a monk and this person is
going to be a friend for my restof life or I'm going to go all in.
(09:21):
And we're going to be together,and I'm not going to be a monk.
So she either prevented me or saved me.
I haven't figured that out sometimes.
Like I said, I waited a wholeyear, she says 11 months.
And I still remember the same friendthat I went to yoga with that one time.
(09:42):
We're driving back from a paintingjob because I had a painting company.
And I told them that I was going toask Patricia out, and she says, Woo.
You sure?
Cause you're a friendand like, yeah, yeah.
But what I really needed some advice,cause I'm really not good at this stuff.
I'm not the guy.
I'm not the guy with lines.
I'm not the guy withthe right thing to say.
I I don't get that stuff.
(10:05):
It's just, well.
I mean, the only advice I can giveyou is, first off, you have to make
a plan, know the day, know the time,when you're going to pick them up.
You have to have thatall firm before you call.
And then, , because you guys are friends,you have to make it , very clear that
you're asking them out on a date.
(10:25):
Because otherwise, you're kind of, Idon't know, not saying you're being slimy,
but you're being a little underhanded.
You can't, you can't pretend it's a dateif everybody doesn't know it's a date.
So I literally called Patricia up and Isaid, I want to ask you out on a date.
And she was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
I don't know.
(10:45):
I don't know.
We are friends.
And it's like that little voicethat told me when I first met her, I
could live my life with this person.
And also the voice thatsaid, it doesn't matter.
, this person needs to be in your life, andlet her decide, , define what that means.
That voice came out and just said,I just did say, I just did now.
All I said was, I just did.
(11:06):
I just crossed that line.
And Patricia says, well,can I think about it?
And like, yeah.
Now, I wonder if we should pausehere and hear Patricia's side and
then we can move forward from there.
What do you think?
(11:26):
That sounds good.
I don't think it was 11 months.
You waited
six months and then you starteddropping hints because My ex fiancée
broke up with me in December, I wasstill in Chinese medicine school.
(11:49):
And we were still hanging out withfriends and then you started dropping
hints in the summertime but I knew Ididn't want to date you because you
were also at that stage figuring outprobably the last bits of your depression.
And when my ex broke up with me, anotherfriend of ours said to me, we need to
(12:12):
figure out what you want in a partner.
And what you want cannot be what yourpast relationships, the guy didn't
have really write down what you want.
I did in that Decemberwhen my ex and I broke up.
When you started dropping hints in thesummertime, I talked to one of our other
(12:36):
friends who was also our acupuncturist,and I was like, I think he's interested.
What do I do?
I don't wanna cross the line.
She also had a hand inhelping us get together.
, but to go back to thebeginning, so we met in 2004.
Which is when I came backfrom yoga teacher training,
(13:02):
,you know, then we were friends for a while before you asked, you know,
so that's my understanding of it.
And the place I foundafter my ex and I broke up.
I actually remember that I was sitting.
It was during my break, whenI was working at Starbucks.
I was looking through theads, the classified ads.
(13:25):
So this was years ago.
This was before Craigslist.
Maybe not before Craigslist, but thiswas when people were still putting
ads for rent in the newspaper.
And I was looking at it and they hada place for rent and I called them.
And, you always say to me, thingsalways work out when it's meant to be.
(13:47):
I went to see the place.
It was a small place, but it was perfect.
It was 10 minutes walkfrom school and from work.
And the the building manager gave it tome, even though there was a guy who saw
it at the same time, because I was single,he didn't want to rent it to a couple.
(14:07):
So that's how I got the place.
That's my version.
Yeah.
When you came over to my place once andyou set up the relationship corner and sat
in it for a little while to see what itfelt like, you told me about that later.
(14:28):
Okay, the timeline was Decemberwas when my ex and I broke up.
You and I didn't start going outuntil November, but you started
dropping hints in the summertimebecause you also started.
So at the meantime, youstarted online dating.
What is it?
Yeah.
It was like plenty of fishor something like that.
(14:51):
The reason I went into it because I reallywanted to know if I wanted to be with
you or if I wanted to be with somebody.
So I went on a few datesand oh my goodness, I found
everything I didn't want.
And I realized it wasn't justwanting to be with someone.
(15:11):
It was wanting to be with you.
It was like, I was still consideringbeing a monk at the time.
Yeah.
And you, and when I went to yourplace, you told me that you were
trying dating again, even though wewere friends, I think a part of me
wanted to be with you, but was afraid.
(15:32):
But then I wanted to help youbecause I also practice Feng Shui.
So I helped you set up theromance, , corner in your place.
Yeah, and if I remember it was makesure you have two places set at the
table, , have some mallard ducks in pairs.
(15:52):
It was a certain crystal and there hadto be a comfy chair in that corner and
then you went and sat in that corner.
And I didn't really get where you'redoing there because I didn't know
anything about that kind of, I didn'tknow anything about Feng Shui at the time.
Yeah, it was Mandarin ducks for thosewho's listening and you want to attract,
(16:13):
, romance into your life is Mandarin ducks.
And yeah, fast forward 18 years later.
Well, I mean, there's a lot between thenand then., some of the other stuff I
remember, I remember when, uh, yeah, Ithink it was pretty rough on, on you at,
(16:34):
uh, at one point you were working andgoing to school and trying to teach yoga
and you weren't making enough money andI still remember one time you just broke
down and cried and you, you just like,I just want to have a tea and a biscuit.
Yeah.
And this thought came into my head.
I'm like, show me your wallet.
(16:56):
And you show me your wallet.
And I took 20.
I put it in there and you'relike, well, I won't spend it.
I'm like, sure you will.
I want you to know that there's abundance.
I want you to understandthere is abundance and there
will always be abundance.
So every day I'm going togo show me your wallet.
And if it's, you don't have money,I'm going to put money in there.
I want you to know that there'sabundance that you can buy a tea
(17:17):
and a biscuit whenever you want.
And I think that was about the time wedecided that, hey, even though we're
four months into a relationship, that wewere old enough to know that, we're not,
we're not just playing, we're not datingaround that we can move in together.
Was that about right?
I think we already moved in because youand I started going out in November.
(17:42):
We moved in, in Marchwithout telling my parents.
For like a few months, and then, uh,yeah, no, it was because, so I, I am
more of a visual person who rememberthings rather than words per say.
(18:03):
So I remember you doing thatwith the money because I remember
I woke up, because I used toteach 6am and 9am yoga classes.
Then I would either go to school and thenwork at Starbucks after, or on the days
that I don't work at Starbucks, afterI taught the 6:00 AM and the nine, I
(18:24):
would go to school and I remember you.
That was when you put the money inbecause I could remember our bed in
that old place, and that was whenyou put the money in my wallet.
I said to you, I wanted to havetea and breakfast or something like
(18:47):
that in between the two classes,the 6:00 AM and 9:00 AM classes and
yeah, so we moved in pretty fast.
We moved in 2005 andthen we got married 2009.
I might have the dates off.
(19:08):
I don't think we were togetherfour years before we got married.
, so we got together two thousand and six.
Yeah.
That makes more sense.
We moved in 2007.
Yeah.
We got married 2009.
I think it will be interesting totalk about some of the challenges that
(19:32):
we've had in the relationship, andhow we survive because I think that's
what people have asked in a sensebecause also in my job as a therapist.
One of the perception for a lotof the younger people I think
is that relationship is easy.
(19:56):
I often tell them relationship isn'tnecessarily easy, but, you have to
put in the work to communicate witheach other to talk to each other.
And the with social media nowadays,people often only post the good
things about their relationship, theydon't share the struggles they had.
(20:21):
The things I remember in ourrelationship that were difficult.
You going back to school tomassage therapy school that
was challenging and difficult
I to be fair, I think both of us arerecovering avoidance, so we're pretty
(20:46):
good at, if one of us is really busyand focused or something, the other one
can sort themselves out and look afterthemselves in that we're not codependent
. . So when you went back to school.
It was challenging financially,but also what I did was I joined
the YWCA, so I could go swimming.
(21:08):
So that was something that filled my time.
Fast forward a few years after that,I think one of the most challenging
thing that really, we had to workthrough in our relationship was when We
open our own business, our own clinic.
(21:32):
On top of that, your brotherdied a few months later.
And I had to look at myown beliefs about, suicide.
People who take their own life.
So that kind of just got me ontomy journey of internal healing.
(21:52):
And also made me realize Ihadn't dealt with a lot of my
childhood trauma at that time.
So it all came out.
That was a catalyst.
And we also went to couples counselingfor a few months, because one thing
that nobody tells you is when you opena business and you're working together.
You see each other all the time.
(22:12):
It can be really hard on the relationship.
Since then, I've lost both parents.
And then COVID hit.
I did my Masters.
So there was a lot of stress, I trulybelieve couples counseling saved our
(22:35):
relationship because I was depressed, Ididn't know it after your brother died.
And I then I realized I didn't dealwith a lot of my childhood stuff.
And couples counseling really gaveme a different way to look at our
relationship and knowing that youare not responsible for my happiness.
Even though I tried to.
(22:58):
I tried to put it on you, but couplescounselling made me realize that I cannot
assume that you will make me happy becausethat is a lot of pressure to put on you.
Yeah.
So that's my version of someof the challenging times.
(23:23):
I actually think we had somechallenges right out of the gate.
And I remember one of the big ones waswhen we went out to dinner with my friends
and I would just start eating first.
And i've never been told that that wasa bad thing and you get so upset and so
angry and it's like I don't understandwhere that's coming from I remember one
(23:44):
time I was like I don't know what todo anymore because you were so upset and
I said listen I know you to be a veryincredibly spiritual woman Like a very
deeply spiritual woman and right nowyou're coming from the ego And that's not
who I know you to be and it was reallyincredible I've never, like, this was
one of those times where it was, aha,I'm with the right person because you
(24:06):
stopped and you went, you're right.
And I'm like, wow, thatwas, that was amazing.
I have never, never seenthat before in my life.
Never seen anybody just to hear it.
Well, also to be fair, you know, whenwe talk about what I, when I share that
(24:29):
at that time, I haven't dealt with a lotof my childhood stuff and my upbringing.
