In this episode, we welcome Julie Menanno, a renowned Marriage and Family Therapist and the voice behind the successful Instagram account, The Secure Relationship. With over a million followers and a groundbreaking book titled "Secure Love," Julie brings her extensive expertise in attachment theory and couples therapy to our listeners.
Discover the transformative power of secure attachment in your marriage as Julie delves deep into the heart of relationship dynamics. We explore critical topics such as:
This episode is not just an exploration of theories; it's a guide to revolutionizing your marriage. Whether you're looking to heal from past hurts or enhance the emotional bond with your spouse, Julie's insights offer a pathway to a deeper, more secure love.
Join us for an episode that could change the course of your marriage. Embrace the power of secure attachment and start your journey towards a more fulfilling, loving partnership.
Today's Guest: Julie Menanno
Julie Menanno (MA, LMFT, LCPC) is a licensed marriage and family therapist specializing in Emotionally Focused Therapy for couples. She also provides insight and advice for couples at @TheSecureRelationship on Instagram, with over one million followers. She founded and runs the Bozeman Therapy & Counseling clinic, and The Secure Relationship Coaching. She lives in Bozeman, Montana, with her husband and six children.
Get her new book here!
Visit her website
Your Host: Kimberly Beam Holmes, Expert in Self-Improvement and Relationships
Kimberly Beam Holmes has applied her master's degree in psychology for over ten years, acting as the CEO of Marriage Helper & CEO and Creator of PIES University, being a wife and mother herself, and researching how attraction affects relationships. Her videos, podcasts, and following reach over 200,000 people a month who are making changes and becoming the best they can be.
Website: www.kimberlybeamholmes.com
Thanks for listening!
Connect on Instagram: @kimberlybeamholmes
Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to the podcast and leave a review!
WE HAVE A NEW WEBSITE!!
Visit www.itstartswithattraction.com to check it out!
In this episode, we welcome Julie Menanno, a renowned Marriage and Family Therapist and the voice behind the successful Instagram account, The Secure Relationship. With over a million followers and a groundbreaking book titled "Secure Love," Julie brings her extensive expertise in attachment theory and couples therapy to our listeners.
Discover the transformative power of secure attachment in your marriage as Julie delves deep into the heart of relationship dynamics. We explore critical topics such as:
This episode is not just an exploration of theories; it's a guide to revolutionizing your marriage. Whether you're looking to heal from past hurts or enhance the emotional bond with your spouse, Julie's insights offer a pathway to a deeper, more secure love.
Join us for an episode that could change the course of your marriage. Embrace the power of secure attachment and start your journey towards a more fulfilling, loving partnership.
Today's Guest: Julie Menanno
Julie Menanno (MA, LMFT, LCPC) is a licensed marriage and family therapist specializing in Emotionally Focused Therapy for couples. She also provides insight and advice for couples at @TheSecureRelationship on Instagram, with over one million followers. She founded and runs the Bozeman Therapy & Counseling clinic, and The Secure Relationship Coaching. She lives in Bozeman, Montana, with her husband and six children.
Get her new book here!
Visit her website
Your Host: Kimberly Beam Holmes, Expert in Self-Improvement and Relationships
Kimberly Beam Holmes has applied her master's degree in psychology for over ten years, acting as the CEO of Marriage Helper & CEO and Creator of PIES University, being a wife and mother herself, and researching how attraction affects relationships. Her videos, podcasts, and following reach over 200,000 people a month who are making changes and becoming the best they can be.
Website: www.kimberlybeamholmes.com
Thanks for listening!
Connect on Instagram: @kimberlybeamholmes
Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to the podcast and leave a review!
WE HAVE A NEW WEBSITE!!
Visit www.itstartswithattraction.com to check it out!
What does it mean to have secure love and how can you get it in your relationships if you don't have it? That's what we're talking about on today's episode of it Starts with Attraction. I am interviewing Julie Minano. Julie is a licensed marriage and family therapist and she is also behind the Instagram account, the Secure Relationship, where she talks about attachment styles and attachment theory, with over a million followers. She's recently released a book called Secure Love, which is out to buy, and we are talking about what that is.
