February 14, 2025 • 62 mins
Whether you’re looking to refresh your relationship, improve communication, or navigate life’s challenges together, Clay and Sonja are here to help you build a stronger, more fulfilling bond.Clay and Sonja, have over the past 25 years have helped couples create greater communication and deeper connections. As certified Safe Conversations® coaches and relational experts, they have worked with individuals, families, and couples worldwide, guiding them toward healing and thriving relationships.Through their integrative, neuroscience-based approach, they provide the tools and support needed to strengthen trust, resolve conflicts, and foster lasting connection in every area of life.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Let's get started. Hi, and welcome to Make More Love
Not War. This is Tara Harrison, licensed professional counselor and
relationship expert.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
This is her husband, Jeff Harrison, of no qualifications whatsoever,
just a normal dude.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
Hello and welcome to Make More Love not War. Today
we have with us Clay and Sonia Arnold. I've known
Clay and Sonia since twenty nineteen when they trained me
to be a Safe Conversations leader. They also have an
awesome business here in the Dallas Fort Worth area called
Heart Life Coaching DFW. So to This is part of
(00:47):
our Relationship Master, a power couple series in which I'm
talking to relationship experts and learning about what you do
and also how you bring this into your daily relationships
in your personal relationship. So welcome, So welcome to the podcast.
We're so excited that you're here.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Great, thanks, thanks for having us. We're glad to be here.
Speaker 4 (01:10):
Well.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
So, Clay and Sonia, please tell us about I like
to learn a little bit about your connection with safe
conversations and also what are you doing with Heart Life
Coaching and what do you bring to people with that.
Speaker 4 (01:23):
So with Safe Conversations, we train people, we train people
to take this to their communities. So you learn in
our training program, you learn how to use all the
theories for yourself in your own life, and then to
take this wherever you need to take it. So people
have taken it to their businesses, to their works places,
(01:45):
they have taken it to their congregations. They take it
all over the place and they've made it there. This
training that we have right now, we have people from
six different countries who are involved, three countries in Africa, Romania, Canada,
and New York and Texas, which you know almost counts
(02:05):
different countries and it's really.
Speaker 3 (02:07):
Having a worldwide impact too with it too. We trained
some leaders several trainings back and they have taken this.
They work in Liberia, which has been at civil war
for many, many years, and they have been leaders in
the movement to bring peace to Liberia. They had their
first election without violence, the first time ever in their history,
(02:30):
just a couple of months ago, and one of the
people that we trained was invited to become part of
the new president's cabinet and teach the presidential cabinet safe conversations.
So it's a real far reaching tool and that's one
of the things we love about the training is the
reach we can set in our little town home in Arlington, Texas,
(02:54):
you know, and impact the world like that. It's a
lot of fun.
Speaker 4 (02:59):
And it is all about it's you know, as you know,
it's all about, you know, how do you talk safely
to people? How can you be connected with people that
maybe you disagree with, which you know is something that
we all need and the.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Basic core of it, which we use in our work
with couples and couples coaching is, you know, how do
you talk without criticism? How do you really learn to
listen without judgment? And how do you connect beyond differences?
Which is the pnemona and reason why couples or anybody
else really for that matter of five And it gives
you a systematic, safe way to be able to connect
(03:35):
with anybody and talk to them about anything if you
choose to use the tool.
Speaker 4 (03:39):
And that's what our Heart Life coaching is all about.
It's learning a lot about like how can you create
in your own life the life that you want to live?
And there's lots of ways and lots of lots of
tools that we have accomplished are brought to the brought
to the table with that, and some of it is
the safe conversations tools which help your relationships of all kinds.
Speaker 3 (04:00):
We also have we have an online course for couples available,
and we have some smaller courses and other resources that
are online on the website www dot art Life Coaching
DFW dot com and you can access all kinds of
things to help your relationship and be able to maneuver
(04:22):
that in Anon a better way where you get the
connection and the communication. You know, we often talk about
how important it is to communicate, but we kind of
have lost the fact that we need to connect first
before we really get good at communicating, and that connection
will make all the difference in the world of how
well you communicate. So all of our tools are kind
(04:45):
of geared that way of how do you get better
connection with each other so that you can communicate and
make your relationship richer.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
So and how also add that Clay does a lot
of work with men, especially who've experienced traum in their life,
and that's kind of a unique thing. I think that
he brings to the table that we don't often see
in the therapy or the coaching space. It's like, how
can you keep this pass from entering into your career,
(05:16):
your relationships, and how do you resolve these things within yourself.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
So there's a couple of things based on what you're
saying that that I was feeling and experiencing, which first
the goosebumps of how on this quantum level, Save Conversations
impacts the world, which is amazing. I didn't know. I
didn't I didn't realize the extent that it was changing politics,
(05:48):
which is very exciting, and bringing peace to other countries.
It's just exciting. I mean, I've heard about that and
Save Conversations, But I think what's also really import with
that is to understand that this is a kind of
This is training. You don't have to be a therapist
to go to right, a lot a lot of training
with communication and stuff like that. It's it's for therapists,
(06:10):
and then therapists bring it to clients and blah blah blah,
and it's just like you can just reach one person
or one couple or a few couples, but this reaches everybody.
You can be in any sort of position and bring
it into that environment and make these huge shifts to
have an election without violence. Wow, that's that's really amazing.
(06:30):
I mean, it's just sitting there with goosebumps when you
said that, So I wanted to share that response with you.
Speaker 4 (06:39):
Yeah, and then that because it's an educational program, we
teach people how to talk. We don't. It's not therapy, yeah,
but we teach people how to talk, and then they
can take these any place they want and teach people
how to talk in a way that's safe, create that
psychological safety wherever you go.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
And like in the librarya experience, they have centers for
dial log now, which is mainly kids they're in school,
and they're using to get in the public school system
there with it. They're also using that to kind of
usher in because they don't. They have zero mental health
care in Liberia, none, and so this is kind of
(07:18):
a segue into bringing that into the country for those
in that and you can imagine the traumas after so
many years of war. But this is just kind of
a launching point to be able to do that from
an educational point of view, so that people can get
trained and are getting trained to be able to help
with the mental health end of it as well. So
(07:40):
that's pretty exciting too.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Yeah, big changes, big changes, bringing all of that into
a country that had zero mental health care, and the
fact that it's not mental health I think makes it
even more impactful because you can bring it everywhere.
Speaker 4 (07:56):
But even here in the US, it's like, you know,
we have access to mental health, but a lot of
people don't see it as a need. A lot of
people don't see it where they don't go now, or
they don't are they don't go, and there still is
a stigma. But because this is an educational process and
it can be used in schools, it can be used
in businesses, it can be used in all your relationships.
(08:17):
It's because it's just learning, learning skills that anybody can learn.
Speaker 3 (08:21):
And we've used this in all kinds of different settings
with first responders and hospital chaplains and you name it.
We've taught it in an all plethora and local government,
all kinds of different settings with it, so it's usable
in any which direction. And now Quantum Connections, which is
kind of the core company that sponsors conversations, they're bringing
(08:44):
that into the corporate and workplace now. They have a
new program called connected work and are working to bring
that in the business community where it's more of a
relational connecting environment. Versus the traditional corporate type of approach
to relationships. So that's really exciting, and that's just getting
off the ground right now.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Yeah, that is really exciting bringing in as many places
as you can well, and so I'm going to bring
it back into the smaller ecosystem of families and couples.
And you know, something that you mentioned earlier also was
helping people to become more connected, right, and something that
(09:27):
I've noticed, especially this year, for a lot of people,
and for Jeff and I too, it's been a tough year.
There's been a lot of outside stressors for people. It
just seems like this year in particular. And I'm sure
every year is its own year and a tough year
in different ways, but when the outside stressors weigh so heavily,
(09:48):
it's easy to become disconnected. And I'm wondering for y'all,
what is the advice that you give to people and
what do you do in your own marriage to stay
connected when you're really weighed down by outside forces?
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Well, in our own relationship, and you piggyback here with that,
we made we made we have made it a must.
We've kind of made it a real decision that we're
going to be intentional about connecting in different ways, whether
that's just touching base with each other, whether that's having
a date night, you know, whatever it takes. And particularly
(10:23):
when we have uh uh, you know, an issue or
something's going on where we utilize our own tools to
make it work and resolve it. You know. Safe Conversations
is a great example of that. We were recording when
we were recording our online program, we kind of hit
a snag at one point and we just could not
(10:43):
work through why we couldn't finish this one set of recording,
which was about going to be about a thirty minute
long thing, and we finally said, okay, this is not working.
Let's dialogue about it. And so we use the Safe
Conversations dialogue and discovered we were both triggered stuff from
our past that we were bringing to the space at
that moment. And once we realize that and have the
(11:06):
aha using the tool, we went back to it and
we finished it in about twenty minutes, after a couple
of days worth of wrestling with it. Yeah. So I
mean that's just a microcosm of what we've done.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
So this is when we talk about dialogue. What this
is is it's a structured way of talking. It's a
structured way of talking, whether you have specific sentence stems
that you say, and then it's kind of like a
mirroring is a big one. Let me see if I've
got that you said, and then mirroring back what the
person has said, and then this is there more about that?
(11:42):
And then just fully being able to listen to that,
and then did I get that? And then re you know,
like checking for accuracy because oftentimes we don't hear what
another person is saying. So those three sentence dats, those
three steps makes a huge difference being able to get
to the bottom of a situation. So with our stressors, yes,
(12:05):
there's stressors in life that you face every single day.
But we had Klay's mom lived with us with dementia
and for the end of her life, and and then
we also had a teenage son, and and so that
was sandwich, right, Yeah, that was it was like And
what we realized during that time was we we didn't
(12:28):
know how to support each other. We really because of
our vision what we did. I mean, we've been coaches, pastors,
all these things, and but we we've to everybody, you know,
we told everybody else what to do right, But there
was a fear in me. I thought, I don't really
know how to get the support that I need, and
(12:50):
I don't know how to to communicate my my needs safely.
Speaker 3 (12:57):
Voice.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
Yeah, we didn't really have a voice there and often
was shadowed. And so this really got us on the
same playing field to do this, to really fully listen
to someone, really I could fully listen to Clay and
he could fully listen to me, and then we could
then we could like, oh, I see the bigger picture
(13:19):
of what's going on. And then we learned how to
how to support each other because there's no different times.
I mean, we'd already we had four children, and we
had been through a lot, and we spought we were
doing great at supporting each other. But this one thing
was so huge. And this is kind of I think
what you're saying is that the world has become so
(13:39):
harsh and so huge that we we really need to
step up the game as couples to cope with in
our families are challenges that we that we face outside
the world. But to be able to come home really
fully feel seen and heard and valued by each other,
(14:00):
and then.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
Listening is such a big part of that because we
think in our culture, we think we're good listeners, but
we're not. We're good talkers. We give accolades like toastmasters
for talking, but I've never heard of a reward for
listening from anywhere. And that's such a missing piece of
what goes on, and it reflects in our culture too.
We don't listen to each other. We don't know how
(14:20):
to be good listeners. For me, that was an enormous
thing growing up in my mother, who we were talking
about earlier, had what's called a cluster b as a
group of different disorders, and she would kind of hop
from one disorder to the other. And then I had
a dad who's alcoholic and very narcissistic and abusive. So
(14:41):
needless is said, growing up, there was no listening. I
never thought anybody would ever listen to me, and honestly,
even after thirty years of marriage, it wasn't until we
learned this particular tool that I had my AHA moment
of lot. You know what, I realize I haven't trusted
you in thirty five years that we've known each other,
(15:01):
and I probably can open that door now just as
far because you actually really did and are listening to me.
And that was a huge thing just for healing my
own heart, let alone what was going on in our
interactions and not being so much so transformed.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
Wow, can you walk us through what exactly safe conversations means?
To somebody who's never even heard that, they have no
idea what safe conversation means.
Speaker 3 (15:30):
Yeah. Sure. Well, one thing just to understand is it's
based on cutting as real science. The sentence stems themselves
in the structure. There's safety in the structure, and that's
the beautiful thing about it. But what it does is
if you're in the emotional part of your brain in
the back of your head and you are triggered and
you're stuck there, the sentence stems will actually help you
(15:52):
integrate and get up to your frontal cortex where you
can reason and find your win wins. And it's designed
and been studied search for over forty years to make
that happen with it. But it is, like I was
saying earlier, it's learning how to talk without the criticism
and that is the number one thing, and that's being committed,
(16:14):
and that's something we had to do. You can imagine
how negative my growing up was with what you heard
while ago and I was bent in negativity. And part
of this process teaches you you've got to get you've got
to have a zero negativity space between the two of
you as much as you possibly can to do that.