That has a lot to do with it, right?
Because we, in relationship, we bringour upbringings, our lived experiences
into a relationship and if we have notlooked at that, We haven't dealt with
(24:55):
our beliefs, whether they are, whetherthey are, not that they're wrong,
but our beliefs, but when two peoplecome together, things tend to clash.
And I was single.
I was never somebody who was in arelationship and then out, in and out.
Before my ex and I got together, Iwas single for four or five years.
(25:16):
Before you my whole life I'veonly had, including you, like,
four partners, that's about it.
So to be in a committed relationshipwith someone, , you are the only partner
who, At that time, because I was stillso young, who had challenged me, who
(25:36):
challenged me when I have things that Iheld on for dear life, and you're the only
one that said, is it still serving you?
And sometimes my, I like tocall it my Arie spiciness would
stand firm and refuse to budge.
Internal healing is such a long process.
(25:57):
At that point, I mean the firstfew years of our relationship, I
have not looked at my stuff at all.
And luckily, I always say to people,luckily you're such a patient
guy and nothing really bugs you.
So that really helped in our relationship.
(26:17):
You just reminded me of one time,yeah, like, like you said, we, we,
we tended to butt heads a little bit.
Yeah.
And one time you were like, you're sostubborn and I'm like, you couldn't
be with anybody half as stubborn withme as I am, or you'd walk all over
them, literally I would rather havesomebody who can stand , in my face
(26:44):
and say no than somebody who knuckles,like I would much rather have that.
I mean, it's, there is discomfortin somebody who's so strong willed.
tenacious, but there's alsosomething really beautiful about it.
, like I was saying,, one thing I realized,so like Patricia said, she hadn't
(27:06):
been in a relationship in a while.
, I'd only had a number of relationshipsmyself and I hadn't actually been in
a serious relationship for, I want tosay, getting close to like 18 years
when Patricia and I got together.
And so it was really differentfor me to be in a relationship.
(27:27):
And one of the big things I learned,and I think if I'd given anybody advice
about how to be in a relationship, thefirst, the very first thing, I would
say is give up everything you thinkyou know about relationship, everything
you think you know about relationship.
And that doesn't mean giveup your deal breakers.
Your deal breakers important,infidelity, stuff like that.
(27:50):
that's the deal breakers.
You don't have to give up that, but giveup all the other things you think you
know about relationship and be in therelationship you're in because nothing
causes upset more than expectation.
And if somebody's expecting you toshow up other than how you show up.
It's not going to be acomfortable relationship.
And the other thing, so give upeverything you think you know about
(28:13):
relationships, not your deal breakers,but just give up the stuff you think
and be in the relationship you're in.
And the other thing is, be related tothe person you're in a relationship
with, not to who you wish theywould be, or you would like them
to be, or you would rather them be.
You have to be related andin a relationship with who
(28:34):
you're in a relationship with.
Because if not, then you'rein a relationship with some
fictitious character, and thenthey'll never live up to it.
Or then maybe they can pretend for awhile, but they'll never get there.
I will say this, though.
One of the best thing you ever said tome, because I had abandonment issues.
(28:55):
One time I said to you, in the beginningof our relationship, I said to you, You
have to promise me, you will never leave.
And you said to me, I cannot promiseyou that because what if life
happens, things happen, what if,you know, something happens to me.
And then the other thingyou also said to me was
(29:17):
the expectations you have on me.
to make you happy.
It's a lot of pressureto put on someone else.
And I say this to the couples I workwith, even young people or individual
clients I work with all the time isthat I truly believe that Disney,
(29:40):
all those romance movies, all thoseromance books have ruined the idea of
romance and relationship for us becauseeven look at the traditional wedding
vows is that you complete you are myeverything and I didn't recognize
that until you brought that to me andsaid, think about how much pressure
(30:04):
you are putting on the other person.
I'm so smart.
I'm a smarty pants.
I also said around abandonment issuesis I also have abandonment issues.
So if you leave, I'm going to follow you.
You can't abandon me becauseI'm going to stalk you.
(30:26):
No, but I think you said that to helpwith my abandonment issue because I was
so afraid, which again, we talk aboutattachment styles and for the listeners
you can read about this, you can Googlethis I was so avoidant because of my
(30:47):
abandonment wound, and I was so afraidto let you in, even though we were
already in a committed relationship Ihad my shield up I had my protection,
because I didn't want to be hurt.
You figure out pretty early on thatif you said that to me that if you
(31:11):
ever go anywhere, I will follow you.
That actually helped my nervous systemto settle because even though I had all
these shields up to protect my heart, Iwanted to be loved, which is one of the
traits of people who are Avoidant, right?
We are so desperate to love,but we're also so afraid.
(31:33):
Of opening ourselves up toothers and being vulnerable.
So when you say, you can'tleave me if you go anywhere.
I will follow you for me a part of mewas that oh okay, he's going to stick
around, , he's going to be there for me.
And side note here I often say,if you have a partner who say
(31:55):
that to you and you're in your.
abusive relationships,that's not the same thing.
But for you and I, at thattime, we were committed to each
other in a loving relationship.
You saying that to me reallyhelped me to go, Oh, right.
Okay.
He's here.
He's not going anywhere.
(32:15):
And that helped me to slowly.
, then with therapy, open up toyou and be able to trust that
you are not going anywhere.
You picked up on my tactic.
(32:37):
I can't remember for sure, but I thinkI also said , that I, I might've told
you once that, , in this relationship,I'm going to be a hundred percent
responsible for my own happiness.
I really need you to be the same.
When the stress hit the wall inthe big job and I left, and you
(33:03):
nailed it on the head when yousaid, , you need to figure this out.
I can't figure this out for you.
What I need to do and at that moment,there was a small bit of like a
small bit of anger about that, butthere was this larger thing that
I am responsible and I do need tofigure this out and not just like not
(33:23):
figure out like a duct tape solution.
I need to figure this out.
Okay, I think we need to backtrack a bit.
, to talk about that part of your life,long version short, that part of your
life, you were hired to do this job and
on paper, it looked great, butit didn't in the end because
(33:44):
The job just wasn't a good fit.
It wasn't a great job.
And then you were stressed out, you hadheart palpitation, you, , ended up going
to ER, to the emergency room , you wereonly in this job for a few months, but
leading up to it, you were not sleeping.
You were in this job for six months,leading up to it, you were not sleeping
and it affected our relationship.
(34:06):
And I remember standing nextto you when you were in ER.
saying to you, you need to figurethis out because our marriage
will not survive this if you don'tfigure out what you need to do.
And saying that doesn't meanthat I wasn't going to support
(34:27):
you, whatever you decide to do.
But like what you saidjust now is, Ultimately,.
We need to figure out what works forus with the support of our spouse.
Now again, one of the things withus is we don't have children, so we
don't have to consider, , like youchanged career, I changed career.
(34:50):
We don't have to consider the impactthat would happen if we have children.
So,, then you took control and I'lllet you share that part of your story.
It's going to backtrack a little bitto that job, too, because it's funny.
It's like, uh, this is a partof who I am, something I learned
(35:11):
really big about myself that I wasblaming myself for taking that job.
And like, I was like, I shouldhave been able to handle it.
And there was all this stuff around that.
And then I remember one of the lastconversations I had with the director
and he just let it slip that, yeah,we knew we should have hired two
person people for this job, but forall that time, I was blaming myself.
(35:36):
Like that I should have been ableto do it, which is interesting.
I would say that one of my traits isI am uber responsible to the point
of, , blaming myself for a lot.
. I need to do it.
I need to be able to do all thisshows up in lots of areas of my life.
, it's not hugely detrimentalusually, but sometimes it does
(35:59):
cause me anxiety and stress.
Are there other things thatstood out to you that was
challenging and impactful for you?
, I didn't really enjoy seeing yougoing through , the problems with,
(36:19):
, the placement you went through.
But I don't know if youremember, I told you.
During that moment.
I feel like I did a good job ofsupporting you and letting you
know that This is gonna workout like you were really afraid.
This is gonna work out it's gonna workout better than you think it will and
(36:40):
in the end you'll see the reason why andSee, I'm that's the thing like I mean
we've had challenges, but I always show Ialways try In my whole life, I try to show
up when somebody's having a tough time.
I don't know if you'll agree, but themajority of times when you're having
(37:01):
a tough time, I show up in a big way.
You do.
And I really think it would be,really helpful for you to share.
How you're able to stay so sensitiveand grounded when things are happening,
(37:21):
especially to me and , hold the space andgo, it's okay, everything will be fine.
Everything will work outthe way it's supposed to be.
I mean, that's a lifelong question.
That's not just a, it's not justa moment, , but I'll go through
the whole, the whole thing.
(37:41):
Like, I don't know anyonelistening out there.
If you know an amazing human beingin your life, somebody who really
shows up, somebody who's reallycompassionate, caring, the most
beautiful people, you know, havebeen through some really rough stuff.
And they're not beautiful andamazing in spite of, they're
(38:01):
beautiful and amazing because of.
I spent a lifetime, and Patriciaknows it, like right up to before we
met, I was dealing with depression.
But what I was doing was I wasunwinding a lifetime of stuff.
of really tough stuff.
(38:22):
And it wasn't, like, I got an inklingof this idea that people who go
through hard things, they're themost compassionate and caring, not
in spite of it, but because of it.
It's like going through tough things,creates empathy and compassion.
(38:43):
It, well, I mean, it can go both ways.
Some people get angryand bitter and, and hate.
And I was angry about thingsthat happened in my life.
And I was, but not only was I angryabout it, but I was angry about the
fact that I was angry about them.
And it wasn't until I decided to givemyself an opportunity to like, quit
(39:03):
trying to not be mad and allow myselfto be angry, as angry as I need to be.
And I remember I was rage drivingup to Tofino on Vancouver Island,
and I was going to give it to God.
I was just like, I'm so mad,because I'm allowing myself
to finally feel this anger.
And I pull onto Long Beach, andit's raining, and I'm yelling
(39:24):
and squaring at God, and I'mpounding my feet on the ground.
