Speaker 1: You are listening to the regular version of Sexy Marriage Radio. SMRNation.com.

Speaker 1: You've turned on Sexy Marriage Radio, where the best sex happens in the marriage bed. Here's your host, Dr. Corey Allan.

Corey Allan: Well, welcome back to another episode of Sexy Marriage Radio, where… You know what, Pam?

Pam Allan: What?

Corey Allan: Valentine's Day is right around the corner-

Pam Allan: It is next week.

Corey Allan: … as of the time that this is airing. So, it's pretty important if you're wanting to get ahead of it and not be last minute for your spouse.

Pam Allan: Right.

Corey Allan: You might want to start doing something today if you're listening to this right after it airs.

Pam Allan: Yeah. Relieve the stress off yourself if that's something you guys celebrate.

Corey Allan: And we have a fabulous idea for a Valentine's gift, because it's one that you can give Valentine's Day and then actually pay it off in June.

Pam Allan: Yeah, you spread the love out.

Corey Allan: Come join us at the Sexy Marriage Radio Getaway in Indianapolis, June 23rd through the 25th, and sign up, register, and then surprise your spouse, "Guess where we're going for Valentine's Day in June," and come spend the weekend with us and a whole bunch of other couples.

Pam Allan: Yeah, it gives you just some anticipation and something to look forward to.

Corey Allan: Anticipation's a big part of the giving process.

Pam Allan: It is. Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Corey Allan: That's one of the things I've realized early on is over the years, I've tried to surprise you with different trips or different things, like for anniversaries or… not necessarily Valentine's Day, but we would do different things and I would surprise you with them hopefully, but then I would end up telling you in advance because I was horrible at keeping those kinds of secrets.

Pam Allan: Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Corey Allan: And then I realized the value of the anticipation is actually a gift in and of itself.

Pam Allan: For me, it is. Surprises are pretty cool, but I do love having something to look forward to and playing in with you.

Corey Allan: And it's so funny because that's almost the opposite end of the spectrum, because here in Texas this past week, we had mini ice-mageddon from a couple days. The whole place shut down because of ice and snow. And we were realizing the day before it came in, we went out to the store just to pick up a few last things and then hopefully been able to do this mini conference that ended up being canceled and postponed to May. But we were… you could just sense among the people, there was still some PTSD in a sense from last year's serious ice-mageddon, that was 6, 7, 8 days. No power. And in Texas, that's a huge… this was a huge deal.

Pam Allan: Well, anywhere it's huge when it's that cold and you have no power, and houses are getting ruined, and you name it.

Corey Allan: That's true. But you could almost see the opposite effect of the anticipation of something to look forward to, but the fear is a similar fundamental thing that we react to.

Pam Allan: It is. Yeah.

Corey Allan: And these are the things that wreak havoc all the time in marriage and in life. And it's just recognizing both ends of the spectrum. How do I realize it so I can make better moves in response to not just react from? And so, if you want to hear more about whatever we got going on, then you need to subscribe to SMRNation and the podcast that we do because we've got new shows every week coming out and we want to help speak to what it is that's going on in your world. And the way you let us know is 214-702-9565, feedback@sexymarriageradio.com. And then we hope that we see you in Indi in June.

Pam Allan: Did you tell them how to get there?

Corey Allan: SMRNation.com/getaway is take you straight to the page. You can register there. Early bird rate is still available until April 15th. So, save your spot because we've sold out every year prior, and all signs to point to we will again, too. And so, if you want to come join us, we hope that you will.

Corey Allan: Well, coming up today on the show, Pam, we're giving… this is our Valentine's Day gift to the nation, they get the full show today.

Pam Allan: Ah, I like giving gifts. That's fun.

Corey Allan: So today, the episode I'm joined by a good friend, a mentor and friend of mine, Dr. Robert Glover.

Pam Allan: Yeah. A lot of the fellows in particular out there have read him.

Corey Allan: That he's the author of No More Mr. Nice Guy. Ran across him, man, early on in my career, largely thanks to my advisor and my doc program, because Dr. Glover had the same advisor.

Pam Allan: Oh, okay. Nice.

Corey Allan: Well, that's how we met each other was via Dr. Jennings. But he joined me today where… And the reason we're doing the full show is just we just couldn't break this up into two different segments because it was too good and too fun of a dialogue. And so, the topic today is: What do you do when you are roommates, not lovers in marriage?

