Today we're discussing our drive to seek security in relationships, especially as economic uncertainty increases, and how sometimes, that can turn around and bite us. We'll be talking about why we seek security in relationships, some paradoxes of security, and as always, some tools to help better understand your own behavior around seeking security in your relationships.

Jase: 00:00:03

There's a difference between intimacy and connection and then fusion, which means kind of becoming one. And when we've talked about this before, we've talked about Esther Perel and, you know, her whole take of when intimacy between partners collapses into fusion, then it's not a lack of closeness, but actually too much closeness that impedes desire. She's big on the whole like, you fell in love with your partner because you saw them doing their own thing and you thought that was cool. And then as you developed your relationship, you kind of lost any sense of identity outside of each other. And so you don't feel that same desire or that excitement for your partner because it doesn't feel like there are any mysteries. You don't kind of have that ability to see them across the room anymore. Metaphorically speaking, there requires some separateness in order to have someone that you want to connect with, right? Like in order to want to connect with them, they have to be separate Welcome to the Multiamory Podcast. I'm Jase.

Emily: 00:01:05

I'm Emily.

Dedeker: 00:01:06

And I'm Dedeker.

Emily: 00:01:07

We believe in looking to the future of relationships, not maintaining the status quo of the past.

Dedeker: 00:01:13

Whether you're monogamous, polyamorous, swinging, casually dating, or if you just do relationships differently, we see you and we're here for you.

Emily: 00:01:31

Forcing me to form myself.

Jase: 00:01:35

To fit. On this episode of the Multiamory podcast, we're talking about security and how sometimes the things that we do to try to find security in our relationships could actually be having the opposite effect. We're going to explore a little bit about why we seek out security, some of the different ways that we do that, as well as some interesting paradoxes that our pursuit of security can cause. And then at the end, we're going to look at some tools for how we can examine that and how we can adjust our relationship to security to hopefully get us more security while also making us more at ease and happier as we're doing it. If you're interested in learning more about our fundamental communication tools that we reference on this show, you can check out our book, Multiamory: Essential Tools for Modern Relationships. It covers our most used communication tools for all types of relationships, and you can find links to buy it in print, Ebook and [email protected]/book Emily and Dedeker: what if I told you that the very behaviors you use to make your relationships feel more secure were actually making it less secure? How would you react to that?

Dedeker: 00:02:48

I'd say you're a liar. That's crazy. I can't believe it.

Emily: 00:02:51

See, I would believe him. And no, that's probably true in a lot of ways. And then in fact, not just like me feeling less secure, but also probably making my partner not feel as good about the relationship in general, perhaps.

Jase: 00:03:06

Dang. Yeah. I definitely can relate to sometimes where my pursuit of like, oh, does this person really like me? Has definitely been the thing that ultimately felt like it drove them away. Maybe that's not true. It's hard to always say looking back in retrospect, but Sometimes I've had that feeling and sometimes that fear in current relationships of like, am I asking too much for reassurance? Like, is it too many times if I ask, like, if I look good in this outfit or something like that? So the thing that inspired me to put this episode together was looking at various trends and articles and things about relationships. And there have been these posts that have come up, and this isn't new, right? This has been happening for several years, but about future-proofing your relationships. And I think that these aren't all bad. Like a lot of the advice in these posts is- Wait.

Dedeker: 00:04:01

Didn't they used to call this affair-proofing like 10 years ago?

Jase: 00:04:05

Oh, I'm not familiar with that term.

Dedeker: 00:04:07

Really? That's the term I'm more familiar with.

Jase: 00:04:10

Seeing in the literature.

Emily: 00:04:11

Interesting. Future-proofing, I also don't really know what that means. Can you kind of give us an overview of what that even means? Because I'm unfamiliar with it. Exactly.

Dedeker: 00:04:21

This is all crumbling at the seams.

Emily: 00:04:22

That's a great question. Yeah.

Jase: 00:04:25

So I know it is funny because the term future proofing to me always comes up more in like software and technology fields where it's like we want to build our software so that it can adapt and change as standards and expectations of people change in the future. Like that's often called future proofing or like making it compatible with new software is coming up. And so yeah, it is a little bit weird to wrap my head around what does future proofing mean in this context, but basically The way that I would describe it, just based on the articles that I've looked at and what I've seen, is it's this idea of saying, I want to make it so that this relationship will be stable and last, and that I don't have to worry about it. It's not going to sneak up on me and fall apart later on. And so... Good luck with that. I know. Good luck with it. I think part of the problem might be that it's setting up some unrealistic expectations about relationships in this pursuit of security. But as far as the actual advice that comes up with it, it's not all bad. In fact, a lot of it is stuff that we'd agree with. A lot of it's things like have more vulnerable conversations earlier, like actually talk about what you really do want in your relationships and not avoid conflict early on because you want to keep the peace. It's kind of more like get that out in the open earlier on so you don't have surprises later on. I think that we could talk all day about how trying to eliminate any possibility of surprises is what leads people down the road of making a bunch of complicated rules and agreements that then are hard to actually follow or that don't keep up with the changing relationship. But I think that's kind of the idea is it's like we see all this instability going on. We want to try to go against that. We want to do something that's more intentional. For the sake of either just not being in a relationship or being in one that we're, like, confident is gonna last. And I don't think that's a new sentiment in relationship talk at all. I think it's just a new way of saying it. I feel like, you know, maybe in the 90s it would have been articles about, like, how to tell if he's a keeper or something like that.

Emily: 00:06:34

Right? Maybe a fair proofing is an interesting one, too, when you look at that, because, again, I mean, I. I just think it is impossible. I. I have to tell myself constantly in my relationships whenever. I feel nervous or vulnerable about something, especially in the context of non-monogamy, that like, even if you were in a monogamous relationship, your partner could still leave you for someone else and still find somebody else more attractive, more interesting, more beautiful, whatever it is. And that doesn't change just because you are in a monogamous setting, for instance. And I don't know if there's anything that you can do to make sure that that doesn't happen or that that can't happen. Like, you kind of have to just let go of the potential and just, like, see what happens.

