Turn down the volume on your people pleasing traits for greater happiness and peace of mind. Discover how with two of the best couples therapists around.
Are You a People-Pleaser? Here’s Why It’s Costing You (And How to Fix It)
Ever felt like you’re always giving in your relationships—yet somehow, it’s never enough? You pour your energy, time, and love into others, hoping the connection itself will sustain you. But over time, you end up feeling drained, unappreciated, even resentful. Sound familiar?
In this episode of Love Isn’t Enough Podcast, two of the top couples therapists around, Dr. John Schinnerer and Joree Rose, LMFT, break down one of the biggest relationship traps out there—people-pleasing. We dive deep into six core struggles that keep people-pleasers stuck, and why you might have developed these patterns in the first place.
The 6 Key Struggles of People-Pleasing:
Boundary Setting – You want to say no, but guilt stops you.
Overactive Guilt – You feel responsible for others’ happiness, even at your own expense.
Conflict Avoidant – You avoid difficult conversations to keep the peace, even when it hurts you.
Fear Of Being Alone – You’d rather be in an imbalanced relationship than risk being alone.
Accumulated Anger & Resentment – You give and give, but when it’s not reciprocated, frustration festers.
No Idea What Your Needs Are – You’ve spent so long prioritizing others, you’ve lost touch with what YOU want.
If any of this resonates in your core, then this episode is a must-listen. We’ll explore the root causes of people-pleasing and, most importantly, share actionable steps to break the cycle and create healthier, more fulfilling relationships.
Essential Questions We Answer:
❓ What does it actually mean to be a people-pleaser?
❓ How does this pattern start in the first place?
❓ What’s the connection between people-pleasing and boundary struggles?
❓ Why do people-pleasers feel so much guilt?
❓ How does avoidance of conflict lead to resentment?
❓ Where does the fear of loneliness come from?
Ready to shift from people-pleaser to self-empowered? Tune in now for insights that could change the way you show up in relationships.
Don’t forget! If this episode speaks to you, please like, rate, review, and share. Your support helps us reach more people who need this message!
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Relationship Master Class Alert!
Joree and John are beyond excited to invite you to their new monthly Relationship Master Class Series—designed to help you deepen your connections, remove barriers to vulnerability, and create real intimacy.
If you’re ready to build the kind of relationships that nourish rather than drain you, click here to learn more: Love Isn’t Enough Relationship Master Class. And right now, we’re offering an exclusive launch discount—so don’t miss out! Get a free hour of coaching with Joree and John when you sign up for the whole year of classes.
If you’d like to listen to this episode, click here to go to Apple Podcasts, take a listen, and start to build the relationship of your dreams today.
To watch the video, click below.
If you’d rather read the transcript, carry on below! And, as always, thank you for your interest in healing and improving your relationship.
Stop Being A People Pleaser! Here’s How to Fix It w/ Dr. John Schinnerer & Joree Rose, LMFT – Transcript
Dr. John Schinnerer: Hello, courageous listener. It is I, Dr. John, back with the latest episode of the Evolved Caveman podcast. Today I am honored to have with me my partner in life and love, the beautiful Jory Rose. Welcome Ms. Rose.
Joree Rose: You sound very official, like you’re announcing something much grander than our podcast.
Dr. John: Hoping to be in the world series next year.
Joree: Hello. Hi.
Dr. John: We are here today to talk about relationships and our new podcast, which we launched called Love Isn’t Enough.
Joree: I’m so excited. It’s finally here. We’ve only been talking about this For quite some time.
Dr. John: It’s about how to get the relationship you want, you deserve, how to find happiness and fulfillment. On the flip side, what gets in the way of that?
Joree: Well, let’s qualify by saying we’re not telling people to go out and find a new relationship
Dr. John Schinnerer: It depends,
Joree Rose, LMFT: The idea really is that we can build the relationship we desire, deserve, crave, want, long for see in media and healthy versions of media. And well, let me finish my sentence that we can have that. But as ours, public cast is so aptly named.
Joree Rose, LMFT: You need more than love.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah. One of the things makes me think a lot of times what gets in the way of a fantastic relationship is one partner who wants to grow and learn and find ways to become better and show it better in relationship. And the other one that.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Doesn’t
Joree Rose, LMFT: We’ve seen this firsthand in a variety of examples That’s a real challenge, especially because one of the things we tell our clients, when they ask, how do I know if I should stay with this person? One of our stock answers is someone inclined towards having a growth mindset, especially about [00:02:00] relationships.
Joree Rose, LMFT: if someone has no desire to grow it’s hard to get them on board with wanting to develop new tools, new skills, because it’s not just. Developing the new tools or skills about how to communicate more effectively non defensive listening or repair after a fight. We’re really talking about is peeling back those layers to look at ourself and see what’s going on inside of me.
Joree Rose, LMFT: That’s preventing me from leaning into safety, trust, vulnerability, communication, and more.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Well, I think, what keeps us from doing that, I would say it’s socialization and fear. And I think,
Joree Rose, LMFT: Well, we’re talking mostly for men there.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yes.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So let’s be specific.
Dr. John Schinnerer: I was thinking about my male clients where I am so proud, admiring and respectful of the men that show up to do the work that are willing to look at themselves that are willing to do that deep dive into how can I be better it’s often the men that are the biggest barriers in [00:03:00] relationship because of their fear.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Of appearing weak, right? Like we don’t want to be vulnerable because we see that as weakness. If we don’t learn to be more vulnerable, women are initiating divorce 80 percent of the time in the U S which tells me that women are,
Joree Rose, LMFT: Fed up.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Unsatisfied in their relationships.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Was that too strong of an answer for me to support women?
