Disconnection

Episode number 73, disconnection. Hello and welcome to the Fighting for Connection podcast. I'm Brett Nicola, a husband, father and fun lover. Listen in as I share stories, tips and inspiration that will move you toward the connection that you want in your relationship. Hello and welcome back to the Fighting for Connection podcast. I'm recording this at the end of a very full and busy week here at Pivotal Approach. I'm just checking off the last of my to-do list of the things that need to get done here before I go into the weekend and thought that I would do this podcast on the topic of disconnection. I'm not done working for the week or the weekend. I guess Tomorrow morning I'll be back here in the office recording an episode that I'm very excited to release here in the near future. It should be, let's see. This will be episode 73. It should be actually the episode that's coming out following this episode, so look for that. It's going to be my first three person. I guess not. I did have three people on Justin and Megan came on together and it will be another husband and wife that are coming on to the podcast. So check out episode number 74.

Apart from that, on my mind the topic of disconnect has been swirling around kind of throughout the week. It seems like sometimes there's these themes that come up in disconnect. This week has been the one that I've spent some time thinking about. As I'm here alone at the office or after sessions or on my drive home, I'm thinking about this idea of disconnection. What I've found is so many of my clients are experiencing pain because of the disconnect that they are experiencing in their lives and it really feels like at our core for each individual. We all want to feel connected in some way, shape or form. Some of us feel connected by being the leader or by being in charge, by having significance in our workplace or our lives or with our friends, others by being included or sought out, and others still want to feel that others are interested in who they are in their lives and really truly care about them. And we aren't always aware of how deeply we hold this longing for connection and how it affects how we show up. I would even encourage you guys to just assume that this longing for connection is showing up in your lives and go seek for how it's showing up in your lives. Look for how your relational longing, how this longing for connection is showing up. Sometimes it has us moving towards people and seeking significance. Other times it has us avoiding people and trying to avoid the pain that we experience when it feels like we're disconnected. So we'll almost disconnect ourselves ahead of time.

I've found that in my own interpersonal communications I can feel how, like my own insecurity about how others might perceive me or if they would really accept me or like me as I am, stems from this desire to be connected. And it makes sense that we would, especially as humans, be aware of our connection with others. When we get this sense of safety, we feel, I guess, like safe, like we aren't going to experience pain or harm that can happen when we don't belong or we aren't accepted. The sense of connection helps us to provide that sense of belonging and acceptance. Historically, if we didn't belong, there were times where maybe we weren't safe and even from like an attachment theory perspective, if we aren't connected to our parents and we're not accepted by them, there definitely could be painful physical consequences and even death in those kind of situations. So our brain knows these things instinctually and knows that we really are better off if we're accepted, if we belong, if we're connected. The problem is it's not always very accurate and sometimes, even when we're accepted, even when we belong, even when we're connected, it doesn't sense that and it moves into a protective place. It's because our brain knows that connection is critical to safety at certain points in our life and I've watched how so many of my clients experiencing this feeling of disconnect move into a protective space or into protective behaviors.

And I think I've mentioned it on here before that I really enjoy analogies. For some reason they kind of come into my mind when I'm listening to different people's stories or experiences. And today I want to share with you an analogy that has come to me as I've been sitting with someone's experience, with someone's story, and I've shared it with quite a few of my clients, probably the last few weeks or months since I've created this analogy. But often when people experience disconnect, they go into a fight flight, freeze response and this often causes a conflict cycle in their relationship. This analogy, I think, really can help you make sense of what's going on. So I want you to picture this that you're on a ship and I've been on a cruise before. Sometimes, after dinner or whatever, you'll go out on the balcony and you're out in the middle of the ocean and it's completely black. You can't see light in any direction.

My imagination is kind of ran in these situations of what would happen if you fell off that ship and what would that be like? That, to me, feels like disconnection. There's this big ship, this big ship that represents safety. If you're on the ship and you're connected to the ship, you're going to be safe. But now you've fallen out, you're disconnected from that ship and I think so many people experience this kind of a feeling in their relationships that they're disconnected from their relationships, from the sense of safety, from this feeling of warmth and security that you have when you're on that cruise ship. And now you're out in the cold water, you're out in the dark and that ship is moving away from you.

