Speaker 1: You are listening to the regular version of Sexy Marriage Radio, passionatelymarried.net.

Corey Allan: Welcome back to another episode of Sexy Marriage Radio. Where each and every week Pam and I get on the mic and talk to the nation, the entire nation.

Pam Allan: Wouldn't that be pretty sweet.

Corey Allan: It's kind of like Meet the Nation.

Pam Allan: Right.

Corey Allan: Isn't there a show that... It's in Sunday mornings?

Pam Allan: Yeah, I don't think we want to be them. Yeah.

Corey Allan: You don't want to go to the political side of things.

Pam Allan: No. No, no. No, no. No, no.

Corey Allan: Agreed. Agreed, agreed.

Pam Allan: The sex topic is heated enough so-

Corey Allan: It's already happened in the political world way too much anyway.

Pam Allan: Yeah, we don't need that heat of politics.

Corey Allan: No, we don't. But this is Sexy Marriage Radio where each and every week we try to help out the nation and if you are listening to this episode you're part of the SMR nation and the way you can let us know what's going on in your world or questions that you may have. Let us know by calling us at 214-702-9565 as always the email out there is feedback@sexandmarriageradio.com, been around for over 10 years. That's still baffling to me, when I was sitting down for episode one and two and three which Gina and I recorded all at the same time. Who would've thought?

Pam Allan: Pretty cool.

Corey Allan: Yeah.

Pam Allan: It was pretty fun.

Corey Allan: Here's to decades more, right babe?

Pam Allan: Yeah, exactly.

Corey Allan: What we also ask of the nation is to help us spread the word. There's a couple different ways you can do this. If you listen via Apple Podcast or iTunes, jump on there, rate and review, leave a comment. Spotify you can rate the show. Android, Google Play whatever you can rate to show. Some of them will have possibilities of leaving comments. Audible, comment. Spread the word.

Pam Allan: Got it. Check.

Corey Allan: Are you doing that? Is that what you're saying, you're going to hop on and-

Pam Allan: Spread the word. Yes.

Corey Allan: Rate and review the show.

Pam Allan: Rate myself. All of them are from Pam A.

Corey Allan: No one will crack that code.

Pam Allan: No one will crack the code.

Corey Allan: Just to get out ahead of this thing while we're doing this show this week. This is the season of the year where I open up mastermind groups for husbands.

Pam Allan: Right.

Corey Allan: So Man Of His Word Mastermind groups are going on ramping up to launch in mid August. So fellas if you are interested in taking a six month long journey with a bunch of other guys that have skin in the game to just be better men, husbands, fathers, friends. Send me an email corey@passionatelymarried.net and let me know you're interested. I'll give you the next steps because there is a process to this. It's not just, "Hey I'm in. I'll pay the money and I'm in." No, there's some hoops you got to jump through.

Pam Allan: Your wife will thank you.

Corey Allan: Absolutely. Because the thing I still keep coming back to on this whole group... All the different groups we've been doing for over eight years now that I've been doing this. That I love it when a group gels to where the wife is saying, "Well what do your guys say about that? What do they think?" Because they know they've got some allies in their husband's corner and that's what this group is for is just, wrap up 2022 by making it a better you.

Pam Allan: Yep.

Corey Allan: Well coming up on today's regular free version of Sexy Marriage Radio, Pam and I are going to do a deep dive into the world of trust and trustworthiness and try to just look at it through a slightly different lens.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: Angles, and Pam's going to poke holes in it-

Pam Allan: I will.

Corey Allan: See if it ruins my trust in her and coming up on the extended-

Pam Allan: Not going to happen but I will ask questions.

Corey Allan: Coming up on the extended content which is deeper, longer and no ads. You can subscribe @passionatelymarried.net/smracademy. An email that's come in from a member of the academy who's curious about what happens when there's role reversals. There's some suggestions that we gave in the past about a husband that was lacking confidence and he's recognized his wife is incredibly successful. He's struggling and that really impacts his confidence.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: So what are some things you can do to help overall when there's a dichotomy going on of one person is rocking along differently than the other and it feels like it's a hierarchy?