Dr. John Schinnerer: There’s no swearing
Joree Rose, LMFT: So this is actually a twist that we haven’t actually talked about before. And I think great for your audience in particular.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So if we’re talking about, we need to have a growth mindset, which is going to include the ability and the courage to look within. you just named that you are proud of the courageous men you work with who are open to that. Let’s see if we can help understand what is it about those men that are giving them that courage.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Say I can think of a couple of things. If someone’s listening right now and it’s like, I don’t know that I have that in me, what would I need to do to be able to get [00:04:00] there, other than have a great coach like you or us guiding them. And would you say?
Dr. John Schinnerer: I think part of it is, and this is typical, right?
Dr. John Schinnerer: Whenever we do couples work, I would say 90 to 95 percent of the time. It’s the female dragging the male in to do couples. Correct. And then that’s shifting a little bit in the last five to 10 years, but it’s always been that way. And I think that We’ll continue in a large. Capacity.
Joree Rose, LMFT: That goes back to what you said a moment ago about socialization women are socialized to be more relational.
Dr. John Schinnerer: More emotionally aware. I think, you know, If we’re not in relationship and we’ll just talk about this, assuming heterosexuality, but it can go either way.
Dr. John Schinnerer: You know, if, if we’re talking to homosexual relationship, you know, you look at who’s the more masculine, who’s more feminine, and we can generalize based on that, but just to keep things easier for us, if you’re not in relationship, I’m doubly impressed if there’s a man who comes in to work on himself while not in relationship, because I think one of the greatest [00:05:00] motivators, and I know it’s been so for me over the years, one of the greatest motivators to facing those.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Fears, let’s call it. Those doubts, those insecurities has been me,
Joree Rose, LMFT: my little
Dr. John Schinnerer: most of us men it’s a female that really lights a fire under her butt and says, you need to go in and talk to somebody.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Or else I’m leaving you.
Dr. John Schinnerer: And part of that is, the socialization of be stoic.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Don’t feel part of it’s be self reliant. Don’t ask for help.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Let’s grind
Joree Rose, LMFT: let’s get really nuanced here While what we’re saying is accurate and what we’ve seen in our professional and personal experience let’s get nuanced for the listener.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Who’s like, okay, I have someone telling me this. I’m still scared. This, feels really overwhelming and daunting. I don’t want to lose my partner, but I’m scared of looking within let’s talk to that guy who is. Open but fearful.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Okay. The first question I would ask is what are you afraid of feeling?
Dr. John Schinnerer: I think that’s most of it, right? I don’t want to feel, I don’t know how to feel. I love the [00:06:00] analogy of, I’ve got a scab on me. If I scratch the scab, it’s going to start bleeding and it’s never going to stop. With emotion, if I start to dig into my emotion, how I really feel underneath this surface of invulnerability, if I take the mask off.
Dr. John Schinnerer: I’m never going to be able to stop feeling. God forbid, I’m at work and I start crying or I show fear or I’m overcome with a panic attack or anxiety, which, might be happening anyway, since we’re suppressing a lot of emotion.
Joree Rose, LMFT: But it’s not coming out as a panic attack or it might be coming out as anger and blown up.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Think the real fear is crying. I mean, I think that’s the biggest one for us men because if I go to work and I lose my temper, that’s much more acceptable. Now it might create problems depending on what you say and do, but it’s much more acceptable than if I go to work and start sobbing my eyes out.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Right.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Because then that’s an easy judgment to weakness. And I really think that’s one of our biggest fears.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So if that’s men’s biggest fears. Women have their own different [00:07:00] fears. feeling their emotions, crying, being one example, Getting overwhelmed with the motion and not knowing how to turn the volume down feeling weak, right?
Joree Rose, LMFT: You just said that’s part of it. What do we do about that?
Dr. John Schinnerer: Well, then I would say there’s also shame involved with feeling weak. I could see being overwhelmed, paralyzed. I think part of the fear is not being rational, not appearing in charge. And so what do we do about that?
Dr. John Schinnerer: I think that we educate people that that’s not how emotions work. I’ve been doing this work for 30 years and, particularly since Breck’s death. I’ve been much more easily able to access tears, whether it’s, watching a romantic comedy or, seeing something awe inspiring.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Or a deep conversation between us.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah. Or I get gratitude. I can bring myself to tears with that, but it’s much more controllable and manageable. I can distract myself. I can take a deep breath. I can turn it off.
Dr. John Schinnerer: I think there is [00:08:00] truth to once you start to dig into the emotional landscape inside you, those emotions will come out more strongly at first, but it doesn’t mean that you’re going to be. Angry or sad or guilt ridden a hundred percent of the time. It doesn’t mean that you can’t compartmentalize it.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Still.
Joree Rose, LMFT: It
Dr. John Schinnerer: doesn’t mean you can’t turn it off when you want to.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I love the description in the book burnout by Emily and Amelia Nagoski that came out a few years ago that described emotions of being a tunnel. And that we get really stuck when we don’t complete the emotion cycle. Based on research, they explain there’s a beginning, middle and end to an emotional experience.
Joree Rose, LMFT: We tend to stop ourselves in the middle and then over time, those emotional uncompleted cycles compound, which lead to emotional burnout. And in that book, they give seven different research based ways to help get through that emotion tunnel, breathing movement, crying is [00:09:00] actually one of the interesting thing is it’s not crying while ruminating on while you’re crying.
Joree Rose, LMFT: And why you know what’s going on because that can then get us more in the emotion versus out of it, but it’s really tuning into the sensation of the tears and the somatic experience of the crying is what really makes a cathartic reaching out to someone you love and trust. Journaling, a lot of these things are going to be more relational that men might not tap into.
