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Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert, Expert s on Expert.
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I m Dax Randall Shepard.
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I m joined by Monica Lilly Badman.
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Hi.
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Hi.
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This is a saucy episode because we get to talk about sex, baby.
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Let s talk about you and me.
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I loved this episode.
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Me too.
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It was really, really fun.
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Vanessa Marin is a licensed psychotherapist specializing in sex therapy.
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She s also a best-selling author.
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She has a book coming out on January 30th.
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She wrote that with her husband, Xander Marin, and they also have a podcast that is already out called Pillow Talks, which is hosted by Vanessa and her husband, Xander.
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I feel like people know about them.
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They re out and about.
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They re out and about.
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They have a social media presence.
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Yes, they do.
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But I do think, not unlike her book, if you listen to this and you have been in a relationship, you re gonna relate.
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I think we all will relate to this.
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I mean, just like couples therapy, Orna, where every single couple is dealing with some sort of sex issue, she sort of normalizes that and then helps people get through it.
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I found it very fascinating.
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Yeah, and very, very informative.
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I think it ll be very encouraging for people.
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I think a lot of people have thrown in the towel or they feel defeated by it, and I think there s a very pragmatic, simple approach to getting back on track.
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Back on that horse.
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Please enjoy Vanessa Marin.
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He s an upturned expert.
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He s an upturned expert.
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He s an upturned expert.
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Hello.
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How are you?
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I m good.
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I m Dax.
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Nice to meet you.
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SPEAKER_02
Welcome.
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Thank you.
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Hi, Dax.
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Great to meet you.
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Happy New Year.
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Where in California do you live?
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I live in Santa Barbara.
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Oh, you do?
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Yeah, I m from there, but I lived here in Silver Lake for a long time before I moved back last year.
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How long were you away from Santa Barbara?
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20 years.
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Oh, 20 years.
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Yeah, I grew up there and then was like, I gotta get out of here.
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And then eventually realized, what have I done moving away from the best place in the world?
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I lived there from 95 to 96.
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Oh.
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On Bath Street.
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Oh.
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Maybe two blocks off the ocean in an enormous yellow building apartment.
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It looked like a McDonald s.
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Yeah, that s an interesting spot.
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What school did you go to?
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I went to Santa Barbara High School.
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And you didn t want to go to UCSB?
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I didn t.
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I had very romantic ideas of going to school on the East Coast.
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Of course.
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Me too.
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Never happened.
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Actually, I did kind of go to school on the East Coast.
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Well.
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We can count it.
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Technically, it s on the East Coast of the South.
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Oh, sure.
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But wait, where did you go?
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Forgive me.
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I went to Brown.
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So I got to have my experience and then was like, I m not made for this, this weather.
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I have to presume my children will want to go to the East.
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It s just really funny.
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Wherever you grew up, you want to go to the opposite.
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I was in Detroit and I was like, I could get over to California.
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It feels very glamorous, especially for college.
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Snow, older buildings and all the things.
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Santa Barbara s a, it s an interesting vibe though.
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I don t know that everyone gets it.
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Like if you just go there on vacation, it s glorious.
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It couldn t be prettier.
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But when I was living there, I was like, there s a whole strata of kids whose parents are rich and they ve been neglected and they re all meth addicts.
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And there s just a real weird underbelly there, right?
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There is.
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And you don t expect it coming from Santa Barbara.
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There s so much wealth, but it s low-key wealth.
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It can mess with you in some interesting ways.
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So that s why I wanted to get out of it for a while.
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It s like, I don t want to have my whole life in this place.
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I need to get out, have some other experiences.
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Yeah.
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And what brought your parents to Santa Barbara?
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Are they like second generation?
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Yeah.
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Are you one of the...
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Are you a meth addict?
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Yeah.
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We re going to go in a totally different direction with this interview.
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It s great for your sex life, Matt, to just talk to the users.
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My mom s mom came up from Mexico.
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They had some family who had already immigrated and came there.
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My parents still live in the house that my mom grew up in.
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No way.
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How old is that house?
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It was made in the 1920s, I believe.
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So you know Santa Barbara.
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It s up in the Riviera, like beautiful up in the hills.
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But back in the day, apparently, that was a very undesirable neighborhood because it was too far from the beach.
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So it was a primarily Mexican community because the houses were really cheap up there.
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Yeah.
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Is it by the mission that s up there?
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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Brings back a lot of good memories.
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And you got a BA from Brown in sexual health and sociology.
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What was it, sexual something?
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Human sexuality.
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Human sexuality.
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And in sociology, I got dual bachelors.
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Okay, now did you feel brave by declaring this?
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Because let s just, I want to own my stuff.
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I m a fucking pervert.
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If I could have majored in sex at college, obviously I could have.
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If I would have known I could have, but then maybe some voice would have been like,
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You don t need to explore this more.
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You need to pull back.
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You would have been disappointed because it s not like how to have sex.
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Is it?
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No.
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Let s talk.
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That would have been fun, but no.
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But did you feel like you were declaring your own pervertedness by majoring in that?
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A little bit.
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I was always interested in sex therapy from a really young age.
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Okay.
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Sex just fascinated me.
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And my initial interest in becoming a sex therapist was actually my parents trying to give me the talk.
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Okay.
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It was super awkward, like most people s experience of the talk is.
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I didn t even get one.
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It s like osmosis.
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Well, a book was placed on a shelf.
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It was there when I was born.
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It was like, she ll probably find it.
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She s a voracious reader.
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She ll run out of everything else to read.
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Did you get a talk?
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Oh, it would blow your mind what my mother told me.
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Probably over the line.
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I was in, I think, second grade.
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And I heard people on the playground calling other kids butt humpers.
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He s a butt humper.
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So I came home and at dinner I said to my mom,
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someone so-called so-and-so a butt humper.
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She goes, oh, okay.
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And I said, do people do that?
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Do they hump in the butt?
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And my mother goes straight faced immediately.
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Well, there s a tremendous amount of nerve endings in the anus and some people find it pleasurable and some don t.
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I love it.
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I was like, okay.
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And did you understand?
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Yeah, totally.
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I m like, okay, people do that.
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And some people like it and some people don t.
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And that proved to be true.
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She s probably should have mentioned most people don t like it.
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Some people do.
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That would maybe meant more honest, but whatever.
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We re pivoting a tiny bit, but it s in keeping.
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I didn t tell you this, but I took their daughter on a shopping spree for her birthday.
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She s my best friend.
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Auntie Monica spoils them.
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Yes, and she was turning nine.
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We went to all these places, but we ended up at Target.
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And she s getting like little squish mellows, mainly.
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Very tactile child.
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Yeah, but they re very mature, these children.
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Obviously, that s their grandma.
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And so we re walking by the lingerie.
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And I kind of assumed they already knew what it was.
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Sure.
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And Delta said, oh, that s a cool bathing suit.
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Okay, uh-huh.
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And I didn t even, it just came out of my mouth so fast.
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I was like, I think it s lingerie.
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And then she was like, what s that?
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And then I felt like I didn t know if I was allowed to tell her.
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What if you just instinctually went, there s a lot of nerve endings in the anus.
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But it s a weird thing to explain to a kid that sometimes you d want to dress
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sexy.
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Then I was like, am I putting something in her brain that she probably shouldn t hear that you re supposed to dress up for people to make yourself sexy?
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It just got scary fast.
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Well, I think you say that, you know, sometimes you want to wear a nice outfit when you go out for dinner and you want to feel pretty.
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You can also do that before going to bed.
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If you want your partner, you know, you both want to be excited by what you re wearing to bed.
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Oh, I didn t.
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What did you say?
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Whores wear lingerie.
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You re going straight to hell.
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No, I think I just said, oh, sometimes people like to wear it to feel sexy.
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Yeah, there you go.
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Perfect.
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That s good.
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What would you have said?
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I like what you said, actually.
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You know, I think sometimes people, we like to wear different things and sometimes people like, yeah, we like to wear these kinds of outfits.
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Yeah.
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Back to the talk.
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Because they left a lot unsaid?
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Yeah, so their version of it, we were trapped in our minivan driving home from grandma s house after family dinner, and my mom s driving, she looks at me in the rearview mirror and she says, you have any questions about, you know,
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Oh boy.
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You can ask.
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Yeah, it was definitely whispered.
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There were some long, awkward pauses.
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And I remember in that moment just thinking, what she s really saying is, please, for the love of God, don t ask me anything.
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Oh my god!
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First ever.
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Oh my god.
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First ever.
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Oh my god, I made you do a spit taste.
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SPEAKER_03
That s never happened in six years.
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That has not happened in six years on this show.
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Oh my god, I need to get some papers out.
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And there s fucking olive oil all over everything.
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I m jealous that you got that out of him.
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I ve said some pretty funny stuff.
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Wow.
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I feel really honored by this.
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What happened?
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I didn t think spit tastes were real.
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it was really uh iconic like it looked very classic a lot of fluid tell us the truth
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Was it just that it was too hot?
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No!
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Her delivery of that was fucking great.
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Wow!
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Great start to 2024.
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I feel like I need to get some sort of special award at the end of the year.
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We need to get you a medal.
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I m telling you, I don t think I thought those were real.
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I didn t either.
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Fuck.
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And I was wearing my most expensive fucking.
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I know.
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I should never have worn this up here.
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I should be trusted to have that.
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It s weird that it kind of got on you, because it was so projected.
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Oh yes, it went everywhere.
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I m surprised, you might need to check yours were.
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It s fucking all over the carpet.
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And it s oil, it s not just coffee.
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Oh yeah.
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It s the bummer.
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Oh no.
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Okay, wow, thank you for that.
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Okay.
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That s a good omen.
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You knew, please don t ask.
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So I knew, don t ask, we don t want to talk about it.
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It really struck me in that moment of like, why can t I ask?
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Because I had a lot of questions.
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Of course.
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I was very curious.
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I was hearing things on the playground.
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I d actually just made a bet with my guy friend, Nick, about how many holes a lady had down there.
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Okay.
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I was wrong.
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I lost a dollar.
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What did you think?
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I thought there were two.
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Yeah.
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Oh, we re counting the urethra as a hole?
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Yes, that s a hole.
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We ve already discussed this.
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Sometimes it s a hole, sometimes it s not.
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We ve already discussed this.
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But hold on, Monica.
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It is closed until you re applying pressure on it.
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How about it s a hole with a latch?
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It s still a hole.
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You re right, okay.
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Oh my God, okay.
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Yeah.
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Okay, sorry.
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So I did have a lot of questions I wanted to ask things and yeah, I was very struck in that moment about like, why can t we talk about this?
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I want to talk about it.
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Ooh, this would be a great place to start with theories.
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Because yes, why is it?
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There s obviously like a puritanical religious history to this.
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From the anthropological point of view, we all lived in a one-room house most of the time we ve been here on Planet Earth.
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So we were hearing fucking nonstop.
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It wasn t this thing that we recoiled from.
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That all changed when we went to multi-room dwellings and you were removed from it.
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But then beyond that, I think, for me, the reason the topic is so loaded that people don t really
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give credit to is our primary purpose on this planet is to reproduce.
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You re here to eat, stay alive and reproduce.
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And so any talk of sex, sex in general has the stakes of not being desirable, not reproducing, not being attractive, being excluded, not fulfilling this weird primary instinct we have that we never can put our fingers on.
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Like it s the highest stakes there are in a way.
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Yeah, I mean, I think really for the U.S.
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it traces back to Victorian times when we started getting really uncomfortable with sex and the attitude started changing a lot.
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We haven t really recovered.
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We re slowly inching towards more openness and more comfort, but I think most people in this day and age just have generations of shame and trauma that we re really struggling to unpack.
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Yeah, and if you even look at the art tradition of them going in and covering up famous paintings, the genitalia in the Vatican, like we had a whole period where everyone loved nudity, you know, they were just fine with it.
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And then we went and put fucking leaves.
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Did something happen other than just that was the era?
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Was there a impetus?
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You know, I m certainly not like a sexual historian, but Victorians just really had very different attitudes towards sex where shame started to come into it.
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A lot of stuff around masturbation, you know, there s really strongly anti-masturbation things and just this feeling that sex was something dangerous.
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To do the degree that they started covering the legs of furniture with fabric, like even the legs of the furniture in the Victorian era was too risque.
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Yeah, sex became something to be feared.
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Yes.
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Maybe STIs were on the rise?
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They ve been with us for, I know, but maybe there was a major influx or something that causes fear.
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Well, there s curious once you got removed from hearing your aunts and uncles and your parents having sex and you were just in a bedroom down the hall and you didn t know you had to start filling in the blanks and in the filling in the blanks became the proclivities and the perversions and the shame proclivities are born out of the ignorance and curiosity that no one s educating you on.
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I think that s part of it.
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SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
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Anywho, so you re at Brown, and is the major itself everything you had wanted it to be?
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Did it answer all these questions?
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Did it create new ones?
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I decided to go to Brown because at the time it was one of just a couple of schools that had any sort of undergraduate program in human sexuality.
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And it was very small.
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I was the only person in it.
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SPEAKER_01
No!
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My year, the year before, and the year after.
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I was the only person.
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So it was really more of like a multidisciplinary.
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So basically I had an advisor and they said, take 10 sex related courses.
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So I kind of got to design my own curriculum.
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I did classes in anthropology and English and psychology.
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And Brown also let you make up your own classes too.
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So you could come up with your own curriculum, say, you know, I m going to read these books.
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I m going to write a paper on this type of thing.
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So I had a lot of freedom, which I ve always cherished.
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I had a lot of freedom to be able to pick and choose and mold my own education.
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But I definitely would have enjoyed having some friends along for the ride.
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And at that stage, when you were just getting your bachelor degree, did you have a fantasy of what you were going to do career-wise?
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Did you already think you were going to go into
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therapy and counseling?
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Well, I knew I wanted to do sex therapy in particular.
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SPEAKER_00
Oh, you did right from the jump?
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Right from the jump.
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I didn t know how I was going to do it though, because sex therapy wasn t and still isn t regulated.
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SPEAKER_01
You could actually call yourself a sex therapist tomorrow if you wanted to.
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SPEAKER_01
What?
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SPEAKER_01
Do not.
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I m not encouraging it.
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SPEAKER_01
Look at his face.
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SPEAKER_01
I hate this.
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SPEAKER_00
Please don t.
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My glee is knowing how much it angers you.
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SPEAKER_00
That s really what it is.
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SPEAKER_01
Don t people know by now never to say stuff like that?
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Take it back.
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So I didn t know how to pursue it.
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Initially, I was thinking maybe I would be a doctor and kind of do it more from the medical route.
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SPEAKER_01
And that was actually what I had started telling people in high school that I wanted to do.
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SPEAKER_01
The first few times you tell somebody as a 17 year old, like, I m going to be a sex therapist, you do not get good reactions.
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SPEAKER_00
Really?
1
SPEAKER_01
I was getting scholarships to go to school and, you know, at the scholarships award, oh, here s Vanessa.
1
SPEAKER_01
She s going off to Brown.
1
SPEAKER_01
What are you going to study?
1
SPEAKER_01
What did we just give you money to go study?
1
SPEAKER_01
Sex therapy.
1
SPEAKER_01
The room goes silent.
1
SPEAKER_01
So I started saying a doctor.
1
SPEAKER_01
Obviously, that sounds classier and more professional.
1
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
That idea got into the back of my head of, OK, maybe I ll be a doctor, like an OBGYN, and I ll go more of the medical route from it.
1
SPEAKER_01
So that was my initial approach.
1
SPEAKER_01
I did the dual majors and I did pre-med at Brown.
1
SPEAKER_00
Oh, my goodness.
1
SPEAKER_01
And then I took the MCAT and did horribly and hated all my pre-med classes and eventually realized this is not the path for me.
1
SPEAKER_01
So I thought, how about psychology instead?
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I would only ask you this because I know on your podcast and in your book, you re pretty open.
1
SPEAKER_00
What is your own sexual life at this time?
1
SPEAKER_00
Because you do see people go into psychology because they have a lot of unanswered questions about themselves.
1
SPEAKER_00
They hope to get some tools maybe that they can
1
SPEAKER_00
address, how would you evaluate your own sex life at that point?
1
SPEAKER_01
I was still very curious about sex and interested in it.
1
SPEAKER_01
But the biggest thing that I was really struggling with was orgasming with a partner.
1
SPEAKER_01
I had learned how to orgasm on my own pretty easily.
1
SPEAKER_01
It felt pretty straightforward.
1
SPEAKER_01
It felt like this very fun, exciting, cool thing that I could do with my body.
1
SPEAKER_01
And I could not replicate that experience with any partners.
1
SPEAKER_01
And it was not only the orgasm itself, but sex with a partner was very performative for me.
1
SPEAKER_01
It was all about my male partners
1
SPEAKER_01
pleasure, what he wanted to do, he was taking the lead.
1
SPEAKER_01
And so there was an internal struggle that I had for many years of this interest in sex and this fascination by it and wanting to pursue it for my career, to spend my life on it, but also this huge imposter syndrome of I have so many things within myself, I cannot find it within myself to initiate sex, to give feedback in the moment, to show a partner what my body likes and responds to.
1
SPEAKER_00
I might like to bring
1
SPEAKER_00
my toy with me to the next session.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
And anything like that.
1
SPEAKER_01
I really struggled with feeling like sex was something that I gave to a partner or did for a partner rather than something that was for me that I got to participate in.
1
SPEAKER_01
That is so common for people.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
And I think especially for women.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
I was just going to say, did you feel this frustration of going, this shouldn t be happening to me because I have the knowledge?
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
I felt like a horrible imposter.
1
SPEAKER_01
You know, I m studying this.
1
SPEAKER_01
I want to help people with this.
1
SPEAKER_01
And I m not really walking the walk myself.
1
SPEAKER_01
But a lot of that was because, you know, I was doing all this research and learning and exploration, but I wasn t learning any practical tools.
1
SPEAKER_01
I m learning about Kinsey and Masters and Johnson.
1
SPEAKER_01
And that s great.
1
SPEAKER_01
But like, what do I do in the moment with my partner when he s doing something that I don t like rather than just faking it and saying, that s so great.
1
SPEAKER_01
Keep going.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
1
SPEAKER_00
Because there s the awkwardness.
1
SPEAKER_01
It s so vulnerable and you don t want to hurt anyone s feelings.
1
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_01
A big thing that came up was I really wanted to make it seem like we were clicking when I was having sex with somebody that I really liked.
1
SPEAKER_01
Like, I want it to feel like the chemistry is there.
1
SPEAKER_01
It s so easy and effortless between the two of us.
1
SPEAKER_01
And so I had this idea in my head that my pleasure and my body were more complicated or needier than my partner s.
1
SPEAKER_01
And I felt very much alone in that, which I think most people have had the experience of feeling alone with some sort of sexual struggle.
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SPEAKER_00
that they ve had.
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SPEAKER_01
Were you talking to your girlfriends about it at all?
2
SPEAKER_00
A little bit, but talks with my girlfriends were more kind of braggy.
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SPEAKER_00
Like, oh, yeah, we had sex last night.
2
SPEAKER_00
Oh, it was so great.
2
SPEAKER_00
We didn t really get into the nitty gritty of I m really struggling to orgasm with anybody else.
2
SPEAKER_00
It was sort of this feeling of we re talking about it openly and look at us evolved college girls, but at the same time, like not being willing to be truly honest and vulnerable with each other about what was actually going on.
2
SPEAKER_00
The imposter syndrome that I felt made that so much harder for me.
2
SPEAKER_00
I was like, I can t admit to anybody that I, here I am this little sex therapist in training and I m not orgasming with my partners.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m not enjoying the sex that I m having.
2
SPEAKER_00
Like, I can t admit that to anybody.
2
SPEAKER_01
Had a guy said to you, how can I help you orgasm?
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SPEAKER_01
Would you have even been able to answer that or been confident enough to express what would have helped?
2
SPEAKER_00
I was never asked that.
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SPEAKER_01
You weren t.
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SPEAKER_00
I m not sure, honestly, how I would have responded to it.
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SPEAKER_00
I probably would not have been honest.
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SPEAKER_00
I probably would have said like, oh, what you re doing is great.
2
SPEAKER_00
Right, right.
2
SPEAKER_00
You re always making me orgasm.
2
SPEAKER_00
But the final straw for me when I decided to stop faking orgasms and finally figure this all out,
2
SPEAKER_00
was actually a partner who did the exact opposite.
2
SPEAKER_00
So we had been hooking up and I had faked an orgasm.
2
SPEAKER_00
I had gotten really good at a great convincing performance by that time.
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SPEAKER_00
And he d been using his hands on me and he said, I can play you like a fiddle.
2
SPEAKER_00
Oh boy.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I just, my stomach just turned in that moment, like just huge pit in my stomach.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I thought, this is so gross.
2
SPEAKER_00
This guy is so proud of himself and this sleazy, like I can
2
SPEAKER_00
What a weird thing to say to someone, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
I can play you like a fiddle.
2
SPEAKER_00
And so that was the moment for me of like, I m not doing this anymore.
2
SPEAKER_01
In some bizarre way, we have some gratitude for this person.
2
SPEAKER_00
Oh yeah, absolutely.
2
SPEAKER_00
I have a lot of those experiences in life where it seems horrible in the moment and then you look back and you re like, that terrible thing that happened to me was actually one of the best things that happened to me.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
As we ll discuss, there s so many tight ropes in sex.
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SPEAKER_01
It s so precarious.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so for a guy you re writing, there s the trope of the guy like immediately going, did you come?
2
SPEAKER_01
Which no woman wants that.
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SPEAKER_01
And yet also you want to make sure your partner s orgasm and you want to help in any way you can to facilitate
2
SPEAKER_01
So it s like this very narrow lane you can be in to explore that where you re not the guy just going like, did you come for my ego?
