40: Can a Couple Stay Together When They Want Different Things Out of Life?

Hey there. This is Make More, Love the show for high performing men who don't want relationship advice, but want a better relationship. I'm Ellen Dorian, and I'm a coach for people who want a deeper physical and emotional connection with their partner, without endless talking, or going to therapy, or having to guess how to make them happy. We bring you judgment-free conversations about what it takes to maintain a passionate and fulfilling partnership, along with real solutions that you can implement right away without losing ground anywhere else. If you want to nail the essentials for an optimal life in business, relationships, health, and personal fulfillment, that's what we do here every week. So hit follow and subscribe so you don't miss anything. Well, it's hard to believe, but this is Episode 40 of Make More Love. Thank you for staying here with me. This is the final episode in our Avoiding Divorce series. Over the past few weeks, I've been exploring the factors that make your relationship stronger, and the ones that wear them down, and how you can keep yours on the strong side of that equation. We started off with why January is known as the opening of the divorce season, and why so many couples struggle during this time of the year. Then I shared the three core drivers behind the best relationships I know: passion, presence, and purpose Each episode in January has focused on the specific challenges that can block one of those drivers and what you can do to move past them, or even avoid them altogether. Part two focused on four subconscious behavior patterns, neediness childishness, apathy and transactional thinking, that drain desire from our sexual and emotional connection. Part three focused on recovering from disappointments, which are fixable situations and betrayals, which damage the core of trust between you. We talked about how the blame, shame and guilt that comes with betrayal can take away your ability to be fully present and why you need to let go of those things. To help with that, I introduced the SHIT Model, an hommage to George Carlin, which walks you through a process for deciding whether you're ready to work on your relationship. And today. We're wrapping up the series with the final piece of the puzzle. And that is purpose. Purpose is what gives your relationship meaning beyond the day-to-day stuff. It's the shared vision, values and goals to keep you on the same page, working as a team, no matter what life throws at you. It's mind blowing to me how many couples go through life without a shared vision for the future, a plan for getting there, or any support to stay on track. They don't even have the basics in place, like a personal financial plan, an estate plan. And they have no thoughts about what they want their life to look like for the foreseeable future. And this is just not relationships where this happens by the way. Do you know how many successful business owners have no succession or exit plan in place? I joke with my clients that their exit strategy is just to have the funeral director pull the hearse up to the loading dock. So do you have the basics in place? Later this spring, I'm going to bring in some experts to talk about those things and how they impact your relationship. So things like financial planning, succession planning, and estate planning. Of course, most of those experts won't be available until after tax season, but I'll let you know. Let's talk about how to rediscover or redefine your shared purpose, align your lives around it and still accommodate everyone's dreams for the future, so you always stay on the same page. And I want to start with a question. How many people do you know who, when they got divorced said something like, "we just didn't want the same things anymore." it's more than just a throw away phrase. It's actually measurable. In fact, 31% of divorced couples site incompatibility as the reason for their split. Add to that 73% who say lack of commitment and 45% who blame unrealistic expectations, and you can see a pattern. A huge percentage of divorce comes down to couples who lose sight of their vision for their future together. If we want to win at relationships, which is what I want most for you, then we'll have to rediscover or maybe even define for the first time, your shared purpose, and use it to build a stronger, more connected relationship. There are three reasons couples get into the situation where they no longer want the same things in life. Reason Number One is that your goals and priorities diverged over time. This happens to everyone. As you grow and evolve your goals naturally shift. What mattered to you most at 25 is likely to be dramatically different when you're 40 or 50 or beyond. That's completely normal and there's nothing wrong with changing, but it's important for you and your partner to have deep conversations about your dreams, values, and priorities. You probably talked about this a lot when you were first dating and starting to picture a life together. But once you've settled into that life, all the conversations tend to become about logistics-who's picking up the kids, what's for dinner, and how to pay the bills. The big picture stuff gets buried under the weight of current responsibilities and any conversations you do have about the future or more like a wishlist that an action plan. The problem is if you're not intentionally staying aligned, even small detours from the future that you planned can turn into a huge mismatch that's much harder to come back from. You might find yourselves working toward completely different futures without even realizing it, and by the time you get into your fifties, you could be very far apart. A classic example is where one person is dreaming about big adventures and travel, while the other one is focused on putting down roots and planning for retirement. The only way I know to prevent that kind of disconnect is to make sure you're checking in regularly, revisiting your shared goals and making adjustments along the way. Now, if you're already at an impasse, there are ways to bring your dreams back into alignment, but you're probably going to need some outside help to do that. Because it's not just about having a shared vision. It's about creating a vision that also accommodates your individual dreams and goals and the changes that will happen naturally over time. A healthy relationship makes space for both of you to grow and pursue your passions while staying connected on the big picture. I run strategic planning sessions with my clients at least once a year. They usually say it's one of the most transformative things they've done to create the relationship they both want to be in. So that was Reason One. Reason Two is that Sometimes the issue isn't