In this week's episode we're talking about moving from control to connection. Power and control are pretty insidious, seeping into so many corners of our lives. We talk about dropping the need to be right, considering the context of the moment, and the value of transparent communication. Reaching for control is often a red flag that shows where we might want to dig deeper, to figure out what's really at play. Moving towards connection helps strengthen our relationships and makes navigating conflicts so much easier.

We hope today's episode sparks some fun insights for you and we invite you to dive deeper with our Episode Questions. Join us on Instagram or YouTube to continue the conversation and share your reflections.

Let’s dig deep, challenge paradigms, choose connection, and live joyfully!

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EPISODE QUESTIONS

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1. Next time you’re talking with your partner or friend about what to do next, try adding “for me” to the conversation. Like, “The right thing to do, for me, is X.” How does that feel? How does the conversation flow from there?

2. Do you notice yourself grasping for control more often in moments that have a sense of urgency for you? Can you remind yourself that there’s plenty of time? Does that help?

3. Do you feel resistance when someone else tells you what to do? Why? Does it feel like they’ve taken away your choice? Do you purposefully avoid doing that thing now, even if it seems like it might be helpful?

4. Turning that around, do you feel resistance from your partner and/or children when you tell them what to do? What does their resistance look like from your perspective? Now shift and see the situation through their eyes (see episode 4 for more details).

TRANSCRIPT

PAM: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. We are so happy you're here exploring relationships with us, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.

If you're new to the podcast, we encourage you to go back and listen to the earlier episodes. We started with some foundational relationship ideas in these first 14 episodes and have really enjoyed how they're building on one another. And if you've already been enjoying the podcast, we would love if you could share it with someone in your life that you think would benefit from contemplating these ideas. It is super easy to share. Just send them to pod.link/livingjoyfully. From there, they can pick their favorite podcast player and it will take them right to the show in that app. Thank you so much for helping us spread the word.

So, back in episode two, we talked about connection and how connecting with another person creates a feeling of being in alignment with them, where each person feels seen and heard for who they are. Yet the cultural and conventional wisdom that surrounds relationships is steeped in power and control, which is almost the opposite of connection.

Now, granted, I think many people would answer that they prioritize connection over control, especially in their closest relationships, like with their partner and children. But what's interesting is that what that looks like day to day can be a lot more nuanced than we first think. Power and control are pretty insidious, seeping into so many corners of our lives. So, this week we want to talk about what the shift from control to connection might look like in our relationships.

For me, one of the most impactful paradigm shifts, as I moved away from using power and control as a relationship tool to focusing on connection, was a shift away from needing to be right, which to be clear is not the same thing as being wrong. That's one of the societal frameworks that keeps us stuck in control-based relationship dynamics, that one person is right and the other is wrong. That right and wrong, black and white thinking is overly simplistic, particularly when it comes to the complexity of being in relationship with another human being. Not needing to be right means not needing to be universally right. It means recognizing that people are different, which we dove into back in episode three.

What I can say is, "This is what feels right for me." We aren't in competition with the people we love. It is not us versus them. When I don't feel the need to judge the other person's choices or interests as right or wrong, I am so much freer to connect with them as the unique person they are and to show up as the unique person I am. For me, releasing the need for the other person to agree that I'm right weaves together nicely with the idea of being open and curious that we talked about a few weeks ago in episode 11. I can know what's right for me and I'm curious to discover what's right for them. 

ANNA: Yes! I think our culture sets up competition and black and white thinking pretty much from the get-go, especially in school. And while leaning into that paradigm might serve us in that environment, it does not help with our relationships at all. We want to cultivate an environment where we're learning about each other, not pushing a particular agenda. And understanding we're not universally right about all the things is a big step.

And if I'm having trouble finding that energy, I'll use my mantra, "Be kind, not right," because at this point, I'm usually looking at the choice of being right and harming the relationship or being kind and staying connected. And I just always want to stay connected to the people that I love, because it's from that place that we move with the most ease through our days and through any issues.

