What to Do When your Partner is Unwilling to Change

In this week's episode, Kate & Eric explore strategies for engaging with a partner resistant to change.

Topics:
➡️ Identifying traits of resistance like inflexibility, criticism, lack of empathy, and defensiveness.
➡️ Reflecting on personal contributions to relationship dynamics and initiating change from within.
➡️ Effective communication and setting clear boundaries to foster a healthier relationship.

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TRANSCRIPT:

Today we're talking about this idea of, like, what to do when your partner is unwilling to change. Yeah. We call them impossible partners. Yeah, that's a term we've came up for them, yeah. And again, we're just talking about, like, a general sense here. We really don't want to, like, point like you're an impossible partner. Yeah, label on, but we use the term to help people understand like, hey, at some point you need to accept that your partner is very resistant to change, because that's their adaptation, right? Yes,

and usually this comes from their upbringing. Usually this comes from somewhere. It's not like they just woke up one day and decided to be an impossible partner.

Yeah, exactly. And sometimes they're not even aware of it, like they, you know, people who are typically, like, in grandiosity, so think they're above others, and what we call, like, totally walled off, right? Typically they fall into this kind of category where they're like, there's nothing wrong with me. I'm doing everything cool. You need to change. I'm not doing anything. And until you change and level up to my level and be exactly who I want to be, I'm not engaging here exactly. And the reason that this topic came up is because, you know, I had a conversation with somebody the other day, and we kind of had this whole like, they have been really working hard to create connection with their partner, and it's clear that this person like was dedicated. They were doing the work right. Like this man was intentional his marriage and the belief he had around it was really important, and was something that he wanted to continue, and he had been working at this for a very long time, to. And read a lot of books, podcasts, done the work like he had improved, like he was a totally different dude, you know, which was really awesome. And we started getting this conversation about, you know, how resistant his partner was, and in a lot of instances, often sabotaging, like his, you know, desire to connect or grow, right? And then we really got to this conversation of, like, okay, like, how much you know, longer are you willing to continue this interaction until you take responsibility that, like, the system that you're in and the way that you're showing up in the system is not getting you the results you want, right? And so we have to try something different. And oftentimes different is scary, right? And so I don't want to necessarily go into that and kind of what this man did, and this man now is like a really awesome spot, and has really taken some steps to kind of reclaim his own life and find his own happiness again, and done all that. But what we really want to talk about is these different kind of characteristics to watch out for when it comes to an impossible partner, maybe

be aware of not necessarily. Well, also watch

out for, hey, maybe you're dating, right? Maybe you're like, in another relationship now you you know,

like, yeah, maybe you're in a newer relationship, and this is already starting. And then you can be like, okay, yeah, maybe we're not going to push this one further,

right, exactly. And I think that's really important, right, to create awareness around some of these traits that kind of show up, and not even traits like, but like these, these ways of engaging that are maybe, are like, hey, this kind of red flag for me. I don't know if this is good, yeah, but also that something needs to change. So if you're in a long term relationship and you're seeing some of this and listen, I mean, the reality is, if you're listening to this podcast, you're probably not one of these people, earlier into like growth and learning and all that stuff. Not

maybe they're listening to it thinking maybe they're gonna give me, I mean, that was me. Maybe somebody's going to give me the magic formula to fix my marriage. Maybe there is a mathematical formula out there that I can just do, a plus b equals better marriage. Well, but that was me, the idea that you

wanted to improve your marriage already in a different spot. That's true, like,

well, we're talking about here, I'm not, I'm not the impossible partner listening to this marriage. Yeah, that's what I mean. People

who are impossible partners are not listening to merit ways to improve their life, right? They're just totally closed off. They think they have all the answers. They're super resistant, yeah, to any sort of outside engagement, and oftentimes they're focused on other people and so

and if, sorry, if you are an impossible partner listening to this, we're not attacking you. You are this reason, because of past circumstances, because of things that have come up.

