The Implicit Power Struggles in Our (and every) Intimate Relationship

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hi everyone. Um, we are very happy to be here today. And today we're gonna actually do a special episode about the behind the scenes of working together. I , as some of you have noticed , um , in the past 20 or more talks, Gale has been joining us, joining me. And as you know, as you can, some of you have experienced it, hasn't gone so smoothly and today we're gonna take time and we're gonna actually show the backstage of what happens behind the scenes. And also, why is it so difficult for us sometimes to share this spotlight?

Speaker 2: 0:33

You are listening to the potential state podcast With your host, Dr . ASEL Romanelli.

Speaker 1: 0:42

Hi, my name's Dr . ASEL Romanelli

Speaker 3: 0:44

I'm believe Romanelli,

Speaker 1: 0:45

And this is the potential state. And today we're gonna talk about the power dynamics in every relationship, starting with our relationship. So about a year and a half ago , I started making these talks and about a hundred talks later, I realized that I want Gallet to be part of these talks. It was a cuz all these theories, all these , the ideas have been cooked in our relationship and have been tested and tried. And I thought this would be wonderful to bring in Galit and to share the stage and to her bring her side. Cuz I used to use bring a lot of examples of my marriage with Galit . And so this was a wonderful idea, but when she actually practically came in and those of you who know me know that it's hard , I'm a one man show and it's hard for me to share this space. Um, I saw that it was really hard for , for me on a physical level cognitively. I loved it, but physically as we were filming it, it was like, Ugh . And it was hard for me to share the space and I was man spliting her and cutting her off. And in my mind I was saying, oh, this we have to go on faster . We have a script and she's going off script. And I started getting feedback, especially for men that it looked like I was , um, shutting myself up or forcing myself to let her in, in the beginning I felt a lot of shame and it was kind of like, I didn't wanna talk about it with delete , but then we started opening up and, and we realized, and I realized that this is part of a wider dynamic, which we call the ninety five seventy, which we'll talk about in a second and bringing that together. And we've reached a point where we said, Galit said, and I love her for saying that. She said, we need to make it talk about this, about this parallel process, cuz you guys are witnessing as we are starting to work together. How this power dynamic between us is manifesting in our overt and covert power struggles in these talks.

Speaker 3: 2:22

Yeah. Um, I love that. So I think that part of , um, what was happening kind of simultaneously to you creating your channel and your talks was that I was also finding my voice , um, in, in working with, with um, the whole infant feeding journey and, and working with mothers. And, and so then when, when you had kind of suggested, or when I think we realized that a lot of the things that you were bringing to the, to these talks was our relationship. It only felt right to actually join and really bring my voice to the room because that felt aligned with what I was trying to achieve. Um, and yeah, we came up, we , we , we came up with a lot of challenges and, and , and noticed that we were talking over each other, we were kind of fighting for the space. Um, and it became clear , um, not, not just, but also from the constructive feedback that, that it was, it was, it was becoming a challenge that was, that was something that we really should address and look into. And I think that one of the last videos, I really noticed it, like it became really , um, I became really aware of how much we were doing it and that we were really kind of like fighting over the space. Um, I also wanna say that I, I think it , we realized that it was an opportunity, a to be transparent on the process and also to realize where we weren't working towards each other's strengths. So ASTE is much more ad and logical and he really builds out the structure and my strength is much more improvisational. I'm a fast reactor. I take something and I see kind of where it landed and how it came to play in our relationship or in our family or in past experiences. And I am much more associative, but we weren't working together in a partnership that worked towards our strengths. Rather we were trying to kind of compete, compete or fit into like I needed to fit into the existing structure. And so we realized that that's not working and we needed to kind of name it and renegotiate. And I think that what we realized was that this is another opportunity to refine our work on the 95 70 and explore. And so we came up with , um, through working on these videos, we actually came up a new , uh , with a new way and process to , uh , tease out and soften the 95 70 from various areas in the relationship. And what we came uh , up with was , um , observation, right? To first kind of observe, like where does the 95 70 exist? Where do we have it in our, so where is the power dynamic?

Speaker 1: 5:13

So we'll use this as an example. So once she starts joining me in the videos, I'm realizing I have a 95, 70 on intelligence or on knowledge. And I feel like I know more knowledge and she does, and that's, that's triggering me. So first we just observe that right . Playfully and

Speaker 3: 5:26

We , we start . And also, I wanna say it's kind of very internally, right? I'm not necessarily even yet bringing that to my partner. I'm just noticing it. I'm just observing. So one is observation. The next is exploration. So now that I've identified kind of what, what, where this power dynamic comes to play, what am I willing to kind of soften? Where would I be willing to , uh , give up a little bit of, kind of my 95? Where do I want to raise a little bit from my 70? And what would that kind of look like?