Speaker 1:How do we move towards secure attachment? What do you do if you're in a relationship where you're anxious and your spouse is avoidant, or you're avoidant and your spouse is anxious? How can you move to secure attachment and what are the changes that you may need to make internally in order for any of that to happen? We talk about all of those items and more on today's episode. Let's dive in, Julie. Thank you so much for joining me today on the show. I'm excited to talk about this topic with you. Great to be here. So you have done a lot of work, a lot of research into attachment theory. It's the basis of the new book that you have coming out, called Secure Love, which will tell us more about throughout and at the end of the episode. But the first question to ask and it kind of goes along with the first chapter of your book in the relationship problems that you tend to see in your practice, what do you really see? Is the problem beneath the problem that people might be presenting with in therapy or in coaching?
Speaker 2:The problem beneath the problem is, 100% of the time, the way that partners are communicating with each other both verbally and non-verbally but usually they're more aware of what's going on verbally in a way that is eroding the emotional safety of the relationship, which then takes its toll.
Speaker 2:If that's happening more often than not and they're not repairing that's going to take a toll on attachment security.
Speaker 2:And once we start to interfere with attachment security, then we start our nervous systems are kind of constantly flared and that's going to contribute to even less safe communication, which is then going to make the attachment security worse and it just starts to take on this really kind of awful life of its own, to varying degrees depending on the couple.
Speaker 2:And with that said, that doesn't mean that real problems aren't problems as far as finances or figuring out parenting or figuring out sex or where we're going to live. Those are actual, real problems. It's just that those are issues that can be worked through most of the time as long as we're communicating about it in a way that everybody's feeling heard, understood. When people are feeling heard and understood, all of a sudden they start to get more flexible and things tend to sort of start working themselves out over time. If that's not the case, then we have another problem, maybe one of compatibility, and maybe it isn't best for that couple to continue to try to share a life together. But we never know until we start looking at the communication first and fixing that so would you say that the basis of attachment theory is that an individual feels seen and heard.
Speaker 2:Basically, yes, I would say that comforted, helped when they go into their dark emotional places bonded with and enjoy experiences, feeling like they're valued and they want. You know their partner wants to be with them and spend time with them. Yeah, so I mean, I maybe add a few words to heard and understood, but at the end of the day, both of those hit it very well valued. Maybe we could add to that.
Speaker 1:I'm sure many of my listeners. There's been a couple of episodes. We've talked about attachment theory a bit, so I'm sure, and you know, it's becoming more and more popular, so a lot of people know about it. Just in general, and the general idea is that your attachment style is mainly formed in the earlier years in your life with your caregiver, but then it can also change based on, like, your first romantic relationship. Has that continued to stay true throughout the years that more research has been done, or are we also seeing where someone's attachment style can even change in the current relationship where they are, that they're in.
Speaker 2:It's a great question. I mean, I think that you know, a lot of people are really wanting to know where's the root of all this? Right, and so I would. This is my answer, based on, you know, research that I've been, you know, following for very many years and then my clinical experience.
Speaker 2:Most of this stuff is formed in childhood and almost exclusively the insecure attachment, no matter what, if we're talking about anxious or avoidant. Yeah, we all, you know, our brains are malleable. We're all adjusting to the different relationship climates that we find ourselves in. And, yes, can we in one relationship, have more anxious feelings and then somehow find ourselves in a relationship with someone who is anxious themselves, and that's what it might spur us to start managing our relationship stress with more avoidant feelings because we just don't know what else to do, or more avoidant behaviors.
Speaker 2:With that said, I think the vast majority of the time, people are pretty consistent. They're going to pick up an attachment style in childhood. It's going to start to show up in their romantic relationships. The relationships they actually find themselves in are going to be informed by what they experienced in childhood. They can't ever separate it all out and that's going to, you know, stay pretty consistent, I think, throughout the lifespan.
Speaker 2:But there's always exceptions to those rules. There are always people who have stress, you know stressful moments that come up and it starts to bring out different sides of them. So what I have found is it's probably best when you're working on your relationship that you're in to stick with what's showing up there, right? Just if in most couples are going to find an anxious, avoidant balance, if they don't have secure attachments within themselves going into the relationship, somehow that relationship will find some emotional balance, kind of the second best version of it, which is going to be an anxious, avoidant dynamic. If it's anxious, anxious, there's just going to be too much heat. It's probably not going to be sustainable. If there's avoidant, avoidant, it's going to be not enough heat and it'll probably just either be very dead or fizzle out.