2
SPEAKER_01
Versus I want to make this as good as it can be for you.
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SPEAKER_01
How could I help?
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SPEAKER_01
That s a tricky, I think, especially if you re a young dude, zone to navigate.
2
SPEAKER_00
I think sex is tricky for everyone.
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SPEAKER_00
I think we have this tendency to think of male sexuality as simpler or easier than female sexuality, and it s really not.
2
SPEAKER_00
We re all struggling with what do we do in the moment.
2
SPEAKER_00
But yeah, for a lot of men, they feel this pressure to be in the lead, to be taking control, to know what they re doing, and to be able to like guide the whole interaction.
2
SPEAKER_00
And that s a lot of pressure.
2
SPEAKER_01
Let s start with the fact that the male orgasm is almost a given.
2
SPEAKER_01
The female is much more elusive.
2
SPEAKER_01
So a guy s pride and esteem... That s not true.
2
SPEAKER_00
Okay, tell me why that s... So there s nothing inherently more complicated about female orgasm than about male orgasm.
2
SPEAKER_00
What the problem is, is the way that we re all having sex.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know, male-female cisgender relationships, the type of sex that we re having heavily prioritizes male pleasure.
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SPEAKER_00
Penetration.
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SPEAKER_01
Right, right, right, right.
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SPEAKER_00
Most male-female couples, we use sex and intercourse interchangeably.
2
SPEAKER_00
Like, when we have sex, we re having intercourse.
2
SPEAKER_00
That s the thing.
2
SPEAKER_01
To the degree that in the 80s, people would ask, like, how are two lesbians having sex?
2
SPEAKER_00
Yes, exactly.
2
SPEAKER_00
I mean, even think of the bases metaphor, you know, at the home run.
2
SPEAKER_01
Well, and it s the test of virginity.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s the thing, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
So if we look at intercourse, though, a man is getting stimulation of the most sensitive part of his body.
2
SPEAKER_01
His clitoris.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, okay, so you know about this, which is great.
2
SPEAKER_01
We ll tell everyone.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, most people don t know.
2
SPEAKER_00
Fetus is in the womb.
2
SPEAKER_00
We all start off like as the same little blob.
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SPEAKER_00
And when we re differentiating into we re going to be born a man or born a woman, the tissues start to differentiate around 8 to 11 weeks.
2
SPEAKER_00
And the exact same tissues that make a penis make a clitoris.
2
SPEAKER_00
So it s like having a ball of clay.
2
SPEAKER_00
I can mold it into a mug or I can mold it into a bowl.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s a different shape, but it s the same ball of clay that I m starting with.
2
SPEAKER_00
So the clitoris and the penis are biological equivalents, they re called homologous structures, and they both are the pleasure centers of their respective genders.
2
SPEAKER_00
So if we go to intercourse, like a man s getting stimulation of his penis and a woman is getting stimulation in her vagina.
2
SPEAKER_01
Let s add there too.
2
SPEAKER_01
So yes, all fetuses are female until mom senses testosterone.
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SPEAKER_01
The ovaries are dropping down through the body and becoming testes and where they drop down through and come is where your vagina is.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then the clitoris grows into a penis.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so if you can imagine if you re a guy right now, removing your balls and starting to put your fingers inside that hole, how stimulating you think that might be?
2
SPEAKER_01
Probably not entirely stimulating.
2
SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
2
SPEAKER_00
So the clitoris has anywhere from 8,000 to 10,000 nerve endings in it.
2
SPEAKER_00
The penis has 2,000 to 3,000.
2
SPEAKER_00
The vagina, there s not really even an accurate scientific tally of how many nerve endings are there, but it s not a particularly sensitive part of our bodies.
2
SPEAKER_01
You re going to pass a baby through that.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
I mean, the funny comparison that I always like to make is that intercourse for a woman is like playing with a man s balls.
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SPEAKER_00
Sure, it might feel good.
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SPEAKER_00
It can feel pleasurable.
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SPEAKER_00
It can feel fun to do with a partner.
2
SPEAKER_00
But for the vast majority of men, it s nowhere near enough stimulation to lead to orgasm.
2
SPEAKER_00
And we don t make men feel bad about that, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
There s not some alternate universe where we re like, you know, God,
2
SPEAKER_00
The penis, it s so complicated.
2
SPEAKER_00
Why do I have to touch that?
2
SPEAKER_00
Why can t you get the orgasm from the balls instead?
2
SPEAKER_00
Right.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I m in 100% agreement with you that biologically, neither is predisposed to have an orgasm easier.
2
SPEAKER_01
In the current sex teenagers are having, with the lack of education and the lack of instruction and the lack of understanding of the clitoris, all of that, the result of which is females are having far fewer orgasms than men are.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so in that world, which is the reality of the teenage boy, if a woman orgasms, that s the blue ribbon.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like that s the thing you have to do or you were bad, even though you don t understand how to make that happen because you ve watched porn, which is not realistic.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I m just saying when we re talking about different pressures, like I think for the boy, the pressure is like,
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SPEAKER_01
Oh my God, I gotta figure out how to get this.
2
SPEAKER_01
Girl, I don t know what the hell to do, you know.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, we re in agreement on that.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s not that biologically anything s different or more complicated than our bodies.
2
SPEAKER_00
Like people of all genders, we just need stimulation of the part of our body that s the most sensitive.
2
SPEAKER_00
And it s not an extremely difficult thing to do to invite the clitoris along to the party the same way that the penis is always invited to the party.
2
SPEAKER_00
Always at the party.
2
SPEAKER_00
But yeah, the way that most male-female couplings are having sex these days, there s very little in it for the woman and everything in it for the man.
2
SPEAKER_00
And so many of us women don t have that information or that knowledge, so most women feel like something is horribly wrong with them.
2
SPEAKER_00
I mean, it s one of the number one questions that I get from our community, like, what s wrong with me?
2
SPEAKER_00
I don t enjoy sex.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m never having orgasms.
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SPEAKER_00
barely even feels good.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m broken in some sort of way.
2
SPEAKER_00
But it s just a basic lack of information about what our bodies need to experience pleasure.
2
SPEAKER_01
Okay, so now we re like perfectly into the beginning, I think, of the book, which is breaking the fairy tale, confronting the fairy tale.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so there s a bunch of pretty well-worn and common things you ll see in your practice, and they re broken up into some categories that I think everyone will kind of relate to.
2
SPEAKER_01
But first and foremost, back to the growing up in multi-room homes,
2
SPEAKER_01
The only time we ve seen anyone have sex is in a film or TV, unless you got invited to an orgy at a young age.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like, I don t know where one would see it, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
So tell us what we see and what we expect.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, we see that same scene over and over again on TV and in the movies.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s the characters just look at each other across from the room and it s on and they re dashing off into the bedroom.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s hot and passionate and wild.
2
SPEAKER_00
The clothes are flying off.
2
SPEAKER_00
And we really only see a couple of seconds of rolling around in what we assume is intercourse.
2
SPEAKER_00
And then both heads are flopping back onto the pillow.
2
SPEAKER_00
Everybody is satisfied and happy.
2
SPEAKER_01
You say, like, in the book, you say, like, three pumps of missionary and both people are totally satiated.
2
SPEAKER_00
So, I mean, some of it is even just a logistical challenge for TV and the movies.
2
SPEAKER_00
There s a limited amount of time that you
2
SPEAKER_00
You re not going to show an entire 30 or 45 minute interaction or all the little pieces of it.
2
SPEAKER_00
So we see this condensed version of it.
2
SPEAKER_00
But as viewers, if that s the only thing we re ever seeing, rationally in our heads, we can think, okay, they re taking some license with the way they re filming it.
2
SPEAKER_00
But when we see it over and over and over and over again, it just gets drilled into your head of that s how it s supposed to be.
2
SPEAKER_00
Spontaneously passionate, completely effortless, zero communication required, heavy emphasis on intercourse.
2
SPEAKER_00
And simultaneous orgasm.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
Sounds great.
2
SPEAKER_01
Sounds like how it should be.
2
SPEAKER_01
You re right, though, because they re showing other things in the movies.
2
SPEAKER_01
And even in a car chase, they still got to shift the gears and hit the brakes and hit the gas.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s not like they deviate entirely in all the other areas, even when it s romanticized.
2
SPEAKER_01
But that one, yeah, is a real departure from what needs to happen.
2
SPEAKER_00
So as a sex therapist, I think the things that frustrate me the most are the feeling
3
SPEAKER_01
of effortlessness.
3
SPEAKER_01
Most people feel like sex should be absolutely effortless, that we shouldn t have to try or put effort into it in any sort of way.
3
SPEAKER_01
And then also the lack of communication, that my partner should just be able to read my mind.
3
SPEAKER_01
They should know my body better than I even know my own body and just magically do all those things that I need.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I m magically doing all the things that they need, so we re magically having the orgasm at the exact same moment.
3
SPEAKER_01
So those two things in particular are really harmful when we internalize them.
3
SPEAKER_01
And then also, oh, sorry.
3
SPEAKER_02
No, I just wanted to back up for just two seconds about the actual profession of a sex therapist.
3
SPEAKER_02
So is that a couple comes in and is having trouble connecting or a person is what is sex therapy?
3
SPEAKER_01
Sex therapy is just helping people create the sex lives that they want to have.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, that s the way that the simplified version that I look at it.
3
SPEAKER_01
So I would see people, you know, individually, I would see couples and it would be anything from our relationship is about to break up because we re not connecting in the bedroom to somebody just saying, you know, like, I feel like I don t really know who I am sexually and I kind of want to explore that.
3
SPEAKER_01
So all sorts of different goals and questions and concerns, but all wrapped up in the idea of like understanding and having the kind of sex that we want to be having.
3
SPEAKER_02
Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare.
3
SPEAKER_02
I just don t know a couple, truly, I don t know a couple that s been together for at least a year who doesn t have an issue with sex.
3
SPEAKER_02
I don t know one.
3
SPEAKER_02
Every couple does.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, and that s a
3
SPEAKER_00
perfect other thing that s really required at the very beginning, which is your chemistry.
3
SPEAKER_00
What happens chemically when you meet somebody, when there s novelty in something new that you get dopamine and you get serotonin and you get all these incredible chemicals that are encouraging you to fuck nonstop and have a baby.
3
SPEAKER_00
And then those are replaced with really nice oxytocin and other here and now chemicals that make you feel bonded for life and mates.
3
SPEAKER_00
No matter who you are or how horny you are, how invested you are, you too are going to go through this cycle of chemistry.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s completely unavoidable.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s so important to normalize that because physiologically our bodies are incapable of sustaining that kind of intensity of emotion.
3
SPEAKER_01
And sometimes I even tell people, like, imagine what life would look like if you were still as obsessed with your partner as you were at the very beginning.
3
SPEAKER_01
Like, it is fun at the beginning.
3
SPEAKER_01
Undeniably fun and exciting.
3
SPEAKER_00
But you re neglecting your work and your friendships.
3
SPEAKER_00
You re not cleaning your house.
3
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
3
SPEAKER_01
To be in that, you know, 15, 20 years later, your life would be crazy.
3
SPEAKER_01
The other aspect of it that I think we forget a lot is that we were actually putting a tremendous amount of effort in at the beginning of a relationship.
3
SPEAKER_01
We think of it, again, so effortless, this myth of effortlessness.
3
SPEAKER_01
But when I think back to, you know, when I started dating my husband Xander, those dates that we went on, I was spending days thinking about, okay, Friday we have the date.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s four days away.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s three days away.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s two days away.
3
SPEAKER_01
So much mental energy.
3
SPEAKER_01
And anticipation, dopamine.
3
SPEAKER_01
Anticipation.
3
SPEAKER_01
I m canceling plans for other things.
3
SPEAKER_01
I m spending hours picking out what outfit am I going to wear and trying things on.
3
SPEAKER_01
Target lingerie.
3
SPEAKER_00
You re eating differently all week.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I m putting on the lingerie.
3
SPEAKER_01
I m going to the gym.
3
SPEAKER_01
I m playing like all my pump up jams before the date, like getting myself excited.
3
SPEAKER_01
Like there was so much effort going into it.
3
SPEAKER_01
So it s not that we just had this spontaneous perfect connection.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was putting a lot of energy and he was putting a lot of energy on his end to create that connection.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
3
SPEAKER_00
But in that period of time, it s effortless.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s simply what you want to do.
3
SPEAKER_02
The effort is fun.
3
SPEAKER_00
Initiating all of that is effortless.
3
SPEAKER_00
The inertia is there.
3
SPEAKER_00
As opposed to later when you don t have those chemicals, all that work has to be conscious and thoughtful and mindful and intentional.
3
SPEAKER_00
But it just happens when you meet somebody.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s like you were telling yourself, get excited for Friday.
3
SPEAKER_01
I didn t have to tell myself, but I was using a lot of energy and time and making decisions.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I think that we can change our attitudes about the effort as well.
3
SPEAKER_01
We get into relationships and then the effort feels heavy and hard and boring.
3
SPEAKER_01
But I think we can recapture some of that early feeling of, I enjoy putting effort in.
3
SPEAKER_01
Effort is what makes life meaningful.
3
SPEAKER_01
We put effort into the things that we care about and we see that effort as a good thing.
3
SPEAKER_01
A lot of parenting examples come up.
3
SPEAKER_01
You know, if your kid has a soccer game on Tuesday and maybe you wanted to do something different on Tuesday, but the effort that you put in to show up for your kid, to be there, to have the snacks, that effort feels powerful to you.
3
SPEAKER_01
It feels like a sign of love.
3
SPEAKER_01
Like I m doing this for you because I care about you and I want to show up for you in this way.
3
SPEAKER_01
But it s really only with sex that we start to see effort as a bad thing.
3
SPEAKER_00
Well, as evidence in some cases that we re not with the right person, that we re broken or they re broken or something s broken and probably irreparable.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I m seeing other people, they seem to be having more sex and I m seeing TV and then this is just done.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
And people regularly are entering your office in that spot.
3
SPEAKER_00
And you talk about stress too, stress being a very, I don t know, horniness killer, what would we call it?
3
SPEAKER_01
The number one libido killer.
3
SPEAKER_01
And this is the part where people always roll their eyes, because we re all sick of hearing about stress.
3
SPEAKER_01
We know like stress is bad for us.
3
SPEAKER_01
We re not supposed to be feeling it.
3
SPEAKER_01
We need to decrease the stress in our lives.
3
SPEAKER_01
But I do think it s really important for people to recognize that stress has a huge impact on libido.
3
SPEAKER_01
And it does go back to our caveman days, too.
3
SPEAKER_01
Stress was a way to help the body survive, to figure out, am I staying and fighting this woolly mammoth that s coming at me, or am I running away from it?
3
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And so when we re feeling stress, all of our body s resources go into survival, into figuring out what we re going to do in those moments.
3
SPEAKER_01
And when you re literally in a life or death moment, having an erection or being wet is not a necessary function.
3
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It s going to, if anything, I write in the book, you know, having an erection is going to slow you down as you re a caveman running away from the woolly mammoth.
3
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So all of the resources get redirected and there s just no way to be really turned on and horny all the time when you re under extreme amounts of stress.
3
SPEAKER_00
Although what about in this situation?
3
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This is something I habitually do.
3
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So I m an addict.
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My brain is great at figuring out external things that can alleviate my suffering.
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So when I m super stressed, I do get enormous bouts of horniness because I see it as relief.
3
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The brain is going, relief s over here if you want it.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, there are some people who associate sex with stress relief.
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And those people typically have a pattern of sex being something that s enjoyable and pleasurable.
3
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So there s a trust that you have in it of this is going to work.
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Versus maybe let s look at a woman who s not getting a lot out of the sex, feeling disconnected from her partner.
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She doesn t have that same amount of trust that, oh, this is going to feel good for me.
3
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It is going to get me out of my head.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, that s interesting.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I wonder what order I want to go in here.
3
SPEAKER_00
I just wrote down a lot of things that I like reading.
3
SPEAKER_00
I just want to read one of them.
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SPEAKER_00
Hearing the word no from our partner, especially when it comes to sex, typically brings up enormous amounts of shame.
3
SPEAKER_00
Rejection feels so terrible that most of us will go to great lengths to avoid it.
3
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If your partner turns you down, your instinct is likely to stop initiating.
3
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But if no one is initiating, what do you think is going to happen to your sex life?
3
SPEAKER_00
But yeah, that weird, immediate sense of shame.
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It s a different type of rejection.
3
SPEAKER_01
It is.
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It s so deep and primal.
3
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It feels like the longer you are in a relationship, the closer you are with your partner, the more it hurts to be turned down for sex.
3
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It s been my own personal experience, too.
3
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Like I was saying earlier, initiating sex was something that I struggled with personally.
3
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Especially as a woman, it felt like something I wasn t allowed to do, and I m walking that fine line as a woman of,
3
SPEAKER_01
Well, I don t want to be the ice queen and too closed off, but I also don t want to be a slut and too forward.
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SPEAKER_01
And so it felt like this dangerous thing to do.
3
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And once I finally did work up the courage to start doing it, then it s this, you know, horrible wave of shame that comes crashing over you when you hear a no from your partner.
3
SPEAKER_00
Let s dig deeper on the shame.
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Things pop into mind.
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One is like, well, I m not attractive.
3
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That s not necessarily shame inducing, but there s all of us.
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As kids were starting to feel sexual and that was confusing and for me masturbating and feeling shame, even though I wasn t in a religious household and my mother was saying things like you just heard, there s no reason for me to, but I was trying to quit it all the time.
3
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So does it bring you back to that thing?
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Like I m a perverse little weirdo or is it just the rejection of I m not attractive or is it all things?
3
SPEAKER_00
What do you think that shame is?
3
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I think it s those two main things.
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So it does bring up just that deep shame around sex that all of us have.
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By initiating sex, it s like you are acknowledging that sex is a thing and you want to be having it.
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And if you hear a no from it, it just brings up all of those primal feelings of, oh, this is this bad thing that I m not supposed to want it.
3
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It s wrong and it s shameful and sinful and all the things.
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And it also brings up feelings of inadequacy.
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Most of us take it extremely personally.
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And it s very interesting as a therapist.
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you know, when I work with couples, I can see the reasons that people turn their partner down for sex are almost never personal.
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Really, they re more situational or they re more about how the person is feeling.
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It s so rare that someone says, I don t want to have sex with you because you don t look good right now.
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You know, we re like, I m not attracted to you anymore.
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But when we hear that no, we go to these really dark places inside of ourselves of, I m not pretty enough.
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I m not thin enough.
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I m not sexy enough.
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I m not desirable enough.
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The spark is gone.
4
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My partner s interested in other people.
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Like we take it extremely personally.
4
SPEAKER_00
You re so right, and we love couple therapy.
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Do you watch that with Orna?
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Yes.
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Oh my God, I fucking love it.
4
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So good.
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Obsessed with it.
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SPEAKER_00
And it is very revealing.
4
SPEAKER_00
Every single couple that enters there, the standard is one wants to be having more sex than the other does.
4
SPEAKER_00
There s no two people that seem to be wanting to have the same amount of sex.
4
SPEAKER_01
I mean, that would be crazy though.
4
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It s so normal.
4
SPEAKER_01
I don t even like to call it mismatched sex drives because every couple has mismatched sex drives.
4
SPEAKER_01
You re never going to find a partner who wants sex the exact same time you want sex, every single time the exact same type of sex that you want to have in that moment.
4
SPEAKER_01
It s just not realistic.
4
SPEAKER_01
So most of us get so up in our heads about, oh, are we mismatched?
4
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Are we, you know, different sex drives?
4
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What s the problem here?
4
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But I think it s important for couples to realize that s normal.
4
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There s nothing wrong.
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Instead, let s use our attention and energy to figure out how do we need to work together as a team to create the space for us to connect?
4
SPEAKER_00
What also comes out in every single one of those is that when they start exploring that, almost without exception, the person that rejected the other person, they themselves don t feel attractive.
4
SPEAKER_00
It actually isn t their partner.
4
SPEAKER_00
I think that s so mind-blowing.
4
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if you acknowledge that.
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Not only is it not about you, it s about them.
4
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But you re having all this cognitive dissonance, which is like, well, I m pursuing you, so obviously you re hot and sexy.
4
SPEAKER_00
So that couldn t possibly be what you re experiencing right now.
4
SPEAKER_00
But it is.
4
SPEAKER_01
There s so many wild dynamics that come up around it.
4
SPEAKER_01
And one of the things that came up for me was there were times where Xander would initiate sex with me, and my gut instinct reaction is almost always a no.
4
SPEAKER_01
And that comes from the deep shame place inside of me and feeling like as a woman, I m trying to navigate that line of not too available.
4
SPEAKER_01
But there s always this feeling of like, I m not supposed to.
4
SPEAKER_01
We ve been married for 12 years, you know, by all definitions and putting this in air quotes, like I m doing it the right way.
4
SPEAKER_01
But there s still that feeling that comes up of like, I m not supposed to.
4
SPEAKER_01
Right.
4
SPEAKER_00
You were about to say something and I cut you off.
4
SPEAKER_02
No, I was just because I know, as we have just said, everyone listening who s in a partnership is experiencing this.
4
SPEAKER_02
And I know some personal cases currently that would love to hear if a couple comes in and says, this person really doesn t want to have sex.
4
SPEAKER_02
I really do a lot and I feel rejected or whatever, but also I want to have sex.
4
SPEAKER_02
How will I get
4
SPEAKER_02
pleasure if my partner isn t giving it to me, what would you go? 
4
SPEAKER_00
She pulls out her Rolodex of divorce attorneys and says, I think you ll pair nicely with... I think it s common.
