What traits and behaviors make you feel connected to your family, friends, and loved ones? In this emotional Push-Up, Dr. Emily talks about a concept she calls our Currencies of Closeness with guest Tommy Kuntze, VP of Product & Design at Rhumbix. Our Currencies of Closeness are the things we felt we had to pay to receive the love and attention and recognition we needed in our families, and we’ve all had both positive and negative versions. Tune in to explore what currencies you may still be paying and what currencies you may just want to leave behind. 

Thank you for listening! Staying emotionally fit takes work and repetition. That's why the Emotionally Fit podcast with psychologist Dr. Emily Anhalt delivers short, actionable Emotional Push-Ups every Monday and Thursday to help you build a better practice of mental health. Join us to kickstart your emotional fitness. Let's flex those feels and do some reps together!

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The Emotionally Fit podcast is produced by Coa, your gym for mental health. Katie Sunku Wood is the show’s producer from StudioPod Media with additional editing and sound design by nodalab, and featuring music by Milano. Special thanks to the entire Coa crew!

Ready to break an emotional sweat? Welcome to Emotionally Fit, with me, Dr. Emily Anhalt. As a therapist, I know that staying mentally healthy takes work and repetition. That's why I'll share emotional pushups, short, actionable exercises to help you strengthen your mental fitness. From improving your friendships to managing stress, let's flex those feels and do some reps together.

Hey, there Fit fans. I am here today with Tommy Kuntze, VP of Product and Design at Rhumbix. Tommy, thanks for joining me. How are you doing overall?

I'm good. Thanks.

I'm really excited to be here with you today to explore a concept that I've been playing with lately. I started thinking about this when I was having a conversation with actually a mutual friend of ours, who is very quick-witted. He's sharp and clever, and he makes me laugh. He makes people laugh in general. And I was telling him that this trait of his makes me feel connected to him because a quick wit and sharp mind were traits that my family valued very highly.

So if I made a clever joke growing up, I immediately felt such love and admiration for my parents that I think I unconsciously learned to be that way more. And similarly, people who have this trait, people who are quick and clever, they seem to have kind of a fast pass to closeness with me. So this got me thinking about what other behaviors and traits were valued in my family and in other people's families, which led me to this concept that I'm calling our currencies of closeness. And the currencies of closeness in a family are like, what did you have to pay in order to get love and validation and closeness? What traits or behaviors or ways of being tended to lead to connection and love? Is this landing so far?

Totally. I'm already thinking of examples of how this works in my family.

Okay, great. All right. So every family has different currencies of closeness and sometimes there're things that we were happy to pay and which serve us in our lives now. So for example, maybe you felt really loved in your family when you were honest or when you were generous. And now you're an honest and generous person and you're attracted to honest, generous people. And that's great. But sometimes our currencies of closeness were things that we didn't like having to pay, and which might actually be detrimental to our relationships now. For example, I was talking with a friend of mine about this, and she said in her family, obedience was the currency of closeness.

And that it felt really bad for her, but that even now she feels like she has to be obedient in her relationships to be loved. And she finds herself expecting obedience from her children. So as we learn what the currencies of closeness were in our family, we get to decide, is this still a currency that I want to be charging and paying in my current life? Or is it maybe something I want to leave behind? Tommy, what do you think about this so far?

Yeah, so I'm thinking of examples in my family and then also how I pay or request those currencies. So what I'm already thinking about is that the things that I had to pay in my family are not things that I would want to request.

Oh, all right. That makes sense. You're ahead of the game here. So that leads perfectly to our pushup, which is all about examining our own currencies of closeness. So step one of this pushup is to spend five minutes or so thinking about what the currencies of closeness were in your family. Try to think both about the positive and the negative currencies. If you're having trouble thinking of one, you can ask yourself, when did I feel most accepted and loved in my family? What behaviors were rewarded in my family? What traits do I most value in myself and in others? So go ahead and take some time to think about that. For those listening in, feel free to press pause here, so you can think of your examples or keep listening to hear Tommy's. So Tommy, what do you think were the currencies of closeness in your family growing up?