Corey Allan: And he's got a really good take on this of how do you look at the power dynamic of the energies of masculine, feminine, and the role that we each play as husbands or wives, and how it's so easy to make this thing where we are just roommates and not lovers. And so, what we try to do is help the nation fall in love again. All that's coming up on today's show.

Corey Allan: Well, I'm honored again to be joined on Sexy Marriage Radio by Dr. Robert Glover, who's a friend, I would say now, and colleague, just because we've connected enough, I think, over times that it's fun to… anytime, we can sit and have a conversation. I leave better. [crosstalk 00:05:48]

Robert Glover: I've always considered as friends. We've got a very common background and it's always fun to sit down and talk with you. It never feels like work, so-

Corey Allan: Oh, that's… If you could figure that out, then that's the best way to go through life, right? [crosstalk 00:06:06]

Robert Glover: I like that way.

Corey Allan: Perfect. All right, so Robert, you've been on in the past. I'm just going to catch some of the members of the SMRNation up to date, if they're new to the show. You have a book out there, which is fantastic. I recommend all the time, No More Mr. Nice Guy. You came on, we've talked about that whole idea. And then, there's also the idea and the archives of the positive emotional tension, which is the principle of… there needs to be some tensions there, so how do you use it as positive and create positive tension rather than the negative that will create if there's the absence of no tension. Right?

Robert Glover: That's a very basic overview.

Corey Allan: I went a 100,000 feet on that one. I get it.

Robert Glover: Yeah.

Corey Allan: But that's a teaser for people to go back into the archives with this, so we don't have to unpack it all the way.

Robert Glover: Oh, there you go. Tease them back.

Corey Allan: But I do want to go into a conversation with you on, because I know you come across this too, working with husbands, whether they are… or just men that are dating, in long-term relationships, or searching for a deeper connection with people. But there seems to be a scenario in marriage, for sure, where it's very easy, common, normal in some regards even, to get into roommate syndrome, not lover aspect. And I'm curious what's your take on… how does that all happen?

Robert Glover: Oh, my goodness because that can happen in so many different ways. I've been a relationship therapist coach for over 30+ years, and been in a few relationships. There's so many things that can happen. People get together for all the wrong reasons and then they start showing up over a long-term relationship. It's not unusual when things are not going well sexually in a long-term relationship for there to be a sexual trauma in one or both people's backgrounds, more often than not, the woman's, but I've worked with plenty of men with sexual trauma in their background.

Robert Glover: What I see the most over long-term relationship is that people just get busy. They get busy doing their own stuff. And I always get a kick when I was doing couple counseling, and either a guy would come in or the couple would come in and say, "Well, we've started scheduling sex," and I would go, "Why? Why are you doing that?" "Well, we just are so busy, the kids, work, this, that, we just never have time anymore." And I said, "When you guys first got together early on, did you have to schedule sex?" "Oh, no. Of course not."

Corey Allan: Right, right.

Robert Glover: You were in doing room closets, you were doing it anyway, you didn't have to have it on your calendar. And I would usually tell other people, I would ask them, "What changed? What's changed from when you didn't have to schedule sex in order to have sex to now?"

Robert Glover: And I'd say, "That's what you need to deal with, whatever's changed in the meantime." And it may be that it's gotten busy, they've gotten busy. Another thing that I've seen is that the wounds start piling up, the ways that we hurt each other. If you live in close proximity with each other, you're going to step on each other's toes every now and then.

Corey Allan: Absolutely.

Robert Glover: And couples aren't always real good at resolving that stuff, so it is like little bricks of these wounds, or resentments, or hurts start building up, and more often than not, when people get busy, when stuff builds up, when the man only approaches his wife affectionately when he wants sex, when those things happen over time, it's usually the woman that starts closing.

Corey Allan: Okay.

Robert Glover: Because if you think about it, if we look at sex, sex always involves the dominance and in submission always. And we don't probably usually think of it like that. We might think of BDSM or something-

Corey Allan: Right. That's not termination… that's not terms that we use in a general sense, as far as the… I understand exactly what you're saying, but those terms go into the BDSM world, I think, in most people's minds.

Robert Glover: Yeah. So let me just, we'll just do it in plain English. For there to be sex, there has to be a doer and a done to. Otherwise, it's just two bodies lying next to each other, waiting for something to happen. Right?