Speaker 1:What percentage of people? I don't know if anyone knows this number, so it may be a guesstimate what percentage of people enter into their marriages secure?
Speaker 2:Statistically speaking, around 50%.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:So then we're talking about like another half of the marriages where they end up in this anxious avoidant cycle with each other and with some of that being also the partners who are, you know, have some disorganization thrown in and some people that might relate more to anxious, anxious or avoidant avoidant and my experience as a clinician 99% of the people that come to me are very clearly anxious, avoidant, whether they can see it initially or not.
Speaker 1:Yeah, now is there hope for the people who are in this anxious avoidant cycle or balance with each other to move into secure, or is it that they learn how to balance better the anxious, avoidant part of it?
Speaker 2:You know, while you're learning to move towards secure, you need you do need to learn to kind of work with each other, understand where each other are, meet people, meet each other where they are right and learn to kind of okay you're, you've got this anxious attachment. I'm going to try to kind of accommodate that and recognize that. You've got this avoidant attachment. I can work with that. But the goal, the end game, is a secure attachment. I would not be able to do this work if I didn't believe that that was possible and very highly possible, as long as people are getting access to the right information and they're willing and able to do the work. Some people need a little more help with self-regulation and co-regulation to be able to put the work into practice. But absolutely, I do really believe that everybody can find secure attachment and it's really not as complicated as it can seem at sometimes. That's great, great news here.
Speaker 2:I really I say that with you know, experience and just a lot of confidence.
Speaker 1:Yeah, which one typically reaches out for help first, I would guess the anxious, but I could be wrong.
Speaker 2:Anxious, yes, but that, yes, the anxious is more likely to reach out for help, but both are blocked and actually getting help?
Speaker 1:So, avoidance.
Speaker 2:You know I like to say this phrase and it sounds it might land as a little shaming toward the anxious, but it doesn't come from that place in my heart. But the hardest part about working with an avoidant is getting them through the door. The hardest part about working with an anxious is what happens when they're through the door. Because avoidance they want to push away help because, for a number of reasons I could explain, they associate getting help as threatening. For again, for a few different reasons that are pretty common, but anxious partners they're really coming to change their partner. For the most part, that's what anxious partners are wanting is is.
Speaker 2:I've got all this information, I'm over here understanding all of this and now I just need to get you to change. But what happens is is there? They can have a really hard time recognizing that they actually are continuing to contribute to the cycle in ways that they just can't see. And it makes so much sense on paper or on the surface. Okay, the avoidance, the one shutting down, you know all of these things, but it's really. There's a lot more to it than that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so what are some of the ways that this is the classic question. Like either you as a clinician or, probably more than likely, the spouse, who's the more anxious one? How do they most effectively kind of encourage their spouse to seek this help with them?
Speaker 2:I think it's. It's helping them see the value in it. And you can't help someone see the value in it If you're applying a lot of pressure and you're trying to get them to go to therapy or get help in ways that are actually part of the problem, the way that you're communicating that to them. And it's tricky because sometimes we can communicate things in the most perfect way possible and that doesn't mean that our partner is going to respond positively or positively right away. And so what we have to do is we want to. We want to get the topic of relationship help out of negative cycles first, and that you know we're, we're what I'm. My work is is trying to increase the odds. Right, no relationship advice, no relationship help out there has a guarantee to get the results that you're wanting, and what we can do is is increase the odds, and I believe this work dramatically increases the odds.
Speaker 2:So if you're wanting to get help because you're recognizing, hey, we've got this anxious, avoidant dynamic, you know, this is kind of what's fueling these negative cycles that we get in, that get our conversations stuck, that get our closeness stuck, and I'd like to get some help with that. The way to approach that is first of all, to try to understand why your partner might need to be resistant to that. If your partner is resistant to help, they have very good reason to be. That doesn't mean that it's a healthy action to not get help, but we need to figure out what's that block? Okay, do they associate therapy with the end of a relationship? Understandable. How many people do you know that have gone to therapy and ended up divorced? Right? Do they associate getting help with? Maybe that means I'm weak or I'm supposed to be able to figure all of this out on my own, and so, whatever that reason is, we need to start making space for that, validating that. So leading with hey, listen, I get it that you aren't interested in getting relationship help. It makes absolute sense to me. You know, if you're kind of walking around with the idea that you're already getting these messages from me that you're getting it wrong, and now we go into this environment with me and a therapist telling you that you're getting it wrong, that would be understandably hard for you, and I get that. Yeah.