Pam Allan: Okay, I've already got questions on that because that's a hierarchy, is it a role reversal?

Corey Allan: Well then we'll need to tune into the extended content today to find out more.

Pam Allan: Yes. I've got all kinds of questions already.

Corey Allan: All that's coming up on today's show.

Speaker 3: The Sexy Marriage Radio Academy is a private community of people perfecting the art of a passionate marriage. It's your opportunity to fully experience the fact that the best sex happens in the marriage bed. Not only that, you get to discover that being in a community makes a better life as well. The academy is a private space for listeners and readers of Sexy Marriage Radio. A place to connect with others about life, relationships and marriage. You'll find people that come together to meet, support one another and get answers to burning questions, learn from experts, participate in growth challenges and more. Marriage can be hard, don't go at it alone. You pick the level of access, go to passionatelymarried.net/smracademy to join today.

Corey Allan: I think there's a lot of information out there that people come into relationships thinking about the whole world of trust. Right? You would say you could easily see that trust is a primary thing needed in a marriage. Yes? Agreed?

Pam Allan: It would sure be helpful, yes.

Corey Allan: Okay.

Pam Allan: Any relationship I'm in that I want to be in long term ideally there's trust in it.

Corey Allan: Okay, which means what? Because I just want to start with just kind of a global... What do we bring in to this equation of a relationship when there's this inherent expectation of trust?

Pam Allan: Generically in any relationship I think if I'm in a marriage, a business relationship, something like that. That I'm going into some sort of union together. My initial response is reliability, right?

Corey Allan: Okay.

Pam Allan: I know that if they say that this is the role they're going to play that they're going to play it and ideally play it well.

Corey Allan: Okay.

Pam Allan: Okay. I'm not going to show up and X, Y, Z is not taken care of because they didn't do their part. So at a high level in my mind that's really what it is. Here's the part that I said I would play and I'm going to show up and do it.

Corey Allan: That's right in line so I did Webster's dictionary says, "Trust is the firm belief in the reliability, truth ability and strength of someone or something."

Pam Allan: Well, I could-

Corey Allan: Nailed it.

Pam Allan: I could work for Webster.

Corey Allan: Nailed it. Because I think there's an important component of this that when you think of the whole idea of trust it's a paramount thing I think most everybody has in mind that, yes I need to have some trust in my relationship. I need to have trust in that other person and I want to keep this in the context of a marital dynamic that I have a trust in another human being. So what areas do those play out in most do you think? Because the things that come to my mind are finances, intimacy, judgment, communication, time, parenting.

Pam Allan: Well, yeah. Those are the big ones I guess that I would think of as well but taking care of the house.

Corey Allan: Okay.

Pam Allan: Right.

Corey Allan: Roles

Pam Allan: Different roles.

Corey Allan: Responsibilities.

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: Okay.

Pam Allan: Kind of played in that.

Corey Allan: No, I think that fits because there is this element of we come into a relationship together and we're creating this story. Right? We start to think of this through the lens of, okay it was idealized at the beginning. Right? Think about it. When you meet and fall in love with somebody it produces some feelings in the both of you that then carry you forward to where I want to keep checking this thing out. I want to come back to this even more because of the way you make me feel, the way I make you feel.

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: This dynamic starts to enhance us and so I think that's part of that whole idealized or idealistically distorted aspect that we bring into life when we're in the beginning of new love.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: Then as that goes on we start to get a better picture of who am I really in a relationship with.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: What are the characteristics of them? What are the things that make them, them? What are the things that I'm meeting of them that's like, that's a good match I could see... Because if you're early on in this relationship you see it as this thing could be great because it's going to be stable, we're going to have financial things taken care of. Because-

Pam Allan: Or we just have fun together, right? We just really enjoy being together.

Corey Allan: Sure. But then as things go on inevitably there's going to be a disappointment or in the sake of our conversation a broken trust.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: Right?

