How Do You Get Your Partner To Make More Plans… When That Isn’t Their Style?
Cathy: I’m here with Elizabeth Wood from https://www.bedevents.com and I’m Cathy Vartuli from http://www.TheIntimacyDojo.com and that can be so frustrating, if you’re someone who loves to have things planned ahead and your partner just doesn’t do that that you can feel unloved and uncared about even if they do it, it’s just not their self-expression I remember when I went out on a date with someone once and they didn’t tell me where we’re going to dinner and I was like oh that’s kind of romantic, they’re just going to take me somewhere and then like where do you want to go? And I was like…
Elizabeth: Oh no…
Cathy: I was like, it’s not romantic, no no that’s not what I expected so.
Elizabeth: I think it’s a great question because you know if that’s her skill set, I mean if one of the two partners their skill set is stronger and making plans finding like really unique things to do and sort of is in-charge of that area you know like how does your partner then step in, you know knowing that you’re pretty specific and you have absolute ideas I think that other partner might be like well what if you don’t like it.
Cathy: Yeah…
Elizabeth: You know like I think she or he likes Mexican but I’m kind of afraid to take her there. So what I would suggest is throwing out like wow! there’s this new restaurant that I really want to try and you know perhaps you could make some reservations let that partner have a win and you kind of I’m not saying you force feed but kind of feed them some of the information so that they can have that win and you guys have a great time.
Cathy: I think it’s important to that if you do that to not criticize if it’s not like why did you make it at 7:00instead of 7:30 or I didn’t want to go on Friday I wanted to go on Saturday like it’s really easy I’m a very I like to be very organized I like to plan things and I think when we have people like that other people will try to abdicate some of that power and responsibility partly because they don’t want to get wrong all the time.
Elizabeth: Oh and there’s nothing worst than to be criticized so I absolutely agree with you like just remember that what they’d done is they went out of their comfort zone and they try to create something that you were really going to enjoy and that’s the thing that you appreciate in addition to spending time with your partner.
Cathy: Yeah… I think I mean Reid Mihalko does something really cool he calls it cats vs. dogs and this really resonated for me, I’m a cat I feel like people care about me, care about me when they show they were thinking about me about me when I wasn’t around so like hey I got you this thing when I was on a trip and I got you this gift cause I was missing you or you know I was thinking how much fun it would be to go out on a Friday night so I made plans is that okay? Like oh you love me, versus a dog is someone who’s like just happy that you’re there they’re like they don’t think about you till your key turns to the door and they’re like oh my god! I’m so happy you’re here so happy you’re here and a lot of people like that don’t want to make plans cause they’re very, very in the moment and they’re like, well I don’t know if you want Mexican on Friday or Chinese versus the cats like I wanted you to be thinking about it, I don’t care so much about the restaurant as I get my love feeling from that but I think explaining that can be powerful to someone who’s not a planner it might be like, oh oh you’re feeling loved when I do that versus I wanted to do such a good job I was like waiting to the moment of it happening so I think it’s partly just a different prospect, prospective in a different way of people looking at it.
Elizabeth: Absolutely, planning and having that conversation ahead of time so that they know the result of them doing something them going outside of their comfort zone how that makes you feel, it’s like how can that not possibly make the planning part or like oh it makes my partner feel like so attended to or so loved so yeah absolutely way to go Reid Cats and Dogs.
Cathy: Yeah, he has a handout on it if you go, if you search cats and dogs on www.reidaboutsex.com but I do think like part of it is we tend to fall into our strong suits when in our relationships and were like oh that persons really going to be paying the bills we’ll just let that happen then it’s so much easier and that person is better getting things fixed around the house and that will just happen versus okay we both can be good at it maybe we default to one but we both can be the planner and part of that’s like okay let it be an adventure I don’t have to have it turn out just the way I thought it might look kind of mean swept away and letting some else be responsible for things that’s delightful….