Well also you're already changing it. And by listening to me exactly, kudos to

you. This is exactly what I was gonna say. You're already in the right place. You're taking the first steps to trying to remove those barriers, trying to remove those walls,

yeah. And I think that, you know, the big four here that we often talk about, and this is like Julian John gottman's work, right? This idea of the four horsemen, when you really think about the Big Four, that are kind of red flags to lead to, like, hey, my partner is really unwilling. You know, for we us, we break them down as like, they're inflexible, so they're totally rigid. They're unwilling to change. It's their way or the highway. They're constantly criticizing you, the world, the systems, everybody else, right? There's a lot of criticism. There's a total lack of empathy. So they're emotionally unavailable to you. They're, we call it, we call it walled off, yeah, right, but they're totally walled off to you. They're like, they do not care about your feelings. You open up vulnerably, and they're just stonewalling and or they're constantly defensive, right? So it's never their fault. They're always trying to spin things around. They're always the victim, right? And they're always in different parts of the Drama Triangle. Now, some people will show these behaviors every now and then, right? Sometimes I get defensive, sometimes I have a lack of empathy, sometimes I'm critical, sometimes I'm not flexible. It's when this becomes a constant thing that you're butting up against no matter what you try. Yes, does that make sense? Yeah, absolutely.

I love that, and I think that I like that you added that because some people are gonna be like, oh god. I was just thinking about that. I was like, oh my god, this is like me, but it's like, yes, in the last few months, I have probably been an impossible partner. I have gone through a lot of personal things myself, and I have been focused on pleasing people and trying to make everyone around me happy and trying to fit in and trying to, you know, say yes to everything, even though those things were getting in the way of my marriage getting in the way of me being a good mom, getting in the way of taking care of myself. And by doing all those things, I have become an impossible partner. You have opened up to me numerous times, and I'm like, Yeah, okay, but here's all the reasons why. And defense, defense, defense, and then that makes me come off as, like, very walled off. And a lot of times, like, the more you open up to me, the more that wall builds, and the more I'm like, Oh, I'm just gonna stand here and, like, listen to him, like, with this, like, empty, blank look. And so, you know, like. Lack of empathy, for sure, I just

want to jump in quickly, because I think this is my fear, and for a lot of people, they're going to either do this themselves or their partner,

and then that's what I'm that's where I'm going. It's like, just because I have been this way for the past few months does not mean that I'm an impossible partner, yeah, because there's a part of me that knows this isn't the wife I want to be. This isn't how I want to show up in my marriage. And I am aware of that, and I am taking actions right now to heal parts of me and to do the work to get out of this kind of weird wall that I've been in,

yeah, and I think that that's important to, like, differentiate, right? Like, when you say, like, I'm a people pleaser, I'm trying to make sure everybody else is taken care of. That actually shows an incredible amount of flexibility, if anything, you're like, jumping through hoops in very flexible ways to try to please everybody. Right? Somebody who would be inflexible would be like, F everybody else. I'm closed off to all kinds of ideas. I'm doing nothing for no one. I'm only taking care of myself. Yeah, and so really important. Like, you might have had defensive behavior when I brought up realities of, you know, our relationship and stuff like that. But also, like, there's empathy there, there's and so this is what I really want. Like, people need to slow down and create awareness. Some people think they have an impossible partner, and you don't, yes, and it's just actually the relational dynamic that you've created with your partner is leading to what we call gridlock, right? And so that's really important to understand is, you know, I don't want you to listen to this episode and just say, like, Oh yeah, you know, my partner shows some of this, or I show some of this. We're an impossible partner. Like, blah, blah. Like, no, that's absolutely not true. Examples of impossible partners, totally unwilling to get any sort of help whatsoever. When you talk about help, they criticize you, hold you in contempt, create defensiveness, Stonewall you. Yeah, exactly every time that you try to do something nice or compliment them, they insult you about it, right? These are like, more extreme examples of what we're talking Yeah, it's

very aggressive. It's very obvious that this person has completely checked out of the marriage. It's very bluntly obvious that day in, day out, this person has zero interest in being married, has zero interest in being a kind human in this area,

if they're actively ignoring you. Yeah, right. If, if they're actively insulting you every day. Like, these are ways it's like, okay, that like, I think that is when we start getting into this territory.

