The 3 Stages Of Relationships

Join Tamara and Sheena as they talk about The 3 Stages Of  Relationships in this episode of Les Talk About It.

Episode: 8 of 12 of the Relationship Season

In this episode:

• What are the 3 stages
• Which is the most difficult stage
• Why you argue a lot during one stage
• How to get through and keep the relationship intact

Listen to this episode here

Les Talk About It Series: Relationships

Relationships are important for humans. We need them to survive, never mind thrive. In this series we delve into relationships and break down some statistics and realities because, let’s face it, most us just muddle through and don’t necessarily have the skillset to rally make a relationship work.

Transcript

please note this transcript has not been edited and is automatically generated meaning certain words will be incorrect

Music] welcome to les talk about it, I’m Sheena and I’m Tamara and we’re talking today about the stages of a relationship so it may seem like we’re going backwards about this because the stages of a relationship sounds like something we should have talked about in episode one yes perhaps except that I think a lot of the content that we’ve given before this help you get into the right framework for a relationship yes which i think is ideal before you actually get to the right stages because it will help you understand the stages a bit better as well well I couldn’t have said it better myself let’s start with a very first phase falling in that this is the phase that movies are made of and books are written about meadows lovers running across fields songs I can’t stop thinking about you so in 1979 Dorothy ciner coined the term limerence for the first stage of love it’s characterized by physical symptoms flashing trembling palpitations sounds like you’re about to have a heart attack you’re excited well I have you in a tech of the heart in a way well that is true actually see this is why I made you very smart intrusive thinking obsession fantasy sexual excitement and direction yeah and then later dr. Theresa Crenshaw wrote a book called the alchemy of love and lust and in this book she stated that there are very specific people that elicit these reactions in us so you can’t just you know come in contact with just anyone and get the heart palpitations the flashing obsession it has to be a specific person that’s kind of obviously from person to person and that’s why you meet some people and you just have zero chemistry right and other people you have this the soul connection that’s what it feels like but where it actually is is they smell right mm-hmm they feel right they look right and and it just everything kind of correlates into this hormone inducing delight yes so when you’re in love they’re all of your sensors are actually really involved and they really make you think differently so these hormones flood your system is a whole bunch of them these pheromones is oxytocin there’s something that I can’t pronounce called PA and fennel Nutella mean analyst nummy which is a natural and fit amine mm-hmm so Drac meat so your body’s folded all these drugs that make you happy and make you just ecstatic and that’s why the falling in love phase is so awesome mmm because it mean you’re literally high yes you are and that’s why you can’t stop thinking about this person either because when you think about this person it releases more of these hormones when you with this person it releases more of these hormones it’s like a drug so and love is a drug you want more of it so your obsessive you wanted to see that person so you get that hit again yes exactly and then it fades mm-hmm and then we hit phase 2 which is the building trust phase now if you manage to get through phase 1 and into phase 2 you then you’re in for a rather rough ride because phase 2 is where you start asking the big questions like will you be there for me can I trust you can I count on you to have my back and it’s those questions that the basis of a lot of the conflicts in the phase 2 of a relationship yeah so this is you know when you’ve been long enough together that you’re kind of out of their honeymoon stage so whether you’re actual newlyweds or you’re just a longer-term relationship you’ll start to experience this so you’ll have a lot of insecurities regarding to attachment to the other person right now the success of phase 2 like phase 1 is quite a successful phase because you feel really great throughout it so during phase when you’re not dead likely to break up it’s when you get to face to you that you’re likely to break up and the big driving force for making it through phase 2 successfully is your ability to argue correctly mm-hmm sound summer anyone so this goes right back to that you know the four horsemen of the relationship apocalypse yes and all of that stuff that we spoke about previously so I want to rehash that but basically you building trust in this particular phase and you have to figure out how to communicate with each other without the hormone hits mm-hmm so you know you’ll have a lot of conflict discussions during this and your ability to communicate with each other in a way that you know rides out their conflict or to even fight but in a way that’s healthy will see you through the stage it’s important to note that even if you’re not doing great at stage two and you’re not managing to