Overthinking About "Healthy" Relationships

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All Mint plans come with high speed data and unlimited talk context on the nation's largest 5G network. You bring your own phone and number, activate with ESIM in minutes, and start saving immediately. If you like your money, Mint Mobile is for you. Shop plans at MintMobile.com/magical. That's MintMobile.com/magical. Up front payment of $45 for three month five gigabyte plan required, equivalent to $15 a month. New customer offer for first three months only then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra C-Mit Mobile for G-Gills. Welcome to the magical overthinkers podcast. A show for Thoughts, Viralers, exploring the subjects we can't stop overthinking about. From burnout to insecurity. If you ever get the feeling that despite living in the information age, the world only seems to be making less sense than you're in the right place. This podcast is here to soften the clash between our innately mystical, irrational, stone age brains and the overwhelm of this time. I'm your host Amanda Montel. Today with the help of Dr. Sarah Naserzade, an author, speaker, an expert in sexuality and relationships with a PhD in social psychology, we are going to be overthinking about healthy relationships. Romantic ones in particular. Covering questions from what is a healthy amount and style of argument in a romantic relationship? Why does it feel like I will never get over the six-month situation that I had five years ago? Is it normal to have a crush on someone else when you're in a stable, monogamous, healthy relationship? How do you know if you've gone from chill and accommodating in a healthy way to sacrificing who you really are and what you really want in a relationship in an unhealthy way? And beyond that, we're also different. Is this even a productive conversation to have at all? Dr. Naserzade is here to help us through it. Dr. Sarah's latest book, Love by Design, Six Ingredients to Build a Lifetime of Love is Out Now, and we'll be referencing it quite a bit throughout this episode. So without further ado, here's our conversation. Dr. Sarah, welcome to the magical overthinkers podcast. Thank you so much for having me. Could you introduce yourself and your work to our listeners? Of course. So I'm known as that a relationship architect who helps you make sense of your relationships. And I help you design the relationships you desire and deserve from bedroom to the boardroom. I'm a social psychologist by background and also a fellow linguist. Clinically, I'm a psychosexual therapist and a relational psychotherapist. Ooh, it's a delicious combo of fields. And I am so glad that you're here. I'm so excited for this conversation. It's coming at kind of a funny time for me because yesterday, I had a conversation that I don't think I'll ever forget as long as I live with my most formative and toxic. I'm just gonna say it. X's X after me. And she and I got together and were comparing experiences and it was a heavy conversation, but it was extremely reality affirming. And I think back on that relationship all the time, unfortunately, it was with someone who was like much, much older than me. We started dating when I was a senior in high school. He was like almost 30. He was very mentally ill and manipulative and whatever. She shared in that experience, sadly. But I think a lot about if a relationship expert had gotten a view of us and our dynamic, what would they have seen and what would they have thought? And I'm so curious what your sort of red flags and green flags are when you observe couples or even hear about them. Sure. So there's a lot here to unpack. First of all, you and your X's X sound to be trauma-bonding. Basically, you went through the same thing and then tried to say, it was reality affirming. That's one. And I'm really sorry that you had to go through that. But clearly, you made it to the other side. Yeah. Hey, you know, let's take it the positive way. Look, the relationship that you're describing as being much older, so the power imbalance was clear there, mentally, unstable person, older, manipulative, all of those words I pay attention to. Because words give validity to the experiences that we have. So we can't have experiences without expressing them in a certain way. It's not always verbal, but usually I listen to verbiage, as you're saying, what are you looking for? Red flags and green flags and gray flags, all the thing in between. One of the things that I want people to know in my initial sessions with any individual or couple, I want to know where we are going. A lot of people, when I was listening to some of your conversations about overthinking or going over your book, and I was thinking, look, overthinking comes from, we want a sense of agency and control. We are human. Nobody can fault us at that. That's like a desicc human need after being able to breathe and be alive, right? I want to assert myself, I want to insert my opinion in certain things. If we don't have that, we have this overthinking, this spiral that will happen to us. So that is one. About relationships, one of the things that I want people to know is where they want to be. And if they don't know that, where they don't want to be. That will really prevent maybe, this is not a scientific number, but maybe 50, 60% of that overthinking. That's one. The second thing is, right now, at this moment that I'm