Invalidating Each Other’s Feelings - The Sneaky Ways You Do This To Each Other & How To Stop Episode 85
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
Release Date: 06/23/2020
Who’s to Blame? Determining Your Part in Marriage Issues: Episode 339
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
Who's to blame for your frustrating problems and patterns in your relationship? It's obviously your partner, right... they're the problem. No… blaming them doesn't get you anywhere, in fact it makes things worse and more difficult to get out of. If there's one thing that is inarguable in social psychology it's that relationships are bi-directional.Meaning, your attitude, actions, and choices affect your partner's attitude, actions, and choices, and vice versa. Unfortunately many couples stay stuck in frustrating cycles or without a solution because they aren't in a problem-solving...
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Navigating Power Struggles With Your Partner: Episode 338
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
There are disagreements in your relationship, and then there are Power Struggles! These power struggles are more detrimental and have deeper rooted contributing factors. They keep you from being the best team possible and being able to come up with mutually beneficial solutions for your family. In today’s episode we dive into: How to define a power struggle The goal of interdependence, rather than co-dependence or independence Contributing factors to being in a power struggle Communication skills to be more collaborative + harmonious Dive into our Relationship...
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Issues With the In-Laws: Episode 337
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
Your family is a source of support, love, and acceptance. Now there are certainly times that our perception of actions from family members make us forget those underlying intentions. Of course this can be even more true when you are interacting (or dealing with) your partner’s family members (your in-laws)! There is always the grand idea that two sides of a family can come together and just magnify the sense of community, family, and support, but that doesn’t always happen. It can be common that each of your own families (and how you individually interact with them) can be a source...
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Communicate Better, De-escalate Conflicts, Repair Faster After Arguments: Episode 336
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
The basis of a strong marriage is how well you handle 3 “stages” of interactions. These 3 stages are before, during and after conflicts. The before stage is all about communication and being able to prevent conflicts from even happening. The during conflict stage is about de-escalating tensions and potential conflicts. The after stage is about how you repair when conflicts to happen (because they will) In this episode you will hear the tools you will need to master each of the 3 stages and putting them all together will make you feel unstoppable and confident that you can handle any...
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6 Keys to Become More Emotionally Intelligent Partners: Episode 335
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
Emotional Intelligence (or lack thereof) can truthfully be a make it or break it factor for a marriage. It’s a big part of what helps you be connected, navigate hardship and disagreements, and embrace your differences. It’s also what can cause feelings of “walking on egg-shells” or be what escalates simple miscommunications into big conflicts. Yet nowadays this term can be used too conceptually, and you know we are all about making things useful and practical! In this episode you’ll hear: 6 keys to Emotional Intelligence Examples of how these look in your marriage How to...
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5 Foundations for a Strong Marriage: Episode 334
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
You can’t build a strong marriage on a weak foundation. But do you know what the ingredients for a rock-solid foundation are? Well don’t worry, we’re covering that today and we’re certain this will open up some great conversations for you two. In this episode you’ll hear: The 5 foundations to a strong marriage Specific examples so that you can have these conversations with your partner How these can help guide you when you disagree and/or encounter hard moments Also, make sure you utilize our resources because we have a long waitlist for private sessions: ...
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How Your Psychology Helps OR Hinders Your Marriage (Perception & Memory Bias): Episode 333
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
You don’t often “think about your own psychology”, life is just happening and you are responding. So when it comes to interactions with your partner, it's easy to defend yourself when your perspective is brought into question. The cycle continues when you go back and forth about who remembers events more accurately. Your perception and memory are all a part of your psychology. These are actually very complex cognitive functions that can easily make errors and include bias you are not even aware of. In this episode we intend to share some of these errors and biases with the intent...
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3 Mistakes Women Make in Marriage: Episode 332
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
From the thousands of coaching sessions, DMs, and emails that we receive, we tend to see themes come up in marriage. You would be surprised to learn how common certain topics are for couples, that all seem to come up in the same weeks and months. We are not here to hypothesize about why that is, but just make these themes known. This is the highly anticipated followup episode from last week’s on mistakes men are making. Lately we have been noticing themes around Women and mistakes they are making in marriage. These are not character flaws but just patterns of behavior that we see adding to...
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3 Mistakes Men Make in Marriage: Episode 331
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
From the thousands of coaching sessions, DMs, and emails that we receive, we tend to see themes come up in marriage. You would be surprised to learn how common certain topics are for couples, that all seem to come up in the same weeks and months. We are not here to hypothesize about why that is, but just make these themes known. Lately we have been noticing themes around men and mistakes they are making in marriage. These are not character flaws but just patterns of behavior that we see adding to the dynamics in marriage. Today you will hear from Aaron on this solo episode about the 3 mistakes...
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Not Everything Needs to Be A Thing: Discerning Between Tension & a True Issue in Marriage: Episode 330
EmPowered Couples with The Freemans
The scenario is that your partner makes a comment, you sense they are a little irritated. They may very well have a frustration but have expressed it with a mild (level 2) upset. Yet you are not in a conflict or argument. But as you talk back and forth, you start giving explanations and justifications and an early onset of defensiveness starts to create a divide. This is a critical moment where you could even say to each other “this doesn’t have to become a thing …” Often these moments are not handled properly and now it does turn into something. You have this energy between you and...
info_outlineSo here you are, trying to share with your partner something that is important to you and something that you feel emotion around… Then they say something like: “you are overreacting, it’s not that big of a deal”, or even “that doesn’t make sense!”
You immediately feel invalidated and maybe that your feelings don’t matter, right? This causes many upsets and conflicts for couples and at the very least, disconnects you from love and understanding from your partner.
Today’s topic came from a coaching session we had this week, in which we then posted this question to our couples community: “Do you ever notice that you feel your emotions are invalidated by your partner, what has you feel that way?” There were many replies and great examples of the words and actions that caused people to feel invalidated (we will cover a number of them).
From this episode you’ll take away:
- What causes you to feel invalidated
- The 3 reasons why this is used as a defensive mechanism
- The new actions to take to keep from invalidating each other’s emotions
Quotes:
“Yes there are universal truths, but there are also personal truths, for both you and your partner. What you BOTH are feeling right now are both true for YOU!” - Aaron
About Us:
We’re The Freemans, your go-to couple for authentic and actionable relationship advice. Send us your relationship questions for the show with a DM on Instagram
Resources For Your Relationship:
- As you listen to the episode, tag us on an IG story and let us know what you loved.
- Get a FREE hard copy of the book 📚 The New Power Couple (just pay shipping)
- Get 50% OFF The Couples Workshop (online home edition) to practice communication skills, resolve recurring disagreements, and connect more than ever!
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