Jase: 00:07:28

Maybe it's about being a fair resistance rather than a fair proof.

Emily: 00:07:34

Sure. Future. Future resistance.

Jase: 00:07:37

Future adoption.

Dedeker: 00:07:39

I appreciate that distinction. Going down a Google rabbit hole of affair proofing, realizing two things. One of them, it does bring me to this book from 1998, A Fair Proof youf Marriage. So that's about the time frame that I was thinking of. But it also brings up a lot of Christian resources as well. And maybe that's where I picked up from being steeped in Christianity. Maybe this is a little bit of a Christian coded phrase. I don't know.

Jase: 00:08:07

Possibly, yeah. It makes sense there'd be extra priority put on affair proofing, right? That like, that's the, what's important is that the affair doesn't happen and having a good relationship is maybe secondary to that. Maybe I'm just being too cynical right now, but that's what will happen. So we've talked about this future proofing or affair proofing or affair resistant, whatever it is, you know, fire resistant.

Dedeker: 00:08:33

Can we make a relationship fire retardant at the very least?

Emily: 00:08:36

Hopefully.

Jase: 00:08:36

I like that idea. I wonder how. I guess maybe that's having good things in place to help de-escalate a conflict when it's brewing. Maybe we could call that.

Dedeker: 00:08:46

Oh, Jace, I was trying to talk about literal fire safety. I think that maybe takes precedent over conflict.

Jase: 00:08:52

I suppose that's true.

Dedeker: 00:08:53

Yeah. I'd rather be in a bad fight with you than to be on fire with you.

Jase: 00:08:57

Sure. Okay.

Emily: 00:08:58

Yeah.

Jase: 00:08:59

All right. You make a compelling argument. Oh, boy. Okay. So, so with all of this talking about future proofing and whatever, the heart of what we're really getting at is this desire for security. And I think that's pretty relatable thing. But to kind of first check in, I wanted to look at some ways this can show up and see if maybe we've done any of these. And listener, include yourself in this conversation here. So the first one would be something like checking your partner's social media more than you would like to admit or more than might be healthy. Anybody here perhaps done this?

Dedeker: 00:09:37

As a means of trying to seek security, specifically?

Jase: 00:09:41

Yeah, you could look at it of like, I want security by making sure they're not doing something I don't approve of, like reading between the lines.

Dedeker: 00:09:48

Sure, yeah. I mean, I've definitely been that type of person where I feel like the more information I have, the more equipped I will be to avoid any kind of surprises. And so if I can keep tabs on someone a little bit better, then I will ergo feel more secure.

Emily: 00:10:04

Exactly. That's an interesting distinction there because it's not necessarily that I am looking at likes because I'm going to get upset at my partner, but it's more that I'm like, okay, who's liking this slash who did my partner recently friend, for instance? And is it a person that I heard about them recently meeting? And is that going to turn into something more just so that I have information? I feel like sometimes We try to make sure that something isn't sprung on us because if that were to happen, then it would feel even worse than if at least we had a little bit of information at play and know, like, okay, this is a possibility. So I can kind of try to temper my emotions a little bit because I understand that this may be something that's about to happen here.

Jase: 00:10:52

It's an interesting, interesting, long roundabout way of of justifying it. Explaining it away.

Emily: 00:10:59

I'm not saying it's good. I'm just saying this is what I do.

Jase: 00:11:02

Well, and I think it's interesting, right? Because you're talking about it from kind of a sense of security, right? Like, I don't want to be surprised by something. And so having more information means I won't be surprised. But and we'll get into this a little bit more later when we talk about some of the paradoxes. But with this one, it's that yes, but then also I would guess that you're also prepared for a lot more negative things than actually happen. And so you're kind of going through a lot more suffering and preparing when it's not necessary and potentially eroding some trust and closeness in that relationship. So I think that's a good example of how these things all feel good. Like they feel clear, they feel like you have reasons for it. So like another one here is asking the whole like, do you still love me over and over again? Or are you still attracted to me or something? And this is one that I'm definitely bad about this one occasionally, especially if I'm tired and even more so before I was on antidepressants. So like all those things factor in there that it's just that constantly pursuing that validation from your partner. It's like to one extent asking for what you need is good, but at some point it can kind of cross this line into now you're just it feels like you're just not believing the answer. And so you're just asking it over and over again.

Emily: 00:12:24

One is maybe feeling really anxious when your partner doesn't text back quickly, and so your mind maybe goes to a worst-case scenario. That can mean that maybe they're off with somebody that is more fun and cool than you are. But I had this happen with you, Jase, when you were in Bulgaria that one time, and I didn't hear from you. Romania, sorry. And Romania, yes. It was a long time ago, but... I thought you had died. I truly thought you had died. I went so just to the absolute worst case scenario because I hadn't heard from you in like, maybe it was just an evening or something, but it was very unlike you. I think that's the thing as well, is that if there's like a pattern of behavior that all of a sudden changes, it's like you have to rewire your brain in that moment to try to understand what the heck just happened and what the heck just went on. And sometimes instead of doing that in a rational way, you go to, oh, this person must have just like perished somehow. They're in a foreign country. Because now they're gone. Oh, Jace goes to Romania.

Dedeker: 00:13:28

I don't hear from him for 24 hours. That sounds like a total Jace thing, honestly.

Jase: 00:13:34

Really?

Emily: 00:13:34

That's interesting.

Dedeker: 00:13:35

Especially like, okay, if you're going to, I was going to say only if you're going to Romania for some purpose, as though there's a version of this.