sitting in front of you, we know better. We have the information to help people to put their efforts where they matter. But if they don't know where they're going, even if they arrive, they don't know they arrived. So the overthinking is not going to be helped in any form or shape, if that makes sense. So in your book, Love by Design, you talk about these six ingredients to build a lifetime of love, attraction, respect, trust, compassion, shared vision, and loving behaviors. And I was wondering if you could walk us through each of those so that we can understand them better in the context of our own lives. Absolutely. So the whole idea behind this was based on the 10 years of research with 300 and two couples that, you know, like retrospectively, I went through my own account as a psychotherapist and couples therapies. And then I put them into a survey just to make sure that this is not a therapist idea or a subjective idea. And we can qualify and validate it as something that we can scale it to other people. So we researched 159 couples and more than 140 individuals in our research, were US representative sample, meaning that from educational background, from relational orientation, sexual orientation, I wanted to know what are those ingredients that make relationships thrive, not just survive. And then at the end of that research, I defined a whole new model of love. That you know how we say love happens, the rest will follow, and then we talk about the infatuation, we talk about the friendship love, different sort of love, disease, and other addition to all of these models, I call it image and love model, which means that there are certain qualities, certain ingredients that need to be in place for love to even has a chance to emerge. And then I was interested to see what are those ingredients and how do we define them? And our couples in our research, they've been together on average 10 years, and they considered themselves as thriving. So I wanted to know how are those defined by those couples, not us in regular conversations. So that was what the talk was about, and I focused my talk on introducing the image and love model. So instead of one plus one equals one, finishing sentences, all of that. Instead of that, we have image and love model, one plus one equals three. That third entity that people come together to create. And then the other one was the six ingredients that are essential to go into this, to actually make it happen. And another thing that came out of our research was eight relational configurations. You know how people talk about situation, this ship, that ship. So we realized that people come together in eight very distinct ways. And sometimes within a couple of them, they actually go through so many of them through different seasons after a couple of them. And I want people to know that because we are going to normalize it. Again, going back to that sense of agency, I want them to know that if you peak, for example, friends with benefit over leftover couple, so there are different names that I gave them, then that's a choice you have, rather than just falling into it and waiting for the other person to name it or your friend come over and name it for you. So that piece of agency mattered to me. So this is what came out of it. Can you describe these eight different relationship structures and how can we orient ourselves around them in order to have like the healthiest relationship, whatever we find ourselves in, whether it's like a long-term monogamous relationship or something that's a little more casual, but we still wanted to be healthy. So there are diagrams in the book that you know will help people if they want to check it out or Google my name, they're somewhere I'm pretty sure. So there are people, friends with Benefit that these relationships come together because they want to experience something together. They're not going to build necessarily. That situation ship that many people talk about. Usually is that a form of friends with Benefit. The other one is contemporary couples that they are usually they have their own piece and then they share a little bit of the space. The other one is sub-mergent couples. Sub-mergent couples are the ones that are finishing each other sentences that ideal that we grew up with many of us that you know oh my god you look at each other across the room read each other's mind that piece. The other piece is left over couples that they would have their own lives whatever is left of their time energy attention money goes to the couple the. The other one is constitutionally bound couples they are together for the bigger reason, religion, social media, portrait, couples brand you know whatever the reason is bigger than that. The other one is getting where you're fitting. One person wants the other person to fitting whatever they do and the other one is parent child. The other person clearly had you know power and balance by the sound of your relationship started like that. The one that was not very pleasant and then last but not least is they merge in love that two people come together and then create a third entity and some people might want to add other people to any of these occasions and couple them scenarios and those are other things to be discussed. The word healthy when describing healthy relationships is pretty vague so I think it would be useful to understand what we're talking about here and how can we use this research