Covid-19 Hurdles and dealing with Isolation

In this webinar replay, from the 25th of Mar 2020, we shared the following tools:

• Emotional Regulation
• Overcoming Isolation
• Tips for different situations that might occur in lockdown

Ziv Raviv: Hello Shachar Erez

Shachar Erez: Hi Ziv

Ziv: We are here to talk about the situation of COVID-19, the Coronavirus pandemic and we’re going to focus mainly on isolation and how to overcome it. Shachar, is this a topic that you talk with your clients?

Shachar: Yes, that’s the main thing that’s happening for everyone these days, and everything around it, the isolation, and being so much together, not really able to leave the house.

Ziv: Yeah. So, this is something that the people that joined here live or that would watch the replay, is going through. Some sort of isolation. For us here in Israel, we are in day 10 of the complete shutdown. Other countries, just started the shutdown today. But either way, there’s so much fear and stress going on and we want to give you some tools. I think the first thing we need to do is take a few good breaths and regulate ourselves.

 

Now, let’s go through this lecture together and hopefully you’ll find something that will help you overcome isolation and some of the hurdles that are coming your way or already are part of your life. So Shachar, please share the screen.

So “Facing the Coronavirus challenges”. We’re focusing in this lecture mainly on things that are not financial and not business oriented. We are going to be talking about the emotional and relationship related problems. Shachar Is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. I’m a business coach. We both are the co-hosts of the Generous Marriage Podcast and we’re here to support you in this time.

So, first, we want to make sure you’re in the right place.  

If you are feeling isolated or physically isolated and you’re spending more time than usual with your family members, that puts you in a situation where certain things are going to happen for you.

But this is not the only case. That might create a problem for you. You might be isolated with just your partner or without your partner. And both of those options can create a day to day struggle. We’ll talk about that today. You’re in the right place.

And we also want to say like that people that are within the “at risk group of COVID-19” – older people or people with chronic conditions, or immunity issues and so on. And if that’s you, then you’re in the right place because you have to be extra isolated.

And also, if your life changed dramatically recently. You’re in the right place.

And, you might be a person that is a part of the medical teams, or a police officer, or anyone that is currently involved in keeping the data, keeping the shutdown active or helping people save lives. And if that is the case then you have a different challenge of isolation right now, like isolation from your life. And thank you that for being involved in fighting this pandemic.

Shachar: Right. Also, if your partner is the first responder or doctor or nurse or anybody who’s fighting it on the front lines. Thank you as well. You’re taking a lot of the burden as well.

 

Ziv: Oh, for sure. So either way, if you see yourself in any of these, then you’re in the right place. Stay along. And we will try to help you with some ideas and even just knowing what you’re going through I think will be a relief.

Shachar: So, what are we talking about today? We’re going to talk about the challenges of this time. How to deal with the feelings that are coming up and how to create a new routine. All of us, our lives just changed dramatically and we need to create a new kind of life. So how do we do that? We’ll talk about healthy habits, which are super important for this kind of time. Connecting with loved ones, especially in this isolated state. The importance of keeping in touch with people we care about, and people that care about us.

Ziv: Shachar, let me introduce you. A licensed marriage and family therapist that is married for 12 years, father of two. And wonderful kids. We get to see each other’s kids by exercising over zoom together. So, we see the kids exercising too. Shachar is a guy that helps people celebrate their humanity. And I want to thank you, Shachar for your partnership and your support on the Generous Marriage Podcast and also for your friendship.

Shachar: Thank you.

Ziv Raviv runs three online schools and podcasts. He married his high school sweetheart 18 years ago. He’s a father of three. And he knows from personal experience that his success is dependent on the success of his marriage. And he walks his talk. I can see how much he’s practicing what we’re preaching. And I think that’s very inspiring.

Ziv: Thank you.

So, let’s look at these challenging times and try to understand what we are going through. We start with some emotional stuff that you can explain to us, right?

Shachar: I think one of the big ones is the uncertainty. I don’t think there was ever such meeting with uncertainty. On a global scale, on a national scale, on family scale, and on a personal scale. And we humans, we don’t deal with uncertainty so well, uncertainty triggers us, it feels like a risk. And we go into this fight or flight mode, we become anxious. That’s a really big one. We don’t know the enemy. You know, we don’t know the virus so much. We don’t know how long these lockdowns are gonna be. We don’t know the effect it will have on their economy. Big stuff.

