Joree Rose & Dr. John Schinnerer - Growth in Partnership

In this week’s episode Robin is in conversation with Joree Rose & Dr. John Schinnerer. John and Joree share their personal journey as partners and therapists, including challenges they've faced together. They have been jointly doing couples work for over seven years, and are passionate about guiding couples towards fulfilling and connected relationships.They discuss key skills for improving relationships, including self-awareness, vulnerability, and understanding each other's core wounds. They also talk openly about their experiences with psychedelic-assisted therapy and how it's helped their healing and connection. This insightful conversation provides valuable relationship lessons and perspectives on making intimacy fulfilling through ongoing self-work.

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Credits: the Let’s Talk Love Podcast is hosted by Robin Ducharme, recorded and edited by Maia Anstey, and transcribed by Otter.ai.

Transcript

Robin Ducharme | Today I welcomed two therapists, Dr.John Schinnerer and Joree Rose. John and Joree are partners in both life and love. They've been jointly doing couples work for over seven years, and are passionate about guiding couples towards fulfilling and connected relationships. Joree and John co facilitate workshops, couples, intensives and lead retreats. They're both certified in psychedelic assisted therapy, which I was super curious to learn more about, and excited to try myself one day. John and Joree demonstrate how vulnerability breeds connection. They share their own relational journey and challenges and what the tools they teach look like in practice. I hope today brings new learnings and an open perspective for you that you can bring into your own life. Enjoy. Welcome to Let's Talk Love the podcast that brings you real talk, fresh ideas, and expert insights every week. Our guests are the most trusted voices in love and relationships. And they're here for you with tools, information and friendly advice to help you expand the ways you love, relate and communicate. We tackle the big questions not shying away from the complex, the messy, the awkward and the joyful parts of relationships. I'm your host, Robin Ducharme. Now, Let's Talk Love. 

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Let's Talk love. I'm so happy to be joined by two therapists, Joree Rose and John Schinnerer, who I met at our In Bloom Summit last April in Vancouver, who joined as guests. And I'm just so grateful for both of you being here today. Thank you. 

Dr. John Schinnerer | Yeah by the way that that conference was amazing. I was really impressed. 

Joree Rose | Yeah it really was.

Yeah, you know, to be in the field and to be amongst such experts and have the opportunity to share personally and not just professionally, it was a real gift for us as well. So we were grateful for the opportunity to even have an opportunity to be vulnerable. 

Robin Ducharme | Yeah.So first, why don't we just talk about your background, your both you're, you know, what you both done to become therapists and your your work today with clients together as well as individually? 

John | Sure so I got into psychology because I wanted to learn more about emotions, because that was what was kind of vexing me. And I'm an emotion geek at this point in my life. But I got a PhD at UC Berkeley in educational psychology, became a school psychologist stopped doing that for a few years after a few years, got into my own private well, I ran a business for seven years got out of that got into positive psychology about 2004 and realized I had these tools to turn down the volume on the negative turn up the volume on the positive. So I wrote a book which led to me doing a daily primetime radio show. And that was exciting got to interview some world class experts. Stoped that after a year opened up private practice. Positive psychology was kind of lukewarm. So I went into anger management, which started me working a lot with men, and kind of combined that with positive psychology. Got tired of that after 10 years started working with executives and business men realized pretty quickly that the biggest source of their pain and suffering was at home with their relationship or you know, relationship with their spouse but also with usually their teenage kids. So started teaching them relationship skills, which led to this more recent work in masculinity and then even more recent work in men bucks culture, which is how we're socialized. In growing up to learn what it means to be a real man. The rules of being a real man, you know, be stoic, be self reliant, compete, don't back down. Treat women as objects be the provider. There's all sorts of rules in there and there's some good and some bad but the one that really hamstrings us the most in relationship is be stoic, or don't feel. Yeah. That's the short answer.

Joree | And I'm a marriage family therapist. I knew from the time I was really young, I always wanted to work with couples, couples absolutely fascinated me. I was actually with my ex husband since I was 13 years old. And so the idea of what makes some couples work? What makes some couples not work? Literally from early teenage years, I was fascinated by and knew I wanted to be a marriage family therapist started my hours right after graduate school. I was young for my grade, graduated college early realized it, you know, 22 years old, I had no business being anybody's therapist, and stopped to have my kids. I've got two daughters, almost 18 and 20. And when my youngest, was school aged, had a bit of my own personal crisis of who am I, how did I get here? I always just did what was next? What was next? What was next? And I was at this point of there were no more next. And it was this excess existential crisis of well, now what? What about me, you know, I delved into being a wife and a mother. And it was really a big challenge, because I realized I was living on autopilot for the majority of my life in the hopes that what was next was going to give me fulfillment or satisfaction, and it didn't. And getting into my own therapy made me realize, oh, I want to go back to get my hours and go back to what my original intention was. And through that process of really discovered mindfulness practice delved into mindfulness and meditation in a personal way, got certified to teach mindfulness to kids wrote a couple of books on mindfulness for kids and for educators to teach mindfulness to kids, and ultimately got licensed and open up practice. And I've been licensed now for just about eight years. And I absolutely love working with people in the quest of how do I figure out who I am, what do I want? How do I want to feel? What do I need? Making sense of how did I get here? What's not working? And how can I move forward. And I met John soon, about a year and a half after my divorce. And there was a lot of synchronicity in our meeting. And also knew like, well, there's not just a lot here personally, to develop a relationship. But also professionally, we just had so much in common. And so we're at this point of our careers where we're really delving into couples work together. 