in order to find ourselves in relationships that make us feel fulfilled. I love that word fulfilled because when people say healthy I often think how do we define healthy so in a certain situation so let's say for example 20 years ago the cholesterol that they would measure in your blood workup it would be like 240 and then anything above that you should be unstatin or whatnot but then now even in medical terms things are being defined and redefined and reloct and revisited and that's solid that's numbers right in relational science when we are looking at different criteria it's very very subjective nobody can tell you what is healthy what is unhealthy and that word fulfillment is so important because everybody wants to be happy I don't even know scientifically how to measure happiness but if you tell a person are you fulfilled and the physiological aspects that are connected to being joyful to being fulfilled to not overthinking to not putting yourself down or the other person what is the quality of your dialogues that you have in your own head with yourself about yourself about the relationship about the whole world those are the qualities that we are measuring when we are looking at fulfillment of a person so let's be clear bring it all together right when we talk about what are you looking for we are looking for fulfillment however that it means to you and that can change over a period of time in your own lifetime so that's that you need to figure out what is that fulfillment with the emergent love model couples what we found is that fulfillment is peace of heart clarity of mind so you're not second guessing each other or yourself or the whole world so that's one piece of it and then going back to what takes for you to be there one thing that I see a lot is that people don't fail in their relationships because they're lazy or they don't have high IQ or you know whatever that we want to call it they fail in their relationships and they are miserable because they don't know where to put their efforts there's a lot of information out there there's a lot of noise everybody's an expert yes you're expert in your own relationship but I think it's very important to look at the science look at the research look at the people who are in your community cohort who are like you and then compare your life and the outcome of your relationships with them to see what is it what is that road map that you need to be following and unfortunately in relationships we don't have many of those road maps which is really shooting in a dark yeah you know what's a shame how expensive glasses are being able to see clearly in style shouldn't cost an arm and a freaking leg you know what I mean whenever I need to update my glasses I never used to feel excited about it because I knew I was about to be out hundreds of dollars that is why I'm so glad zeni optical exists and the they're sponsoring this podcast zeni is an online iWare shop prescription glasses sunglasses blue light glasses all starting at under thirty dollars you go to zeni.com pick out a frame upload your prescription and they ship right to your door no appointment no store no upsell at the counter they have over a hundred and fifty thousand five star reviews a virtual trion so you can see exactly how the frames look on your face and if you didn't hear me the first time styles start at under thirty dollars so that buying new glasses and seeing in style is suddenly fun because it's affordable and affordable because it's fun does that make sense doesn't matter all you need to know is that zeni is truly such an amazing service I highly recommend it for my fellow for eyes if your glasses are overdue for a refresh now's the time go to zeni.com/podcast and use code podcast 15 for 15% off your first order the style sell out so don't sit on it that zenni.com/podcast promo code podcast 15 I don't know about you my lovely magical over-thingers but I like to keep my money where I can see it unfortunately so many big wireless providers like to keep my money where they can see it as well that is why after years of overpaying for wireless you can finally have premium wireless at a fraction of the cost with mint mobile paying my freaking wireless bill is high key one of my least favorite bills it doesn't make sense to me how mint mobile is the only company out there being reasonable with their customers but they are and I highly recommend you check them out because their premium wireless offering start out at just 15 bucks a month because you can get premium wireless with them for just 15 bucks a month seriously stop overpaying for wireless just because that's how it's always been all mint plans come with high speed data and unlimited talk in text on the nation's largest 5g network you bring your own phone and number activate with e-sim in minutes and start saving immediately no long-term contracts no hassle ditch overprice wireless and yet three months of premium wireless service from mint mobile for 15 bucks a month if you like your money mint mobile is for you shop plans at mint mobile dot com slash magical that's mint mobile dot com slash magical upfront payment of $45 for three month five gigabytes plan required equivalent to 15 bucks a month new customer offer for first three months only then full price plan options available taxes and fees extra cement mobile for details you mentioned you know fulfillment of heart clarity of mind are there any other more