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 Resources: 📔 Family Meeting guide 💻 Marriage WebClass ❣️ Our NEW 30-Day Couples Challenge: Rebuilding US …and more! ALL LINKED HERE  

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 of conflict, even between you and your partner. In this episode we dive into some of these sources of conflict and 5 particular patterns that you should avoid as to not make your partner out to be the bad guy with your family!   Relationship Resources:  It's April 1st, 2024 and we now have TWO 30-Day Couples Challenges that you can start!  1) The Prioritize Us Couples Challenge - daily activities to grow your love accounts  2) The Rebuilding Us Couples Challenge - daily prompts to repair and rebuild after a hard season. 

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 challenge as a team.    This episode is our "audio version" of the webclass we just hosted. So be sure to watch the replay of the webclass while it’s still available. You can find it here on our Top Resources Page.  There you can also find the BRAND NEW ‘Level 2’ 30-Day Couples Challenge that is all about repairing and rebuilding from a hard season. This is the advanced “Rebuilding Us Couples Challenge”!

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 improve in each one Also, our LIVE Marriage WebClass is next week, March 25th! And we only host these two times a year, so get signed up here. (yes, it’s free!) Spots will be limited to 500, so make sure to join early for Communicating Constructively, De-escalating Conflicts, and Repairing Arguments webclass.   After March 25th, visit our resource link for the latest guides, courses, and events

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: Steps to Rebuild guide Prioritize Us 30-Day Couples Challenge      3. Making Up & Moving Forward guide

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 that you loosen the grip you have on being right and be willing to be more flexible with your own perception to bring more understanding into your marriage.   Resources For Your Relationship: 1. Join the  "Prioritize Us" Couples Challenge starting April 1st, 2024 - the 30 day challenge for couples to simplify how to make positive changes in their marriage and prioritize loving actions and respectful communication. 2. STEPS TO REBUILD A MARRIAGE GUIDE: A step-by-step guide to the process of rebuilding a marriage after a hard and prolonged season of disconnect or hurt. It’s the Rebuild a Marriage Guide and it’s only $19.

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 the dynamics in marriage. Today you will hear from Jocelyn on this solo episode about the 3 mistakes women are making: Criticisms, Conclusions, Consistency   Resources For Your Relationship: 1. Join the  "Prioritize Us" Couples Challenge starting March 1st, 2024 - the 30 day challenge for couples to simplify how to make positive changes in their marriage and prioritize loving actions and respectful communication. 2. If the challenge start already passed, you can find all of our resoruces from guides, to courses, to coaching sessions with this link: Best Resources

Discover the common mistakes men make in marriage including being reserved, lacking responsibility, and lacking receptivity. Learn about the importance of assertiveness, communication, leadership, and listening in relationships. Explore resources available to enhance relationship dynamics and navigate challenges effectively.

Learn how to differentiate tension from true issues in marriage with 5 actions to 'bounce back' faster. Discover strategies for managing everyday conflicts, exploring emotional elasticity, and shifting energy to break negative patterns in relationships.

What is the bare minimum to expect in a marriage? You likely read that question and think about your expectations about your partner… However this is actually about what to expect from yourself!  There are a lot of social media comments on relationship posts that judge the portrayal of a partner. That shows that most people think about what changes a partner needs to make in order to better meet one’s own needs. But that is quite backward. In this episode you will hear 6 traits that are the bare minimum to expect within yourself if you want to be a good partner. Join the  "Prioritize Us" Couples Challenge starting Feb 14th, 2024 for Valentines Day - the 30 day challenge for couples to simplify how to make positive changes in their marriage and prioritize loving actions and respectful communication. Find all our other guides and resources here on our website resources page