I'm like, why?
Why?
And then clouds open up, and somesun comes in, and I fall to my knees.
And it's funny, as I allowed myselfto feel anger, I started to realize
that, yeah, you know, okay, I do careabout people, and when somebody's
(39:49):
hurting, I know how it feels, andI want to ease that suffering.
I just like, I have to, I have no choice.
This is why I'm here.
And as I felt, as I experiencedthat anger more, after a while the
anger dissipated, and the angerturned from anger to an acceptance.
(40:10):
And as the acceptance came in.
I was more and more compassion, moreand more caring, more and more, like,
wanting to make a difference in the world.
And at one point, I got to the pointwhere I liked that part of myself.
I didn't like what happened to me,the big thing that happened to me.
(40:33):
I didn't like that situation.
But what I liked was what it created.
Because it's really good to bea caring person on this planet.
And after a while, Iloved that part of me.
And I would never change it.
And in fact, I'd go through itall ten times harder if I knew
I was coming to the same place.
(40:54):
So that was like step one.
Step two was, when you, if you lookback on your life, every single problem
you've ever had in your life that'snow in the past, not the problems that
are still happening right now, everysingle problem you've ever had that's
now in the past, worked out betterthan you thought it was going to be.
(41:18):
in the moment that you werestuck in that problem and anxious
and worried about the problem.
So I learned to ask myself aquestion, one simple question,
and I still ask it to this day.
When I'm sitting in a problem, I ask,what's different between this problem
and every other problem I've alwaysexperienced every time in my whole life?
(41:40):
And there's no difference.
There will be a solution.
The solution will be better than I expect.
And that brings some comfort.
I start looking back, um, and thisis easier to do in retrospect.
It's not easy to do whenyou're sitting in a moment.
And I noticed how every time, every timea door closed, something else opened.
(42:05):
I noticed how everything, everytime something fell apart,
something better came along.
Like every job I went through, it justkept on getting better and better.
And better and better.
And when things are goingin a direction like that, I
can't see them not continuing.
(42:26):
And I've come to this belief that weare always, like, I used to wonder if
I was in the right place or not, orif I should be or shouldn't be, and,
and this is another way I live my lifeevery day, is that I know for a fact the
one truth about my life is I am alwaysexactly where I need to be, Exactly
(42:49):
when I need to be there, because if Ididn't need to be there, I wouldn't.
And if it ever comes a timethat I no longer need to be in
a situation, place, or, I won't.
But I know it will move to somethingbetter, and it's a constant.
And the only problem with all thatstuff is, if you can't get that,
(43:14):
and you can't hold on to that, themoment is really hard, and going
through the path is really hard.
But if you can understand These thingsare true that all problems will have
a solution that when you're in themoment You can breathe a bit and you can
relax, you know, this will work out andliterally Sometimes I sit in this head
(43:37):
and I have a conversation with myself.
I don't allow the thought process Icall the ego the sense of identity
Um, beautiful thing, right?
If I can digress again, can I digress?
Okay.
, I honestly believe , the internaldialogue, the conversation going
on in your head is the ego.
(43:59):
Um, not the sensible ego, but it'sthe sense of self sense and people
say, Oh, it's a terrible thing.
Cause it picks on me.
, Well, wait a minute.
Maybe, maybe, maybe, like, mine wasdeveloped when, in my life, if I'd be
going along, and I'd do something thatgot me really embarrassed, or made me
(44:20):
stand out, and it would go, no, no,no, don't do that, and every time it
would come to a moment where I was goingto stand out, my ego would go, don't,
don't, don't, don't, you're going toget hurt, you're going to get hurt.
The sense of identity, the internaldialogue is actually really kind of
a nice thing, but it's not effective.
It's nice in the way that it'salways trying to protect you.
(44:40):
The only problem is it protectsyou by keeping you small.
And if you don't want to be small,you have to tell that little
internal dialogue, that conversation,thank you for sharing, but I'm
going to have to do this anyway.
And yes, maybe I'm going to get hurtor maybe I'm going to get embarrassed.
In fact, when I was in my lateteen years, I used to do stuff
(45:01):
on purpose to get embarrassed soI could feel how bad that felt.
So I could see that I couldsurvive in small doses for it.
You can like do baby steps with things.
So I worked on that for a longtime because there was a time
I couldn't talk to anyone.
, one of the things I love about youis how much internal work you've
done, because in the relationship.
(45:25):
We are each responsible fordoing our work so that we can
show up as a better partner.
You and I often joke about this in asense that, , when one of us die, the
other one is never going to date again.
And because there's somuch work, oh my God.
(45:47):
There's a trend going on right now onsocial media is that for the people
who are really aware and they'resingle, and when they're meeting
people online, one of the questionsthey ask is, are you going to therapy?
And I think that's totallyfair, because then we're not
(46:09):
expecting our partner to fix us.
Both of us, our parents relationshipmarriage were not healthy.
How did you learn to be inrelationship, and not repeat what
(46:32):
your parents did or didn't do.
So the first thing I learned isto give up everything I thought
I knew about relationship andbeing the relationship I was in.
Uh, yeah, my parents,there was no warmth.
(46:54):
There was no compassion.
There was no kindness.
And don't get me wrong, they'renot, my parents aren't bad people.
My dad's a really kindand compassionate person.
.They just got married really young.
My, my mom was 17 when she had her, myolder brother, my dad, or my, I was, she
was 19 when she had me, she was, by thetime she was 20, 21, or 23, or 22, she
(47:20):
had three little boys running around.
She just wasn't equipped.
, they were vicious with each other,violence, there was violence in the
home, and they punished us with violence.
One of the good things that can happen inthis life in a sense, is a lot of children
become exactly like their parents.
(47:42):
Or the opposite.
So I would say I'm a littlebit the opposite of my parents.
Which is good.
I had a lot of really good friends.
And I get the idea.
I probably learned more from myfriends about caring for my wife.
Like, it's easy to learn howto consider somebody else
(48:03):
and care about somebody else.
From your friends if you never,uh, Learned it from your parents.
, then I went through a long selfhelp period where I learned a
lot about, how you can't rely onsomebody else to make you happy.
You need to, if you want to likecoming into a relationship, 50
(48:24):
percent each is not the way it works.
You got to come in 100%.
, you need to have, , things out, there'scertain things that you don't deal with
in your relationship that you need todeal with outside your relationship.
Like your partner can't bethe end all be all, they can't
be the rock for everything.
(48:45):
They can be the rock for some things.
And that's when they have the strengthand they can do that and they're
in the right place for that, it'sokay to lean into it, but you don't
need, you can't like expect that.
They'll show you when they can,and when you know that this isn't
something that they can help youwith, then you got to find outside.
Like, when my brother took hislife, , I went to counseling regularly,
(49:12):
and , my brother and I never hada good relationship, and that's
kind of a constant with our family.
But I was working with people, andI needed to make sure I was okay,
because I don't want to go andwork with people and not be okay.
So I need to make sure my head was in theright place and yeah, recently something
(49:36):
else came up and I look at life, uh, Isaid something about, I got into self help
and have you ever thought about self help?
You're digging, you're digging, you'redigging, you're peeling away layer
after layer after layer after layer.
Like improving, improving, improving,looking for problems and guess what?
At some point.
In the self help discovery mode, yourealize that the more you, you, every time
(50:03):
you solve one problem, there's anotherone, and another one, and another one.
We're onions.
There's layers.
In relationship, we're onions.
If you're going to just sit and lookfor problems, you're going to find them
and you're going to keep on digging intoanother layer of onion, another layer.
There has to come a point when you say,you know, this is good and I trust that if
(50:27):
something needs to be handled, it's goingto come up, it's going to be very obvious.
And when it does, I'm going to dowhatever it takes to deal with that then.
So we can go back tothis really great place.
And that's what recently somethingcame up and in my life now, I, I, most
of the time things are really good.
And then suddenly something just floorsme and I go, Whoa, I have access to
(50:51):
something I didn't have access becauseit never has anything to do with
what's going on in that situation.
It has to do with something in your past.
This is my opinion, right?
I don't know if this is true.
It's something that youdidn't have access to.
It bubbles up to the surface.
You have sudden access.
That's the time to take action.
(51:12):
That's time to likeworking with therapist.
That's to like, take a look.
When, when did I feel this before?
When's the first time I felt this go back?
Um, because if you don't deal with it,when it comes up, it's going to go back
down and it's going to come up again.
Yeah, that's well said.
(51:32):
, you know, what you said about peelingthe onions, peeling the layers.
I agree that you shouldn't go look fortroubles, but when things shows up, or
if you have never dealt with your stuff.
And you're getting activated in yourrelationship and it's time to look at
(51:55):
it and to talk to someone about it.
How I learned to be in relationship.
A lot of it came from you and fromcouples counseling and from my own
therapist, because I needed to takeresponsibility for my activation.
(52:16):
And I needed to learn that.
When I am activated by you, it's not you.
It's my past experiences.
, what we said in the beginningunderstanding that you're not going
anywhere gave me a safe space todo my own healing and to learn
(52:40):
to be in relationship with you.
And also really.
Knowing that I didn't want our marriageto look like how my parents marriage was.
It wasn't healthy, you know, there wasa lot of verbal abuse, mostly from my
mom, and I didn't want to be like that.
(53:04):
I didn't want to be, I didn't want ourmarriage to look like my parents And
so I tried to do things differently.
How do you know when I amstruggling with something?
What are the signs?
(53:27):
Nothing to do with snacking.
, nothing to do with not sleeping well.
I think you, you tend to betriggered very easily and
sometimes about very little things.
, I know you're going through stuff whenyou're not sleeping or when you're quiet,
(53:48):
your avoidant self comes out and thenyou go back into your turtle shell.
Yeah, I spent time in my cave.
. The most effective human beingsare some, one of those people who's
spent many years in their head andthey've dealt up all their stuff.
And they've really looked at who they are.
So yeah, when I get quiet, , I am going inmy cave and I'm working through something
(54:12):
and I'm working hard and that's whenI get quiet and it takes some times.