Joree Rose, LMFT: What if they don’t have someone they can reach out to and they feel embarrassed and they get stuck in a shame spiral, like you said. Even just talking about this makes me have a lot of compassion for the men who have the desire, but not yet have the capacity to be more growth minded.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah, that whole man box phenomenon is awful to me in the sense that it really cuts us off from two thirds of the emotional spectrum. The thing that frustrates me the most about it is it from the possibility of happiness because one third of that emotional spectrum is the positive emotions.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Because, we [00:10:00] don’t want to be seen as something people can attack our sexuality. If we’re too positive emotion, fill in the blank, if we’re too excited to romantic, too joyous, and going back to high school. And middle school that stuff happened all the time. As young men, we were mocked and humiliated by our friends.
Dr. John Schinnerer: if we wanted to go spend time with our girlfriend.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Yeah.
Dr. John Schinnerer: And like,
Joree Rose, LMFT: How much do you think was jealousy for the guys who didn’t have a girlfriend?
Dr. John Schinnerer: Well, I think the funny thing is, time and attention is the currency of relationship. So that’s true for both. Male and female relationships. And so if all of a sudden your time and attention, which you were spending on your group of guy friends now goes,
Dr. John Schinnerer: 75, 80, 90 percent now goes to a new girlfriend, the guy friends, your circle of guy friends were hurt. They were angry. They were jealous. I get it you’ve withdrawn your time and attention, which is painful. And yet we didn’t have the skills or the emotional awareness to talk about it and say, Hey, when you stopped hanging out with us, because you were [00:11:00] hanging out with Sally, that hurt, is it possible?
Dr. John Schinnerer: You could split your time and attention a little bit differently.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So I love this topic because we have seen in our own relationship, The benefits of doing that relational work. to give you a lot of credit, you had a growth mindset in most areas of your life, but as you’ve shared on this podcast, I’ve been stuck in certain areas,
Joree Rose, LMFT: at that point we had been broken up. You had already lost me, it was knowing, oh shit, I know what’s on the other side of not being vulnerable. Of not doing the work, right?
Dr. John Schinnerer: : when we broke up, it wasn’t for lack of love.
Joree Rose, LMFT: No, right.
Dr. John Schinnerer: It was because we’d gotten stuck, and I couldn’t see any way for us to change those patterns the patterns were not about you and I. The patterns were about things that far preceded our relationship.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Right. And so that’s where I’m trying to get to is, you know, if a guy who’s in your same shoes in that moment, you had to tap into [00:12:00] an immense amount of courage.
Joree Rose, LMFT: We went to 12 hours of therapy over two days. Talk about facing the fire and risking immense vulnerability. And so from my view, what let you State in that discomfort was knowing what the end goal was, for us to be back together. You had experienced the alternative. Would that be accurate
Joree Rose, LMFT:
Dr. John Schinnerer: I think the other piece of it that was really helpful to me was doing that internal family systems work
Joree Rose, LMFT: Mm-hmm .
Dr. John Schinnerer: On that drive down to LA when I was listening to, no bad parts by Dick Schwartz. That book, if you’re interested is great especially on audible, Dick will walk you through a lot of these exercises and someone else reads the text, which is great because Dick’s brilliant, but he kind of puts you to sleep if he’s just talking,
Dr. John Schinnerer: I actually went in and spoke to my five year old self that was coming up when we would get into disagreement. And so part of that was helpful in healing that inner child so I wasn’t getting caught up and flooded and lost in shame. So I could stick with [00:13:00] things longer
Joree Rose, LMFT: in
Dr. John Schinnerer: It was heavily emotionally laden conversations
Joree Rose, LMFT: And that’s what we really want to inspire whatever the route is, whether it’s deep intensive therapy, whether it’s more lighthearted weekly therapy,
Joree Rose, LMFT: even the use of psychedelics, whatever the path is. I would offer to the listener to keep your mind and heart set on what is it you’re working towards, because if you keep focused on what the roadblocks are going to be right we know energy flows where intent goes those roadblocks are going to not necessarily get easier.
Joree Rose, LMFT: We just have to learn how to go around them or see them as speed bumps, not roadblocks.
Dr. John Schinnerer: We were watching shrinking last night on Apple TV and there was a great line by Harrison Ford. He was coming out of a drug induced night. Half awake and he was talking to a gay couple who had just, agreed to get married,
Dr. John Schinnerer: he was like, my advice to you, which was unasked for is stay open,
Joree Rose, LMFT: stay
Dr. John Schinnerer: And whenever that need for defensiveness arises, Let it go and turn towards one another. That’s great advice. It’s [00:14:00] hard to do, but it’s absolutely on point.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Well, for someone who’s not able to quite access that, I think a starting point would be to acknowledge, Hey, honey, I’m really working at staying open right now.
Joree Rose, LMFT: It feels really hard. Please offer me some grace because I am trying. And I think that’s the language. That if most couples would adopt, because we go immediately to defensiveness, reactivity assumptions and judgments, and we’re going to that all or nothing thinking that black or white, rigid thinking of you’ll never, you’ll always,
Dr. John Schinnerer: and that’s based on hurt feelings underneath. one of the keys of being aware, especially for men it’s what’s underneath your anger and anger can sometimes be but a lot of times it’s Wow. That really hurt my feelings or it was embarrassing or there was, you know, there’s sadness or anxiety.
