Navigating Resistance in Couples Therapy

Terry Real is a nationally recognized family therapist, author, and teacher. His book I Don't Want To Talk About It: Overcoming the Secret Legacy of Male Depression, the first book ever written on the topic of male depression, is a national bestseller. His new book, Us: Getting Past You & Me to Build a More Loving Relationship is a New York Times bestseller.

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Timestamps:

[00:00:00] Start.

[00:05:51] The pumpernickel story.

[00:09:44] Wise adult, wounded child, and adaptive child.

[00:11:25] Relational mindfulness.

[00:12:11] Remembering love.

[00:13:29] Why do we remain loyal to bad relationships?

[00:16:58] The RLT stance on taking a position as a therapist.

[00:18:46] Objectivity battles.

[00:24:11] Entering into compassionate curiosity about your partner’s subjective experience.

[00:29:40] Normal marital hatred.

[00:34:19] Taking the first steps toward repair.

[00:37:03] Empathizing with someone whose reality doesn’t match yours.

[00:39:45] Should you stay or should you go? Understanding relational reckoning.

[00:43:41] Leveraging a resistant partner toward therapy.

[00:46:03] The preconditions that must be addressed before RLT can be effective.

[00:48:37] Understanding covert depression in men.

[00:52:52] Determining underlying depression.

[00:54:36] Favored modalities for working with trauma.

[00:55:04] Parsing the patriarchy.

[00:59:35] Taking care of your relationship’s biosphere without being codependent.

[01:03:23] Terry’s prescription for overcoming my own faulty childhood templates.

[01:07:05] Pondering gender expectations and expressions.

[01:13:06] Were Terry’s distinctly different boys raised similarly?

[01:15:05] A good Morani vs. a great Morani.

[01:16:53] The greatest achievement of Terry’s life.

[01:18:44] Advice for people who want to be better parents than the ones they had.

[01:21:17] The typical format of Terry’s men’s group therapy.

[01:23:56] Full-respect living, group guidelines, and boundaries.

[01:25:07] Comparing and contrasting Relational Life Therapy (RLT) with Internal Family Systems (IFS).

[01:27:54] Modern relationship challenges — from polyamory to monogamy.

[01:29:53] The research is clear: Humans are born to be intimate.

[01:32:16] Toxic femininity and the new world order.

[01:34:40] Relational empowerment vs. individual empowerment.

[01:35:45] One up, one down.

[01:37:50] From grandiosity to baseline: Relational joy vs. gratification.

[01:43:06] How to learn more about Terry’s work.

[01:45:16] Recommended reading.

[01:49:09] Terry’s billboard.

[01:49:34] Parting thoughts.

*

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Past guests on The Tim Ferriss Show include Jerry Seinfeld, Hugh Jackman, Dr. Jane Goodall, LeBron James, Kevin Hart, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Jamie Foxx, Matthew McConaughey, Esther Perel, Elizabeth Gilbert, Terry Crews, Sia, Yuval Noah Harari, Malcolm Gladwell, Madeleine Albright, Cheryl Strayed, Jim Collins, Mary Karr, Maria Popova, Sam Harris, Michael Phelps, Bob Iger, Edward Norton, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Neil Strauss, Ken Burns, Maria Sharapova, Marc Andreessen, Neil Gaiman, Neil de Grasse Tyson, Jocko Willink, Daniel Ek, Kelly Slater, Dr. Peter Attia, Seth Godin, Howard Marks, Dr. Brené Brown, Eric Schmidt, Michael Lewis, Joe Gebbia, Michael Pollan, Dr. Jordan Peterson, Vince Vaughn, Brian Koppelman, Ramit Sethi, Dax Shepard, Tony Robbins, Jim Dethmer, Dan Harris, Ray Dalio, Naval Ravikant, Vitalik Buterin, Elizabeth Lesser, Amanda Palmer, Katie Haun, Sir Richard Branson, Chuck Palahniuk, Arianna Huffington, Reid Hoffman, Bill Burr, Whitney Cummings, Rick Rubin, Dr. Vivek Murthy, Darren Aronofsky, Margaret Atwood, Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Thiel, Dr. Gabor Maté, Anne Lamott, Sarah Silverman, Dr. Andrew Huberman, and many more.

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