Yeah.
And putting on the therapist's hat.
, I don't think there's anything wrongwith that, but if you're somebody who do
that, you need to communicate with yourpartner that that's what you're doing.
So your partner can understand what'sgoing on and support you, especially
(54:38):
if your partner is worried thatit's something that they've done.
You and I have talked about this.
I'll go first with this one.
Non negotiables in relationship.
Two or three.
(54:58):
Mine is infidelity, drugs, and
what would you say my third one is?
I am not sure, but I knowinfidelity and, drugs, I get that.
I , mine is infidelity.
, uh, physical violence wouldn't besomething that I would be very happy with.
(55:20):
Oh, that's true.
Any form of violence orabuse, physical, mentally.
Verbal abuse.
Those are non negotiable because whatyou and I witness in our parents, right?
That's the cycle we don't want to repeat.
Oh, you know what?
I would say my third one is
(55:42):
selfishness.
Yeah.
I don't think I have a lot of that.
I have, I'm probably swing waytoo far to the other side, but.
You know what?
I really believe it's betterto err on the side of caution.
Like, if I'm going to fail in this life,I'm going to fail by being too kind.
And if you want to put me in jail forbeing too compliant, kind, too passionate,
(56:06):
too caring, too generous, that's fine.
Because that's who I am.
I would also say one of mine, now thatI've done so much internal work, is If
you don't protect me in a sense thatbecause in 2020 with Asian racism,
(56:31):
you know, that really triggered mysense of safety and for me, if you
didn't understand that, that wouldbe really hard for me because my ex.
whom we shall not name names.
(56:54):
, I remember going to watch a moviewith him and this was the start of
the end of my relationship with my ex.
We saw a movie a few months before myex and I broke up, and it was about
racism, and my ex was a white guy.
He said, if anything to you,and you were harassed by a
(57:16):
white cop because of your race.
I will not protect you because Idon't want to put myself in danger.
And I walked away from that interactiongoing, something is not right here.
But at that time I was stillso young, I didn't understand
(57:36):
what felt so yucky to me.
Yeah.
I think, I, I think one of the thingsI said a while, while ago is like, I
think we're talking about white privilegeand, and, , I was saying, like, I do
not understand, uh, what it's like tobe you, to be a minority in a space.
(58:00):
I am, I have, my heart is there,I'm compassionate, caring, and
supportive, but I will never, Be able tocompletely understand because I didn't
grow up , without white privilege.
I have always lived in this, butit doesn't mean I don't care and it
doesn't mean I don't compassionateand doesn't mean I won't stand
(58:21):
there with you and support you.
It's just like, I just want to acknowledgethat I don't, I can never understand it.
Yeah, and I tell people, one of thereasons we finally got a dog, even though
both of us have wanted to have a dogfor so long, and the timing was right.
(58:43):
One of the reasons was you said thatwith the anti Asian racism, hate that
was increasing in the last few years,you say that it's good for you to have
a dog because then people won't tendto bother you as much, . Which I think
that kind of backfired in the first sixmonths because Bailey is so cute and
(59:05):
everybody wanted to say hi and they justcome and boundaries people don't touch
people's puppies without asking first.
Is it okay to say hi?
I'm just going to put it out there.
Do not just go.
Oh, so cute.
Touch the puppy.
No, no, because oftentimes puppyare reacting and new parents are
struggling to train the puppy.
(59:27):
So boundaries.
Saying that though, I think, yeah,it's great because now I don't
necessarily make eye contact withpeople as we walk down the street.
As I set better boundarieswith not letting Bailey say
hi to everyone and every dog.
(59:47):
But it is true, I feel alot safer having Bailey.
Nobody's the overprotective pawrent.
I have no idea what you're talking about.
I get that.
Anything else you want to share?
(01:00:09):
I remember, , once I told youit's something about your ex.
I think people should understand this.
, if you're in, you know, like , youfinally find that relationship, that
you wanted to be in , or whatever.
And then you go, I wasted time withthis other person or these other people.
(01:00:31):
What I said was, well, I'm just kindof grateful that that person was
there holding the space until I couldget my head into the right place
until I could work out enough things.
So I could grow into the man whocould be in a relationship, , I
mean, if you're having trouble withrelationships, understand that the person
(01:00:53):
who you're in relationship is eitherthe one or the one holding the place.
Well, the other, the one who's.
Who's like, you know, coming, holdinga place for that person to grow into
or clear the stuff out of the wayso they can be the person who can
(01:01:13):
be in that relationship with you.
Yeah, and I often say this to clientsor friends again, if you're in an
abusive relationship, please seek help.
But I think we learn about ourselvesfrom the relationships, oftentimes when
(01:01:39):
couples come and see me, if they don't endup staying together, it is not a waste of
time because you learn better skills andtools to take to your next relationship.
One of the things You said to me a longtime ago, maybe it was you, maybe it
(01:02:03):
was someone else, but I think it was youwho said to me, that oftentimes you're
with somebody who is a safe person.
That's when your own individual healinghappens because your partner is safe.
(01:02:23):
That gives you the space.
To learn and to grow, because now thereis someone there to hold you while you do
the difficult work of internal healing.
Yeah, it might have been along the linesof an anchor, if in a relationship with.
(01:02:46):
Somebody who's really solid thatyou're anchored so you can go
and take a risk to deal with thatstuff, but all but still have your
anchor connected to something solid.
So, you know, you can alwayspull your way back to it.
Row, row, row your boat.
(01:03:08):
Anything else that we want to talk about?
When I get older?
Let me see my hair.
Many years from now, will youstill be sending me a valentine's
birthday greeting bottle of wine?
(01:03:34):
And with that, my husband likes to sing.
Oh, it's a really good strategy.
If your internal dialogue is really meanto start singing because it drowns it
out and eventually it becomes a strategyand then you forget it was a strategy and
then you just do it all the time to bugyour wife, especially before bed time.
(01:04:00):
There's a rule in thishouse, no singing after 6pm.
No.
But you don't necessarilyfollow the rules.
Well, you know, rules weremeant to be bent, not broken.
Oh dear.
Okay, love you.
Bye bye.
(01:04:20):
A little more.
We hope you enjoy this episode wherewe share our relationship our marriage.
And once again, Ourmarriage is not perfect.
But when things show up, we deal with it.
(01:04:40):
We work on it.
And if we need help, we go outside ofthis relationship and ask for help.
and witness.
From our friends.
And our therapist.
My sister told me thisonce many, many years ago.
I remember I was visiting her in England.
(01:05:03):
We were on the train and she said to me,
Who you end up with is importantbecause you have to wake up.
Next to this person forthe rest of your life.
And I was with my ex at that time.
And that really made an impact on mebecause I knew I wasn't happy with my ex.
(01:05:27):
I hope.
You find someone.
Who makes you feel loved and that.
They can hold space foryou take care of you.
And you do the same for them.
Relationships are hard enough.
(01:05:47):
Do your internal work so youcan show up for your partner.
Please feel free to rate,subscribe, and leave a.
review for.
Our podcasts wherever youlisten to your podcast.
This help others to find theshow and we truly appreciate it.
(01:06:09):
Have a great week and we'llsee you in the next episode.
Hello everybody, this is PatriciaPetersen, Conversations with your Chinese
Auntie podcast, and today I'm joinedby my lovely husband, Kimen Petersen,
who hosts Conversations with Kimen.
And we've had a few requests to talkabout our relationship, our marriage,
(00:24):
and we will see also what topics come up.
One of the teachers.
I took a couples counseling.
Training with, he said that couples lie.
I don't agree with that because I think.
What is more true is that.
We each have our version.
(00:47):
Of what happens because ofour lived experiences and
what we perceive to be true.
You'll hear that.
In this podcast, when, we both talkedabout how I found my place after my.
Ex and I broke up.
(01:08):
And we remember different things.
The.
Important thing is.
To remember.
I think it relationship is.
No relationship is perfect.
I work.
Marriage is not perfect,but we work on that.
Relationships are hard.
You need to work on it.
You need to be there for your partner.
(01:30):
And you need to showup as your truest self.
So you can hold space for your partner.
Kimen said.
. Said something really.
True in this episode.
Is that.
When you enter a relationship.
give up everything.
You know, About relationships,everything you think, you know, Because
(01:52):
the person standing in front of you.
might.
not meet all that those expectations.
Also your partner cannot be the end.
And be all for you.
It's a lot of pressure to put on somebody.
They can be the rock for somethings.
(02:14):
But you should not expect yourpartner to be there for you.
For everything.
This is why we have community.
This is why we have friends.
This is why.
We have therapists
we need to.
seek support from other people.
Besides our spouse, our partner.
(02:36):
Now in this episode.
FairWarning the topic of suicide.
Comes up childhood abuse.
and unhealthy marriages.
We don't go into much details, butI do want to name those topics here.
I hope you enjoy thisconversation between Kimen and I.
(02:59):
And stay tune at the end for advicefrom your Chinese Aunty YiYi.
So we're going to start off with howwe met, and Kimen is going to go first.
Yay!
(03:21):
So I'm going to go back a little bitbefore I met Patricia, and I was in
a, probably a transitional periodof my life, and I'd gone to this
10 day Vipassana silent meditationretreat, , and I realized this was a
way to, , fulfill a few fundamentalimportant things in my life.
(03:42):
One was to,, make a difference in theworld, and two was to help people.
And So I decided that I was goingto give up everything and become
a monk,, which seems interesting.
The first thing I had to dowas start to get healthy.
And at the time I was, , This,like I said, this was a bit of,
(04:03):
a bit before I'd met Patricia.
So I was actually a smoker at the time.
So the first thing I did was quit smokingand I was already a little bit overweight.
So when I quit smoking,food got really tasty.
So I got even heavier.
And in the end, I had a manualmanual , , with springs and such
(04:27):
like, that went up to 290 pounds.
And when I stepped on it, thepin went past 290 and there was
a stop pin, , about three inchespast 290 and it would hit that.
So I was over 300 pounds, and I realizedI needed to do something about this
because,, if you want to become a monk,you're going to have to take care of
(04:51):
your financial well being, your health.