concrete signs to look for in one's relationship and what to do if they're not there yes so first and foremost think about the six ingredients let's name them and when I go through them usually say oh yeah I know that but that's not the way our couples define them so if you bear with me I go through them as this as I can and if people want they can always go to read my book and you know it's all there it's all in love by design so the first one is attraction why do you want to be around another person got forbid if I tell you oh Amanda you know I really want to be around you because I think your family have means and I want to be around you because you will provide me access to your social circle or your prestige or you elevate my social brand or got forbid if I mention any of that I just say that I love you for you and let me just be clear about something if you are not clear about what you want to be around another person what is that attraction point then it gets reduced to sexual chemistry and sexual chemistry is a fleeting biological distance that we have right the experience that we have and then they move forward to build a relationship build life have babies or build houses or you know whatever together and then when they fall apart they feel the solution the love was not enough it wasn't the real love so and then starting blaming the whole shabang so with that attraction be honest with yourself see what is it why do you want to be around the other person and think of it as a multi faceted entity social financial and physical attraction actually matters in our research we figured that and that's very different than sexual chemistry so that's attraction and by the way we talk about romantic love today between the two of us romantic relationships but if people really pay attention all of these are present in any high-stake relationship it could be work it could be community it could be your child you know whatever so really I want people to listen to us with an open heart and open mind the second one is respect respect is as a word it means to look and to look again it means that not to take anybody for granted including yourself I love this so much I never thought before about the word itself re as an and to do something again, and then spect, like, spectacle, you know, like to see, to see someone again. I am like so mind blown by this. And if anyone has ever been in like an argument with Romantic partner where someone's like, you don't respect me. And the other person's like, of course I respect you. What are you talking about? Give an example and they like can't come up with an example. I think having that definition of respect in your head is so useful because it's like when they are going about their life, voicing their opinions, whatever, being themselves, are we kind of just seeing the surface level kind of vague version of them? Are we really looking at and appreciating them? Are we respectacling them? Yes. That's so interesting. And what is the other person's priority and what are your priorities? You need to know that. A lot of people, and I'm sorry to say, especially women, we are not brought up to know what we want, what we need, how to articulate them in a loving and fair way. So our boundaries are not there. At best they are borders. We are passive aggressive and not only women by the way, many, many people right out there. And it's very important for us to know that boundaries are invitations for people how to be around us. They're not borders to keep people away or cut them off or whatnot. But it's for example, I say, "Hey Amanda, I would like to have you over." So we need to have a mutually agreed time who is bringing what? Who is being served in what way? So everybody is clear. But if I say, "Hey, come over sometime." And you just pop up, I have nothing in the house to host you. I don't have food to feed you. I mean, who's going to be satisfied? The same thing with boundaries. So the boundaries that we put in place, we need to know why we are putting them in place and put them lovingly and firmly. People ask me, "How do I know if my boundaries are healthy?" Ask your criteria. If you are loving and firm and on time, not holding it and then exploding over the other person, then that's healthy. But if you're passive-aggressive, you hold resentment. You don't know how to bring it up. And one moment you are loving the way and the other moment you want to chop the other person's head off, that is not having guilty boundaries. So that's respect. So you need to also be respected, bell, for the other person to respect you. So many of my clients come and say, "My partner doesn't respect me." And my first question is, "Are you respectable?" And they look at me as if I'm a crazy lady. Like no, think about it. Then was the last time that you said, "I'm going to do this thing for myself," whatever that is. And you are the first person to cancel it. You are the first person walking on over your own boundaries. And what am I supposed to make of that? So that piece is very important to be respected both. You hold on lovingly and firmly to your boundaries and communicate them to. Now trust. Trust is a big concept, huge concept. So you either trust somebody or not trust somebody. And that's another thing. When I say trust, people say who's left with whom? Immediately their mind goes there. But trust is financial, trust is so short, trust is emotional. So many different ways that we