Robin | I love that.

Joree | And so when we both have our individual practices, for a couple of years, we've been working with couples in which I work with the women he works with the men we will do some crossover sessions, and then we'll come together the four of us. And while that's kind of been a bit of our focus, it's now becoming a huge piece of the focus of our, the future of our careers. Because we're recognizing what's missing in couples therapy, we're recognizing where couples get stuck in actually doing paperwork. And part of that was born out of our own relationship challenges. And, you know, we're both divorced. And we've been together, like I said, we just had our eight year anniversary, and what you mentioned at the beginning of our vulnerability was at your beautiful conference, we had just gotten back together, after a short but very painful breakup. And we've been on a trajectory of healing. And recognizing the long winded answer to your question, recognizing though that part of what was causing us struggle in our relationship was our own unresolved stuff, from our own self from our marriage and subsequent divorce and our childhood, and realizing how much of our own personal stuff gets in the way of vulnerability and partnership in relationality. So what we're bringing to our work now is really this interplay of ongoing self work and relational work. You know, it's hard to be really relational. If you're unaware of what's going on inside yourself. It's hard to do the self work if you're only focusing, you know, on the problem. So this ongoing unfolding of our personal lives and our professional lives is where we're at now. 

Robin | Yes and I think one of the lessons that you share openly in your podcast as well, is how, you know, you've got all the skills, you're both therapists. And I think about myself and how much therapy I've had over the years, individually, as well as when I was married. I do this for a living, I've got I'm interviewing relationship experts like yourself every week, and reading all the books, I have the skills. That doesn't mean that I'm not having a heck of a time, like in my relationships, intimate relationships sometimes. And it's like, and you could you can try out, you'd be pulling out all the toolbox, you've got the tools, and you're still finding yourself in this complete mess and say what the heck, right? So tell us what

John | To me it's about, you know, intellectually we know what to do. rationally. We know what to do. I know what the tools are. It's can I put the tools into effect when my emotional mind is taking over? And how do I prevent that from happening? Most of the time, I don't know that. We can do it all the time. And then how do I receive it well, when I know she's trying to do the same, but maybe can't access the tools. So I mean, there's been times where, you know, I've been an anger management specialist, right. So inevitably, I will get something from a partner like, well, you're the anger management specialist, how come you can't manage your anger? Well, because I'm human.

Robin | And anger. And we're taught that anger is not a good emotion, like we're judging emotions, good or bad and anger. Motion? 

John | Yeah no, I mean, all the emotions exist for a reason. 

Robin | Yeah. 

John | Anger is there to tell you if someone's trespassing a boundary or treating you in a way you don't want to be treated. And so it's not about never feel any particular emotion. It's about you know, how do we manage them? How do we regulate them? How do we minimize the frequency of them? How do we minimize the intensity of them? 

Robin | Yeah.

Joree | And to add on to that Robin, I, I was always not as gracious in the times that John couldn't access the tools with me saying something like, you teach this, how can you can't do this, and I struggled with that. And it was,

John | That  really doesn't help with anger management 

Joree | But part of it was for me to understand truly like, what's preventing each of us from accessing our tools. And that's what we really had to understand. Like, let's peel back the layers. And one thing that John did not really appreciate, without me at first, but has come to really recognize appreciation for is, if we would have a disconnect or an argument, and we would seem to repair a day or a couple of days, I might still feel unsettled about it. So I would bring it back up again. And he'd be like, oh, man, really, like we're talking about this again. And I'm like, well, if I'm on unsettled, then we are unsettled. And I'm really just trying to investigate, like, I don't care if we argue I don't care if we're going to disconnect, I want to learn from it. And I want to understand like, what was actually going on underneath it so that perhaps we don't get there again? Or perhaps we have greater compassion? Or maybe we have a better understanding of what are our individual triggers. And, you know, one of the things that when I work with couples all ask partners is, do you know what your partner's core wounds are? 

Robin | Right

Joree | And many times, I actually don't know what their core wounds are. 

Robin | That's such an important one Joree.