And over the years, it's been interesting to see how, when I can refrain from jumping in with my idea of what's right, I can learn so much. Because we are all so different. We really can see the very same situation completely differently. And when we leave space to see through another person's eyes, we find that maybe things really weren't as black and white as we originally thought they were.

PAM: Yes. Choosing to give that space to listen rather than jumping in with my two cents was a pivotal shift for me in cultivating connected and trusting relationships. There was space for me to learn so much more about my partner and kids and about the situations and how they saw them. So often, situations were, and are, so much more nuanced than I first thought.

So, another valuable shift that has helped me move away from control and focus on connection in my relationships has been recognizing that so much of life isn't as urgent as we're led to believe. We first talked about that in episode eight, "There's Plenty of Time." And I really do love how so many of these foundational ideas weave together. That's why they feel foundational to us. You'll hear us mentioning, oh, this one and this one.

So, when something feels urgent, it makes sense for us to be tempted to fall back on control tactics. Because we feel like we need things to happen quickly. We need to solve this fast. But so often, that urgency isn't real. It's ingrained through societal messages like, doing things faster is better. The first person across the line wins.

But truly, when it comes to relationships, it's not a race. And doing things in connection is better. So, sure, it can take longer to have conversations and come up with a plan that works for both parties, rather than just telling them what to do and expecting it to be. Yet the resentment that builds in the relationship as a result will eventually need repair. So, I think it's more like a tradeoff, right? The time upfront to prioritize the connection or the time later to repair the connection. So, for me, the relationship is just much more enjoyable and fun when I prioritize the connection as much as I can versus the ups and downs of control, repair, control, repair.

Enough things, when you think about it, really do come up in a relationship that need repair. I don't need to create more by stepping in and trying to control other people. Because I sure don't like when they try to do it to me!

ANNA: Right! For me, it's really an energy thing. Like, where do I wanna spend my energy? Because I can tend towards controlling things in the environment, but it's like, do I want to spend all that energy trying to control humans that don't want to be controlled? Or do I want to have that connection? Do I want to do that upfront work with those conversations. And for me, that just felt better in my days. It just felt better with my kids. It feels better with my partner.

And I don't know if we can ever mention the culturally embedded sense of urgency too much, because it really is this state that keeps us from tuning into ourselves and to others. And letting go of it is so liberating. When something's a true emergency, we'll know, and we'll act on it right away. Every other time, we can take that pause and tune into the people around us to really understand where they're coming from and also tune into ourselves so that we can communicate our needs in a way that isn't pushing through someone else's consent or running over top of their needs.

That self-awareness piece is so critical, and it takes some time to develop, because many of us did not have our needs acknowledged as children. So, it's hard to even know what we want or why we want it. Teasing apart the cultural shoulds and have tos from our true inner voice takes practice, especially if we were discounted as kids.

But as we learn to listen to ourselves, we're then able to communicate from that place. And it's more honest and it's more understandable. When we're throwing shoulds and have tos at people, shoulds and have tos that we may not even fully understand or buy into, it's just a recipe for misunderstanding and disconnection.

But when something truly means something to us, we can explain the why. And then we leave space for the other person to do the same. We can have these more interesting conversations where we're learning about one another and where we can find solutions that feel good to both of us. And that begins with the generous assumption that there may be more than one right way, our way, to look at a situation.

PAM: Oh, it's so true. Developing that level of self-awareness where we better understand and can communicate our why is pretty key to moving from control to connection in our close relationships, and I see it as a wonderful spiral.

As we better understand ourselves, it opens us up to recognizing that others have that depth as well, which helps us give space to learn more about them and connect more deeply with them, which in turn inspires us to dig deeper ourselves and round and round. Because there is no need to wait until we think we perfectly understand ourselves and give ourselves an A before opening up these conversations.

I think that's one thing I can promise. There are always more layers. Always, always. It's an ongoing journey.

All right, so, one other thing I want to mention is that when we're feeling the urge to reach for control in our relationships, sometimes what's underneath that is fear rather than judgment. Controlling the other person feels like the safer choice to us. When that happens, it's also worth digging into seeing where that's coming from. It is always worth digging.