(16:34):
And honestly, when you go to that space and do that,
then I can talk without criticism and then that listening
without judgment not preconceiving. You know, we all have the
little lawyer and little analysts I call them that sit
on our shoulder. And if Terry, you're talking to me
and I'm sitting over here creating my rebuttal or I'm
(16:54):
figuring out how to fix it, I'm not listening to
you at all. So that's the worst part of that.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
What do you think about?
Speaker 3 (17:04):
What's that?
Speaker 2 (17:04):
If you're not doing the rebuttal and you're not doing
the how to fix it, what are you thinking about?
Speaker 3 (17:10):
What I'm thinking about is what she's saying as she's
talking to me, because the brain will not do that
processing and be able to retain what she's saying to
me at at the same time. And if I mirror
that back using the senate stems, that's about all my
brain can contain because I'm going to have to share
that back and reflect that back to her at some point,
(17:33):
and so I can't. My brain will just not do that.
And that's what I love about mirroring. It makes those
guys go away.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Yes, I do too, because I love to write a
story in my head. I'm just I'm an internal person.
I love writing stories. So it helps me not to
write a story and just focus on what's actually there
rather than my perception of what it is, which is
always what gets people stuck.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
The interesting thing about that is the person you're trying
to talk to if you're not if you're doing that
process with rebuttal or figuring out how to fix it,
the person who's sharing with you, they know that non
verbally in a nanosecond. Oh yeah, that's what's going on.
And so you create anxiety in the space and when
you do, you disconnect.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
Yeah, because they're thinking about, oh gosh, I'm gonna have
to rebut the re butt yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
Then you go on this other path.
Speaker 3 (18:28):
Yeah, let you go off and down some bunny trails
on direction, you.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Know, And then then the stories come out about thirty
years ago what you did at the thing.
Speaker 4 (18:38):
And then we listen, you know, just to and we
listen enough so that we kind of like, oh, yeah,
now I know what you're saying. So we're just like,
don't even listen, like, yeah, now I know where you're
going with this, rather than listening to the whole message,
and like you said, we make it up okay, Yeah, yeah,
I know that instead of just really having to stick
(19:00):
with it, or we go into solutions like oh, yeah,
I know what you should do. Yeah, why did you
just listen to me?
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Yeah. When we first learned this process, I didn't believe it.
I thought it was a bunch of crap, quite honestly,
and so I put it to the test. I went
out in downtown Dallas, down near the homeless area, and
I found a guy have any of a sockettic episode,
walking on the street talking to his mama. I had
been off his meds for three years, and I began
(19:26):
to use these very senate stems with him and watching
him move from that emotional part of his brain even
though he'd been off his meds for several years, and
get up to the frontal cortex and be able to
share his story. So if I got that you said
you've been on the street since you were fourteen, and
you've had you know, you've just had to hustle for
(19:48):
it with it too, and you know you kind of
got off and they diagnosed you with medication, but you
hadn't been on your medication, you know, for years? Did
I get all that? Oh? Yeah? Is there more about that?
When I said that that's the magic sauce, by the way,
is his eyes got really big and he was like,
you really want to know more? It's like, yeah, absolutely.
(20:10):
I mean, man, you're a human being a guy here.
I want to know the whole story. And he began
to tell and the interesting things started to happen was
he started regulating. He had gone from yelling and screaming
to his mom, who wasn't even there, balancing out and
calming completely down. And before we finished, he was having
a conversation with me in the same tone of voice
I'm having with you right now. And then I had
(20:31):
an aha, you know, if this works with this cat,
I bet it'll work with her.
Speaker 4 (20:37):
It's got to work.
Speaker 2 (20:38):
With she offer mints? Is that what's going on?
Speaker 3 (20:45):
Compliment?
Speaker 4 (20:50):
But kind of we've talked a lot about this thing,
but I want to kind of get a bigger view
of it. But it's this this theory of the space between.
So a relationship is two people and the space between,
and when we can be aware of this space between
and nurturing that space between, which kind of is where
we can connect, where we can be in relationship, but
(21:12):
it also allows each of us to be individuals. So
if we have a problem, you have a view and
I have a view, and then we can kind of
both like, look around, Okay, well how can we solve
this problem. It's not like you're the bad guy or
I'm the bad guy, or did I even have to
change what I think?
Speaker 3 (21:31):
So it's kind of a different paradigm where the space
between is actually the relationship. And so looking at okay,
if we've got a problem, let's look at it together
from our different viewpoints and figure out, Okay, what do
we do to fix this or make a change if
we need to do. And looking at that with that
paradigm and nurturing that is taking that negativity as much
as possible out and putting in affirmations and appreciations and
(21:56):
car and behaviors and stuff that will actually nerve sure
the relationship. And that's the day to day nitty gritty stuff.
That really makes this work is when we're committed to
nurturing that space between, then if we have to do
dialog or we hit a snag or whatever, the energy
of it is totally different than it would be if
(22:18):
we're not doing those things.
Speaker 4 (22:19):
Because I think I always had the idea. You know,
if I had a viewpoint that someone else had a
different viewpoint, which you know happens daily, I would either
have to argue or fight. I guess you know, we
go in that fight or fight mode to make you
(22:41):
either make you agree with me, or I just had
to shut down and suck it up and just agree
with you. If we're going to be in relationship together
and neither of those are are true, neither of those,
you don't have to put the space between. Then it's like, oh,
you have this idea, and then I can get awareness
(23:03):
by listening and understanding, being curious, and yeah, that curiosity
of why you have this view and what is going on.
And then Clay can also get this awareness of why
I have my point of view.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
And where that's come from.
Speaker 4 (23:17):
And you know, and neither of us really has to
change the point of view. Sometimes we have to, like
adjust to come up with a solution that meets both
of our needs. But that's easy to do as long
as we actually are respecting the difference that we.
Speaker 3 (23:34):
Both have and that listening. And that's what makes the difference.
Is when you're in this and you have a structured
way of talking and doing this, it creates an energy
of softness I call it, and receptivity. Because we're sharing
that back and forth. I know I'm going to be
heard even if I've got a different viewpoint, and so
(23:56):
so will she and she knows that as well, so
that we if we've both been heard, then we're going
to have a completely different viewpoint on the Okay, but
here's the problem. What's a solution? What do we do
with that? And you find you know what it is
with it? The founders, the people who created this, Orvil
Hendrix and Helen la Kelly Hunt. They he shared a
(24:17):
story with me about he loves to fish, and but
she's a homebody. She has to stay home and knit
and do her thing at the house with it too,
And they could not come to an agreement about how
to do that, and so they finally dialogued about it,
and once they did, they both almost at the same
time had found a solution of why do we buy
a motor home? That way I can go, we can
(24:40):
drive to the like and you can sit here and
net your your life away if you want to do that.
And it wouldn't until they did the dialogue though, that
they were able to have that aha moment and find
a solution I mean them and had a great time.
Speaker 4 (24:57):
So we need Yeah, arguing about where to take a vacation,
that's a high quality start, you know, really you want
to argue about So Jeff, does that answer that question?
Bunny Trail?
Speaker 2 (25:12):
Yeah, I thought that was great.
Speaker 1 (25:14):
Well, so I have a question about the mechanics of
this as well, which is getting to a zero negativity space.
So a lot of people listening to this might be
listening to this individually and they're thinking, well, you know,
my relationship is not doing very well, and this all
sounds legit and makes sense, But I don't feel like
(25:37):
doing that because it's a risk I'm being vulnerable. Being
in a negative space makes me feel protected, and I
don't know how to get to a place where I'm
going to try. So if you're starting off in that place,
what what are what are your ideas or suggestions on
how to get closer to being open to even trying
this with.
Speaker 3 (25:57):
Our relations with our coaching clients are couples of work with.
I usually start with the gut check. I call it,
is okay, what is your intention here to be right
or the relationship? Because most of the time we won't.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
Say that again. So say that again. What are the
two choices.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
What's more important to you? Being right or the relationship?
Because if we're stuck on being right, then we're not
gonna let We'll take our negativity and we'll pet it
like a kiddi cap in our lap, you know, and
nurture it. I mean, that's just what we do. It's
making an intentional decision of you know what, I need
to go to a different space here so I can
(26:34):
connect with you and relate to you, even with whatever
history you've had h and just realizing, you know, if
I'm going to be right, we're gonna go to odds,
you know, because if it's something that we have different
viewpoints on, that's how we're going to posture, and we'll polarize,
which is what we do with couples. That's what we
do in our culture. So that's that's a huge part
(26:58):
of that with it too. And the other thing is
that that for realizing how habituated we are in negativity
to judging to judge it, Yes, I mean the English Dictionary.
Do you realize in the Webster's Dictionary that sixty eight
percent of the words that are the Webster's Dictionary have
a negative connotation to him?
Speaker 1 (27:18):
Really, that's pretty powerful statistic.
Speaker 3 (27:23):
Yeah, we're already bent that way.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:25):
So for me in my growing it was negativity all
the time. I mean in our house, you know, we
if you want to make your viewpoint, we go out
in the front yard and have fist five. I mean
it was intense, yeah, with it. So I didn't know
how to do negativity when I learned this, and so
I went to no debt negativity. I was proficient in negativity,
but I went to harblean goal. I can't do this.
(27:47):
What do I do? And he goes set the clock
on your phone for five after the hour. He goes,
do it one hour at a time, See if you
can get through the whole hour without being.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
Negative about anything.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
About anything just in general, and then do it again
with that challenge, and all of a sudden I realized, hey,
I did was negative at time, and then it kind
of grew to a week and two a month, and
then I got to where, you know, no, I'm not
totally there. I mean, there are always going to be
times where it slips in. But if we have negativity
(28:23):
a space between us, I can't stand the feel of that. Now.
That's how much the paradigm has changed for me, And
so I will pursue her of Okay, what do we
let's dialogue, what do we need to do to get
this out of the space.
Speaker 4 (28:38):
It really does lead to polarization in toxicity, antixsity. I
noticed for me one of things is boundaries. So that's
why I love this visual of the space between because
it allows me to have a boundary and play to
have a boundary. And when you grew up in a
big family, nobody has boundaries and so you're kind of
like all in mesh. So so just you're then and
(29:00):
I'm number seven of seven, so we're plays only, so
that creating a whole different different things. So realization of
boundaries that I can have my own thoughts, feelings, attitudes
is like huge and so but I think I had
a realization that I was like annoyed a lot. I
(29:21):
was like getting annoyed, and I was like I was thinking.
I was like, I was using annoyance as a boundary.
So I was like, oh, I was being annoyed because
I needed to protect my space. I needed to protect myself.
I needed my thoughts like oh, yeah, you're just annoying
(29:42):
cause you did that and then said that, and it was.
Speaker 1 (29:45):
Like you just stopped doing and saying.
Speaker 3 (29:51):
So.
Speaker 4 (29:51):
But the realization, I think, I think it was realizing
that it's it's you can bring up topics, you can
bring up situation, whatever troubling me, and then learning a
skill of being able to bring up problems, being able
to bring up annoyances in a way that really invites
(30:13):
co collaboration, that really invites understanding, rather than just feeling like, oh,
I can't bring up this topic because it's going to
cause conflict and I didn't want to have conflicts. So
then I would just be annoyed, and you know, because
that was my boundary and that was my protection. But
that having the skill of being able to bring up
(30:37):
something helped me to not stick in that annoyance place
because I had I had a voice, I had a voice.
Speaker 3 (30:46):
And if you have a tendency to do that, what
usually happens. I mean, that was true. It's been true
with us and others that we work with, is you stack,
You stack this annoyance and another one on top, another
one on top, and then some little thing happens way
up here and you go nuclear and everybody's like, what
the does happened? What's going on here? Well, they don't know.
All this stuff's been stacking up because you know, one
(31:09):
or the other of us has avoided talking about the topic.
It's still there. The an nooise is still there, and
the frustration or whatever it might be still there, and
we stack them. So being able to go ahead and
talk about this, but be able to know you're going
to be able to do it in a safe Why
what was the game which iger? When it comes to
this for me, I've stopped stacking pretty much.
Speaker 4 (31:32):
Yeah, because Clay. Clay knows how to bring because he's
the he's the one that brings things up. He's the
one that talks all the time. He's the one that
he's kind of like, okay, let's let's his and then
and I'm the one that kind of procrastinates and why
do we have to talk about it?
Speaker 3 (31:48):
Didn't we talk about that last month?
Speaker 1 (31:49):
So you're the turtle, Sonya and Clay you're the hailstorm.
Speaker 3 (31:52):
I am the help right.