Well, when I thought about the question, when did I feel most loved in my family? The love language acts of service is what came up. When I was being productive or helping someone with something that I felt most appreciated and valued and loved.

That makes sense. And definitely resonates with what I know about you. Do you find that you also feel most connected to people when they do things for you and show up for you in this particular way?

Yeah, for sure. I appreciate acts of service because time and energy are such finite resources. So when someone does something for me, it just feels very valuable.

This is a great example. And I've seen how acts of service has been a really positive force in your life and in your relationships. I know you're very generous. You do things for people all the time. Were there also currencies of closeness that felt less positive that maybe you wish you didn't have to pay?

Yeah, definitely. What comes to mind for me with this is sacrifice. Sacrifice is something that was also just really highly valued in my family. Being willing to sacrifice your time and your energy, it really showed that you love the person that you're doing that for.

That makes sense to me.

And really, I think acts of service and sacrifice are very similar. It can be really hard to tell the difference.

That's true. They are really similar. I guess the difference is how much suffering is involved.

Yes.

And it sounds like in your family, if there wasn't some suffering, maybe it didn't really count.

Exactly.

Yeah. I see that a lot actually. Especially I see that in people who grew up in religious environments, I think there's this love equals sacrifice thing that's inherent to a lot of religions. So some people feel like if it doesn't hurt to show your love, then you're not really showing it.

Totally. Yeah. I remember once my parents were having people over and so the day before we spent the day cooking and cleaning, so we could host everyone. And all that went really smoothly. We had a fun day. And then at the last minute, at the very end of the day, my mom decided that we should also make cupcakes for everyone. And it was already super late, but suddenly it felt like making cupcakes was the most important thing. So my sisters and I said, okay, sure, we'll make a couple batches. But my mom felt like no, a couple batches wouldn't be enough. There needed to be enough for every single person at the party to have at least two cupcakes.

I like two cupcakes, but yeah, that feels excessive maybe.

So we ended up staying up super late, making like 70 cupcakes and you know what? No one even ate any of them. We felt really annoyed because of how big of a deal it was and how much energy we put into making them. And I think looking back, I'm realizing it wasn't about the cupcakes. It was about the sacrifice. The day went too smoothly and now we needed to add on a suffering component for it to really count. So if it wasn't something that we labored over, that we weren't really showing our love.

Wow. So much yes to this. This is really resonating with me. I imagine it's really resonating with a lot of people right now. I've heard this in my practice a ton. People feeling like if someone isn't giving up something that's important to them, then they don't really love them. It's complicated. And hearing you talk about acts of service and sacrifice, I think it's funny how our positive currencies and our negative currencies can often just be two sides of the same coin.

Yeah. I think I haven't always realized and communicated when something goes from being acts of service that I want to do to sacrifice something that I don't really want to do.

Yeah, 100%. Yeah. I guess anything that's good for us, anything that's a medicine in a small dose can be a poison in a large dose.

For sure.

Okay. So for you Tommy, it's acts of service and also sacrifice. Thank you so much for sharing that here. So step two of this pushup then is that for each currency you've thought of, explore a little bit about how it might be showing up in your life and in your relationships now. Do you still pay for closeness in this way and expect that that's what's going to lead to love? Do you still charge it, meaning do you expect it from others? For those listening in, take a moment to think that through. Tommy, I'm curious, how do you see acts of service and sacrifice showing up in your relationships now?

Well, it's interesting. There's a really big difference of before therapy versus after therapy. So I guess it depends if we're talking about before therapy or after.

Love that. What about before therapy?