So, maybe it's something we've absorbed about relationships growing up. A really simple example might be if growing up our parents were adamant that we, that's that royal family we, must always be sorry after a disagreement, whether or not we felt it. That message was ingrained in us, and now we're an adult, and if our partner doesn't tend to apologize automatically, we may find ourselves trying to convince, in other words control, them to do so. The perfunctory apology feels safer to the relationship for us, because that's the message we absorbed growing up.

But is it really? As we become more insistent, they may well become increasingly resistant. Few people like that feeling of being controlled at any age. So, it's worth digging deeper to discover where we've picked up messages about being in relationship with others that lead us to reach for control, and then taking the time to ponder whether they actually make sense to us now. We've got an experience now. We have real people in front of us that we are in relationship with. Is it working? How is it working? How is it feeling? It's so worth taking the time to dig into that.  

ANNA: It really is. And I think control is pretty much always hiding something. And I think you're right that it is often fear and judgment. And it's so helpful to dig into that, because then we can understand the fear. I feel like it's rare that fear can stand up to shining a light on it, when we really call it out in front of us. It tends to lurk back in the recesses. I think insecurity can also be tied up in it as well. And if we're unwilling to look at where that's coming from, it can cast this huge shadow on the relationship.

I've worked with couples where one of them looks to control to help themselves feel safe. But what that looks like is saying things like their partner needs to delete Instagram or change their communications, or stop doing X. And even if the partner agrees in the moment, it's this very shaky foundation to build upon, because trust is one of the most important elements of relationship. We build trust through conversations and owning our own pieces, through hearing our partner, and offering that generous assumption.

So, we can look and talk about what feels scary about Instagram, we can walk through it, own our pieces, and keep having the conversation. Because no one wants to feel controlled, and a coerced mind is not a changed mind. So, at the first sign of trouble, those shaky agreements are thrown out the window and then feelings are hurt. We need to understand the why behind actions for them to have meaning. That only happens through really listening to one another and finding a path forward that works for everyone.

PAM: Yes. I love that so much. A coerced mind is not a changed mind. Just thinking for myself, for me to change my mind, I do need to understand the why behind it. I need that bigger picture. It needs to make sense to me. And pulling it back to being open and curious, I want to be open to learning more and to changing my mind, because again, I'm not clinging to my perspective, my right answer, as the right answer for everyone. I'm curious to learn more about it. It just all weaves together so beautifully, doesn't it?

ANNA: Oh my gosh. It really does. And we also talk a lot about context, and I think it's important to think about context as it relates to control, as well. If we find ourselves grasping for control in our relationships, or we see our partner trying to control us or our children, look at what's going on in the wider context. Because I've seen over and over again that if work feels out of control, we clamp down at home. And if home is feeling out of control, we clamp down at work. And that leaves the people impacted really reeling, having no idea where it's coming from. And it can lead to some pretty big ruptures.

So, owning when things feel hard and out of control and realizing that trying to control others won't change that. It just ends up disconnecting us from the people who could actually be providing support during the challenges. And when we see it happening, that's where I think some narration can really help our partner. "I'm feeling a lot of pressure at work and it feels like we might not even have jobs next week, and it's making me feel freaked out and snappy." That helps our partner know what's happening in our mind, helps them not take it personally. And it keeps us honest.

We don't need or want to take things out on our partner, but when we're operating on autopilot, we often will, and it just never feels good.

Context includes a lot of things, not just work and home life, but smaller things like sleep and have we eaten and hormones and visiting relatives and bigger things like death and major changes like moves or a new job. Even when it's something positive that's happening, it can still be adding to our sense of overwhelm and triggering that need for control. So, being honest with ourselves and really taking responsibility for how we're showing up can help so much. And if we see it in our partner, we can gently hold space for them to view the larger context, to try to make sense of the behaviors that are causing harm or disconnection.