Another big deal is isolation. Which is another thing that we humans don’t deal with well, because our body-minds are actually wired for connection. As human beings, we are born into connection and all through life, relationships give us a feeling of safety. And now with this isolation that’s challenging for us.

Ziv: Sometimes the connection is there. We are there with our family, but the connection is too intense. And that is something that you have to get used to and you need to go through these adjustments where we need to learn the new routine. And this is quite intensive these days that you want your kids to do certain things and you see them do other things and you don’t have a teacher to do your hard work and tell them what to do. So, this all brings up a lot of emotions and a lot of conflict.

Shachar: And a lot of new roles that we need to take on, it’s not just parenting and going to work. We also need to be teachers now and friends because the kids don’t see much of their friends. Also, it might be a lot of time to spend with your partner.

All of these bring up a few common responses. The first one is shock. That’s what I see mainly in my clinic for the last week or so, most people are shocked, don’t really know how to respond.

Two common responses to shock are either anxiety or numbness, avoidance. And I want to say all of this is normal. Most of us go through this. And sometimes we go through both ends. We move from anxiety to numbness, from being stressed out, to wanting to go to sleep. This is all normal. This is the first phase of facing such a huge change.

Ziv: So, it’s okay, it’s ok that you’re going through these normal cycles of feelings and responses. Don’t be hard on yourself. Don’t think that it’s the end of the world. Don’t think this will last forever. This state of shock or stress or anxiety. And I know what you want right now – the assurance, the safety of knowing when will this end? And that’s part of the reason why we’re doing this. You don’t have any choice and you still need to take care of yourself and we are going to show you a few ideas about that, right?

Let’s talk about love languages. The concept of love languages was created by Dr. Gary Chapman a pastor who wrote a lot of books on this topic. Basically each of us has a language that we are wired to listen for love, to hear love. That’s how we feel loved. We also use the the same love language to express love, even though other people might actually feel loved in a different language.

For example, if you are more into touch, then you might be giving a lot of hugs.

And if you are more a person that wants quality time, then sharing an experience, looking eye to eye and so on will make you feel loved. I think, the majority of people use touch or quality time, these are the most popular love languages. And the majority of people are now with a deficit of love. There’s no love invested into the bank account of connection and love. And that is really troubling people that are used to, to hugs. I’m a hugger. When I meet people, I want to hug them or give them a good handshake. That creates a connection for me with them that makes me feel seen and noticed. And now with the lockdown, I can’t get that. I need to do all sorts of funny elbow shakes and stuff like that and be very careful about social distancing, which is really important right now. In order for the pandemic to flatten the curve, you have to stay away.

Well, the same problem goes with people that have quality time as their love language. There’s a good chance that they cannot have any quality time right now. If they can’t go on a date, there’s a chance that their loved ones is in lockdown on another location, which can be hard, and just you know, making sure that the house doesn’t go crazy is not the quality time that you’re usually looking for. So, finding enough quality time to be feeling loved is very hard right now in these days. And we want to share this with you.

If you’re not familiar with what is your love language, please go to 5lovelanguages.com where you can go through a 10 minute survey. It’s really easy and actually fun. You can learn what is your leading love language and share it with your partner. You can let them know that you need more of that, for example a bit more quality time. Maybe there’s a way to create quality time without risking any viral exchange. And maybe you’re stuck with your partner at home, so maybe you can provide touch to each other and find some glimpses of quality time.

Shachar: Yes, it is part of the challenge these days. So, let’s start talking about how to face those challenges.