4
SPEAKER_00
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
4
SPEAKER_01
So the first place that I start is helping a couple explore what does each person need to feel open to sex?
4
SPEAKER_01
A lot of it is just figuring out what makes me feel excited, what creates the space for me.
4
SPEAKER_01
And then if there really is an issue with low libido, that s a thing that comes up a lot, there are really three main causes of low libido that actually really aren t about the libido at all.
4
SPEAKER_01
Libido is not the problem that most of us think it is.
4
SPEAKER_01
So it s a lack of emotional connection, it s a lack of pleasure, and it s also sexual pain.
4
30%?
4
SPEAKER_01
Yes, I m so glad you know that stat.
4
SPEAKER_01
From your book.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, 30% of women experienced pain the last time they had sex with their partner, which is mind-blowing.
4
SPEAKER_00
And the solutions are use lubrication always, 15 minutes of warm-up, stop if it s hurting so you don t start associating it with that.
4
SPEAKER_00
There s two more I ve forgotten.
4
SPEAKER_01
Well, and see a pelvic floor specialist or a pelvic pain specialist if you re having any sort of pain that those simple steps can t address.
4
SPEAKER_01
So that s a good low-hanging fruit one to knock out.
4
SPEAKER_01
And then that leaves us with the connection and the pleasure.
4
SPEAKER_01
And pleasure really is the biggest one.
4
SPEAKER_00
You give your clients really good little homework.
4
SPEAKER_00
So she ll say, for the next three weeks, just log when the environment or the context or the situation did make you open for sex.
4
SPEAKER_00
What was happening?
4
SPEAKER_00
What happened before that?
4
SPEAKER_00
Know what gets you in the mood.
4
SPEAKER_00
Don t just wait for the mood to hit you.
4
SPEAKER_00
Be aware of what things got you in the mood.
4
SPEAKER_00
Also, conversely, be aware of the things that take you out of the mood, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
Know what these things are to avoid.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, so the book Sex Talks, you know, a lot of it I thought back to that younger version of myself who was struggling so much with her own sex life and really struggling to find practical tools and solutions.
4
SPEAKER_01
So I really wanted to make the book very practical and give people specific things to do, specific questions to ask themselves, exercises to try out.
4
SPEAKER_01
So starting to pay more attention to what sorts of things get me into the mood and pull me out of the mood.
4
SPEAKER_01
And also, what kinds of experiences am I looking to have?
4
SPEAKER_01
When I want to have sex, what is it that I m looking to experience on my own and with my partner?
4
SPEAKER_00
Right, know that.
4
SPEAKER_00
Take a minute and try to articulate that.
4
SPEAKER_01
We all feel this pressure to have an incredible sex life and have it so spicy with our partner, but so few of us have taken the time to actually feel into what does great sex mean for me?
4
SPEAKER_01
What is the kind of experience that I m looking to have?
4
SPEAKER_01
When I ve just finished having really great sex,
4
SPEAKER_01
What am I thinking in that moment?
4
SPEAKER_02
Like, oh, that was so good because X, Y, Z. Don t you think a common thing for people is sex brings a lot of validation?
4
SPEAKER_02
I think.
4
SPEAKER_02
Do you think so?
4
SPEAKER_02
Say more.
4
SPEAKER_02
Well, I feel like
4
SPEAKER_00
I can speak on that.
4
SPEAKER_02
Okay.
4
SPEAKER_02
Go ahead.
4
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
I can only speak for me.
4
SPEAKER_00
There s this thing you want.
4
SPEAKER_00
You re resistively drawn to it.
4
SPEAKER_00
You can t really get it.
4
SPEAKER_00
And if you get it, it s the ultimate sign that someone likes you because they re not supposed to give it to you.
4
SPEAKER_00
This is the paradigm I grew up in.
4
SPEAKER_00
So if.
4
SPEAKER_00
becomes unavoidably the ultimate signal that someone really likes you or maybe loves you or cares about you.
4
SPEAKER_00
That is the pinnacle of the validation.
4
SPEAKER_00
So without that, this thing you ve grown up as being the symbol of validation, it can be very powerful.
4
SPEAKER_02
at least validating that you re attractive.
4
SPEAKER_02
Whether or not that s accurate or not, that is something that sex can and often does make people feel.
4
SPEAKER_02
I know a couple that one of the partners, I think, gets a ton of validation out of sex.
4
SPEAKER_02
So then when this person entered a safe, good relationship, it was harder for that person to have sex and find it pleasurable because the validation is there.
4
SPEAKER_01
Oh, the validation can make it really difficult on the other end of things.
4
SPEAKER_01
Like when you re the partner of someone and you can feel that they re initiating and what they re really looking for in that moment is for you to validate them.
4
SPEAKER_01
That makes sex take on a totally different vibe and tone.
4
SPEAKER_01
It s not like you re inviting me to share an experience with you, an experience like pleasure and connection and joy and freedom and all these things.
4
SPEAKER_01
It s like you re wanting me to validate you with my body.
4
SPEAKER_00
Do you think those are binary though?
4
SPEAKER_00
Either you re seeking validation or you re seeking to enjoy a beautifully shared, connected,
4
SPEAKER_01
Both kings can be true at the same time, absolutely.
4
SPEAKER_01
But I think when you can feel that intensity of your partner s desire to be validated, it can make it feel more complicated in the moment.
4
SPEAKER_00
Right, or that you re basically just servicing that.
4
SPEAKER_02
But I mean the person who s seeking validation no longer is as interested in sex because there s nothing to seek.
4
SPEAKER_00
They have the validation.
4
SPEAKER_02
They have the validation because they have this partnership that s full of validation.
4
SPEAKER_02
So sex doesn t do the thing it used to do.
4
SPEAKER_01
That can happen too.
4
SPEAKER_01
It can get really, really tricky.
4
SPEAKER_01
And then it can come around on the other end of it as well, where then it becomes sort of this high stakes, well, I don t ever want somebody to say no to me because then what happened to that validation?
4
SPEAKER_00
So back to the fairy tale, you asked people to make a list exactly what they think they re supposed to be doing in the bedroom and to actually take a look at that and ask if those are realistic and reasonable expectations.
4
SPEAKER_01
I think there s something very powerful that happens when we take all these deep, dark expectations that we ve just been holding within ourselves and bring them out into the light and really examine them and ask ourselves, like, yeah, is this a reasonable thing for me to expect of myself?
4
SPEAKER_01
So sometimes just that act of externalizing it can help us realize, ooh, that s not very reasonable.
4
SPEAKER_01
So one of the examples that I give in sex talks is a client that I had worked with who felt like he was supposed to get hard instantaneously with zero stimulation from his partner.
4
SPEAKER_01
And once he started talking about that out loud, realized, okay, yeah, maybe that s not the greatest expectation to have of myself.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, a little unrealistic.
4
SPEAKER_00
Well, that feeds into my, I think my favorite thing I read in there, but first I want to say, cause I just loved that you said this.
4
SPEAKER_00
So you have a good friend that you started talking about her sex life with her husband.
4
SPEAKER_00
They re happily married on all accounts.
4
SPEAKER_00
They have kids, they have a great life together.
4
SPEAKER_00
They re not having sex much.
4
SPEAKER_00
This is weighing on her and she s now beating herself up for having the feelings.
5
SPEAKER_02
And you wrote, OK, I m anxious or frustrated or sad, and that s all right.
5
SPEAKER_02
I don t need to criticize myself about it, too.
5
SPEAKER_02
The best way to navigate your feelings is to simply notice them and leave them be.
5
SPEAKER_02
What we resist persists.
5
SPEAKER_02
When we accept our own emotions and experiences, they actually dissipate much faster.
5
SPEAKER_02
So I think
5
SPEAKER_02
This is so important.
5
SPEAKER_02
I experienced this.
5
SPEAKER_02
I have more discomfort in suffering from the disappointment of having the original feeling I had than I have from the feeling.
5
SPEAKER_02
I m so let down with myself.
5
SPEAKER_02
I m so disappointed in myself.
5
SPEAKER_00
The meta feelings.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
Some of my favorite feedback that we got about sex talks is people said, this is not just a book about how to talk about sex with your partner.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s a communication book and it s a general feelings book, like just learning how to be with my own experiences and be with my own emotions.
5
SPEAKER_00
So that s a classic therapist thing that we say all the time, you know, what we resist persists, or the only way out is through.
5
SPEAKER_00
But it s something that so few of us have put into practice of just sitting with our feelings and allowing them to be.
5
SPEAKER_00
So what you re talking about are meta-emotions.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s our feelings about our feelings.
5
SPEAKER_02
That s almost all I have, to be honest.
5
SPEAKER_02
The second I have the feeling, I go straight into the meta-feelings into the whole.
5
SPEAKER_00
So the key for you and for all of us is just to try sitting with those emotions, to name them as well, because when we can put a name to it, that helps it dissipate a lot faster.
5
SPEAKER_00
When I m feeling this, sometimes I ll just sit with myself and say, okay, I m feeling a lot of anxiety right now.
5
SPEAKER_00
That s okay.
5
SPEAKER_00
I can notice it.
5
SPEAKER_00
I can sit with it.
5
SPEAKER_00
I don t need to do anything about it.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m just here with it.
5
SPEAKER_00
And there s been some really interesting research that shows that when we can do that, a lot of feelings will dissipate in about 90 seconds.
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
Which is wild.
5
SPEAKER_00
Right.
5
SPEAKER_02
Because most people when they re like, I m anxious.
5
SPEAKER_02
Why am I so anxious?
5
SPEAKER_02
Why am I always so anxious?
5
SPEAKER_02
When am I ever not going to be?
5
SPEAKER_02
What is the fucking problem?
5
SPEAKER_02
You re just off to the races.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
So I like to think about my feelings.
5
SPEAKER_00
I will often think of them as like little parts of myself.
5
SPEAKER_00
And sometimes I ll even picture myself at different ages too.
5
SPEAKER_00
And just imagine being with that part of myself.
5
SPEAKER_00
Like, okay, I see you.
5
SPEAKER_00
You re there.
5
SPEAKER_00
A lot of it s validation, going back to this theme.
5
SPEAKER_00
Feelings want acknowledgment and validations.
5
SPEAKER_00
Your feelings want you to just say to them, you exist.
5
SPEAKER_00
I see you there.
5
SPEAKER_00
And you re allowed to be here.
5
SPEAKER_02
We get in male mode.
5
SPEAKER_02
It s like, I got to fix this, get rid of this.
5
SPEAKER_00
Oh, yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
I need a plan.
5
SPEAKER_00
The classic fix-it syndrome.
5
SPEAKER_00
I need to understand it.
5
SPEAKER_00
I need to fix it.
5
SPEAKER_02
I need to destroy it.
5
SPEAKER_02
Okay, this one was awesome.
5
SPEAKER_02
Me versus we.
5
SPEAKER_02
So these two different types of, I guess arousal, what would we say?
5
SPEAKER_02
Spontaneous type and the responsive type.
5
SPEAKER_00
Desire.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, Emily Nagoski gets a lot of credit for really breaking all this research down in an easy, digestible way.
5
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, so tell people about the two different types of desire.
5
SPEAKER_02
So I think it would alleviate a lot of the guilt.
5
SPEAKER_00
Oh, yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
This is one of the biggest pieces of information that people say changes their life.
5
SPEAKER_00
So desire and arousal are actually two different things.
5
SPEAKER_00
We tend to use those words interchangeably, and we mean them as like just getting turned on or being horny.
5
SPEAKER_00
But desire is something that happens in our head.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s the thought of like, oh, sex sounds good.
5
SPEAKER_00
It sounds interesting to me right now.
5
SPEAKER_00
I would like to have it.
5
SPEAKER_00
Where is my partner?
5
SPEAKER_00
And then arousal is a physical response that we have in our bodies, our bodies getting ready for sex, preparing for it.
5
SPEAKER_00
So it could be things like getting an erection, getting wet, your heart rate starting to increase.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so these two things happen separately from each other.
5
SPEAKER_00
And your desire type, your sex drive type, it really boils down to which one you feel first.
5
SPEAKER_00
Do you feel that mental desire or that physical arousal?
5
SPEAKER_00
So spontaneous desire is when we feel the mental desire first and then the physical arousal follows.
5
SPEAKER_00
And that s the only type of desire that you ever see on TV and in the movies.
5
SPEAKER_00
It s that, ah, out of nowhere, I m all of a sudden turned on, I make the eye contact with my partner, we re running off into the bedroom.
5
SPEAKER_00
So most of us think that s how it s supposed to work for us.
5
SPEAKER_00
But about half of people, and of this group, the majority are women,
5
SPEAKER_02
I was going to say this is very gendered.
5
SPEAKER_00
It is very gendered.
5
SPEAKER_00
Most women are responsive types, which is that we feel the physical arousal first and then the mental desire follows after that.
5
SPEAKER_00
So the classic sign that you are a responsive type is if you ve ever been in the middle of sex or even the end of sex and you catch yourself thinking, that was really fun.
5
SPEAKER_00
Why don t I ever seem to want this?
5
SPEAKER_00
That is a responsive reaction.
5
SPEAKER_02
I love the list of it.
5
SPEAKER_02
I wish I d written down the whole list, but it s like, you don t think about sex very often.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
So if you go up to a responsive person and ask them, do you want to have sex 99 times out of a hundred, it s going to be no, because their body hasn t been aroused first.
5
SPEAKER_00
Their head is not going to be interested in sex until their body s aroused.
5
SPEAKER_00
So if you re just going right for their head and asking them that question, it s going to be a no.
5
SPEAKER_00
So this kind of leads us into initiation.
5
SPEAKER_00
We need to learn different ways of initiating because you re just going to get a no if you re asking a responsive person.
5
SPEAKER_00
You re probably going to identify as I have low desire or even no desire.
5
SPEAKER_00
It might feel like the circumstances have to be like just right for you to be open to it.
5
SPEAKER_02
This is why it s easy to feel defeated by the whole thing, because I m talking with all my other male friends.
5
SPEAKER_02
We re mostly all tracking to be spontaneous types, right?
5
SPEAKER_02
As you say in the list, you re at work in a board meeting and you just start thinking about fucking like, oh yeah, that d be great.
5
SPEAKER_02
And then we can talk over it.
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And so you start believing, well, that s, what s missing from the, and that must be unfixable because that s just how I m wired.
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And they re not even thinking about sex.
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They don t even care about, they re not planning some crazy sex capade.
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So how on earth would we meet in the middle on this?
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But I think it s a big relief to just go like, both equally powerful, just different starters.
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It s a huge relief.
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Most people have no idea that this exists.
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Most women tell me that they feel really broken and ashamed that they never seem to want sex.
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It always just feels like this huge source of tension between them and their partner.
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So just being able to recognize you re normal, there s nothing wrong with you.
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You re not broken in any sort of way.
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It s not a worse type of desire.
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Because people will often say like, OK, but spontaneous just sounds better, right?
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But the challenge with spontaneous desire types is that your body might not always go along with what your head s wanting, so they can experience more performance issues.
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And then that brings up an entirely different set of shameful thoughts.
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I m turned on.
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I want to have sex.
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What s happening with my body?
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Why is my body not coming along?
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So there are joys and challenges of each type, but being able to start with this recognition of there are two
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Nobody s broken.
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Nothing s wrong with anybody.
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It s just figuring out, okay, what do each of our types need to feel open to sex?
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Yes.
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A diesel engine s not broken because it can t accept gasoline.
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And a gas engine isn t broken because it can t accept diesel.
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They both are engines that work as long as you put the right shit in them.
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Great metaphor.
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I think that s comforting.
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Anytime you need an automotive metaphor.
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Please.
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I wish you were drinking so you could have done a spit take.
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It s a responsive desire.
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Okay, this gets a little tricky though, because if you re in a partnership, are you saying the physicality starts first?
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So then if your brain doesn t want to go there, how does the physical ever start?
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Yeah, no, that s a great question.
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Thanks for asking the male question.
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Yeah, that s a hard thing.
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Because if someone just starts touching, that feels bad or wrong.
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That s the bristle reaction we ll get to.
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Oh, yes.
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Okay, so I like to think of initiation with responsive desire as being two phases.
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So we want to first give that person some sort of physical contact.
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So what you re doing in that moment is you re not thinking about, do I want to have sex, yes or no?
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It s am I open to having some physical contact with my partner?
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And something that feels very good to you, very tame for you.
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So for a lot of people, it s simple stuff like, can we get in bed and cuddle together?
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Can you give me a massage and a massage that s actually a massage, not a like 20 seconds and then I m sliding my hands in places.
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Is it maybe kissing?
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Is it just holding each other?
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This is Orna advice.
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She s like, don t try to fuck.
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Just go home and commit to snuggling.
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Exactly.
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So if you really create the space and the energy behind this is important, you can tell if your partner s like, okay, let me give you your 10 seconds of perfunctory back rub.
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Are you turned on yet?
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Are you turned on yet?
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So you really have to be willing.
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I just want to have some skin to skin connection with you.
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I just want to be in the moment with you.
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And then at that point, then it s a like, okay, are we open to going further with this?
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And there has to be a true and genuine acceptance of a yes or a no.
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When you and Xander have a great hack for this, because I do think this happens nonstop with couples as well.
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It s like the guy reaches over in bed and does anything, touches her hair, does whatever he does.
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And immediately, and rightly so, the woman s like, oh Jesus.
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There s no mystery to anything that s going on.
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A hack you guys have is like, you have a policy, you make out every night before bed.
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Yes.
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Oh, we do.
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And this seems like such a hack because like, sometimes it s going to happen.
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Sometimes it s not, but you don t have this muscle memory association with every time I m touching, he wants to fuck.
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You re pushing through that by having a routine.
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We started doing that a few years ago because I noticed a couple of things.
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One, I noticed that we weren t making out very often anymore.
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at the beginning of our relationship, we would make out so much.
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And I love that.
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I think most people, we have this really fond association.
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It brings us back to like being teenagers when making out was the best thing in the world.
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It s the cutest, dumbest things primates do.
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Like what are we doing?
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We re smashing our mouths together?
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We were in this relationship, we were a decade into it.
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And it s like, I don t remember the last time we made out just for the sake of making out.
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Like we make out when we re having sex or we re
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right about to have sex, but there s no making out just for that.
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So that thing came up.
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And then I also noticed that I had become, like most people, hyper-attuned to when he was initiating.
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Like, I could tell the moment that his eyes got that little look.
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You probably even experienced something biochemically before you even saw anything.
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You probably smelt something you don t know yourself.
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There was like a smallest little touch of, I know what you re up to.
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You rascal.
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And so I wanted to break that association.
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And it goes back to what I was saying earlier, too, about that knee-jerk reaction that comes up in me, like, no, we re not supposed to.
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So we came up with this idea to start making out every single night and to break the association that we had created that we only made out as a lead up to sex or during sex.
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Like bring back that enjoyment of just kissing for the sake of kissing and having this like sweet little... Oh, I want to kiss now.
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That sounds great.
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I really recommend everybody try it.
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It s become this very sweet ritual that we have every night.
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What about if you re fighting?
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That s also a good way to get you out of your fight if you ve committed.
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If you re like, fuck, we gotta get this kissing over with.
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We don t do it if we re fighting, and if one of us is sick, we don t do it.
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But otherwise, we do it.
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If we re really tired, sometimes it s literally 10 seconds, but it feels like a sweet ritual to have with each other, and it s been really fun to just have those little moments of making out some connection with each other.
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Well, let s talk about the bristle reaction because that s adjacent to that.
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I think a lot of people will relate to this.
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The bristle reaction is that feeling that you get when your partner reaches out to touch you and you just feel your whole body tense up and recoil.
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And it can feel shockingly strong sometimes to even the most simple touch.
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Your partner s just trying to like give you a little pat on the shoulder or a hug or something and you feel yourself recoil.
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And so there are a number of different causes that can lead to it.
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So one is bad initiation, people who aren t being very direct with initiation.
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So the quote that you read earlier, we re so afraid of rejection that a lot of us have learned to do this dance around initiation.
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We re just trying to subtly do it or we do it in a joking way.
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The classic example is men coming up behind a woman and like honking her boobs.
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Tuna in Tokyo.
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So many men try this.
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We have polled our audience before, and there s like 1% of women who do enjoy it, but the vast majority of women do not like it.
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You just gotta find that woman, then.
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Yeah, you gotta find that one woman.
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All the men have to find the two women.
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Please put a Pew s bandana hanging out of your back pocket if you re that 1% so they can find you.
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Monica, would it work for you as an initiation?
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No.
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But it depends, I guess, if I m in like a super playful mood, maybe.
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But if I m like doing the, I know this from all my friends who have husbands, they seem to always do it when they re doing the dishes.
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Sure, well, your guard s down.
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You re trapped.
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Yeah, your hands are busy.
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That feels like the worst time possible.
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Exactly, don t do it then.
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So we do it in these roundabout ways or these jokey ways because it gives us plausible deniability.
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If you get mad, oh, I wasn t trying to.
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I was just messing around, right?
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But we get this hypersensitivity like I had developed of you weren t just kidding or like, no, no, no.
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I see it in your eyes.
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I smell it in the air.
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I feel it.
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I m on guard.
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And then it s also the discomfort that we have in saying no to our partner.
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So we try to catch it at the earliest possible moment.
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Like I don t want to get into, we re already making out and clothes are starting to come off and I have to say, hold on, I don t, I don t want to do
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do this, so we learn to backtrack.
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I m so aware of the exact moment that you re starting to think about it, so I can say no to you right then.
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And it can also be just straight up touching you in ways that you don t like as well, like the boob honk.
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That s extreme.
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Yeah, that s the extreme version.