Speaker 4 (31:53):
Oh yeah, the hills the one that that brings things up,
all their energy is out, whereas the turn it brings
their into the shell. And just like, yeah, we don't
want to talk about that. Oh, but then the appointment
we didn't talk about. The appointment is sometimes when you
have something to say that's really important. We've all had
that situation where you you know, somebody's talking to you
(32:17):
and you don't know. You're like, oh, wait, were you
talking to me? Three minutes into the conversation. So that's
one of the really big skills is like, it's now
a good time to talk about what you want to
talk about. And that really helps both the turtle and
the healthstorm to really have that parameter because you can
kind of be prepared and also honors honors the boundary,
(32:41):
honors the fact that sometimes you don't want to talk
about things, but you have to come back, No, I
can't talk about this, I need to eat and or whatever.
And then it also kind of controls that health storming
nature of just talking about things all the time.
Speaker 3 (32:55):
It also improves the listening too, because it gives you
the opportunity to be fully present. If I'm finishing a
project and she is now a good time to talk
about whatever. And by the way, when you ask that
for the appointment, always fill in the blank. Is it
a good time to talk about these abusiness subject? Yes,
sexual life or whatever is. If we don't fill in
(33:18):
the blank, it's a lot going to the principal's office.
I don't know if you've ever had anybody go hey, Terry, Jeff,
we need to talk.
Speaker 1 (33:25):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
Yes, I heard lots of times, and.
Speaker 3 (33:28):
They never tell you what about what happens internally? You
got dread anxiety and dread yes. And here's a thing
about the space between. Once you feel that anxiety, you
will disconnect in a nanosecond so that that ability to
connect in the space happens. So fill in the blank.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
Yeah, I think that's really important. I agree because I
used to do that with Jeff. Or I would just
start talking to him about something, and of course I
knew what I was talking about, but he's sitting there
and he's like looking for like what is the subject?
Like what what are you Is this? Is this a
complain about me? Is this so now I will just say, Jeff,
I need to vent about whatever. This isn't about us.
(34:12):
I'll tell him that, like so that way he knows, Okay,
I'm not needing to think about our relationship right now.
She's just complaining about her mother or something like that,
right you know. So that has made a big difference
for us too, for me to give that to him,
because it was very much like going to the principal's
office for you, I think, Jeff.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
With me, Yeah, well you don't you don't You don't
know where you're gonna get hit, Like, I mean, is
it like, am I gonna get flanked her? Or what's
going on? Is she setting me up for something? I don't.
I don't know what's going on here. She just walked
in and all of a sudden, you know.
Speaker 3 (34:44):
And if you've grown up with caretakers or had other
experiences where you were set up like that, you instantly
go to that place emotionally and get triggered. So good
luck connecting. Yeah, it's not happened. It's not safe.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
And I think a lot of people have have that
trigger because because of the fact that there is so
much negativity, that so many conversations are just negative conversations,
and so many people are coming in and they have
an agenda of how I'm going to persuade you to
see my side, rather than coming in with like I
(35:19):
just like you to understand me or I'm curious about
you that. I think that's just a very common wound
that people have. So I love the appointment part because
it really just allows that allows some some predictability in
that space of like, okay, this is what.
Speaker 4 (35:35):
We're doing now, yeah I think so, And but there
also can you know, just asking for is now a
good time to talk about? This can be a trigger
to some people as well, because we how often do
people approach us with still good Usually if somebody wants
to talk to us, it's it's because we're talking, or
(35:56):
it's something that they need us to do or change
or that type of thing. So often putting in is
now a good time to talk about how great you are?
Is now a good time to talk about appreciation?
Speaker 3 (36:07):
I appreciate the today.
Speaker 4 (36:11):
Situation, how great you were on that podcast, and how
articulate you were, so really putting in those type of
appointments in that we often neglect. Usually we talk about
what's wrong, we talk about our problems, but how often
do we talk about this, you know, this appreciation, which
is like what makes us feel good, it makes us
(36:32):
That's what we did when we were dating and we
were first married, as we talked about these things because
you were so wonderful and great and.
Speaker 3 (36:39):
What you were and where did you go? And that
nurtures that space between when we put that that positivity
and affirmation or the appreciation or whatever. So it's it's
a simple way of doing that, you know, where were
we kind of flood each other with good, with what
we want instead of what we don't want, and have
(37:02):
both of that be able to do either if you
need to. That's that's what's cool about it.
Speaker 1 (37:06):
So that's that because I was wondering, so when you're
doing this challenge of zero negativity, what do you put
in the space when there's not negativity?
Speaker 2 (37:15):
Right?
Speaker 1 (37:15):
So, for you, Clay, when you're doing this hour, how
did you do that? Because you know so I think
that kind of piggybacks on that creating the positivity and
a relationship, But like, how do we just do that
individually ourselves before it.
Speaker 3 (37:28):
Was the principal I learned and my coaches training teen
years ago with it. I've been a coach now twenty
five years with people, and it's about focus. Whatever I
focus on, my feelings are automatically going to follow. And
whatever I focus on, I'm probably going to get more
what I'm focusing on and if that happens to be negative,
(37:49):
have a nice day. So adjusting the focus so when
I was actively not trying to be negative, I would
look for what I would appreciate. You know, we have
a thing we do with each other at least once
a day we give each other an appreciation at a minimum,
just to nurture the space and make sure that that
(38:12):
we can do that. And that's okay. So when when
we're able to go there, you know, it just makes
all the difference in the world. But for me filling
that with what, okay, what are you going to focus on? Now?
Asking myself the question, okay, instead of negativity, what can
you focus on? What's good about the situation? What are
(38:33):
you learning about yourself? What are you willing to change?
What are you not willing to change? You know, can
you use the right tools, you know, with a lot
of couples. We they come and they bring to the
space whatever they learned about how to do relationships, probably
usually for the caretakers. And so it's like going out
(38:53):
to your car and I say to you, Okay, here's
a butter and I have changed the spark plug out. Well,
guess what I go to work very well? Why you
don't have the right tool to do it with. And
so if you get the right tool and you use
the tool, you'll accomplish what you want. But that's about focus.
What you focus on, your feelings will automatically follow. So
(39:15):
that helped me start changing my feelings in that vacuum,
if you will to look at that. And then I
kind of built a momentum of positive feelings as I
did it more and more and more, and I condition myself.
And we know now from neuroscience that's just creating a
new neural pathway in your brain. The more you do it,
(39:38):
the more consistently you do it. But the cool thing
we know from neuroscience now is your old way of
doing it, Like the negativity will begin to collapse in
the brain if you take pictures of it, and eventually
it'll go away, and what will be left is the
new thing you've developed, and that's exciting because the brain
has the ability to lex and change and do that.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
Yeah, the plasticity that's there, not that window that they
thought was there anymore. I mean, they know that you
can do that throughout your life, which is really exciting.
And so basically what you're saying is when you start
to go into this negative place, let me see if
I got that when you start to go But I
(40:18):
am going to add my own interpretation, so I'm not
quite mirroring just back. But when you go back, when
you start going into that negative space, you are focusing
on it sounds like gratitude. You are focusing on gratitude
and really just leaning into all of the things that
were good instead of having your brain go into that
critical place that our brains go into primally and focusing
(40:42):
on all of the threats that are out there instead,
How am I safe? What am I grateful for? What's
good about my life?
Speaker 4 (40:48):
And you.
Speaker 1 (40:50):
Did that over and over again, and it started to
heal your trauma of being in this negative environment as
a child and not having an escape from that.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
You got it, you know, I did. I did something
similar to this, and I just started doing this where
I would every day, and I did this for a
few years, and it's like it once you kind of
reprogram your mind to to visualizing and seeing things like this,
you just see it everywhere. So I was I just
every day I'd take you know, make like take five things,
(41:23):
and I'd say, I'd just come up with five things
that I'd be gratitude gratitude about. So and and you know,
you quickly get past the Thanksgiving stuff. Oh, I'm gratitude
for my family and blah blah blah, the same stuff
you hear. But but but what you want to do
is you want to go to the stuff that's like
you don't even think about, like gratitude that the road
(41:44):
system actually works really good, the painted lines on the
roads that actually is that's really necessary. The uh, you know,
the traffic jam. Oh okay, I'm in the traffic jam. Oh,
instead of oh I can't get there at the same
time I want, oh, well, I can finish up some
of that audiobook I was on. Or I'm in a
(42:04):
town where there's lots of people that want to be here,
so that's kind of neat. So you start it's just
taking all the stuff. So like I had an accident,
an incident the other day where I needed to go
get something done, Like I needed to go to get
some stuff printed. I get in my car, I start
to drive, and I realized in about two seconds ago,
I have a flat tire. I didn't see it until
(42:26):
I got in and started moving, and I went okay,
so I backed up, went back in the thing. I went, oh, yeah,
it's flat. Okay, it's raining. Now it's flat. It's raining,
and I gotta go do this. And I was like, Okay,
at least I don't have to be at this appointment thing,
and I do have time today that I can get
this done. Okay, great, So now do I have to
(42:46):
change the tire? No? I put aired it up. It
held air. Okay, is it holding air long enough for
me to get to the place. Okay, yeah, no problem, perfect, easy,
just drive there, get the thing done. Never like, oh
I got it, do this thing. Oh this is this.
It's like, oh, I'm glad that I don't have to go. Yeah.
You say yeah exactly, you just say okay, yeah, so
(43:07):
you just boom boom boom. I go to the place.
The guys are great, walk change the thing done. These
guys are awesome, you know, like, hey, thanks guys for
getting that done. We're out and I go went and
get the stuff printed. Like you just don't even like
it's all that. You start to notice all the good
things that were happening to make that change. You're done.
Speaker 3 (43:26):
I actually did that this morning. We take a walk
every morning. It's one of the things we do together.
And I came back and I patted the trash can
as we're rocket walking angle. Thank god for people who
will pick up my trash.
Speaker 2 (43:38):
Oh yeah, and it runs smooth and it runs smooth
like that. I mean so many people. It's like it's
like people get a Gextra value to point out something like, oh,
I went to Starbucks and they didn't have the right
straws for me, and the world's in it's like seriously
like or or like you go on a plane and
(44:00):
they're like, oh, my phone's not working, or I can't
get that. You're flying. You're flying through the air in
a tube. That's incredible.
Speaker 4 (44:08):
It's amazing.
Speaker 2 (44:08):
It's amazing.
Speaker 4 (44:10):
So Jeff, if I'm getting you, you're saying that you
have created this ritual that you come up with five
gratitudes every day. And you quickly got through the just
the basic ones. But so now you're kind of having
to reach and get some more far reaching gratitudes for yourself.
And you find that it's kind of shifted that whole
(44:31):
process and attitude so that even when something bad happens
that could cause you to go down a path that
you kind of go to, well, what's good about this?
What can I do about this? And if you've made
that shift.
Speaker 2 (44:44):
In your mind, well, when you do it every day
to a certain and you give yourself five, there's no
magic number to five, just five to ten, whatever numbers
you have enough, it's enough number that you have to
make your brain sweat a little bit and you start
to think like, oh, okay, well my speakers work. Oh
the computer monitor that that okay, monitor's pretty cool. Oh
(45:05):
the paint's not just falling off the walls. It's been
holding up for years. That's really neat. So you start
to see it. So, now, once you've done that enough
and you've had made your brain work and sweat a
little bit, as you drive around, you start to really
just sort of look around and you see stuff and
you're like, wow, these buildings are really nice. That's pretty
neat the walls. The glass doesn't just fall out. It's
(45:26):
kind of like the what you're doing is in Sherlock Holmes,
they used to have the dog not barking, so what
So that's what you're really doing, is you're really trying
to find the dog that's not barking and why is
that happening? So and you just need to do it
enough to where you finally you just start seeing it.
(45:47):
So you read programmed, that's the key.
Speaker 3 (45:50):
It's the skill you learned and teach yourself with it.
And the lucky you were asking me while I go
to her about what did I fill the gap with it?
Speaker 1 (45:57):
Too?
Speaker 3 (45:57):
It was the repetitiveness of doing it. By the way,
that's why use resolutions don't work. While the average person
goes maybe ten days before they stop, they don't do
it long enough to develop the skill or whatever it
is they want to do and create that new pathway
with it too. But you know, with this again, this
is a skill relationship. Since the nineteen nineties, we are
(46:17):
learning that it's a skill that we can learn. Like
playing basketball. You know you don't if you've never played
basketball before, you don't know how to dribble. You don't
know how to shoot a shot, Well, you do that
over and over and over again until you get proficient
at it. And the same thing is true with using
these tools and relationships. The more we practice and we're
intentional about but about using them, the better we will get.