can interpret trust. In our research we found that trust has two components, reliability and consistency. You have to be trustworthy for yourself, show up for you and then show up for everybody all around you. And in a consistent way, you can't be Lucy Guisi and expect that other people trust you. So true. The other concept we trust is you need to be clear. What is secret? What is private. And be very clear between whoever that is in that relationship. There needs to be clear at great parameter there, between secrecy and privacy. The other one is compassion. It's one of the most misunderstood pieces in relationships. A lot of people say, "But if you are more empathic towards me, but if you would put yourself in my shoes, I get it. We want to have empathic resonance. We are humans. That would be lovely. But let me tell you something. Empathy is what is wrong in the world. Because we are over empathizing. We're making everything about ourselves. Whoa. So really go back to the neuroscience of it. Lucy is feeling with the other. Compassion is feeling for the other. Right? In any relationship as friends, as partners, you come and say, "Sara, I'm really angry." The first thing I think is, "Oh my God, if I'm over empathizing, over relating with you, I will get angry with you and then even lose it for you." So all of that. And I see that a lot in my couples, a lot of relationships that fall apart. They can't hold the space for each other without making it about themselves. This is such an important point. Like you said, really misunderstood because the feeling alongside versus feeling for is crucial because I mean, there's like kind of, yeah, the narcissistic side where like if someone is feeling a big way, the other person, you know, adopts those big feelings and then it's partially about them. But also like, it's just not sustainable for two people to be taking on the same heaviness so much, you know, like some persons got to be grounding, some persons got to be like the stable factor without being like icy or not supportive, you know. And when I think about times in my relationships that felt less healthy, it was too high temperature. Like everybody was freaking out. There was no one in the dynamic who could just kind of be this like buoy in the storm. If that makes sense. Yeah, you know in my TED talk, when I was explaining the difference between empathy and compassion, I made a gesture with my hands and that was intentional because I want people to really know that let's say for example, as a therapist, if I'm sitting in the room and I'm over empathizing with my client, if I lose it with them, sometimes we cry out of joy together. I love those sort of impities, right? Or for example, with your romantic partner or whoever that you choose, erotic empathy is a beautiful one, right? But if you are there and just to hold this space for another person and lose it above them, beyond them, there's nobody there to help, right? I often tell my clients, I say, especially couples, I say, look, if both of you are bleeding who is going to get the banded? And there are moments that we commiserate with each other because we both are going through something and they are precious, they go through them, we are stronger for them, hopefully that all. I'm not undermining those, I'm just saying as a default when you're going to grow slowly shopping and go, you know, everyday life that you come together after work, whatever compassion is the way to go, not empathy. The other piece of it is shared vision. In shared vision also, a lot of couples, when I ask them, first of all, they tell me that, well, what do you mean by shared vision? We want the same things, we have same values, we want the same things and then I ask one of them, where do you want to live? For example, they say, oh, we'll figure it out. No, no, you're not going to figure it out. Where are you going to live? I'm not asking you for a specific house in a specific city, in a specific street, whatever, I'm asking you, where do you live, who is around you? Do you like to live in a big environment that going to be surrounded by people, take metro to work? Or do you see yourself in a suburb riding in your privacy of your car? Is your family around, friends around? Is the other person's family around? These are the things that we need to know. So, geographical, social, financial, spiritual. Do you know how many couples I see every single December? Because they don't know how to decorate the house, especially if they're intercultural. So who's like, go up, who's three doesn't go up? It's a whole chaos. And especially when they have children, whose paths are they going to follow? So you need to really figure that out. And that's why I don't want to scare people. To think that, oh dear God, so we don't have a shared vision, it's okay. But I'm going to show you how to do this. Look, if you're not in a relationship, so make sure that you are following all of these steps and with a shared vision of what you want to live, who is around you in five years, 10 years, 15 years, are you open minded, are you flexible? Who do you think needs to be the main breadwinner? You know, like these sort of things that we should be talking about that many people don't. Because then they are accused of being calculative. They are planning too much. They are overthinking. There are certain things that are not overthinking, they're basic thinking. So do you need to do that, right? So