The Living in Clarity Podcast, w/Coach Ratner

Infinite Marriage Audio Book, Chapter #9

• By Coach Daniel Ratner

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Ever wondered how to transform your marriage from "me" to "we"? Join Coach Ratner on the Living in Clarity podcast as we unravel the secrets to enduring love and partnership. This episode dives headfirst into "Never Leaving" the final and most intricate phase of a loving relationship. Discover the life-changing 24-hour rule that helps couples sidestep unnecessary conflicts and learn how to view trivial expenses as a "marriage tax" to preserve harmony. We also delve into the emotional landscape of marriage, illustrating the crushing burden of grudges with a powerful metaphor about a professor and a glass of water.

In another riveting segment, we decode the importance of emotional intelligence and intellectual decision-making in relationships. Coach Ratner shares wisdom on speaking thoughtfully, guided by the THINK acronym (True, Helpful, Inspiring, Necessary, Kind), to avoid emotional pitfalls and build stronger bonds. You’ll also hear insightful personal anecdotes and practical advice on effective communication skills. Learn the art of social savviness, knowing when and how to convey your messages for maximum impact and minimal friction. Tune in for a treasure trove of actionable tips that promise to elevate your marital journey and deepen your connection.

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This is Coach Ratner with the Living in Clarity podcast. We're reading Chapter 9 of the book Infinite Marriage the Four Phases of a Loving Relationship. Phase 4, never Leaving Marriage is not about me, but about we. We are now in the final stage of the four phases of love. This phase may be the hardest to understand and implement, most likely because most people will never get to this point. Just like your computer has an operating system that sometimes needs to get upgraded in order for it to work at its maximum efficiency, this phase is like the computer upgrade, but for your marriage it is also the hardest to implement and just the same as the reason most hikers won't get to the summit of Mount Everest. Besides the months of training, getting to the summit takes lots of money and time out of your life just to even attempt it. This phase is just like the Mount Everest of marriage, but you won't have to deal with a 14% death rate of hiking the world's highest peak. Instead, you will have to deal with the 75% chance or more of having an unhappy marriage. This is the part that I want every reader to get to when you can truthfully say about your marriage that you are never leaving the 24-hour rule. The 24-hour rule states that you should not argue, complain, disagree, scream, yell or fight for at least 24 hours after the first sign of a looming disagreement with your spouse. I know what you're thinking. If you wait 24 hours, you won't remember what you were fighting about. That's the point. Most, but not all, arguments in marriages are senseless and not worth remembering. At first it might not seem meaningless, but after some time has passed and you've reviewed the issue, you will probably come to the conclusion that it was not worth quarreling over. You want to stay focused on the big picture, and your relationship is the big picture.

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One common issue that married couples struggle with is finances. Money is considered the second most common reason that couples get divorced, but I would not be surprised if that's the number one reason couples fight. There is one way to avoid making money a source of disagreement in your marriage. Consider that part of the income you earn goes to a marriage tax. A certain amount of your income will be used by your spouse to buy things that you may consider a waste of money. If you think something is a waste of money, someone else will not think that way, and that's where the disagreement begins. This can be an issue in any marriage and just comes with the territory. This problem does not just happen to people who lack money. It can even happen to people who are considered wealthy.

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One area where I see a lot of wasted money is buying soaps, shampoos, conditioners, dish soap, hand soap and so on. When I walk into my children's showers, I see about a dozen bottles of half-squeezed shampoos, conditioners and body washes. Then I look under the kitchen sink and see all sorts of different hand soaps and kitchen soaps. How many different kinds of soaps and shampoo does one really need? Are you going to be a better smelling person because you use tea tree oil soap? Isn't that just a fancy name for tree sap? Why on earth would you want to wash in tree sap, especially when you tell your kids to take a shower after they climb the trees. That makes no sense. They may as well take a shower with the sap while playing on the tree.

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Soap can have so many different ingredients in it that there are now stores that just sell soap. Who would have thought that would happen? There are ingredients in soaps such as beeswax, palm oil, cocoa butter, shea butter. Companies that put peanut butter in soap, but the public would buy it when traveling. I personally just grab whichever soap I can and use that soap for my hair and body. I would not be surprised to see marketers start to target more specific body parts like toe soap or knee soap. I believe fancy soaps are a waste of money, but my wife does not, thankfully. I just make believe that my tax bracket is now higher, even if it's only in my mind, and that extra money is being used to buy organic soap berries picked by free-range monkeys. I am not happy about all the money spent on overpriced soaps, but I have to look at it as an extra tax to keep my wife and marriage happy. Plus, I am keeping monkeys off welfare. Realize that not every cent your family earns will be used efficiently. Next time money becomes a source of attention, just think of it as another tax. This will save you a lot of aggravation.