Dr. John Schinnerer: There’s other things that can be under there, but in a relationship, I would argue 90 percent of the time. It’s My feelings got hurt. And then I flipped to anger without any awareness of the hurt feelings underneath. [00:15:00] It’s a much different conversation if I can say, Hey, honey, what you just said hurt my feelings that stung, that was a little too far
Dr. John Schinnerer: I can’t believe you just said that. going off the, anger route, those are two different conversations. One of which has a much better chance of a successful outcome.
Joree Rose, LMFT: And part of that success of the outcome is the other person receiving the intention. I’m working on it.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Because we’re not going to hit the mark right off the bat.
Dr. John Schinnerer: trusting positive intent.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Well, and I was going to lead to saying part of it’s hard because what we’re seeking is an environment within our relationship in which we feel safety and trust. And if we’re at the point where we’re being defensive and reactive, we don’t feel safe and trusting of the positive intent.
Joree Rose, LMFT: And if we’re taking those small steps towards, this is that gray zone in which I think we have more movement than people realize, because they don’t see things changing yet. But what we’re wanting to do is change. Assumption of the intention [00:16:00] so that when someone’s vulnerable, we can say, wow, thank you so much for your vulnerability.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Even if what the vulnerability was hurtful, because that’s what we want to get towards is the authenticity, and honesty of communicating how we feel
Dr. John Schinnerer: Receiving that in a nonjudgmental way,
Joree Rose, LMFT: It’s all a practice. As someone who’s been teaching mindfulness and meditation for 15 years, truly believe.
Joree Rose, LMFT: That meditation is a very, very, very root of all these tools and in meditation, we are practicing breathing in an effort to regulate our nervous system. Whenever we’re getting those arguments, it’s because our nervous system has been activated. That fight flight freeze has been turned on and we’re in a survival mode protecting our safety, our heart, our space, our wound, whatever it is.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So, in meditation. If you are practicing your breathing, you’re practicing building the muscle of regulating your nervous system, you’re creating an observer stance where you’re just observing [00:17:00] what’s arising versus being in the middle of it which will help in a fight. And you’re also practicing accepting what’s arising without judgment.
Joree Rose, LMFT: And when we do that internally, we then can take it off the cushion in our own life whatever your meditation looks like. But I don’t know how we get to that part relationally without some of those basic skills of awareness and regulation.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Interesting. My mind is going to men as you’re talking about regulating physiology, regulating the nervous system, I agree, I think mindfulness.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Is the foundation of self awareness and gives you that leg up to figure out what’s going on in your body and to downregulate or relax when you need to, or at least give you a better shot. I was talking to a male client yesterday about how Most of the men I’ve worked with over the last 30 years, because of how we’re socialized and because of one of the parts of that man box you’re only as good as your last achievement.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Part of it’s due to [00:18:00] always doing in an attempt to gain self worth. And as soon as we stop the voices, catch up with us, those inner voices. And so what I find with a lot of the men that I work with is. They’ve forgotten how to relax they’re in fight flight freeze to some extent, even if it’s at a two or a three, they’re in fight, flight, freeze, fawn.
Dr. John Schinnerer: The vast majority, if not all the time. If that’s the case, it makes it really difficult to regulate yourself. While in disagreement with your loved one.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Which is why we’ve got to learn how to regulate ourselves outside of disagreement if we don’t have that baseline
Joree Rose, LMFT: our brain and our body has the literal neuro pathway built to know how to get there. we can’t do it without a baseline of a practice.
Dr. John Schinnerer: And just as a question for the listener, can you truly relax? Can you, lay down or sit down, deepen your breathing?
Dr. John Schinnerer: Relax all the muscles in your body and bring your heart rate down. Most of the people that I talked to are [00:19:00] like, wow, I haven’t been able to do that for decades.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So let me ask this question, cause I’m trying to relate it in a way that maybe men can most connect with. And put it into real life examples besides sitting on a cushion or lying down and doing that.
Joree Rose, LMFT: let’s take a guy who works out a lot. So I would imagine you’re, running on the treadmill or Stairmaster or, pushing some heavy weights, that feeling of being activated, that’s, what’s going to be like when you’re turned on, right? Everything is pumping. I’m trying to bring it back.
Dr. John Schinnerer: I think the other, Common experience is the addictive feeling we get from being at work where we’re multitasking. We’re in a rush. We got more things to do than we have time to do It feels important. We know what is expected of us. We’re talking fast. We’re not taking breaks.
Dr. John Schinnerer: We’re getting shit done. I think that’s a low level fight flight freeze response and we kind of like it, it’s truly addictive because it’s also
Joree Rose, LMFT: motivating.
Dr. John Schinnerer: [00:20:00] We’re distracted from ourselves in that. We know that we have worth when we’re in it and earning money. Right. And so those two are good examples of what it feels like to be in fight, flight, freeze at different levels.
Dr. John Schinnerer: both of those you can easily work into, especially when you’re working out, after you’ve done a set, focus on your breathing.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Well, that’s what I was trying to get back
Dr. John Schinnerer: down.
Joree Rose, LMFT: How do you calm your body down after a hard workout?
Dr. John Schinnerer: You can do it after a set.
Dr. John Schinnerer: That’s great training because the way the system’s designed is to go on, off, on, off, not on for years.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Do I have experience ever having done that?
Joree Rose, LMFT: If you go out for a run, you need to calm your body down. You don’t come up from a run and go into the next thing. You’ve got to get your heart rate down. So that might be a great entree point look at the areas in which your heart rate is up for things you enjoy that aren’t stressful.
Joree Rose, LMFT: That is still physical stress on your body. And what are you doing already that you could harness? [00:21:00] I think is my point.
Dr. John Schinnerer: I think one of the things we’ve got to look at as men is what we do for our pastimes, hobbies or interests? we go to work and then come home and watch Monday night football.