if you are in a relationship already, how do we do this? You sit together, I ask my couples to come together every Sunday. Sunday in this country, you know, we have a holiday in this country, weekend, in another places, pick your pick. And then you sit together just for one hour, just do the admin around household. Shared vision is where the priorities are, where the resources of time, energy, attention and money would go. That's shared vision. So next time you're having a conversation that who picks up the child and okay, let's not buy this by that. So that's the weekly planning, you know, annual planning, long term planning. It doesn't become a talk of war or personal. It becomes, oh, that is strategy that we agreed upon. It becomes a strategy. So shared vision shows where you're committed to with your priorities and where the resources go. So if you say you're committed to the shared vision and then your actions show me otherwise with your time, energy, attention and money, you're not committed to our shared vision. That's a conversation to be had. And then I think we have one more on this list of six. Yes. The last one, definitely not least, is the loving behavior. When I was writing the book, my editorial team asked me, "Why do we want one whole chapter on loving behavior?" The whole book is called "Love by the Sun." And I said, "Look, love has certain qualities that people misunderstand. I might be beating you in the name of love. I might be controlling in the name of love. I might be doing so many different things in the name of love. And I might be bringing you a cup of coffee in the name of love in the morning, right? Some of it is subjective, some of it is cultural, but the one that we found in our research with our thriving couples, where tender touch, tender words, tender energy around each other, giving each other benefit of the doubt, going out of your way for the other person, making them feel special, seeking them out. So these are the qualities amongst many others that make a behavior loving, very distinct, from respecting or caring or whatnot. So there you have it. So we have loving behavior, shared vision, compassion, trust, respect, and attraction. And I'm telling you, if I had this list in front of me when I was in that terrible relationship in my early 20s, who knows if I would have followed through, but at least I would have known for sure. I was not in something fulfilling and of us probably not in something healthy. (light music) Hi, I'm Alex Goldman. You may know me as the host of Reply All, but I'm done with that. I'm doing something else now. I've started a new podcast called Hyperfix. On every episode of Hyperfix, listeners write in with their problems and I try to solve them. Some massive in life altering and some so minuscule little ball go your mind. No matter the problem, no matter the size, I'm here for you. That's Hyperfix, the new podcast from Radio Topia. Find it wherever you listen to podcasts or at HyperfixPod.com. (light music) - I want to transition into relaying some of the anonymously submitted thoughts, spirals, and questions from our listeners because there are a lot of them and I want to get through as many as we can. And some of these questions are kind of unanswerable, but I think it will be fun to reckon with them anyway. So the first question goes, what is a healthy amount and style of arguments in a road-mantic relationship? - So there was a research that actually doctors, Julian and John Gottman, they did a while back with real couples, they watched them and they came up with this ratio of five, one. So five positive interaction for every one negative interaction. So that is the mathematical calculation based on that research. And on the other side of it, I would say, depending on how deep the argument cuts you. Because sometimes you could have one argument and five positive, but that one argument or one interaction that you have cuts you so deep, it's very difficult to come back from. So I would say the quantity and quantity both matters. - I sometimes think of it as a credit system. Like, you know, how like some demerits or delinquencies on your credit will be like major and other ones will be minor. So like if you've really good credit and there's a minor delinquency, you'll probably still end up with good credit and there will be time to remedy that or whatever. But if you don't build up good credit with all of those positive interactions and there's this really big wounding negative thing that happens, well, now your credit's down the tubes. - So true. Well, I love that analogy. Yeah, that's true because you know, relationships are all about currencies. And when I say currencies, people look at me like, what, you know, it goes down because people frown upon it because they feel like, oh my God, then we are getting into this calculation. It is calculation, my love. But you know, it's really interesting, naive and almost conniving if we think that we are entering a relationship without expecting something. - Damn, tell it like it is. Okay, next question goes, why does it feel like I will never get over the sixth month situation ship I had five years ago? - There's the whole memory, does wonders. When you move on from something, it's so rosy and usually memory is actually memory is designed to remember good things, not the bad things. Unless, unless I see a lot of nodding from you. - Oh, I just think about this all the time. I've