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Try to think back to any argument you had with your spouse more than a year ago. How about six months ago? I bet most people have a hard time remembering an argument they had a little as a month ago. Do you know why? Because the argument was not important enough to remember. Most arguments in a marriage are usually about things so insignificant that you will not be able to recall them. If you had the same disagreement with your friend, you probably wouldn't get nearly as upset over it. The reason is that you are not as emotionally attached to your friend as you are to your spouse. Even in trying to think of examples for this book, I had a hard time coming up with something I argued about with my wife. It's not that we haven't argued, it's just that it wasn't worth remembering because it probably was so stupid that I would be embarrassed to mention it.

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If you can remember an argument you had with your spouse, it is possible that you were holding a grudge. This is very damaging to your psyche because it can eventually wear you down, and the longer you hold it in, the more painful it will become. Imagine a high school professor sticks out his arm all the way out while holding a glass of water in his palm. He asks his students to guess how much it weighs. Some say 6 ounces, some say 10 ounces. The teacher says the answer is irrelevant because the weight of the water depends on how long you hold the glass. If you hold it for a minute, the weight feels like nothing. If you hold it for an hour, it gets heavier and your arm starts to hurt. If you hold it for an entire day, your arm becomes numb and you can't hold it anymore. The absolute weight of the water hasn't changed. It's the weight that we feel has changed. This is no different than life.

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We hold on to our grudges that we have and don't let go of them. It becomes excruciating painful. This will keep us from achieving what we want in life. Instead of holding a grudge, let go of whatever is causing you emotional distress and don't let a grudge ruin your marriage. Emotional arguments are just that emotional. Nothing is accomplished when one or both spouses are emotional.

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I learned this concept while raising children. Can children become emotional? You bet. The problem is that when they are emotional, you cannot reason with them. What you should do is wait a few hours until they have calmed down. Then you will be able to talk to them logically without their emotions getting in the way. Unless they happen to be teenagers, then you may have to wait a few days or maybe years. Teenagers have a tendency to act irrationally. Some psychologists consider teenagers to have symptoms similar to brain damage until they are into their early 20s. If you have ever lived through raising a teen. You can attest to what scientists are talking about.

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When raising children, you don't have to win every battle, and you must pick which ones are worth fighting over With your spouse. You don't need to win any battles. It's imperative that you are able to discuss issues as calm, rational people, and that means taking emotion out of the equation. And once you wait 24 hours and have calmed down, you will see that what you were fighting about is probably meaningless. There are issues in a marriage where you may never agree with your spouse. This does not need to get in the way of an amazing marriage. This manifested itself recently when President Donald Trump was in office. I know many marriages where this became such an emotional issue that they ended up getting a divorce. Don't let politics trump your marriage.

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Did Donald Trump winning the office of the president really cost many divorces? It was most likely the trigger that exacerbated what was already a rocky relationship. A Wakefield research study entitled the Trump Effect on American Relationships reports that 29% of Americans, either married or in a relationship, acknowledged that the political climate under President Trump was causing tension with their partner, and 22% said they knew a couple whose marriage or relationship was negatively impacted while Trump was in office. In addition, a report recently published by the Michigan Institute for Fighting Family Education confirms that Donald Trump and his presidency was the number one cause of divorce among American married couples. During his time in office, the former president was also the catalyst for more family contract in recent times than any economic or social factor, resulting in an increase in heated arguments, disownments and relatives being struck from wills. Nobody is neutral about Donald Trump, said Dr Philip Rangel, who conducted the study. If couples are not on the same page about the president, there's going to be trouble. Divorce by Trump, as we are now calling it, is so rampant that it is responsible for more breakups than the other big three factors combined Money woes, religious differences and episodes of infidelity.

