734: What to Do When Your Partner Doesn’t Want to Grow

As I’ve worked with women through growth and transformation over the last 20 years, I’ve had countless conversations about partners & spouses who, “just don’t get it.” Back when I was working with my personal training clients and boot camp members, women would come to be fraught about spending money without their husband’s approval.  

When I started running programs inside the SMA, moms came to me so eager to participate but very uncomfortable about talking to their husbands about investing money in an online program with a coach they met on the internet, especially a coach selling “personal development for moms”.

I totally understand that it can be awkward to work on goals that aren’t connected to your partner, especially if you haven’t done that before. And… if that’s you, I want to invite you to consider why you haven’t taken steps to work on yourself independently in the past? Not from a place of judgment, but from a place of genuine curiosity.  

As I’ve helped so many women show up for themselves and step into growth over the last 20 years, I’ve also seen the frustration that comes when you are growing, growing, growing, and hoping your partner will follow suit, and they’re like, “Nah, I’m good.”

There can be a decent amount of tension when partners are growing in different directions or one partner is committed to growth and the other is not.  

As you’ve become more Shameless as a listener of this show, perhaps you’ve wondered, “How do I encourage my partner to make some of the changes I’ve made?”  

In today’s episode, I talk through this tension. The tension of becoming more autonomous. The tension of codependency. The tension of doing your own work and letting a partner decide on their own what work they do or don’t do. 

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