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: Because I want to at least at the outset put out there this idea of our trust often time is initially built on something ideal.

Pam Allan: My guess is though those things aren't discussed. That sounds like expectations.

Corey Allan: Sure.

Pam Allan: Right?

Corey Allan: I think there's an undercurrent of that, absolutely.

Pam Allan: The way that you're setting it up, oh here's how this relationship is unfolding and when we're dating things are fabulous. Everything just kind of flows potentially and hey this is going to be good. In my mind I think you're going to be doing X, Y, Z, you're always going to initiate because you love it so much and then we get married and maybe you're getting upset that I'm not initiating-

Corey Allan: Something shifts and changed.

Pam Allan: So maybe you stop initiating and I'm like wait a second that was my expectation of what you would do. Is that kind of where you're going with this?

Corey Allan: Somewhat. But I'm thinking this more in the terms of how often do we come into a relationship and it's built on something slightly precarious at best because it's idealized. It's distorted, it's euphoric and then when we start getting into it there's this joint expectation of it won't change, it won't shift. Even though logically speaking I think we all realize it will.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: Then when it does our emotion can jump in and I crumble, it's a catastrophe, it's a huge deal when maybe it's not. Because it's a better chance to actually reevaluate, reorganize around what really is. Because one of the things we've talked about on the show is this idea of trust. Anytime it comes up when I'm working with couples or a person and they say, "I need to be able to trust them." I always ask the question, "Trust to do what?" Because it's not just a blanket statement. If I just blindly throw out there, babe I need to be able to trust you I'm setting myself up to be hurt. If I'm thinking of the entirety of it. Because there will be things that will disappoint me or frustrate me or it is a broken agreement. Even if it's not a huge one it's just, you said you'd be home at 05:30 why are you walking in the door at 05:40?

Pam Allan: Well, and how many times in the scenarios you're talking about is broken trust from something that just wasn't even communicated, what the expectation was in the first place.

Corey Allan: True.

Pam Allan: When you use the word trust does it typically come up in your office in relation to a betrayal?

Corey Allan: That's most of the time because obviously when people are coming to see me there's usually something that has precipitated their reasoning of reaching out.

Pam Allan: Yeah, they're in crisis mode.

Corey Allan: Betrayals are a big part of that. Yeah, betrayals are a big part of why people will reach out for counseling.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: So there is this element of, my trust has been broken in them and I can understand that and that's why if you go back in the archives you can look up trust and hurt and realize there's a difference between it. Because rebuilding trust is different than dealing with the hurt, those are two separate things.

Pam Allan: Yes.

Corey Allan: So that needs to be addressed differently. But for the sake of our conversation I want to think of it through the lens of, trust to do what? Because I need to get more realistic or reasonable of what I'm expecting, what I'm looking for, what I'm wanting and then also what's even viable. If I'm married to somebody that travels all the time and I'm upset when they have to leave, is it viable that they could change that without huge consequences?

Pam Allan: Right.

Corey Allan: Well probably not, not without a different kind of grief that could happen and struggle that could happen between us. So one of the things I came across not too long ago was this phrase of when I'm talking about trust in a relationship. A better path or a better thought process is to think of this in the terms of, "I need to learn how to regulate myself so I can determine my partner's trustworthiness."

Pam Allan: Okay, two big keys there. What does it mean to regulate myself? Then-

Corey Allan: That means-

Pam Allan: How is trustworthiness different than-

Corey Allan: So that means I need to look at this through the lens of, how do I overreact to something that was an unmet expectation or an unspoken disappointment that happened or even just a broken trust. Right? Because look at the variations that can happen Pam, because the example that comes to my mind is a betrayal that's happened. So obviously one of the routes a lot of couples will go with a betrayed spouse they will go I need transparency to make sure everything's done. To make sure there's nothing else being hidden and to make sure you can earn back trust.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: So oftentimes the betrayer is usually on board with absolutely here's my phone. I want this relationship. I want my marriage.

Pam Allan: Yeah, yeah.