Emily: 00:13:44

Where you're going to Romania for no reason at all.

Dedeker: 00:13:45

Yeah, if you ended up in Romania for no purpose whatsoever, I would expect to hear from you. But if you went and it's a work thing, especially, I'm just like, I'm.

Jase: 00:13:54

Not gonna hear from that guy. Sure, yeah. Also, I will say this is from an era when I didn't have a cell phone of my own. I had to borrow one from production that was the one I was able.

Dedeker: 00:14:04

To use, and I wasn't able to use it.

Emily: 00:14:07

So this was 250 years ago.

Dedeker: 00:14:08

Wait, really? This was the 18th century. Yeah. After the French Revolution.

Emily: 00:14:13

Okay, now I've placed this in history. All right, I guess that makes sense that you wouldn't necessarily be on the other side of the world with a cell phone plan that would be able to contact me, for instance.

Dedeker: 00:14:23

Exactly, because it was the French Revolution. It was 1789.

Emily: 00:14:26

We didn't know. Our cell phone plans weren't very robust back then.

Jase: 00:14:29

Yep, I had to climb over barricades in the street to get a signal.

Emily: 00:14:34

Yeah, but no, that makes sense. I think it was just very different for me at the time to not hear from you. And so that put me in this state of, oh, my gosh, something happened here that was really bad.

Dedeker: 00:14:45

Okay, well, can I ask about the actual future proofing part of this, which I'm still wrapping my brain around? Like, is this in reference to things like just like really trying to pin down what your future is gonna be with this person? Like really trying to have a lot of conversations as a means of trying to get security. Like really trying to have a sense of where is this going? Where is this headed? Do you see this as being serious? Do you see this as being not serious? Could you see us getting married? Could you see us living together? Like all those things?

Jase: 00:15:12

Is that what future proofing means? Yeah, it's a lot of those sorts of things. It's like, let's have talks early on about money. Or whether we want kids or whether we think we want to get married. Yeah, so some of it, I think, is planning a little bit too far ahead for some things in your relationship that you might not know yet. But also, on the other hand, we're all fans of talking more openly about money earlier on instead of having that be such a taboo thing you can't talk about. But I do want to clarify that this episode is not about future-proofing. That was just what got me thinking about this security-seeking behavior. So all of these things we're talking about are not parts of future-proofing. Like, this is not stuff that's advised in articles or people's Instagrams about future proofing. That's more just kind of what started this idea. But I think more of the thing to look out for here is, do you find yourself really seeking those sorts of things? Like, I want to find some way to make this thing sure, to kind of guarantee I'm not going to have any problems.

Emily: 00:16:12

Often, I think, we, in order to try to not rock the boat, you may just like avoid bringing up concerns because you're afraid of conflict. You're afraid that that might threaten the relationship. You're afraid that if I bring this up, my partner is going to decide pretty early on. Actually, maybe I shouldn't be with this person because, yeah, we're really not aligned in that way. I mean, when it comes to non monogamy, I think that that's something in my long term relationship that I should have brought up pretty immediately when he was very upset about that possibility, especially like as time went on about that being something in my life. And when I tried to change that, I think that it just wasn't a good thing overall for me as a person and for him, I guess, to be around that potential of me wanting to do it eventually again. So that was just a huge misalignment. And we didn't talk about it really fundamentally. Until, I think, way down the line when the hurt and the pain had gotten way worse.

Jase: 00:17:19

I think that's an interesting example that's kind of on the opposite extreme of the future-proofing conversations, which are kind of like, have all of the hard things up front, like get all of those conflicts out of the way so then you never have to worry about them is kind of the mentality behind it. Versus on the other hand, there's that, like, well, I'm going to actually avoid any sort of conflict or bringing anything up. To try to feel more secure that way. Because then, oh, if we're not fighting, that means we're good, right? And I don't have to worry about anything. Sure. Even if maybe you're laying the groundwork for bigger problems down the road.

Emily: 00:17:50

Definitely.

Dedeker: 00:17:52

Yeah.

Jase: 00:17:52

I think this can also show up in over researching relationships or relationship decisions. And this could be anything from the, oh, let me take this quiz that says it'll help determine whether my relationship's going to last. Or it could just be put together this big kind of pros and cons, facts list in a spreadsheet about like whether or not we should get married or something like that, and that kind of hiding behind too much research. That's not to say people should get married lightly. Let me be clear, I think that's actually something you should spend a lot of time researching, but maybe for smaller relationship type decisions, if you find yourself using that as kind of a coping mechanism to try to feel less at risk, I guess, or like there's fewer unknowns. And with all of this desire for security and being afraid of things being unpredictable, I think it's understandable. And there are some reasons why this might be even more common now than it has in the past. One of those is economic uncertainty, that when we feel insecure about kind of the world economy, as well as how that will affect our own personal ability to make money and pay for our expenses and stuff. That also creates a lot of emotional uncertainty and fear that can then show up in our relationships.

Emily: 00:19:15

I'm trying to think back to this time in my life also when stuff like social media wasn't around as much. Back when I think I was dating non-monogamously with you, Jason, with you, Deds, right at the beginning of 2013, for example. And I feel like that comparison factor was not shoved in our faces quite as much as it is now. And I do feel like there were times when I felt a little bit more sure of myself, maybe. I don't know. I wonder how much, if the circumstances were similar now to when they were then, I wonder if I would feel less insecure about myself sometimes.

Jase: 00:19:57

Like if you just didn't have as much access to social support.

Emily: 00:20:00

To all of these comparisons. Yeah, sure, sure. I don't know.