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But what compounds this greatly, and yeah, I forget what the number is, like 64% from the Gottman Institute, people s marriages get worse when they have kids.
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I mean, that s just kind of the standard.
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So for the mom, the mom has been experiencing probably so much touch.
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She has no fucking personal space.
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And now here comes gorilla Mike for a little Hong Kong.
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Totally not me, everybody.
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Yeah.
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So it feels like touch that s not for her.
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And that s another thing that comes up as well.
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It s like, you re touching my body for you.
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You re wanting something from me.
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And with a parent, you know, I ve been touched all day long.
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I ve had people needing things from me all day long.
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Here is yet another creature with more needs, with more demands of my body.
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It all gets wrapped up in this huge shutdown reaction that we have.
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Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare.
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how do I say this?
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This is untherapeutic, but I think it s the truth.
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So I think there s like, there s being vulnerable, there s being honest, there s communicating.
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There s also this terrible force that is real, which is vulnerability s attractive, neediness is not.
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No one s fucking attracted to neediness.
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So for me, historically,
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The most precarious part is in initiating, I refuse to go down a needy path.
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For me, neediness is like the end of the sexual attraction.
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How do you define the difference between vulnerability and neediness?
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but it s a very, very tiny line between the two.
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I agree with you.
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So I think vulnerability in general is sharing with somebody your character defects or your fears or your shortcomings.
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I think neediness is, I need you to fix me.
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But our language is incomplete.
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The difference between those two things, although I can say it that way, in practice and in talking and in touching and in all these things, it s not precise.
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And I think the dance that I see a lot of my male friends, where I wanna go like, you gotta pull back a bit.
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I think that s the hardest dance for a spontaneous person with a partner who is a responsive person.
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I agree with you.
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And I think it is a particular challenge for men who are getting more and more messages these days that like we want men to be vulnerable and open and share.
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which is something that historically has been incredibly dangerous for men to do, that you ve been given so many messages of, don t do that.
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So now there s this dance, that s such a good word for it, that men are trying to do of like, I want to do this, but I don t have a lot of practice at it.
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It s always felt scary and dangerous.
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I don t know how to do it.
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I think that the difference between vulnerability and neediness is what you re describing.
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For me, vulnerability feels like I m sharing with you challenges that are coming up for me, things that are within me.
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I m sharing them with you because I want you to see me.
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Whereas neediness, again, it s not a therapeutic term, but neediness does feel like I am needing you to come help fix me.
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Right.
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So it s not just, I m showing you, it s a, even if we take a real example.
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So if you were to say we re not having sex very often and I recognize that I get so much of my validation for that.
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And then I m feeling completely unattractive and I think I must be doing something that is not appealing to you.
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And I m filling in all these blanks and I ve created the story and it s all based on this thing I ve decided.
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So that seems like all above board and fine, but that s also saying, I need you to give me this.
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because this is how I m wired.
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So that s fucking hard.
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It is.
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And that s what we pick up on as partners as well.
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It s like, is it that you re inviting me to share an experience with you or are you needing me to take care of you in a certain sort of way?
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Again, that feels binary.
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How about I need the shared loving experience where we re staring in each other s eyes and we re having this bond.
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I need that for my own self-esteem.
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That s how it s happened.
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That s how it shook out.
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I m working on it, but that s where we re at.
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So I think the challenge for you is finding other ways to get that experience.
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If sex is the only way, that puts a lot of pressure on sex.
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So are there other ways that you can get those needs met with your partner?
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And there totally are.
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I m just saying, like, the vulnerability version is very, very close and almost identical to the needy version.
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It is like grains of sand between your partner going like, fucking A, I have a third child.
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Yeah, it is.
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I have such a practical mind.
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I m always wanting to give people like practical tools and strategies.
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And there s also a part of me that just holds on to all the nuances and complexities of how sex shows up in our lives.
6
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And this is a primary example of one.
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I recognize what you re saying about, I don t want to be around just to fix you or validate you or give you self-esteem.
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You need to give yourself self-esteem.
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Great.
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I know that s the response.
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So I would just not initiate the risk of being needy and unattractive.
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I m going to side with, I ll just wait until you re interested.
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And then the other part of your brain starts going, well, do I want to live on planet earth without having sex?
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Is that what I want for the rest of my life?
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You know, you go down the dark.
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road of, well, then I give up.
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And then again, you confront that and you go, well, now you re being a baby and you re doing this and you got to now validate yourself and have your own things.
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And, you know, but it s very complex.
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There s so many people in that position, but I think what you re actually looking for is that deep intimacy.
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That s the actual thing you want.
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You want the thing that separates you from being friends.
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Right.
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But there could be other things.
7
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that give you that deep intimacy.
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Plus maybe, I guess this is a good hack of touching not for sex and seeing where that goes.
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That s a really good hack.
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I think weirdly for me, the answer in general is not put that on their plate, be mindful, make my own list, but not be resentful, not be resentful.
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Yes, the mature grown-up adult thing would be like, when was she in the mood last?
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What was happening?
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How can I recreate that?
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How can I touch all the time without that expectation?
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Proactively do a bunch of things so I don t even need to have that conversation.
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That s probably the more productive approach.
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You have to sit with both.
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When we have intimacy with a person, we also have to acknowledge we re never going to be able to get the exact kind of intimacy that we want, like perfectly and consistently.
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And that s such a horrible pain to feel.
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And also an important one for us to feel as well.
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Particularly for men, it can be challenging because you ve been taught that the only ways that you re allowed to experience connection and intimacy with a person is through sex.
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Now we re talking more about vulnerability, but really the deep messages are like, don t be vulnerable, don t show emotion, be strong and capable and all the things.
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And so for many men, all of their need for connection, for love, for validation, it all gets funneled through sex.
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Yes, but we re getting close to the thing that really irks me that I really want to drill down into.
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There s the intellectual version of what we would aim to be, which would be for men, more vulnerable, more open, all these things.
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Then there s the reality of which we live in, which is women aren t as attracted to that.
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And no one wants to acknowledge that.
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No one wants to be truthful about that.
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I hear it.
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Even when you re watching Orna, you re like, they re so pissed that their guy isn t a fucking dude.
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Well, it can t be a hundred percent of just like, oh, I m so depressed all day or whatever, but that is not true.
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I think it was best summarized on, did you watch White Lotus this season?
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Yes.
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Here s this guy, he s saying everything she wants him to say.
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He s a perfect feminist and she meets this dickhead tattooed asshole and that s who she wants to fuck.
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And that s the truth.
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I think everyone s running from that truth and it drives me nuts that we can t somehow first acknowledge it and then get into it.
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But we re not even at the phase where we re acknowledging it.
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So the problem is that the same toxic beliefs about masculinity that men grow up having, we women grow up with as well.
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And so there s this dance that we do inside ourselves of we want more vulnerability, we want more openness, but we want it in the right way.
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There s toxicity within us as well.
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There s a vestigial 300,000 years of evolution where you re trying to get with whoever s going to be most successful on planet Earth and feed your child.
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And you know, societally, it s not that dude.
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It s the dude who leads the other men.
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It is getting there.
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And I do think we re just in this very slow and I think quite painful transition before we recognize, no, this vulnerability does equal status and does equal food and a roof over your head.
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I m in complete agreement with that.
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We re in a very uncomfortable phase right now where we re wanting to make this shift, but we don t know how to and we don t have the tools to.
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And so it s like we want it just right kind of feeling.
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You know, I can speak to my own relationship.
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I ve had moments where Xander has approached me in vulnerability and I m like,
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Oh, that feels so good.
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Look at this evolved man that I have with me.
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Like, you go, babe.
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And I ve had moments where he shares an emotion and I m like, ooh.
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Like cringing.
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I don t want to fuck you right now.
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SPEAKER_00
Yes, I appreciate you admitting that so much.
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But why do you have to- It s a pain.
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But you don t have to-
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But there s also this sense of like, okay, so it s not physically attractive today.
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That s okay.
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No one has to have sex today.
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Why does it have to be?
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Do you know what I mean?
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When you re saying, ooh, like that s a little cringy.
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I don t want to fuck you.
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Then maybe you don t fuck that day.
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Right, you re saying, why is the expectation that you re going to be 100% attractive at all times?
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Exactly.
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That s fair.
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That s necessary.
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If we want our partners to take on different behaviors and do different things, we need to create the space for them to not always get it right.
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And we need to examine within ourselves, what is it within me that I m wanting him to do it just right?
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There is no one right way to express vulnerability and emotion, and that s stuff that I have to look at within myself of why are there times that it turns me off and times that it turns me on.
7
SPEAKER_02
Well, I just have great compassion for the 17-year-old boy who s like, he s nice, he s thoughtful, he does all the things, and he looks around and the assholes are the ones getting laid, but he s being told by all the academics, well, that s the way.
7
SPEAKER_02
I just want to acknowledge that I have compassion for that.
7
SPEAKER_01
I think he s gonna end up being fine.
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SPEAKER_01
I think he s gonna end up with a partner with an emotional maturity that matches his.
7
SPEAKER_01
And I don t want someone not vulnerable.
7
SPEAKER_01
I m never ending up with someone who can t be vulnerable.
7
SPEAKER_01
I m not, that s so boring.
7
SPEAKER_01
What a boring life.
7
SPEAKER_02
But you ll also admit to the weird primitive thing when you re watching Bradley Cooper in the movie where he s a fucking dickhead and you admit, I m so horny for this guy.
7
SPEAKER_02
So that s also on the table.
7
SPEAKER_01
It is, but not to marry.
7
SPEAKER_01
Not to be with.
7
SPEAKER_02
Right, but we re incentive creatures.
7
SPEAKER_02
So if you re a 17 year old boy, you re not trying to get married.
7
SPEAKER_02
You re trying to like have sex with a woman.
7
SPEAKER_00
I guess.
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SPEAKER_00
I think there s a difference between what we feel attracted to and who we want to choose as our long-term partner.
7
SPEAKER_02
Oh, that s very true.
7
SPEAKER_02
It s so tough.
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SPEAKER_00
I think it s tough.
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SPEAKER_00
It is.
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SPEAKER_00
I mean, these are some of the complexities and it is this phase that we re in of trying to figure out we want to move towards this.
7
SPEAKER_00
We all see the value in this, but we re kind of stuck on that growing edge of it, of how do we do it?
7
SPEAKER_00
I think being able to see the ways that we re each contributing to it.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_02
Okay, so we were mostly just living in the beginning of this book, if you can believe that.
7
SPEAKER_02
That s really the beginning of the book.
7
SPEAKER_02
But as you have said, so it s sex talks, the five conversations that will transform your love life.
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SPEAKER_02
So it is broken up into number one, acknowledgement, which is sex is a thing and we have it.
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I think that s a good place to start.
7
SPEAKER_00
It is a good place to start.
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SPEAKER_02
Is it right that you originally had like 26?
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I had 14.
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I m a tools and techniques kind of gal.
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SPEAKER_00
I was like, I want to cram everything into this book.
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SPEAKER_00
And my editor was like, nobody wants to have 14 conversations.
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SPEAKER_00
Like, can you pick five?
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SPEAKER_02
Well, I love the five you picked.
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SPEAKER_02
So yeah, sex is a thing and we have it.
7
SPEAKER_00
So when I was conceptualizing the book, I knew people are going to see this book at the bookstore and just think, oh, God, I m nervous.
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SPEAKER_00
I don t know if I want to do this.
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SPEAKER_00
Can I do this?
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SPEAKER_00
And so I wanted to find a really easy starting point.
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SPEAKER_00
Let s ease our way into it.
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SPEAKER_00
We re not jumping in the first conversation talking about I want to have a threesome and I want you to tie me up on my toes and hang from the rafters.
7
SPEAKER_00
We have perfect rafters in here for this.
7
SPEAKER_00
So I wanted to pick something that was going to feel accessible to a lot of people and just give them the confidence of, I can do this.
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SPEAKER_00
I can have this first conversation.
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SPEAKER_00
I can get some momentum going, some confidence and some courage up to keep me going through the others.
7
SPEAKER_00
And so for most couples, they just have not talked openly about their sex life.
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SPEAKER_00
Going back to the fucking fairy tale, as I call it in the book, we re taught that we re not supposed to have to talk about sex at all.
7
SPEAKER_00
So this conversation is literally just getting comfortable with the words, saying them out loud, acknowledging sex is a thing and we have it.
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SPEAKER_00
I can t remember the statistic off the top of my head right now, but there s a pretty horrible statistic about what percentage of couples  conversations are purely logistical, just about like the appointments at four and who s picking up Timmy from soccer practice.
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SPEAKER_00
We re just not having these deeper, meaningful conversations anymore.
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SPEAKER_00
So this conversation I really like because it s something that you can continue doing throughout the course of your relationship.
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SPEAKER_00
Not every conversation about sex needs to be about a problem, trying to solve an issue.
7
SPEAKER_00
I want people to start with having neutral to positive conversations about it.
7
SPEAKER_00
We re not trying to accomplish anything in this first conversation.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s literally just getting comfortable saying, we just had sex.
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SPEAKER_00
That was fun.
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SPEAKER_00
What did we like about that?
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SPEAKER_02
I love that because yes, the times we ll talk about sex is when either of us have an issue.
7
SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
7
SPEAKER_00
And that s the mistake that most couples make.
7
SPEAKER_00
And so I actually got the inspiration for this conversation when Xander joined my business.
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SPEAKER_00
We made this transition.
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SPEAKER_00
I used to work one-on-one and two-on-one with couples, and then we transitioned into creating online guides and courses.
7
SPEAKER_00
And Xander joined the business.
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SPEAKER_00
And so we started talking, especially on Instagram, much more openly, the two of us as a couple.
7
SPEAKER_00
Here s something that we tried.
7
SPEAKER_00
Here s something funny that went wrong.
7
SPEAKER_00
And the more that we talked about sex, just generally, we started having more and more sex and feeling more connected.
7
SPEAKER_00
We re on to something here.
7
SPEAKER_00
It doesn t have to be.
7
SPEAKER_02
It s so stupidly simple yet.
7
SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
7
SPEAKER_02
It shocks you when it happens.
7
SPEAKER_00
Those are the exact kind of tips that I go for.
7
SPEAKER_00
They re stupidly simple, but you don t think about them in the moment afterwards.
7
SPEAKER_00
You re like, why did I resist that for so long?
7
SPEAKER_00
That was so easy, and it made such a big impact.
7
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, and you talk about expectations a lot in the book, which are fantastic.
7
SPEAKER_02
Like, yeah, here s the thing I want to try.
7
SPEAKER_02
Also, it s going to go wrong in many ways.
7
SPEAKER_00
That s the first pancake rule.
7
SPEAKER_00
Oh, yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
Oh, my God, that s great.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, just like whenever you re making pancakes, the first one turns out a little weird.
7
SPEAKER_00
Like very often when we try new things in the bedroom, it s not going to go perfectly.
7
SPEAKER_00
Having a sense of humor about it and really bringing the expectations down of like, let s just try this and see how it goes rather than we need to hit it out of the park.
7
SPEAKER_02
One of your patients was like, I want to try cowgirl, but I m afraid to.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, most of us have fears of things that we are curious about or would be open to trying, but we don t want to look stupid in front of our partner.
7
SPEAKER_00
We don t want to look incompetent, like we don t know what we re doing.
7
SPEAKER_00
We put that pressure for it to be the home run on the very first go.
7
SPEAKER_00
So the first pancake rule is really helpful for
8
SPEAKER_01
that of just literally saying, let s give it a go.
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SPEAKER_01
Let s treat it as an experiment.
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SPEAKER_00
Learn some things.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_01
And sometimes even putting a name to it like, yeah, this is just our little practice session.
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SPEAKER_01
You know, we re playing around here.
8
SPEAKER_01
That can be really beneficial as well.
8
SPEAKER_01
And a lot of times also just speaking your fear out loud to your partner.
8
SPEAKER_01
So with that client in particular, we had a session with her partner where she was able to say, I m really afraid of getting on top that I m not going to know how do I move my hips and what do I do?
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And I m afraid that you re going to laugh at me.
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SPEAKER_01
And so he was able to hear that and tell her, like, I m never going to laugh at you.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s really become what our business is focused on, communication and technique these days, because that s the other big thing that comes up with sex.
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SPEAKER_01
We all feel like we re supposed to be so good at it.
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SPEAKER_01
But where did you ever learn to get on top?
8
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Where did you ever learn, here s how you move your hips, here s how you get into this position or out of this position, or here s how you transition smoothly into another position?
8
SPEAKER_01
I love teaching that nitty-gritty.
8
SPEAKER_01
We have a sex positions guide.
8
SPEAKER_01
We have a foreplay guide that walks you through step-by-step exactly what to do in a very fun and playful way.
8
SPEAKER_01
I think the Virgos will love that.
8
SPEAKER_01
Oh, they re going to love it.
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SPEAKER_01
There s really nothing else in life that we put such an expectation and pressure on ourselves to be so good at despite having zero resources.
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SPEAKER_01
Where do we ever learn this stuff?
8
SPEAKER_01
So that s what I wanted to do with my life is teaching people all these things.
8
SPEAKER_01
I love that.
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SPEAKER_01
How to actually have sex.
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SPEAKER_00
And then connection is the second conversation you encourage people to have.
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SPEAKER_00
What do we need to feel connected to each other?
8
SPEAKER_00
And we ve talked about some of that already.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, we ve talked a bit about that.
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SPEAKER_01
I mean, I think the big issue that comes up here is that most of us think of sex as something that happens in a vacuum.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s that thing that we do in our bedroom with the lights off at the end of the night, the doors are closed.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s compartmentalized.
8
SPEAKER_00
Right.
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SPEAKER_00
You re having sex all day long if you want to.
8
SPEAKER_00
Foreplay is all day.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
8
SPEAKER_01
So that s what this conversation is about is understanding what do we need to feel close to each other and feel connected to each other all day so that the bar for having physical intimacy feels so much lower.
8
SPEAKER_01
This is a particularly important one for parents who feel like we re ships passing in the night.
8
SPEAKER_01
We re only having those logistical conversations.
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SPEAKER_01
Our lives are all about the kids.
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SPEAKER_01
You re feeling so disconnected from each other that you get into bed with each other at the end of the night and it feels like there s a stranger crawling into bed next to you.
8
SPEAKER_01
And most people don t want to have sex with somebody who s feeling like a stranger.
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SPEAKER_00
Even worse, an adversary.
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SPEAKER_00
This is the person I ve had to compromise with all day long.
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SPEAKER_01
Yes, all day.
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SPEAKER_01
So it s understanding like that emotional intimacy and physical intimacy, they go hand in hand.
8
SPEAKER_01
They re two sides of the same coin and we need to work on both of them and have practical tools for both of them.
8
SPEAKER_01
So that s all about keeping the simmer going throughout the day so that you feel more open to being physically intimate.
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SPEAKER_00
Then three is desire and four is pleasure.
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SPEAKER_00
These are kind of linked.
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SPEAKER_00
So what would get you turned on?
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SPEAKER_00
And then at the end of that, what feels good?
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SPEAKER_01
And that is such an underlooked part of sex.
8
SPEAKER_01
We focus so much on the desire, like I was talking about earlier, and we neglect the importance of pleasure because that s really what sex is about.
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SPEAKER_00
That s what will keep them coming back for more.
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And there s a huge connection between our desire for sex and our enjoyment of it.
8
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So one of the first questions that I ll ask people when they say, I have no desire, low desire, they tell me about the sex that you re having.
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SPEAKER_01
And what they ll describe is typically sex that s not worth craving.
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SPEAKER_01
It s routine.
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SPEAKER_01
It s predictable.
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SPEAKER_01
There s nothing in it for me.
8
SPEAKER_01
I feel disconnected from my partner.
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SPEAKER_01
I just lie there and like let my partner do it to me.
8
SPEAKER_01
And so the question is, okay, why would you crave that?
8
SPEAKER_01
You know, I always make food comparisons too.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s like eating the same old bowl of overly steamed mushy broccoli.
8
SPEAKER_01
Do you ever wake up craving, oh, I can t wait for another bowl of overly steamed mushy broccoli.
8
SPEAKER_01
Like, of course not.
8
SPEAKER_01
We make that connection so readily with food.
8
SPEAKER_01
Why would I crave a kind of food that I don t enjoy eating?
8
SPEAKER_01
That we don t make that connection with sex.
8
SPEAKER_00
You could try to get so in the mood to eat the bad broccoli.
8
SPEAKER_00
But it s still bad broccoli.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s not gonna work.
8
SPEAKER_02
And food is a good analogy because there is gonna be a food that you do crave in life.
8
SPEAKER_02
There s gonna be something you like.
8
SPEAKER_02
You just have to find it.
8
SPEAKER_00
Also, the more time you prep it and prepare it, it s better and you desire it more.
8
SPEAKER_00
A lot of really good analogies here, right on the table.
8
SPEAKER_00
Oh, I don t know why I m going to share this, but I feel lucky to have had this experience.
8
SPEAKER_00
When my wife was getting close to delivering, the OB said, have sex as much as you can and ejaculate on the mucoid plug.
8
SPEAKER_00
That ll help erode it and help, right?
8
SPEAKER_00
Do you know this?
8
SPEAKER_00
No, that feels intense.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
So all of a sudden there was this huge role reversal.
8
SPEAKER_00
Right.
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SPEAKER_00
So there was this huge role reversal.
8
SPEAKER_00
I was expected to do that every night and after the third night and now I attributed it to, and I was honest about it.
8
SPEAKER_00
Night four, I was like, this is bringing up weird molesting stuff.
8
SPEAKER_00
Knowing that I need to do this is really fucking me up.
8
SPEAKER_00
And I shared that and then that ended, but.