that you've drifted apart. It's that you'd never had a clear, shared vision to begin with. Think about it. How many couples actually sit down and map out what they want their life to look like? A lot of couples only plan as far as the wedding and the honeymoon, and then maybe when they want to start a family. And beyond that it's often. "Well, we'll just figure it out as we go." The problem with that approach is it's nearly impossible to stay in sync. Unspoken assumptions about money, careers, parenting, retirement, and even how you spend your free time, conspire to pull you apart. It's sorta like saying, Let's get in the car and go for a drive," without any idea of where to go, or how long you'll be on the road, or what you need to take with you, or why you're going in the first place. Now I'm all for a drive to nowhere as a date, but not as a life. Again this, isn't just a relationship problem. I see this in business all the time. Founders create a business plan to get things off the ground, but then they spend years reacting to circumstances and changing conditions instead of anticipating them. And those companies rarely succeed at a high level because they're always playing defense. You can't be agile or competitive, and you have no idea about the end game, if you don't have a plan. People assume that things will just work themselves out. But that rarely happens without serious intentional effort There's something really powerful about planning that goes beyond the plan itself. Research shows that when people collaborate on creating a plan or solving a problem together, the process itself strengthens the connection. In fact, the act of working together often brings people closer than achieving the goal does. So Make planning and problem solving a regular part of your conversations, and see if that doesn't bring you closer. And now we come to Reason Three, which is where one partner drastically changes the game. This happens when one partner makes a major life decision that shifts the entire trajectory of the relationship. Like starting a business, for example. It's not just the decision itself. If you act unilaterally, it can leave your partner feeling blindsided and robbed of the future they signed up for. I have got a colorful story to get you thinking about this. So long time ago, there was this guy Duke, who lived next door to my boyfriend at the time. I met Duke a few times. He was a Vietnam vet. He worked at a nuclear plant and he wrote a Harley every day, even in the winter, he loved weapons of all kinds, guns, knives, you name it. You could say Duke was rough around the edges, but I'd say he was rough around the top, the bottom and everywhere in between. But believe it or not, he'd been married for decades to Dolores and they had a pack of kids. So here's the story I heard. One day Duke pulls into the driveway on his Harley, with a bombshell of a woman on the back. Her name was Jessica like the rabbit. And she looked like she just stepped out of Girls with Guns magazine. They tell me that Duke brought Jessica into the house to meet Dolores and said, "this is my girlfriend. She's going to live here now. You don't have to leave. You're still my wife and I'll take care of you. Like I always have. But Jessica is now part of the deal." I never heard whether Dolores stayed or not. But can you see some parallels maybe, to like starting a business? And upending your entire life to do it. If you got married while you were working a steady job with a secure future, your partner likely built their expectations around that. But somewhere along the way, you felt driven to start your own business. To you, it probably seemed like the opportunity of a lifetime. A way to build a better future on your own terms. But if your spouse wasn't fully on board with the decision, they might see it as reckless, risky, and like the rug's been pulled out from under them. Even if they want to be supportive, they can still feel caught between wanting to have faith in you and quietly resenting you for taking such a big risk without their full buy-in. And if you're thinking that nobody in their right mind would make such a huge decision without their partner's buy-in, I'm so happy to hear you think that, but I have to tell you that happens all the time. Alright. Now we've talked about three reasons, and I want to tell you about the emotional dynamics that can amplify these situations and make them even harder to navigate. The first one is loss of respect. When respect erodes in a relationship it's incredibly difficult to stay aligned. Respect is the foundation of trust, collaboration, and passion. Without it, every decision or difference of opinion can feel like a personal attack. The second one is loss of confidence in the plan. This happens when one partner starts to doubt the other's ability or commitment to build a future that they both envisioned. It could be broken promises, missed opportunities, or a sense that the plan was never solid to begin with. I can tell you a personal story. That relates to this. Years ago when I was in coach training, we did this meditation where we visualize what our lives would look like 20 years into the future. Uh, for me, something disturbing happened. My husband at the time did not appear in that vision. Now I made up a story to make myself feel better about it, convincing myself that it didn't mean anything. But looking back, I realized, I knew even then that the marriage wasn't likely to last. We've been married for six years at that point and stayed together for another seven after that. But the truth is I was pretending. I wasn't addressing the deeper issue, and deep down, I'd already lost confidence in the plan. This is where a lot of couples go wrong. Instead of facing those doubts and working together to either rebuild the plan or create a new one, they just keep pretending. They kick the can down the road, hoping that things will magically work out. But that only widens the gap and makes it harder to fix later. The third dynamic is emotional withdrawal. When challenges arise, some people disengage instead of leaning in. Emotional withdrawal might not always be easy to admit, but it's rarely subtle. It looks like avoiding deep conversations, spending more time away from home, or putting all your energy into work or hobbies instead of the relationship. The tricky part of this is that the person withdrawing might convince themselves that they're just keeping the peace staying out of the way. But in reality, it creates distance that makes it even harder to work through differences. Over time that distance becomes insurmountable. We talked about this one in episode 26, which is called Dead Quiet: Is Stonewalling Killing Your Relationship. Emotional withdrawal and stonewalling are closely related and both can be devastating for a