Let’s start with Emotional regulation, because as I said earlier, many of us feel either anxious or numb. Well, both anxiety and numbness are actually secondary responses to our primary feelings. We can use them as a flag. Whenever I feel too anxious or whenever I feel too drowsy, too tired, that is not because of lack of sleep, I ask myself: “Hmm, interesting. What am I feeling right now?”  I try to become curious and mindful. Take a few good breaths, actually exhale a few times, that helps us slow down. And feel my body. And maybe take a moment, you know, in my bedroom or some place that I can have a few moments to myself and just see what am I feeling. Is it fear? Is it pain? Am I feeling helpless? Cause these primary feelings, even though we’re kind of scared of them, they’re actually easier to handle than the anxiety and numbness. They are like a wave that washes you over. You know, a wave of fear is not fun, but it comes and it goes, and then an insight usually appears and we know how to handle it better. Some clarity can arrive. It’s a state of mind. So it’s really important to stop and be curious and feel

Ziv: After you feel your feelings, ask yourself some questions. What are you afraid of? What are you, I’m curious, why is that scary? What might happen? Just go deeper a little bit. Is it because I didn’t do something that was expected? Well what’s underlying that?

Shachar: Right. That’s actually really important. It’s not just what do I feel? Also, what do I need? What are my needs right now?

Ziv: So feelings are actually indicators for needs. And a lot of times when you feel something, it’s a way to know something is lacking. Something that you need is lacking. For example, you might be feeling afraid and your need is to feel safe. You might need to be respected. You might need to have space. These are all real needs. Once you listen to your feelings, you can check what is the need that is correlated to that.

Shachar: Right. Clarify your needs and you did most of the work. Some needs don’t even need to be fulfilled. They need to be seen. They need to be heard. They need get room.

Then after you clarified how you feel and what is your need right now, it’s really good if you reach out to your spouse or to a good friend and share with them. That’s super helpful. We humans we’re able to self-regulate and we are also able to co-regulate. Our nervous system is able to regulate another person’s nervous system, even better than what we can do for ourselves sometimes. So, if you are not feeling great, check and see what you’re feeling and what you need. And even if it’s not clear to you because you weren’t able to get regulated, reach out and ask for help. Reach out to your spouse or if you have some friend that is like a body that you can call and talk to, super recommended.

Ziv: The reaching out can even start with “I feel scared of”, “I feel afraid”. And notice how when you say a sentence like “I feel”, and then you say how. You describe how you feel. You don’t say “I feel you should have done this” because this is no longer your own feelings. It’s criticism. Criticism doesn’t help ever, and right now with the isolation, many of us are very touchy, criticism can escalate very fast. So, we want to say one word feeling. “I feel scared”. “I feel angry.”

We want to also mention about emotional regulation, that it’s really strategic to create a group of support. It’s a group of people that you can contact that you can share with them, your feelings, share with them your needs, just be in touch with them. And that by itself helps with regulation because it normalizes how you feel.

Shachar: It’s a special ability of our nervous system because we’re tribal beings. Being part of a group is very nourishing, is very resourcing for us. So it’s kind of weird to do it on zoom and online but it’s better than nothing, and it works. We do help each other. Just hearing each other’s voice helps us. And if we can see faces that helps as well.

I’m part of a men’s group and we’re meeting online now and it’s not the same as meeting by a fire in the woods, but it’s still really valuable. And I am part of a peer group, which is more professionally oriented, but that’s very helpful as well.

Ziv: Communicating your needs is something that people naturally take very seriously. When you express your needs without blame, without demanding. The tone of voice matters. When you say, I need something, people actually respect that. When you say, I feel agitated, I need you to tell me everything will be okay.

Shachar: We can even use softer ways instead of “I need”. We can turn our need to a request. “I feel scared, I wish I felt safe, would you reassure me that everything is going to be ok?”

“I need” can sound harsh sometimes.

 

 

Ziv: So, let’s talk a little bit about routines.

Shachar: Routine is something that actually helps us feel safe. We talked about uncertainty earlier in this presentation and routine is the other side of uncertainty. We feel as if we have certainty when we have routine, when we know what we’re doing next. And that’s true for children, but it’s also true for grownups. Even people who say they love flowing, if they really check themselves, they love flowing within some routine. It might be very wide boundaries of routine, but they roughly know what’s happening next.

This time demands a new routine.

On one hand, you know, do your best to create a new routine. On the other hand, don’t be rigid about it. Be kind to yourself. It takes time. A new routine is not easy to build. There are so many uncertain parts in the new routine, we really recommend creating a new routine, but not being too harsh about it. Giving yourself some time to create it. We’re going to be in this situation for at least six weeks, we’re going to have time to create it.