Dedeker: 00:20:05

I think something that can influence our overall sense of security with relationships is actually the amount of relationship information we're exposed to. So it's not only being able to, like we referred to earlier, like being able to see your partner's every move online essentially, right? Who they follow and who they like and who's commenting on their stuff. But I mean, this podcast exists in the ecosystem of like all the information about relationships and psychology that's out there. And I think especially when it comes to dating or relationship formation, I think we live in a culture that's just much more hyper aware of like all the things we suddenly need to worry about and scream for. Like, is he a narcissist? Is this person trauma dumping on me? Uh, are they love bombing me? Are our attachment styles compatible? All of this stuff that I think plants these little seeds of insecurity potentially, or at least seeds of stuff that we we could be worrying about and obsessing over.

Jase: 00:21:02

Yeah. Yeah. It's actually funny, another area that I feel like I've really seen a change over the last 20 years or so is with parents, too, especially with their first children, of just the amount of awareness we have of all the things that could go wrong has created, like, even more of this kind of hypervigilance, hyper fear of. Of something bad could happen to my baby.

Emily: 00:21:23

Oh, you're talking about. Young parents that you know first-hand.

Jase: 00:21:26

First-time parents, whether they're young or not, doesn't matter. Sure, sure. But it's their first child that I feel like I've noticed a much bigger increase in the amount of things that they know to be afraid about or to be worried about, either from a parenting point of view or just from a safety or illness kind of point of view.

Emily: 00:21:44

There's also just this unbelievable abundance of choice that we have now in things like dating apps that, again, yes, we were doing that maybe in 2013, 2014 when we started this show, but now it's just is so prevalent. It's so in the zeitgeist. It's so much that question of, like, okay, who's on my roster for the week or whatever, or what date am I going to go on today? It's pretty incredible just how much choice there is and how many different people we can get involved with at any given time. And I don't know that that might make us feel insecure as well, just simply because we know that. Somebody could just drop us for the next hot thing at any given time.

Jase: 00:22:27

I think especially this can come up with this feeling that, well, my partner, because I obviously think they're attractive and hot, everyone on the apps is going to be into them. And so, like, look at all these choices they have. And, you know, my perception of myself is not as generous, right? Not as good. And so can lead to that fear of, like, oh, my gosh, they have so many options all the time. And I can see that everywhere. And then potentially also things like delayed life milestones, like that these kind of markers of stability, even though we've talked about they maybe don't actually make us a lot more stable, things like getting married, having kids, stuff like that, that we're doing those later in life on the whole. Maybe that's also part of this equation of why we might be seeking more of these other, perhaps not as healthy ways to try to attain some kind of security in our relationships. And so with all of this, why is it a problem? I think the first one is that kind of like we've mentioned, it can wear your partner out and it often doesn't make you feel a lot better. Actually, there was this really interesting study that I found that's from 2022 in Europe's Journal of Psychology by Evrard, Dauszoa, and Wild, and they looked at the relationship between attachment styles and ERS, which is excessive reassurance seeking. So that's that kind of extra going out of your way to ask for a reassurance or checking up on a partner, things like that. They found several things, but the one I thought was particularly interesting is that they found that for individuals who scored as being anxiously attached, that they found that of those people, the ones who did more of this ERS, this excessive reassurance seeking, actually ended up decreasing the amount of trust they had for their partner over time. Like that they had this kind of extra negative effect on themselves, not even looking at how their partner felt about it, but this extra negative effect on themselves by seeking out that reassurance more often. And that was specifically for the anxiously attached individuals who anecdotally might sound like the ones most likely to pursue that sort of thing. But among those, the ones who did the most reassurance seeking actually ended up feeling like they had the least trust of their partner.

Emily: 00:24:40

Is that just because they don't believe it? Or what is that exactly?

Dedeker: 00:24:45

Well, I could see it creating a little bit of a feedback cycle where if you feel that the only time that you feel a sense of security or reassurance from your partner is when you ask for it.

Emily: 00:24:56

Sure.

Dedeker: 00:24:57

Yeah, that can plant a question mark in your brain of is there an actual foundation of trust here or not? Or is it just when I turn towards my partner and ask for it?

Jase: 00:25:07

Yeah, I've definitely seen, I've been on both sides of the situation where if someone asks for reassurance often enough, there's never enough of a like break to just spontaneously give that reassurance or to receive it not when you're asking for it. So that can definitely be part of that feedback loop.

Emily: 00:25:25

Well, and it also might feel to the partner like anytime I give this reassurance, they don't really believe me. They don't really trust that what I'm saying is true. And that can in turn just make the other partner feel really shitty, like, oh, my partner doesn't believe what I'm saying, or they don't necessarily even care what I'm saying.

Jase: 00:25:44

Yeah. And then with all of this, like we've talked about, there's this erosion of trust over time, because you're asking this over and over again. And so each time they answer you, it doesn't hit as hard. And so maybe you're actually developing a resistance to their reassurances in a way. And then also the same with anxiety, that by focusing on these things more and more and seeking this reassurance to make that go away. Again, it's like less effective over time. And so you feel like you need to ask more often. And you get into this cycle where you're actually just feeling more anxious more of the time. Or like with the seeking them on social media all the time of like keeping tabs on them that you're anxious about everything just in case it might let you be prepared for something that's bad, but you're in this state of anxiety all the time, even though those bad things maybe never happen or at least don't happen as often. So with all this, we're gonna get into the three paradoxes of security, which you probably already have some ideas about what these might be, but we're gonna look at some specifics. But before we do that, we're gonna take a quick break to talk about our sponsors for this show. Please do give them a listen if they sound interesting to you, or if we're particularly funny in the way that we talk about them, you should use our promo codes and our links. You can check out the links in our episode show notes. And also, if you'd like to join our community directly and get ad free episodes a day early, as well as our discussion groups, our monthly video processing groups, as well as extra add ons and things that we throw into episodes, then go to multiulemory.t com, Slash, Jo and become one of our subscribers there., And we're back and it's time to look at some paradoxes. So the first paradox is, if you wanted to be so secure that you went back in time and killed your parents, how would you?