8
SPEAKER_00
I was so grateful to have the experience that I think a lot of women experience, which is like, there s this creature out there that wants me to do this thing and I don t want to do it.
8
SPEAKER_00
It feels fucking terrible to do this thing if I don t want to do it.
8
SPEAKER_00
Doing something sexually that you don t want to, I m lucky I got to feel it because it made me certainly more empathetic to a lot of women that feel that way.
8
SPEAKER_00
And I m like, yeah, it s a fucking bad feeling.
8
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That s one of the biggest mistakes that women make with their sex lives is that there s so many women who just have sex to keep my partner happier.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s what I m supposed to do.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s my role as a wife, as a good partner.
8
SPEAKER_01
Even the lighter versions of it are just, oh, I m just throwing him a bone.
8
SPEAKER_01
A quickie.
8
SPEAKER_01
I just like let him have it.
8
SPEAKER_01
Again, it goes back to that connection between our enjoyment of something and our desire for it.
8
SPEAKER_01
If you start creating this association with sex that it s something I give to my partner, I throw him a bone, I don t have a choice in doing it.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s what makes me a good partner is saying, yes, you are never going to feel any desire for it.
8
SPEAKER_01
So it s so important for us to only have sex that we want to have.
8
SPEAKER_00
Exploration.
8
SPEAKER_00
What should we try next?
8
SPEAKER_00
What an appropriate last conversation to have.
8
SPEAKER_00
This is probably pretty hard for couples, yeah, if they have something they feel like is a kink or something that makes them weird or different.
8
SPEAKER_01
So you re illustrating the mistake that I think a lot of people make with exploration is that we go to the kink aspect of it.
8
SPEAKER_01
And kink is amazing and great if you have super complex fantasies or wild and crazy kinks that you want to do.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s amazing.
8
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Do them, go for it.
8
SPEAKER_01
But trying new things in the bedroom doesn t have to mean wildly pushing your comfort zone.
8
SPEAKER_01
For a lot of couples, I actually recommend starting with what are the things that you used to do when you first started having sex that you haven t done in a while?
8
SPEAKER_00
That s a great one.
8
SPEAKER_01
Most of us, as time goes on, our window of what sex looks like narrows and narrows and narrows into this very predictable, very quick little routine.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s turned from a buffet into
8
SPEAKER_01
An entree.
8
SPEAKER_01
And so yeah, mixing it up, spicing it up.
8
SPEAKER_01
It doesn t need to be anything complex.
8
SPEAKER_01
It could be, oh yeah, we haven t made out in a while.
8
SPEAKER_01
Can we bring back the making out?
8
SPEAKER_01
Or you haven t gone down on me a while.
8
SPEAKER_01
We haven t played with toys in a while.
8
SPEAKER_00
Haven t fucked on the couch in a long time.
8
SPEAKER_01
Exactly, had sex somewhere else.
8
SPEAKER_01
So just bringing back some of those things.
8
SPEAKER_00
Okay, we re leaving your book.
8
SPEAKER_00
Now you re just my therapist.
8
SPEAKER_00
Not even my therapist.
8
SPEAKER_00
You re my friend who s a therapist and we re at dinner.
8
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
8
SPEAKER_00
Let me also preface it by saying I was in an open relationship for nine years.
8
SPEAKER_00
But I m curious, you must increasingly be having patients that are in polyamorous situations.
8
SPEAKER_00
In so many ways, it was fantastic, which is there was never any diminishment of love or respect.
8
SPEAKER_00
And that didn t have the impact that I guess I think a lot of people would be fearful it would have.
8
SPEAKER_00
At least for us, it didn t.
8
SPEAKER_00
We sleep in the same bed together every single night.
8
SPEAKER_00
When stuff happens, who knows?
8
SPEAKER_00
We don t talk about it, whatever.
8
SPEAKER_00
That was the situation.
8
SPEAKER_00
I think the cancerous thing, and maybe this is just for me, is that
8
SPEAKER_00
If given an easy option, why on earth would I work hard on the other thing?
8
SPEAKER_00
It s a given that a long-term relationship is going to require a lot of work, sexually.
8
SPEAKER_00
So if I m getting something that s filled with dopamine and excitement, how on earth are those two things going to compare, and how incentivized am I to put in the work on the stable thing?
8
SPEAKER_01
So what I see is that the open relationship, anything non-monogamous, the ones that work out are the ones where it s actually more work than having a monogamous relationship.
8
SPEAKER_00
Ironically.
8
SPEAKER_00
Ironically.
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SPEAKER_01
Because to do it properly, there s so much communication that needs to be involved.
8
SPEAKER_01
You re bringing in multiple people, so now there are just more feelings and more feelings about the feelings.
8
SPEAKER_01
You know, it wasn t just person A s feelings and person B s feelings and person B s feelings about person A s feelings.
8
SPEAKER_01
Now it s, you know, all the different permutations of it.
8
SPEAKER_01
So I wholeheartedly believe, you know, there are billions of people on this planet.
8
SPEAKER_01
Monogamy is not the one and only relationship structure that works or that we should all be striving for.
8
SPEAKER_00
Historically, we didn t really have that.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, exactly.
8
SPEAKER_01
I believe that people should be thoughtful about the kinds of relationship models that they want to try out and explore and be open about it.
8
SPEAKER_01
But it does require a lot of communication.
8
SPEAKER_01
So the ones that I don t see working out are where people go into it, one, if the relationship is bad.
8
SPEAKER_00
That s a solution to it?
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_01
Our sex life is terrible, so let s just bring in other people.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s only going to make it worse.
8
SPEAKER_01
And two, where there are no rules type of thing.
8
SPEAKER_01
It really needs to have boundaries.
8
SPEAKER_01
There s a lot of communication.
8
SPEAKER_01
We re figuring out what s on the table, what s off the table.
8
SPEAKER_01
There s constant negotiation and renegotiation.
8
SPEAKER_01
So it s an incredible amount of work.
8
SPEAKER_00
Well, that was ours.
9
SPEAKER_00
situation.
9
SPEAKER_00
Ultimately, years in, I was like, I feel like you re going on dates with people.
9
SPEAKER_00
This doesn t feel like what the thing was.
9
SPEAKER_00
And she goes, well, yeah, this thing works great for you.
9
SPEAKER_00
You just want to fuck a stranger.
9
SPEAKER_00
I want to go out to dinner with someone and have them be super interested in what book I m reading.
9
SPEAKER_00
That s what I m longing for.
9
SPEAKER_00
And you
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SPEAKER_00
give that and I don t even expect you to give that to me we ve been together for four years and I was like that s very legit so yeah that s a new element so yeah you can go on dates and it did it had to constantly evolve and account for what each person was looking for I guess it was probably started out very a patriarchal version of the arrangement and then it evolved into something maybe hopefully more egalitarian
9
SPEAKER_00
But ultimately for me, also I was in my 20s, I didn t have to tend to the sexual relationship in the primary relationship because I was fulfilled.
9
SPEAKER_00
And that was very destructive for me on that aspect of it.
9
SPEAKER_02
I think a lot of people go into open relationships thinking that it s going to be easier and fun and, oh, I just get to continue having that new relationship energy with new and new and new people.
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SPEAKER_02
And I don t have to tend to the original relationship.
9
SPEAKER_02
And it s just not going to work out in the long run in that way.
9
SPEAKER_02
It has to be both.
9
SPEAKER_02
I tend to the relationship.
9
SPEAKER_02
The relationship is solid and we work on that.
9
SPEAKER_02
And we also have different relationships with other people as well that we tend to those too.
9
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
9
SPEAKER_00
I was pretty shocked while watching Couple Therapy, were you?
9
SPEAKER_00
With like kind of the high percentage of people that were involved.
9
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, there were.
9
SPEAKER_01
I know, but it didn t really work out.
9
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, a lot of people just don t set it up properly from the get-go, and then they get into a place where it s like, oh, it s chaos now.
9
SPEAKER_02
What do we do?
9
SPEAKER_02
How do we figure out where we are now?
9
SPEAKER_01
And I think you re right.
9
SPEAKER_01
So many people place it as a solution.
9
SPEAKER_01
It s like, well, we re not getting this, so we might as well go get it from other people.
9
SPEAKER_00
I think people enter it naively too, with the assumption that like, no one s going to fall in love with anyone.
9
SPEAKER_00
They re like, oh, we just want this physical fun outlet.
9
SPEAKER_00
But that also is not going to be the case.
9
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
9
SPEAKER_02
And that s something that you can even go into a relationship saying, well, that s our guideline.
9
SPEAKER_02
That s our rule.
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SPEAKER_02
I have a boundary of this is just sex, not love.
9
SPEAKER_02
We can t really always control that.
9
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
9
SPEAKER_00
Oh, all right.
9
SPEAKER_00
Did I have one other one that had nothing to do with your book?
9
SPEAKER_01
Before we started, we were talking and you said, I don t know if this is connected to your work, but you re not interested in having kids.
9
SPEAKER_02
It s not connected to my work.
9
SPEAKER_02
It s a big surprise for both Xander and I. We entered our marriage thinking that we were going to have kids.
9
SPEAKER_02
We both love kids, have siblings, always envisioned our lives with kids.
9
SPEAKER_02
And we got married kind of on the younger side, younger than either of us were expecting to.
9
SPEAKER_02
And so it was this idea of, yeah, we ll be married for a few years and then we ll have kids when the time feels right.
9
SPEAKER_02
And we would always hear from people like, oh, you ll know when the time feels right.
9
SPEAKER_02
You ll start to get that urge.
9
SPEAKER_02
And so time started ticking on and we were getting closer and closer to the time that I thought was going to be right.
9
SPEAKER_02
And neither one of us were feeling the active desire to have kids.
9
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
9
SPEAKER_02
And so we kept checking in with each other, like, I feel like we should be having them at this point.
9
SPEAKER_02
Like, that s kind of the time.
9
SPEAKER_02
But do you want to?
9
SPEAKER_02
Not really.
9
SPEAKER_02
Do you want to?
9
SPEAKER_02
Not really.
9
SPEAKER_02
And so we kept kind of kicking the can down the road saying, well, let s just keep talking about it.
9
SPEAKER_02
Let s keep checking in about it.
9
SPEAKER_02
And ultimately, it ended up being a very challenging and very emotional journey to have had this
9
SPEAKER_02
image in my head of what my life is going to look like and then realize in the moment I m not actually feeling the desire to create that.
9
SPEAKER_02
You know, I didn t even know how do you make that decision?
9
SPEAKER_02
It s such a monumental decision.
9
SPEAKER_02
But what anchored me, the question that I kept coming back to over and over again was just, do I feel the active desire to have a child?
9
SPEAKER_02
And I kept thinking any potential child that I could have
9
SPEAKER_02
I would want to be able to look my child in the eyes and say, I wanted you so badly.
9
SPEAKER_02
You were loved for the moment you even came into existence.
9
SPEAKER_02
And I just never felt like I could do that.
9
SPEAKER_02
And to me, bringing a new life into the world feels like such an enormous responsibility and privilege that not being able to say yes to that, I felt like I shouldn t then.
9
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
9
SPEAKER_01
Well, it s great you two are on the same page.
9
SPEAKER_02
Miraculously.
9
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
9
SPEAKER_02
We both like, I don t know how we both managed to change our mind.
9
SPEAKER_02
And we really made the space for each other to like, you don t have to change your mind about this.
9
SPEAKER_02
I would support him if he realized, no, I actually do really want to have kids and vice versa.
9
SPEAKER_02
So there was no pressure on either end.
9
SPEAKER_02
So I m really grateful that we both changed our minds.
9
SPEAKER_02
But it s been a real journey.
9
SPEAKER_02
and it s been interesting to talk about publicly, like there s still so much judgment that couples who choose to be childfree- Did you even feel triggered when I said, primitively, we have a purpose on planet Earth?
9
SPEAKER_00
Like, does that, because Monica and I often get in these little, I say things that are- Yeah, because I don t know if I want.
9
SPEAKER_00
And I say things that sound like I m either shaming people who are not bonded to another person or not having kids.
9
SPEAKER_00
That s never my intention and I don t think everyone should have kids.
9
SPEAKER_00
But when I say that sex is important because that s our primary mission as a species, do you go like, fuck this guy.
9
SPEAKER_00
Here s that goddamn thing again.
9
SPEAKER_02
I appreciate you asking, but no, I didn t feel a judgment around that.
9
SPEAKER_02
Biologically, our genes want to survive and pass on.
9
SPEAKER_02
I have felt that little biological, I m supposed to be doing this type of feeling, but I just keep coming back to the desire.
9
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it s crazy what comes up at certain times.
9
SPEAKER_00
Well, we just had the holidays.
9
SPEAKER_01
I m sure that s what we- We just had the holidays.
9
SPEAKER_01
I have a grandfather who passed this morning.
9
SPEAKER_01
Oh, he did?
9
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I sent you a text, but- Oh, I haven t read it.
9
SPEAKER_00
I was reading all about it.
9
SPEAKER_00
It s okay.
9
SPEAKER_01
It was a while coming, and it s still sad, but it s-
9
SPEAKER_01
It s, yeah.
9
SPEAKER_01
But anyway, that experience, a few weeks ago I was home visiting and I left and I was like, I probably gotta have a kid because one s on his way out.
9
SPEAKER_00
You re letting down your grandfather.
9
SPEAKER_01
It s letting down, but then there is something bizarrely primitive of like, we ve gotta keep these genes going.
9
SPEAKER_01
Now one s gone, there s only a couple options left.
9
SPEAKER_01
I never think like that.
9
SPEAKER_01
I don t care.
9
SPEAKER_01
Just keep propagating your genes.
9
SPEAKER_01
I never think it, but then death brings up a whole
9
SPEAKER_00
And remember, Neil Feist was saying, like, I m contributing to Hitler s goal.
9
SPEAKER_00
That was his takeaway by being gay and Jewish.
9
SPEAKER_00
That was the weight that was on his shoulders.
9
SPEAKER_00
He s like, I m fulfilling Hitler s dream by not having kids and being gay.
9
SPEAKER_01
Like, whoa, that s heavy.
9
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, there s just so much underneath that you don t think about until you re confronted with those decisions.
9
SPEAKER_02
We started having these conversations around when we were 27 and about to turn 40 next month and Xander just got a vasectomy a couple months ago.
9
SPEAKER_02
So that was like the final like, OK, now we re officially closing the door and saying this is not going to happen.
9
SPEAKER_00
I ve only seen three pictures of Xander and all three photos he was not wearing shoes.
9
SPEAKER_00
He hate shoes or?
9
SPEAKER_02
We both do.
9
SPEAKER_02
I m like sitting here just kind of wishing I could have taken them off.
9
SPEAKER_00
You could have absolutely taken them off.
9
SPEAKER_00
And you ve got real strong bottoms of your feet.
9
SPEAKER_00
You can walk across gravel and stuff because I m a coward.
9
SPEAKER_02
He s a surfer so his feet are gnarly.
9
SPEAKER_01
You don t want to look at those feet.
9
SPEAKER_00
Looks like sea foam.
9
SPEAKER_00
Coral.
9
SPEAKER_01
You guys should get into that, what s it called?
9
SPEAKER_01
Like grounding.
9
SPEAKER_01
They re already into that.
9
SPEAKER_02
I like never wear shoes.
9
SPEAKER_00
They re grounding just naturally.
9
SPEAKER_00
They don t even have to pursue it.
9
SPEAKER_02
That s a funny thing to notice about his photos though.
9
SPEAKER_00
Well, most people wear shoes in photos, in a magazine.
9
SPEAKER_02
That s great.
9
SPEAKER_00
Okay, Vanessa, this was so fun.
9
SPEAKER_02
I had a great time.
9
SPEAKER_00
Worth your trip down from San Diego.
9
SPEAKER_02
You got a spit take?
9
SPEAKER_00
I got a spit take.
9
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, first ever.
9
SPEAKER_02
It was all downhill from there, but I know.
9
SPEAKER_00
Your book s really, really great.
9
SPEAKER_00
I do think you re right in that people will be scared to even buy the book.
9
SPEAKER_00
And besides it being a great book, I think the thing that I would most want people to know is you re just effortlessly in it immediately.
9
SPEAKER_00
It s not a mountain.
9
SPEAKER_00
You just start breaking these things down and you re like, all right, that s all doable.
9
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I could make that list.
9
SPEAKER_00
It makes it very pragmatic and approachable and surmountable.
9
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
9
SPEAKER_00
And I think that s the kind of genius of the book.
9
SPEAKER_00
It makes me think of AA.
9
SPEAKER_00
You walk into AA and you re like, how the fuck am I going to quit doing drugs and drinking?
9
SPEAKER_00
You re going to read these 12 steps and by God, here we re at this one.
9
SPEAKER_00
You know, it just starts happening.
9
SPEAKER_00
So I think for anyone who has any fear or anxiety of even broaching this, this book s perfect.
9
SPEAKER_00
Just get this fucking book and read it.
9
SPEAKER_00
And then maybe you ll want to give it to your partner.
9
SPEAKER_00
I think you will.
9
SPEAKER_02
Thank you for saying that.
9
SPEAKER_02
I really appreciate it.
9
SPEAKER_02
Definitely writing a book about sex is an undertaking and trying to market a book about sex is an undertaking.
9
SPEAKER_02
But I really wanted to write a book that would feel approachable and manageable for people.
9
SPEAKER_02
I wanted it to not be scary and also feel like Xander and I are there along with you every step of the way.
9
SPEAKER_02
We share some of our most embarrassing stories and most personal stories and just like, hey, we ve been through this, too.
9
SPEAKER_02
You re normal.
9
SPEAKER_02
We re all normal.
9
SPEAKER_02
Let us guide you through this.
9
SPEAKER_00
And I m not diminishing the sophistication of the book, but literally it s like you ve started kindergarten.
9
SPEAKER_02
That s exactly what I wanted.
9
SPEAKER_00
If you remember sitting on the carpet and they start telling you about the sun, you re like, oh yeah, okay, I get this.
9
SPEAKER_00
Like it s that approachable.
9
SPEAKER_01
We need that.
9
SPEAKER_01
No one went to school for this.
9
SPEAKER_01
We have to start at kindergarten.
9
SPEAKER_00
Yes, truly.
9
SPEAKER_02
And you can buy it on audiobook.
9
SPEAKER_02
You can buy the Kindle version if you don t want to have the physical version.
9
SPEAKER_02
You don t have to go into a bookstore or anything like that.
9
SPEAKER_00
who read the audio book?
9
SPEAKER_02
Xander and I read it.
9
SPEAKER_02
Oh, you did?
9
SPEAKER_00
Oh, so you have a podcast.
9
SPEAKER_00
Let me also mention that if you love Vanessa, which I m sure you do, you can also listen to her and Xander on Pillow Talk.
9
SPEAKER_02
Yes, we do a little weekly podcast from our bed.
9
SPEAKER_02
And yeah, he s kind of a little bit of an audiophile.
9
SPEAKER_02
So he managed to hook up our closet to be our audio book recording studio.
9
SPEAKER_00
Oh, nice.
9
SPEAKER_02
So it was all recorded from home in our closet.
9
SPEAKER_00
Oh, perfect.
9
SPEAKER_02
Closets are the way you should be recording.
9
SPEAKER_00
This has nothing to do with that, but Schwarzenegger s book?
9
SPEAKER_00
Listen to the audio you can just tell he has all the leverage
10
SPEAKER_02
and anything at any point.
10
SPEAKER_02
And you can tell he was just like, I m going to do it at my house and I don t want anyone there.
10
SPEAKER_02
So he s literally, no, it s great.
10
SPEAKER_02
He s like, I came to this country.
10
SPEAKER_02
You re hearing goats.
10
SPEAKER_02
I have a lot of animals.
10
SPEAKER_02
They re walking around and you can hear animals fucking walking.
10
SPEAKER_02
And it s like, not on the page.
10
SPEAKER_02
He s just kind of riffing on what s really happening.
10
SPEAKER_02
Like, oh, this is a whole new experience.
10
SPEAKER_02
He s like acknowledging what s going on while he s recording.
10
SPEAKER_02
And he s reading the book.
10
SPEAKER_00
I wish I could have done that.
10
SPEAKER_00
I had to be exquisitely tuned in to like, oh, there was a little creek in the background.
10
SPEAKER_00
Get the dogs out of here.
10
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, there s a goat.
10
SPEAKER_02
Can you hear it?
10
SPEAKER_02
All right, Vanessa, thank you so much.
10
SPEAKER_02
Everyone check out Sex Talks, the five conversations that will transform your love life.
10
SPEAKER_02
Good luck to you.
10
SPEAKER_02
And I hope we get to talk to you on the next book you write.
10
SPEAKER_00
Thank you so much for having me.
10
SPEAKER_02
Stay tuned for the fact check so you can hear all the facts that were wrong.
10
SPEAKER_01
What would happen if I put my cup on that?
10
SPEAKER_02
Your paper cup?
10
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
10
SPEAKER_02
Nothing.
10
SPEAKER_01
Would it heat, I mean?
10
SPEAKER_02
No.
10
SPEAKER_02
Because it s, you see this thing at the bottom here, this ring?
10
SPEAKER_02
When that connects with the electricity, the electricity goes through there and creates some friction, which creates the heat.
10
SPEAKER_02
So you need this part.
10
SPEAKER_01
Got it.
10
SPEAKER_02
This doesn t actually heat.
10
SPEAKER_02
This just gives electricity.
10
SPEAKER_01
Copy.
10
SPEAKER_02
So you might get some ions in your coffee.
10
SPEAKER_02
Do you want ions?
10
SPEAKER_01
I m low on ions.
10
SPEAKER_02
What s your ion level right now, currently?
10
SPEAKER_02
Did you take a reading this morning?