Speaker 2:At the same time, we do have some things that are getting in our way. I'm feeling kind of alone over here and you know we're fighting about X, y and Z and I think there is some value in trying this, even though you know both of us are, you know, have our own fears around different ways to get relationship help and letting that kind of just sit, allowing that space and letting that partner sort of feel an openness to an idea, without it coming at them as you have to do this, or else you have to do this or else Right, and that dialogue is part of a bigger environmental shift. Hopefully that sort of dialogue is taking place in lots of areas of the relationship. Sometimes when we go into that level of dialogue, we're moving away from fear and anxiety and perpetuating all of that yucky energy in the relationship. And when we can start to clear that out, I believe, and I have seen that people genuinely do want to start growing into their best selves.
Speaker 1:Let's go back to so the person. We know that typically the person who's reaching out for help is the anxious. But whether it's the anxious or avoidant, is there a way that that person can begin to work on changing the communication cycle in the marriage, moving to help the other person feel seen, heard and understood with that if they continue to be reluctant to engage in help?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. You know the healing here is creating a new environment. You can have help from a therapist with that or you can figure out ways to start doing that on your own with books. It does take two. At the end of the day it absolutely takes two people willing to meaningfully contribute and work on the relationship and work toward being their best self and as an individual and a partner Right.
Speaker 2:But very rarely do two people start kind of paralleling each other as far as how much work they're doing on the relationship. Most of the time one person is needing to take the initiative. Usually that's going to be the most resourced person, the most educated person around these kinds of changes. So if you're starting to behave in a way that's coming from you wanting to grow as an individual and create a safe environment, that's going to open up the space that's going to cause that other partner to really be able to self reflect. It's going to remove a lot of this anxiety and tension from the environment and that's going to open up space for self reflection and then just more positive feelings that are much more inspiring as far as change goes and fear and threat. People are their best selves when they feel safe.
Speaker 2:Now what if that doesn't happen? What if someone is telling me hey, I've been for six months, I've been my best self, I've been doing everything in my power, I've been changing the way that I speak and I'm still kind of over here, feeling alone and unfulfilled? That's when you might have to start thinking about whatever that looks like, demanding that we get help. It's at the point, babe. It's at the point that if we don't get help, I cannot feel safe and close in the relationship. Something's got to shift here. Or, you know, maybe leaving the relationship, maybe just getting to a place in your own heart where you say, well, I just kind of have to accept this the way it is, it's not bad enough to leave, and just kind of stay the course on my end and recognize that I can't force someone else to change.
Speaker 1:What are some of the things that a person can begin to do on their own to begin to change the cycles, these communication cycles?
Speaker 2:Okay. So let's say you know it's just 100% the way you communicate. Are you communicating in a way that is emotionally supportive or are you communicating in a way that is not? And every single interaction has the opportunity to be emotionally supportive. Even if it's a boundary, even if it's, you know, something that someone doesn't want to hear, we can still deliver that information in a way that is emotionally supportive. Whether or not that partner takes it in as a way to feel supported is depending on a bunch of different factors, but the key is is your communication is coming from a place of. I'm here to deliver my message in the clearest way possible, without kind of wanting you to end up feeling shamed or blamed, or. And so let me give you an example of what that might look like.
Speaker 2:Let's say you want to talk to your partner about money and you have, you know, a lot of anxiety around that topic, and in the past the two of you have tried to talk about it and it's just turned into fights, right. And so now you go to your partner and you say, hey, we need to talk about money. And they say I don't want to talk about money, not right now. Now's not a good time? Well, it's never a good time. Well, whatever, why are you always coming at me? You know what about when I wanted to talk to you about something last week, and then they start just going off, you know, in all these places. So a different way to bring that up would be hey, you know, listen, I understand that this has been a really hard topic for us. Money is hard and in the past it has led us down this road, into these fights, and, you know, it makes a lot of sense to me that you aren't eager to go down that con, into that conversation and kind of go into this yucky negative cycle that we found ourselves stuck in. So I just want to validate that. Right, it's a hard topic for us and you have really good reason to not want to go there.