Ziv: You know, it might be an opportunity. Six weeks is a lot. And that means that you will be used to the new routine. You’ll need to adjust again after that. But some of the new habits might stick like exercising over zoom with your buddies. That can become something that you occasionally do when you don’t have time to drive to the gym. If you establish now a healthy, good, new routine, that will not only save your mental health, it might be something that will later on be a part of you. And this is not the time to be too hard on yourself, you need a little bit of zone out time and a little bit of, I don’t know, watching Netflix, that’s fine. This is not a good time to play the shame and blame game where you keep talking badly about yourself. It’s okay if you, if you feel that because we all have those voices in different volumes. But just know that this is a situation that requires a little bit of adjustments and it will be easier on you if you choose a routine, like actually choose when to wake up and even plan a day in advance what you’re going to try and accomplish. Like cleaning the refrigerator that you never get to do or fixing something around the house or a digital course you’ve been meaning to finish for the last year or so. This can become an opportunity and adventure, a challenge, that is positive, that is building you.

So I want to imagine a few healthy habits. We run coaching groups as a part of what we do in our schools and we help people establish new habits that are healthy for them, that are positive, that are moving them closer to fulfilling their dreams. And this includes, of course, to do something with your body, to sweat, to exercise. And this can be very easy to do all by yourself, just with your body, with the weight of your body. And it can actually be a fun exercise to do with your family members if they are up to that.

Shachar: Ziv and I we exercise together in a CrossFit box and it’s closed obviously. I’m not good at exercising myself. I know how to do it, but I’m not good at showing up and doing it. So, we meet over zoom and we exercise together through zoom, each one of us in our own homes. And our kids join us sometimes and it works beautifully.

Ziv: Yeah. We lead by example. Knowing that my kid is literally holding my hand while we do 100 squats reminds me, I need to be strong and fearless for her. And for me. And this is a very special moment of the day.

And same goes with meditation. My coach used to say there’s only one wrong way to do meditation and that’s to not to do meditation. So really if you only meditate before going to sleep or in the shower or after a hard moment, maybe you’re walking remotely, maybe you’re just watching the news and it’s scary. Breathing, counting breaths. Just focusing on your body, focusing on how you feel. And there’s so many free meditation apps out there, and some of them, even the premium ones are free now because of the situation.

Shachar: Sleep. Science says we need more than eight hours of sleep. Especially in this kind of times, when stress levels are high, it’s important to get a good night sleep.

Sleeping is how we rejuvenate. Our bodies and our minds rejuvenate themselves. It’s really important to give yourself some extra time to sleep now. And I think for most people it’s actually available. It’s actually more possible than in normal days. Take advantages of that and add another hour whenever you can.

Ziv: And I would just add – listen to your body. I have a really good communication around that with my family, with my spouse, and I can share with her I need an hour now and sleep before I go into the next lecture sessions and coaching and whatnot. So even I have the luxury of being able to fall asleep for an hour and do a power nap and get back to work. Make sure that people are supporting you by making it possible for you to sleep in the night.

Shachar: Spending time in the sun. Vitamin D of course, while making sure that you respect the regulations in your country. Yeah, but

Speaker 2:

It’s really important. You know, the sun, eh, is an antidepressant. Vitamin D when we lack it, we would get depressed. Yeah. It’s really important to spend time in the sun. If, if we’re going into regulation, you’re allowed to go out and get some sun. That’s great. If not even just sitting by a window and sunbathing. It’s really important. We can’t overestimate it. Really underestimate anything about nature and nature is a great regulator. I mean, eh, to our feelings and to our bodies and to our minds. Follow the regulations in your country, in your area, and do what’s right. But if you can go out to nature, it’s very healthy.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. And we did mention like if you can do something like Oh, we’ll talk about food later, but like drinking again, smoothie is something that can, religion can, can make you happier. And like just yesterday I was walking outside for a brief moment and I was just stopping to look at the sky, just, just not, not just about the sun, but just to enjoy the beauty of nature, to remind ourselves how beautiful this world is and taking breaks and stopping that you should respect your, your spouse needs. Actually this is a, a big thing for men and women. For men. There is this need to visit your cave, your man-cave to be in your own place and not be disturbed. For a lot of women having their moments where no one is going to come over and disturb them and if they are disturbed, you need, they need to downtime all over again to be like recalibrated. Respect that with one another. Know that DC’s, there is a need for some space for some portfolio. And of course, if your partner is like these connections for, for a very long time, maybe you should communicate about that with with him. But just know that there is a need for some downtime, for breaks,