written about this too. Just the tendency for us to revise not fully traumatic memories that you couldn't romanticize if you tried, but kind of like low grade, negative stuff or tendency to revise those into positive memories helps us cultivate hope for the future. So it's kind of like a fantasy practice. - Yeah, so it gives us hope unless something really hurt us, then we will memorize it because we don't want to be stunned from the same place, right? So I don't know if I answered that question, but if you want to get out of this, my friend, whoever that asked that question, you need to figure out what is it that that thing years ago, six months, years ago, is still representing your life. What is it that you are missing in your life that you're almost yearning and craving? If you figure that out, hopefully if you want, you can move on from it. The next question goes, why do we almost never see healthy relationships in TV movies, et cetera? - Because TV is for entertainment, my love. It's not supposed to be educational, unless it says so, right? So it's for entertainment and healthy relationships are boring to watch, we're feeling to live. So that's what I would say. - That's a great way of putting it. - Someone wants to know, when I'm in a relationship, I want out, but when I'm not, I want in. What the fuck? - Good phrasing. So here's what I would say. There are two parts of you that I invite you to have conversations with. So the first part is one thing in, one thing to be included, to belong, to commit. So that, that tie. And then the other piece of view, part of you, equally respected here in this space, wants out. So one of the things that you can do, look at your attachment styles. Don't go too deep because that's one of the things that people really overthink, that, oh my God, I'm doom and gloom because I come from this attachment style. Now you can change it, by the way. So just look at it to see if you are maybe, you know, disorganize around your attachment, you want something, but you know, when you have it, when you're close in it, you feel claustrophobic and you want out, or you don't feel like you deserve it, you sabotage it. So look at that. And on the other side of it, what is it about the relationship that you want or don't want? That's that. The other piece is, which I ask actually my clients to do, if you can sit and then bring two pictures of yourself. One that is in a relationship that relatively okay, relationship, as long as it's not terrible. And then the other one, for the time that you are out of a relationship in between, and watch those people in front of you have a dialogue with one another and see what you find out. That's such good advice. Okay, so this next question is so interesting and it reminded me of the kind of like meme-esque phrase that's going around right now, that like having a boyfriend is cringe. And we want to, I guess like push against kind of patriarchal sexist expectations that women are only valuable if they're in a couple. But I think it's, you know, that can go too far at times because we do need love. Anyway, this person just wants to know if and how I can support the single positivity movement even though I'm in a relationship. Okay, so that's a good one. A dilemma that many people have. Look, how are you going to show up for somebody who is not sharing the same experiences with you? For example, maybe you don't have a child, but you want to be supportive of a friend who you just got pregnant or they're going through the whole, you know, like process. You don't need to have that experience. Remember empathy and compassion? So it's not about you, it's about the other person. However I get you because sometimes socially, you can't really comment on something. So for example, you say, "Oh, don't get into a relationship." And then your friend may be thinking, "Well, that's easy for you to say, you are in it." So you know, these sort of things. Or for example, 11-1 I would say, "Ekis is about them and their experience." Not yours. So that is one, if you can keep it clean. The other thing is often I figure, we mistake our roles, you know, within the society, you just talked about the patriarchy and like a masculine feminine and you know, the politicization of it. I often say, "Look, you cannot be an advocate and activist and be in your life all at the same time." You just can't. It's not possible or not. But one thing that you can do is let's say, think about this person who's a single, you want to really support them, think, "Am I a friend here? Am I an advocate? I'm a representative of all women for all other women." Who am I here? Who are you? What is this space? What are the currencies and rules of engagements in this space? Then you can operate with peace of heart that, you know, I show up the way it matters. That's such a good reminder. This next question goes, how can one maintain a healthy friendship when one person has a limmerance for the other? Rainship limmerance. My mind goes into so many different places. I wonder how they define them. So limmerance could be only sexual attraction. So I'm hot for you, you know, it could be that. or it could be you can't really well just listen to it. it because clearly there's no shared vision right so the currencies cannot be defined in a way that the person who is experiencing and expressing the friendship could be equitable to the experiences and expressions of the person who has that