Corey Allan: Right.

Robert Glover: And so, what happens is it typically… and depending on how a couple's wired in terms of… I'll think of the masculine pole in this polarity as the doer, and the feminine pole as the done to, we all have masculine and feminine sides to us, but typically, in most sexual relationships, when the thing that gets them going is when the more default masculine does and the more default feminine opens to be done to, and then that can switch. There's reciprocity that hopefully all of us have experienced, that of switching top, bottom, pitcher, catcher, dominant, submissive, whatever terms we use that in good, healthy relationships that switches. But what happens because the woman is usually the more inherently emotionally feminine person of the two, is that she often starts closing and doesn't open.

Robert Glover: And for there to be good sex, the feminine part of us has to open, and relaxed, and submit, and be taken, and be done to in pleasurable ways. So, because of all these things that add up that we've been talking about, it's often the woman that starts closing. And so, there's often the woman that gets blamed because we're not having sex like we used to anymore. I've worked with women for years and listened to their issues around sex. And like I say, it could be any number of things, but more often than not, the two biggest complaints that women have is either when they do have sex, their partner's just poking them. I often say that when it comes to sex, we men are wired to be sexual mopeds.

Robert Glover: If we can just, I'll be crass, find a hole to put a penis in and ejaculate, we call that sex. Women are sexual Ferraris. They're highly tuned sexual creatures, and they don't do well with just being indiscriminately poked, and that's what a lot of women have experienced. And maybe the other thing that a lot of women have experienced is just their partner being just really unconscious, of not being particularly present, not particularly available, and for the feminine to open up, she's got to feel safe. There got to be a sense of depth, and connection, and oneness to open up to that. One more piece that I see that actually turns women off over time, and this might be a little surprising and it goes back to the "nice guy" thing, that nice guys are often seeking external validation from our partners through sex.

Robert Glover: We're feeling insecure, or lonely, or bored, or depressed, and so we turn to our partner to have sex. And if the desire is to have sex, it fills some empty place inside of us. But in general, the feminine is turned off by neediness. The feminine feels that big needy hose… coming [crosstalk 00:14:01] Ross Perot, when he was running for president, they talked about that big sucking sound of the federal government. I think about that when a needy man is go, "Oh, let me rub your back. Let me give you a neck massage. Let me just sneak my sexual agenda up on you, and then you'll want to have sex with me, and I'll feel okay." All right, so all of these things can add up, and again, it's often the woman either because she's been poked, or her man only pays attention when he wants sex, or only comes to her when he is needy and wants her to take care of him. So, when she turns down his neediness, it feels like she's rejecting him and rejecting sex.

Corey Allan: Right. Right. Right.

Robert Glover: And it may be none of the above. She's just, "No, don't come to me with that needy sucking sound. I want a man to show up and do me, and do me with consciousness, and presence, and love, and creativity, and spontaneity, and playfulness, and humor, and fierceness, and his dark side," and all of these stuff that makes sex juicy. And I wonder how many women listening to this right now are going, "I don't know that I've ever had a man show up with all of those things he just listed," and then we wonder why they lose interest in sex, or why they close and don't open as well.

Corey Allan: Right. And that's why we created in this dynamic of a marriage, that's why we would create this system of… we just keep stuff at the surface, we just manage a household well, we may co-parent really well, we may go on some vacations, we may even do date nights, we do all on the surface, everything that is proposed of what would make a marriage good, but you're not the deeper level lover because of… I love the way you're framing it in the sense of, it's the build up of a lot of the things of our mannerisms, or our hesitancies, or our timidity, or our neediness, or-

Robert Glover: All the above.

Corey Allan: ... all of it.

Robert Glover: That's why this isn't simple. That's why you, as a therapist, couple walks in your office, you can't just say, "Oh, do this different, do that different, do that different. I'll see in two weeks. It is that simple."

Corey Allan: Dude, if we actually came up with that, we would've been the world's first trillionaires overnight.

Robert Glover: Yes. Yeah.