Speaker 2:

Right? Support each other’s need for downtime and also communicate when you go for a downtime and try to communicate when you’re planning on coming back. And especially talking to a man, men tend to shut down for a long time. So, you know, promise your your partner when you’re planning on coming back and do it. And for many women, especially mothers, they are busy taking care of other people’s needs all the time. So having some undisturbed downtime when they don’t need to care for anybody else and they can just zone out and watch Netflix or do yoga or whatever is nourishing, blink a cup of coffee, you know, support your, your wife in doing that, that’s very important as well. So we’re in the information overload.

Speaker 1:

And this is actually a situation that it’s been in business for a long time that you become the average of the five people. It’s allowed you most. So if you’re getting advices from people that you want to become like them you eventually become like them and you become successful if you’re surrounded by successful people. And we are now in a situation where we’re not exposed to five people. We’re exposed to 5,000 people over Facebook and and, and Daryl opinion, they’re afraid, they’re scared. They’re not going to be very optimistic on the poets. They might even learn about the situation. Fear, media, fear media is how I call any media right now. Public media is, is full of scary things, sometimes scary and exaggerated, sometimes scary and real and and you become what they want you to become, which is a creature that is full of fear of feel feelings.

Speaker 1:

And you can control that first of all, by detoxing yourself by disconnecting from certain things like TB, like now might be something that doesn’t, you don’t need to have the TV all the time. You might actually overcome that habit. You might actually try, try a couple of hours where you disconnect it or even taking your phone, putting that in another room for an hour, just playing play something, have fun to learn, learn something in you. Just have [inaudible] with data and information that will empower you, that will help you, that will support you, that will help you be more active and productive. Right.

Speaker 2:

Both about the information sources that you know that you trust them and also about not overloading ourselves with information and detoxing.

Speaker 1:

So much information. Yup.

Speaker 2:

Nutrition. That’s very important. Then there’s a, there’s a opportunity right now. Most of us

Speaker 1:

Can cook for ourselves right now.

Speaker 2:

We have more time. We don’t eat out as much, so it’s an opportunity to eat real food and not eat too much of it and it mainly veggies. I think if you follow these three rules, eating real foods, so avoiding processed food as much as possible and not overeating and eating a lot of veggies,

Speaker 1:

You’re, you’re pretty good. You know, there’s a lot of other advice, but that’s a good start. Yeah. And even, even if you only do a little bit about it, like be, be mindful that you might have voices in you that says, let’s eat more. Let’s eat more sugar. Let’s, let’s just not all because of this, these depressing situation, but the actual habit of cooking can protect you from going deeper and deeper into, into these depress mode. A few days ago I got a free online course about making the perfect omelet and I thought, okay, that’s going to be a probably a waste of my time. Like I know how to make an omelet. But I watched it anyway. And I was surprised about two big mistakes I was making my whole life when I was making homelands. And I’ve fixed the, those two mistakes. And the next time I’ve made the Edina for my family and, and made some omelette the kids were very impressed on the level of fluffiness of Wilmette and they basically asked me to cook again and we, we cook more. We actually give our kids each kid has its own meals that they cook for the family. So they are part of the process and you can be very, very long, right? Like in a good way. You can take your time and, and, and experiment.

Speaker 2:

Alright. And do you have to send me this class? I wonder what I will learn.

Speaker 1:

Oh man, I was shocked about the way you, you mix the ex. I was doing gold all along. Okay.

Speaker 2:

You got me curious and the, you just did or the next slide you shared an experience, you know, we talked to, we just talked about the information overwhelmed and it’s like living through other people’s experiences and we would like to encourage you to create your own experience. This is, we are in a period of time in history that will be part of history. No, we will have what to tell our grandkids, you know, use it to use this time, this special time in our life to, to do special things that will be memorable and we want to encourage you to connect to people you care about. You know, I especially put a landline kind of fun picture here, you know, eh, I find myself calling my friends, which I normally don’t do enough and suddenly I do it and it’s super nourishing, you know? It’s so intimate and special and also just normalizing. I understand that I’m not the only one who’s going through this craziness and they’re going through it and think it’s a great way to connect. So we can’t see each other much, eh, right now. But you know, we can chat online, we can send emails, we can call, we can even send a letter via snail mail, like the old way, you know, try that. That will be very special.