Corey Allan: I'm turning towards it, I realize this was just a mess up but I want this. So a lot of times the best move for that is to, here you go access to everything. Which that's reasonable for the short term.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: It starts to become harmful in the long run, my opinion.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: Professionally speaking. But the struggle becomes if I come... Say it happened with us. I mean it did happen to us years and years ago, but let's say it was going on now. So I've given you transparency of everything and then you asked me one day so did you come straight home from work? Assuming I work not in the house. I'm like, yeah I did. But then the credit card bill comes through and you see I got gas on that day and you realized it was at the time I was on my way home from work so I didn't come straight home from work, I stopped to get gas. Was that a broken trust? Because those are the variations of life or things that we can't possibly control and when I get so caught up in I need every assurance of you. My trust is contingent on that. I'm going to be disappointed and frustrated and hurt at times rather than realizing how do I regulate myself to see it as okay, hold on. What was that that really happened? Rather than letting my emotions add fuel to the fire.

Pam Allan: So by regulate myself is that another way of saying I need to look at myself and determine if I'm overreacting or not.

Corey Allan: I need to self soothe. I need to calm down and ask some better questions of, wait why is it that happened that hurt me? Because what you can do is start to recognize then what are the actions the person I'm doing life with, what are they really telling me? What's really being said here?

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: Because if there's something nefarious going on, my personal belief and professional belief is we're too stupid as humans to keep it hidden for long. So it will come out.

Pam Allan: Right.

Corey Allan: But the other thing I can look at it as, okay everything we do tells a story. So how do I see the story cleaner to realize what level of trustworthiness are they showing here.

Pam Allan: So then moving onto that are they trustworthy?

Corey Allan: Right.

Pam Allan: Where's that determination? That is me making a judgment call about you.

Corey Allan: Yes.

Pam Allan: Saying whether you are or you are not trustworthy.

Corey Allan: This is where we need to pivot the conversation to make it to where it's not a global level of trustworthiness but it's a situational level of trustworthiness.

Pam Allan: Yeah, it really sounds like that there's room for a lot of fire in there. Right? A lot of-

Corey Allan: Yes.

Pam Allan: Because I'm judging you.

Corey Allan: Well-

Pam Allan: Which we do in a relationship.

Corey Allan: We all judge to varying degrees. We don't call it judgment typically but we are all making assessments of stuff.

Pam Allan: Yeah and some of that could be for self protection and can be valid for my own safety and security. So guide me through that, what that looks like if I'm to determine if you're trustworthy or not.

Corey Allan: Well then you look at it in the different aspects of what we talked about earlier. Finances, intimacy, communication, spirituality, time, roles. Are you trustworthy in you'll take over the house during tax season?

Pam Allan: So I can't-

Corey Allan: Reversing that.

Pam Allan: Yeah, so I can't define trustworthy with trustworthy.

Corey Allan: Do you follow through with what you say you're going to do in those areas? Do you take care of what your responsibility is? Or we have an agreement on how we're going to spend money and do I uphold my side of that equation? Or am I out frivolously taking care of other things with it and being flippant hoping it doesn't get seen? Or coming up with reasons why that was a justifiable worthless expense?

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: That's not according to what we had agreed upon. That's not a trustworthy action.

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: So it's recognizing the dynamic and how it plays out between us in the different aspects of us and what we create together.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: Because this is one of those things... Let's pick on our kids for a second.

Pam Allan: That'll be fun.

Corey Allan: That there's an element of there's aspects of their life according to what we want for them and what is their responsibility as high school students that they are trustworthy with the way they conduct themselves. They take care of their work at school, they keep up with what they need to. They keep up with their calendar of when things are scheduled and due and not and that's not what we do that's theirs and they've shown we handle that. We also have some expectations of, hey pick up after yourself in which they have shown they are not as trustworthy.

Pam Allan: True that.

Corey Allan: They have people that take care of that ie-

Pam Allan: Us.