Corey Allan: Because that's what everybody's longing for, but I think there, I want to add another component, just to hear what you think about this, because the way you're framing it is perfect, but I think built within this frame is also that element of I have a tendency to see, or [inaudible 00:16:32] see we will have a tendency to… I've got this fear of rejection if I let all of me be seen, or a dark side of me be seen, or a fetish or a kink or a fantasy, or even just a desire to be seen, and now all of a sudden, if that's gotten shut down or rejected in the past, there's a tendency then I'm like, "Well, I'm not going to break." So, I start maybe even holding back, so that even compounds this problem more to where it's risk aversion almost in marriage.

Robert Glover: Yes. In two ways I see that then goes, often both, and especially in men. One is that we clam up in many ways. I call it pre-rejecting ourselves. "Well, she won't be interested in that," or "She's not in the mood," or "Well, I'll bring that up at another time, not now." And so, we start just guarding stuff and keeping stuff close to the best, so we men don't even realize how non-transparent and how non-honest we are.

Corey Allan: Correct.

Robert Glover: And I'm not just talking about honesty like, "Oh, I looked at some woman today and felt attracted to her." I mean, just honest about so many things. And then, the other thing I see happen, as you're saying that, is as you know, so many men then turn to pornography and fantasy, is whatever those dark sides of ourselves. And when I say "dark," I don't mean evil. I just mean, the part of ours that we might have shame or fear [crosstalk 00:18:08]

Corey Allan: It's the underbelly [crosstalk 00:18:09], right?

Robert Glover: Yeah. It's part of who we are. And what happens is we will then start go and pursuing that through pornography because anything and everything is available in pornography. One of the things, I didn't mention this earlier, but another piece, one of these layers, is that perhaps, you've heard the phrase, "madonna-whore complex," or madonna-whore syndrome."

Robert Glover: I see that manifest so often with so many men, especially Christian men, because it's like, "Oh, my woman is the good woman. I have to always show her I'm the good man. Don't let her see the darkness in me. Don't let her see the rage in me. Don't let her see the [crosstalk 00:18:53] in me, but I can go over here to pornography, or fantasy, or massage parlors," or however-

Corey Allan: A lot of other nefarious things that are out there.

Robert Glover: I can take all my dark sexual energies there because you can't bring that to a Madonna. And one of the things that I've been telling men for a long time is the best thing you can do for your sexual relationship with a long-term partner is bring those energies together, to where you bring both the love and the reverence to your partner, and that dark side. And it's funny because that scares men to death. You talk with women about it, women are sitting there nodding like, "Yeah!"

Robert Glover: I read one or two romance novels a year, just for kicks and just to… The formula is the same, no matter whether it's a sci-fi, fantasy, or gothic, it doesn't matter. They all have the same formula. And the men that the women fall for in these romance novels are always a little bit dangerous [crosstalk 00:20:04]

Corey Allan: Yep. They have an edge to them. Right?

Robert Glover: There's an edge to them. There's tension. There's a fierceness. There's a, "Oh, he's not safe, but I want him." And then, we men, we think, "Well, I'm going to be the real nice guy and real pleasing, and do everything my partner wants, and I know that worked last time to get her excited, so I'll do that again to get her excited," and she's sitting there going, "Now, he did this last time to get me excited. There he goes, he does the same thing again."

Corey Allan: "I can follow the map. I got it."

Robert Glover: "I know what's coming next. Okay. All right." And then, the woman goes, "I'll create my own little fantasy so I can get aroused and get this over with." Again, these are stereotypes, not everybody [crosstalk 00:20:42]

Corey Allan: No, I get you totally. Yep.

Robert Glover: But there's so many different ways, and that's why I love working with sexuality with couples. Schnarch referred to the Sexual Crucible. David Deida talks about Finding God Through Sex. Jung, Osho… I mean, you can go lots of different directions and they're basically saying, "If you get down to the nitty-gritty in sex, you get down to the nitty-gritty to who we are as human beings."

Corey Allan: Absolutely.

Robert Glover: And that's why this is such beautiful work to do.

Corey Allan: Right. Because I think there's a component that this, as I'm hearing this, as we're talking, Robert, I'm just hearing this, this is bringing in several of the key words I've picked up from you over the years of… there's a consistency that's necessary among the man and the woman of just being our best, presenting our best. I've landed on and this has resonated with a lot of the men I worked with in mastermind groups and even at listeners of SMR, of solidness, right?

Robert Glover: Sure.