10
SPEAKER_02
It s at a four?
10
SPEAKER_02
Oh no.
10
SPEAKER_02
How did you do waking up so early and getting over here?
10
SPEAKER_02
Was it hard or okay?
10
SPEAKER_01
It was okay.
10
SPEAKER_01
I went to bed pretty early.
10
SPEAKER_01
I have a headache.
10
SPEAKER_02
Uh oh.
10
SPEAKER_02
Have you had enough caffeine today?
10
SPEAKER_01
Well, yeah.
10
SPEAKER_01
I had tea and I m drinking coffee.
10
SPEAKER_01
Sometimes I get headaches on my period.
10
SPEAKER_02
Okay.
10
SPEAKER_02
Any crampies?
10
SPEAKER_01
No crampies, but headaches.
10
SPEAKER_02
Crampies kisses?
10
SPEAKER_01
Cramp daddy s kisses.
10
SPEAKER_01
Cramp daddy s kisses.
10
SPEAKER_02
I m so sorry you got a little bit of, I see you have a little sputum on your Prada s, your white Prada s.
10
SPEAKER_02
You want to wipe it right now with some tissue?
10
SPEAKER_01
It s okay.
10
SPEAKER_01
It s all right?
10
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, thank you, I appreciate the offer.
10
SPEAKER_01
It s what happens.
10
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, shoes are gonna get dirty.
10
SPEAKER_01
They are, I m okay with it.
10
SPEAKER_02
The quicker you can accept that, the quicker.
10
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
10
SPEAKER_02
Peace.
10
SPEAKER_01
Peace on earth.
10
SPEAKER_02
Peace on earth will be done.
10
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I don t need a perfect shoe.
10
SPEAKER_02
Good.
10
SPEAKER_02
I try to get mine dirty.
10
SPEAKER_01
I know, you ve said that.
10
SPEAKER_02
You saw me in my white Converse the other day.
10
SPEAKER_02
I was like, oof, I can t wait for these to get dirty.
10
SPEAKER_02
You thought they were too white.
10
SPEAKER_02
Oh, they were humiliating, walking down the street.
10
SPEAKER_02
I like them.
10
SPEAKER_02
I ve got bright shoes on today.
10
SPEAKER_01
It s cause you feel embarrassed.
10
SPEAKER_01
They re obviously new if they re that white.
10
SPEAKER_01
I think that s what it s like.
10
SPEAKER_01
I have the money to buy new shoes every day.
10
SPEAKER_02
I think it s more like playground.
10
SPEAKER_02
Like it s just gonna draw attention to you.
10
SPEAKER_01
The attention that you re fancy.
10
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, that s true.
10
SPEAKER_02
Oh, this just popped in my head.
10
SPEAKER_02
Some people and maybe just one person has been regularly requesting an update on P-Baby.
10
SPEAKER_02
I know.
10
SPEAKER_01
I miss P-Baby.
10
SPEAKER_02
Where is P-Baby?
10
SPEAKER_02
I guess we can t give you one because we re not certain.
10
SPEAKER_01
P-Baby s probably with my grandpa.
10
SPEAKER_02
P-Baby s definitely dead.
10
SPEAKER_02
The toilet s probably gone, right?
10
SPEAKER_02
But could have P-Baby escaped the boundaries?
10
SPEAKER_01
Well, yes.
10
SPEAKER_01
P-Baby definitely evaporated before the toilet got removed.
10
SPEAKER_01
Although the toilet at this point is probably still there.
10
SPEAKER_01
I could run over.
10
SPEAKER_01
I could check with Bill.
10
SPEAKER_02
This person suggested many requests for an update on P-Baby, and then at some point wrote, like, maybe Hermium Permium s living with P-Baby, and perhaps we could get an update from Hermium Permium.
10
SPEAKER_01
Okay, I see.
10
SPEAKER_01
An update.
10
SPEAKER_02
I wasn t leading you all there.
10
SPEAKER_02
No, I love that.
10
SPEAKER_02
It just occurred to me that that was part of the, what a sweet man.
10
SPEAKER_02
He s taking in the P-Baby and the robot.
10
SPEAKER_02
I don t know how Hermium makes his money, though.
10
SPEAKER_01
All these misfits.
10
SPEAKER_02
I m on disability.
10
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, I got a bad back, but that s okay, because it gives me a lot of time to pursue my other interests, friendship.
10
SPEAKER_01
Oh.
10
SPEAKER_01
So can we, should we ask him?
10
SPEAKER_01
What s the state of?
10
SPEAKER_02
Sure.
10
SPEAKER_01
But I m a little nervous, but okay.
10
SPEAKER_02
Tell me what you re nervous about.
10
SPEAKER_01
I m just like, is he gonna have bad news?
10
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I just don t know what, I m curious too.
10
SPEAKER_02
Got great news for you.
10
SPEAKER_02
P-Baby just graduated TK.
10
SPEAKER_01
Oh my God.
10
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
10
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
10
SPEAKER_02
He or she is doing wonderful.
10
SPEAKER_01
That s right.
10
SPEAKER_01
Top marks.
10
SPEAKER_02
Celebrated around the whole playground as being a good companion and someone who can listen and rarely interjects.
10
SPEAKER_02
Doesn t have a lot of advice, but that s okay sometimes.
10
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
10
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
10
SPEAKER_01
TK, pee baby s aging interestingly.
10
SPEAKER_02
The chronology of a pee baby is very peculiar.
10
SPEAKER_02
I agree with you there wholeheartedly, Miss Monica.
10
SPEAKER_02
We d love to have you stop by the house over in Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, USA, say hi to me and the robot.
10
SPEAKER_02
Is that my friend Monica?
10
SPEAKER_02
Has she ever considered dating a robot?
10
SPEAKER_01
Because I am a boy, so she shouldn t feel ethically compromised.
10
SPEAKER_01
The robot needs to know that I can t date boys.
10
SPEAKER_01
I have to date men.
10
SPEAKER_01
He s not a man.
10
SPEAKER_01
I am 18 years old.
10
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
10
SPEAKER_02
I think he s lying.
10
SPEAKER_02
Some of my material is timeless.
10
SPEAKER_02
Wait, now he is.
10
SPEAKER_02
Permian speech impediment, that got confusing.
10
SPEAKER_01
No, I sounded like him.
10
SPEAKER_01
Well, those two are, I m glad they ve chatted.
10
SPEAKER_02
Sorry about your headache.
10
SPEAKER_02
I think we should update people.
10
SPEAKER_02
This is the earliest we ve ever done a fact check because we started an interview this morning at 7.45.
10
SPEAKER_01
Early, pearly.
10
SPEAKER_01
It is early, but it s nice.
10
SPEAKER_02
The whole day to ruminate.
10
SPEAKER_02
I liked it because it gave me an excuse to drink more caffeine than I normally get to.
10
SPEAKER_01
I saw you had a coffee and then started on your own.
10
SPEAKER_02
Well, Wabi Wabi brought me a Maru and brought you a Maru.
10
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
10
SPEAKER_02
And then I also wanted to brew one.
10
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
10
SPEAKER_02
Just because, creature of habit.
10
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I know.
10
SPEAKER_01
I brought a tea in, so I drank that and now I m drinking that.
10
SPEAKER_02
Transitioned into the Maru.
10
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, into the Maru.
10
SPEAKER_01
Okay, something,
10
SPEAKER_01
uncharacteristic happened.
10
SPEAKER_02
Please tell me.
10
SPEAKER_01
Yesterday I left to go to a pickleball birthday party.
10
SPEAKER_02
Okay.
10
SPEAKER_01
Left my house.
10
SPEAKER_02
Are you allowed to tell me who s?
10
SPEAKER_01
Rachel.
10
SPEAKER_01
I really need her to teach me.
10
SPEAKER_01
Cause we just like paddled around a little bit and um, I liked it, but I couldn t really, I don t know how to play yet.
10
SPEAKER_02
I m proud of you for playing.
10
SPEAKER_02
Cause you wouldn t participate in my volleyball game.
10
SPEAKER_02
So I had low expectations of you playing pickleball.
10
SPEAKER_01
But listen, you don t want to believe me.
10
SPEAKER_01
I don t like volleyball.
10
SPEAKER_01
It s not that I just don t want to participate in anything.
10
SPEAKER_01
I just don t want to participate in things I don t like.
10
SPEAKER_02
Have you ever played grass?
10
SPEAKER_02
I don t want to press.
10
SPEAKER_02
I m just trying to tiptoe around this, but you have played grass.
10
SPEAKER_02
Cause let me just say, gymnasium volleyball, ouchy.
10
SPEAKER_01
Ouchy, yeah.
10
SPEAKER_02
Sand volleyball, too hard.
10
SPEAKER_02
Grass volleyball, just right.
10
SPEAKER_01
Well, except that everyone was in so much pain, it didn t make it more alluring after the fact.
10
SPEAKER_01
And it s not the ground, it s my wrists.
10
SPEAKER_01
It s my hands and wrists, I don t like it.
10
SPEAKER_02
You get afraid you re gonna hurt your wrist as you hit the ball.
10
SPEAKER_01
Look how small they are.
10
SPEAKER_02
I got the same size ones, unfortunately.
10
SPEAKER_01
No.
10
SPEAKER_02
Try being a 6 2 male with those size wrists.
10
SPEAKER_01
Your wrists are not as small as mine.
10
SPEAKER_02
They re so dainty.
10
SPEAKER_02
It stings, I don t know what you re talking about.
10
SPEAKER_01
It hurts.
10
SPEAKER_01
It stings in the head.
10
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
10
SPEAKER_02
If it s a hard ball, like a gym class, it s stunned when you re playing.
10
SPEAKER_02
Guys, you hit with your fingertips and it won t hurt.
10
SPEAKER_01
It s still, it s an impact.
10
SPEAKER_02
Fuck that, I m anti that.
10
SPEAKER_02
Okay.
10
SPEAKER_01
But even that, it s the impact.
10
SPEAKER_01
I have D&T wrists.
10
SPEAKER_01
It was always hard for me to do back handsprings.
10
SPEAKER_01
Oh, okay.
10
SPEAKER_01
Because of the impact.
10
SPEAKER_01
Right.
10
SPEAKER_02
Okay, so anyways, back to pickleball.
10
SPEAKER_01
Okay, yeah.
10
SPEAKER_01
So, but pickleball, I m happy to try.
10
SPEAKER_01
It was fun.
10
SPEAKER_01
I didn t really play any of the games.
10
SPEAKER_01
I didn t know how to play and people knew how to play.
10
SPEAKER_01
It wasn t fair.
10
SPEAKER_01
So I went to this party.
10
SPEAKER_01
I m gone for a long time.
10
SPEAKER_01
And it hits me that maybe I left my candle on.
10
SPEAKER_02
Uh-oh.
10
SPEAKER_01
But if you didn t know that I was telling a story right now and I was with you and I said, oh, I feel like I maybe left my candle on, you d say, no, you didn t.
10
SPEAKER_02
Mm-hmm, well, yeah, because I know you worry about things.
10
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
10
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, you ll be in bed thinking your oven s on.
10
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
10
SPEAKER_01
Right.
10
SPEAKER_01
So I channeled everyone else who I knew would say, I m sure you didn t and you re just worried.
10
SPEAKER_01
I get home, many, many hours later, it s on.
10
SPEAKER_01
Oh.
10
SPEAKER_01
Left it on all day.
10
SPEAKER_02
Oh, in an apartment building.
10
SPEAKER_01
Scary.
10
SPEAKER_02
Yeah, yeah.
10
SPEAKER_02
I hate candles.
10
SPEAKER_01
But I guess, okay, then I started to really think about it.
10
SPEAKER_01
The fear, right, I guess is that something would blow on it and catch fire.
10
SPEAKER_02
No, so this is what, as you know, my mother s
11
SPEAKER_00
house caught on fire while we were downstairs in the basement having a shows and shoots work party Christmas party.
11
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
11
SPEAKER_00
And we were down there playing pool and everyone s pretty hammered and Dean goes upstairs to get probably some more refreshments of some sort and we hear him screaming,
11
SPEAKER_01
Fire!
11
SPEAKER_01
For real!
11
SPEAKER_00
We re all such shithead jokesters.
11
SPEAKER_00
But it was pretty clear by the tenor of his voice that it was real.
11
SPEAKER_00
So what had happened there is there was a candle on a glass table.
11
SPEAKER_00
Sometimes those things crack, like they get hot, it cracked.
11
SPEAKER_00
Got too hot.
11
SPEAKER_00
As the wax spilled out and then over the table, it all just caught fire and it went right down to the wood floor and now you have this accelerant on the wood floor.
11
SPEAKER_00
I think they re the cause of like 90% of house fires.
11
SPEAKER_01
I know, I just always wonder, because, okay, I ve done it one other time in my life.
11
SPEAKER_00
Okay.
11
SPEAKER_01
And it just burnt out on itself.
11
SPEAKER_01
Like it just burnt all the way down.
11
SPEAKER_00
And I think that 99.9999% of the times, that s what happens.
11
SPEAKER_01
But then I guess, yeah, the glass crack is an ish.
11
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, and shouldn t happen.
11
SPEAKER_00
Maybe it was a shitty candle my mother had bought.
11
SPEAKER_00
But also at that exact same time, I worked with four dudes that lived at this house.
11
SPEAKER_00
One of them had candles burning in his room, burnt the whole house down.
11
SPEAKER_00
So it was like that happened.
11
SPEAKER_00
And then the thing at my mom s house happens.
11
SPEAKER_00
I m so reckless with so many things.
11
SPEAKER_00
Candles happens to be the one thing I m like on high alert for.
11
SPEAKER_00
And so Kristen loves candles.
11
SPEAKER_00
They re burning all over the house.
11
SPEAKER_00
And my thing is like, you gotta have a runoff, at least like if you re gonna have these candles burn all the time, please have them on a plate that ll capture if it breaks the wax, so it won t spill over.
11
SPEAKER_00
I don t ever wanna see a candle on a wood finish of anything.
11
SPEAKER_00
So I m pretty neurotic about the candles.
11
SPEAKER_01
My candle is on a little pedestal.
11
SPEAKER_01
Oh, great.
11
SPEAKER_01
And it s on top of books, and that s all on top of a wood table.
11
SPEAKER_00
And books are very flammable.
11
SPEAKER_01
Well, the top is not.
11
SPEAKER_01
It s a coffee table book, it has a veneer.
11
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s pretty flammable, I think.
11
SPEAKER_01
Okay, well.
11
SPEAKER_00
Anywho.
11
SPEAKER_00
Anyway, that s my story.
11
SPEAKER_00
I m not trying to shame you.
11
SPEAKER_01
That happened.
11
SPEAKER_00
I m trying to save you, so I think books are pretty flammable.
11
SPEAKER_01
I know, I know what to say.
11
SPEAKER_00
You have like platters, you have decorative platters.
11
SPEAKER_01
I don t have, I mean, yeah, I don t know.
11
SPEAKER_01
I don t know, I don t know what to say.
11
SPEAKER_01
It was a big oopsies.
11
SPEAKER_00
Like this candle, I was in the house, I guess Friday after we recorded, we did two episodes.
11
SPEAKER_00
And then I find myself in bed going like, oh right, I remember we had a candle going, that s on a wood desk.
11
SPEAKER_00
And then I start getting neurotic about it.
11
SPEAKER_00
And then I got to come up here to double check that it s out.
11
SPEAKER_01
And was it out?
11
SPEAKER_00
I will say you normally blow it out before me and I m pretty neurotic about candles also.
11
SPEAKER_00
Just because I did this the one time, I m careful.
11
SPEAKER_00
That s why it s so upsetting when you re right.
11
SPEAKER_01
Because then it s really bad for anxiety.
11
SPEAKER_00
Mm-hmm, it fuels another 20 times being wrong.
11
SPEAKER_01
Yes, but luckily nothing happened.
11
SPEAKER_01
Still just burning a little quiet burn.
11
SPEAKER_00
It probably smelled wonderful in there too.
11
SPEAKER_01
It did, it did.
11
SPEAKER_01
That s how I, when I came in, I was like, oh fuck, I definitely did.
11
SPEAKER_00
It s definitely been burning.
11
SPEAKER_01
It smells great in here.
11
SPEAKER_01
I need to practice using the fire extinguisher, but I can t really practice.
11
SPEAKER_00
Also, I don t think you do.
11
SPEAKER_00
You pull the pin out and squeeze it.
11
SPEAKER_00
It s not very complicated.
11
SPEAKER_00
They make it real intuitive.
11
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, so that happened.
11
SPEAKER_01
And then on Saturday, something else happened on Saturday.
11
SPEAKER_00
What?
11
SPEAKER_01
I went to bed really early on Saturday.
11
SPEAKER_01
I was so tired.
11
SPEAKER_01
And I went to bed and then I woke up in the morning, early in the morning, which was exciting.
11
SPEAKER_00
Right, before the sun was out.
11
SPEAKER_01
And then I looked at the clock and it was 11.30 p.m.
11
SPEAKER_00
Oopsie-doosie.
11
SPEAKER_01
I already slept the whole night.
11
SPEAKER_00
Had your dreams, had your REM, had your deep cycles.
11
SPEAKER_00
Did everything.
11
SPEAKER_00
Made your endorphins.
11
SPEAKER_01
It was so upsetting.
11
SPEAKER_00
What did you do?
11
SPEAKER_01
I just like closed my, I tried to go back to sleep, which I did.
11
SPEAKER_01
Oh, good.
11
SPEAKER_01
I don t know how long, because I didn t want to keep checking.
11
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
11
SPEAKER_01
I don t know what time I fell back asleep, but I did fall back asleep at some point.
11
SPEAKER_00
Okay.
11
SPEAKER_00
And when you woke up for the second time, what time was it?
11
SPEAKER_01
Nine.
11
SPEAKER_01
Whoa.
11
SPEAKER_00
I know.
11
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
11
SPEAKER_00
I know, weird.
11
SPEAKER_00
You needed a deep cycle charge.
11
SPEAKER_01
I guess.
11
SPEAKER_01
I still feel tired.
11
SPEAKER_00
You do?
11
SPEAKER_00
I wonder what your iron s at.
11
SPEAKER_01
Well, I m on my period, so it s probably low.
11
SPEAKER_00
Right.
11
SPEAKER_01
I had beef yesterday, though.
11
SPEAKER_00
Oh, good.
11
SPEAKER_00
Get some beef.
11
SPEAKER_00
I love beef.
11
SPEAKER_00
What kind of beef did you have?
11
SPEAKER_00
Hamburgers?
11
SPEAKER_01
Oh, God.
11
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
11
SPEAKER_00
He s here now, too.
11
SPEAKER_00
Sorry, not coming in.
11
SPEAKER_00
Don t even wait for an answer.
11
SPEAKER_00
Check me out.
11
SPEAKER_00
I m here.
11
SPEAKER_00
Take me in.
11
SPEAKER_00
Just like the beef you had.
11
SPEAKER_00
What kind of beef was it?
11
SPEAKER_01
It was ground beef.
11
Oh, grinded.
11
SPEAKER_01
Oh, he s so the opposite of the robot in Hermium Permium.
11
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, the yin and the yang.
11
SPEAKER_00
Ew, he s so awful.
11
SPEAKER_00
Oh man.
11
SPEAKER_00
I had a really, really satisfying day yesterday.
11
SPEAKER_00
So were you done?
11
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
11
SPEAKER_00
Okay, I am preparing to go to the sand dunes.
11
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, are you so excited?
11
SPEAKER_00
I am and particularly because of yesterday.
11
SPEAKER_00
So what generally happens and I ll out myself as being like not a good steward of my stuff.
11
SPEAKER_00
I have too many items, I have too many vehicles.
11
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
11
SPEAKER_00
Just keeping all the batteries tended to is, and then like I have them all plugged into tenders, but then, uh, you know, the GFI blows on the garden fucking plug and then they re not charging for six months.
11
SPEAKER_00
And I go to start something and I use things so infrequently, like I would love to go to the dunes all the time, but I don t really have time.
11
SPEAKER_00
So I have not been to the dunes.
11
SPEAKER_00
And I went in November for Aaron s sobriety birthday last year.
11
SPEAKER_00
So we re, we re at 14 months.
11
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
11
SPEAKER_00
So I haven t started my sand rail.
11
SPEAKER_00
I haven t started the razors.
11
SPEAKER_00
The razors have been in a trail, you know, all this shit.
11
SPEAKER_00
And I had help.
11
SPEAKER_00
Jay was helping me, thank God.
11
SPEAKER_00
So I at least deployed him to make sure the batteries were charged last week.
11
SPEAKER_01
Oh, that s smart.
11
SPEAKER_00
Fucking sand rail fired right up, ran beautifully.
11
SPEAKER_00
The razors all worked.
11
SPEAKER_00
Oh, great.
11
SPEAKER_00
I loaded the trail.
11
SPEAKER_00
There s always an incident loading, like the fucking cable breaks with the big heavy door, but everything went beautifully.
11
SPEAKER_00
Everything ran beautifully.
11
SPEAKER_00
Everything s prepped.
11
SPEAKER_00
Everything s full of fuel.
11
SPEAKER_00
The extra tank is full.
11
SPEAKER_00
I slid it right into the trailer, the big trailer, then the one seater behind it.
11
SPEAKER_00
Everything s perfectly in there.
11
SPEAKER_01
Everything as it should be.
11
SPEAKER_00
Yes, and then I put the trailer ahead of time, like already where it needs to be to hook the bus up to it, which is always a fiasco when I m trying to leave.
11
SPEAKER_00
So everything is like ready to get hooked up and drive away and nothing s broken, which then led back to the candle and obsession and kind of obsessive compulsive thoughts.