So that's why I was bringing up that example. Because right away, like, as you were saying those I'm listening things off in my head. And I was like, Oh my gosh, is that me? But it's like, no, Kate, it's not you. You have just, yes, you've shown some of these behaviors, but you're not an impossible partner. You're just going through it right now. Yeah, and

so the first season, yeah, the first step to really move towards understanding, like, is my partner totally unwilling to change, or is there opportunity here to change, is understanding your role in the dynamic. So this is like, what a lot of people don't do, right? It's always easier to try to change others than it is to change ourselves. And so oftentimes the first thought when there's a problem is somebody else is to blame, right? And so really slowing down and understanding your own role in the relational dynamic, maybe you're an enabler, maybe you're a people pleaser, maybe you're defensive more often than not, maybe you're emotionally unavailable. Maybe you know, like you need to look at your side of the street and say, How is it that I prevent change from happening? Right? One of the great ways that we prevent change from happening often is we think our partner needs to do something before we can change, right? So that's a way that we prevent or disempower ourselves from changing. So it's like, if I believe, like, well, I can't do anything until Kate does X, Y and Z, that my role in that dysfunction is that I disempower myself and put 100% responsibility on the first step to Kate. That is dysfunctional. That is not me, owning my side of the street. I have many choices I can make to create change in our marriage, the idea that Kate needs to do something first before I do something is dysfunctional, right? Is that making sense?

Yeah, it does. It does make sense. And honestly, like, I have this weird analogy in my head of, like, this dog in a cage who's really aggressive, and if you as the owner of the dog, the partner is like, every time you go up to the cage, you're rattling the cage. You're smacking the cage. When the when the dog bites you, you smack it right back. Like you're really aggressive towards the the dog. Well, the dog is going to continue being aggressive. But if you're showing love to the dog, you're showing patience to the dog, you're taking the dog out of the cage, you're really trying to work on that going really slow relationship, exactly that is going to heal an aggressive dog. I think, when you look at relationships, and I hate to compare humans to dogs, but truly it is. I mean, we are animals. If you're in a relationship with a partner who's aggressive, who, like fights back, who insults and you're doing. The same thing back, they're insulting you, and then you insult them right back. You're just playing into the dynamic. If instead of, you know, biting back, you're like, hey, it really hurts me when you talk to me like that, that's already a step in the right direction. That's already a step in breaking that dynamic of this relationship that you've created and making this kind of like a normal behavior in a relationship, if your partner is, you know, snapping at you, insulting you, ignoring you, and you're not saying or doing anything about it, they're never going to learn that this is not okay behavior, yeah, and

I think this is really important, right? Because it brings us into some practical strategies in order to create change. You know, even if you think your partner's unwilling to change, there are still things that you can do that can create change in the relational, dynamic, yes, right? And so those, in those moments, you know, really emphasizing communication, yeah. And this is a, this is kind of something that we struggle with when it comes to communication, is we always try to get our partner to communicate, right? We're like, hey, we need more communication. So you're trying to get your partner, but you have the ability to communicate yourself, yeah. So you can be open, you can be vulnerable, you can notice and bring you know awareness to the situation. So