Speaker 2:At the same time, we are having these struggles with money. I'm feeling kind of anxious over here about my stuff. I'm imagining that you have some important things to say too. So we really need to work together on this. How can we do this? How can we go into this conversation in the safest way possible? That is a start. It's just planting seeds of a different way of dialogue. Will it create something different right then and there, in that moment Probably, but maybe not. Maybe we need to work on safety and the relationship for a while before we can really start to see it show up in. You know, oh yeah, let's have a conversation about money and it go perfectly. I'm a big fan of Gabbermate and he talks a lot about this type of approach to relationships and part of what he says is that you might have to work for a while to improve the quality of a relationship before you can start to see some of these conflicts start to sort of be resolved on their own. Sometimes you just have to start creating safety for a while first.
Speaker 1:Now, when you say create safety, are you talking about having that type of response, like you just demonstrated in that example, or are you talking about something else?
Speaker 2:Well, let me just say this. Let me give you, you know, a little example here. Okay, just bear with me, be patient with me here, but you know these. I feel like these questions that you're asking me are really ridiculous, honestly, like I don't know why you're going down this road. It seems really silly to me, like you had me on this show to talk about attachment and now you're asking me all these questions that don't even really make sense. What's going on? Okay, how are you feeling inside right now?
Speaker 1:At first, I thought you were really asking me and I'm like, yeah, that's why I didn't want to, that's why that's why you want to and I was like whoa what Like? What do you mean? It's ridiculous, I'd what.
Speaker 2:Okay, so where in your body did that, did that show up? Where did you go?
Speaker 1:Right here, okay, right from my chest. So it was audio like my neck throat down into, like my chest area.
Speaker 2:That's where it shows. Okay. So what is that feeling? If that feeling had words, that tightening intention, what would it be saying right now? Like suffocating, yeah. And it would probably be saying something like this doesn't feel safe anymore.
Speaker 1:I feel threatened yeah okay, that's it.
Speaker 2:You're either we. We can sit here and go back and forth. We're we are emotionally supporting each other. Right now. This is an emotionally supportive conversation. We're both feeling heard, we're both feeling respected, we're both feeling valuable and Understood.
Speaker 2:And all of a sudden, I just started showing up in a way that wasn't safe and your body picked it up immediately and that, you know, had we really that been real and we kept going with that, you would have started reacting to that in whatever way. Right, you know, maybe you would have become people pleasing, maybe you would have shut down, maybe you would have started pushing back. Then I would have started reacting, and so that that's it. I mean, it's just the quality of an interaction. Yeah, so it's easy for you and I. We don't have a history, we haven't, you know, we don't have overlapping lives, and so it's easy for us to be emotionally supportive. And it is more difficult to start bringing this into your relationship with your partner when you have history, you have built-up resentments or you have an overlapping life more as at stake, you have more emotional expectations of them. But it is absolutely possible.
Speaker 1:It takes a lot of the self-awareness emotional awareness, I mean even to just Stop yourself, right. If you're the spouse wanting to make a change, then then if your spouse says something you know, similar to what you did, then it's hard, like it's hard. It would have been hard for me in that moment to like, okay, calm down, like how can I approach this back? Yeah, it's emotionally safe. So are there things that a person can, can do Before or kind of in addition to the communication part of it, that just gets them calm absolutely?
Speaker 2:yeah, and that's that. That's the piece of. You know, we have these two different Relationships and every interaction we have our inner, our relationship with the other person, that's going on. And then we have our relationship with Ourself. And our relationship with ourself is exactly what you've just described how we manage our own feelings.
Speaker 2:And, yes, that is a huge piece of this work, because if we're not Mm-hmm successful with helping ourselves in those hard places, it is going to make it more difficult to show up in a way that can be helpful to our partner and then help them start learning to show up in ways that are helpful for us.
Speaker 2:And so, learning how to help yourself in your dark places through therapy, through somatic work, that is definitely or just through self-help meditation, I mean, that's a big piece of this.
Speaker 2:What I you know, one of the reasons that I work with couples is because what I found is that, while working with the couple, I'm actually working with them each as individuals also. So I'm bringing that self regulation piece into their relationship and I'm also bringing in that co-regulation piece and I'm helping them, in this very safe, contained environment, start to have safe experiences with each other and in that safety they're building secure attachment, not only between them but then in their own bodies, because support from other people is Absolutely a piece of you know, starting to be able to support ourselves. That's how it all starts. From you know birth is, we get support from a loving parent and from that support we start to integrate that and learn to support ourselves. And if something goes wrong with that process, either an infancy or later in childhood or wherever, even in adulthood, then it starts to, you know, break down and our relationship with ourselves starts to break down, and then our relationships with others start to break down and it's all really kind of the same thing.