There's a lot of things you need to do inorder to be in the right place to be that.
So I talked to a friend of mineabout going to hot yoga, because I
thought, well, I tried it once before,And it was pretty intense workout
(05:12):
and I thought maybe it would help.
So we talked back and forth andfinally they agreed that we would
go to a place called YaletownYoga in downtown Vancouver.
So the first day I went down there, , wegot in the doors and , I think they said
it was like 16 for one session or wecould pay 20 for a full week of Unlimited.
(05:37):
There was a 30 day challenge going onwhere you do a 90 minute hot yoga class
every day for 30 days and I was like,Ooh, , can I decide after in that class?
It was pretty rough.
Cause I did not likewhat I was looking like.
I could not look at myself in the mirror.
And by the end of that class,I knew the only choice for me
(06:00):
was to do a 30 day challenge.
So I signed up and basically built mylife around doing hot yoga classes.
I made it to the 30 days, and at the endof 30 days, the scale was at 290, so I'd
lost a substantial amount of weight, soI decided to keep on going, and I think
(06:22):
in the end I went to 96 days and, myweight was down to two 60 by then, and
I'm not sure exactly when it happened, butsomewhere in the middle of that, like 96
days, I came in and I sat down and therewas this new person sitting at the desk.
And we just struck up thisconversation and she was funny and
(06:49):
cute and fun and like engaged andsomething in me said, Oh my God.
And I never believed in like knowingthe first time you met somebody
that would be a possibility.
I didn't think that was real.
But something in me said,yeah, I could spend the rest
(07:10):
of my life with that person.
And then somewhere in the conversation,, it turns out she was engaged.
And that same little process inmy head that said I could spend
the rest of my life with thatperson also said, that's okay.
The plan is to be a monk anyway, so,, just need this person in my life and
(07:30):
we'll let them define what that means.
We became friends and I remembermy friend I brought to yoga one
time Patricia and I were goofingaround my friend just berated me like
you shouldn't be flirting with her.
She's engaged I'm like, I'm not flirting.
It's like you're flirtinglike I guess that's right.
(07:52):
I guess I was maybe
so we became friends and After a periodof time, and I can't remember how long
it was, it was probably a year anda bit,, their relationship broke up.
My understanding is Patricia was outlooking for a place to live, and the
(08:16):
story I always tell is she was walkingup around the area where I lived at
the time,, probably because her Chinesemedicine school and the Starbucks she
worked at was at the corner of Broadway.
, And Granville.
And the story I always say is shecame around the corner and there was
(08:36):
somebody bringing a for lease sign out.
And she said, oh, yougot a place for lease?
And I said, yeah.
And he took her and showed her and it wasa reasonable deal, , close enough to work.
And basically, she moved a halfblock from where I lived at the
time, or it was a block and ahalf, I can't remember exactly.
(08:58):
And, , I helped her move.
Then, I say I waited a full yearand the reason I waited a full
year because the last thing is Iwant, I don't want to be a rebound.
If it was going to be, I'm goingto be a monk and this person is
going to be a friend for my restof life or I'm going to go all in.
(09:21):
And we're going to be together,and I'm not going to be a monk.
So she either prevented me or saved me.
I haven't figured that out sometimes.
Like I said, I waited a wholeyear, she says 11 months.
And I still remember the same friendthat I went to yoga with that one time.
(09:42):
We're driving back from a paintingjob because I had a painting company.
And I told them that I was going toask Patricia out, and she says, Woo.
You sure?
Cause you're a friendand like, yeah, yeah.
But what I really needed some advice,cause I'm really not good at this stuff.
I'm not the guy.
I'm not the guy with lines.
I'm not the guy withthe right thing to say.
I I don't get that stuff.
(10:05):
It's just, well.
I mean, the only advice I can giveyou is, first off, you have to make
a plan, know the day, know the time,when you're going to pick them up.
You have to have thatall firm before you call.
And then, , because you guys are friends,you have to make it , very clear that
you're asking them out on a date.
(10:25):
Because otherwise, you're kind of, Idon't know, not saying you're being slimy,
but you're being a little underhanded.
You can't, you can't pretend it's a dateif everybody doesn't know it's a date.
So I literally called Patricia up and Isaid, I want to ask you out on a date.
And she was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
I don't know.
(10:45):
I don't know.
We are friends.
And it's like that little voicethat told me when I first met her, I
could live my life with this person.
And also the voice thatsaid, it doesn't matter.
, this person needs to be in your life, andlet her decide, , define what that means.
That voice came out and just said,I just did say, I just did now.
All I said was, I just did.
(11:06):
I just crossed that line.
And Patricia says, well,can I think about it?
And like, yeah.
Now, I wonder if we should pausehere and hear Patricia's side and
then we can move forward from there.
What do you think?
(11:26):
That sounds good.
I don't think it was 11 months.
You waited
six months and then you starteddropping hints because My ex fiancée
broke up with me in December, I wasstill in Chinese medicine school.
(11:49):
And we were still hanging out withfriends and then you started dropping
hints in the summertime but I knew Ididn't want to date you because you
were also at that stage figuring outprobably the last bits of your depression.
And when my ex broke up with me, anotherfriend of ours said to me, we need to
(12:12):
figure out what you want in a partner.
And what you want cannot be what yourpast relationships, the guy didn't
have really write down what you want.
I did in that Decemberwhen my ex and I broke up.
When you started dropping hints in thesummertime, I talked to one of our other
(12:36):
friends who was also our acupuncturist,and I was like, I think he's interested.
What do I do?
I don't wanna cross the line.
She also had a hand inhelping us get together.
, but to go back to thebeginning, so we met in 2004.
Which is when I came backfrom yoga teacher training,
(13:02):
,you know, then we were friends for a while before you asked, you know,
so that's my understanding of it.
And the place I foundafter my ex and I broke up.
I actually remember that I was sitting.
It was during my break, whenI was working at Starbucks.
I was looking through theads, the classified ads.
(13:25):
So this was years ago.
This was before Craigslist.
Maybe not before Craigslist, but thiswas when people were still putting
ads for rent in the newspaper.
And I was looking at it and they hada place for rent and I called them.
And, you always say to me, thingsalways work out when it's meant to be.
(13:47):
I went to see the place.
It was a small place, but it was perfect.
It was 10 minutes walkfrom school and from work.
And the the building manager gave it tome, even though there was a guy who saw
it at the same time, because I was single,he didn't want to rent it to a couple.
(14:07):
So that's how I got the place.
That's my version.
Yeah.
When you came over to my place once andyou set up the relationship corner and sat
in it for a little while to see what itfelt like, you told me about that later.
(14:28):
Okay, the timeline was Decemberwas when my ex and I broke up.
You and I didn't start going outuntil November, but you started
dropping hints in the summertimebecause you also started.
So at the meantime, youstarted online dating.
What is it?
Yeah.
It was like plenty of fishor something like that.
(14:51):
The reason I went into it because I reallywanted to know if I wanted to be with
you or if I wanted to be with somebody.
So I went on a few datesand oh my goodness, I found
everything I didn't want.
And I realized it wasn't justwanting to be with someone.
(15:11):
It was wanting to be with you.
It was like, I was still consideringbeing a monk at the time.
Yeah.
And you, and when I went to yourplace, you told me that you were
trying dating again, even though wewere friends, I think a part of me
wanted to be with you, but was afraid.
(15:32):
But then I wanted to help youbecause I also practice Feng Shui.
So I helped you set up theromance, , corner in your place.
Yeah, and if I remember it was makesure you have two places set at the
table, , have some mallard ducks in pairs.
(15:52):
It was a certain crystal and there hadto be a comfy chair in that corner and
then you went and sat in that corner.
And I didn't really get where you'redoing there because I didn't know
anything about that kind of, I didn'tknow anything about Feng Shui at the time.
Yeah, it was Mandarin ducks for thosewho's listening and you want to attract,
(16:13):
, romance into your life is Mandarin ducks.
And yeah, fast forward 18 years later.
Well, I mean, there's a lot between thenand then., some of the other stuff I
remember, I remember when, uh, yeah, Ithink it was pretty rough on, on you at,
(16:34):
uh, at one point you were working andgoing to school and trying to teach yoga
and you weren't making enough money andI still remember one time you just broke
down and cried and you, you just like,I just want to have a tea and a biscuit.
Yeah.
And this thought came into my head.
I'm like, show me your wallet.
(16:56):
And you show me your wallet.
And I took 20.
I put it in there and you'relike, well, I won't spend it.
I'm like, sure you will.
I want you to know that there's abundance.
I want you to understandthere is abundance and there
will always be abundance.
So every day I'm going togo show me your wallet.
And if it's, you don't have money,I'm going to put money in there.
I want you to know that there'sabundance that you can buy a tea
(17:17):
and a biscuit whenever you want.
And I think that was about the time wedecided that, hey, even though we're
four months into a relationship, that wewere old enough to know that, we're not,
we're not just playing, we're not datingaround that we can move in together.
Was that about right?
I think we already moved in because youand I started going out in November.
(17:42):
We moved in, in Marchwithout telling my parents.
For like a few months, and then, uh,yeah, no, it was because, so I, I am
more of a visual person who rememberthings rather than words per say.
(18:03):
So I remember you doing thatwith the money because I remember
I woke up, because I used toteach 6am and 9am yoga classes.
Then I would either go to school and thenwork at Starbucks after, or on the days
that I don't work at Starbucks, afterI taught the 6:00 AM and the nine, I
(18:24):
would go to school and I remember you.
That was when you put the money inbecause I could remember our bed in
that old place, and that was whenyou put the money in my wallet.
I said to you, I wanted to havetea and breakfast or something like
(18:47):
that in between the two classes,the 6:00 AM and 9:00 AM classes and
yeah, so we moved in pretty fast.
We moved in 2005 andthen we got married 2009.
I might have the dates off.
(19:08):
I don't think we were togetherfour years before we got married.
, so we got together two thousand and six.
Yeah.
That makes more sense.
We moved in 2007.
Yeah.
We got married 2009.