Joree | It's huge. And then they're unknowingly activating them at the worst in their ability to access their emotions. Because, you know, I often teach simple brain science when I'm working with clients, but especially for couples to understand, you know, our emotional brain, when it gets triggered and fires off, it shuts off access to our tools. So all of our executive functioning is a separate part of our brain from where our emotions reside. And once that emotional brain fires off, I like to say it goes from a four lane, open highway with no traffic to a one lane country road with traffic, you just can't get there. So to have the internal awareness of even where I'm at emotionally, gives the other person indication, can I even have a conversation that's going to be effective right now? When you add it to it? Yeah. But then you add into different things like John and I would get horrible in a avoidant anxious dance, because he would have the awareness actually of, hey, I can't have this conversation right now. I need some space. Part of that was avoidant attachment. Part of it was also self awareness of recognizing what does he need to be at his best? Well, my anxious attachment, attachment took that as rejection. And until I understood, like what was coming up for me that I couldn't easily give him space, so that we could have an effective conversation. Like there was a lot of tools that we had to practice interpersonally as well as individually. 

Robin | Yeah

Joree | Not easy.

Robin | Of course not.

John | It's funny to think that 56, I still have individual work to do to show up at my best in relationship.

Robin | I think what that just points to John, which we need to understand fully, life is about healing, the whole thing. Like, it doesn't matter what age and some people have even started their healing journey. Maybe listening to this is going to maybe encourage people to be like, I need to do some stuff. Because these patterns that I'm in, they're repeating and having the same arguments with my partner. Maybe it's time for me to do some inner introspection. And look at my look at my role in that, but I'm just saying like, 56 I mean, like, yeah, well, let's talk when you're 76 you're gonna be, you know, you're gonna know more and be in a different place. But you're still going to be like, oh, I discovered this about myself. I'm still I'm working on this right now. This is my heal. This is where I'm at with my healing. I just think it's like, it's a lifelong process 

Joree | It's ongoing.

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Joree | It's never a one and done. And this past year, John and I have committed to really delving into that and looking into the aspects of our self work. And we just keep on covering a lot of fascinating stuff. And I want to come back a piece to what you said a minute ago about anger. Part of I think effective relationality is allowing for those emotions. And John very lovingly has encouraged my anger, he's given me a little bit of opportunity to tap into it. But he's also encouraged it. But with that became the practice of non defensive listening. And he's gotten quite skilled at allowing me to be angry and simply responding with.

John | I can see where that really pisses you off, or I can see where that really makes you angry. And thank you for sharing your anger with me. Thank you

Joree | Thank you for sharing. 

Robin | Yes, because you need to get it out. Right.

John | And heard once it's validated, I think you know, to speak to the emotion underneath your words is liberating and cathartic at some level. 

Robin | Yeah

John | I think it's what we always want and never get.

Robin | So you see you broke up for a few months. Right? 

John | Yeah, two months.

Robin | And during that time, you were both working individually on your healing. And you were an did you start couples therapy after you got back together? Or was that? Yeah, it was it was after? After your breakup, right?

Joree | We did. We did a two day 12 hour intensive.

Robin | Yes. And so I want to talk about this because you also share how you both become certified in in is this true? Is psilocybin? Am I saying that

 Joree | Psychedelic assisted therapy. Yeah.

Robin | Yeah, psychedelic-assisted therapy. I'm just like, so fascinated by this, because I'm like, I want to do this. I know, I really do. I want to do it. I mean, I've been doing EMDR I'm in therapy. Like, I'm just so dedicated to my healing. And I've heard that doing psychedelic-assisted therapy, and you talk about this is like you're able to go deep in this in a concentrated amount of time, rather than, you know, every my therapy is like we,

Joree | Let's get some qualifications first. So we do need to qualify that in most states. these are still schedule one substances. And there's, you know, underground work being done.

Robin | This is something in the province I live in for sure. Right.

Joree | So you know, just to qualify that. This is something that we're hoping as we're in California becomes legalized for therapeutic use, we can expand our work into helping guide couples in this. And right now, ketamine is what's legal and MDMA and psilocybin or Well, psilocybin Neris is decriminalized. MDMA is looking to be legalized for therapeutic use in hopefully this year. So we really wanted to get ahead of the curve in getting a lot of training and understanding in the contra indications for which couples this might be or individuals really effective and healthy and helpful for and which ones might not, and to really understand what it's doing in our consciousness. And I think what was fascinating, as we brought some of these into our own experience, which I've never been a drug person, that's just not my I've never been a partier, like that, but to see the research behind what MDMA does, for trauma and anxiety and depression and to see all the research around psilocybin. The science of it is remarkable, 

Robin | Yes. 