fire it it is possible to pass on to the next stage of the relationship and phases but you’re breeding contempt and there is an underlying negativity that’s going to Pfister right so phase three is when you build commitment and loyalty just to get you on board but let’s finish talking about Phase two quickly so during the building trust relationship there’s a little acronym for six processes that you can do to help the stage along and to sort of get through unscathed oh how careless of the unscathed so the word is a tube so that’s the acronym for this process okay so number one is a which stands for awareness in one’s partner’s pain this once again relates back to the EQ podcast is exactly number two tea for tolerance that there’s always two valid viewpoints to any negative emotions mm-hmm another tea for turning towards one’s partner’s needs so the ability to be sympathetic and empathetic yes so like you’re having conflict but it’s not all about you you’re now in a relationship so you don’t easily need to compromise but you do need to understand each other’s points of view and be able to build a life that works with full bath of you here at the next one is you for trying to understand your partner then we got in for non defensive listening and E for empathy that spells a – so it’s awareness tolerance turning towards your hotness needs understanding non-defensive listening and empathy mm-hmm so if you can master those six things which is basically a lot of the stuff we’ve already spoken about EQ yeah and your firm you know the it’s stuff that you struggle with listen to the EQ podcast because there are some subs in there on how to improve your EQ there was a patriot exclusive okay go sign up a patreon get that fight closet yes now once you’ve gone through phase two and you’ve iron $1.00 and pleasant nurses you actually start to face to you which is building your commitment and loyalty this phase is much more comfortable than Phase two you generally mmm-hmm it’s about making a deeper love lost a lifetime or slowly nurturing a betrayal so you can in this is what you were talking about if you manage to get through phase two but in a negative way and the relationship is not emotionally sound yeah you think what happens is this becomes this festering betrayal stage I mean and you see this a lot in relationships there are they’re not a equal relationship with is a business there’s a problem with the balance of power or you have someone that has some sort of negative thoughts where they think that other persons may be constantly cheating or you together because you have two kids and you’re you know that kind of a thing those relationships that people like the term toxic yes this is where this is happening so an important metric in Phase three is what the author of this article that we’re referencing calls the famous metric mmm-hmm the Saints that power is fairly distributed in a relationship is what the famous metric is all about it’s difficult to establish deep and lost interest in relationships that has unwelcome power symmetry we spoke about this in one of our previous podcasts about how you have to feel like you’re equals in a relationship yes and that study that we spoke about gay relationships and straight relationships in the our dynamics of them and and the gender role yes yes we spoke about how homosexual couples tend to have even if they have the traditional male-female type roles they tend to feel less upset about it yes because there isn’t that power dynamic yes I think what’s key with phase three is if you feel like there is an imbalance of power you need to address that if you want to continue in the relationship that’s an interesting point I wonder the if it’s not too late at that point if that shouldn’t have been dealt with in Phase two well it probably should have but I mean if there is a once to keep the relationship going from both sides I think it is something that you can work on I think you can I probably need like couples therapy is some sort of outside mediated I probably also depends on what kind of power imbalance it is I mean if it’s a kind of power imbalance that comes along from one partner working while the other one stays at home and if the partner that says home feels deeply that you know they’ve got no control over their life because they don’t have their own finances like you know it’s something fixable by maybe working out an arrangement with that person can get a part-time job or into the workforce full-time you know what I mean yeah definitely money is definitely a driving force for the imbalance of power for sure so I think you know I think it depends on what the imbalance of power is I think if it’s an abusive relationship where the power is about you know hurting the other person emotionally or physically there is no fixing it you have to get out you just have to get out so I think it really depends on what that imbalance is but I do think there are cases we it’s stuff we a person has changed their mind about what they want in life or they discover the greatest load not what they exactly and I think in those cases communication can really help to get over that and having a licensed therapist is not a bad thing it doesn’t make you less of a couple it doesn’t make your worst couple it it shouldn’t be something you’re embarrassed about a lot of people need therapy need help need