(46:38):
We have to make that it a must that we're
going to do that and make a real decision what
a should akoda is not going to work. You have
to make it a must. And that's where it all
begins to shift and change.
Speaker 1 (46:52):
It's when you make that decision inside yourself.
Speaker 4 (46:57):
So I think going back to your question tire about
somebody who's kind of like, I really don't want to
be negative. Not being negative it is a protection. I
think we've just learned it. It's a habit. We've learned it,
we've been conditioned that that is a way to be.
And so making that shift to like I think I said,
(47:21):
the learning how learning the skill to bring up things
in a way that is safe and productive to the
relationship is a good shift. So you don't have to
use that that other skill because that is a skill
that we've developed of negativity and of criticism and things
(47:42):
like that that we just go to automatically is like
I'm annoyed, I'm critical, I'm judging you. Whereas if you
have a skill and how you can come from my
point of view and talk about this is what I
think I want, I need, rather than your reason, and
then you can be fully heard in that. Because of
the structure, it really you're able to be curious, curious
(48:05):
about yourself. I learned things about myself when I'm allowed
to talk and be mirrored. Sometimes Clay will mirror me.
I'm like, oh, yeah, that's what I said, but what
I meant was this, and so then it's just kind
of like learning about myself. I can also then hear
the other point of view about why, and then to
respect that, you can have your review, I can have
(48:27):
my view, and then we can come together and come
up with a solution.
Speaker 3 (48:31):
And in that it's such a beautiful thing when you
use the structure, because we tend to bring how we
process men and women depending on who they were raised
with and how they were raised. You know, for Sonya,
she does. We are a couple who do the office
that most men have. When they process thought, they have
what I call cavetime. They can move from one here's
(48:54):
the problem, and here's the solution. But in between, I'm
going to go to the cave and figure it out,
and then I'll come out with my answer. For most gals,
it's like a plate of spaghetti. They can seamlessly move
from one topic to the next topic, to the next topic,
to the next topic. And the guys over here kind
of moving in waffle squares if you will with it too.
The structure makes it sustinct and it slows both of
(49:19):
us down where we are able to really listen and
to process what we're hearing in a different way than
we maybe normally would do that. And I love that
part of it because we really get down to what
we want to talk about in whatever topic it is
because we have it sustinct and we have to we're
(49:41):
going to get it mirrored. But we also it just
naturally makes you slow down, which is great.
Speaker 4 (49:47):
And what I even the three things that that we
mentioned that you know, let me see if I've got that?
Did I get that? Is there more about that? And
just just mirroring though, just just doing that slows you down.
People always say this takes too long, Like, but how
long does it take to have disagreements and to be
(50:09):
on different pages.
Speaker 2 (50:11):
Yeah, and hold on to something for thirty years and
bring it up later, right.
Speaker 1 (50:17):
Well, And what I love about this too is, you know,
so we're talking about that. I always think of the
space between as it like a Venn diagram. There's the
me and the U and the us and that's you know, right,
that's the space between. And so what I hear from
both of you that I think is really powerful that
we all can take as advice and use for ourselves,
is that you were able to see what was going on,
probably because of using the safe conversations and also your
(50:40):
own reflection. At the same time, you were able to
understand some of your own childhood trauma child the way
that your neural network's form because of how your caregivers
responded to you. That we're contributing to the fact that
you couldn't keep that space safe and figured out what
you needed to do. Sonia Forget, it was understanding that
(51:02):
the annoyance or that feeling meant, oh, I need to
set a boundary. And for you, Clay, it was understanding
that that you couldn't You weren't able to come in
with zero negativity because you were overwhelmed with so much
negativity and you had to you had to work on
that for yourself. So you both did that work and
that made that space between safer as well. And so
(51:22):
it goes back to the individual choices we make too
of choosing that relationship. Like you were saying, it's either
I can be right, and being right also often means
stuck in your own trauma and way of doing things
that hasn't worked out for you that got you to
this place in the first place. Or I can choose relationship,
which is healing. It's always healing to choose relationship if
(51:46):
you're in a healthy enough relationship, right, I mean, obviously,
if you're choosing relationship that's abusive, that's a whole other topic.
But it's healing to choose connections.
Speaker 4 (51:57):
And you can be partners there. You don't have to
fix you each other. You don't have to fix I
don't have to be your therapist. I don't have to
be your coach. But just by listening and validating your
experience and accepting that really helps to him to heal
and the same thing for me, it helps you to
(52:17):
grow out of that trauma that we all have experienced
in our early years in our early lives, and that
has kind of gone through all of our lives. I'm
glad you brought that up. That really is such a
good point.
Speaker 2 (52:31):
You know, talking about how people will hold on to
negativity and they'll hold on to something negative. I kind
of feel like this that there's something about negativity that
makes you feel like you're smarter because you see, because
I'm seeing this negative thing. So I see that all
the time with you know, like, let's just take the
(52:52):
stock market. Like if you listen to financial gurus, it
almost seems like the one who's saying that the thing's
going to drop and go crazy down, the market's gonna
fall apart, they feel like they come across as like
they're the smarter one. But if you say, what are
you talking about? Thing's gonna be great, this thing's gonna
go up, it's like, oh, he's just a Pollyanna. He's
not He's in a fantasy world. It's not really. There's
(53:16):
something just I think, just in our nature that makes
you think that because you brought up something that's negative,
that you are smarter about it. Then if you say, no,
this is no, this is actually really cool and good.
Speaker 3 (53:30):
But you can go to a different space even than
those two though. I mean you can you know, go
to you know, most bigionnaires. They they're just fine with
it dropping because that's when they invest and buy up
all the stocks and make a billion dollars with it too. Yeah,
it doesn't have to be the negative. It's what again
the focal point? Well, are you focusing on? Okay, this
(53:52):
can be the worst thing that ever happened, or this
can be a grand opportunity. What are you focusing on?
Speaker 2 (53:59):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (54:00):
What reality are you creating? Because in the end, if
you're if you're feeling smarter for being negative, and you
create a horrible world that you've live in where you're
this smart person in it, well that's your reality. Or
you can be the Pollyanna and live in your own
fantasy world that feels really good and safe and connected,
(54:20):
and that's your reality too. So I mean you can
look at it that way. It's just the choices we're
making about how we construct our own realities.
Speaker 4 (54:30):
And accepting that everybody has their own reality. Yes, everybody
has their own reality, and there's not good or bad.
It's like, Okay, that's your reality. Okay, be curious about that.
Tell me about reality. I know one time I was
talking about, well, we haven't even talked about validation step,
which is like accepting that you have a reality and
(54:53):
it's okay, and even if it's different than my won't
And so I there was a big window behind me
that was beautiful, was overlooking downtown area, and then all
of a sudden, everybody in the audience was going, oh,
my eyes, the sun is so bright, and I'm like,
(55:16):
the sun's not bright. It feels good on my shoulders.
I was a little cold, but now it feels good.
But then it was just a different perspective. And then
all of a sudden I turned around. Yeah, the sun
was setting and it was shining in everybody's eyes. I'm like, oh, yeah,
the sun is pretty, Like can we do something about that?
But if I just considered in my viewpoint of like,
(55:37):
oh yeah, no, the sun's great, then you know, but
that's what we do. That's what we do. We never
take the time to be curious about another's reality except
that they have the right to what they're going to say,
and like, oh, yeah, I could see from your point
of view because I've heard you, I've heard what you
had to say, I've heard you share. I've mirrored this.
(56:01):
I can tell why you feel this way and why
you view it this way, even if it's so much
different because of my experience.
Speaker 3 (56:09):
And this is where the I want to be right
thing raises its ugly head right here. Is if it's
the dumbest thing, I think it's the dumbest thing I've
ever heard in my life. You sharing your reality with
it too, it's still your reality, and as a human being,
I can respect that and honor that, even though I
think it's a dopey idea. But Okay, you know your
(56:31):
life experiences, you what you bring to the table, how
you see things with it too. That's your viewpoint, and
that's just as valid as it is mine. And most
of the time in a relationship, we don't take that posture.
Speaker 2 (56:45):
Yeah, I think it's hard for people to realize that
that what we perceive is reality is really narrow to
just what we have experiences seen. And it really reminds
me of Plato's cave. You know Plato's cave. So, I mean,
just the general gist of the player's cave is it's
just a bunch of people that are looking at They're
in a cave. They're looking at a wall. All they
(57:07):
see are the shadows from everything that's happening behind them.
They're chained down, they can't see it. One guy breaks
loose of that and he gets out and he goes
out and he sees that there's a whole other world
out there, and he and he experiences it, sees it,
comes back, tells the people that are in the there
are still chained up there. Oh no, there's this other
world out there. There's all these things you can do
(57:27):
and all that stuff. And they think he's the crazy
one because they're like, what are you talking about?
Speaker 3 (57:31):
No, this is this is the world reality.
Speaker 2 (57:34):
This is reality.
Speaker 3 (57:35):
Yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker 4 (57:38):
Oh, I love that. That really is a good is
a good point, Jeff. And now they're going down that
road to those early philosophers. I think the whole thing
about the Socratic dialogue method because we talk about dialogue
and the dialogue that we teach is different than the Socrates,
but it's the whole idea that they would go to debate.
(58:00):
But before you could debate, you had to state what
your opponent's viewpoint was completely and they had to state
what your viewpoint was. And isn't that when we argue
with people, oftentimes we don't even know what their point
of view is. We're arguing about what we think their
viewpoint is rather than finding out what their viewpoint is.
(58:23):
And I'm like that was like a big ahat a me.
It's like, oh yeah, I have to know your point
of view before I could even argue about it.
Speaker 3 (58:30):
And we did that in a relationship for years.
Speaker 1 (58:33):
Oh yeah, yeah, it's so funny. Tool, Yeah, so funny.
Sometimes Jeff and I have had conversations where it's like
we realize that we're actually agreeing. You know, sometimes you
have those in your You're not shocking those conversations. We
haven't used our tools because you know, even people that
know the tools sometimes don't use them. And then we're like, yes,
(58:58):
I'm saying that too.
Speaker 4 (59:00):
Oh I. Sometimes I would be saying something and telling
them something and they're like, well I know that already.
And then it's like, well, then why are you arguing
with me and you know that we're in agreement? What's
(59:20):
going on?
Speaker 2 (59:22):
Because I want that reminds me. There was this is
just a stupid movie where the guy came out like
there was he had a jet ski and he was
staying at his brother's house, and his brother's kids were
playing on the jet ski and you know, they weren't
doing anything. He comes running out. He's yelling at the kids.
(59:44):
He's like, what are you doing? Get off my thing?
Blah blah blah, you'renn and he's just yelling and the
and the father of those kids came out and said,
what are you talking about? And everything? What do you do?
So he keeps yelling and he goes, Okay, I know
you're right right now, but I'm still mad, and I'm
going to keep my voice up because I don't want
you to realize that I'm wrong. So I'm just going
to do that and I'm gonna huff off. I love you, guys.
(01:00:06):
Sorry yelled at you. Bye.
Speaker 4 (01:00:11):
Well that's what that low does. It just like it
gets us in a frenzy and he says like, oh yes,
and it takes us a while to calm down and
to realize, Okay, life is good.
Speaker 1 (01:00:25):
I'm safe, I'm safe.
Speaker 4 (01:00:27):
I'm safe.
Speaker 1 (01:00:30):
Yep. Well, thank you so much, Clay and Sonia. I
feel like we could talk for hours and hours about this.
Of course, my favorite topic, and I know y'all love
it too, But so if people want to talk hours
and hours with you more, where might they find you?
Speaker 3 (01:00:47):
They can go to www. Art Life COACHINGDFW dot com
and that's our website and then connect with us through that.
And it also again has all the materials and resting
there for you.
Speaker 4 (01:01:01):
So that we have we have a video on four
ways to communicate effectively, a free video, a free video
that they could watch, and then they can get on
our mailing list and we send out weekly tips on
relationships which would be a good way to get to
know us and start on that.
Speaker 3 (01:01:18):
And we're also on Facebook and Instagram as well under
Heart Life Coaching DFW.
Speaker 4 (01:01:22):
And and yeah, support the email if they want to
want to reach out, you're like, Okay, I think I
need more, you know, I need some some one on one,
two on two. I think that's one of the things
about our coaching is that you get both a mail
and a female voice rather than just one person. And
so we we do that. But that email is support
(01:01:43):
at heart Life Couching DFW.
Speaker 1 (01:01:46):
Support at Heart Life Coaching DFW. And then your your
web address is Heart Life Coaching DFW dot com. Right,
and then say if they want to find another social
media just search heart Life Coaching DFWA. All together Okay, awesome.