Speaker 1:How do things like depression, anxiety disorder, addictions I mean some of the things that people struggle with it on their own can make more difficulties in a marriage? But then add that on top of this anxious avoidance balance that people might be fighting does Is it that you need to fix one of those things before working on attachment? Do they go hand-in-hand? Does helping to move into secure attachment help some of those other Issues that may be happening? What's that relationship?
Speaker 2:like.
Speaker 1:I.
Speaker 2:Think that you know, let's just take substance abuse, right. So there are different pieces of treating a substance addiction. One of those is treating the individual and helping them learn how to deal with their own feelings in a Way that they don't need to use the substance as a way to, you know, self-medicate or fill the void or Whatever it is that they're needing to do by using that substance. And then the second piece and I don't think this piece can be ignored, and I think this is the future of addiction treatment, the present and the future which is Helping the relationships and their lives be more secure. Because when you have more secure, I mean think about you know.
Speaker 2:Most of the Areas where people start to feel bad inside are Relational. A fight with someone you know, something relational, even Losing your job is relational if your family safety is dependent on that. You know Everything. Most of the things we do in life, even if they're not directly relational, can be circled back to relate relational. What are people going to think of me if I'm an actual failure in life, right? So we want to get those Relationships and that person's life as secure and supportive as possible and part of that is those people learning how to help With also taking care of themselves and their own self-care, their own boundaries. So we're treating it. You know everything when it's on that level is going to need. You know you need to get help with the depression piece. But the help with the depression piece is going to be far more likely to be successful when that person has secure relationships to go home to and helping them participate in the relationship in a secure way.
Speaker 2:So just kind of apply that to any number of things, including what you've just listed. You know there's a lot of. One type of work right now is called shoot. I can't remember the name of it, it's Jeffrey foot F O O T E and he approaches Substance abuse treatment from an attachment perspective and his he works with the families to help the families take care of themselves and the relationships in the best way possible. There have been all sorts of studies on my favorite is rap part. I won't bore you with the details, although it's fascinating studies of how addiction can start to spontaneously heal with the right kind of social network and environment in that person's life.
Speaker 1:It's fascinating.
Speaker 2:That's awesome yeah it's very powerful work that has. This is why I love Gabor Gabor sorry, gabor Mati because he he has so much to say on this from more of a medical perspective.
Speaker 1:Hmm, what can someone expect the anxious, the avoidant or the couple if they, if they decide you know what I do want to start doing therapy or or coaching, can the same kind of thing be done and be done in coaching? But what can they expect from, from that engagement with a clinician?
Speaker 2:Well, the way that I work, I use a modality called emotional, emotionally focused therapy for couples, and it's I have a pretty structured way of working. As far as I know, you know, the, the course of therapy is very organized. We have a Beginning and an end, and then what I do in the sessions is pretty much the same kind of pattern throughout the whole sessions with. With that said, there's a lot of flexibility within that structure. So you're going to come to me and the broader course of therapy is going to be at the beginning, I'm just going to need to form a relationship with you, with each partner, and understand where they're coming from, and then quickly, soon after that, that doesn't typically take too long. Then we're going to go into understanding that couple's negative cycle, their pattern of conflict, which is probably going to be, underneath all the details, pretty consistent from topic to topic. I need to really understand that and I need to help them start stabilizing that just damage control. Let's not go down that road. If we start to recognize we're in this negative cycle, we need to learn how to interrupt it and then from there we're going to start. You know, part of that process of stabilizing it just starts to naturally, naturally build up more understanding and empathy and then, as we get that on board, we start just diving into more emotionally bonding experiences, developing more closeness. That starts to in and of itself give resilience to these negative cycles, because now we're really building up the safety with each other.
Speaker 2:That's the area where we might start to heal some old wounds, because we can, because we now have these, these partners, able to communicate outside of a negative cycle about how we're going to be able to communicate with each other. We can be able to communicate outside of a negative cycle about past wounds. So we start to heal some of that, dissolving some of those old resentments, which is a very you know, there's a process to that and then we start to move into the next phase, which is sort of just consolidating it all, putting it all together, you know, making sure we can talk about finances, we can talk about parenting, and we can kind of get through these conversations and then turn some resolution without going into those negative cycles. And that's what the book does to. I mean, the book is really meant to be a self help version of that process I've just laid out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if someone's going to do it with a practitioner, how long does that on average take?