11
SPEAKER_00
At some point when it was going so well, I m like, the bus has gotta be broken.
11
SPEAKER_00
You re waiting for the other shoe to drop.
11
SPEAKER_00
Yes, the shoe to drop, like there s no way this is all going, is, because usually I m discovering I have a big mechanical thing I ve got to sort out, not enough time.
11
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
11
SPEAKER_00
So everything s working so perfectly.
11
SPEAKER_00
And so the only thing hovering above me is like, that I m gonna fire up the bus on Wednesday and the suspension s not gonna be working or something, the air suspension, I have them.
11
SPEAKER_00
But I did fire up the generator yesterday, that thing ran perfectly.
11
SPEAKER_00
Almost there, we re almost to everything being perfectly.
11
SPEAKER_01
I see it s getting washed today.
11
SPEAKER_01
It s taking a bath.
11
SPEAKER_00
Yes, yes, the bus is getting a bath, and I m never this ahead, and all I gotta worry about is the food we re gonna eat out there.
11
SPEAKER_01
I was gonna say, snacks could be a thing you re overlooking as not a problem, but then could end up being a problem.
11
SPEAKER_00
Be a big problem if we had no snacks out in the dunes, agreed.
11
SPEAKER_01
What are you gonna make meals-wise?
11
SPEAKER_00
I plan on taking out a couple pounds of taco meat, a couple pounds of manwich.
11
SPEAKER_01
Okay, great.
11
SPEAKER_00
And then I already have like eight steaks out in the freezer.
11
SPEAKER_00
I already put them in the bus in the freezer.
11
SPEAKER_00
I ve already got a few in the fridge thawing.
11
SPEAKER_00
So we ll barbecue steaks and we ll have our ground beefs and our, yeah.
11
SPEAKER_01
That sounds nice.
11
SPEAKER_00
But you re right, we need more snacky snacks.
11
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, chippies.
11
SPEAKER_01
Because the little mice and rats will need some chips.
11
SPEAKER_00
The mice are gone.
11
SPEAKER_00
If you recall, Aaron and I captured them humanely.
11
SPEAKER_01
Well, you don t know who will arrive.
11
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, for their chippies.
11
SPEAKER_01
Look who it is, miniature mice.
11
SPEAKER_00
Will you talk to them and just say like, can they sit this trip?
11
SPEAKER_01
I will, I will as their mother.
11
SPEAKER_00
Do you remember how like the first time I discovered that we had the mice is that I thought Aaron was eating ruffles at three in the morning.
11
SPEAKER_00
I was like, I felt like his parent, like I want to go yell at him.
11
SPEAKER_00
Like you can t eat chips in the middle of the night.
11
SPEAKER_00
Like when I woke up, I was like, how am I going to broach this subject that I don t think he should be eating chips.
11
SPEAKER_00
And finally I just said,
11
SPEAKER_00
Did you get into the bag of ruffles last?
11
SPEAKER_00
He s like, no.
11
SPEAKER_00
And he can t hear a fucking thing because he s hooked up to that contraption while he sleeps.
11
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
11
SPEAKER_01
That s okay.
11
SPEAKER_01
So, I mean, this is a moot question because the answer is yes.
11
SPEAKER_01
And for all of us, if I was there and you were like, oh, Monica s eating ruffles in the middle of the night, you probably wouldn t.
11
SPEAKER_01
Well, you tell me, you probably wouldn t be like, I need to tell her she shouldn t do that.
11
SPEAKER_00
Correct.
11
SPEAKER_01
Isn t that funny?
11
SPEAKER_01
Like we have such specific, but if there was something else I was doing, you would.
11
SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
11
SPEAKER_00
Cause we re co-piloting each other.
11
SPEAKER_00
Like that s part of friendship.
12
SPEAKER_00
You know, Kristen s telling Eric not to eat the Krispy Kreme on the birthday party on Saturday.
12
SPEAKER_00
You know, like we re kind of trying to help each other with minimally are their expressed goals.
12
SPEAKER_00
Like I m never trying to intervene with somebody who hasn t expressed a goal.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_00
But if a friend of mine has expressed a goal and then I hear something that they might not occur to them, this is very contrary to your goal.
12
SPEAKER_00
I might mention it.
12
SPEAKER_01
That s true.
12
SPEAKER_01
I guess you re right.
12
SPEAKER_01
It has to be stated.
12
SPEAKER_01
Like they need to sort of given you permission to do that.
12
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, like deputized you to help.
12
SPEAKER_00
Because also for me, it s also a very big sign of love.
12
SPEAKER_00
I don t care enough about a lot of people to have an awkward conversation that might offend them.
12
SPEAKER_00
I d rather just skip it.
12
SPEAKER_00
And I don t really care if they don t meet their goals.
12
SPEAKER_01
Totally.
12
SPEAKER_01
I guess you also know he does have that goal, so he would never feel defensive about it.
12
SPEAKER_00
Right, or maybe he would, and then he would get over it, because he would quickly recognize my intention was to not control him, but to help him.
12
SPEAKER_00
But similarly, there are people that would tell me this candle story, and I would just listen, and I would have no feedback.
12
SPEAKER_00
I wouldn t tell them how to avoid burning to death.
12
SPEAKER_00
I would just be like, okay, yeah, you re handling your candles however you handle them.
12
SPEAKER_00
But you, I m gonna make some suggestions.
12
SPEAKER_01
I don t know what to do, though, because I love the look.
12
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s a good look.
12
SPEAKER_00
And I love the smell.
12
SPEAKER_00
You love silver platters.
12
SPEAKER_00
Am I wrong, and brass platters?
12
SPEAKER_01
It s on a gold, brassy, little pedestal thing.
12
SPEAKER_01
But I don t want it to be too big.
12
SPEAKER_01
It won t look good if it s too big.
12
SPEAKER_00
No, but what about small trays, like serving trays that are decorative?
12
SPEAKER_00
You have those.
12
SPEAKER_01
I do, but it just.
12
SPEAKER_00
Could we put our candles on those?
12
SPEAKER_01
I don t think it s gonna look as good.
12
SPEAKER_01
Okay, well then.
12
SPEAKER_01
But I hear you, I think.
12
SPEAKER_00
can t commit to it.
12
SPEAKER_00
That s okay.
12
SPEAKER_00
We re not there.
12
SPEAKER_00
We re not ready for this.
12
SPEAKER_01
I just can t believe I did it.
12
SPEAKER_00
Right, right, so again, and as your friend, I mean like- I think I have long COVID.
12
SPEAKER_00
Wanting to be- Or current COVID, maybe.
12
SPEAKER_00
Wanting to be infallible sounds like an unobtainable goal as your friend.
12
SPEAKER_00
So in place of that, that everyone s fallible, I m suggesting a backup, a safety net, which would be, again, a very beautiful serving platter.
12
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
12
SPEAKER_00
Okay, just think about it.
12
SPEAKER_01
I ll look.
12
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I love buying stuff, so I guess I could go buy one.
12
SPEAKER_00
Or I could settle for that there s a post-it on your door.
12
SPEAKER_00
I know.
12
SPEAKER_00
Something that just says our candle s out.
12
SPEAKER_01
I know, I thought about that, but then that feels like that s really not good for my anxiety.
12
SPEAKER_00
To have that post-it.
12
SPEAKER_01
Because then it s like a constant.
12
SPEAKER_00
That you ve invited peril into your orbit.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I have to be careful managing this brain.
12
SPEAKER_00
This is a brag, but I m gonna say it, because I often complain when the opposite s happening.
12
SPEAKER_00
Okay.
12
SPEAKER_00
My word access has been off the charts for like five days, and it s so weird I can feel it.
12
SPEAKER_01
I can feel it too when it s happening.
12
SPEAKER_01
Mine s the opposite.
12
SPEAKER_01
What are you doing?
12
SPEAKER_01
What s different?
12
SPEAKER_00
No dip.
12
SPEAKER_00
I mean, I m trying to think what s different.
12
SPEAKER_00
But that s counterintuitive because dip is a stimulant, and probably it was helping me think.
12
SPEAKER_00
I don t know, but- Probably not.
12
SPEAKER_01
This is what we think.
12
SPEAKER_01
This is like with booze.
12
SPEAKER_01
where you think you re so flowy and- Your best self.
12
SPEAKER_01
But you re not.
12
SPEAKER_00
Also, I guess my diet, I just haven t deviated and had any flare ups.
12
SPEAKER_00
I don t know what s going on, but I ve just been like, oh- You re 49.
12
SPEAKER_00
This feels good, yeah.
12
SPEAKER_01
Maybe that, your birthday.
12
SPEAKER_00
Could have been my birthday.
12
SPEAKER_00
Maybe because I m writing more and I m playing with words in my head more.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_00
But I like it so much.
12
SPEAKER_01
That, I know, it feels so good.
12
SPEAKER_00
It does.
12
SPEAKER_00
I wish it would stay forever, but alas, it won t.
12
SPEAKER_01
It might, it might.
12
SPEAKER_00
I mean, isn t your greatest fear in life is like when you get much, much older and you re starting to get dementia and you re like struggling to remember a word.
12
SPEAKER_00
That sounds like purgatory to me.
12
SPEAKER_00
I know, it s awful.
12
SPEAKER_00
Oh my gosh, how exciting.
12
SPEAKER_00
Oh my gosh, spam.
12
SPEAKER_00
Oh, that s from your computer.
12
SPEAKER_00
I was gonna say, you re not one to have your ringer on, but your computer just rang.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, my ringer s not on.
12
SPEAKER_01
That is annoying, that is weird.
12
SPEAKER_00
I can phone call you on your computer.
12
SPEAKER_01
Call me.
12
SPEAKER_00
All right, let s see.
12
SPEAKER_00
And then answer on your computer, and let s see what happens.
12
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
12
SPEAKER_00
This is a real-time experiment, so if it goes wrong, forgive us.
12
SPEAKER_00
Okay.
12
SPEAKER_00
I m gonna go to Favorites, because you re one of my favorites.
12
SPEAKER_00
And then I m gonna go here to Messages, but then I m gonna go to Call.
12
SPEAKER_01
It is, okay.
12
SPEAKER_00
But let it ring on your computer.
12
SPEAKER_01
It did, it just didn t make a noise.
12
SPEAKER_00
Okay, hold on.
12
SPEAKER_01
Hello?
12
SPEAKER_01
Hi.
12
SPEAKER_01
Hi.
12
SPEAKER_01
What kind of beef did you eat last night?
12
SPEAKER_00
The end.
12
SPEAKER_00
Hung up on him.
12
SPEAKER_01
He s not allowed to call me.
12
SPEAKER_00
I thought I d get to hear on your computer because you re so smart.
12
SPEAKER_01
It s like, he s so weird.
12
SPEAKER_01
I was okay.
12
SPEAKER_01
Star.
12
SPEAKER_01
He s so aggressive.
12
SPEAKER_01
Oh, man.
12
SPEAKER_00
No one modeled any good behavior for him.
12
SPEAKER_00
It s not really his fault.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it s not his fault, but it s his responsibility to change.
12
SPEAKER_01
You re absolutely right.
12
SPEAKER_01
OK, now this is for Vanessa.
12
SPEAKER_00
The sex spurt.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_01
Loved her.
12
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
12
SPEAKER_01
Loved this episode.
12
SPEAKER_01
And I was very helpful.
12
SPEAKER_01
I think very helpful to a lot of people.
12
SPEAKER_01
It will be.
12
SPEAKER_00
This is a day of novelties because we recorded at 745 with a guest.
12
SPEAKER_00
Also, I have never listened to an episode when we do the fact check, but this is a rare case in which I have heard the episode as well.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yes, you have.
12
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_00
I think there s only happened twice.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_00
I m on the same page as you.
12
SPEAKER_00
It s exciting.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it is.
12
SPEAKER_00
I listened to it because I wanted to make sure I hadn t said anything that was too revealing of other people.
12
SPEAKER_00
Yes, exactly.
12
SPEAKER_00
Tabloid.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_00
And I didn t think so.
12
SPEAKER_00
You had already removed stuff?
12
SPEAKER_01
Oh yeah, I mean, I cut so much.
12
SPEAKER_01
And I was sad to cut some of it, to be honest, because I think it was good, but we just can t trust the world.
12
SPEAKER_01
And that s just sad.
12
SPEAKER_01
It sucks.
12
SPEAKER_00
For me, the boundary is, and I think I ve said this in the past, like there s definitely been moments long ago where I would have gone to an SLA meeting.
12
SPEAKER_00
I relate to that.
12
SPEAKER_00
And in fact, I went to one once with a friend.
12
SPEAKER_00
And if I go to an AA meeting, that s not something Kristen s gonna be forced to address in an interview.
12
SPEAKER_00
Of course.
12
SPEAKER_00
But if people see me at SLA meetings, then all of a sudden every fucking interview will be like, what s it like to be married to a sex and love addict?
12
SPEAKER_00
But that s so unfair.
12
SPEAKER_00
It s so unfair, but it happened to Tia Leone where every fucking interview she was in, she would have to answer for David Duchovny having said that.
12
SPEAKER_00
And so I can only be as honest as I wanna be so long as it doesn t really impact anyone else.
12
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
12
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_01
No, I know.
12
SPEAKER_01
That s just a bummer for our listeners who are kind and nice, which is all of them for the most part, are missing out on some interesting, helpful pieces of information that they could probably relate to.
12
SPEAKER_01
We can tell them here.
12
SPEAKER_00
I was in a three-year relationship with a horse.
12
SPEAKER_01
Are you sure you want to say it?
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, no.
12
SPEAKER_01
No, it was nothing.
12
SPEAKER_01
That s also the annoying thing.
12
SPEAKER_01
You re not saying anything that everyone else isn t saying or experiencing, but I agree with you that there s just no point and it s not fair to Kristen to drag her into something.
12
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_00
Whatever level of honesty I feel comfortable with is, you know, I can t assume it s everyone else s.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_01
The episode is great still.
12
SPEAKER_00
So, yes.
12
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I think a lot of people follow her and know of her, so they re probably already exposed, but if you don t, if you haven t go follow her.
12
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_01
Check her out and her husband.
12
SPEAKER_00
I have a knee jerk to anyone giving advice with their husband online about relationship stuff, right?
12
SPEAKER_00
Like I just have a knee, I recoil at that and I was completely wrong.
12
SPEAKER_00
I keep being proven I m wrong.
12
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
12
SPEAKER_00
But I have a bit of a knee jerk about people profiting from advice.
12
SPEAKER_00
There s something for me that like.
12
SPEAKER_01
Well, we do that on Sync d.
12
SPEAKER_00
You give advice.
12
SPEAKER_01
I mean, that s the whole, people write in and we talk about their questions.
12
SPEAKER_01
It s not necessarily, I mean, it is advice in some ways.
12
SPEAKER_00
That s true, but you guys, you don t, so sure, but neither of you, in my opinion, are approaching it as if you have the actual answer and you re an expert.
12
SPEAKER_00
No, God, no.
12
SPEAKER_00
It s more like muddle through this with us.
12
SPEAKER_01
Totally, that is true, yes.
12
SPEAKER_00
So that to me is the distinction.
12
SPEAKER_01
Oh, I see.
12
SPEAKER_00
But if you and Liz were making posts all the time, like, eight ways to make your boyfriend send you flowers, I d be like,
12
SPEAKER_00
Ugh.
12
SPEAKER_01
Right.
12
SPEAKER_00
I don t like that stuff.
12
SPEAKER_01
Why do you think you don t like it?
12
SPEAKER_00
I mean, it s so off the dome.
12
SPEAKER_00
This is not a sussed out why it is, but it reminds me, I think, of religion.
12
SPEAKER_00
Like, we have the answer.
12
SPEAKER_00
Act like us.
13
SPEAKER_00
We got it figured out.
13
SPEAKER_00
And I just think, no one s got it figured out.
13
SPEAKER_00
Everything s a fucking mess.
13
SPEAKER_00
No one should be up there saying, I ve got the solution.
13
SPEAKER_00
Granted, it s earned.
13
SPEAKER_00
Often, yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
A physicist should get on there and tell you how to build X, Y, and Z. Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
There s a place for it, but I think the self-help domain is riddled with charlatans.
13
SPEAKER_01
Social science is a little, can be dicey.
13
SPEAKER_00
It is, I think a pretty small percentage of the self-help world is helpful.
13
SPEAKER_00
There s been a bunch of studies about the result of people reading self-help books, that the majority of the people feel worse afterwards because a plan is laid out in front of them and they yet fail at that thing again too.
13
SPEAKER_00
So like, I had learned that 12 years ago and so that s in my craw.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, and it s just what works for me.
13
SPEAKER_01
I mean, some people could say that about AA and it works for you and it works for a lot of people and some of the self-help things really work for a lot of people and they don t for others.
13
SPEAKER_00
Right, but if AA had an Instagram account and they were urging people to come to them for the solution, I wouldn t like AA.
13
SPEAKER_00
I think the reason I ve been able to embrace it is there s no, it s against the rules to promote AA.
13
SPEAKER_00
It s literally against the rules.
13
SPEAKER_00
Right.
13
SPEAKER_00
So they re not trying to get more members.
13
SPEAKER_00
There s no money to be made.
13
SPEAKER_00
So to me- Money.
13
SPEAKER_01
I guess you re right.
13
SPEAKER_01
Money is the piece maybe that you bristle at.
13
SPEAKER_00
And power.
13
SPEAKER_00
No one has power.
13
SPEAKER_00
So no one s getting status.
13
SPEAKER_00
It s weeded out a lot of the things that are the triggers for me.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
But all that to say this isn t at all Vanessa.
13
SPEAKER_01
No, God no.
13
SPEAKER_00
But I just have to step over that little hang up I have.
13
SPEAKER_00
How do you feel about the whole space?
13
SPEAKER_00
That s what I was just thinking.
13
SPEAKER_01
I ve never really thought about it too much.
13
SPEAKER_01
I don t have an allergy to it.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_01
But I,
13
SPEAKER_01
I take a lot of it with a grain of salt.
13
SPEAKER_01
You know, I follow some things on Instagram, and I can take and leave.
13
SPEAKER_01
I don t think that just because I like someone or something, I have to like every piece, or I have to, it s an all or nothing.
13
SPEAKER_01
I don t think that.
13
SPEAKER_00
Right.
13
SPEAKER_01
Like, oh, I like this one.
13
SPEAKER_00
You can a la carte it.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, and what works for me and let the other shit go.
13
SPEAKER_00
I think also is that what I like is a general base disposition for all these people is like, this has worked three out of 10 times for me.
13
SPEAKER_00
That I like, I don t think anyone s got a diet that works all the time.
13
SPEAKER_00
I don t think they have a strategy for their mental health that works all the time.
13
SPEAKER_00
I think like if there s just an admission that like,
13
SPEAKER_00
Hey, I was a one and this thing got me to a four.
13
SPEAKER_00
I m still a fucking mess.
13
SPEAKER_00
Like that s what I kind of need to trust you.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
But a lot of these people are, and they feel compelled to present an image of excellence.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
And overcoming things.
13
SPEAKER_00
And I don t think we overcome things.
13
SPEAKER_00
I think we have varying success rates about battling things.
13
SPEAKER_00
I don t think you ever put anything completely behind you.
13
SPEAKER_00
Well, that s true.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I agree.
13
SPEAKER_01
I do bristle at some of these, the body optimization.
13
SPEAKER_01
I do bristle at that way more than I do the mental optimization.
13
SPEAKER_00
Right, like when people are like, how to hack your- Longevity.
13
SPEAKER_00
Let s go right at probably glucose monitoring.
13
SPEAKER_00
Is that one of them that s, because it s in our circle a lot right now.
13
SPEAKER_01
That s in our circle.
13
SPEAKER_01
That one, for some reason, doesn t because I associate it so much with diabetes, where I m like, you know you need to know that.
13
SPEAKER_01
No, it s just when it s all consuming, where my whole day is spent doing this and then this and then this and then this and then this in order to optimize.
13
SPEAKER_01
Mm-hmm.
13
SPEAKER_01
It s also fine for, I think it also gives a sense of control, which is great.
13
SPEAKER_00
It might be like the least bad of many addictions the person could have.
13
SPEAKER_01
Totally.
13
SPEAKER_01
It s fine, but I am not buying in.
13
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, I agree with you.
13
SPEAKER_00
There s a lot of different fads that pass through in and out of our circle.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
And I m kinda like, every road leads to the same place.
13
SPEAKER_00
Consume the same amount of calories you expend.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
Sleep like, wait, wait, you got all these different ways to reconfirm this.
13
SPEAKER_00
Like, this is not a mystery.
13
SPEAKER_01
Exactly, yesterday I was thinking about it.
13
SPEAKER_01
I was like, you know, I haven t eaten a vegetable in two days.
13
SPEAKER_01
I need to eat a vegetable today.
13
SPEAKER_01
You need to eat vegetables, get some protein, sleep.
13
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, drink water.
13
SPEAKER_01
Drink water.
13
SPEAKER_00
And move your body.
13
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
13
SPEAKER_00
So like what movement of body is superior to the other?
13
SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
13
SPEAKER_00
Like people get hung up on that.
13
SPEAKER_00
I think it s part of our technology fetish.
13
SPEAKER_00
It s like there s always gonna be some technological breakthrough that s going to revolutionize this experience.
13
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
And I m just more pessimistic about that.
13
SPEAKER_01
It is capitalism, and I m not even one to normally go there, but it is.
13
SPEAKER_01
It s selling your health to you.
13
SPEAKER_00
Yes, and it has to be novel.
13
SPEAKER_00
So you have to have some proprietary approach.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_01
What I don t like about it is there s a false promise that there s perfection, which is not true.