Thank you so much for your time today. This has
been so helpful. So glad you could join.
Speaker 4 (01:02:08):
It's been a lot of fun. Thank you so much.
Let's get started. Hi, and welcome to Make More Love
Not War. This is Tara Harrison, licensed professional counselor and
relationship expert.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
This is her husband, Jeff Harrison, of no qualifications whatsoever,
just a normal dude.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
Hello and welcome to Make More Love not War. Today
we have with us Clay and Sonia Arnold. I've known
Clay and Sonia since twenty nineteen when they trained me
to be a Safe Conversations leader. They also have an
awesome business here in the Dallas Fort Worth area called
Heart Life Coaching DFW. So to This is part of
(00:47):
our Relationship Master, a power couple series in which I'm
talking to relationship experts and learning about what you do
and also how you bring this into your daily relationships
in your personal relationship. So welcome, So welcome to the podcast.
We're so excited that you're here.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Great, thanks, thanks for having us. We're glad to be here.
Speaker 4 (01:10):
Well.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
So, Clay and Sonia, please tell us about I like
to learn a little bit about your connection with safe
conversations and also what are you doing with Heart Life
Coaching and what do you bring to people with that.
Speaker 4 (01:23):
So with Safe Conversations, we train people, we train people
to take this to their communities. So you learn in
our training program, you learn how to use all the
theories for yourself in your own life, and then to
take this wherever you need to take it. So people
have taken it to their businesses, to their works places,
(01:45):
they have taken it to their congregations. They take it
all over the place and they've made it there. This
training that we have right now, we have people from
six different countries who are involved, three countries in Africa, Romania, Canada,
and New York and Texas, which you know almost counts
(02:05):
different countries and it's really.
Speaker 3 (02:07):
Having a worldwide impact too with it too. We trained
some leaders several trainings back and they have taken this.
They work in Liberia, which has been at civil war
for many, many years, and they have been leaders in
the movement to bring peace to Liberia. They had their
first election without violence, the first time ever in their history,
(02:30):
just a couple of months ago, and one of the
people that we trained was invited to become part of
the new president's cabinet and teach the presidential cabinet safe conversations.
So it's a real far reaching tool and that's one
of the things we love about the training is the
reach we can set in our little town home in Arlington, Texas,
(02:54):
you know, and impact the world like that. It's a
lot of fun.
Speaker 4 (02:59):
And it is all about it's you know, as you know,
it's all about, you know, how do you talk safely
to people? How can you be connected with people that
maybe you disagree with, which you know is something that
we all need and the.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Basic core of it, which we use in our work
with couples and couples coaching is, you know, how do
you talk without criticism? How do you really learn to
listen without judgment? And how do you connect beyond differences?
Which is the pnemona and reason why couples or anybody
else really for that matter of five And it gives
you a systematic, safe way to be able to connect
(03:35):
with anybody and talk to them about anything if you
choose to use the tool.
Speaker 4 (03:39):
And that's what our Heart Life coaching is all about.
It's learning a lot about like how can you create
in your own life the life that you want to live?
And there's lots of ways and lots of lots of
tools that we have accomplished are brought to the brought
to the table with that, and some of it is
the safe conversations tools which help your relationships of all kinds.
Speaker 3 (04:00):
We also have we have an online course for couples available,
and we have some smaller courses and other resources that
are online on the website www dot art Life Coaching
DFW dot com and you can access all kinds of
things to help your relationship and be able to maneuver
(04:22):
that in Anon a better way where you get the
connection and the communication. You know, we often talk about
how important it is to communicate, but we kind of
have lost the fact that we need to connect first
before we really get good at communicating, and that connection
will make all the difference in the world of how
well you communicate. So all of our tools are kind
(04:45):
of geared that way of how do you get better
connection with each other so that you can communicate and
make your relationship richer.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
So and how also add that Clay does a lot
of work with men, especially who've experienced traum in their life,
and that's kind of a unique thing. I think that
he brings to the table that we don't often see
in the therapy or the coaching space. It's like, how
can you keep this pass from entering into your career,
(05:16):
your relationships, and how do you resolve these things within yourself.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
So there's a couple of things based on what you're
saying that that I was feeling and experiencing, which first
the goosebumps of how on this quantum level, Save Conversations
impacts the world, which is amazing. I didn't know. I
didn't I didn't realize the extent that it was changing politics,
(05:48):
which is very exciting, and bringing peace to other countries.
It's just exciting. I mean, I've heard about that and
Save Conversations, But I think what's also really import with
that is to understand that this is a kind of
This is training. You don't have to be a therapist
to go to right, a lot a lot of training
with communication and stuff like that. It's it's for therapists,
(06:10):
and then therapists bring it to clients and blah blah blah,
and it's just like you can just reach one person
or one couple or a few couples, but this reaches everybody.
You can be in any sort of position and bring
it into that environment and make these huge shifts to
have an election without violence. Wow, that's that's really amazing.
(06:30):
I mean, it's just sitting there with goosebumps when you
said that, So I wanted to share that response with you.
Speaker 4 (06:39):
Yeah, and then that because it's an educational program, we
teach people how to talk. We don't. It's not therapy, yeah,
but we teach people how to talk, and then they
can take these any place they want and teach people
how to talk in a way that's safe, create that
psychological safety wherever you go.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
And like in the librarya experience, they have centers for
dial log now, which is mainly kids they're in school,
and they're using to get in the public school system
there with it. They're also using that to kind of
usher in because they don't. They have zero mental health
care in Liberia, none, and so this is kind of
(07:18):
a segue into bringing that into the country for those
in that and you can imagine the traumas after so
many years of war. But this is just kind of
a launching point to be able to do that from
an educational point of view, so that people can get
trained and are getting trained to be able to help
with the mental health end of it as well. So
(07:40):
that's pretty exciting too.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Yeah, big changes, big changes, bringing all of that into
a country that had zero mental health care, and the
fact that it's not mental health I think makes it
even more impactful because you can bring it everywhere.
Speaker 4 (07:56):
But even here in the US, it's like, you know,
we have access to mental health, but a lot of
people don't see it as a need. A lot of
people don't see it where they don't go now, or
they don't are they don't go, and there still is
a stigma. But because this is an educational process and
it can be used in schools, it can be used
in businesses, it can be used in all your relationships.
(08:17):
It's because it's just learning, learning skills that anybody can learn.
Speaker 3 (08:21):
And we've used this in all kinds of different settings
with first responders and hospital chaplains and you name it.
We've taught it in an all plethora and local government,
all kinds of different settings with it, so it's usable
in any which direction. And now Quantum Connections, which is
kind of the core company that sponsors conversations, they're bringing
(08:44):
that into the corporate and workplace now. They have a
new program called connected work and are working to bring
that in the business community where it's more of a
relational connecting environment. Versus the traditional corporate type of approach
to relationships. So that's really exciting, and that's just getting
off the ground right now.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Yeah, that is really exciting bringing in as many places
as you can well, and so I'm going to bring
it back into the smaller ecosystem of families and couples.
And you know, something that you mentioned earlier also was
helping people to become more connected, right, and something that
(09:27):
I've noticed, especially this year, for a lot of people,
and for Jeff and I too, it's been a tough year.
There's been a lot of outside stressors for people. It
just seems like this year in particular. And I'm sure
every year is its own year and a tough year
in different ways, but when the outside stressors weigh so heavily,
(09:48):
it's easy to become disconnected. And I'm wondering for y'all,
what is the advice that you give to people and
what do you do in your own marriage to stay
connected when you're really weighed down by outside forces?
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Well, in our own relationship, and you piggyback here with that,
we made we made we have made it a must.
We've kind of made it a real decision that we're
going to be intentional about connecting in different ways, whether
that's just touching base with each other, whether that's having
a date night, you know, whatever it takes. And particularly
(10:23):
when we have uh uh, you know, an issue or
something's going on where we utilize our own tools to
make it work and resolve it. You know. Safe Conversations
is a great example of that. We were recording when
we were recording our online program, we kind of hit
a snag at one point and we just could not
(10:43):
work through why we couldn't finish this one set of recording,
which was about going to be about a thirty minute
long thing, and we finally said, okay, this is not working.
Let's dialogue about it. And so we use the Safe
Conversations dialogue and discovered we were both triggered stuff from
our past that we were bringing to the space at
that moment. And once we realize that and have the
(11:06):
aha using the tool, we went back to it and
we finished it in about twenty minutes, after a couple
of days worth of wrestling with it. Yeah. So I
mean that's just a microcosm of what we've done.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
So this is when we talk about dialogue. What this
is is it's a structured way of talking. It's a
structured way of talking, whether you have specific sentence stems
that you say, and then it's kind of like a
mirroring is a big one. Let me see if I've
got that you said, and then mirroring back what the
person has said, and then this is there more about that?
(11:42):
And then just fully being able to listen to that,
and then did I get that? And then re you know,
like checking for accuracy because oftentimes we don't hear what
another person is saying. So those three sentence dats, those
three steps makes a huge difference being able to get
to the bottom of a situation. So with our stressors, yes,
(12:05):
there's stressors in life that you face every single day.
But we had Klay's mom lived with us with dementia
and for the end of her life, and and then
we also had a teenage son, and and so that
was sandwich, right, Yeah, that was it was like And
what we realized during that time was we we didn't
(12:28):
know how to support each other. We really because of
our vision what we did. I mean, we've been coaches, pastors,
all these things, and but we we've to everybody, you know,
we told everybody else what to do right, But there
was a fear in me. I thought, I don't really
know how to get the support that I need, and
(12:50):
I don't know how to to communicate my my needs safely.
Speaker 3 (12:57):
Voice.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
Yeah, we didn't really have a voice there and often
was shadowed. And so this really got us on the
same playing field to do this, to really fully listen
to someone, really I could fully listen to Clay and
he could fully listen to me, and then we could
then we could like, oh, I see the bigger picture
(13:19):
of what's going on. And then we learned how to
how to support each other because there's no different times.
I mean, we'd already we had four children, and we
had been through a lot, and we spought we were
doing great at supporting each other. But this one thing
was so huge. And this is kind of I think
what you're saying is that the world has become so
(13:39):
harsh and so huge that we we really need to
step up the game as couples to cope with in
our families are challenges that we that we face outside
the world. But to be able to come home really
fully feel seen and heard and valued by each other,
(14:00):
and then.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
Listening is such a big part of that because we
think in our culture, we think we're good listeners, but
we're not. We're good talkers. We give accolades like toastmasters
for talking, but I've never heard of a reward for
listening from anywhere. And that's such a missing piece of
what goes on, and it reflects in our culture too.
We don't listen to each other. We don't know how
(14:20):
to be good listeners. For me, that was an enormous
thing growing up in my mother, who we were talking
about earlier, had what's called a cluster b as a
group of different disorders, and she would kind of hop
from one disorder to the other. And then I had
a dad who's alcoholic and very narcissistic and abusive. So
(14:41):
needless is said, growing up, there was no listening. I
never thought anybody would ever listen to me, and honestly,
even after thirty years of marriage, it wasn't until we
learned this particular tool that I had my AHA moment
of lot. You know what, I realize I haven't trusted
you in thirty five years that we've known each other,
(15:01):
and I probably can open that door now just as
far because you actually really did and are listening to me.
And that was a huge thing just for healing my
own heart, let alone what was going on in our
interactions and not being so much so transformed.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
Wow, can you walk us through what exactly safe conversations means?
To somebody who's never even heard that, they have no
idea what safe conversation means.
Speaker 3 (15:30):
Yeah. Sure. Well, one thing just to understand is it's
based on cutting as real science. The sentence stems themselves
in the structure. There's safety in the structure, and that's
the beautiful thing about it. But what it does is
if you're in the emotional part of your brain in
the back of your head and you are triggered and
you're stuck there, the sentence stems will actually help you
(15:52):
integrate and get up to your frontal cortex where you
can reason and find your win wins. And it's designed
and been studied search for over forty years to make
that happen with it. But it is, like I was
saying earlier, it's learning how to talk without the criticism
and that is the number one thing, and that's being committed,
(16:14):
and that's something we had to do. You can imagine
how negative my growing up was with what you heard
while ago and I was bent in negativity. And part
of this process teaches you you've got to get you've got
to have a zero negativity space between the two of
you as much as you possibly can to do that.
(16:34):
And honestly, when you go to that space and do that,
then I can talk without criticism and then that listening
without judgment not preconceiving. You know, we all have the
little lawyer and little analysts I call them that sit
on our shoulder. And if Terry, you're talking to me
and I'm sitting over here creating my rebuttal or I'm
(16:54):
figuring out how to fix it, I'm not listening to
you at all. So that's the worst part of that.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
What do you think about?