Speaker 2:

And once again, group support. You know, I talked about it earlier, but eh, yeah, we can mention it again. It’s just finding ways to connect with your friends with, we just did, my family did. We usually eat eh, Shabbat, eh, meal together, the whole extended family and we can do it. So we did the zoom.

Speaker 1:

Wow. Wow.

Speaker 2:

Of course it wasn’t as nourishing as actually meeting and eating my mother’s food. But it was fun. It was fun.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. We, we do a little bit of like a WhatsApp calls with like four, four video screens. So my wife’s sister and her kids, we end to allocate and my wife’s out of system and her kitten can’t mother and or the grandfather and like it will just be a very unique experience to see all the kids together, each of them in their own homes. I want to also mention about connecting to your loved, it really doesn’t matter how you can even connect by writing a journal that you will later on or read for them or we will later on show them or you will later on send to them once these pandemic is over. I’ve seen an idea about celebrating a half birthday, meaning right now a kid can celebrate his birthday, but then after the pandemic, six months after his birthday, he can celebrate his 6.5, but they end, there was like a cake cut into the middle and it said like happy half birthday like for a kid.

Speaker 1:

And that, that’s a unique moment where you choose to do something special and fun and positive. Suffolk you will remember for life and you could talk about it for life. It’s, it’s, it’s a story you can share and talking about support, there are now so many opportunities for free support and for, for cheap support and like just learning in a group on an online school, like the ones that we have in TV media is actually providing a lot of, of moments where you connect with other people that care about you, that wants you to succeed. And that’s a, another thing that can help you.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. The also asking for help, you know, it’s really, they’re all in this vulnerable state right now and people really when you need help and people are happy to give every two years. So the courageous and be vulnerable and ask for help.

Speaker 1:

And also like Yana said on the check volunteering or helping under the constraints of, of the regulations. It’s an opportunity you can teach someone for free. You can, you can just be kind to other people remember that when we will all kind. So we can do that.

Speaker 2:

Right? They are all isolated, elderly, isolated people that would love to get a phone call. And there’s all sorts of organizations that can hook up with you can call and actually giving services nourishing. It’s actually a great way to regulate yourself. To volunteer.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. Yeah. So we w w we have collected a few tools that can help you to create a more generous relationship and clear of them very appropriate to these days. And we, we do share a lot of information about them on the Jeunesse managed dotcom website. But we want to say just why did we choose those? Play a white dude, can they help you? The, these can help you in these times to overcome isolation.

Speaker 2:

So, you know, when we’re so triggered and there’s so much uncertainty and we get anxious, it’s easy to notice what’s missing and what is wrong and what is bad. And gratitude is the easiest and most rewarding practice you can do to tackle that because gratitude helps us notice what’s good, what’s beautiful, what’s nourishing, what’s eh, pleasant right now. And there’s tons of research in the last decade or so about the long lasting effects of [inaudible] and in our website, whether you examples of that. But for example, you can write a journal and write three things every morning that you’re grateful for or in the evening I do this practice with my wife, especially when we’re done. Each of us says a few things we’re grateful about, you know, about ourselves, about the world, about each other. So that’s very helpful and nourishing.

Speaker 1:

And we, we actually use a post it notes hearing in the family and share a moment together and say thank you for something. And God did you do you know, the research says that after you do it 21 days straight, your brain actually starts to change in a positive way. You start to look for positive more than anything more than before anyway, and we have the time right now. This one is really good for you because if you stop now because of the lockdowns, you will be able to even maintain the habit later on and you will just get to the results with the independent mic most likely. And it can even help you a safe, like a, be safe because you will be overcoming pain more easily. You, you will, you just being in a better mindset to be, to stay healthy. Right?