Dr. John Schinnerer: when we watch football, our physiology spikes, we get angry at the ref, we get angry at our team. In any sport, there’s more negative emotion than positive emotion. What else do we do? We play, violent first person shooters. We watch UFC fighting.
Dr. John Schinnerer: What else do we do? We watch boxing. We go hunting. We go on motorcycles. We’re driving fast in the car. all the activities or most of them that we do. Are aimed at upping our physiology.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Golf might keep it down to some extent.
Dr. John Schinnerer: it’s interesting because I think that’s one of the brilliance of tiger woods, his dad taught him meditation and a lot of Eastern. Techniques to help him regulate his physiology in between shots. I would argue that the extent to which he learned to do that was what made him spectacular.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Other golfers are trying to learn to do that, but most of the golfers I Talk to their weekend [00:22:00] golfers typically get really upset when they’re not playing up to par, which is most of the time.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I want to give guys the confidence that they can do this despite all the things.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So I guess I was looking for what is the easiest way to start in things that they’re already doing? So that way, they can harness something that doesn’t feel so foreign.
Dr. John Schinnerer: one of the things I would say is if you’re at the gym, work on breathing deeply, work on tuning into your heart rate.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Work on bringing your heart rate down after each set if you’re playing golf, work on deepening your breath, work on focusing on nature and see if you can bring your heart rate and your breathing and your physiology down to a relaxed state in between shots.
Joree Rose, LMFT: How do you bring your body back to a relaxed state after sex?
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah. It’s focusing on your breath and trying to bring your heart rate down it takes practice, this is for the listener. It’s not that we have to practice mindfulness six hours a day, seven days a week. Most of the research has been done on 20 [00:23:00] minutes a day, five days a week, but that 20 minutes doesn’t have to be consecutive.
Joree Rose, LMFT: And
Dr. John Schinnerer: you can think about it as practicing and refocusing on your breath and being where your feet are or being present. In little one to two minute chunks throughout the day. Golf is a great opportunity to practice in between sets of the gym, great opportunity to practice.
Joree Rose, LMFT: The car drive home from work is a great place to practice that.
Joree Rose, LMFT: if you don’t have a commute anymore, maybe go for a five minute walk. If you work from home reset your nervous system before entering back with your family. The defensiveness, the reactivity is Harder to access when you’re calm, when you’re calm, you’re not going to be as reactive,
Joree Rose, LMFT: we’ve got to build more of that practice to regulate when we’re activated, stressed, overwhelmed and anxious, when we’re angry, that defensiveness and reactivity is going to be right at your fingertips.
Dr. John Schinnerer: what percentage of your clients would you say are overworked and too [00:24:00] busy?
Joree Rose, LMFT: I think for most moms that never ends. I work mostly with women, and the to do list never, ends. I’m just now, after 20 years of being a full time mom, beginning to feel like, there’s not much I need to do right now.
Joree Rose, LMFT: That’s the beauty of empty nesting and living with a partner who takes half the load but not many people have that experience. I see a lot of women who stay busy. So as not to access their emotion, I’ve heard from so many women over the years. If I slow down, I’m going to realize how unhappy I am.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I knew someone once who would do P90X workouts starting at 1130 at night, because That prevented them from getting in bed with their partner. I saw women who would go all day without a breath for herself, because if she tapped into who am I, what do I want? What do I need? [00:25:00] That breakdown would be an emotional overwhelm.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So women have it too. Women, definitely feel that. part of it’s the glorification of busyness. This is a conversation. I have a lot of moms of the quote, good mom, right? The good mom is one who does all of these things for their kids. I would argue a good mom is one who teaches the kids to be self sufficient so they can go off to college and live their life out of the house,
Dr. John Schinnerer: I would
Joree Rose, LMFT: we’re just perpetuating a horrible cycle. I don’t know a ton of couples that are really happy. They might love their partners, but I don’t know that they always like them. The difficulty in speaking our truth when things come up, they don’t know how to, be honest.
Joree Rose, LMFT: For fear of reactivity, defensiveness, judgment, shutdown, emotional, physical, mental, spiritual punishment. there’s a lot of reasons we don’t.
Dr. John Schinnerer: which brings us back to the beginning of the conversation, which is the idea of love isn’t enough. The thing that excites me about this approach is these are learnable tools that if you and your [00:26:00] partner are interested and curious you can begin to master.
Dr. John Schinnerer: And improve the quality and fulfillment of your relationship.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So let’s give a plug for what a happy relationship looks like, because I would say, you and I have been together almost nine years and we were really happy for a very long time, despite our challenges.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Would you agree? Absolutely. And I would then argue that since our breakup and getting back together, we are how much happier? How do we quantify that?
Dr. John Schinnerer: Well, part of it is the trust went from 90 percent to 110%, that wasn’t about you for me. That was about my past. Right.
Joree Rose, LMFT: But I guess what I want to be able to say is we were happy. We had frequent sex. We rarely argued, It was not horrible. I mean, [00:27:00] sometimes it was big fights
Dr. John Schinnerer: I would say they were extended. Right.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I would say what we were experiencing prior to our breakup was a good generalized happiness.
Joree Rose, LMFT: since having done the work, going to therapy, looking at Our own inner demons, our own wounds, doing our own work to heal, making the repairs on our stuff with each other in the past, really opening up vulnerable communication. What do we have now? Let’s give the before and after.
Dr. John Schinnerer: So now I think we just took it to the next level after the breakup. one of the things was really helpful was our self awareness of, what am I feeling? What am I thinking? What are my values? What are my hopes? What are my dreams?