Joree | And to see that there's a limitation to talk therapy, and that we get stuck in tunnel vision around our viewpoints around our rigid thinking around over attachment to our positions. And I think that was where we were getting stuck

John | When we get flooded with negative emotion to in the moment and MDMA is really pretty amazing and that it floods you with positive emotion so you can have these conversations about really triggering topics, but you're not getting flooded by anger, fear so sadness, guilt or shame. And so you can go deeper in the conversation and more honest and reveal more about yourself and be heard and validated by your partner. And they can do the same. 

Joree | So MDMA, while simultaneously eliciting positive emotions, it turns down the trigger on reactivity.

Robin | Yes

Joree | And when we are able to allow that as an opening for conversation, I mean, just to have really authentic talks going deep beyond the reactivity, the defensiveness, that repeating the same story to get curious. And psilocybin, you know, it partly opens up new circuitry. So it's literally opening up a wiring in your brain for new ways of looking at things. And so, if you would have told me a year and a half ago that, you know, any sort of psychedelic would have been part of our healing after a breakup, I wouldn't have believed any of it.

Robin | Exactly. I wouldn't. I didn't, I think this is all, you know, this. As we know, this was used many, many years ago before, you know, all the stuff that happened politically and banned, but it was being used therapeutically for a long time and proven to right, so

John | Psilocydin has been used for 1000s of years. MDMA was used in the 70s and couples therapy. 

Robin | Yes, yes. 

John | And then it got lost in the drug wars. It got.

Robin | Yeah

Joree | Right now, it's being considered the fifth wave of psychotherapy, it's been called a psychedelic renaissance. And, ultimately, to your point earlier, Robin, we all want to heal, we want to heal, and we want to be connected. 

Robin | Yes. 

Joree | And there's a lot of barriers that aren't our fault, that have conditioned us to not know how to heal effectively, and how to connect, really, on a vulnerable emotional level

Robin | Right. And so

Joree | Not everyone's gonna have that desire. But for those who do, just, I'm excited that there's, you know, multiple levels of work to be done. And talk therapy is a limiting, honestly, and as a therapist to say that because we're we can get stuck in, you know, our patterns of thinking and not open to possibility,

John | I think talk therapy is one tool and one framework just like science. 

Robin | Yep. 

John | Just like spirituality is

Robin | So I am, I am curious, before we move on from this topic, because I just I am so fascinated by it, I really am. So, talking about how your experience using psilocybin and how it goes deep into, you know, I'm just wondering about like, yes, you're able to have these conversations together and you're not being triggered. Were you able to reflect like were did you were you able to see like subconsciously, these things coming to your memory around like childhood traumas that you may not have have identified that are causing these, you know, unhealthy patterns in your in relationships, you want to take that one because you have the most, like, past relationship traumas that just weren't in front, your your, your top of mind? Like I'm wondering, yeah, and stuff that you weren't actually conscious of, you're like, oh, wow, like that really is affecting my relationships?

Joree | Yeah, in fact, absolutely, yes. And somewhat recently, we did a journey. And I with in minutes. I was curled up on the floor, kind of in the fetal position, my eyes were closed. And I had a very, very clear, I don't think it was a vision, it was a memory, it was an embedded memory of, I want to say around one years old, I was in my crib, and I saw this entire scene play out. And Robin, it was literally like I was there. 

Robin | Yeah

Joree | Be a little girl. And it was all family of origin stuff that as I had this experience of feeling like I was that little girl. And then throughout the rest of the day, sharing that experience with John and processing and and talking about it, and helping see how it bridges into where I'm at now, both with family of origin as well as relationally. It was huge. And it was healing and what I've been able to do to continue to process that process that and give myself the permission to not do the same patterns as what I was. So it's, you know, there's all going to be different experiences. Sometimes it's very spiritual, but this was one that was very clear childhood.

John | One of the ways I like to go with it is in a couple of the studies, one of the ways they gauge the effectiveness of a journey with psilocybin is by using the mystical experience questionnaire. And what they looked at in that questionnaire are things like, did you have a contact with God or higher power? Did you feel interconnectedness to all living things on the planet? Did you feel out of body? Did you and you know, they kind of go into six different areas to look at kind of the interconnectedness or, you know, could you realize that you are not alone in this universe, that we're not late, we're not limited to this five layer meat sack that we are in. Because that's an incredibly limiting depressing belief that I am that I am an island, I am completely by myself. And I'm cut off from all other individuals, which you know, what is depression? But I would say those beliefs,

Robin | Yeah

John | I don't want them it's hopeless. I can't connect with anybody. And so the opposite of that, is these beliefs that you kind of get? You have a visceral experience with many times of being interconnected with all things. 

Robin | Yes. Love that.

Joree | So then we take it from that, you know, very spiritual inner connectivity to then having that deep level of interconnectivity, which with one another, that's very healing, and they're

John | And there one in the same moment. It is. Yeah, I mean, there, you can argue that they're different. But I would say it's exactly it's the same thing. 

Joree | Yeah. 