I think it will be interesting totalk about some of the challenges that
(19:32):
we've had in the relationship, andhow we survive because I think that's
what people have asked in a sensebecause also in my job as a therapist.
One of the perception for a lotof the younger people I think
is that relationship is easy.
(19:56):
I often tell them relationship isn'tnecessarily easy, but, you have to
put in the work to communicate witheach other to talk to each other.
And the with social media nowadays,people often only post the good
things about their relationship, theydon't share the struggles they had.
(20:21):
The things I remember in ourrelationship that were difficult.
You going back to school tomassage therapy school that
was challenging and difficult
I to be fair, I think both of us arerecovering avoidance, so we're pretty
(20:46):
good at, if one of us is really busyand focused or something, the other one
can sort themselves out and look afterthemselves in that we're not codependent
. . So when you went back to school.
It was challenging financially,but also what I did was I joined
the YWCA, so I could go swimming.
(21:08):
So that was something that filled my time.
Fast forward a few years after that,I think one of the most challenging
thing that really, we had to workthrough in our relationship was when We
open our own business, our own clinic.
(21:32):
On top of that, your brotherdied a few months later.
And I had to look at myown beliefs about, suicide.
People who take their own life.
So that kind of just got me ontomy journey of internal healing.
(21:52):
And also made me realize Ihadn't dealt with a lot of my
childhood trauma at that time.
So it all came out.
That was a catalyst.
And we also went to couples counselingfor a few months, because one thing
that nobody tells you is when you opena business and you're working together.
You see each other all the time.
(22:12):
It can be really hard on the relationship.
Since then, I've lost both parents.
And then COVID hit.
I did my Masters.
So there was a lot of stress, I trulybelieve couples counseling saved our
(22:35):
relationship because I was depressed, Ididn't know it after your brother died.
And I then I realized I didn't dealwith a lot of my childhood stuff.
And couples counseling really gaveme a different way to look at our
relationship and knowing that youare not responsible for my happiness.
Even though I tried to.
(22:58):
I tried to put it on you, but couplescounselling made me realize that I cannot
assume that you will make me happy becausethat is a lot of pressure to put on you.
Yeah.
So that's my version of someof the challenging times.
(23:23):
I actually think we had somechallenges right out of the gate.
And I remember one of the big ones waswhen we went out to dinner with my friends
and I would just start eating first.
And i've never been told that that wasa bad thing and you get so upset and so
angry and it's like I don't understandwhere that's coming from I remember one
(23:44):
time I was like I don't know what todo anymore because you were so upset and
I said listen I know you to be a veryincredibly spiritual woman Like a very
deeply spiritual woman and right nowyou're coming from the ego And that's not
who I know you to be and it was reallyincredible I've never, like, this was
one of those times where it was, aha,I'm with the right person because you
(24:06):
stopped and you went, you're right.
And I'm like, wow, thatwas, that was amazing.
I have never, never seenthat before in my life.
Never seen anybody just to hear it.
Well, also to be fair, you know, whenwe talk about what I, when I share that
(24:29):
at that time, I haven't dealt with a lotof my childhood stuff and my upbringing.
That has a lot to do with it, right?
Because we, in relationship, we bringour upbringings, our lived experiences
into a relationship and if we have notlooked at that, We haven't dealt with
(24:55):
our beliefs, whether they are, whetherthey are, not that they're wrong,
but our beliefs, but when two peoplecome together, things tend to clash.
And I was single.
I was never somebody who was in arelationship and then out, in and out.
Before my ex and I got together, Iwas single for four or five years.
(25:16):
Before you my whole life I'veonly had, including you, like,
four partners, that's about it.
So to be in a committed relationshipwith someone, , you are the only partner
who, At that time, because I was stillso young, who had challenged me, who
(25:36):
challenged me when I have things that Iheld on for dear life, and you're the only
one that said, is it still serving you?
And sometimes my, I like tocall it my Arie spiciness would
stand firm and refuse to budge.
Internal healing is such a long process.
(25:57):
At that point, I mean the firstfew years of our relationship, I
have not looked at my stuff at all.
And luckily, I always say to people,luckily you're such a patient
guy and nothing really bugs you.
So that really helped in our relationship.
(26:17):
You just reminded me of one time,yeah, like, like you said, we, we,
we tended to butt heads a little bit.
Yeah.
And one time you were like, you're sostubborn and I'm like, you couldn't
be with anybody half as stubborn withme as I am, or you'd walk all over
them, literally I would rather havesomebody who can stand , in my face
(26:44):
and say no than somebody who knuckles,like I would much rather have that.
I mean, it's, there is discomfortin somebody who's so strong willed.
tenacious, but there's alsosomething really beautiful about it.
, like I was saying,, one thing I realized,so like Patricia said, she hadn't
(27:06):
been in a relationship in a while.
, I'd only had a number of relationshipsmyself and I hadn't actually been in
a serious relationship for, I want tosay, getting close to like 18 years
when Patricia and I got together.
And so it was really differentfor me to be in a relationship.
(27:27):
And one of the big things I learned,and I think if I'd given anybody advice
about how to be in a relationship, thefirst, the very first thing, I would
say is give up everything you thinkyou know about relationship, everything
you think you know about relationship.
And that doesn't mean giveup your deal breakers.
Your deal breakers important,infidelity, stuff like that.
(27:50):
that's the deal breakers.
You don't have to give up that, but giveup all the other things you think you
know about relationship and be in therelationship you're in because nothing
causes upset more than expectation.
And if somebody's expecting you toshow up other than how you show up.
It's not going to be acomfortable relationship.
And the other thing, so give upeverything you think you know about
(28:13):
relationships, not your deal breakers,but just give up the stuff you think
and be in the relationship you're in.
And the other thing is, be related tothe person you're in a relationship
with, not to who you wish theywould be, or you would like them
to be, or you would rather them be.
You have to be related andin a relationship with who
(28:34):
you're in a relationship with.
Because if not, then you'rein a relationship with some
fictitious character, and thenthey'll never live up to it.
Or then maybe they can pretend for awhile, but they'll never get there.
I will say this, though.
One of the best thing you ever said tome, because I had abandonment issues.
(28:55):
One time I said to you, in the beginningof our relationship, I said to you, You
have to promise me, you will never leave.
And you said to me, I cannot promiseyou that because what if life
happens, things happen, what if,you know, something happens to me.
And then the other thingyou also said to me was
(29:17):
the expectations you have on me.
to make you happy.
It's a lot of pressureto put on someone else.
And I say this to the couples I workwith, even young people or individual
clients I work with all the time isthat I truly believe that Disney,
(29:40):
all those romance movies, all thoseromance books have ruined the idea of
romance and relationship for us becauseeven look at the traditional wedding
vows is that you complete you are myeverything and I didn't recognize
that until you brought that to me andsaid, think about how much pressure
(30:04):
you are putting on the other person.
I'm so smart.
I'm a smarty pants.
I also said around abandonment issuesis I also have abandonment issues.
So if you leave, I'm going to follow you.
You can't abandon me becauseI'm going to stalk you.
(30:26):
No, but I think you said that to helpwith my abandonment issue because I was
so afraid, which again, we talk aboutattachment styles and for the listeners
you can read about this, you can Googlethis I was so avoidant because of my
(30:47):
abandonment wound, and I was so afraidto let you in, even though we were
already in a committed relationship Ihad my shield up I had my protection,
because I didn't want to be hurt.
You figure out pretty early on thatif you said that to me that if you
(31:11):
ever go anywhere, I will follow you.
That actually helped my nervous systemto settle because even though I had all
these shields up to protect my heart, Iwanted to be loved, which is one of the
traits of people who are Avoidant, right?
We are so desperate to love,but we're also so afraid.
(31:33):
Of opening ourselves up toothers and being vulnerable.
So when you say, you can'tleave me if you go anywhere.
I will follow you for me a part of mewas that oh okay, he's going to stick
around, , he's going to be there for me.
And side note here I often say,if you have a partner who say
(31:55):
that to you and you're in your.
abusive relationships,that's not the same thing.
But for you and I, at thattime, we were committed to each
other in a loving relationship.
You saying that to me reallyhelped me to go, Oh, right.
Okay.
He's here.
He's not going anywhere.
(32:15):
And that helped me to slowly.
, then with therapy, open up toyou and be able to trust that
you are not going anywhere.
You picked up on my tactic.
(32:37):
I can't remember for sure, but I thinkI also said , that I, I might've told
you once that, , in this relationship,I'm going to be a hundred percent
responsible for my own happiness.
I really need you to be the same.
When the stress hit the wall inthe big job and I left, and you
(33:03):
nailed it on the head when yousaid, , you need to figure this out.
I can't figure this out for you.
What I need to do and at that moment,there was a small bit of like a
small bit of anger about that, butthere was this larger thing that
I am responsible and I do need tofigure this out and not just like not
(33:23):
figure out like a duct tape solution.
I need to figure this out.
Okay, I think we need to backtrack a bit.
, to talk about that part of your life,long version short, that part of your
life, you were hired to do this job and
on paper, it looked great, butit didn't in the end because
(33:44):
The job just wasn't a good fit.
It wasn't a great job.
And then you were stressed out, you hadheart palpitation, you, , ended up going
to ER, to the emergency room , you wereonly in this job for a few months, but
leading up to it, you were not sleeping.
You were in this job for six months,leading up to it, you were not sleeping
and it affected our relationship.
(34:06):
And I remember standing nextto you when you were in ER.
saying to you, you need to figurethis out because our marriage
will not survive this if you don'tfigure out what you need to do.
And saying that doesn't meanthat I wasn't going to support
(34:27):
you, whatever you decide to do.
But like what you saidjust now is, Ultimately,.
We need to figure out what works forus with the support of our spouse.
Now again, one of the things withus is we don't have children, so we
don't have to consider, , like youchanged career, I changed career.
(34:50):
We don't have to consider the impactthat would happen if we have children.
So,, then you took control and I'lllet you share that part of your story.
It's going to backtrack a little bitto that job, too, because it's funny.
It's like, uh, this is a partof who I am, something I learned
(35:11):
really big about myself that I wasblaming myself for taking that job.