yeah, and you know, we've just just to stop you there, because this can be very, very difficult to do with a toxic partner, with a partner who is hurtful. I remember there was a point in our relationship where I knew I needed to talk to you about things. I knew I needed to open up. I knew I needed to be honest with you, but I knew that if I did, you would turn around and you would make me feel like like you would gaslight me, and all of a sudden, all of the things that I was like, Eric, it hurts me when you do this, and I feel like this, and I feel like that, and I'm trying to use the ice team, and I'm doing everything that our coaches and our therapists have told us, and I'm doing the right things. But then somehow it turned around that, oh, the reason I'm acting this way. It's because of you, Kate, and if you were different, then I wouldn't have to and it was very hard for me to open up to you, so I had to get in the mindset of before speaking to you, saying everything this man is going to say is a lie. Trust in yourself. Trust that the things that you say are okay for you to say, and it doesn't matter how they respond. It doesn't matter how aggressive or the insults that are going to come out of their mouth. You are worthy of your voice, and you are worthy of saying these things, and so say them. Say them even though it hurts, say them, even though they're going to fling back insults and they're going to turn this around on you, and they're going to make you feel like you're the problem, because you're not. It is okay for you to feel off. It is okay for you to have this voice and to have the feelings you are having in this relationship. And yes, it's it hurts, it's difficult, but move past that, and you have to speak your voice. You have to communicate. Because if you don't start that is the first step. If you don't start communicating, you cannot break this cycle. Yeah,

you sound very impassioned.

I'm very passionate about this because this has been something that I've realized lately is, like, part of the reason that I've like, shut down my own voice is because I'm gonna get emotional here, but is because my whole life when I would speak up. People told me I was wrong for feeling the way I was feeling. People would tell me that the reason I was feeling the way I was feeling was because of me. And nobody ever took ownership of like their side of the street. Nobody said, wow, Kate, like that must be really hard. And you're right. I am doing those things. It was always like, Well, the reason I'm doing those things is because you suck. The reason I'm doing those things is because you're wrong. The reason I'm doing those things is because you're a bad person, or you want too much, or you want this and that, and I'm never gonna give this to you. And so I shut my voice down. I shut it off completely, and I stopped talking about myself, and I stopped talking about my needs, and I stopped talking about what it is that I want and need in this life, and I don't do it anymore. I'm at a point. I'm 37 years old, and I can't even tell you when I'm feeling disconnected in our marriage, and that's not on you. That's just a learned behavior that if I speak up about my needs and my wants, I am going to be told that I'm wrong. I'm going to be told that those needs and wants aren't important. And so, yeah, I'm passionate about it, because if I can help somebody not get to the point where I am, if I can help somebody find their voice early enough before their voice is completely snuffed out, then that's why I'm doing it. This is why I do the podcast, because I'm hoping that one person out there listening to me is in the position I was about 10 years ago, being told that like you're not good, your thoughts are not valid, you're not right, and that they're gonna. Tell themselves like I don't have to listen to this, I don't have to believe this, what they're about to say is a complete lie, and I need to really stand my ground and say this is how I feel, and it's okay for me to feel this way. And so yeah, yeah, I'm passionate about it, and yeah, I get emotional when I talk about it, because now I have to do 10 times more work to heal this very, very deep wound inside of me. And I'm doing the work, I'm going to therapy, I'm journaling, I'm doing the work, I'm trying to get my voice out there, and it's hard, but I have a voice, and I'm worthy of that voice, and I'm learning that slowly. So it's important to, like, not get to this point if you can. Yeah,

thanks for sharing that. Thank you. I'm sorry that happened to you. Yeah,

shut that away. Put that all away. We're done talking

next. Thanks. I really appreciate allowing yourself to connect to that and inspire others to speak up. Because I agree. I think we live in a world where a lot of us have gifts to share and have been told a long time and continue to be told that we're not enough and we need to hide and we need to betray our sense of self in order to connect. And I think that is totally backwards. So thanks. It really brings us to our second point, though, which is really important around loving firmness and boundaries, which is, like, what a great display, right? Of like, I'm gonna stand up for myself. I'm gonna do this thing. You know, I'm doing this because of me, and this is really about you having healthy boundaries in terms of, like, not allowing other people's thoughts and opinions that they have, like, really land in you, right? So that's like a protective boundary. So you need to have those boundaries. And