Joree Rose, LMFT: And I think we both always had that, but how that showed up to make for the better relationship.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I want that kind of the whole, when Harry met Sally, I’ll have what she’s having.
Dr. John Schinnerer: How
Joree Rose, LMFT: does that translate?
Dr. John Schinnerer: I’ve got greater empathy for yours. I can tell what you’re feeling and I can respond more appropriately.
Dr. John Schinnerer: it makes me more aware of your needs as well as your feelings.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Which in turn will [00:28:00] make me feel my favorite three words, seen, heard, and validated. I will feel Safe.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah. And safe, safe cannot be overstated the importance of safety and security in a relationship. I really think it’s the fundamental thing that we are shooting for is to make our partner feel safe.
Dr. John Schinnerer: And I think, you know, we talk a lot about masculinity and femininity, man box, One of the greatest things we can do as men in terms of exercising and displaying our masculinity is to show our gentleness
Joree Rose, LMFT: with
Dr. John Schinnerer: our loved ones.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Yeah.
Dr. John Schinnerer: That is the ultimate.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So working towards creating greater emotional safety on both sides, vulnerability and responding well,
Joree Rose, LMFT: if I get angry, which is rare now, but if I were to get upset, you’re likely very first response would be thank you for sharing your anger with me.
Dr. John Schinnerer: I can see that you’re really upset. I can see that you’re. Pissed off.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So that again creates the safety to express ourself without fear of consequence.
Joree Rose, LMFT: what are the [00:29:00] other benefits we’ve gotten?
Dr. John Schinnerer: I don’t think there’s any game playing and I don’t think we’ve ever had game playing. there is the first couple of weeks of a relationship. But after that, I think there should be, transparent, honest, authentic communication.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah.
Joree Rose, LMFT: And once we have that, what I’m trying to get at is There is no walking on eggshells. There is no topics that feel like, Oh, I don’t know that I can bring that up. things might get uncomfortable, but there’s no repercussion for any of that. And our intimacy has skyrocketed.
Dr. John Schinnerer: It’s unlike anything I’ve seen.
Joree Rose, LMFT: intimacy being not just sex, but just
Dr. John Schinnerer: a nice part of that,
Joree Rose, LMFT: people want to feel more connected during sex. you got to work at all the connections throughout the day. I think we went from a good relationship to a great relationship.
Joree Rose, LMFT: We both feel confident in positive intentions of the other. [00:30:00] We both feel supported on our individual. Ventures and friendships.
Dr. John Schinnerer: let me ask you this because I think one of the things has to do with paper cuts.
Dr. John Schinnerer: how do you feel as far as the paper cuts, those emotional hurts in our relationship? are you holding on to any,
Joree Rose, LMFT: I don’t have any, paper cuts.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah.
Joree Rose, LMFT: And it’s rare when the thought of an old one arises.
Joree Rose, LMFT: in the past, if I were to feel hurt. I think I would have held it in a little bit more because I wouldn’t want to rock the boat. now I can safely and easily share. Oh, I just had a thought about something. And that kind of bummed me out that hurt. And you can join with me and say, yeah, I get that.
Joree Rose, LMFT: That hurt. Come here. Let me give you a hug. And then it’s done.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah. And I love you. Like, I think I love you. Some of those intrusive thoughts, you need reassurance. We need reassurance, right? Right. I don’t feel like there’s any old paper cuts that we’re holding onto, which is pretty incredible
Joree Rose, LMFT: because we had some big ones.
Dr. John Schinnerer: heard me say this, that [00:31:00] relationships don’t end typically because of an affair or something massive. They end because of an accumulation of those paper cuts, the small hurts, angers, annoyances being ignored, and that stuff accumulates.
Dr. John Schinnerer: then your perception of your partner goes from positive to negative.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Yeah. I think. I’m so proud of our relationship because we are modeling what people want. we went through a couple of years where it was hard. if we can do it, anyone can do it.
Joree Rose, LMFT: You got to have the motivation. the motivation can’t simply be my partner’s making me do this. you got to find something internally to say, how does this benefit my overall life when I do this?
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah. one of the things I like in response to that is, listen, I’m not that attached to this relationship.
Dr. John Schinnerer: If I’m talking to a couple, this relationship may or may not last. regardless, you’re going to need to learn these skills. If you want a happy and fulfilling relationship, hopefully it’s this one,
Joree Rose, LMFT: but if
Dr. John Schinnerer: you’re going to have to learn the skills for the next one. So you better get on board.
Joree Rose, LMFT: one thing we haven’t even mentioned [00:32:00] is how does this benefit you as a parent? So if you’re, if you’re a father, And you get to learn these schools that now you engage with your kids. So if you are a father of sons, you are role modeling, healthy masculinity that they can see in real time being practiced.
Joree Rose, LMFT: if you practice these with your daughters, they begin to experience what it feels like for a man to see validate and hear them.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah. And it gives your daughters the blueprint for what they’re looking for in a potential mate. and we’ve done a lot of work on that with our three girls.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Mm-hmm .
Dr. John Schinnerer: my daughter Molly told me a few weeks ago, she was like, yeah, I really have to thank you and joy because you made me believe in love again. You showed me that a good relationship is possible.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I love that song,
Dr. John Schinnerer: a beautiful compli.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I remember when we first started dating, you would bring me flowers.
Joree Rose, LMFT: More often than you have in recent years. He used to bring me flowers early on and more frequently [00:33:00] and would always have a little note attached. I think we both consciously agreed to keep the note out on the counter.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So my daughters could see the note this is what it looks like when a man. Loves you or adores you or wants to do something kind. We really wanted to make that implicit explicit over the years.