So I imagine trying to paddle towards that ship and I'm a terrible swimmer. I can. Probably my fastest swimming stroke is a back float, so I just kind of would be at the mercy of the currents in the ocean or whatever. But if I was trying to swim and I couldn't catch up to that ship, what would I begin to do? I would begin to call out and say help, help, like I fell in, I'd splash the water so someone maybe would notice me or see me, but then I know, as that ship would get further away, I'd become desperate. I can feel like this desperation in my body as I imagine this and how I would start to yell and cry out.

And really what I find with people who are experiencing this in their relationships is eventually they get angry. And it makes so much sense to me that at some point wouldn't you even look angry in this kind of a situation? Maybe you'd have, maybe you'd be crying, but you would be yelling at the top of your lungs at that ship to turn around, come back, come get me, please, just find me. And how that anger would really be a protective emotion in that situation. Right, it would be kind of propelling you to action so that you could get to a place of reconnection. And as you're doing this, that ship just keeps moving further and further away.

This is the picture that I hold when I see my clients experiencing disconnection and it really helps me make sense of their experience. And yet I can see how, as they're showing up from this desperate space, their spouse doesn't really see that experience and what they typically see is just this angry and a spouse that's lashing out and I can see how that anger and that aggressive response or that critical response or that pursuing response whatever that is for you when you're in that desperate space oftentimes hurts so much for that other individual. Because, again, this is an illusion oftentimes there is someone on the other side that is caring, that really values your opinion, that really values your sense of happiness, and they see this anger and this frustration and this resentment and this criticism and all of these things and it really just strikes them across the bow and they move away because it hurts, because they're confused, because they don't know what is causing this response. And it's just so interesting for me to observe and sometimes heartbreaking, but more often than not it's promising for me, or it feels exciting to me that we can help these two who really care about each other, find each other. And that's what I see them trying to do here is those two people are worried about their disconnection from each other really, and they're trying to find each other but they just, in their protective responses, experience so much pain from each other. I think when we can understand this picture that I've illustrated here of disconnection, we can see and we can understand that we likely are experiencing a conflict cycle and learning how to manage yourself in this feeling of disconnection can make all the difference for you.

My mind goes to this idea of rip currents when, at the first time I went to the ocean, I was actually with my in-laws and I remember talking about rip currents with I guess it probably wasn't the first time that I was at the ocean, but it was one of the first times I was swimming in the ocean, for sure. And I remember talking about rip currents with some of my in-laws and how they they shared that if you ever get caught in a rip current, don't try to swim straight back to shore, but you swim parallel with the shore and that's going to be the skill that allows for you to swim out of the rip current. And oftentimes people will panic right and they'll try to swim right into the rip current, back to shore. And how often they get so exhausted and they panic because they can't make any progress that they end up drowning and getting pushed out into the sea. And it's just those little skills that can make all the difference Just knowing that if you're getting caught in a rip current, find yourself parallel to the shore and swim with the shore until that current disappears.

And once the current disappears, then you can turn back to land there and swim back to shore. And these are the skills that, once you learn what is happening in your relationship, once you understand the conflict cycle, you can utilize these skills in a way that has you getting back to that sense of safety that you're looking for. So if you're feeling disconnected and if you're wanting to feel closer and more secure in your relationship, I'd encourage you to seek to understand your conflict cycle and learn the skills that you can apply to your relationship so you can, utilizing this analogy of a rip current, you can swim out of the rip current, out of the conflict cycle, and you can get back to the safety of shore, that connected relationship with your spouse that I know so many of you long for. You just don't know how to get there. Stay strong.

I hope that in some way this gives you hope and encouragement, and know that I know so many of you are desperately wanting to be reconnected and you feel like this sense of disconnect and I understand to some small degree just how intense that is and know that there are things that you can do to manage this feeling so that you can better know what's possible for you and you can maybe someday get back to that sense of safety that you once had in this relationship. So have a good week everybody. Keep showing up, keep doing the work to break your conflict cycles and we will see you here next week. This has been the fighting for connection podcast. If you've enjoyed this podcast and want more content like this, check out my connected couples campus, which can be found on my website, wwwpivotalapproachcom, and become the difference you need in your relationship.