it's going back to, you know, last week's episode of having wants and having needs. You are allowed to have those wants and needs. You are allowed to to feel what it is that you need to feel. And so you know, being okay with expressing those to your partner and and setting boundaries. If you know, if this doesn't happen, then this, this is going to have to happen. You know, it's it's being trusting that the things that you need and want for yourself are important and are valid and are things that you need for your own life, for your own safety, for your own basic survival, yeah, yeah. In order to not show up as this, like, you know, desperate, like, because what happens oftentimes, when you have a partner who's impossible, you become this, like, desperate, like, I need to fix it. Oh, my God, I need to do everything in my power to fix this. But you're just faced with this brick wall. So you're just running into a brick wall again and again,

especially if you're boundary less. People don't have boundaries. You end up like sacrificing part of yourself to try to get others to do exactly

so by setting those boundaries, it's going to allow you to move past those brick walls, to move past those, those, you know, barriers of hitting that wall over and over and over again. If you say, I am no longer willing to hit this wall, and here's the boundaries I'm going to set for myself to protect myself, and sometimes your kids, right like, then that is a very healthy step, yeah.

And so I think a lot of times change can be created with just these two steps, right? You choosing to openly communicate for yourself, to be honest, to kind of, for lack of better term, rock the boat, right in a careful way. And you know, stepping into loving firmness and having healthy boundaries that alone will create change in most relational dynamics that are stuck in gridlock. The next ones you know, are, hey, we're feeling really stuck, and you have to go beyond just open, honest communication and loving firmness and setting boundaries. And this is where we, you know, we often recommend getting help around these because the tensions will rise. And this is really important to understand, is that, like, things will get harder before they get better, right? And that's typically what happens when you're in gridlock, is you're gonna have to get a bit uncomfortable. So the first thing that we talk about is using leverage. Now, the most common form of leverage, it gets thrown around like, it's, you know, yesterday's news is, like, at the ending of the marriage, right? And this is, like, people throw this around, like, now it's meaningless, right? We're gonna divorce, we're going to separate. It's not going to work out. We're going to stop doing that. Stop threatening the end of your marriage, unless you're serious about ending your marriage like you need to be very careful about just throwing these shots across the bow, because it's not healthy and it creates a massive disconnect in terms of the safety. If you think that it's going to bring your partner closer to threaten the end of the marriage. Short term, it might create change, but in the end, you are going to have to go back and heal some of that stuff that you did, right? And a lot of the work that we do around using leverage is this mix of like coming at it from a really loving firmness place speaking truth to power, and then healing that if the healing and the RE commitment decides to happen, right? So there's all kinds of leverage that you can use in. Relationship. All we're doing in terms of leverage here is understanding, Hey, what is the positive impact in creating change? So this is like, what does your partner want ideally? What do you want ideally? Can we work towards that, right? So if your partner is really unhappy in the relationship, well, it's like, what does a happy relationship look like for you, right? Is that something they want to work towards? Is that even meaningful to them, right? Or are they just actually kind of comfortable in being unhappy for the rest of your life? Mm, the rest of your life. That's okay too, right? That's their experience. And so that's an example of positive leverage. What do you want to move towards? What do you want to, you know, kind of start to create that brings pleasure and excitement to your life. And then there's what we call negative leverage, right? Which is an inducement of pain, right? And this is where you start getting into, hey, like we're not going to have a sexual relationship until I feel connected to you emotionally. That would be an idea of negative leverage, right? So you're going to miss out on the experience of deep, connected sex if you're unwilling to open up about your emotional experience, right? Oftentimes, it can be the disillusionment of the marriage. Oftentimes it's around the kids, and the impact it's having on your kids, right? For me, one of the biggest pieces of leverage that totally changed me was how my behavior as a man, treating a woman in my home was impacting my son, and thinking about that as negative leverage, my son will grow up to be an abusive man if I continue to show him these traits of an abusive man. And so that was a great catalyst for me to change who I was at my core, right, to kind of break the cycle.