Robin | And you're bringing that awareness into your everyday experience. Now? It stays with you. Yeah, not so easily. Yes. That's one of my learnings, when I was listening to your podcast about it and sharing your story about it, which I was like,

Joree | That's important to understand. Because it's not, you know, and I want to say this to, you know, the research around this is not only quite solid, but part of what makes this different than a party experience, like a party drug, is what's considered set and setting. And the set is the mindset you have going into this is how are you setting an intention? What are you hoping to receive from this journey? And, you know, with, especially with psilocybin being a plant medicine, part of it is what am I here for the medicine to teach me and really releasing and surrendering into the wisdom of the medicine. And that setting is physically what is your environment Who were you with, right? If you're taking mushrooms, or you're taking, you know, ecstasy at a rave, that setting is going to be very different than you are if at home with your partner lying down with some blankets with some soft music, or you're lying outside in the grass, or you're in the hot tub regularly. So the setting of physically who you're with, and your environment, because as we're opening up different levels of consciousness, we are also susceptible to bring in outside influence. 

Robin | That's for sure

Joree | That's a lot of layers here that really make this an intentional healing opportunity. And that's just a big piece I wanted to name. 

Robin | Yeah. So you are going to be leading your Couples Retreat in September. And, and even just in your own inner practice right now with couples, like what I would wanted to ask is, and this is, there's probably not one, of course, not one answer. But what would you say are some key skills that you are inviting couples to work through that you're guiding them through to improve their relationships? Because everybody's gonna, I can just see, like, I've been getting couples therapy, and people come with their, like, biggest complaints. This says what's going on? He's doing this, she's doing that, or they're doing this, right. And it's like this. 

Joree | There's a lot of finger pointing.

Robin | Right, because there's fights do you have that are seem to be consistent, which we know most fights can't be resolved. 

Joree | Yeah.

John | How are you on swearing on this podcast?

Robin | Pardon me?

John | How are you on swearing on this podcast? 

Robin | You can swear as much as you want.

John | I was really looking at this question. And I was writing out some notes just to get my thoughts clear. And this question came up and I was like, and I wrote fuck, period, a bunch period. And I sent it to Joree. And her interpretation was 

Joree | Have a lot of sex.

John | Well, yeah, okay, that works. But there's a ton of tools. 

Joree | There's a lot there's a lot,, but I think they should have been fuck exclamation point, comma, punctuation.

John | I think the foundational skill of self awareness, and I think it's yes, taking radical accountability for your own shit. Because so often we're stuck in that loop of anger, right. And anger is intoxicating. It's empowering. It's addicting. And it sells us a bill of goods because if you and I are angry at each other Robin, I am in my mind, your rational mind externalizing all blame onto you. And if you would just stop being such a fill in the blank, I wouldn't be so pissed off. So I've given up all my power and given it to you, but it also completely cuts me off from any possibility of introspection and personal growth. And that's a huge disservice to ourselves. So I think the first step is really? What's my part In this dynamic? 

 Robin | Right

John | And then let me work on that. So that's the individual piece, right? And then you've got relational skills on top of that. But that individual piece can take, I mean, that's a process. As you mentioned earlier, 

Robin | It is a process. I was just gonna ask, I'm kind of just

Joree | Can I add to that?

Robin |  Yeah

Joree | Real quick. You know, we we just started this year, long, masterclass series, and it's based on frameworks that we've developed and kind of combined all of our, I guess, combined 50 years of work of your 30 years, my 20 years of doing this work. And we're calling it the AWARE Method. Because what we're recognizing is, you know, I love Gotman's work, I'm trained in some of Gotman's work, and the ideas of, you know, getting to know one another in their left maps, and creating a culture of gratitude and appreciation and repair attempts, I think, are phenomenal tools. And if we're not self aware, we can access that, right,

John | Because what we see in so many couples that we work with is we can teach them tools, but they're still getting stuck in this dynamic of conflict and finger pointing. 

Joree | And it's not 

John | Individual work, right.

Joree | And so we really want to help couples and partly against through our own vulnerability, and I'll be the first to say like, I've been teaching mindfulness and meditation for almost 15 years, and I'm embarrassed to say, I wasn't being super self aware of how what I was saying, and what I was doing was inconsistent, that he was feeling was hurtful in the relationship. And it took our break up for me to really see Oh, shit, I thought I was being aware of when I said and did this, but I can now see where I wasn't, I had my own blinders on, which was partly a function of my own, you know, traumas and such, from my past, that was my own protective defense mechanism. But if I'm not aware of that, then I can't openly hear him. So, you know, we like to draw upon all that different aspects. I mean, we love Terry Real work, I love Gottman's work, I, you know, and we want to be able to say, Look, you got to do both the self and relational ongoing simultaneously. Because if you're just doing couples work without doing any individual work attached to it, you're missing where the depth can be uncovered, for real connection, for real vulnerability. So it's, it's, you know, the retreat is about guiding couples in both.