Corey Allan: That there's a solidness. Schnarch refers to it as creating a solid, flexible self, that it's that idea of "I can pivot and adjust without losing myself, because I know who I am and I know who I'm not," and so I think because far too often, you and I are both of the male persuasion, so we have fallen victim to the idea of, "I find this thing. I think it might work so I'm about to put it right into practice as a tool," rather than it's something that needs to be integrated into all of me. Right?

Robert Glover: Yeah.

Corey Allan: It's a holistic thing of my presence and my action. The other thing that comes to my mind is that I have worn this out with my clients, of the idea of "My wife benefits from 5 minutes of my 100% presence than more than 30 minutes of my 50% presence."

Robert Glover: I've been teaching that to men for so long is that you might go spend an hour or two with your wife because you think you have to, but you're thinking about work, and you're thinking about this, and you're thinking you'd rather be watching the game and what's the score now. And the women feel that. But yeah, they don't want a giant piece of the pie, but when they get a piece of the pie of our life and our attention, they want a 100% of it, and that is so challenging for so many men. It takes work. It takes practice. I think it takes a mentor. It takes a coach. It takes a men's group.

Robert Glover: I'm in a men's program, I have a men's coach and I'm still working on "How do I bring all of my consciousness, all of my presence? How do I be grounded? How do I be here, be solid?" and it's the initiation stuff that our ancestors used to get from our forefathers that we don't get anymore, of how to get comfortable feeling discomfort? How to be present? How do we stay strong when we feel fear? How do we stay grounded? How do we keep breathing? How do we hold on to ourselves? How do we penetrate women and world with consciousness, and presence, and strength? And again, that's why I loved working with relationships and sexuality, because there's such a great container to do this work, to really get down to the core of who we are.

Corey Allan: Right, because it really is a language. I mean, it's incredibly descriptive and revealing of our nature, of our capabilities, our fears, our insecurities.

Robert Glover: Yeah.

Corey Allan: You can't hide. If you're involved in a sexual relationship over anything at the time, you really can't hide who you are.

Robert Glover: Well, we think we can. I remember I had a conversation with my second wife, 20 some years ago. And I asked her, I said, "If you could get away with anything and there were no consequences, what would it be?" I remember lying in bed and she goes, "I'm not going to answer that, but I'll ask you the same thing." And I thought, "Hmm." I said, "Well, I think I'd take a look at my dark side." And I didn't say I would like go into my dark side, or even you go explore it, I think I would like take a peek at it.

Corey Allan: Right. Let's look behind that curtain a little bit.

Robert Glover: Yeah. And she said to me, "I doubt you'll find anything that I don't already know about." And here I am thinking… and we men all think that, "Oh, I got this hidden from them. I got it under control," and I learned the lessons that if anything is all is up for me, I go tell my partner. If I talk to my accountant and I got a tax penalty to pay, first thing I do, I go tell my partner because she's going to know something to know.

Corey Allan: She will pick up the cues of something.

Robert Glover: Yeah. And what if I try to keep that press down and be normal and try to have sex later on, and I'm thinking, "I owe her as this tax penalty." Whenever anything comes up that unsettles me now, first thing I do is I tell my partner because she's going to sense it and she's going to know. And that's just a form of being honest and transparent in a way that makes my partner feel safe and makes her want to move closer to me. But if I'm antsy and anxious, and keeping it hidden from her, she'll feel it and sense it. She's not going to open to that.

Corey Allan: Right. Right.

Robert Glover: So, so much of this is really just letting them in, letting them see inside, just letting them see what all's there.

Corey Allan: So, what do you do then with… because if we put it under the frame of, it can be the risk aversion is what can lead to the roommate syndrome, of I'm afraid of being present.

Robert Glover: Let's go with that one.

Corey Allan: I'm afraid of letting it being known. I'm letting her see or him see all of me, because I think this is on both sides of the equation. I think you would agree with that. Right?

Robert Glover: Yeah.

Corey Allan: That it's not just whoever the doer is in this regard, there's also an element of understanding who I am as I receive, male or female, understanding who I am as I harness my power, and my eroticism, or my fantasy, or my dark, or whatever it could be. So, if there's this element of "I'm afraid of letting it be seen," or "I've been rejected when it has been seen," at least as I perceive rejection, because it could be that I've pre-rejected it. So therefore, I brought it about, because I didn't bring it about honestly, I tried to covertly get it there, and she just heard the sucking hose. Right?