guidance because these people can look from the they’ve got techniques that they can give you to help you through these things it’s things that we don’t learn naturally no and the thing is if you have broken your arm you go to a doctor if your car has a an indicator that’s broken you take it to a mechanic to fix like you know we use professionals and every day that bits of our life use it in a relationship stitute I mean what makes your relationship less worthy of professional help in your pocket especially considering we’re not professionals with our own emotions we have discussed emotional intelligence and how you should be teaching that to your children because we don’t get taught there mm-hmm so you know if you need to help get the help there’s nothing wrong with it I agree with it you’re listening to the lesbian talk show the lesbians will choke on your hub of podcast information so then I went and looked up because I wanted a little more information on okay how to make to phase two and three really good okay right and so I found an article in Time magazine called the science behind happy relationships they’ve got a couple of pointers here they say in the early stages of love for exhilarates that it’s you know and then we move on to the general ground of everyday life and that’s the key here is that it’s the everyday stuff that is gonna hurt you in the long term well that’s the thing I mean we spoke about how being a relationship when it’s new is like being high on a drug yeah now when you come off that high that alone can feel like quite the crash but then you bring in everyday problems whether it’s you know who gets to make dinner tonight or hey I just lost my job whatever it is you know how do you navigate through that space right but it also gets a little more complicated next remember how we spoke in one of our previous episodes about how to be a whole person first yes whole thing mm-hmm well you bring your own personal baggage into the relationship as well and that starts to creep in during phases two and three and we find ourselves floundering with hurt feelings and emotional withdrawal escalating conflict insufficient coping techniques and boredom hmm because now we’re not getting those hits from being with this person so it feels like what stuff any of this really you know and I think or a lot of people mistake you know the second part of relationship they think that games apart we’re not necessarily having sex every five minutes or you don’t feel that like jolt of electricity every time you touch that the relationship has gone stagnant and that’s not true it’s just you’ve gone into another phase I mean you can’t live your life on the high I’m gonna be nice for you yeah can we have a heart attack from it but that’s right the phase two is is finite mm-hmm and it will get better because when you hit phase three it’s a whole different kind of level abortion some people don’t understand that having that relationship yet they get to the stage where you’re just comfortable with each other okay when you say the word comfortable I know exactly what you mean but it sounds boring no I know it does but I think so many people are careless misinformation where they think that for a relationship to be successful it needs to be dramatic and passionate a hundred percent of the time and that’s just not sustainable and I think some people leave really good relationships because of that because they think that the movie ideal of the special little consuming is real well it is real in the first phase of the relationship that’s the thing I mean movies to show you after the happy ending they don’t show you what comes after right so it comes off to all the conflict and then we get to phase three which is we you and I are at but now in order to get through phase – and into Phase three there are some fundamental lessons but there are both difficult to master but super obvious which is empathy positivity and a strong emotional connection okay so empathy which is EQ basically so it’s being able to connect with another person and put their feelings above your own basically not just above your own but to understand them to actually understand what’s going on regardless of your feelings yes okay maybe that is a better way of putting it well then high five and positivity is important in the space as well okay I think you know what kind of positivity though because it can be dangerous if you just always like overly positive so we may have talked about positivity do you remember we spoke about the small things often principle from the Godman Institute that means that find ways to compliment your pot every day find ways to connect every day on an emotional level small things often not necessarily big gestures it’s the small small okay so as you know getting the person a cup of coffee when you know they need one or saying hey that dress looks really good on you right the touch as you walk past a I really enjoyed your lasagna last night whatever it is so even if you have pressures if you you know struggling with money or if you’re fighting about something find ways to connect in a positive way even if you haven’t gotten over whatever it is that you’re dealing with exactly because those things are what gold would get you through phase two they build it has all the trust exactly and you label each other commitment later right so