John | And the other thing we do is we'll share anything pretty much in our story, in an act of vulnerability, because part of it is I want men to show I want to model for men that they can be vulnerable, I want to show them that vulnerability creates connection, I want to give them permission to feel because that's one of the things that we really need to work on is getting men comfortable with emotion, comfortable with feeling comfortable with being vulnerable. And there's great research that came out recently that shows that to go from an acquaintance, if you want to develop friendship, a friendship, you go from being an acquaintance to a friend, it takes about 40 to 50 hours of time together to go from friend to best friend or close friend, it's about 150 to 200 hours. So if you tell that to an adult, that busy adults can be like, Well, shit, I don't have the time for that. Like, how am I going to do that? Now, here's the loophole, which is incredibly important. If you introduce vulnerability into that equation, it collapses that 200 hours to 45 minutes. 

Robin | Wow.

John | And I had a real life experience of this recently, after the death of my son where I shared that I was struggling because of the death of my son with a guy that was an acquaintance like I barely knew him. And he responded really well. And the next day, he was vulnerable in return with me. And now we're friends. And we have very little in common. 

Robin | Right

John | And but we were, we're connected now, because we had this deep sharing,

Robin | You're connected through your vulnerability. 

John | And so if you can do that with an acquaintance, what is it, what can you do in your relationship?

Joree | I see so many couples so afraid of being vulnerable? Yes, it takes it takes just one time of you being shut down. Really, I'm not doing that again. Fuck that. Yeah, I'm not gonna expose myself. I'm not gonna let him know how I really feel because what if he uses it against me? Or judges me? Or, you know, now decides maybe he won't want to be with me if he knows me. 

Robin | Yeah. Okay, so let's talk about this skill, because you brought up in the beginning about understanding your partner's core wounds. And wouldn't that be the same? Or is there a difference between two questions? Is it the same as understanding your partner's core vulnerabilities? Because those are our wounds Right? Like are they using them?

Joree | I think it's not completely interchangeable. I think the core wound is that that the story around like what happened? Right, what is some of the core experiences As earlier in your life that led you to developing the defenses you have that led to your sensitivities that led to your insecurities that are preventing the vulnerabilities. So that's where if we don't expose ourselves to our partners, we might not have context for understanding why they're acting the way they're acting. So I think, you know, it's really getting to know one another. And that helps give basis for why are they acting the way they're acting, because otherwise we see a behavior. And then we react to the behavior. And I do a lot of parenting work. And I always tell parents, there's always an emotion driving behavior. But like if you have a tantruming child, and you don't like that, because it's undesirable, and it's never on the right timeframe of what you've got going on in your moment or day, and you're trying to get the behavior consequence, which is only going to end in a hierarchical battle of who's gonna win is the same with adults with no relationships. Exactly. But if we if we pause on reacting to the behavior temporarily, because we still need to have boundaries and appropriate levels of fair play in arguing. But if you, you know, take a moment to get curious and compassionate to say, well, like what's going on underneath there? We love the question of, you know, what's the story you're telling yourself right now, or help me understand what's coming up for you right now. And you get in, you know, investigate with the emotion under the behavior. Now we can understand how the core wound is leading to this disconnection right now.

John | And, you know, Jordan mentioned that dynamic that we had early on where we would get in a disagreement, and then we work to repair, I thought we were done a couple days later, she's like, I'm not done, I want to bring this up again. And I was like, Oh, shit, you know, kind of rolling my eyes. And over time, I realized that this was actually a highly effective tool to go back and revisit these disagreements, because coming back to these disagreements days or a week later, means that you can be more objective about it, you can be more curious, you can dig deeper, you can look at it with real honesty. And that's how I believe you kind of unearth some of these patterns. It's like, if I, am I really mad at you, or am I mad at my past partner? Or am I mad at my mom, because of something that happened in my childhood? Like, what's what's triggering this emotion that's a little bit out of perspective, disproportionate to what actually happened,

Joree | right? The other thing, and, again, we're two therapists. So we might have the language but we we've actually been able to even more in the moment say, Is this about me? Is this about your ex? Or is this about your mom, because one of the three of us and I don't think it's me right now, actually. So let's just get clarity on what's the actual trigger here. But this also gets added into the other part of it, but you were gonna go back to was our interest avoidant dance that we got stuck in. And I would get pretty anxious about when I would see him taking distance. And my anxiety at times would feel more distanced, because I'm sure it wasn't, you know, enjoyable, as I'm like, kind of grasping and clinging and like, don't leave, don't leave, don't leave. And that feels embarrassing for me as well. But in continuing to go back to these, we were able to understand because of my core wounds, oh, that actually wasn't just an anxious response. That was a trauma response, which takes it to a whole

John | new level. And for me, it's like, oh, because once we came to that understanding, it helped me to get out of my own anger in the moment to be like, her needs take primacy right now her needs are primary, I need to help her calm her own physiology.