Robert Glover: Right.

Corey Allan: So, that would then create this idea of roommates if there's only, "Here's the levels of depth we can talk about. Here's the things we can do." [Mishnah 00:27:38] refers to that as leftovers sex, right? That we all have leftovers of "We won't do what I want to do. We won't do what you want to do. We'll do whatever's left over." That's what we do.

Robert Glover: Yeah. It's like whatever's been taken off the table, that didn't happen. We get whatever's left of whatever the two of us have taken out of play.

Corey Allan: So, if we flip that, because how often do we find these situations where I'm scared of some of the parts of myself? Even that statement of, "I think I would want to have the courage to look behind the curtain of my dark side." I think there's courage to even have the contemplation of that.

Robert Glover: I agree, for most of us guys.

Corey Allan: Totally. Well, I think women, too, because I think there's this element of our humanness that if you have the Christian [Bent 00:28:26], that that's the flesh that's gone, but no, no, no. It's still reality. It's who we are as humans. And there's a difference between acknowledging it versus letting it run rampant.

Robert Glover: Yeah, of course. I grew up in a fundamental Christian church, and was a minister in a previous lifetime and couple degrees in religion. So, I get the whole… And this isn't true in every church, but I was in a pretty fundamental denomination and the basic message is "Sex is evil, dirty, and simple, so save it for the one you love."

Corey Allan: Love that message. [crosstalk 00:29:05] The terminology in that message is so funny.

Robert Glover: And now, "We're going to get married and everything's just going to be open and clean," and what we forget is that if you're coming from a Christian perspective, you've got to believe that everything that God made, God made perfectly, and everything about our sexuality, he made perfectly. So, why is it we're going to hide something that's perfectly made, just because we've been told, "Don't let that part of you out. Don't let that."? And if Jesus had any message, it was, "Be real, be honest, be transparent, but be you." I'll give you an example, and this is a very personal one, very recent. My wife and I went to a retreat center down in Costa Rica at the end of November of this year. I had been invited to come down and speak at a men's only retreat and it's first one they'd ever done. I got invited two years ago and COVID kept pushing it back.

Robert Glover: So, we went and so was an all men's retreat, but I had to bring my wife along, and so she got to be over on the fringes of things. One night, when we got done with the program, the guy who was next to me started just opening up to me when it was all done and time to head back to our rooms, and he started saying that he was actually there the previous week with his wife at a retreat that wasn't just for couples, but involved men and women, both. And she revealed to him on Wednesday night of the retreat, a week ago from the night he was talking to me, that she'd had an affair 10 years previously. And then on Friday night, she said, "I want a divorce."

Robert Glover: And then, they were there a couple more days. She went on home. He decided to stay the next week for the men's retreat part of it. And so, he was telling me this. As my wife and I were walking back to our room that night, it was pretty late, I was telling her about what this guy told me, and we got back to our room, and we're getting ready for bed, and she undresses, and goes in the bathroom, takes off her makeup, and comes back out, and sits on the bed, and she says, "I have to tell you something." And she says, "I'm really scared…" And she starts telling me some things of earlier in her life prior to being with me, that she says, "I'm afraid that if I ever told you these things, you would leave me."

Robert Glover: And she said, "When you told me that that guy…" and she goes, "I have this guilt thing I need to tell you that I never told you the truth about." That started a process that night of her and I going deeper than we've ever been, mostly telling things about our past. But prior to each other, we've been married five years, so a lot of it is prior, but it opened the door that we just started telling everything that… the way we've been putting it, anything that has fear attached to it or shame attached to it. We're sharing it with each other to use each other to clear out, and most of this is around sexuality. Anything that we have fear or shame, past, present, future, let's just put it out to each other and let's just explore it as a couple, and let it be what it is and decide how we want to deal with it.

Robert Glover: What has been so amazing, other than her not catching COVID a week ago on New Year's, for the last three to four weeks since that workshop, our relationship has been on fire in ways, and of course, our sexuality has been on fire. We can't quit touching each other. And not only has revealing this dark stuff to each other, it's not driven the other person away, but as I keep telling my wife, "I keep falling deeper and deeper in love with you," and I keep feeling more and more aroused, and wanting a deeper and deeper connection all the time. And she does too. So, there is so much power to take that risk of taking the lid off and sharing with our partner.