Speaker 3 (17:04):
What's that?
Speaker 2 (17:04):
If you're not doing the rebuttal and you're not doing
the how to fix it, what are you thinking about?
Speaker 3 (17:10):
What I'm thinking about is what she's saying as she's
talking to me, because the brain will not do that
processing and be able to retain what she's saying to
me at at the same time. And if I mirror
that back using the senate stems, that's about all my
brain can contain because I'm going to have to share
that back and reflect that back to her at some point,
(17:33):
and so I can't. My brain will just not do that.
And that's what I love about mirroring. It makes those
guys go away.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Yes, I do too, because I love to write a
story in my head. I'm just I'm an internal person.
I love writing stories. So it helps me not to
write a story and just focus on what's actually there
rather than my perception of what it is, which is
always what gets people stuck.
Speaker 3 (17:59):
The interesting thing about that is the person you're trying
to talk to if you're not if you're doing that
process with rebuttal or figuring out how to fix it,
the person who's sharing with you, they know that non
verbally in a nanosecond. Oh yeah, that's what's going on.
And so you create anxiety in the space and when
you do, you disconnect.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
Yeah, because they're thinking about, oh gosh, I'm gonna have
to rebut the re butt yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:25):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
Then you go on this other path.
Speaker 3 (18:28):
Yeah, let you go off and down some bunny trails
on direction, you.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Know, And then then the stories come out about thirty
years ago what you did at the thing.
Speaker 4 (18:38):
And then we listen, you know, just to and we
listen enough so that we kind of like, oh, yeah,
now I know what you're saying. So we're just like,
don't even listen, like, yeah, now I know where you're
going with this, rather than listening to the whole message,
and like you said, we make it up okay, Yeah, yeah,
I know that instead of just really having to stick
(19:00):
with it, or we go into solutions like oh, yeah,
I know what you should do. Yeah, why did you
just listen to me?
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Yeah. When we first learned this process, I didn't believe it.
I thought it was a bunch of crap, quite honestly,
and so I put it to the test. I went
out in downtown Dallas, down near the homeless area, and
I found a guy have any of a sockettic episode,
walking on the street talking to his mama. I had
been off his meds for three years, and I began
(19:26):
to use these very senate stems with him and watching
him move from that emotional part of his brain even
though he'd been off his meds for several years, and
get up to the frontal cortex and be able to
share his story. So if I got that you said
you've been on the street since you were fourteen, and
you've had you know, you've just had to hustle for
(19:48):
it with it too, and you know you kind of
got off and they diagnosed you with medication, but you
hadn't been on your medication, you know, for years? Did
I get all that? Oh? Yeah? Is there more about that?
When I said that that's the magic sauce, by the way,
is his eyes got really big and he was like,
you really want to know more? It's like, yeah, absolutely.
(20:10):
I mean, man, you're a human being a guy here.
I want to know the whole story. And he began
to tell and the interesting things started to happen was
he started regulating. He had gone from yelling and screaming
to his mom, who wasn't even there, balancing out and
calming completely down. And before we finished, he was having
a conversation with me in the same tone of voice
I'm having with you right now. And then I had
(20:31):
an aha, you know, if this works with this cat,
I bet it'll work with her.
Speaker 4 (20:37):
It's got to work.
Speaker 2 (20:38):
With she offer mints? Is that what's going on?
Speaker 3 (20:45):
Compliment?
Speaker 4 (20:50):
But kind of we've talked a lot about this thing,
but I want to kind of get a bigger view
of it. But it's this this theory of the space between.
So a relationship is two people and the space between,
and when we can be aware of this space between
and nurturing that space between, which kind of is where
we can connect, where we can be in relationship, but
(21:12):
it also allows each of us to be individuals. So
if we have a problem, you have a view and
I have a view, and then we can kind of
both like, look around, Okay, well how can we solve
this problem. It's not like you're the bad guy or
I'm the bad guy, or did I even have to
change what I think?
Speaker 3 (21:31):
So it's kind of a different paradigm where the space
between is actually the relationship. And so looking at okay,
if we've got a problem, let's look at it together
from our different viewpoints and figure out, Okay, what do
we do to fix this or make a change if
we need to do. And looking at that with that
paradigm and nurturing that is taking that negativity as much
as possible out and putting in affirmations and appreciations and
(21:56):
car and behaviors and stuff that will actually nerve sure
the relationship. And that's the day to day nitty gritty stuff.
That really makes this work is when we're committed to
nurturing that space between, then if we have to do
dialog or we hit a snag or whatever, the energy
of it is totally different than it would be if
(22:18):
we're not doing those things.
Speaker 4 (22:19):
Because I think I always had the idea. You know,
if I had a viewpoint that someone else had a
different viewpoint, which you know happens daily, I would either
have to argue or fight. I guess you know, we
go in that fight or fight mode to make you
(22:41):
either make you agree with me, or I just had
to shut down and suck it up and just agree
with you. If we're going to be in relationship together
and neither of those are are true, neither of those,
you don't have to put the space between. Then it's like, oh,
you have this idea, and then I can get awareness
(23:03):
by listening and understanding, being curious, and yeah, that curiosity
of why you have this view and what is going on.
And then Clay can also get this awareness of why
I have my point of view.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
And where that's come from.
Speaker 4 (23:17):
And you know, and neither of us really has to
change the point of view. Sometimes we have to, like
adjust to come up with a solution that meets both
of our needs. But that's easy to do as long
as we actually are respecting the difference that we.
Speaker 3 (23:34):
Both have and that listening. And that's what makes the difference.
Is when you're in this and you have a structured
way of talking and doing this, it creates an energy
of softness I call it, and receptivity. Because we're sharing
that back and forth. I know I'm going to be
heard even if I've got a different viewpoint, and so
(23:56):
so will she and she knows that as well, so
that we if we've both been heard, then we're going
to have a completely different viewpoint on the Okay, but
here's the problem. What's a solution? What do we do
with that? And you find you know what it is
with it? The founders, the people who created this, Orvil
Hendrix and Helen la Kelly Hunt. They he shared a
(24:17):
story with me about he loves to fish, and but
she's a homebody. She has to stay home and knit
and do her thing at the house with it too,
And they could not come to an agreement about how
to do that, and so they finally dialogued about it,
and once they did, they both almost at the same
time had found a solution of why do we buy
a motor home? That way I can go, we can
(24:40):
drive to the like and you can sit here and
net your your life away if you want to do that.
And it wouldn't until they did the dialogue though, that
they were able to have that aha moment and find
a solution I mean them and had a great time.
Speaker 4 (24:57):
So we need Yeah, arguing about where to take a vacation,
that's a high quality start, you know, really you want
to argue about So Jeff, does that answer that question?
Bunny Trail?
Speaker 2 (25:12):
Yeah, I thought that was great.
Speaker 1 (25:14):
Well, so I have a question about the mechanics of
this as well, which is getting to a zero negativity space.
So a lot of people listening to this might be
listening to this individually and they're thinking, well, you know,
my relationship is not doing very well, and this all
sounds legit and makes sense, But I don't feel like
(25:37):
doing that because it's a risk I'm being vulnerable. Being
in a negative space makes me feel protected, and I
don't know how to get to a place where I'm
going to try. So if you're starting off in that place,
what what are what are your ideas or suggestions on
how to get closer to being open to even trying
this with.
Speaker 3 (25:57):
Our relations with our coaching clients are couples of work with.
I usually start with the gut check. I call it,
is okay, what is your intention here to be right
or the relationship? Because most of the time we won't.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
Say that again. So say that again. What are the
two choices.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
What's more important to you? Being right or the relationship?
Because if we're stuck on being right, then we're not
gonna let We'll take our negativity and we'll pet it
like a kiddi cap in our lap, you know, and
nurture it. I mean, that's just what we do. It's
making an intentional decision of you know what, I need
to go to a different space here so I can
(26:34):
connect with you and relate to you, even with whatever
history you've had h and just realizing, you know, if
I'm going to be right, we're gonna go to odds,
you know, because if it's something that we have different
viewpoints on, that's how we're going to posture, and we'll polarize,
which is what we do with couples. That's what we
do in our culture. So that's that's a huge part
(26:58):
of that with it too. And the other thing is
that that for realizing how habituated we are in negativity
to judging to judge it, Yes, I mean the English Dictionary.
Do you realize in the Webster's Dictionary that sixty eight
percent of the words that are the Webster's Dictionary have
a negative connotation to him?
Speaker 1 (27:18):
Really, that's pretty powerful statistic.
Speaker 3 (27:23):
Yeah, we're already bent that way.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:25):
So for me in my growing it was negativity all
the time. I mean in our house, you know, we
if you want to make your viewpoint, we go out
in the front yard and have fist five. I mean
it was intense, yeah, with it. So I didn't know
how to do negativity when I learned this, and so
I went to no debt negativity. I was proficient in negativity,
but I went to harblean goal. I can't do this.
(27:47):
What do I do? And he goes set the clock
on your phone for five after the hour. He goes,
do it one hour at a time, See if you
can get through the whole hour without being.
Speaker 1 (27:59):
Negative about anything.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
About anything just in general, and then do it again
with that challenge, and all of a sudden I realized, hey,
I did was negative at time, and then it kind
of grew to a week and two a month, and
then I got to where, you know, no, I'm not
totally there. I mean, there are always going to be
times where it slips in. But if we have negativity
(28:23):
a space between us, I can't stand the feel of that. Now.
That's how much the paradigm has changed for me, And
so I will pursue her of Okay, what do we
let's dialogue, what do we need to do to get
this out of the space.
Speaker 4 (28:38):
It really does lead to polarization in toxicity, antixsity. I
noticed for me one of things is boundaries. So that's
why I love this visual of the space between because
it allows me to have a boundary and play to
have a boundary. And when you grew up in a
big family, nobody has boundaries and so you're kind of
like all in mesh. So so just you're then and
(29:00):
I'm number seven of seven, so we're plays only, so
that creating a whole different different things. So realization of
boundaries that I can have my own thoughts, feelings, attitudes
is like huge and so but I think I had
a realization that I was like annoyed a lot. I
(29:21):
was like getting annoyed, and I was like I was thinking.
I was like, I was using annoyance as a boundary.
So I was like, oh, I was being annoyed because
I needed to protect my space. I needed to protect myself.
I needed my thoughts like oh, yeah, you're just annoying
(29:42):
cause you did that and then said that, and it was.
Speaker 1 (29:45):
Like you just stopped doing and saying.
Speaker 3 (29:51):
So.
Speaker 4 (29:51):
But the realization, I think, I think it was realizing
that it's it's you can bring up topics, you can
bring up situation, whatever troubling me, and then learning a
skill of being able to bring up problems, being able
to bring up annoyances in a way that really invites
(30:13):
co collaboration, that really invites understanding, rather than just feeling like, oh,
I can't bring up this topic because it's going to
cause conflict and I didn't want to have conflicts. So
then I would just be annoyed, and you know, because
that was my boundary and that was my protection. But
that having the skill of being able to bring up
(30:37):
something helped me to not stick in that annoyance place
because I had I had a voice, I had a voice.
Speaker 3 (30:46):
And if you have a tendency to do that, what
usually happens. I mean, that was true. It's been true
with us and others that we work with, is you stack,
You stack this annoyance and another one on top, another
one on top, and then some little thing happens way
up here and you go nuclear and everybody's like, what
the does happened? What's going on here? Well, they don't know.
All this stuff's been stacking up because you know, one
(31:09):
or the other of us has avoided talking about the topic.
It's still there. The an nooise is still there, and
the frustration or whatever it might be still there, and
we stack them. So being able to go ahead and
talk about this, but be able to know you're going
to be able to do it in a safe Why
what was the game which iger? When it comes to
this for me, I've stopped stacking pretty much.
Speaker 4 (31:32):
Yeah, because Clay. Clay knows how to bring because he's
the he's the one that brings things up. He's the
one that talks all the time. He's the one that
he's kind of like, okay, let's let's his and then
and I'm the one that kind of procrastinates and why
do we have to talk about it?
Speaker 3 (31:48):
Didn't we talk about that last month?
Speaker 1 (31:49):
So you're the turtle, Sonya and Clay you're the hailstorm.
Speaker 3 (31:52):
I am the help right.