Robin | And that kind of that's such a like, I just, I love that so much. Because that is coming from such a loving place. You're like, Okay, I'm really pissed. I'm so angry. However, she's having she's having a traumatic response. And like her, I need to be there for her right now, even though I'm in my place. And

Joree | it's gonna change, it's not always going to be that this is art. And this was like, you know, is this a moment of self regulation, because that was also really helpful for me to learn how to self regulate in those moments and not rely on my partner to regulate me. And when is this a moment for CO regulation. And that's going to take a wisdom to know the difference, but also flexibility to not over touch that it always is going to be one way or the

John | other. And I think one of the ideas I love in relation to this is, you know, there's three entities when you're in a relationship, there's you, there's me, and there's the relationship. And I think we have to get past this idea of looking at ourselves as individuals and putting my individual needs, you know, above everyone else in this relationship. Rather, it works really well to put the relationship or to put the needs of the relationship as number one in that triad. Because paradoxically, when you do that, you get your own needs met in a much more satisfying way. But it takes a little bit of rethinking about relationship in general. It

Robin | Sure does. It takes a lot of maturity and awareness, mindfulness, all of those things that we're talking about. So watch is the self work, right? Yes. Because this off work. So one of the core wounds that you both had identified and correct me if I'm wrong, but this was, this was through therapy or just like through all of your introspection. But you were being triggered John, by jury traveling, right for work. And you figured out that it wasn't, you know, it wasn't just that you were missing her, or like, whatever we think about when your partner travels for work, but he would, she would come

Joree | wasn't for work. It wasn't always for work. Sorry. Okay. Just. Yeah.

Robin | But you realized that it was feeling abandoned from like your childhood, when your parents would leave and go off in different countries. And you actually, you know, sometimes you're putting unsafe positions or uncomfortable.

John | There was a worth issue in there too, right? That if you love me, you wouldn't leave me. Or if I was worthy, you wouldn't leave me. And part of it was we were caught in a dynamic because after her marriage, she was trying to prove that she was independent, 

Robin | Yes

John | And could stand on her own. And I felt it was very, it wasn't very relational, to the extent that she was doing it. So I really struggled with it. And so there was layers to it that I had to figure out, but that I think one of the last layers, the deepest layers was holy shit. This goes back to my childhood, where my parents did leave for weeks at a time and would leave us with a babysitter. And you know, some yeah, some, some weird stuff happened while they were gone. 

Robin | Yeah.

John | Where I didn't feel safe. When I was young. I was like, 5,6,7.

Joree | And that was where my own lack of awareness for how was hurting him because I was coming from a place of having been dependent and codependent my whole life. So for me to do things independently, literally was major growth for me. And I wanted to be like, Look at me, I'm a big girl. Now, Aren't you proud of me? Aren't you proud of me? Look what I'm doing? And he's like, No, this fucking sucks. For a while. No, I understand. I understand. Right. But like when I got to really a hard point, but that was where I had to recognize, okay, you know, I can prove to myself I can be independent, and have it not hurt my partner. 

Robin | Right I think

John | I think she wasn't putting the relationship into the relationship number one. 

Joree | I wasn't it

Robin | Right. 

John | And so we've kind of learned over time how to adjust, we both had to learn some individual lessons that were, I believe, in a very deep level. Because part of this is I think you have to have a pretty healthy amount of humility, to be able to look at your stuff, right, with honesty, with clarity. And you also have to have some ego strength to look at it and say, Yeah, you know, I mean, like, if you want to ask me five years ago, did I have any trauma? I would have said no. But the more I studied trauma, a little T trauma, big T trauma, like, yeah, there was an accumulation of little T trauma in there. And there was some big T trauma and it left a mark. As trauma does.

Robin | We all have trauma, right? We all have it.

John | It's impossible not to I believe.

Robin | Right. That's yeah, that's our journey as human beings. So this is just like I this conversation is just so full of Wow. A lot of like reflection and learnings. I've just I loved it so much. So tell me like if people that are listening want to, like dive into these things, we're talking about like core wounds, vulnerability, oh my gosh, I'm repeating the same arguments with my partner. If there's people that want to work with you, like do you do? Are you doing zoom sessions are you doing? How does that work? Or give your master class they can take they can go to Costa Rica. 