Robert Glover: And again, we've been together eight years, married five years. I thought I knew a lot about my wife. I found out there's a lot I didn't know, and I would love her even more for knowing it now. And I think she would say this, she feels closer to me because she doesn't have to worry if I've ever find this out about her, her past or her life, I'm going to reject her or not want to be with her. And it's just been amazing. It's so simple and fundamental in a way, but it's just been amazing.

Corey Allan: Right. Well, it's simple and fundamental, but scary as can be from the outset if you're just listening to this and wondering, "Okay, I get it," because I almost hear this as we can… I mean, because what you're describing, Robert, as I'm hearing this, is this is the element of knowing and being known.

Robert Glover: Yeah.

Corey Allan: Right? This is intimacy. This is a true connecting of real. I'm not hiding. I'm not shading. I'm not skewing. This is me. And it's not… because in some regards, I think, people try to preemptively create this by just doing a pass and dump, if you will, that it's not in the sense of being known, it's actually trying to rid yourself of guilt or it's trying to make yourself feel better. I think that's worth-

Robert Glover: [crosstalk 00:34:56] carry it.

Corey Allan: Right. I think that's a good distinction to realize this is an element of both because I would get the sense from what I know of you. I get the sense your wife had something stirring in her likely because of the relationship you guys have created and the pressure you've got of just being in a relationship with you. From what I know of you, you are a pretty forthcoming, open. If it's a thought and it keeps it in there, it's coming out. I'm not going to shade stuff. I'll tell you, let you see me. And so, she's wrestling with, "Okay, I'm going to up my game," in a sense of, "I want to show up better too." And so, she does, and that wasn't intending to get you to respond, and reciprocate, and kind, it was more just a, "Hey, this is the move I'm making, and I want to see where this goes for me and how you do with it."

Robert Glover: Yeah. And she was terrified. She was sure I was going to say, "We're done." That's how much respect I have for the courage it took because she was convinced, when she told me these things, I would be done with her. It is so funny that as opposite as you could be is true that I've just fallen more in love with her. And I always tell her, she's the most courageous person I know in many ways.

Corey Allan: Yeah. That's the perfect word for it.

Robert Glover: And I tell her, she's my role model as well, that it inspires me to be as open and as transparent. And the beauty of this is it does feed on each other in a very positive way, a positive feedback loop that… you see this in, for example, in a men's group or in any kind of therapy, like couple's therapy, one reveals something, somebody else reveals. That courage is contagious.

Corey Allan: Oh, absolutely. I've got a mastermind group that I've run regularly and I had one in the past that everybody's the first call. I already knew the story of the guys because I've done some vetting of it. And we're doing the first call and everybody's going through why they're there. And one dude at the end, he kept it. Everybody had set the tone of this is as deep as we're going to go, and he did the same, and he was wrestling, and I knew he had some skeletons in there and that's why he was there. And then all of a sudden, you could see him, he just goes, "I've got this going on…" and he just let it out. And then all of a sudden, we had to go back around the room to let guys say why they were really there, because he just set the tone differently because he had the courage and the strength to set the depth differently.

Robert Glover: From that moment, you're talking about, I assume a group of guys.

Corey Allan: Yes.

Robert Glover: Those men then went to a deeper level with each other, and that not only happens men between men, but of course, in a couple, in a relationship. When one goes deep, hopefully it inspires the other to… I call it the relationship teeter-totter. One of the person equalizes, gets out of balance by doing something brave or courageous, and all of a sudden, it's out of whack. Now, this other person down here is going, "I feel really uncomfortable. This person has done this really courageous, bold thing. I can either try to bring them back down to get the equilibrium back…" I mean, we don't think this-" [crosstalk 00:38:27]

Corey Allan: Right, but it's the way we operate with the systems. Yep.

Robert Glover: "… or I think I might have to bring my A game, and challenge myself, and rise up to match." And then all of a sudden, this equalizes the equilibrium. And so, it's a beautiful, second-order change of where one person being courageous inspires others, then the other people being courageous inspires back. And bringing this all back to sex, just anybody listening to what you and I have been talking about now for the last, 30 or 40 minutes or so, imagine having the energy you and I have around this thing between a couple, of partners, and the vulnerability, and the nakedness, and rawness, and the energy of bringing sex into that. Oh, man, it's spectacular. You don't know where it's going, but it's going to be interesting.