Speaker 4 (31:53):
Oh yeah, the hills the one that that brings things up,
all their energy is out, whereas the turn it brings
their into the shell. And just like, yeah, we don't
want to talk about that. Oh, but then the appointment
we didn't talk about. The appointment is sometimes when you
have something to say that's really important. We've all had
that situation where you you know, somebody's talking to you
(32:17):
and you don't know. You're like, oh, wait, were you
talking to me? Three minutes into the conversation. So that's
one of the really big skills is like, it's now
a good time to talk about what you want to
talk about. And that really helps both the turtle and
the healthstorm to really have that parameter because you can
kind of be prepared and also honors honors the boundary,
(32:41):
honors the fact that sometimes you don't want to talk
about things, but you have to come back, No, I
can't talk about this, I need to eat and or whatever.
And then it also kind of controls that health storming
nature of just talking about things all the time.
Speaker 3 (32:55):
It also improves the listening too, because it gives you
the opportunity to be fully present. If I'm finishing a
project and she is now a good time to talk
about whatever. And by the way, when you ask that
for the appointment, always fill in the blank. Is it
a good time to talk about these abusiness subject? Yes,
sexual life or whatever is. If we don't fill in
(33:18):
the blank, it's a lot going to the principal's office.
I don't know if you've ever had anybody go hey, Terry, Jeff,
we need to talk.
Speaker 1 (33:25):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
Yes, I heard lots of times, and.
Speaker 3 (33:28):
They never tell you what about what happens internally? You
got dread anxiety and dread yes. And here's a thing
about the space between. Once you feel that anxiety, you
will disconnect in a nanosecond so that that ability to
connect in the space happens. So fill in the blank.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
Yeah, I think that's really important. I agree because I
used to do that with Jeff. Or I would just
start talking to him about something, and of course I
knew what I was talking about, but he's sitting there
and he's like looking for like what is the subject?
Like what what are you Is this? Is this a
complain about me? Is this so now I will just say, Jeff,
I need to vent about whatever. This isn't about us.
(34:12):
I'll tell him that, like so that way he knows, Okay,
I'm not needing to think about our relationship right now.
She's just complaining about her mother or something like that,
right you know. So that has made a big difference
for us too, for me to give that to him,
because it was very much like going to the principal's
office for you, I think, Jeff.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
With me, Yeah, well you don't you don't You don't
know where you're gonna get hit, Like, I mean, is
it like, am I gonna get flanked her? Or what's
going on? Is she setting me up for something? I don't.
I don't know what's going on here. She just walked
in and all of a sudden, you know.
Speaker 3 (34:44):
And if you've grown up with caretakers or had other
experiences where you were set up like that, you instantly
go to that place emotionally and get triggered. So good
luck connecting. Yeah, it's not happened. It's not safe.
Speaker 1 (34:58):
And I think a lot of people have have that
trigger because because of the fact that there is so
much negativity, that so many conversations are just negative conversations,
and so many people are coming in and they have
an agenda of how I'm going to persuade you to
see my side, rather than coming in with like I
(35:19):
just like you to understand me or I'm curious about
you that. I think that's just a very common wound
that people have. So I love the appointment part because
it really just allows that allows some some predictability in
that space of like, okay, this is what.
Speaker 4 (35:35):
We're doing now, yeah I think so, And but there
also can you know, just asking for is now a
good time to talk about? This can be a trigger
to some people as well, because we how often do
people approach us with still good Usually if somebody wants
to talk to us, it's it's because we're talking, or
(35:56):
it's something that they need us to do or change
or that type of thing. So often putting in is
now a good time to talk about how great you are?
Is now a good time to talk about appreciation?
Speaker 3 (36:07):
I appreciate the today.
Speaker 4 (36:11):
Situation, how great you were on that podcast, and how
articulate you were, so really putting in those type of
appointments in that we often neglect. Usually we talk about
what's wrong, we talk about our problems, but how often
do we talk about this, you know, this appreciation, which
is like what makes us feel good, it makes us
(36:32):
That's what we did when we were dating and we
were first married, as we talked about these things because
you were so wonderful and great and.
Speaker 3 (36:39):
What you were and where did you go? And that
nurtures that space between when we put that that positivity
and affirmation or the appreciation or whatever. So it's it's
a simple way of doing that, you know, where were
we kind of flood each other with good, with what
we want instead of what we don't want, and have
(37:02):
both of that be able to do either if you
need to. That's that's what's cool about it.
Speaker 1 (37:06):
So that's that because I was wondering, so when you're
doing this challenge of zero negativity, what do you put
in the space when there's not negativity?
Speaker 2 (37:15):
Right?
Speaker 1 (37:15):
So, for you, Clay, when you're doing this hour, how
did you do that? Because you know so I think
that kind of piggybacks on that creating the positivity and
a relationship, But like, how do we just do that
individually ourselves before it.
Speaker 3 (37:28):
Was the principal I learned and my coaches training teen
years ago with it. I've been a coach now twenty
five years with people, and it's about focus. Whatever I
focus on, my feelings are automatically going to follow. And
whatever I focus on, I'm probably going to get more
what I'm focusing on and if that happens to be negative,
(37:49):
have a nice day. So adjusting the focus so when
I was actively not trying to be negative, I would
look for what I would appreciate. You know, we have
a thing we do with each other at least once
a day we give each other an appreciation at a minimum,
just to nurture the space and make sure that that
(38:12):
we can do that. And that's okay. So when when
we're able to go there, you know, it just makes
all the difference in the world. But for me filling
that with what, okay, what are you going to focus on? Now?
Asking myself the question, okay, instead of negativity, what can
you focus on? What's good about the situation? What are
(38:33):
you learning about yourself? What are you willing to change?
What are you not willing to change? You know, can
you use the right tools, you know, with a lot
of couples. We they come and they bring to the
space whatever they learned about how to do relationships, probably
usually for the caretakers. And so it's like going out
(38:53):
to your car and I say to you, Okay, here's
a butter and I have changed the spark plug out. Well,
guess what I go to work very well? Why you
don't have the right tool to do it with. And
so if you get the right tool and you use
the tool, you'll accomplish what you want. But that's about focus.
What you focus on, your feelings will automatically follow. So
(39:15):
that helped me start changing my feelings in that vacuum,
if you will to look at that. And then I
kind of built a momentum of positive feelings as I
did it more and more and more, and I condition myself.
And we know now from neuroscience that's just creating a
new neural pathway in your brain. The more you do it,
(39:38):
the more consistently you do it. But the cool thing
we know from neuroscience now is your old way of
doing it, Like the negativity will begin to collapse in
the brain if you take pictures of it, and eventually
it'll go away, and what will be left is the
new thing you've developed, and that's exciting because the brain
has the ability to lex and change and do that.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
Yeah, the plasticity that's there, not that window that they
thought was there anymore. I mean, they know that you
can do that throughout your life, which is really exciting.
And so basically what you're saying is when you start
to go into this negative place, let me see if
I got that when you start to go But I
(40:18):
am going to add my own interpretation, so I'm not
quite mirroring just back. But when you go back, when
you start going into that negative space, you are focusing
on it sounds like gratitude. You are focusing on gratitude
and really just leaning into all of the things that
were good instead of having your brain go into that
critical place that our brains go into primally and focusing
(40:42):
on all of the threats that are out there instead,
How am I safe? What am I grateful for? What's
good about my life?
Speaker 4 (40:48):
And you.
Speaker 1 (40:50):
Did that over and over again, and it started to
heal your trauma of being in this negative environment as
a child and not having an escape from that.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
You got it, you know, I did. I did something
similar to this, and I just started doing this where
I would every day, and I did this for a
few years, and it's like it once you kind of
reprogram your mind to to visualizing and seeing things like this,
you just see it everywhere. So I was I just
every day I'd take you know, make like take five things,
(41:23):
and I'd say, I'd just come up with five things
that I'd be gratitude gratitude about. So and and you know,
you quickly get past the Thanksgiving stuff. Oh, I'm gratitude
for my family and blah blah blah, the same stuff
you hear. But but but what you want to do
is you want to go to the stuff that's like
you don't even think about, like gratitude that the road
(41:44):
system actually works really good, the painted lines on the
roads that actually is that's really necessary. The uh, you know,
the traffic jam. Oh okay, I'm in the traffic jam. Oh,
instead of oh I can't get there at the same
time I want, oh, well, I can finish up some
of that audiobook I was on. Or I'm in a
(42:04):
town where there's lots of people that want to be here,
so that's kind of neat. So you start it's just
taking all the stuff. So like I had an accident,
an incident the other day where I needed to go
get something done, Like I needed to go to get
some stuff printed. I get in my car, I start
to drive, and I realized in about two seconds ago,
I have a flat tire. I didn't see it until
(42:26):
I got in and started moving, and I went okay,
so I backed up, went back in the thing. I went, oh, yeah,
it's flat. Okay, it's raining. Now it's flat. It's raining,
and I gotta go do this. And I was like, Okay,
at least I don't have to be at this appointment thing,
and I do have time today that I can get
this done. Okay, great, So now do I have to
(42:46):
change the tire? No? I put aired it up. It
held air. Okay, is it holding air long enough for
me to get to the place. Okay, yeah, no problem, perfect, easy,
just drive there, get the thing done. Never like, oh
I got it, do this thing. Oh this is this.
It's like, oh, I'm glad that I don't have to go. Yeah.
You say yeah exactly, you just say okay, yeah, so
(43:07):
you just boom boom boom. I go to the place.
The guys are great, walk change the thing done. These
guys are awesome, you know, like, hey, thanks guys for
getting that done. We're out and I go went and
get the stuff printed. Like you just don't even like
it's all that. You start to notice all the good
things that were happening to make that change. You're done.
Speaker 3 (43:26):
I actually did that this morning. We take a walk
every morning. It's one of the things we do together.
And I came back and I patted the trash can
as we're rocket walking angle. Thank god for people who
will pick up my trash.
Speaker 2 (43:38):
Oh yeah, and it runs smooth and it runs smooth
like that. I mean so many people. It's like it's
like people get a Gextra value to point out something like, oh,
I went to Starbucks and they didn't have the right
straws for me, and the world's in it's like seriously
like or or like you go on a plane and
(44:00):
they're like, oh, my phone's not working, or I can't
get that. You're flying. You're flying through the air in
a tube. That's incredible.
Speaker 4 (44:08):
It's amazing.
Speaker 2 (44:08):
It's amazing.
Speaker 4 (44:10):
So Jeff, if I'm getting you, you're saying that you
have created this ritual that you come up with five
gratitudes every day. And you quickly got through the just
the basic ones. But so now you're kind of having
to reach and get some more far reaching gratitudes for yourself.
And you find that it's kind of shifted that whole
(44:31):
process and attitude so that even when something bad happens
that could cause you to go down a path that
you kind of go to, well, what's good about this?
What can I do about this? And if you've made
that shift.
Speaker 2 (44:44):
In your mind, well, when you do it every day
to a certain and you give yourself five, there's no
magic number to five, just five to ten, whatever numbers
you have enough, it's enough number that you have to
make your brain sweat a little bit and you start
to think like, oh, okay, well my speakers work. Oh
the computer monitor that that okay, monitor's pretty cool. Oh
(45:05):
the paint's not just falling off the walls. It's been
holding up for years. That's really neat. So you start
to see it. So, now, once you've done that enough
and you've had made your brain work and sweat a
little bit, as you drive around, you start to really
just sort of look around and you see stuff and
you're like, wow, these buildings are really nice. That's pretty
neat the walls. The glass doesn't just fall out. It's
(45:26):
kind of like the what you're doing is in Sherlock Holmes,
they used to have the dog not barking, so what
So that's what you're really doing, is you're really trying
to find the dog that's not barking and why is
that happening? So and you just need to do it
enough to where you finally you just start seeing it.
(45:47):
So you read programmed, that's the key.
Speaker 3 (45:50):
It's the skill you learned and teach yourself with it.
And the lucky you were asking me while I go
to her about what did I fill the gap with it?
Speaker 1 (45:57):
Too?
Speaker 3 (45:57):
It was the repetitiveness of doing it. By the way,
that's why use resolutions don't work. While the average person
goes maybe ten days before they stop, they don't do
it long enough to develop the skill or whatever it
is they want to do and create that new pathway
with it too. But you know, with this again, this
is a skill relationship. Since the nineteen nineties, we are
(46:17):
learning that it's a skill that we can learn. Like
playing basketball. You know you don't if you've never played
basketball before, you don't know how to dribble. You don't
know how to shoot a shot, Well, you do that
over and over and over again until you get proficient
at it. And the same thing is true with using
these tools and relationships. The more we practice and we're
intentional about but about using them, the better we will get.
(46:38):
We have to make that it a must that we're
going to do that and make a real decision what
a should akoda is not going to work. You have
to make it a must. And that's where it all
begins to shift and change.