infatuation. So I would say open conversation if you're up for it depending on your conflict management style. If you are an open person and you can actually have a conversation and I would dare to say reducing proximity and communication. Oh that is such good advice. Oh my gosh. Okay this is a high stakes one. Why is it so hard to know if you're just flexible and chill in a relationship or if you're bending over until you break? Oh I hope nobody does that. I would say if you know which one of the eight relational configurations is your thing but you need to know what is your situation if you're in a couple them and what is that quote and quote ideal place that you want to be. That is the first graph that all of my couples see when they come to see me because I need to know if a person wants to go to sub-mergen and become one with the other and the other person says oh my god get out I'm suffocated then what am I doing as a therapist. Okay this is kind of like a crucial question that maybe you should have come earlier but I'm glad it's coming now. Several people asked who cares what's normal for a healthy relationship anyway. Everyone is different so what does healthy look like? Healthy looks like you don't go crazy every morning waking up thinking what's wrong with me what's wrong with the other person what's wrong with the world why am I not worthy of love these conversations don't exist when you're in a healthy couple them damn is it possible that some people were just never destined to be in romantic relationships. If you didn't have the word romantic I would have said absolutely not we are all human and we have to be in pair bonding not in the form of the traditional couple them but we need at least one other person to belong to for them to belong in that pair bonding with but romantic I would say some people don't want to be in romantic relationships depending on how they define it because remember you know as a linguist you know we define it very differently especially across languages and across cultures. Someone wants to know is it normal to have a crush on someone else even if I'm married? Yeah you're not dead exactly. Someone wants to know why does my situation feel like the healthiest most loving relationship I've ever had? Because probably you entered when you wanted you exited when you wanted so you had the most sense of agency around you that's my guess. So smart. Last one. Is it normal to not to want to have sex all the time but be perfectly happily in love? Yes if all people involved are happily in love and happily not having that interaction yes why not? Amazing. Dr. Sare my last question for you is what do you think is the number one thing people are overthinking with respect to healthy relationships and what's the number one thing people are under-thinking? I think people are overthinking what they think is right about relationships and to put their efforts on I would say they're overthinking the things that might not even move the needle in the relationships and have anything to do with the trajectory of a relationship that would be one thing I would say. The under-thinking is giving yourself permission to think that you do deserve to be in the loving relationship you desire and let everybody else's voice and noise define you. Amazing. If people want to keep up with you and your work where can they do that? I'm on Instagram. I have a substag account called The Common Ground by Dr. Sare every month I put out some relational piece from bedroom to wardrobe from work or intimate relationship sex all that and my book is my most recent one is Love by Design six ingredients to build a lifetime of love. Thank you so much. My pleasure. Thank you so much for tuning in to today's episode. Now's the point where I share a nugget of evidence-based wisdom for how we overthinkers can get out of our own heads this week. This one comes from the Bay Area CBT Center and specifically speaks to how to tell when you're engaging in rumination versus an actually productive line of thinking. The advice suggests the following. When you catch yourself in a moment that you think might classify as overthinking. Lean in to that roominative behavior for three to five minutes. You can even set a timer. After the time has passed, ask yourself these three questions. Do I feel better or worse? Is this within my control or not? Did I resolve something or not? The Bay Area CBT Center says, if you realize that you've been thinking about something that is out of your control already in the past and the thinking hasn't helped you solve any issues or feel better, then you know it was officially rumination. And that can help you set yourself on a path to enlist the help of cognitive behavioral therapy strategies or somatic strategies to get you out of those spirals. Well, that's the show. Thanks again for listening. And until the next thought spiral, remember, think it over. Just don't overthink it. #MatchicleOverThinkers Magical OverThinkers was created and hosted by Amanda Montel and edited by Jordan Moore of the Pod Cabin. Our theme music is by Casey Kove. Thank you to our magical manager, Katie Everson, coordinator, Reese Oliver, and Network Studio 71. Be sure to follow the pod on Instagram at magicaloverthinkers. We're also on YouTube, Lincoln Show Notes, and ad free episodes as well as behind the scenes extras are available on the magicaloverthinkers substack at Amanda Montel. #MatchicleOverThinkers