Speaker 2:

Another great tool is the vending conversation and there are a few ways to do it, but

Speaker 2:

The most important thing about it is it’s a structured way to vent with your partner about everything but your partner. All right? So it’s like maybe 10 minutes each of just, you know, sharing how shitty that was and how annoying he was and the whatever happened there and the how. I’m tired of the isolation and now the kids are driving me nuts, not about each other, just about other people and other events. Then after 10 minutes or 15 minutes, you decide ahead of time you switch and your partner events again, not about you. And if it feels too long, if you decide that each person gets 15 minutes and it feels too long, you can switch to gratitude to celebrating successes and good things that happened today. It doesn’t have to be all about venting, but it’s perfectly okay if it is all about venting. There’s so much pressure right now coming from the outside and we want to keep our marriage, our relationship as solid as possible. And this is a great way to, to bond and to protect our relationship from there. All the outside noise that’s happening right now and they need friends, you know, be supportive

Speaker 1:

And, and this is especially like the right tool when you’re going through a lot. Well, we all got through a lot right now. So it’s a, it’s a very useful practical tool. And there is another tool that we’ve mentioned many times in our webinars in the generous marriage website and on our podcast, which is the, what makes you feel loved conversation. We actually have a, a PDF about that, like a resource you can download and Shannon will create a resource page about specifically the covered 19 pandemic and we would share the links later on with every one that was signed up for email lists. But now you can play the same game instead of talking about what makes you feel loved. You can ask your now in terms what makes you feel supported because supporting each other right now, that is very generous thing to do and a gateway to overcome an isolation feeling. You can even ask your partner, what makes you feel safe? Think about that. We don’t really save, but we are looking for what doesn’t make you feel safe because some things actually do make us feel safe. When you think about it, even now, just being able to talk about that makes makes me feel connected and safe. So,

Speaker 2:

So the way we do it is a one partners partner go both first and let’s say he asks her what makes you feel supported and she answers and then you can ask why. So she can say some more about what about this eh, thing that makes her feel supported and then you switch. So in each turn you answer one answer, not, not too many, not too overwhelming. Don’t use this opportunity to criticize each other for not your partner is not doing you just, and you know, I mentioned share what does make you feel supported and you do four or five rounds of that and it’s okay, like Ziva say mentioned to be creative and change and you know, ask about support it and ask about what makes you feel loved and most wrecks you fail safe. What makes you feel nourished? What makes you feel sexy? You know, we had the, we didn’t talk about sex in this presentation, but this is a great time to make love. I hope you make love with yourself. Yeah. And we will create, I will create a, we will create a resource page and we’ll have these three resources and the plan so far, the resources that are that can help you these days with the isolation and the uncertainty and can help you keep your marriage, your relationship generous and strong. And we’ll send an email about it.

Speaker 1:

Remember that you need to take care of yourself without the extra resources. You can’t be generous. And let’s wrap up guys, we we have a complete, you have time. We have a podcast. So we, we recommend you listen to the generous marriage broadcast. It’s plain and it’s available and there’s a lot of bonus games that you can play with your partner, even just right now in this period of time. And we actually have two different seasons. One with exploring the toolbox, which is the first season and the second season where we interview a lot of thinkers and influencers and movers and shakers. So there’s all sorts of episodes about sex and all sorts of episodes. About relationships and, and can you save this marriage? Yes, you can. And all sorts of big questions that we ask.

Speaker 1:

And it’s funny you can listen to it on your phone. You can go to [inaudible], match.com and listen to it directly and if you need any assistance in any private decision, if you have any questions, you’d know where to find us, you can contact us directly, have a Facebook on [inaudible] dot com there’s a way to do that. So thank you for being here. Thank you for sharing with us this moment of trying to look into the situation, into the isolation, understanding where we are at a very special, unique HUD. Fascinating point in time. Scary. like we will end GRI, we are going through a lot and we’re actually not going through it alone. We are all together in this

Speaker 2:

Right and we’re happy to be here for you. If you have any question, reach out to us, email [email protected] or your email or that’s enough. Okay.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah. You already have my emails. If you, the team in tennis, match.com is perfect. And we’ll walk either way. Please be safe. Please make sure you, you’re careful. And we will go through this together and we’ll get out to the other end and everything will be back to normal. You’ll see it. It will be faster than you think.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. And we’ve been even there. Yeah. All right. Thank you Dave.

Speaker 1:

Thank you. Bye. Bye. [inaudible]

Speaker 2:

I advise the Raviv.