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How do you manage this polarization in a relationship? If your spouse loved the president and you hated him, the best thing to do is not talk about it. If one partner was so passionate about him that they had to constantly be voiced in their opinion, then there needs to be a discussion about how this can ruin your marriage. You need to make it an off-topic subject. You can agree to disagree. You need to let your spouse know that every time they bring it up, it is hurting your connection to them and destroying your marriage. Hopefully that will be enough of a trigger for the other spouse to just keep their opinions to themselves. Is this the best way to deal with this? We will learn later that our inflated egos and strong opinions, especially concerning hot topic issues, can put a barrier between two people, and if this involves our loved ones, we need to do anything that will bring us closer, not farther apart. If that means making off-topic limits in your house, if that means making off-topic limits in your house, then that is what it is going to take. We have a rule at our Shabbat table that we do not discuss politics. There is an idea that two hot topic issues that should never be discussed in mixed company are politics and religion. Since we are already discussing religion, it is best to stay away from politics.

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Letting our emotions affect our actions can not only hurt us in our relationships, but also in investing. Investors in the stock market who follow the daily price swings of the market are more likely to make investing decisions based on emotions. Emotional traders will tend to lose money. Intellectual investors don't let the emotions get in the way by buying or selling on Euphoria. They have made an intellectual decision of why they invest in the company. You can use this same analogy in marriage. If you communicate with your spouse when you are emotional, you will be just like the emotional stock investor you will most likely lose. Unfortunately, it's not your money you're losing, but the ability to have that passionate relationship with your spouse. When you wait 24 hours before discussing a disagreement with your spouse, you're more likely to look at the situation intellectually and you may realize that what you were going to have a fight about was really meaningless. When you can avoid an argument for at least 24 hours in which case you will most likely decide to avoid the argument altogether you will be on your way to a marriage in which you are never leaving.

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Think before you speak. The best piece of advice I could give anyone in a committed relationship is to think before you speak. This advice has been very instrumental in my 20 plus years of strife-free marriage Now 23. If I happen to say the wrong thing, I have enough goodwill and credit in my account that my wife won't be upset too long. If you say the wrong thing when you are dating, that can completely end the relationship and you may have lost an amazing potential lifelong spouse. Once you say something, those words are floating in the air and impossible to take back. Even if you apologize later, those words were still spoken. A potential partner will always remember they came out of your mouth. A good rule of thumb is if it's not positive and constructive, don't say it.

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When my wife and I were on our Jewish journey, gossip, negative speech or the official Hebrew word lashon hara, was one of the first things that we learned about. I never really thought about it because it was just part of my business, life and social circle. It's kind of like walking through a perfume store without ever putting any on. You don't think you smell, but when you walk out of the store you still smell a perfume. Even though I didn't think I gossiped, it was so prevalent it was part of my life.

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There was a parable about a teacher whose student was always talking badly about other people. The teacher asked the student to get his pillow and take it to the roof of his apartment building, rip it open and sprinkle the feathers over the edge. The student comes to the teacher the next day and says that he did what she asked of him. The teacher then tells him to go back and pick up all the feathers, the student responds that it's impossible, as the feathers have blown all over the city. The teacher then says to him that is what happens when you talk badly about others.

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Those negative words spread everywhere with no way for you to take them back. The repercussions can be devastating. Have you ever been in a courtroom or watched courtroom proceedings on television? An attorney asks the witness an incriminating or damaging question and a judge quickly says strike those words from the courtroom. The judge is trying to inform the jury that they should forget what the lawyer asked, but a good attorney understands that once those words are said, they stay in your memory bank. If a judge tells you to forget the words, will you really forget them? The attorney may know in advance that what he is saying will be stricken by the judge, but he knows that he is putting a thought in the jurors brains that will help him win the case. This concept is the same in dating and marriage.

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Even though you spoke when you were emotional, even though you apologized, even though you told your partner the mean things you said were out of rage, those words stay in their memory bank. So be careful what you say and think before you speak. It is usually better not to say anything to anyone when you are emotional. Many poor decisions that happened in your life may have been made when you were emotional. Just think about the times you have been on vacation and made a purchase you regretted. This is why cruise ships sell artwork and jewelry on chefs. Because people tend to spend more money when on vacation. When you are happy, you more likely buy things that are emotional purchases. Cruise ships will charge very little for the trip, just so you can get on board and buy overpriced drinks, artwork and jewelry.

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There is a saying you probably heard when you were young Sticks and stones will break my bones, but words will never hurt me. This is completely false. Words do hurt, and even more so when you are dating, but even worse when you are married. When you were little, you had no emotional relationship to the 8-year-old boy in your neighborhood who said something mean to you. You, you had no emotional relationship to the eight-year-old boy in your neighborhood who said something mean to you. You were able to get over that very quickly. If your spouse says something hurtful to you, it could hurt forever because of your up-close emotional connection. When should you think before you speak? Always. I'm going to use an acronym that can help you to think before you speak and avoid saying hurtful things to your spouse or potential spouse. Living with this acronym will put you on the path to an amazing relationship. The acronym is THINK. T stands for true.