So before therapy, the lines between doing nice things for people and sacrificing, I feel like they were really blurry. So for example, one way that I've seen this show up is that if a loved one would ask me for a favor, I would say yes, even if I had something else that I needed to do, and then I would just have to struggle to do this favor because I'd have to move things around and I'd have to cancel plans. And after the fact, I would feel really resentful for having to do this struggle. They didn't know I was struggling and had to do all this extra work and they didn't know what it required of me, but I was the one that said yes. So it was really on me to suffer silently. And yeah, so the irony the whole time, I probably could have said, yeah, I can definitely help you with that tomorrow or later, or I have this thing and just be transparent with them. But I think if it's too easy for me to help, then it almost doesn't feel like it actually counts as a gesture of love.

Oh, totally.

Yeah. Then I'd say I got into therapy. And after talking about this a bunch feeling overwhelmed with all of these double booked plans all the time and like, oh, it happened again. I did this. After a while, my therapist started to be like, "Hey, you do this a lot. Why do you keep saying yes when you're already booked? It's almost as though you think if you're not struggling, then you're not really showing up." And that was an aha moment for me. So I started working on checking in with myself about whether I was paying in sacrifice when I didn't really have to.

Damn. Drop the mic, Tommy, with the wisdom over here and also shout out to therapy. Am I right?

Totally.

Yeah. Okay. So have you also found yourself charging in this currency? Do you ever expect other people to sacrifice for you?

Yeah, sometimes. Definitely. When I ask someone to do something, I sometimes have to fight this expectation that they'll do it right away. For example, if I ask my partner, put something away or I take the trash out and I might ask her to change the trash bag, I would give it maybe like five minutes and then I would just hastily do it myself.

And then be annoyed that you had to do it yourself.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. So now I ask myself or even my partner will ask me, does this need to happen right now? And often the answer is no. So I'll add in this time component to the request. So there's sort of, "Hey, in the next couple of hours, could you change the trash bag?" With that, there's no sacrificing what she's currently doing and the thing still gets done.

Amazing. What a profound shift of just a small mindset change. I love that. And that brings us to step three of this pushup, which is to decide whether or not these currencies are things you want to keep charging and keep paying in your current and your future relationships, or maybe you'd prefer to do something different. So for those listening in, take a moment to think that through. Tommy, how about you? As you think ahead, what does this look like for you? Do you want to keep charging and paying in acts of service? Do you want to keep charging and paying in sacrifice?

Yeah, I do really enjoy doing things for people. I really like to show my love by giving people my time, by doing things for them while I'm also thinking about them. But I am working on not needing there to be that sacrifice component. That's something I don't want to request from other people in my life or currency to request from people. I know intellectually that you don't need to suffer in order to show love, but that doesn't mean that I don't sometimes slip back into old habits. I do know it's better to preserve my energy so that I can keep showing up for people in a sustainable way and thoughtful way without getting resentful.

I love this so much, Tommy, and I've seen this change in you over the years, so it's really cool to hear you put words to it. And you are still such a truly generous and thoughtful and giving person. So the goal with these changes isn't to rid ourselves of these things completely and to become a totally different person. It's like, when did this go from being a strength to something that gets in my way or when did this go from supporting my relationships to hurting them? It sounds like you've done a lot of hard work around that. This pushup is just meant to be a starting point for all of us. We might start noticing these currencies showing up here or there. And of course, it's easier said than done to shift our relationship to them. But once we know something exists, we have a lot more agency to change it or to appreciate it. So Tommy, thank you so much for being here, for flexing those feels and for breaking an emotional sweat with me today. It was such a pleasure.

Thank you so much for having me.

Thanks for listening to Emotionally Fit, hosted by me, Dr. Emily Anhalt. Did you do today's pushup alongside me and my guest? Tweet your experience with the hashtag #emotionallyfit and follow me at @dremilyanhalt. Please rate, review, follow, and share the show wherever you listen to podcasts. This podcast is produced by Coa, your gym for mental health, where you can take live therapist-led classes online. From group sessions to therapist matchmaking, Coa will help you build your emotional fitness routine. Head to joincoa.com. That's joinc-o-a.com to learn more, and follow us on Twitter and Instagram at @JoinCoa. From StudioPod Media in San Francisco, our producer is Katie Sunku Wood. Music is by Milano. Special thanks to the entire Coa crew.