relationship if we let it continue. Okay. So far, we've talked about the reasons couples get out of sync and the emotional dynamics that make it worse. Now let's talk about what to do about it. I'm going to share three principles to get you back in sync with your partner and build an aligned future. Whether the problems in your relationship are situational or emotional, the prescription is the same. If you want to get back in sync with your partner and create the future you both imagined in the beginning, here's what will get you moving in the right direction. The first principle is to switch off autopilot and re-engage. This means we have to let go of the magical thinking that you'll just tool along and somehow end up where you were meant to be. You can leave the situation up to fate if you want. I am not a big believer in that. I think fate is just what happens when we don't take action. Action in this situation starts by asking yourself this question: "What will your relationship look like in 10 years if nothing changes?" Does it look like something worth working hard for, and that you're going to love? And if you cannot say hell yes then you've got to change course. My own coach asks this question in our planning sessions. "If you're traveling toward your future, what are you doing to get there? Are you driving? Are you a passenger or are you asleep in the back seat? Or are you locked in the boot? That's the trunk in American. If you're not in the driver's seat, you're letting something else control where you end up. I'm sure you have your reasons for not wanting to take control, but if you don't, you might wake up one day in a place you never wanted to be. Like Doc Brown said in one of my favorite movies, Back to the Future, "Your future is whatever you make it. So make it a good one." Okay, the second principle is to create a vision you can believe in. When it comes to getting your relationship back on track, I understand you might not feel fully confident that it's going to last. But here's the thing. If you bring that much ambivalence into the process, you won't be able to make any progress. Who knows if you'll stay together forever. None of us can predict that. But what you can do is to start to paint a picture of a future that you both would want to stay in. That picture has to be real, not some fantasy. It needs to take both of your dreams into account what's important to you as individuals and what matters to you as a couple. And eventually, you'll need to collaborate on it, so it actually becomes a shared vision. Here's what I believe: If you can create a realistic and meaningful vision for your future together, your doubt might quiet down because you'll have something you can both work toward. So take some time alone to reflect on what you want, and what you want your life to look like five, 10, or even 20 years from now. What kind of relationship would you want to be part of? And once you have clarity on that, you're going to pick up momentum. And the third principle is co-create a shared vision. This principle is about working together to build a relationship you both want to stay in forever. It's about having the deep open conversations that might not be happening right now, and co-creating a vision that reflects both your dreams, values, and priorities. The challenge here is that you have to remember that you're not giving a pitch. You're not trying to convince your partner of your vision or win them over. You're sitting on the same side of the table, tackling the challenge of alignment as a team. Alignment doesn't mean that you're going to agree on everything. It just means finding the overlap between your individual visions and creating a future that you're both excited to work toward. The goal isn't perfection. It's progress, connection, and a shared understanding that you're in this together. So here are three key points. I hope you'll take away from today's episode. If you and your partner have lost your connection, and it feels like you no longer want the same things out of life. You can do something about it. You can decide to re-engage, and sooner is better. You can start with a vision of your own that you can buy into for yourself before you bring anyone else in. And you can become allies working toward a common goal, a future you might both want to stay in forever. And that wraps up this episode about finding alignment and getting back in sync. As we close out this series on Avoiding Divorce, I hope you're walking away with a deeper understanding of what it takes to create a long lasting Passionate partnership. This so-called divorce season can actually become your recommitment season, an opportunity to realign, reconnect and rebuild stronger than ever. The truth is no relationship is Bulletproof. Life happens. Mistakes happen. And stress is inevitable But if you commit to cultivating passion, showing up with presence and staying aligned on purpose, you're giving your relationship the foundation it needs to keep it strong, no matter what life throws at you. Now, I know some of you may feel like your relationship is too far gone. Or that it's just too hard to talk with your partner about these things. But. You can start on your own. Every episode in this series and frankly, every episode in this podcast, gives you steps you can take without needing anyone else's buy-in or participation. And I promise you, if you just focus on what you can control, you'll be amazed at how much better your relationship can become. I'm pretty sure everyone on Earth knows some form of the Golden Rule. It's a principle that has survived for thousands of years for just one reason. It works! Reliably! So welcome to my tribe, where the S*H*I*T Model and the Golden Rule live side-by-side because sometimes you need them both to get the job done. Alright. I hope today's episode got you thinking. But, you know, we can only do so much in an open forum like this. So if you want me to have a look at your specific situation, Book a free Relationship Reset Call. It's quick, private, and tailored exactly for you. We'll figure out your next best move and set you on the path to a better relationship for both you and your partner. Just head over to relationshipresetcall.com and pick a time. Also the show notes include all the resources I mentioned, including the links, plus my email, where you can share your thoughts privately any time. If this episode brought you value, please help me out. First, follow or subscribe, so you don't miss anything Second, leave a review to help others find the show. And third share this episode with someone you know who might need it. You could change their life. I'm Ellen, and that's what I've got for you today, Until next time, keep in mind that what I want most in the world is for you to make more love in your life and with your wife.