Dedeker: 00:27:33

I asked. Wy, how badly do you want to.

Emily: 00:27:36

Be secure that you don't even exist, ever?

Jase: 00:27:40

Sorry, I was trying to think of like the first paradox that came to mind. It's always that like, I guess they call it the grandfather paradox of like, if you traveled back in time and killed your grandparents or caused them to die somehow, would you, how could you have been born to then travel back in time to make it happen? So that's not what we're talking about. What we're talking about is some paradoxes about this desire to seek security. So this first one, we're going to call the dependency paradox. So we often think that being independent is the goal, right? And that comes from like our warnings against being codependent. It's like we all talk about codependent being so bad, like, oh, we should be able to be independent and not need anybody else. However, when we look at attachment research, it kind of shows the opposite, that the more we can depend on people who are important to us as a safe base, the more confident and then ultimately independent we become. We kind of gain independence by being able to depend on people and feel secure in those. And so they found in various studies that people who feel really secure in their relationships are actually more likely, not less likely, to pursue their own relationships and their other friendships and things like that. And related to this, I had one quick study that I wanted to share with the two of you. And this is about what's called the Facebook Paradox. And basically- Hold on, let me guess. The Facebook Paradox.

Dedeker: 00:29:05

Okay, sure, sure. Created for people to enjoy each other and connect and nobody enjoys each other and everybody hates connecting. Is that the Facebook Paradox?

Emily: 00:29:15

I mean, that is what Facebook has become.

Jase: 00:29:17

That's what Facebook has become, yeah. This Facebook Paradox thing actually came about, I think, from a time before, either before Facebook sucked as much or before everyone realized it sucked as much as it did. I think maybe a little bit of each. Basically, this study, this is from 2017, and at that time, this concept of the Facebook Paradox already existed, which was that some research would show spending more time on Facebook was beneficial for your feelings of having a social support network and included improving the quality of your relationships, like your overall relationship satisfaction and life satisfaction. And then other studies would show the opposite. That spending more time on social media makes those things worse. It makes you have less of a social support network, things like that. So this study was trying to collect a bunch of data to try to understand some of the nuance of what's going on here. And what's interesting is they did kind of find arguments for both sides, but they weren't equally strong. So they found that having a strong social support network, whether that's online or offline, was the best predictor of overall wellbeing. But they found that having that from your offline relationships has a stronger effect than getting that from your online relationships. Although having stronger social support networks in either case is good, right? And leads to predicting better overall wellbeing. And then they also found that looking more specifically that Facebook use does boost your online relationship satisfaction. However, it does weakly but directly inversely correlate or potentially harm the satisfaction you have in your offline relationships by spending more time on your online relationships. And so ultimately your offline relationship satisfaction is a much more powerful driver of feeling supported. And as we said before, being supported is the best predictor of having overall wellbeing. And so it's kind of this tricky thing of like, yeah, Facebook can help, but maybe it's actually hurting the thing that could help you more, which is your offline relationships.

Dedeker: 00:31:29

So as in this is like a parallel to the dependency paradox.

Jase: 00:31:34

Right. So the way that this relates to the dependency paradox is that in both cases, it's about having a strong sense of trust and support within your relationships actually lets you be more independent. And so the idea here is that by building a support network, whether online or offline, but especially if we can do that offline, that overall is going to increase our wellbeing and allow us to be more independent and actually less codependent in those relationships. So again, it's kind of that tricky paradox, right? Of we want to have a certain amount of being able to lean on our relationships, but, you know, we don't have to go all the way to codependency, but it also means we don't have to like totally isolate ourselves and just be fine on our own.

Emily: 00:32:22

I do wonder if this still holds up with a lot of people who are turning to online relationships as their main source of close relationships now, as opposed to having a lot of relationships that are offline as well. I guess ideally you're just getting relationships, period. And if that means that it's only occurring online, then so be it.

Jase: 00:32:45

Yeah, I might look at it as just making sure that pursuing those online relationships isn't at the expense of offline ones. It's like if you have kind of the choice of I only have so much energy to spend one place or the other, putting it into your offline relationships might be the most beneficial. However, this is just about time on Facebook from 2017. So some things have changed. I think that there could be a very big difference between being in certain tighter knit communities, maybe something where you spend more time actually like voice chatting or video chatting with a social group online, I imagine would be different. This is all speculation on my part. So I don't want this to just say like online relationships are bad, but more to be aware of like what's the actual effect that that's having on us. Are we feeling more supported in our social network by this or less? Now let me introduce to you paradox number two. This is called the control paradox. So, I'm curious to hear your guesses on what this one is.

Emily: 00:33:47

Ooh. When you're more controlling, I'm assuming that means that your relationships are actually more out of your control ultimately?

Dedeker: 00:33:56

That whole deal of the tighter you cling, the more stuff slips through your fingers.

Emily: 00:34:01

Yes.

Jase: 00:34:01

Mm-. Yeah. So this is that when we feel uncertain or insecure, our instinct is to try to eliminate it by seeking guarantees. Or by controlling outcomes. And I think this might be related to several of the things that we talked about in the first part of the episode. But the problem is that trying to eliminate all uncertainty makes the relationship more fragile and that research has shown that people with a low tolerance for uncertainty generally have worse mental health outcomes just in general. And, you know, who knows which of those causes the other, but there's definitely a correlation there between worse mental health outcomes and this greater discomfort with uncertainty. I know this is something that comes up a lot in Buddhist meditation, is kind of letting go of this thought that you can control things that you can't control, or that you can control the future, or that you can keep anything the way that it is right now. So when you think about that, think about watching a movie, and you're like, I don't want any insecurity about this, so I'm gonna spoil everything, right? I'm gonna look up the whole plot to everything before I go. I feel like this is something actually I noticed my stepdad would do a.