Speaker 2:on average for really, really experienced and competent, talented clinician, on average about 40 sessions. But that's again, it's average because people are coming to us at really different places. If someone's coming to me, let's say they've been dating for a year and they're like, hey, we're ready to commit to each other, we're ready to get engaged, I can five sessions. But if that same couple has been together for 10 years and they've built up a lot of patterns and a lot of wounds with each other, then we're going to be looking more at that 40 session range. I've worked with couples for two, three years that have really been in a lot of distress and on top of the distress they both have a really hard time regulating because of their own traumas from the past. So it really, truly depends by if 40 session is a good average.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that makes a ton of sense. You mentioned this a little bit just a minute ago. But what prompted you to write this book?
Speaker 2:Secure Love. Well, I started doing this work in grad school and I started really diving into attachment theory, just resonated with it immediately started using it in my personal life, and then I kind of reluctantly started working with couples but ended up just becoming obsessed with it. Did not want to be a couple's therapist. It's really ironic, because that's truly my most. The place in the world where I feel like I'm the most myself is probably in my role as a couple's therapist and then in that emotionally connected role with my husband and children too. But so then in 2020, I started an Instagram account, just kind of on a fluke. Someone had recommended hey, if you have a clinic here in town, you should be on Instagram, because people use it as Google and whatever. And so I opened it up and I thought, well, you can't really have an Instagram account without posting something, right. And so I just was like well, what do I know? I know attachment theory. So I just started drawing little cartoons to teach people, because I didn't think the information out was very useful at that time. And so I just started drawing cartoons and it just kind of took off and after a couple months, people started saying write a book, write a book. I was like, wow, no. And then I thought, well, I'll just really quickly kind of like try to consolidate all this information I'm putting out there, started diving into that.
Speaker 2:After a couple weeks I was like maybe even a couple days. I was like wait, wait, this is really hard, I have a lot to say here. And I went on the front porch and I said to my husband there is no way that I'm writing a book. I don't know what I was thinking, you know, really bad idea. And he looked at me and he's the one that's usually trying to pull me back, you know and he looked at me and he said you have to write this book, you have to. And I was like, wait, what? Like? My whole world turned upside down in that moment. And I said, you know, in my mind I was like, well, if he's saying I have to write the book, I have to write the book. And so I really believed I was going to sit down and knock it out in about a month and it took three years A lot of effort and wisdom poured into it.
Speaker 2:It's just a sign of that, and I you know, just to go back to take it away from me and put it more into what I'm trying to offer people is. I really want you know the effort, the work that I can do with couples is very, very magical and unfortunately, there's just there aren't enough therapists, there aren't enough resources, like so many people out there will never have access to couples therapy or will never have access to really high quality couples therapy. So that's who I'm trying to. I'm trying to help people in the best way possible that might not be able to get this information in any other way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's fantastic. The book releases on January 30th and people can get it, I'm sure, wherever books are sold wherever books are sold.
Speaker 2:Yeah, lots of languages and all kinds of fun stuff.
Speaker 1:That's fantastic, yeah it's published by Simon and Schuster, so this is like legit oh it's legit.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's pretty legit. I do, yeah, it's about as legit as it could get. It started out as self publishing. And then an agent came into the picture and she's amazing and she made this happen on a much bigger scale.
Speaker 1:So like awesome very grateful for that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it feels very, very special to have a voice that can reach so many people. There's something, just as you know, just really, really amazing about that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure, and wanting to use it for good and to help them in a way that you've been blessed. For sure, we're going to have links to the book and the show notes for people to buy, but where else can people find you and see what you're doing, julie?
Speaker 2:So Instagram at the secure relationship, make sure you look for the blue check. There are a lot of imposters and they'll try to sell you psychic readings from me, which I don't do. And then I have the secure relationshipcom, where I have a staff of their coaches, but they're all also therapists. Just for licensing reasons and state boundary issues, we work under the rubric of coaching a lot of the time and they're all highly trained in the modality that we work in EFT. I only hire in the best and I make sure they're highly, highly trained. So these are the people that are doing this work exactly as it is presented on my account and in the book. And then on top of that, there's a website called I see EFTcom, which is the main website for all of EFT therapy. It's in, so you can go on there and you can find an EFT therapist anywhere in the world Fantastic.