And like, I was like, I shouldhave been able to handle it.
And there was all this stuff around that.
And then I remember one of the lastconversations I had with the director
and he just let it slip that, yeah,we knew we should have hired two
person people for this job, but forall that time, I was blaming myself.
(35:36):
Like that I should have been ableto do it, which is interesting.
I would say that one of my traits isI am uber responsible to the point
of, , blaming myself for a lot.
. I need to do it.
I need to be able to do all thisshows up in lots of areas of my life.
, it's not hugely detrimentalusually, but sometimes it does
(35:59):
cause me anxiety and stress.
Are there other things thatstood out to you that was
challenging and impactful for you?
, I didn't really enjoy seeing yougoing through , the problems with,
(36:19):
, the placement you went through.
But I don't know if youremember, I told you.
During that moment.
I feel like I did a good job ofsupporting you and letting you
know that This is gonna workout like you were really afraid.
This is gonna work out it's gonna workout better than you think it will and
(36:40):
in the end you'll see the reason why andSee, I'm that's the thing like I mean
we've had challenges, but I always show Ialways try In my whole life, I try to show
up when somebody's having a tough time.
I don't know if you'll agree, but themajority of times when you're having
(37:01):
a tough time, I show up in a big way.
You do.
And I really think it would be,really helpful for you to share.
How you're able to stay so sensitiveand grounded when things are happening,
(37:21):
especially to me and , hold the space andgo, it's okay, everything will be fine.
Everything will work outthe way it's supposed to be.
I mean, that's a lifelong question.
That's not just a, it's not justa moment, , but I'll go through
the whole, the whole thing.
(37:41):
Like, I don't know anyonelistening out there.
If you know an amazing human beingin your life, somebody who really
shows up, somebody who's reallycompassionate, caring, the most
beautiful people, you know, havebeen through some really rough stuff.
And they're not beautiful andamazing in spite of, they're
(38:01):
beautiful and amazing because of.
I spent a lifetime, and Patriciaknows it, like right up to before we
met, I was dealing with depression.
But what I was doing was I wasunwinding a lifetime of stuff.
of really tough stuff.
(38:22):
And it wasn't, like, I got an inklingof this idea that people who go
through hard things, they're themost compassionate and caring, not
in spite of it, but because of it.
It's like going through tough things,creates empathy and compassion.
(38:43):
It, well, I mean, it can go both ways.
Some people get angryand bitter and, and hate.
And I was angry about thingsthat happened in my life.
And I was, but not only was I angryabout it, but I was angry about the
fact that I was angry about them.
And it wasn't until I decided to givemyself an opportunity to like, quit
(39:03):
trying to not be mad and allow myselfto be angry, as angry as I need to be.
And I remember I was rage drivingup to Tofino on Vancouver Island,
and I was going to give it to God.
I was just like, I'm so mad,because I'm allowing myself
to finally feel this anger.
And I pull onto Long Beach, andit's raining, and I'm yelling
(39:24):
and squaring at God, and I'mpounding my feet on the ground.
I'm like, why?
Why?
And then clouds open up, and somesun comes in, and I fall to my knees.
And it's funny, as I allowed myselfto feel anger, I started to realize
that, yeah, you know, okay, I do careabout people, and when somebody's
(39:49):
hurting, I know how it feels, andI want to ease that suffering.
I just like, I have to, I have no choice.
This is why I'm here.
And as I felt, as I experiencedthat anger more, after a while the
anger dissipated, and the angerturned from anger to an acceptance.
(40:10):
And as the acceptance came in.
I was more and more compassion, moreand more caring, more and more, like,
wanting to make a difference in the world.
And at one point, I got to the pointwhere I liked that part of myself.
I didn't like what happened to me,the big thing that happened to me.
(40:33):
I didn't like that situation.
But what I liked was what it created.
Because it's really good to bea caring person on this planet.
And after a while, Iloved that part of me.
And I would never change it.
And in fact, I'd go through itall ten times harder if I knew
I was coming to the same place.
(40:54):
So that was like step one.
Step two was, when you, if you lookback on your life, every single problem
you've ever had in your life that'snow in the past, not the problems that
are still happening right now, everysingle problem you've ever had that's
now in the past, worked out betterthan you thought it was going to be.
(41:18):
in the moment that you werestuck in that problem and anxious
and worried about the problem.
So I learned to ask myself aquestion, one simple question,
and I still ask it to this day.
When I'm sitting in a problem, I ask,what's different between this problem
and every other problem I've alwaysexperienced every time in my whole life?
(41:40):
And there's no difference.
There will be a solution.
The solution will be better than I expect.
And that brings some comfort.
I start looking back, um, and thisis easier to do in retrospect.
It's not easy to do whenyou're sitting in a moment.
And I noticed how every time, every timea door closed, something else opened.
(42:05):
I noticed how everything, everytime something fell apart,
something better came along.
Like every job I went through, it justkept on getting better and better.
And better and better.
And when things are goingin a direction like that, I
can't see them not continuing.
(42:26):
And I've come to this belief that weare always, like, I used to wonder if
I was in the right place or not, orif I should be or shouldn't be, and,
and this is another way I live my lifeevery day, is that I know for a fact the
one truth about my life is I am alwaysexactly where I need to be, Exactly
(42:49):
when I need to be there, because if Ididn't need to be there, I wouldn't.
And if it ever comes a timethat I no longer need to be in
a situation, place, or, I won't.
But I know it will move to somethingbetter, and it's a constant.
And the only problem with all thatstuff is, if you can't get that,
(43:14):
and you can't hold on to that, themoment is really hard, and going
through the path is really hard.
But if you can understand These thingsare true that all problems will have
a solution that when you're in themoment You can breathe a bit and you can
relax, you know, this will work out andliterally Sometimes I sit in this head
(43:37):
and I have a conversation with myself.
I don't allow the thought process Icall the ego the sense of identity
Um, beautiful thing, right?
If I can digress again, can I digress?
Okay.
, I honestly believe , the internaldialogue, the conversation going
on in your head is the ego.
(43:59):
Um, not the sensible ego, but it'sthe sense of self sense and people
say, Oh, it's a terrible thing.
Cause it picks on me.
, Well, wait a minute.
Maybe, maybe, maybe, like, mine wasdeveloped when, in my life, if I'd be
going along, and I'd do something thatgot me really embarrassed, or made me
(44:20):
stand out, and it would go, no, no,no, don't do that, and every time it
would come to a moment where I was goingto stand out, my ego would go, don't,
don't, don't, don't, you're going toget hurt, you're going to get hurt.
The sense of identity, the internaldialogue is actually really kind of
a nice thing, but it's not effective.
It's nice in the way that it'salways trying to protect you.
(44:40):
The only problem is it protectsyou by keeping you small.
And if you don't want to be small,you have to tell that little
internal dialogue, that conversation,thank you for sharing, but I'm
going to have to do this anyway.
And yes, maybe I'm going to get hurtor maybe I'm going to get embarrassed.
In fact, when I was in my lateteen years, I used to do stuff
(45:01):
on purpose to get embarrassed soI could feel how bad that felt.
So I could see that I couldsurvive in small doses for it.
You can like do baby steps with things.
So I worked on that for a longtime because there was a time
I couldn't talk to anyone.
, one of the things I love about youis how much internal work you've
done, because in the relationship.
(45:25):
We are each responsible fordoing our work so that we can
show up as a better partner.
You and I often joke about this in asense that, , when one of us die, the
other one is never going to date again.
And because there's somuch work, oh my God.
(45:47):
There's a trend going on right now onsocial media is that for the people
who are really aware and they'resingle, and when they're meeting
people online, one of the questionsthey ask is, are you going to therapy?
And I think that's totallyfair, because then we're not
(46:09):
expecting our partner to fix us.
Both of us, our parents relationshipmarriage were not healthy.
How did you learn to be inrelationship, and not repeat what
(46:32):
your parents did or didn't do.
So the first thing I learned isto give up everything I thought
I knew about relationship andbeing the relationship I was in.
Uh, yeah, my parents,there was no warmth.
(46:54):
There was no compassion.
There was no kindness.
And don't get me wrong, they'renot, my parents aren't bad people.
My dad's a really kindand compassionate person.
.They just got married really young.
My, my mom was 17 when she had her, myolder brother, my dad, or my, I was, she
was 19 when she had me, she was, by thetime she was 20, 21, or 23, or 22, she
(47:20):
had three little boys running around.
She just wasn't equipped.
, they were vicious with each other,violence, there was violence in the
home, and they punished us with violence.
One of the good things that can happen inthis life in a sense, is a lot of children
become exactly like their parents.
(47:42):
Or the opposite.
So I would say I'm a littlebit the opposite of my parents.
Which is good.
I had a lot of really good friends.
And I get the idea.
I probably learned more from myfriends about caring for my wife.
Like, it's easy to learn howto consider somebody else
(48:03):
and care about somebody else.
From your friends if you never,uh, Learned it from your parents.
, then I went through a long selfhelp period where I learned a
lot about, how you can't rely onsomebody else to make you happy.
You need to, if you want to likecoming into a relationship, 50
(48:24):
percent each is not the way it works.
You got to come in 100%.
, you need to have, , things out, there'scertain things that you don't deal with
in your relationship that you need todeal with outside your relationship.
Like your partner can't bethe end all be all, they can't
be the rock for everything.
(48:45):
They can be the rock for some things.
And that's when they have the strengthand they can do that and they're
in the right place for that, it'sokay to lean into it, but you don't
need, you can't like expect that.
They'll show you when they can,and when you know that this isn't
something that they can help youwith, then you got to find outside.
Like, when my brother took hislife, , I went to counseling regularly,
(49:12):
and , my brother and I never hada good relationship, and that's
kind of a constant with our family.
But I was working with people, andI needed to make sure I was okay,
because I don't want to go andwork with people and not be okay.
So I need to make sure my head was in theright place and yeah, recently something
(49:36):
else came up and I look at life, uh, Isaid something about, I got into self help
and have you ever thought about self help?