Emily: 00:35:06

Lot, that like- My friend Tina does this.

Jase: 00:35:08

Yeah, okay.

Emily: 00:35:09

Yes.

Jase: 00:35:10

I would just look up all of the stuff about a play especially. I think less so with movies, but anything that's like, we're really gonna go out of our way to go see this thing, that he'd wanna do all this research and know everything going in before actually experiencing it.

Emily: 00:35:25

My friend will literally look up the ending of a movie that might potentially be sad, or, you know, does the dog die at the end, or the kid, or whomever. I think just because she doesn't want to have the intensity of the emotion happen when she's in the middle of the movie. She goes in knowing, like, Yes, okay, this is gonna happen, or, no, this is not gonna happen. And, I mean, I guess-- I understand where you're coming from. But, of course, the poignant, most wonderful part of a film is experiencing the pain and the challenge that, you know, the protagonist is going through in that moment.

Dedeker: 00:36:01

Okay, but I can't get on board with jump scares. I need to know that about jump scares.

Emily: 00:36:05

I'm all right with that one. I'm all right with that one.

Dedeker: 00:36:08

I'm not okay with that uncertainty. I am not okay with that uncertainty. I cannot handle it.

Emily: 00:36:13

Yes, it's true. I hear you.

Jase: 00:36:14

I've tried to play some games with jump scares in it with Deds.

Dedeker: 00:36:18

I guess some people go through life trying to avoid the jump scares that are in relationships. I don't like those either.

Jase: 00:36:24

I mean, sure, yeah, jump scares are no good. But I think the idea here is that when it comes to a relationship, especially even more so than enjoying a movie or a play, is that growth requires some mystery. One, like it requires it. And also, A total lack of mystery when it comes to another person is impossible, right? Like we're all partly mysteries to ourselves and another person even more so, right? So trying to find that security is gonna be this impossible task that maybe causes you to grip so hard that you've crushed that person out of existence. I don't know. My metaphor got away from me there.

Emily: 00:37:02

The destroying trust part, I think, is interesting. If you are really certain about everything, then I guess you are eliminating the possibility that you can simply just hear your partner say that they're going to do something and then trust that they're going to do it. That instead of you trying to, like, do these things in order to make sure absolutely that they're going to do the things that they say that they're going to do, you just kind of let go, like, take your foot off the gas, unclench your fist as tightly as it is clenched, and simply say, like, okay, I I'm going to give in to the possibility here that That may not happen, but I'm gonna trust and love my partner enough to hope that it does.

Jase: 00:37:44

The idea there being that by letting go of the need to know everything and kind of micromanage and control every variable, that you're able to actually build trust that can then withstand unpredictable situations and new situations because you actually have a foundation of trust there. And that said, just to throw in a quick caveat here is if you can't have that. Like if there is actually some reason why you feel like you can't trust this person, that that's a bigger red flag and not just something that you can kind of paint over by keeping tabs on them and trying to do all of these extra things. And instead, maybe this is a bigger thing that you need to investigate in this relationship. Like, is this actually a relationship that's healthy to pursue? And Paradox number three, this one is called the intimacy Paradox. The intimacy paradox is one that we have talked about many times actually going quite a ways back on this show. And basically this is the one that there's a difference between intimacy and connection and then fusion, which means kind of becoming one. And when we've talked about this before, we've talked about Esther Perel and, you know, her whole take of when intimacy between partners collapses into fusion, then it's not a lack of closeness, but actually too much closeness that impedes desire. She's big on the whole, you fell in love with your partner because you saw them doing their own thing and you thought that was cool. And then as you developed your relationship, you kind of lost any sense of identity outside of each other. And so you don't feel that same desire or that excitement for your partner because it doesn't feel like there are any mysteries. You don't kind of have that ability to see them across the room anymore. Metaphorically speaking, maybe literally, I don't know. But yeah, the idea that there requires some separateness in order to have someone that you want to connect with, right? Like in order to want to connect with them, they have to be separate from you somehow, right? And then on the flip side, seeking security through constant information, like always monitoring them, always knowing what they're doing, always checking in on them can lead to this overload, which actually decreases your wellbeing and also decreases your attraction to that person and probably decreases their attraction to you.

Emily: 00:39:59

Yeah, we have such a desire to cling. We have such a desire to want to be with a person as much as we can be, especially like at the beginning of a relationship. And to me, it's always these questions of what is the difference between really caring about someone very deeply and allowing them to do their own thing and be their own person and kind of like ease up on that intensity a little bit? You want to find a nice middle path, I feel like, because then they're going to feel more attracted to you, and ultimately, I think you'll feel more attracted to them and less inclined to be so needy or clingy or whatever other bad word you want to use there.

Jase: 00:40:45

Sure.

Emily: 00:40:46

It's tough, and I have fallen into this time and time and time again, and I really wrestle with that question of, like, what is too much, what is not enough in terms of the way in which I interact with my partner. Because I've been on the other side of it too, where I feel like my partners are way too clingy and way too needy. And I know firsthand that that's not an attractive quality. So I really want to make sure that I don't do that, but it's very difficult, especially when you're with someone who you really care about slash are, you know, maybe insecure about how cool or awesome you are in comparison to them or whatever other number of things. Yeah.

Jase: 00:41:24

So to recap these three paradoxes, I'd like to give them some cuter names perhaps that you could latch onto. So the first one I called the Dependency Paradox or Clinging Creates Distance. And that's the idea that you try to hold tight, but actually you're kind of losing that support network. And then on the other hand, maybe I don't have a clever way to say this, but by having a good support network and being able to depend on people actually lets you feel more independent. So maybe that like clinging creates distance, yet closeness creates independence.

Dedeker: 00:42:01

I like that.