Speaker 1:We'll include all of those links in the show notes as well.
Speaker 1:Julie, it has been so great to talk with you and your wisdom and insight I know is going to be incredibly beneficial to the listeners. So thank you so much for your time. You're so welcome. It was absolute pleasure.
Speaker 1:Here are my three key takeaways from today's episode with Julie Manano. First, I love how we got to the point in this episode of talking about how working on ourselves and the relationship that we have with ourself is one of the most important things we can do in order to have better relationships in our life. The relationship with ourselves is the more important one for us to actually focus on, because if I am not able to emotionally soothe myself or to calm down or to be aware of my emotions and how I'm showing up towards other people, then I'm likely going to stay stuck in a lot of negative cycles and a lot of negative communication cycles in my marriage, in my parenting, in my co-working, whatever it might be. So a lot of this starts with ourselves. It starts with working on ourselves physically, intellectually, emotionally, spiritually which are the four areas that we always love to cover on this show. So the first takeaway I have for you is check in with yourself. How are you doing working on your pies right now? Which area do you may need to give a little bit more attention to? And maybe you need to focus a little bit more on the relationship with yourself, how you're handling your own emotions right now, evaluating how you're showing up in your relationships, and if you're not showing up the way that you want to, then what can you begin to do personally in order to calm down so that you can show up the way that you want to?
Speaker 1:My second key takeaway from today's episode is that people are their is that people are their best selves when they feel safe. I love the example that she gave, even though it totally threw me for just a second when she began to ask me those questions, right In such a way that was like whoa, where's this coming from? What do you mean? And I really did feel that in my body, and you likely feel that too. You likely know when someone in your life, whether it's your spouse, a co-worker or whoever begins to talk to you or question you or just respond to you in such a way that you begin to feel unsafe. Now, while you can't control them, you can control you, and it may be worth asking the people in your life your kids, your spouse if it's appropriate to do so. What are some things or what are some ways that, when I say it to you or question you or use that tone, whatever it might be, what are some ways that you don't feel safe based on how I communicate with you and that can help you understand some things that you need to change? Now here's the key. You can't or shouldn't, I should say. It is best for you to not get defensive when they give you their answers. Otherwise, they're just going to continue to feel like you are going to continue to do whatever you want to do and justify it, even though they've told you in an honest way that it makes them feel crappy. So, cherish the information they share with you. Use it as an opportunity to look inward and to fuel how you can begin working on yourself in order to make you a better person, but also for your relationships to be safer or for them to feel more safe in communicating with you.
Speaker 1:Then the third key takeaway I have is the question of are you communicating in a way that is emotionally supportive? This ties in with the other two that we've already talked about. But one of the key things that we talk about in working on yourself and working on your pies is that part of attraction, which is the emotional part of attraction, which is are you evoking emotions within other people that they enjoy feeling? This is a bit of a different way to look at it, but it's along the same veins. Are you communicating in a way that is emotionally supportive, even if the other person doesn't necessarily like the outcome? Julie gave a great example in just talking about how to approach finances. Some of you might have been listening to that and thinking man that just rattled off her tongue. Remember, she's a clinician, she's practiced in this, she's been doing it for years, but that's what it takes.
Speaker 1:If we want to respond to the people in our lives in a way that is emotionally supportive, then it takes practicing doing that, practicing responding in a way that's emotionally supportive, and you get better at it over time. You get better at managing your own emotions, becoming more self-aware and responding in emotionally supportive ways the more you do it over time. So the more likely you are to make excuses or to just write things off or to just say to yourself well, that's the way I am, then things aren't really going to change. It really takes intentionality and proactive movement in order to respond to others in ways where they can feel emotionally supportive.
Speaker 1:I would love to hear your key takeaways from this episode too. You can always come follow me on Instagram at KimberlyBeamHolmes. I always love hearing from you. Leave a five-star review of the podcast, or whichever review is the most honest for you. I hope it's five stars. That helps the podcast reach even more people. If you know someone who could benefit from this episode, then just tap that share button and send them a text message, send them a Slack, send them an email sharing this show with them. I would love for them to learn from the great wisdom and insight that we learned with Julie today, like you did. Until next week, stay strong.