Corey Allan: Right, because you both are doing what you can and need to show up.

Robert Glover: Yeah.

Corey Allan: And that's the beauty of it. That's where you get the polarity. Yep.

Robert Glover: Not own anything bad, we've dropped the weaponry, we've dropped the armor, it's just we're naked. We're just naked in front of each other and that's when it gets interesting.

Corey Allan: I love it. Thanks for the personal story, because that's the strength of the wife, and then you in responding in kind, and I think there's an element of courage… is the right word. I have the courage to take charge of my own life and relationship in a different way by taking the risk. I'll take the hit, I'll see where it goes, because it's the only way I'm really going to get to that depth that maybe I really, I think we all long for, but we want someone else to set it for us.

Robert Glover: When I was teaching men, really focusing around single men in creating relationship and dating, I coined a phrase that I started using with the single men, I called "get to rejection quickly." Most men are afraid of getting rejected in any way whatsoever, so when we're passive, we're indirect, we don't take risk. And I go, "No. If you're dating, be bold, be yourself, set the tone and leave. Find out the woman's nature, get to rejection quickly. Find out quickly, 'is this woman a good match,' so you don't waste a lot of time dating somebody that's not a good, long-term match, if that's what you're looking for is long-term." I think the same thing true in a long-term relationship. I teach men and women, "Get to rejection quickly, and the best way I know how to do that is showing up being fully honest, fully transparent, asking for everything that you want, not hiding anything about yourself and finding out, can your partner rise to the occasion to meet you or you're going to find out they're not capable of it?" but nothing's going to change if somebody doesn't take that risk.

Corey Allan: Right. That's the only way that you get to that deeper level of knowing and being known, and really tapping into the energy there, and creating something better for you and your partner. That's what I-

Robert Glover: Exactly. Somebody's got to be willing to take that risk.

Corey Allan: That's great. So, Robert, again, I think we could talk for hours, but-

Robert Glover: We could.

Corey Allan: … but I want people to be able to find you of what do you got going on right now and how do they find more of you that will help them if this has sparked an interest in them.

Robert Glover: Well, the best way to find me is just go to my website, drglover.com, and what I've got going on right now is for the last several months, I've half a dozen online courses around relationship, work and career, the Positive Emotional Tension thing you mentioned, No More. Mr. Nice Guy, and I've been converting all these courses to video. And it's been an interesting challenge, but I'm really excited about it. I'm about a third of the way done. So, come check out my video courses. I just completed one called All The Way In. It's about men taking leadership in relationship, and it touches a lot of stuff you and I just been talking about right here.

Corey Allan: Well, that's great. Well, Robert, thank you so much again for the time, and the work, and the knowledge, and the wisdom, and the personal stories. I appreciate it so much, man. All the best.

Robert Glover: As always, thanks for the invitation, and I look forward to doing it again.

Corey Allan: Well, a little backstory on this episode, Pam. You are aware of this, but the nation wouldn't be aware of this. Dr. Glover and I have been trying to meet to record this show, I think for about five months.

Robert Glover: Yeah, it's been a while. [crosstalk 00:43:16].

Corey Allan: And every time we had it booked, I had something come up a couple of times that I needed to reschedule, but he had internet issues, COVID, internet issues again. There was just one thing after another and it almost got comical where anytime I was seeing on the calendar, he's booked to come on and we were going to record. He was either waiting for the email for me saying, "Ah, I can't. I need to reschedule," or I was waiting for an email from him to, "I got to have to reschedule." And the funny thing is he was telling me that, because he lives in Mexico and the cables that they use for their internet are lined with organic rather than the plastic chemical sheeting or covering, and so the rats are like, "That's organic food. I'm going to eat it all." So, they're eating through the cables.

Pam Allan: They're eating the lines. "We're trying to be good to this earth and-"

Corey Allan: "and the animals are thinking us in some ways-"

Pam Allan: Right. "The earth is paying us for it."

Corey Allan: Well, this [inaudible 00:44:18] Sexy Marriage Radio. If we left something undone or you want a particular path for us to explore more, let us know, 214-702-9565, feedback@sexymarriageradio.com. So, wherever you are, however you've taken some time out of the day to spend it with us, we say thank you again and we'll see you next time.