Dr. John Schinnerer: And the beautiful thing is watching them over what’s been almost nine years.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Learn and grow to understand their worth as beautiful, talented, smart women.
Joree Rose, LMFT: that ties back to how we have shown up as parents by modeling our relationship coupled with utilizing these tools with them as well.
Dr. John Schinnerer: But going back to this question, one of the things I love about our relationship, and I think you’ve grown tremendously here is our ability to be playful with one another.
Dr. John Schinnerer: It helps. it’s more fun and we can laugh and be silly We can call each other a name when we’re mildly annoyed, which helps with the [00:34:00] annoyance, but it’s joking.
Joree Rose, LMFT: But there’s some truth to it
Dr. John Schinnerer: both.
Joree Rose, LMFT: It can alleviate a little pressure.
Joree Rose, LMFT: It’s like a little mini earthquake without a big one, right? It just lets off some of the steam.
Dr. John Schinnerer: would never call you a name in anger.
Joree Rose, LMFT: No,
Dr. John Schinnerer: that’s different.
Joree Rose, LMFT: That’s different.
Dr. John Schinnerer: But to have the permission, and we’ve talked about this, to call each other asshole or whatever
Dr. John Schinnerer: helpful.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Cards.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I swear
Dr. John Schinnerer: especially when we’re playing cards.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I get into swearing Tourette’s at times, but I don’t think I ever would have felt that safe before. To do some of that, playful name calling. I have some family members.
Joree Rose, LMFT: One of the marriages that, I really look up to and revere as a strong couple. Their banter is fantastic, but from the outside. For somebody who doesn’t have playfulness in their life, it feels mean until you realize, there’s actually, love. There’s a lot of safety in that. It’s not mean if it’s ill intended and mean [00:35:00] spirited, that’s different, but a playful tone intention of.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Not hurting and harming.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah. And I think one of the other things we do really well is accept each other’s emotions and you started this long ago.
Joree Rose, LMFT: it
Dr. John Schinnerer: took me more years to believe it, just cause I’d never had that experience before, but I think we do a great job of accepting.
Dr. John Schinnerer: That emotions are, they simply are, they’re not rational, they’re not wrong, the more quickly we can see, hear, and validate the other person’s emotions, the more quickly they go away. and that, you know, part of that includes listening without defense, like not defending what I was thinking, what I was, Planning what I was trying to do.
Dr. John Schinnerer: and that takes a little bit of skill too, but that’s a huge, huge game changer.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I think it goes back to that old adage that we are not thinking beings that feel we are feeling beings that think,
Dr. John Schinnerer: Antonio Damasio.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So when we recognize that [00:36:00] our emotions are the core of us, it’s our heart center.
Joree Rose, LMFT: It’s not our rationality that makes up who we are.
Dr. John Schinnerer: We’re animals. At some level we’re animals. And I think we have this illusion that we’re rational and intellectual and analytical and smart. And I think that really works against us. I was talking to a man a couple of days ago about how we over identify with the thinker in our head.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Yeah.
Dr. John Schinnerer: We’re so much more than that.
Joree Rose, LMFT: We’re so much more, and we gotta allow our partner to be human.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yeah.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Which means making mistakes and offering grace
Dr. John Schinnerer: And we struggled with that one for a bit. I think we expected each other to be emotionally perfect at some level.
Dr. John Schinnerer: I remember you saying to me like, you know, we’d get in a disagreement.
Joree Rose, LMFT: know you’re gonna.
Dr. John Schinnerer: you’re the anger management expert.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Yeah.
Dr. John Schinnerer: how come you can’t, manage your anger
Joree Rose, LMFT: I would be cause I’m human.
Dr. John Schinnerer: I’m still hurt.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Right. And I would say you teach the shit.
Joree Rose, LMFT:
Dr. John Schinnerer: we’ve talked about that and you don’t do that anymore.
Joree Rose, LMFT: do that at all.
Dr. John Schinnerer: I think there is this magical thinking that we have of this shouldn’t happen or because you’re an expert in this. [00:37:00] You shouldn’t feel this.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Renee Brown’s great at that. when she talks about all of her research, that she struggles in most of the things that she researched and probably why she’s so curious about it.
Dr. John Schinnerer: I think that’s one of the things I’ll share with a lot of clients, right. that humanity, that part of me that still feels deeply is one of the most frustrating parts of me.
Dr. John Schinnerer: and we’ll say that sometimes like fucking humanity, for that very reason that it’s like, I’m sorry, I lost my temper.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I think one of the things that, you know, for couples who really want to get closer is not just have the, the culture of gratitude and appreciation, but I mean, I don’t want to understate that, but all of this has to be named specifically because I think for many couples becoming closer, becoming happier is conceptual.
Joree Rose, LMFT: And I think unless we have some marked route markers, like, you know, some actual like talking points, [00:38:00] destinations, we’re trying to reach as a couple, it’s really hard to know where we’re going. If we don’t have that roadmap of what being closer to you mean, because I could, I mean, if we’re just say, you know, if I said to you, Hey, John, I really want to feel close in our relationship, that’s really vague.
Joree Rose, LMFT: So we’d have to come upon a shared common language of understanding. When I say closer, what do I mean when you say closer? And what would it look like for us to take the steps to get there? Well, the only way couples are going to get there is if they have check ins with each other
Dr. John Schinnerer: most couples don’t do that you got to share with your partner What you’re trying to get better at when I talk to men and i’m not doing couples work with them I’m, just seeing the man individually i’m like go share with your wife I’m going to talk about one or two of the ideas that we’ve talked about today, one or two of the tools that we’re working on, she needs to see that you’re putting in the effort and that’s the best way that you can do it.