Speaker 1 (46:52):
It's when you make that decision inside yourself.
Speaker 4 (46:57):
So I think going back to your question tire about
somebody who's kind of like, I really don't want to
be negative. Not being negative it is a protection. I
think we've just learned it. It's a habit. We've learned it,
we've been conditioned that that is a way to be.
And so making that shift to like I think I said,
(47:21):
the learning how learning the skill to bring up things
in a way that is safe and productive to the
relationship is a good shift. So you don't have to
use that that other skill because that is a skill
that we've developed of negativity and of criticism and things
(47:42):
like that that we just go to automatically is like
I'm annoyed, I'm critical, I'm judging you. Whereas if you
have a skill and how you can come from my
point of view and talk about this is what I
think I want, I need, rather than your reason, and
then you can be fully heard in that. Because of
the structure, it really you're able to be curious, curious
(48:05):
about yourself. I learned things about myself when I'm allowed
to talk and be mirrored. Sometimes Clay will mirror me.
I'm like, oh, yeah, that's what I said, but what
I meant was this, and so then it's just kind
of like learning about myself. I can also then hear
the other point of view about why, and then to
respect that, you can have your review, I can have
(48:27):
my view, and then we can come together and come
up with a solution.
Speaker 3 (48:31):
And in that it's such a beautiful thing when you
use the structure, because we tend to bring how we
process men and women depending on who they were raised
with and how they were raised. You know, for Sonya,
she does. We are a couple who do the office
that most men have. When they process thought, they have
what I call cavetime. They can move from one here's
(48:54):
the problem, and here's the solution. But in between, I'm
going to go to the cave and figure it out,
and then I'll come out with my answer. For most gals,
it's like a plate of spaghetti. They can seamlessly move
from one topic to the next topic, to the next topic,
to the next topic. And the guys over here kind
of moving in waffle squares if you will with it too.
The structure makes it sustinct and it slows both of
(49:19):
us down where we are able to really listen and
to process what we're hearing in a different way than
we maybe normally would do that. And I love that
part of it because we really get down to what
we want to talk about in whatever topic it is
because we have it sustinct and we have to we're
(49:41):
going to get it mirrored. But we also it just
naturally makes you slow down, which is great.
Speaker 4 (49:47):
And what I even the three things that that we
mentioned that you know, let me see if I've got that?
Did I get that? Is there more about that? And
just just mirroring though, just just doing that slows you down.
People always say this takes too long, Like, but how
long does it take to have disagreements and to be
(50:09):
on different pages.
Speaker 2 (50:11):
Yeah, and hold on to something for thirty years and
bring it up later, right.
Speaker 1 (50:17):
Well, And what I love about this too is, you know,
so we're talking about that. I always think of the
space between as it like a Venn diagram. There's the
me and the U and the us and that's you know, right,
that's the space between. And so what I hear from
both of you that I think is really powerful that
we all can take as advice and use for ourselves,
is that you were able to see what was going on,
probably because of using the safe conversations and also your
(50:40):
own reflection. At the same time, you were able to
understand some of your own childhood trauma child the way
that your neural network's form because of how your caregivers
responded to you. That we're contributing to the fact that
you couldn't keep that space safe and figured out what
you needed to do. Sonia Forget, it was understanding that
(51:02):
the annoyance or that feeling meant, oh, I need to
set a boundary. And for you, Clay, it was understanding
that that you couldn't You weren't able to come in
with zero negativity because you were overwhelmed with so much
negativity and you had to you had to work on
that for yourself. So you both did that work and
that made that space between safer as well. And so
(51:22):
it goes back to the individual choices we make too
of choosing that relationship. Like you were saying, it's either
I can be right, and being right also often means
stuck in your own trauma and way of doing things
that hasn't worked out for you that got you to
this place in the first place. Or I can choose relationship,
which is healing. It's always healing to choose relationship if
(51:46):
you're in a healthy enough relationship, right, I mean, obviously,
if you're choosing relationship that's abusive, that's a whole other topic.
But it's healing to choose connections.
Speaker 4 (51:57):
And you can be partners there. You don't have to
fix you each other. You don't have to fix I
don't have to be your therapist. I don't have to
be your coach. But just by listening and validating your
experience and accepting that really helps to him to heal
and the same thing for me, it helps you to
(52:17):
grow out of that trauma that we all have experienced
in our early years in our early lives, and that
has kind of gone through all of our lives. I'm
glad you brought that up. That really is such a
good point.
Speaker 2 (52:31):
You know, talking about how people will hold on to
negativity and they'll hold on to something negative. I kind
of feel like this that there's something about negativity that
makes you feel like you're smarter because you see, because
I'm seeing this negative thing. So I see that all
the time with you know, like, let's just take the
(52:52):
stock market. Like if you listen to financial gurus, it
almost seems like the one who's saying that the thing's
going to drop and go crazy down, the market's gonna
fall apart, they feel like they come across as like
they're the smarter one. But if you say, what are
you talking about? Thing's gonna be great, this thing's gonna
go up, it's like, oh, he's just a Pollyanna. He's
not He's in a fantasy world. It's not really. There's
(53:16):
something just I think, just in our nature that makes
you think that because you brought up something that's negative,
that you are smarter about it. Then if you say, no,
this is no, this is actually really cool and good.
Speaker 3 (53:30):
But you can go to a different space even than
those two though. I mean you can you know, go
to you know, most bigionnaires. They they're just fine with
it dropping because that's when they invest and buy up
all the stocks and make a billion dollars with it too. Yeah,
it doesn't have to be the negative. It's what again
the focal point? Well, are you focusing on? Okay, this
(53:52):
can be the worst thing that ever happened, or this
can be a grand opportunity. What are you focusing on?
Speaker 2 (53:59):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (54:00):
What reality are you creating? Because in the end, if
you're if you're feeling smarter for being negative, and you
create a horrible world that you've live in where you're
this smart person in it, well that's your reality. Or
you can be the Pollyanna and live in your own
fantasy world that feels really good and safe and connected,
(54:20):
and that's your reality too. So I mean you can
look at it that way. It's just the choices we're
making about how we construct our own realities.
Speaker 4 (54:30):
And accepting that everybody has their own reality. Yes, everybody
has their own reality, and there's not good or bad.
It's like, Okay, that's your reality. Okay, be curious about that.
Tell me about reality. I know one time I was
talking about, well, we haven't even talked about validation step,
which is like accepting that you have a reality and
(54:53):
it's okay, and even if it's different than my won't
And so I there was a big window behind me
that was beautiful, was overlooking downtown area, and then all
of a sudden, everybody in the audience was going, oh,
my eyes, the sun is so bright, and I'm like,
(55:16):
the sun's not bright. It feels good on my shoulders.
I was a little cold, but now it feels good.
But then it was just a different perspective. And then
all of a sudden I turned around. Yeah, the sun
was setting and it was shining in everybody's eyes. I'm like, oh, yeah,
the sun is pretty, Like can we do something about that?
But if I just considered in my viewpoint of like,
(55:37):
oh yeah, no, the sun's great, then you know, but
that's what we do. That's what we do. We never
take the time to be curious about another's reality except
that they have the right to what they're going to say,
and like, oh, yeah, I could see from your point
of view because I've heard you, I've heard what you
had to say, I've heard you share. I've mirrored this.
(56:01):
I can tell why you feel this way and why
you view it this way, even if it's so much
different because of my experience.
Speaker 3 (56:09):
And this is where the I want to be right
thing raises its ugly head right here. Is if it's
the dumbest thing, I think it's the dumbest thing I've
ever heard in my life. You sharing your reality with
it too, it's still your reality, and as a human being,
I can respect that and honor that, even though I
think it's a dopey idea. But Okay, you know your
(56:31):
life experiences, you what you bring to the table, how
you see things with it too. That's your viewpoint, and
that's just as valid as it is mine. And most
of the time in a relationship, we don't take that posture.
Speaker 2 (56:45):
Yeah, I think it's hard for people to realize that
that what we perceive is reality is really narrow to
just what we have experiences seen. And it really reminds
me of Plato's cave. You know Plato's cave. So, I mean,
just the general gist of the player's cave is it's
just a bunch of people that are looking at They're
in a cave. They're looking at a wall. All they
(57:07):
see are the shadows from everything that's happening behind them.
They're chained down, they can't see it. One guy breaks
loose of that and he gets out and he goes
out and he sees that there's a whole other world
out there, and he and he experiences it, sees it,
comes back, tells the people that are in the there
are still chained up there. Oh no, there's this other
world out there. There's all these things you can do
(57:27):
and all that stuff. And they think he's the crazy
one because they're like, what are you talking about?
Speaker 3 (57:31):
No, this is this is the world reality.
Speaker 2 (57:34):
This is reality.
Speaker 3 (57:35):
Yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker 4 (57:38):
Oh, I love that. That really is a good is
a good point, Jeff. And now they're going down that
road to those early philosophers. I think the whole thing
about the Socratic dialogue method because we talk about dialogue
and the dialogue that we teach is different than the Socrates,
but it's the whole idea that they would go to debate.
(58:00):
But before you could debate, you had to state what
your opponent's viewpoint was completely and they had to state
what your viewpoint was. And isn't that when we argue
with people, oftentimes we don't even know what their point
of view is. We're arguing about what we think their
viewpoint is rather than finding out what their viewpoint is.
(58:23):
And I'm like that was like a big ahat a me.
It's like, oh yeah, I have to know your point
of view before I could even argue about it.
Speaker 3 (58:30):
And we did that in a relationship for years.
Speaker 1 (58:33):
Oh yeah, yeah, it's so funny. Tool, Yeah, so funny.
Sometimes Jeff and I have had conversations where it's like
we realize that we're actually agreeing. You know, sometimes you
have those in your You're not shocking those conversations. We
haven't used our tools because you know, even people that
know the tools sometimes don't use them. And then we're like, yes,
(58:58):
I'm saying that too.
Speaker 4 (59:00):
Oh I. Sometimes I would be saying something and telling
them something and they're like, well I know that already.
And then it's like, well, then why are you arguing
with me and you know that we're in agreement? What's
(59:20):
going on?
Speaker 2 (59:22):
Because I want that reminds me. There was this is
just a stupid movie where the guy came out like
there was he had a jet ski and he was
staying at his brother's house, and his brother's kids were
playing on the jet ski and you know, they weren't
doing anything. He comes running out. He's yelling at the kids.
(59:44):
He's like, what are you doing? Get off my thing?
Blah blah blah, you'renn and he's just yelling and the
and the father of those kids came out and said,
what are you talking about? And everything? What do you do?
So he keeps yelling and he goes, Okay, I know
you're right right now, but I'm still mad, and I'm
going to keep my voice up because I don't want
you to realize that I'm wrong. So I'm just going
to do that and I'm gonna huff off. I love you, guys.
(01:00:06):
Sorry yelled at you. Bye.
Speaker 4 (01:00:11):
Well that's what that low does. It just like it
gets us in a frenzy and he says like, oh yes,
and it takes us a while to calm down and
to realize, Okay, life is good.
Speaker 1 (01:00:25):
I'm safe, I'm safe.
Speaker 4 (01:00:27):
I'm safe.
Speaker 1 (01:00:30):
Yep. Well, thank you so much, Clay and Sonia. I
feel like we could talk for hours and hours about this.
Of course, my favorite topic, and I know y'all love
it too, But so if people want to talk hours
and hours with you more, where might they find you?
Speaker 3 (01:00:47):
They can go to www. Art Life COACHINGDFW dot com
and that's our website and then connect with us through that.
And it also again has all the materials and resting
there for you.
Speaker 4 (01:01:01):
So that we have we have a video on four
ways to communicate effectively, a free video, a free video
that they could watch, and then they can get on
our mailing list and we send out weekly tips on
relationships which would be a good way to get to
know us and start on that.
Speaker 3 (01:01:18):
And we're also on Facebook and Instagram as well under
Heart Life Coaching DFW.
Speaker 4 (01:01:22):
And and yeah, support the email if they want to
want to reach out, you're like, Okay, I think I
need more, you know, I need some some one on one,
two on two. I think that's one of the things
about our coaching is that you get both a mail
and a female voice rather than just one person. And
so we we do that. But that email is support
(01:01:43):
at heart Life Couching DFW.
Speaker 1 (01:01:46):
Support at Heart Life Coaching DFW. And then your your
web address is Heart Life Coaching DFW dot com. Right,
and then say if they want to find another social
media just search heart Life Coaching DFWA. All together Okay, awesome.
Thank you so much for your time today. This has
been so helpful. So glad you could join.
Speaker 4 (01:02:08):
It's been a lot of fun. Thank you so much.
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