the questions you ask in Phase two if you remember will you be there for me can I trust you can I count on you to have my back and if you feel like you’re being loved and like somebody’s paying attention and like they really get you that one sort of those questions are going to be yes because remember like every other relationship we’ll have a fight at some point but knowing that that person regardless of it still loves you is still there for you even when you’re fighting about something and it’s these like little things that help you remember that and help you feel stable in that relationship absolutely because it builds remember the five positive to one negative thing during an argument it’s the same sort of thing you’re just building that really solid foundation yes let’s talk about the strong emotional connection for a minute mm-hmm when it comes to the brain and love biological anthropologist and Kinsey Institute senior fellow Hill and fishers found that after putting people into a brain scanner they practice empathy they control one’s feelings and stress and maintain positive views about your partner that’s the things that they’re doing in the brain okay if that makes sense yes so controlling your stress and emotions boils down to the simple thing of keeping mouth shut and don’t act out so I think anybody who’s been in a really bad argument understands that at some point you have a choice you can either walk away and go and do something else and come back when you’re feeling calmer or you can just let rip and then when you lay crap you feel really bad about it afterwards if you can master the acts of not doing that and walking away and going to the gym or reading or doing something it takes you out of that space it will lead to a happier healthier relationship overall hmm comes back to like EQ and mastering your emotions exactly and keeping positive views of your partner which Fisher calls positive illusions or about reducing the amount of time spin to any one negative aspects of your relationship and focusing on the good stuff it’s good for the body it’s good for the mind and it’s good for the relationship so positive illusions the thing is I think everybody realizes that no one’s perfect yes you know I’ve got flaws what but you choose to focus on things that are not necessarily flaws you choose to focus on the fact that I’ll give you a back tickle if you need it oh I send you love notes during the day while you yes no it’s completely it’s about again keeping in mind that this is a human being you’re worth not a six BOTS and as human beings they’ve got flaws you think I’m not a six but no so that’s some techniques and things to think about when you’re going through phase two where you starting to build trust and interface 3 I mean phase 3 is about building a longer-term relationship and the thing is a lot of people when they get to phase 3 they stronger for it because phase 2 is needed because you have to have those conversations you have to have those conflicts in order to build that foundation and well that’s solid co-op skills to deal with when things get tough you know I think what’s important to note though is that with phase three it’s important not to get complacent and to keep doing those things because I think it can get to the point where you’re just like okay we’ve been together for however however many years and you just stopped doing the little things it’s important to keep that connection going I was reading another study I can’t remember open what it was but I was reading another study when I was doing some research for these podcasts and the study found that people who are the happiest long-term kind of fall in love again and again and again okay so they’re almost like rediscover each other so it’s this it’s sort of repeating pattern okay and I can see that I can see how that would work yeah I remember reading something as well that the longer you’re married or you’re together it doesn’t have to be you know legally married just to get in a long-term relationship the less likely it is that that relationship will end so I think it’s you know within the first two years like the relationship is very likely to end so that’s what are you going through but your phase two at that point yes and then again I thinking around the five year mark there’s another resurgence of like divorces but you know the longer you together the less likely that is to happen and wonder why that is well I think it’s because you know you do have that commitment but I think as Michael should be there a lot of people just get like hammer in a relationship that’s it I hope not I hope it’s because people are actually happy hmm me too so let us know what phase are you in are you happy and what has been your biggest struggle yeah and which phase do you tend to find the most difficult phase two may be no different that’s all for this week I’m Sheena and now tomorrow you’ve been listening to let’s talk about it if you enjoyed this podcast come and sign up to patreon to get exclusive podcasts including episodes of let’s talk about it they’d be don’t share with everybody and you can also go share this podcast with your friends your family the person you just broke up in Phase two and don’t forget to leave us a review on our podcasts it helps you get the podcast out to more Muslims absolutely [Music] English (auto-generated)