Jase: 00:42:02

I almost feel like I need to keep developing it into a haiku or something like that. Oh. All right. Number two is the control paradox. Certainty destroys trust. And so that's the one where we try to control too hard, and so we don't have the ability to build any trust. And that's what's more powerful in the unpredictable world that we live in. And then the third one is the Intimacy Paradox, or Fusion Kills Desire, which is also the name of my French New Wave cinema masterpiece. I think this is the name of.

Dedeker: 00:42:32

Your trilogy of French New Wave film cinema masterpieces.

Jase: 00:42:36

Clinging Creates Distance, Certainty Destroys Trust, Fusion Kills Desire.

Dedeker: 00:42:42

Yeah, the Paradox Trilogy, famously. The Paradox Trilogy.

Jase: 00:42:47

I beautifully acclaimed director, Jason Gruen. I do love that. Beautiful. Okay, beautiful. Great.

Emily: 00:42:55

I gotta get to work on that.

Jase: 00:42:56

Everybody hit up my GoFundMe. For the Paradox Trilogy.

Emily: 00:42:55

Amazing.

Jase: 00:42:56

Okay, awesome. We're gonna take one more break and then we're gonna talk about some ways that we can explore how this shows up in our own lives and some things that we can do about it. But don't worry, it's gonna be like manageable. We're not gonna change everything overnight. We're just gonna take some baby steps and it's gonna be great. But first, we're gonna take a quick break to talk about our sponsors for this show. Please give them a listen. Use the promo codes and the links in our description. And then of course, if you'd like to support us directly and join our amazing community, you can go to multiamory.com/join. Where you can join on a sliding scale and get access to things like early releases of ad-free episodes and our awesome online community. So coming back, we have a little two-part exercise, a little two-part tool for how to become more aware of what's going on in yourself, identifying and breaking some of these patterns, as well as some ways to change your behavior. And like we have been trying recently, we're gonna make a PDF of this available so that you can have it kind of in an easier written down format that you can print out and write along with, or you can just use as a reference. And that is available on our Supercast to any of our subscribers. And there's a link to that in our episode show notes. So you can click on that if you're already a subscriber or if you wanna become one, and then you can get to that PDF so you can follow along at home. So the first one here is called the Awareness Audit. And this is to help us identify and then break some of these patterns. So this part here is for you. This is for yourself. This is a gift you're giving to yourself. So how to understand your own behavior and build a stronger sense of self. And the purpose of this is to clearly identify what of these security seeking behaviors are actually pushing connection away and to reconnect with your own sense of self and kind of short circuit some of those patterns.

Dedeker: 00:44:48

So there's three steps to this exercise. The first step is to sit down and list out what you know to be your security seeking seeking behaviors. So three to five specific things that you do to feel more secure in your relationships. Now, some of the behaviors that we've listed earlier in the episode, maybe they sound familiar to you, you know, asking, do you still love me? Checking their social media, needing to know their exact schedule, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So write those things down. It may not all be maladaptive behaviors necessarily, right? Just really have a sense of what are the specific things that you turn towards when you want to feel more secure in your relationship. And then step two is you're going to test these with what we call the connection test. So as in for each behavior, you need to ask honestly, over time, does this behavior create more genuine connection or does it create more distance and anxiety? And it's okay to sit with this question for a while. Like, you know, it may not be immediately apparent when you're sitting with this.

Jase: 00:45:51

I would add to that, if you feel the urge to really go out of your way in your own mind to justify why it's okay that you do that thing, that's maybe one to really extra take some time to look at and explore. I've often found that to be true with many things of the one that kind of makes you a little bit pissed off to think about or makes you a little bit like, what? No, that's fine. Those are the ones to look at.

Dedeker: 00:46:15

And then step three, take the opportunity to reclaim yourself a little bit. So as in schedule one small activity this week that's just for you, something that you enjoy or that helps you feel capable on your own. And it's not about specifically trying to create distance between yourself and the people that you love. It's more about remembering your own self, your own independence, and your own wholeness.

Jase: 00:46:37

And so the idea behind this is it's based in cognitive behavioral therapy. So by identifying and evaluating your behaviors and becoming aware of those, you're able to interrupt that automatic cycle recognizing the negative consequences provides that motivation to change. And then practicing separateness, maybe that's a bad word to say, like practicing doing things for yourself and doing things that lift you up and fill you up helps build the self-reliance needed to change those patterns. And so I'm actually curious for the two of you, like what some examples of that thing to do by yourself might be. Something that's not just like, I want to chill by myself, but I want I want to feel empowered, right? I want to feel more confident. I want to feel better about myself.

Dedeker: 00:47:23

I mean, I really enjoyed on Valentine's Day this year that I took myself on a date.

Emily: 00:47:28

Oh, really?

Jase: 00:47:29

Yeah. Wow.

Dedeker: 00:47:30

There was a thing I really wanted to go to, and it happened to be on Valentine's Day. And I know Jace, you probably would have gone along, and I probably could have gotten a partner to go along, right? But I was kind of like, I don't know. I think it's cooler if I just go by myself. And it was great.

Emily: 00:47:43

I love that. Yeah, even just going on like a nice walk by yourself or going to like a yoga class by yourself or do something along those lines to move your body, maybe in a different way than you're used to, go dancing, something like that. That seems like something that might be empowering to me, for instance.

Jase: 00:48:01

Yeah, I think for me it's often I want to do something creative. Because if it's just like, I want to veg out and, you know, play a game or watch a movie that partners don't want to watch or something, it's like, I don't, I don't really feel like lift it up. Maybe I feel relaxed more after that, but to me it's if I give myself the time to like play around with writing part of a song where I don't even have to complete a thing necessarily, but just like getting into that creative energy or like working on a little craft or something often helps me feel like, yeah, I made a thing. I did some stuff. That's cool. All right. And then the second part of this is the action flip. That sounds like a cool move that you would do in an action movie. That's like the one where you're running away from someone and you run up the wall and flip over behind them.