You're digging, you're digging, you'redigging, you're peeling away layer
after layer after layer after layer.
Like improving, improving, improving,looking for problems and guess what?
At some point.
In the self help discovery mode, yourealize that the more you, you, every time
(50:03):
you solve one problem, there's anotherone, and another one, and another one.
We're onions.
There's layers.
In relationship, we're onions.
If you're going to just sit and lookfor problems, you're going to find them
and you're going to keep on digging intoanother layer of onion, another layer.
There has to come a point when you say,you know, this is good and I trust that if
(50:27):
something needs to be handled, it's goingto come up, it's going to be very obvious.
And when it does, I'm going to dowhatever it takes to deal with that then.
So we can go back tothis really great place.
And that's what recently somethingcame up and in my life now, I, I, most
of the time things are really good.
And then suddenly something just floorsme and I go, Whoa, I have access to
(50:51):
something I didn't have access becauseit never has anything to do with
what's going on in that situation.
It has to do with something in your past.
This is my opinion, right?
I don't know if this is true.
It's something that youdidn't have access to.
It bubbles up to the surface.
You have sudden access.
That's the time to take action.
(51:12):
That's time to likeworking with therapist.
That's to like, take a look.
When, when did I feel this before?
When's the first time I felt this go back?
Um, because if you don't deal with it,when it comes up, it's going to go back
down and it's going to come up again.
Yeah, that's well said.
(51:32):
, you know, what you said about peelingthe onions, peeling the layers.
I agree that you shouldn't go look fortroubles, but when things shows up, or
if you have never dealt with your stuff.
And you're getting activated in yourrelationship and it's time to look at
(51:55):
it and to talk to someone about it.
How I learned to be in relationship.
A lot of it came from you and fromcouples counseling and from my own
therapist, because I needed to takeresponsibility for my activation.
(52:16):
And I needed to learn that.
When I am activated by you, it's not you.
It's my past experiences.
, what we said in the beginningunderstanding that you're not going
anywhere gave me a safe space todo my own healing and to learn
(52:40):
to be in relationship with you.
And also really.
Knowing that I didn't want our marriageto look like how my parents marriage was.
It wasn't healthy, you know, there wasa lot of verbal abuse, mostly from my
mom, and I didn't want to be like that.
(53:04):
I didn't want to be, I didn't want ourmarriage to look like my parents And
so I tried to do things differently.
How do you know when I amstruggling with something?
What are the signs?
(53:27):
Nothing to do with snacking.
, nothing to do with not sleeping well.
I think you, you tend to betriggered very easily and
sometimes about very little things.
, I know you're going through stuff whenyou're not sleeping or when you're quiet,
(53:48):
your avoidant self comes out and thenyou go back into your turtle shell.
Yeah, I spent time in my cave.
. The most effective human beingsare some, one of those people who's
spent many years in their head andthey've dealt up all their stuff.
And they've really looked at who they are.
So yeah, when I get quiet, , I am going inmy cave and I'm working through something
(54:12):
and I'm working hard and that's whenI get quiet and it takes some times.
Yeah.
And putting on the therapist's hat.
, I don't think there's anything wrongwith that, but if you're somebody who do
that, you need to communicate with yourpartner that that's what you're doing.
So your partner can understand what'sgoing on and support you, especially
(54:38):
if your partner is worried thatit's something that they've done.
You and I have talked about this.
I'll go first with this one.
Non negotiables in relationship.
Two or three.
(54:58):
Mine is infidelity, drugs, and
what would you say my third one is?
I am not sure, but I knowinfidelity and, drugs, I get that.
I , mine is infidelity.
, uh, physical violence wouldn't besomething that I would be very happy with.
(55:20):
Oh, that's true.
Any form of violence orabuse, physical, mentally.
Verbal abuse.
Those are non negotiable because whatyou and I witness in our parents, right?
That's the cycle we don't want to repeat.
Oh, you know what?
I would say my third one is
(55:42):
selfishness.
Yeah.
I don't think I have a lot of that.
I have, I'm probably swing waytoo far to the other side, but.
You know what?
I really believe it's betterto err on the side of caution.
Like, if I'm going to fail in this life,I'm going to fail by being too kind.
And if you want to put me in jail forbeing too compliant, kind, too passionate,
(56:06):
too caring, too generous, that's fine.
Because that's who I am.
I would also say one of mine, now thatI've done so much internal work, is If
you don't protect me in a sense thatbecause in 2020 with Asian racism,
(56:31):
you know, that really triggered mysense of safety and for me, if you
didn't understand that, that wouldbe really hard for me because my ex.
whom we shall not name names.
(56:54):
, I remember going to watch a moviewith him and this was the start of
the end of my relationship with my ex.
We saw a movie a few months before myex and I broke up, and it was about
racism, and my ex was a white guy.
He said, if anything to you,and you were harassed by a
(57:16):
white cop because of your race.
I will not protect you because Idon't want to put myself in danger.
And I walked away from that interactiongoing, something is not right here.
But at that time I was stillso young, I didn't understand
(57:36):
what felt so yucky to me.
Yeah.
I think, I, I think one of the thingsI said a while, while ago is like, I
think we're talking about white privilegeand, and, , I was saying, like, I do
not understand, uh, what it's like tobe you, to be a minority in a space.
(58:00):
I am, I have, my heart is there,I'm compassionate, caring, and
supportive, but I will never, Be able tocompletely understand because I didn't
grow up , without white privilege.
I have always lived in this, butit doesn't mean I don't care and it
doesn't mean I don't compassionateand doesn't mean I won't stand
(58:21):
there with you and support you.
It's just like, I just want to acknowledgethat I don't, I can never understand it.
Yeah, and I tell people, one of thereasons we finally got a dog, even though
both of us have wanted to have a dogfor so long, and the timing was right.
(58:43):
One of the reasons was you said thatwith the anti Asian racism, hate that
was increasing in the last few years,you say that it's good for you to have
a dog because then people won't tendto bother you as much, . Which I think
that kind of backfired in the first sixmonths because Bailey is so cute and
(59:05):
everybody wanted to say hi and they justcome and boundaries people don't touch
people's puppies without asking first.
Is it okay to say hi?
I'm just going to put it out there.
Do not just go.
Oh, so cute.
Touch the puppy.
No, no, because oftentimes puppyare reacting and new parents are
struggling to train the puppy.
(59:27):
So boundaries.
Saying that though, I think, yeah,it's great because now I don't
necessarily make eye contact withpeople as we walk down the street.
As I set better boundarieswith not letting Bailey say
hi to everyone and every dog.
(59:47):
But it is true, I feel alot safer having Bailey.
Nobody's the overprotective pawrent.
I have no idea what you're talking about.
I get that.
Anything else you want to share?
(01:00:09):
I remember, , once I told youit's something about your ex.
I think people should understand this.
, if you're in, you know, like , youfinally find that relationship, that
you wanted to be in , or whatever.
And then you go, I wasted time withthis other person or these other people.
(01:00:31):
What I said was, well, I'm just kindof grateful that that person was
there holding the space until I couldget my head into the right place
until I could work out enough things.
So I could grow into the man whocould be in a relationship, , I
mean, if you're having trouble withrelationships, understand that the person
(01:00:53):
who you're in relationship is eitherthe one or the one holding the place.
Well, the other, the one who's.
Who's like, you know, coming, holdinga place for that person to grow into
or clear the stuff out of the wayso they can be the person who can
(01:01:13):
be in that relationship with you.
Yeah, and I often say this to clientsor friends again, if you're in an
abusive relationship, please seek help.
But I think we learn about ourselvesfrom the relationships, oftentimes when
(01:01:39):
couples come and see me, if they don't endup staying together, it is not a waste of
time because you learn better skills andtools to take to your next relationship.
One of the things You said to me a longtime ago, maybe it was you, maybe it
(01:02:03):
was someone else, but I think it was youwho said to me, that oftentimes you're
with somebody who is a safe person.
That's when your own individual healinghappens because your partner is safe.
(01:02:23):
That gives you the space.
To learn and to grow, because now thereis someone there to hold you while you do
the difficult work of internal healing.
Yeah, it might have been along the linesof an anchor, if in a relationship with.
(01:02:46):
Somebody who's really solid thatyou're anchored so you can go
and take a risk to deal with thatstuff, but all but still have your
anchor connected to something solid.
So, you know, you can alwayspull your way back to it.
Row, row, row your boat.
(01:03:08):
Anything else that we want to talk about?
When I get older?
Let me see my hair.
Many years from now, will youstill be sending me a valentine's
birthday greeting bottle of wine?
(01:03:34):
And with that, my husband likes to sing.
Oh, it's a really good strategy.
If your internal dialogue is really meanto start singing because it drowns it
out and eventually it becomes a strategyand then you forget it was a strategy and
then you just do it all the time to bugyour wife, especially before bed time.
(01:04:00):
There's a rule in thishouse, no singing after 6pm.
No.
But you don't necessarilyfollow the rules.
Well, you know, rules weremeant to be bent, not broken.
Oh dear.
Okay, love you.
Bye bye.
(01:04:20):
A little more.
We hope you enjoy this episode wherewe share our relationship our marriage.
And once again, Ourmarriage is not perfect.
But when things show up, we deal with it.
(01:04:40):
We work on it.
And if we need help, we go outside ofthis relationship and ask for help.
and witness.
From our friends.
And our therapist.
My sister told me thisonce many, many years ago.
I remember I was visiting her in England.
(01:05:03):
We were on the train and she said to me,
Who you end up with is importantbecause you have to wake up.
Next to this person forthe rest of your life.
And I was with my ex at that time.
And that really made an impact on mebecause I knew I wasn't happy with my ex.
(01:05:27):
I hope.
You find someone.
Who makes you feel loved and that.
They can hold space foryou take care of you.
And you do the same for them.
Relationships are hard enough.
(01:05:47):
Do your internal work so youcan show up for your partner.
Please feel free to rate,subscribe, and leave a.
review for.
Our podcasts wherever youlisten to your podcast.
This help others to find theshow and we truly appreciate it.
(01:06:09):
Have a great week and we'llsee you in the next episode.
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