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The greatest way to build trust in a relationship is for your partner that whatever comes out of your mouth is the truth and you will follow through on what you said. Obviously, you should always speak the truth to your spouse, but this choice is a bit different. Whatever comes out of your mouth will be the truth. This means do what you say you're going to do. This includes something that seems insignificant. It may be as small as the husband saying that he will take the trash out that night. When the husband doesn't do it, when he says he will, he's putting tiny little doubts into his spouse's head. If this happens once, no big deal, but if it continually happens, then his wife may slowly lose trust in what he says. The husband may decide to take it out in the morning before the garbage collectors arrive. As far as the husband is concerned, it doesn't really matter in the big picture, because the chore is still being accomplished, but that's not the point. If you say you're taking it out at night, but do it not the point. If you say you're taking it at night but do it in the morning, you're not keeping your word.

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I'm going to go down on a limb here and say that many readers or listeners will not agree with me on this. This is why many readers have less than a 25% chance of having a happy marriage and will never get to the point in a marriage of never leaving. It is similar to someone removing one thread from a sweater. One thread missing won't ruin the sweater, but if you start to take out one thread a day, eventually there will be no more sweater. If the value of the words that come out of your mouth slowly start to erode the trust your spouse has in you, your marriage may end up like a sweater that has turned into a pile of threads. You don't want this in a relationship. You want the opposite that you both trust everything you say and do. That will help motivate each of you to be more passionate together and eventually get you to the point of never leaving.

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H stands for helpful. If what you're saying is not helpful, helping the situation. You should not say it. If you are having a disagreement with your spouse, your ultimate goal should be to make sure you say things that can bring peace to the relationship. Peace in the home is the utmost importance and really should be the mantra you live by. It is so important that God will even lie for peace between a married couple. When God told Sarah that she was going to have a baby at 90 years old, she laughed and said but my husband is too old. God then told Avraham the same thing. Avraham then asked God what Sarah said. God responded that she said she is too old, instead of saying my husband is too old. If God is willing to lie for peace in the home, you should be willing to do anything for peace in your marriage.

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I stands for important. Is what you're saying important to the matter at hand, or you just need to hear yourself? Or are you just need to hear yourself? Or are you just trying to win an argument so your ego can feel like you won? If it is not important, you probably don't need to say it. Try to keep your conversations positive with your spouse. What you think is important may not be so important to your spouse.

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N stands for necessary. Always say things necessary to bring peace to your relationship. So much of what I said earlier in my marriage were things I thought were necessary to say. We have to say things from our spouse's perspective and talk about what they would like us to talk about. K stands for kind. Whatever you say to your partner should be kind. This is one of the most important things you need to remember and one of the keys to a blissful relationship. All words should be affectionate. This is why the mantra at my house is compliment, don't criticize. I even put a song to it so it sticks in my head Compliment, don't criticize. Compliment, don't criticize, or she'll find another guy. Compliment don't criticize, or she'll poke you in the eye. Compliment don't criticize, or he'll say bye-bye-bye. Complimental criticize Live under sunny skies.

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There is a particular skill that will help you speak to your partner in a way that will not cause strife. Psychologist Robert Sternberg calls it practical intelligence. It is one of the three types of intelligence people possess. The other types are analytical and creative. You can improve on the last two, but most of that intelligence was given to you at birth. Practical intelligence is something you can learn. It is knowing when and how to say something. It is knowledge that helps you read situations and know how best to respond.

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Spouses involved in a great marriage have the social savviness to understand what they should and shouldn't say to each other. There is a right way to say something, a right time to say something and the right person to say something. Sometimes you are not the right person to say something to your spouse. It's possible that your spouse will more likely listen to a friend or a co-worker. I know from personal experience that there are things my wife wants me to do, but when the request comes from her I will almost always not listen. But when I hear it from someone else and outside into my marriage, then I'll decide to do it.

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It's not a conscious decision that we make in our heads that we will listen to some people and not listen to others. It's just hard for us to internalize things we hear from people who are so close to us. It's just part of the nuance of communication. The best way to learn this practical knowledge is to think before you speak. It will keep you from sleeping in the doghouse and will get you closer to never leaving. This is the Living in Clarity podcast. We'll see you next time.