Dr. John Schinnerer: So don’t just go home. And when she says, Oh, how was your talk with John? Oh, it was fine. Worst thing you can do.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Like
Dr. John Schinnerer: share what I [00:39:00] shared with you in terms of tools.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Mm hmm.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Because then you can both ideally agree that, yeah, this would be great. Let’s work towards this.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Or, you know, let’s work towards being more appreciative and grateful to one another for all the things that we’re doing around the house, And then it becomes a self reinforcing positive upward spiral.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I want couples to know. Being happier being more connected learning and growing in how to have the best relationship for each of you at this stage of your life, because look who you are when you first met and dated and fell in love and who you are in the height and midst of raising kids and building careers and who you are, empty nesting, you’re going to have different needs.
Joree Rose, LMFT: You’re going to have different abilities. Capabilities, communication styles. And so you gotta be able to grow with life and the stage you’re in without checking in. It’s no wonder couples get to empty nesting stage and are like, we haven’t talked in like 15 years.
Dr. John Schinnerer: growth is the only [00:40:00] constant in life.
Dr. John Schinnerer: And yet so many of us are resistant to it.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Yeah.
Dr. John Schinnerer: it makes life way more difficult than it has to be. to use a metaphor, what would you rather be the stagnant pond with no water coming into it, no water, leaving it with algae and mosquitoes on it.
Joree Rose, LMFT: No.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Or you can be the clear mountain stream that’s got water you can drink out of it that supports life with animals and birds, and is constantly changing.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Mm-hmm .
Dr. John Schinnerer: What do you want to be?
Joree Rose, LMFT: Yeah. And I see a lot of resistance to the natural growth and change that happens. we’ve gotta create the safety and naming it, talking about it, encouraging. it comes down to scheduling time for it. this time is not going to come to us.
Joree Rose, LMFT: We’ve got to consciously create the space to prioritize. This is important enough to me to give time and attention to, you would schedule the dentist, a time with a friend, when you go to the gym or a meeting. I like this idea, especially from the male point of view [00:41:00] treat your relationship as if you’re the CEO of your household, you and your partner are co CEOs.
Joree Rose, LMFT: You would never. Go into a business in which you had no experience training qualifications for and expect it to be 100 percent successful. You would need to be willing to be open to consultants, to be open to trainings. That’s the language I want men to hear so they can see, Oh yeah, I want a successful company.
Joree Rose, LMFT: What do I have to do to build greater success?
Dr. John Schinnerer: Most of the men I talked to have been developing themselves at work. They just fail to bring those tools home, or they fail to do the same for their relationship and their parents,
Joree Rose, LMFT: which is why I’m trying to use that analogy so that you don’t see yourself as weak.
Joree Rose, LMFT: I mean, what, what a guy who is trying to build, greater connections with their employees bosses or teammates call themselves weak for trying to network. No, they probably say I got to go talk to more people and learn about more things so I can climb the ladder.
Dr. John Schinnerer: And so part of this is about having the humility to know what you don’t know.
Dr. John Schinnerer: if you bring in a consultant, [00:42:00] that’s not weakness. That’s just good business.
Joree Rose, LMFT: check out our new podcast, love isn’t enough. And, you know, we are really excited because it’s not just the new podcast. but we’re building out the focus and core of our business for years to come.
Joree Rose, LMFT: supporting couples on this journey. in our model, I work with the women individually. John works with the men individually, and we come together to do couples work we believe you can’t separate self work from couple’s work if you’re only focusing on arguments fights repairs and building new tools without the individual work you can get marginally successful, but not
Joree Rose, LMFT: the full happiness we have seen the possibility for.
Dr. John Schinnerer: One of the things that really convinced me of this direction was the findings of positive psychology over the last 20 years. Christopher Peterson, who’s passed now, once said other people matter George violent, who was in charge of the adult development study at Harvard, followed a group of men and women for 80 years the findings.
Dr. John Schinnerer: In [00:43:00] terms of what makes for a thriving, happy, successful life is love full stop. It’s all about connection. It’s all about relationship without the connection and the relationship. It doesn’t matter how much money you make. It doesn’t matter how successful you are in business.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Yeah. You
Dr. John Schinnerer: won’t be happy.
Joree Rose, LMFT: They might think they are.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Even Steve jobs, died alone and regretted his path at the end.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Yeah.
Dr. John Schinnerer: It’s one of the great regrets of. People that are dying.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Yeah.
Dr. John Schinnerer: thank you for your time and attention And listening to us ramble on about relationships.
Joree Rose, LMFT: We have a new Instagram account.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Yes. Love. Isn’t enough
Joree Rose, LMFT: that will be a focus of relationship tips and tools. And of course the new podcast, and we also have our year long masterclass series no matter what point of the year it is, you get access to these amazing. Workshops that are included in the areas that we see couples getting most stuck and preventing that connection we’re talking about, [00:44:00] but it’s not just the class there’s handouts exercises prompts and partner practices because We don’t learn by conceptualizing change.
Joree Rose, LMFT: We learn by doing, it’s just like going to the gym. If you want to have bigger muscles, you got to do those bicep curls. So everything we’re offering is like little bicep curls for your heart and brain to get stronger.
Dr. John Schinnerer: And you can find out more about all of that at love. Isn’t enough. net.
Joree Rose, LMFT: Thanks for having me John.
Dr. John Schinnerer: Always a pleasure. And that’s it for this episode of the evolved caveman podcast. If you liked this episode, please be sure to rate review, like, and share with your friends. Thanks so much until next time.
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