Joree | So we've got yeah, we've got a couple of offerings right now. One of the lowest points of entry is through our monthly masterclass, which is called the AWARE Method. And it's cumulative. But also each month does stand on its own so you can find the link and I'll give you all those links. So if you want to do the whole year and even though january MONTH has already happened, you can actually retro actively get any month prior. And in fact, we're giving our January one away as a free entry into understanding us and our work. So that's a gift for any of the listeners and I'll have those links for you Robin so you can put those in the show notes. So the monthly masterclass is really just an overview an entree point into understanding our methodology of this interplay of self and relational work. And we also are taking on coaching clients for couples who to self select, if you're the right couple to work with us. You're not in the midst of crisis. You're not having one foot out the door deciding if you're going to divorce you're not in the midst of addiction or massive trauma. This is for couples who've done a little bit of their work and yet know that they're not where they want to be and they're ready to go deeper and they're ready to delve in and they're ready to learn to be vulnerable. They really want to connect. We see a lot of couples who are like, should I stay in this marriage? We're working on whether and I want to stay. We want to work with the couples who saying, this is hard. And I'm committed, because I know through this work, it's going to be better on the other side. So we want to guide couples through that journey who really want to do that work, because that's exciting as hell for us. 

Robin | Yeah

Joree | So, you know, we are joint relationship, or we have individual websites, but our joint website is theultimaterelationship.com. 

Robin | Oh, okay, great. 

Joree | So that's an easy place to be able to get access. And then of course, we've got our Costa Rica retreat, end of September for seven days at an amazing resort, we've been to a handful of times, it's really conducive. Because the other thing is, here's this, it's really hard to create change for an hour or two in the midst of your busy day. And I love retreats, my biggest transformations have happened on retreat, because when you commit to taking yourself out of your day to day routines, and I'm committed enough to put everything else to the side, including my responsibilities with the kids, and with work and all the other challenges that comes with taking time for yourself, you're then prioritizing yourself, and you're giving yourself the opportunity to be fully present. 

John | I would say retreats and psilocybin. 

Joree | Yeah.

Robin | That too.

Joree | But we do, but we do zoom calls, you know, for our sessions, we've come up with anyone all over the planet, we've had clients all over the world that we've worked with. So 

Robin | Is this, is this Costa Rica? Is this just for couples? or can people come? It is for couples, isn't it?

Joree | No, actually, we're opening it up for anyone who wants to to learn the tools to be in better relationship. So if you are not currently partnered, or you are and only one of you can come, it's still gonna benefit you no matter what.

John | And part of it said self worth part of its relational. So it's It benefits, everyone in terms of relationship to self relationship to other.

Robin |  Wonderful. Well, I also want to ask you, are you able to come to our summit in April in Vancouver?

Joree | I don't know, we actually have just changed our travel plans. We weren't gonna be in Europe at the time, but we haven't even looked at the calendar that far. So 

Robin | Okay well, I'll send you the link, I really got a great lineup again, on 12,13,14. And this is gonna be like, I think, similar to what you were just saying about learning. When you're with, you know, it's, I think there's something so there's so something so powerful about coming together as a group as well. And that, that joint experience that collective learning, it's, it's a real thing. 

Joree | It's powerful.

Robin |  It really, really is, because you're all there for to share your energy and that love and that learning.

Joree | And everyone's there for the same intention of how do I be better in relationship. And I just want to end with one. One thing is, you know, so many people get stuck on the whole, I wasn't role model this, I don't have the role models of what a healthy relationship looks like. And I just want to call BS on any of us needing to have a role model to know what to do. We didn't have a lot of role models on parenting, but we know what we didn't want by what we may have seen. 

Robin |  Yeah

Joree | Right. So just because we didn't have a role models for this doesn't matter. If you have a desire to have a more connected, aligned, authentic partnership. That's all you need is the desire for it. That's right, the capacity to do the work. But many people get stuck on Well, I don't know what this looks like, great. Well, you know what it doesn't look like. So that's a good place to start. By that contrast, you know what you do what you might want? 

Robin |  Yeah. Well, thank you, Joree, and John, for joining me today. And I just think this is this episode is just so full of really, really good skills and tools people can take away and hopefully implement in their own lives. So I'm going to close 

John | Thank you for having us.

Robin |  Yes, thank you, I'm going to close with a blessing. May we remain open to new skills and tools that can help us in our ongoing journey of healing. May we practice this skill of being vulnerable, and I'll add self awareness and self accountability with each other, in order to create stronger, more intimate and meaningful connections, and may we show ourselves and our partners grace and kindness and authenticity in times of disharmony. So that repair may be achievable. So thank you.

Joree | That was so beautiful. Thank you so much, Robin.

Robin |  Thank you so much for listening. Visit realloveready.com. To continue learning with us. Please rate and review this podcast. Your feedback helps us get you the tools and guidance you need to form more loving relationships and create positive change in your life. We at Real Love Ready, acknowledge and express gratitude for the Coast Salish people, the stewards of the land on which we work in play, and encourage you to take a moment to acknowledge and express gratitude for those that have stewarded and continue to steward the land that you live on as well. Many blessings and much love.