Corey Allan: You and I. But that's this element of when we can start to break it down I'm less likely to make the blanket, "I can't ever trust you to do anything. I can't ever count on you for anything." Because that's a statement when I'm off balance in reacting rather than, okay I can keep it on this specific area and there's more merit to it. There's more truth behind what I'm saying.

Pam Allan: Yeah, that's so hard though. Because even when you're in a rational mind and self soothing if I'm not trustworthy in one area. We talk about this all the time even the phrase, "How you do sex is how you do life and how you do life is how you do sex." Right? We've said you can interchange the word sex with how you do finances or how you do other things. Because there is a tendency to if I'm this way in one area maybe that's really just kind of who I am. So I get that I'm not always exactly that way in every segment of my life.

Corey Allan: Right.

Pam Allan: But it's just normal as a spouse to carry over and make assumptions.

Corey Allan: Right. Well that's just where I'll take some specific data and make a blanket indictment.

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: When I need to slow myself down to realize that's not for the benefit of either one of us to go that route. I end up setting each of us on the defensive or I set up as judge and jury or I set up as it's unrealistic or moral high ground. There's all these different things that ultimately will be the demise of the moment, minimum.

Pam Allan: Yes. For sure.

Corey Allan: So it's not that we always do this perfectly but when I can start to look at this as, okay what's the level of trustworthiness of the person I'm actually interacting with and then I can parse it out even further of what is it I'm really expecting. What is it I'm really looking for, what is my preference. Because some of the things that ding me with you are just you don't live according to my preference. Which okay, rationally speaking you probably shouldn't. But I need to realize, all right that's just where it is. Okay, I get that and the more I can... That's a regulating move of realizing okay. But in the whole of the story it's good, there's a lot of consistency. There's a lot of congruence with our words and so I think when you start to look at it on what do you do with this to up your level of trustworthiness in the people you live life with and are trying to be close to. Because that's our controlled in, is I want to try to live a trustworthy life.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: I think it's a good goal for all of us.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: That's that whole idea of my level of honesty with myself and with others. My level of consistency with myself and my others. Those are the things that start to create a reliable aspect of things.

Pam Allan: Right. You say that I could be consistent in everything but I could be a really terrible person. I'm just consistently terrible.

Corey Allan: Okay. But then if I look at it the way we're framing this conversation I can trust the fact that you're a terrible person.

Pam Allan: I can make some decisions based off of that.

Corey Allan: Absolutely. That's the shift of now I put the power squarely on my own shoulders to face what the reality is cleaner.

Pam Allan: Okay.

Corey Allan: That's really the whole point of this phrase of, "How do I regulate myself enough to determine my partner's trustworthiness so I can actually face what is." This is a phrase we've said just recently in the several shows is, "I need to deal with the spouse I have not the one I wish they were."

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: So how do I face that? That's how I confront and earn more levels of depth and connection then ultimately probably trust.

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: I'm curious Pam, how much of... So this show was different in the fact that we just took a topic, this felt like a blast from the past actually.

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: Since that's-

Pam Allan: A few years ago.

Corey Allan: That used to be SMR that we would just have a topic, deep dive and let's go and it's funny because before we started recording you were like, "But this is listener driven radio, we're not doing an email for this episode?" Yes, we're still doing emails.

Pam Allan: I just asked the question.

Corey Allan: No, absolutely.

Pam Allan: I can ask the question.

Corey Allan: You absolutely can but you're trustworthy in that.

Pam Allan: There you go.

Corey Allan: I know that you will. But it's interesting because it's recognizing sometimes we can make things too simplified when they're more complicated, that's life.

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: Sometimes what we also want to do is take the complicated and make it more simple.

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: Trust is one of those things Pam.

Pam Allan: That you can go both ways on it.

Corey Allan: It's simple and it's complicated.

Pam Allan: Yeah.

Corey Allan: Well this has been Sexy Marriage Radio. If we didn't live up to the levels of trustworthiness you were expecting with today's show, let us know 214-702-9565 or feedback at sexymarriageradio.com. See you next time.