I really believe our natural state is to want to be connected. So, given the opportunity to be seen and heard, we'll choose to find a way back to it. If we trust our partners and our children in that, it will create an environment where we're helping each other and finding solutions, and then we see there's no need for power over.

PAM: Yes, there is no need to exert power over others. We really can instead work together as a team. And while it is absolutely not an easy button, my goodness, it feels so much richer and vibrant and real. Feeling seen and heard and understood just makes a world of difference for everyone at every age. And that happens through being in connection with another person, where we can share that this stuff is going on right now, or, "I'm having a hard day." Even when we just feel like we've been beaten down a bit, we are snappier. We just jump to the answer, because we don't have time, or we don't have the capacity to think of all these other options. And you don't want the other person to think, oh, that's weird. They're acting strange. 

ANNA: What's happening there? But it's really the connection that would help us through those T tumultuous times when we tend to reach for control. So, it's like, use it as a red flag, create a culture where you can talk about when that control starts to seep in. Because really what's happening is we need more connection, and so, just understanding that can really change things in a home, especially if there's just a lot of tough stuff going on.

PAM: Yeah, that is such a great point, because not only if we can express what's going on in our heads, it doesn't have to be a big, long explanation of all the things. It's like, "I'm feeling overwhelmed right now." Then not only did they not take it personally when we're feeling snappy, like you said, their support is then yet another benefit. It's like, "Oh, is there anything I can do? Would you like to go take a little break? I'll look after this for you."

So, not only are we not making them feel bad about themselves, not creating a disconnection, we're also getting the support alongside it so often. So, it's just good. Connection is so good in so many ways.

All right. So, here are some questions you might want to ponder as you explore the idea of choosing connection over control.

Next time you're talking with your partner or friend about what to do next, try adding, "for me," to the conversation. Like, "The right thing to do for me is X." How does that feel? How does the conversation flow from there? Just opening up the possibilities. "The right thing to do is," like how closed down that feels. "For me, it's this." That just invites someone else to say, "Well, for me, I'm kind of feeling Y. Is there a way we can put X and Y together and then we'll all be happy?" That's just a great baby step to take in that kind of situation.

Okay. So, question two, do you notice yourself grasping for control more often in moments that have a sense of urgency for you? Can you remind yourself there's plenty of time? And does that help? Why or why not? Is there more to dig into there?

ANNA: Right. But it's that red flag. Just know that control is the red flag. Start looking at the other pieces and the context, the sense of urgency, the other things that could be happening. It just gives you a lot of information.

PAM: Yeah. Okay, so question three. Do you feel resistance when someone else tells you what to do? Why? Does it feel like they've taken away your choice? Do you purposefully avoid doing that thing now, even if it seems like it might be helpful? I'm definitely guilty of that. It's so interesting to dig in and just to see, because it can happen. In our world, it often happens. Somebody's just telling us what to do, right? To take a moment to just see how that feels can be so valuable.

Question number four, turning that around, do you feel resistance from your partner or your children when you tell them what to do? What does their resistance look like from your perspective? Now shift the situation and see through their eyes. You can listen to episode number four for more details. And what does it look like now? I find it fascinating to think of, what does their resistance look like? Because it's often not a shouted no in your face or, but all of a sudden they may be in other rooms.

ANNA: That withdrawing or it comes back a little bit later. Just watch how, when we're trying to control other people, how it impacts all the energy of the house, even when it's not someone that we're even directly controlling. There's just so much to be aware of there, and it's usually, again, just hiding some other piece, that digging in that we talked about that's so important.

PAM: Yeah, exactly. Because when we can take that time to dig in that little bit, then we can shift to the conversation that we're always talking about. That conversation brings that connection. So again, it's not like we're stuffing down the things that we're feeling and seeing, but we're being open to learning how other people are seeing it and to understanding what it looks like through their eyes.

Okay. Thank you so much for listening to us chat again. We are so excited to be having these conversations with you, and we would love to hear about how you are engaging with the questions, and we will see you next time. Bye!

ANNA: Take care.