Dedeker: 00:48:45

Oh, yeah, that's good. That's an action.

Emily: 00:48:46

That's great.

Dedeker: 00:48:47

For sure.

Jase: 00:48:48

The action.

Emily: 00:48:48

Love that.

Jase: 00:48:49

And so this one's about changing your behavior of like flipping how you respond to this feeling of insecurity, right? So this is more about how you apply this to be your behavior in your relationships. And this could be any kind of relationship too, right? Not just your romantic ones. And so the purpose of this one is to learn to choose more constructive actions for when that urge to seek security or find some kind of certainty comes up.

Emily: 00:49:17

So the first thing that you should do in this exercise is notice the urge and just feel this familiar anxiety that you have and the impulse to perform one of the behaviors from your audit. So whether that be texting your partner and being like, Hey, where are you right now? What are you doing tonight? Or something along those lines, or do you still love me? Or going and checking social media, any of the above. And then the second thing that you should do is pause and breathe. So just take one deep breath, try to emotionally regulate maybe from that sense of just, I'm going to stop doing the thing immediately. Just pause and like take a moment in time to regroup and take a breath. And then the third thing is do the opposite. So this is the action flip part. You're going to run up the wall, do the flip. Yes. And then instead of the old behavior, you can choose an action that gives security rather than demands it. So instead of asking for reassurance from a partner, maybe give a specific compliment or appreciation. Again, this doesn't have to be a romantic partner. This can be anyone. So instead of demanding to know their feelings, maybe just share one of your own vulnerable feelings without blaming your partner for having that feeling. Just say, you know, sometimes I worry that you're gonna meet someone new and want to leave me, for instance. And that's not necessarily like putting a judgment on it or blaming your partner for doing anything in particular. It's just sharing a feeling. It's just sharing a truth. And then another thing you can do is instead of avoiding a topic to keep the peace, you can just gently Express your perspective on something small. So be really tactful about it, be really kind, but just express an opinion and say, you know, I kind of like it when we put the dishes in the dishwasher as opposed to leaving them in the sink or next to the sink.

Jase: 00:51:15

I mean, I think that the key here is that you've done the audit first, right? So that you have a sense of, like, what are the bad things I do? If you're someone who doesn't have a problem bringing out conflict, this is not the suggestion for you. This is if you identify, I'm someone who goes out of my way to avoid conflict. Avoid any kind of conflict, then, yeah, maybe bring up the dishes as sort of a light way to step into a little bit of conflict over something, if that's true, right? If that's really what's going on.

Emily: 00:51:43

Yeah, I mean, even just bringing that up might cause your partner to be like, oh, I didn't even know that. Let me do that now. You know, just even saying the words might be really helpful. And finally, number four, recite this mantra. So as you sit with the discomfort of not doing the old behavior, you can silently repeat to yourself, I can handle not knowing this feeling is temporary. That's a really good one, 'cause I have to remind myself of that a lot, that even when I get in an emotional kind of spiral, it's kind of incredible how you find yourself in a place where you're having a really intense emotion and it happens for maybe an hour, maybe two hours even, it happens for a period of time, even 10 minutes, and you're like, I'm never gonna get out of this. And then something happens that changes, that emotion into a different emotion, and you realize, like, oh, now that emotion has passed and we have moved on. And it's just a great reminder to tell yourself, when you're in the midst of that intensity, this too shall pass. It's not forever.

Jase: 00:52:49

Yeah. And this is something that I think meditation and mindfulness exercises really do help with, and they might be really uncomfortable at first. It's not like, oh, yeah, do a 10-minute meditation. Now you're cured and you feel great. It's like, no, it's more. About confronting some of the discomfort of these things. Kind of like if you go to the gym the first time, you're going to be sore, right? It's not like, oh, I instantly feel great and healthy after one time going to the gym, right? Or even a few weeks. It's more about building up a skill, building up a different perspective, building up maybe some mental muscles, you could say. And this one is based off of dialectical behavioral therapy or DBT. And this idea of doing the opposite action. So you're actively rewiring your brain's response to anxiety and building up a tolerance for the discomfort of uncertainty, right? Without just resorting to the old habit, you're teaching your nervous system that you are okay. So you're kind of building a little bit of a feedback loop the opposite direction of what you were doing before by doing these behaviors. You're actually building up more of this feedback loop of, no, I am okay. I actually did survive that. Oh, and look, I did something positive that's the opposite of this. So I'm also getting outside of that sense of, I always just have to do the knee jerk thing to fix this feeling right away. And instead it's like, I can do something bigger than that. Like I can change the way I communicate or I can give a specific compliment or appreciation to someone and kind of look at how we can create that positive feedback loop that also makes us feel stronger and probably makes our partners feel better and more loved as well. As we mentioned before, there is a PDF of this that you can go through if you check our show notes here, or you can just go to our Supercast page and search for it there. But either way you can print that out, download it to help follow along with this exercise. Our question of the week on our Instagram stories is, has seeking reassurance from a partner ever backfired on you? What happened? Very curious to hear people's experiences with that. And if you would love to discuss this episode further, the best place you can do that is in our episode discussion channel in our Discord server, or you can post about it in our private Facebook group. You can get access to these groups and join our exclusive community by going to multiamory.com/join In addition, you can post publicly on Instagram @multiamorypodcast Multiamory is created and produced by Dedeker Winston, Emily Matlak, and me, Jase Slinggren. Our production assistants are Rachel Schenewerk and Carson Collins. Our theme song is Forms I Know I Did by Josh and Anand from the Fractal Cave EP. The full transcript is available on this episode's page on multiamory.com.