Yeah. And oftentimes, like, you know, when you see me at my darkest, like you you'll use leverage towards me, and it's often in the sense exactly like that. Like, is this what you want to show our daughter? Is this the example you want to show our daughter? Do you want to be the example of like, all you do is scroll on your phone all day and just continue getting lost in TV and things like that. Like, all you're doing, Kate is you're just buffering. You're buffering because, you know, there's a deeper something that you need to work on. So if this is the example you want to give your daughter, that's fine. You can do that. But if you want to be a different example for her, if you want to empower her and make her feel like being a woman is more than just scrolling on your phone and doom, Doom scrolling and getting lost in TV show after TV show, then you have the power to do that. Yeah, and really important

here, because I want to jump in before somebody to jump in before somebody pauses episode and goes and use leverages on the partner that that was leverage that you created, yeah? And this is really, really important understand is it's not leverage that I brought into your life and try to control you. The reason that I'm able to use that as leverage is because that is your leverage that you created for

myself, right? And I was mentioned that oftentimes in arguments or when I'm feeling very, you know, disconnected with myself, or really down on myself, I'll often say that, like, this isn't the example I want to give to our daughter. This isn't the example I want to give to my kids. So when Eric says that it's not coming out of left field, it's coming out of something that he's heard out of my mouth before, even using that. So I do like that you, and it's

like, I'm trying to connect to a part inside you that means something to you. And I think that's so important to recognize, right? So that, because that's what leverage is, leverage is not like what I bring to you. It's there is no leverage unless you give meaning to it. And so that's really, really important. And then the last piece is what we call, like, the two choice dilemma. And it's really understanding that, you know, there's an old quote here, but like, the only way around this is through it, kind of thing. And the two choice dilemma is all about understanding that when it really comes down to it, you only have two options, and the options are to remain the same or to change, and doesn't matter what you do to change, right? Some things can be really catastrophic. Some things can be really healthy. So you get to decide, hey, do I want to keep things the same, or do I want to change them? And we face two choice dilemmas in long term relationships all the time, right? Every time that you think, Hey, I'm feeling resentment here, and I should probably bring this up, you're facing a two choice dilemma. Do I live with this resentment and kind of bury it, or do I choose to open up and say something and utilizing two choice dilemmas in, you know, relationships where change is not happening is very, very important. And this is a big part of what we do in the evolvements Collective and kind of how we work with individuals and couples is we help them face two choice dilemmas in a way that's really, really healthy, right? And so think about that is like, if you believe that, you know, change is going to be easy and you're going to seek the right answer, and it's going to be like, be like, Oh yeah, it's not going to raise my anxiety. It's going to be totally easy. You're doing yourself a disservice. Yes, at this point, if you're stuck in gridlock, the only way to change is to, you know, get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Yeah, right, with this, which is why we suggest getting help, right? So if you feel like you're stuck, you know, just doing the first two things of really creating awareness of your side of the street, starting open communication and then setting healthy boundaries will do a massive difference for you. And then if you want more help, reach out to us, right? You can email me, Eric at Evolve marriage.com you can go on our website and message us, or you can just add some comments to any of these podcasts,

absolutely. And I think even just for that first step, sometime. Having somebody behind you, you know, brainstorming, saying, Hey, I'm about to say this to my partner. Like, is this fair? And having that cheerleader and knowing, you know, like, for me, that was very important. I had people in the back of my mind when I was saying these things to you, who were saying, Kate, you have to tell him these things. Yes, this behavior is not okay. Don't let him believe you otherwise. Make you believe otherwise. So having those conversations with somebody, whether that's a friend, whether that's with us, you know, like we can help you move through that first step, just making you believe like I am worthy of these thoughts, and I am worthy of saying these things, and the things that I am saying, I'm not crazy, this isn't okay, and it's okay for me to express myself, having those people in the back of your mind and understanding that like they'll be there to catch you afterwards, and it's going to be difficult.