Speaker 1: 5:56

Because , because in , in every couple there's categories where deletes the 95 and there's categories where I'm the 95 and part of this internal exploration is what would I want to take more of in our case, she's the 95 parent. So do I want more of the parenting gravitas?

Speaker 3: 6:09

And what would that look like? And how can , how can we start to become more fluid in these potentially rigid 95, 70 categories? And then the next stage is negotiation, right? And this is actually where you start bringing in your partner and , and bringing it into a place where you can discuss it. You bring it to the table and you can say, I wanna soften this. I've noticed that. And would like to change that and really start negotiating what each of you can let go of a little bit and take more of a little bit and what that would

Speaker 1: 6:40

Look like. And , and this talk is an example of a negotiation where we're owning it. We're saying it playfully, we're trying to own it. And we're trying to renegotiate saying , how do we share this space and how do we I'm naming it. And when I, when I, to my 95, I call it when delete , when I start melting to the seventies , she calls me out on it and we try to start , uh , kind of working first as a Seesaw, but then slowly becomes kind of a dance,

Speaker 3: 7:03

Right? Where can I just give you the space to say what you're saying? And wait, take a breath and then see, do I have something to add or no, am I just gonna repeat what you're saying? And that's not necessary. And then the final is cross pollination of actually acting it out, starting to slowly change the 95 70 dynamic, which again is, is, this is really this

Speaker 1: 7:25

What we're doing right now. And it's drops. It's water on a rock. It's gonna take a while because these power dynamics are on societal level. It's the psychological patriarch or this feeling of scarcity that we all have. And you're gonna see that once you kind of soften, it's gonna take time. And as you can see in our talks, 20 talks later, we're still slowly working at it. And even as we're doing this video, we are slowly massaging that split, that dichotomy, that hierarchical dicho hierarchical. Yeah. So for those of you who kind of want to start softening this, these four stages are kind of like a roadmap and obvious sticks more than just a talk to change it. Yeah . And what we've noticed is a, you might need the help of a third party . Somebody who's gonna enable you to be playfully to put it on a table and own your shift . Yeah.

Speaker 3: 8:06

Because it's really difficult. These, I , I think that the 95, 70 conversations are really difficult and sometimes they have shame or guilt or kind of feeling embarrassment. And sometimes also there's a lot of vulnerability and , um, it's not, it's not pleasant necessarily to hear that your partner thinks that here you're a bit lacking or that they're superior here or that , or to say, I'm superior here. Where are you? I need you more here kind of thing.

Speaker 1: 8:32

And , and what we realize that it exists in almost every single relationship. And you can refer to the episode of why do we empower others, but belitle our partners. And what we do suggest is either work with somebody else. And also we are developing a webinar. We're gonna be , uh , piloting it in February where we're gonna de dive much deeper into this power dynamics, what we call the ninety five, seventy through examples from our own marriage. Yeah . And there'll be some exercises that you can work with your partner yeah . To kind of raise these topics.

Speaker 3: 8:58

Yeah. And I wanna say that , um, firstly, thank you to our listeners and viewers for, for being patient with us and watching us as we kind of, as this process unfolds, I know that it has been challenging. Um, and so thank you. And the other thing I wanna say is that, that our hope is that we will be able to first in relationships, but that, you know, these circles will expand and slowly we will soften all the rigid , um, notions of bigger, better, stronger, right? And like it will stop being a competitive, hierarchical language, culture, society. And we can start living in a bit more , um , harmony and a bit more , um , abundance realizing that everybody has something to contribute and we don't need to be competing over any types of resources. And it starts here

Speaker 1: 9:57

Cause the biggest tax you pay for being in the 95, 7 is loneliness and competition and a sense that I can't lean on my partner. So we are walking this path, follow us, join us. Let's do this. Let's change the power dynamics in relationships. This was elite Romanelli,

Speaker 3: 10:14

Dr . AEL Romanelli. And

Speaker 1: 10:15

We're the potential potential state. Let's see you next time.

Speaker 2: 10:19

You've been listening to the potential state podcast For more information, visit us@potentialstate.com. And thank you for listening.