13
SPEAKER_01
I was having a conversation, a group of us was talking about relationships, and this person was talking about leagues.
13
SPEAKER_00
Leagues.
13
SPEAKER_01
Leagues.
13
SPEAKER_00
What are leagues?
13
SPEAKER_01
Like, this person s out of my league.
13
SPEAKER_00
Oh, sure, sure, sure, uh-huh.
13
SPEAKER_01
I was like, what are you measuring?
13
SPEAKER_01
What are you comparing?
13
SPEAKER_01
Intelligence?
13
SPEAKER_01
Are you comparing physical attractiveness?
13
SPEAKER_01
Are you comparing financial success?
13
SPEAKER_01
What are you saying?
13
SPEAKER_00
Educational attainment.
13
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
13
SPEAKER_01
Athleticism.
13
SPEAKER_01
There s a million ways to define your league.
13
SPEAKER_01
And so I just totally reject this idea of leagues.
13
SPEAKER_00
And well, and you get to decide.
13
SPEAKER_01
You get to decide, but that s why when you break it down, it s so- Arbitrary.
13
SPEAKER_01
Totally arbitrary.
13
SPEAKER_00
Yes, and you know what my fanatical religious view is, is of the primate and how we re supposed to be.
13
SPEAKER_00
I know.
13
SPEAKER_00
But I think there s still room for you and I to see eye to eye on this, which is like, I think it s how, I m compassionate towards everyone.
13
SPEAKER_00
Me too.
13
SPEAKER_00
I think primitively, we re trying to evaluate status and we re trying to get with the highest status person we can get with so that we ll survive.
13
SPEAKER_00
Because that s how we survived, is the higher status person you linked up with, the greater your rate of survival would be and your offspring.
13
SPEAKER_00
So that s like just baked into us and that s not our fault.
13
SPEAKER_01
But some people are driven by it way more than others.
13
SPEAKER_01
I see it, I see a massive,
13
SPEAKER_00
Sure, sure, I m sure there s an enormous spectrum of how driven people are by that.
13
SPEAKER_00
But I think if you first acknowledge that s how you re built, have some compassion for that, and then say, okay, that s how I am, but what do I think should give someone status?
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
Not looking around and trying to piecemeal what I think society, because it s very misleading, because the hot people in your school aren t the people that could ultimately end up a higher survival rate for you.
13
SPEAKER_01
You could also be poor and rich in a month.
13
SPEAKER_00
But again, this goes back to when there weren t jobs and educations and readings, so really the only measure mostly was A, your physical ability to defend yourself and to forage, and then your maybe social acumen where you could climb the social ladder.
13
SPEAKER_00
So there was only a couple things.
13
SPEAKER_01
Well, and it should have been like cleverness too, I feel like.
13
SPEAKER_00
That s what I m saying, the social, because that s, in the chimps we see that the dominant male
13
SPEAKER_00
isn t always spreading their genes because the subordinate male has learned to yell leopard.
13
SPEAKER_00
They have a call for leopard.
13
SPEAKER_00
And of course the dominant male is like first on the scene.
13
SPEAKER_00
Oh, interesting.
13
SPEAKER_00
And then the one who s not even required to be on the scene goes and fucks the dominant female, which happens all the time.
13
SPEAKER_01
Interesting.
13
SPEAKER_00
So, you know, that s in the mix and we re the next step beyond that where we re very clever and we can manipulate.
13
SPEAKER_00
Totally.
13
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_01
I agree, I have compassion for it.
13
SPEAKER_01
But I also, so much of it is about self-esteem because when you know that you offer status, you don t give a fuck about it anymore.
13
SPEAKER_01
But we all offer status in one, that s my point, is understand the ways that you offer it.
13
SPEAKER_01
Because you do, everyone does.
13
SPEAKER_00
Yes, but I think in part of the recognizing and being compassionate towards it, another like modern thing you need to incorporate is I actually have enough status on my own for my survival and my children s survival.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
And I think that too, that doesn t come naturally to us.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
So it s like letting yourself acknowledge like you ll be fine without it.
13
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
13
SPEAKER_00
There s also, there s another dark side, and I certainly have experienced this in life, is there s this other weird hiccup in human.
13
SPEAKER_00
Behavior, which is like it s buyer s remorse.
13
SPEAKER_00
It s like could I have gotten something better?
13
SPEAKER_00
There s some bias towards shit.
13
SPEAKER_00
I got that car and that one was the same price and it turns out that was better Yeah, whatever that thing is that drives us I think two people can t not consider did I get the best thing available to me?
13
SPEAKER_01
Yeah that it s so
14
SPEAKER_00
ingrained in us to have the best, right?
14
SPEAKER_00
Or like, there s no such thing.
14
SPEAKER_01
We re just so painfully hierarchical.
14
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah.
14
SPEAKER_01
It s the fucking nice hotel, but there s a residence next door.
14
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah.
14
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, speaking of, how s your Buddhist exploration going?
14
SPEAKER_01
I ve read, not a lot, but some of one of my books.
14
SPEAKER_01
Oh, back to this gurus and purporting solutions.
14
SPEAKER_01
Like, one of the things was,
14
SPEAKER_01
If a charlatan tells the truth, it s still the truth.
14
SPEAKER_01
And if the Buddha tells a lie, it s still a lie.
14
SPEAKER_01
So the Buddha status doesn t impact, like the truth is the foundational ingredient to enlightenment, to everything.
14
SPEAKER_01
And so like, I m really digging that concept.
14
SPEAKER_00
I love that, yeah.
14
SPEAKER_01
And I m digging the, I told you one of them,
14
SPEAKER_01
there is no higher being than a human.
14
SPEAKER_01
And the human has the capacity to learn the truth and shouldn t rely on another thing above it to find the truth.
14
SPEAKER_01
The truth is in you, it s in your capacity, and it is your responsibility.
14
SPEAKER_01
And it s not someone else s or another deity s or something higher or magical.
14
SPEAKER_01
And I m like, boom, love it.
14
SPEAKER_01
So far,
14
SPEAKER_01
I m really loving it.
14
SPEAKER_01
And then the thing that seems really inspirational is how patient the Buddha is at hearing conflicting things.
14
SPEAKER_01
at feeling no real desire to challenge, having true compassion towards whatever anyone s going through, that stuff s appealing and will take a lot of work for me.
14
SPEAKER_01
But I think ultimately, if I could embrace some of those to some degree, I would be a better person.
14
SPEAKER_01
That s great.
14
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I m liking it so far.
14
SPEAKER_00
Good, that s a fun journey.
14
SPEAKER_01
And I m early in, I don t wanna claim I ve read a bunch.
14
SPEAKER_01
No, it is interesting though, because I do have the voice in my head that is like, wow, this is so interesting, it s so true, yet these people have elevated the Buddha, and I don t like that.
14
SPEAKER_01
That s still my hang up on it.
14
SPEAKER_01
As I ve said, I don t like that the Dalai Lama has his own city and everyone works in it for free.
14
SPEAKER_01
It s weird, there does seem to be a bit of contradiction, how the Buddha has been elevated despite all of the Buddha s teachings are that that s not to be done.
14
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I m still struggling with that aspect of it.
14
SPEAKER_00
Maybe the further in you get, you ll learn more about that.
14
SPEAKER_01
Right.
14
SPEAKER_00
I don t know.
14
SPEAKER_00
Okay, so some facts.
14
SPEAKER_00
You did a spit take, that was funny.
14
SPEAKER_01
I wish it were more obvious when I listened to it.
14
SPEAKER_00
I know, you can t hear it.
14
SPEAKER_01
Right, I m wondering if Rob, you can isolate just the spit, I don t know.
14
SPEAKER_00
No, there s no spit, it just, I mean, you do, but you don t, it s not on mic.
14
SPEAKER_00
Okay, there wasn t.
14
SPEAKER_00
For some reason.
14
SPEAKER_01
Well, it s probably protecting this beautiful Shure microphone.
14
SPEAKER_01
I don t think it was super audible either, because I was back here and I didn t even notice what happened.
14
SPEAKER_01
You just visually saw a big mist.
14
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
14
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, you just hear us react really quickly, but it was a mouthful of hot coffee and olive oil.
14
SPEAKER_00
That s pretty crazy.
14
SPEAKER_00
First time, never seen it, never seen it.
14
SPEAKER_01
Well, so much of it probably is mechanical, which is like, the funniness happened at the perfect moment where I was about to swallow.
14
SPEAKER_01
Something mechanical also happened.
14
SPEAKER_00
Sam, it s like, so specific.
14
SPEAKER_00
Okay, so there was a stat about, someone said the Gottman Institute said 64% of people s marriages get worse when they have kids.
14
SPEAKER_00
67, I mean.
14
SPEAKER_00
Even worse.
14
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, but that was in 2015.
14
SPEAKER_01
I doubt it s gotten, it s only going up.
14
SPEAKER_00
The decline typically shows up between six months for women and nine months for men after the baby comes home.
14
SPEAKER_00
Oh God, this one, this is from 2023 psychology today, within five years after the birth of a first child, over 40% of couples will go their separate ways.
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Oh my God.
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Oh, I believe it.
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SPEAKER_01
It s such a, it s such a radical shift.
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Everything s already been ironed out.
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There s a protocol to how to coexist.
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And then this enormous obstacle presents itself.
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And then your assumption is just like, well, we already know how to hang, so it ll be fine.
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But no, you re going to have, you need like a whole new strategy.
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SPEAKER_00
I found a good article.
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SPEAKER_00
I was looking for something else, but then I found this called, You re Not Listening, Here s Why.
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It s from the New York Times.
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It s about how we have an unconscious tendency to tune out people we are closest to, actually.
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We believe we already know what they re gonna say and do.
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SPEAKER_00
So we re just like constantly not listening.
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SPEAKER_01
Well, it s like any other repetitive task that gets learned and then shuffled back to the subconscious, like driving your car.
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SPEAKER_01
You don t think about it.
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SPEAKER_00
Exactly, they literally use that example.
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SPEAKER_00
Oh, they do, okay, yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, you re just on autopilot.
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SPEAKER_00
You already know them so well, so you know.
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SPEAKER_01
Here comes this.
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This is this, and they re gonna say this, and they.
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It happened yesterday.
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SPEAKER_01
Kristen was like cleaning in some way that was unique and evaluating some radical shifts to some things.
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And then I just, I mean, it was like, I bet she s about to have her period.
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I didn t say anything, so I m not stupid.
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And then later in the day she said, oh, I m about to have my period.
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I was like, yeah, I m not gonna not notice patterns in my life.
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It s impossible not to notice these patterns.
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SPEAKER_00
Totally, but it s forcing yourself
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to one example, which I thought was interesting, was this couple.
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He got his wife a present, something like a trip to the marine biology, blah, blah, blah.
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She loves animals and whatever.
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SPEAKER_00
He knows that about her, right?
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SPEAKER_00
She hates that present because she s pregnant and can t stand the smell.
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SPEAKER_01
Of the sea mammals?
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Yeah, and has said, like, ew, this is,
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when she s like eating tuna or whatever.
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There s been new information.
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SPEAKER_00
Yes, but inability to gather new information because it s so cemented.
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SPEAKER_00
And we re evolving people, so things change all the time, so you have to allow room for it.
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I don t know, I thought that was interesting.
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Check that out.
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That s on New York Times.
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Okie doke.
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SPEAKER_00
The word is earthing, not grounding.
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SPEAKER_00
I said grounding because her husband didn t wear shoes in the picture.
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And she too, it was later discovered.
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She doesn t like wearing shoes, earthing.
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I want there to be a study on people who don t wear shoes.
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When I see someone who doesn t wear shoes out and about, I m like, whoa, that s a thing.
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If you re someone who wears shoes all the time, it seems like a big decision.
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I don t know.
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SPEAKER_00
Now I am curious about it both ways.
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People who are always wearing, like you wear shoes all the time.
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Me, yeah, I m not the type of person who takes my shoes off to get comfortable.
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SPEAKER_00
Right.
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SPEAKER_01
Although I am also, I walked all through London without shoes, so I do like to, yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, so, yeah, you re one of those people that people saw and was like, oh, that s weird.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I loved aquariums, but now the smell bothers me.
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SPEAKER_00
So maybe, so if you like the feeling, that s what they like.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
I guess.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah, but great observation, because you ll take your shoes off when you get home.
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SPEAKER_00
I m half.
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SPEAKER_00
I like having my shoes on.
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SPEAKER_00
It s tricky.
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SPEAKER_00
I don t know.
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I m hesitant to say this cause it sounds like victim me and, and I never leave my childhood, but I do something about, I like knowing if I have to get up and run out of the house, I m ready.
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SPEAKER_00
Whoa.
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SPEAKER_01
Like the notion, like for me, almost shoes off feels too vulnerable.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I could see that.
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SPEAKER_01
I don t wanna fight without shoes on, I don t wanna run without shoes on.
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SPEAKER_00
You could also step on something, it could hurt.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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And you d cry and then you d be embarrassed.
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I just feel safer in them, like I m ready to respond to whatever, as long as they re on.
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SPEAKER_00
I m with you in some ways, I feel a little more protected, like I won t really stub my toe, I won t step on glass, like those things.
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SPEAKER_01
You could step on a mouse and it would suck, but fuck, the difference between stepping on a mouse, right?
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SPEAKER_01
It d take you a week to recover if you stepped on a mouse barefoot.
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My people.
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I know.
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SPEAKER_00
It would be so sad.
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SPEAKER_01
You d have the added, it would be homicide for you.
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SPEAKER_00
It would be matricide.
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SPEAKER_00
Is that what it s called?
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SPEAKER_00
Matricide?
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SPEAKER_01
Matricide, yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
Yes, yes, yes.
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SPEAKER_01
Well, it d be infanticide.
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It d be you killing your infants.
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SPEAKER_00
Oh no, that s so sad.
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SPEAKER_00
I m sorry.
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SPEAKER_00
I mean, I did try to kill a member with my traps.
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SPEAKER_00
Oh.
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So,
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Yeah, I think I m more on the side of shoe wearing.
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SPEAKER_00
I m also not a nude person, like some people who love to be naked.
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SPEAKER_00
I don t just like walk around my house naked.
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SPEAKER_01
Right.
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SPEAKER_00
Even if I m by myself, I wear clothes.
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SPEAKER_01
let that be a message to all peeping Toms.
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SPEAKER_01
It s a waste of your time.
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SPEAKER_00
Although, I mean, if I m going from like the bath to the, I mean, there are opportunities.
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SPEAKER_01
Oh, you just opened yourself up.
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SPEAKER_00
Opportunities to see stuff.
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SPEAKER_00
I mean, I ve mentioned this, that I have a nice neighbor.
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SPEAKER_00
Well,
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the apartment complex next door is one foot distance from my bedroom.
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SPEAKER_00
I mean, from my kitchen window.
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The, a man- To this person s porch.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, his little step where he smokes, he s a smoker.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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So he s out there a lot.
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SPEAKER_00
So he sees me a lot.
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Right.
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And I think he s seen and heard some stuff.
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You, but you ve come to view him as a guardian angel.
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SPEAKER_00
I do, I think he s here to protect me.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah, and he was a red herring, because at first you re like, oh no, a smoker.
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SPEAKER_00
I was scared of him at first.
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SPEAKER_00
Well, I was mainly just like, uh-oh.
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Yeah, there s a man hanging within two feet of your window.
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It s a little unsettling.
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SPEAKER_00
And he looks, what s the word?
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Like he could have been a rock star.
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SPEAKER_01
Okay, right.
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In his earlier days.
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Right.
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And rock stars are oily.
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SPEAKER_01
He looks kind of countercultury.
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SPEAKER_00
I guess so, but I like him a lot.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah, he s your guardian angel.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, he s here to protect me.
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SPEAKER_01
Minimally, he is a deterrent for anyone that would be trying to peep in because there s someone on patrol.
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SPEAKER_00
I know.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
I really want to know more about him.
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SPEAKER_01
Let s find out.
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SPEAKER_01
Let s do a spinoff podcast called Monica s Guardian Angel.
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Oh my God.
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SPEAKER_00
And what if I find out he s quite a history?
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What if you end up marrying him?
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SPEAKER_00
Well, like people who get attracted to prisoners.
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Oh yeah, right.
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Yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
Which we think maybe I could.
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SPEAKER_00
Right.
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SPEAKER_00
We ve said that.
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The tiger fantasy.
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SPEAKER_00
Exactly.
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Okay.
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I tried really hard to find what percentage of conversations in couples are purely logistical.
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SPEAKER_00
I could not find that number.
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SPEAKER_00
But then I did find on Pew Research, there s so many statistics about couples and technology and how many people share email and share- Calendars?
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, share calendars, exactly.
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SPEAKER_00
But also sharing email is interesting.
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SPEAKER_01
That wouldn t be for me.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it says 27% of internet users and couples share an email account with their partner.
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SPEAKER_01
Eric and Molly share like their iMessage and their, yeah.
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I have, again, I had no privacy as a kid.
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It s just huge to me.
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I have nothing to hide, but I also just, I want,
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SPEAKER_01
something in life to be mine.
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SPEAKER_00
I get it.
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SPEAKER_00
I have that too, even though I, I did have privacy, but I like, I like having my own space and stuff.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
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Like I have a journal.
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SPEAKER_01
I don t hide it, but I would be fucking pissed if someone read it.
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SPEAKER_00
Fucking piss.
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SPEAKER_01
I have nothing like Kristen could read the whole thing.
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SPEAKER_01
I m not getting divorced.
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There s nothing I m going to get, but, but just, yeah, I am entitled to a place.
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SPEAKER_01
That s my mind.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
I mean, I feel like if someone reads your journal, that s the biggest sin.
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SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
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Let s add to the equation that I would also feel like it would violate the confidence and trust I have with the other people I communicate with.
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SPEAKER_01
Like when you re in a friendship with me,
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it shouldn t be assumed that you re also exposing everything to Kristen.
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SPEAKER_01
So if you write me an email about something that s going on with you, I would feel like I have violated our bond by having invited a third person in that I didn t clear with you.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I find this to be an interesting part of being single.
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SPEAKER_01
Oh sure, is that married people pretty much tell each other everything?
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, and it s like we have to assume that when you re telling one person in the couple that the other person is privy to that knowledge.
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SPEAKER_00
And I really hate that.
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SPEAKER_01
Yes.
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SPEAKER_00
I often, if I am going to confide in someone in a couple, I ll say, please don t tell blank.
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SPEAKER_01
Right.
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Please keep this between us.
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I hope I at least earned my honors when I had enormously powerful information about someone that I did not share until that person ultimately did.
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And it was months and months and months.
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SPEAKER_00
Yes, I trust you.
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It s also, I m lucky, right?
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SPEAKER_01
So some partners, when they found out I had known that thing for five months, would have been very mad at me.
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They were upset, yeah.
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And to Kristen s credit, she was like, you re a very good friend.
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I think if you have the type of partner that s going to put you through hell when they find you out that you knew something.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_01
I don t know what choices you have.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_01
Well, I m, I m acknowledging my privilege.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
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SPEAKER_00
It s a weird thing.
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SPEAKER_00
That s why, um, therapists are so great because you can tell them anything.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, okay, 11% of social network site users in a marriage or committed partnership share a social media profile with their spouse or partner.
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SPEAKER_00
Also 11% share online calendar.
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SPEAKER_00
67% of committed couples have shared a password with partner or spouse, an online password.
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SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s all interesting.
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SPEAKER_00
Okay, well, that s it.
15
SPEAKER_01
That was all?
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SPEAKER_00
Yes, it was indeed.
15
SPEAKER_00
What are you gonna tell me?
15
SPEAKER_01
Sorry.
15
SPEAKER_00
I just, you know, I just need, I just can only take so much of him.
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SPEAKER_01
He has made you laugh sometimes.
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SPEAKER_00
He does make me laugh, he does.
15
SPEAKER_00
But he s also like, he does, he feels predatorial.
15
SPEAKER_00
It s weird.
15
SPEAKER_01
Because he thinks you re great.
15
SPEAKER_00
No, that s not.
15
SPEAKER_00
Also, that s nice if he thinks I m great, but I shouldn t engage with someone who I know is problematic just because they think I m great.
15
SPEAKER_01
Oh, because you think he s low status.
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SPEAKER_00
No.
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SPEAKER_00
Here we go.
15
SPEAKER_00
You re a victim of your own complaint.
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SPEAKER_01
Oh my God.
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SPEAKER_00
Oh my God.
15
SPEAKER_00
Where do you grow up?
15
SPEAKER_00
I m scared to know.
15
SPEAKER_01
In the woods.
15
SPEAKER_00
Oh.
15
SPEAKER_01
I like when you ask him questions.
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SPEAKER_00
I m asking you, I can t really communicate directly.
15
SPEAKER_01
I don t know about him till he s talking.
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SPEAKER_00
I know, I know that.
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SPEAKER_01
So I really can t answer that until, like I wouldn t have said he grew up in the woods, but as soon as he started talking, I found out, oh yeah, of course he grew up in the woods.
15
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I know.
15
SPEAKER_00
I don t wanna communicate with him directly.
15
SPEAKER_01
Okay, do you wanna use a proxy?
15
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, exactly.
15
SPEAKER_01
Should you ask Wobby Wob questions and then he asks me?
15
SPEAKER_00
No, I ask you and then you talk to him and then he responds.
15
SPEAKER_00
Okay.
15
SPEAKER_01
Well, I love you, this has been a fun morning.
15
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, great morning and it s only 10.50.
15
SPEAKER_01
Where do we go from here?
15
SPEAKER_01
I know I m anxiety about the rest of this date.
15
SPEAKER_01
All right, love you.
15
SPEAKER_00
All right, love you.
15
you