The Adversity Advantage with Doug Bopst

Vanessa & Xander Marin On Building a Strong Emotional Connection With Your Partner & How To Effectively Communicate In Your Relationship

Feb 9, 2023

59:46

Today’s guests are Vanessa and Xander Marin. Vanessa is a licensed psychotherapist and has spent over 20 years as a sex therapist. She has bachelor’s degrees in human sexuality and sociology from Brown University and a master’s degree in counseling psychology. Xander is a regular dude who left a cushy career in tech once he realized it was more fun to talk about sex with his wife all day. He’s here to show you that you don’t need a graduate degree or a license to have extraordinary communication skills. Vanessa and Xander also host the highly popular Pillow Talks podcast where they share the ups and downs in their relationship while giving you step-by-step techniques for improving yours. In this episode we discuss how to maintain emotional connection during your relationship, how to get the “spark back” if you are feeling disconnected from your partner, the relationship between physical and emotional intimacy, how to improve your sex life with your partner, why gratitude is so effective for rebuilding relationships, how to know if you’re relationship is stale and much more. While this episode covers some mature content, it’s intended for educational purposes and to help you improve the relationship with yourself and/or your partner.

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What to Listen For:

00:00 Intro
02:08 Maintaining emotional connection during a relationship
04:32 How to get the “spark” back in a relationship
07:35 Why is diving back into memories effective for rebuilding emotional connection
09:17 Does sex lead to emotional connection?
11:35 How long should you wait before getting intimate in a relationship?
14:36 Does chemistry in the bedroom matter?
17:05 Your sex life shouldn’t be a fairytale
18:36 Why is it weird to talk about sex?
20:54 Has Vanessa and Xander ever lost attraction for each other?
26:02 Is your relationship stale?
29:16 How do you know if your relationship is healthy?
31:18 Discovering your interests in the bedroom
32:38 Initiating sex with your partner
36:28 Communicating your needs to your partner
43:22 Biggest “turnoffs” in a relationship
46:31 What to do if your partner doesn’t want to work on the relationship
49:42 Dealing with resentment in a relationship
50:19 How to flirt with your partner
52:22 Exploring new things with your partner