Ep 111: How to forgive quickly in relationship w/ Meg & Jacob

"Devotion to love will ask you to put down the sword and pick up presence."

In today’s episode, we’re sharing a real and raw story straight from our recent road trip, baby meltdowns, car seat chaos, and all the feelings. What unfolded was a powerful reflection on devotion, forgiveness, and the quiet ways resentment creeps into relationships.

We’re talking about the difference between preference and truth, how to stay connected in discomfort, and why letting go is sometimes the most loving thing you can do.

If you’ve ever found yourself in a power struggle, holding onto the small stuff, or feeling like you need to be right… this one’s for you.

🔥 Here’s what we get into:

• Why forgiveness isn’t about words—it’s an energy
• How holding onto "small things" kills intimacy
• The truth about letting go without repressing yourself
• The difference between preference and truth in love
• Why your nervous system holds the key to deeper connection
• How devotion shifts the dynamic from “winner/loser” to interdependence
• Parenting, power struggles, emotional triggers… all of it.

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Transcript

1:47

What if the practice was, can I love you as you are? And can I relax into life in myself in this partnership? And I also know that that is so simplified. And there is there's nuance to this, and there are so many other things that, you know, are involved, like safety and all these things that support us to create that and experience that. And we need to be choosing someone that we truly want to practice that with. But if we all distill it down like, that's the fucking practice, accept the person you're in partnership with. And if you really fucking struggle to do that, and if you're actually not willing to do that, leave like leave full stop. Yo yo yo lovers. Welcome, welcome, welcome to sex, love and everything in between. Where the O'Neals. You're here with Meg and Jacob. And this is the place we have really uncensored conversations about sex, intimacy and relationships. Well, super excited you're here. Enjoy this episode. It. Hello my love. Yo, yo, lovers. Welcome back. Welcome back, my love. We've had a big few months. Life has been so near. Neil home. We've been doing shit. We really have been doing a lot of things. What are we even doing? I have claimed you held a three day sacred rage facilitated training. I went to New York. Oh, we went on a trip before that to visit your family. Then we've just come back from, Easter camping. Which was another. Should be a seven hour drive, but they were 11 to 12 hour drives for us. With our son, who knows what he wants and knows what he. Doesn't want. Unapologetically him. Yeah. Yeah. Allows emotion to move through him in real time. I feel like that. You know, I was saying this to someone yesterday that if someone would have told me that before I became a parent, like, oh, a seven hour drive is actually going to take you close to 12 hours, I would have been like, that sounds torturous. And there were moments of that car ride that were like, this is hard. But also you just can't. You just do it like there's not another option. And I know that's probably a really cliche parenting thing to say, but also every time we took him out of the car seat because he was crying, he would just have the biggest smile on his face. And then we would look at each other and just be like, look how glorious he is. Yeah, of course I'm going to do this. Of course we're going to patiently wait while he recalibrates before we put him back in the car seat. Of course we're going to. Of course, this is going to take as long as it takes. Yes. I don't know. In the hard moments of parenting, I don't think I was prepared for like, it's like when when there's hard things that happen in our relationship with challenging things, of course I'm going to do it because I fucking love you. Like. And it's the same with a child. It's like this sense of, oh yeah, this is high, but I'm not thinking this is hard because it's I love this being and I'm going to do whatever the fuck I need to do for this being right now. I know that that was just what I was contemplating on the phone. I got a lot of time to think and be with the emotions of it. I, I'm pretty sure you put in the post that you wrote recently, but it was like, yeah, this is the art of devotion. Yeah, it's beyond what I want. It's beyond what you want. It's beyond the, the, I guess the, the truth that I think is right and the truth that you, it's like, this is what is okay, can I be with this? And am I willing to stay with this through this? And eventually we get there. And that is the practice. And I feel like this is actually the conversation that needs to be had today. And let's jump in here. We're going to go somewhere else. Yes. This is this is really what is being asked of us. I feel it's. Often. That when, you know, I feel like we've been we see life as a practice and all of life, you know, is our spiritual practice. And whether this is business or parenting or our relationship, it's like, this is what life is asking of me. How can I meet more of myself by devoting myself to this? You know, instead of trying to run or avoid. It's like, I'm going to give myself to whatever is here and I'm going to meet more of myself or meet more of life, will meet more of God or goddess or whatever. That for whatever you want to call that force. And so, yeah, in those moments, even when it's hard or it's like in our relationship when, you know, it's when I am and when deep in a conversation, it feels greedy. Or, you know, in business, when something feels challenging, it's it's not like. Before this podcast. Yeah. And we both had a disagreement on how we should approach something. You know, when it's when it's challenging, it's I feel like both of us are in the practice of this is the practice. There's no other way. We lean in, we open, we we give ourselves to this moment. We make this moment. Yeah. We give ourselves to this moment. And that is devotion. Yeah. Giving yourself over to the experience. I think so many people want to manipulate, control or manage the experience. But when you give yourself the way that I've been like working with this is like, okay, I can be conscious and be aware, but I can still be checked out. I can still dissociate, I can be conscious and I can be aware, but I'm not engaging with what's happening. So, for instance, with ocean in the car and he's crying, I could be conscious in aware of that, but I could disengage and just keep driving and just push through and use force to get to where I want to get to, because that's the whole game. The game that we're playing is like, we want to get from point A to point B, literally in an X amount of hours. But what is the moment asking of us through our beautiful greatest teacher, our child, asking for us to stop and be present with what is? Yeah, and we have a choice. We can stop and be present with what is. And there's like, okay, I'm conscious of it, I'm aware of it, and I'm going to engage with it and I'm going to be with him. I'm going to hop out of the car. I'm going to hold him. I'm going to go for a little walk, and we're not going to just go for a little walk until he settles in and try to, you know, force him back in. We're going to go for a walk until he feels until the, the the emotions have fully moved and he's ready to go again. And he's going to get a little nervous system being in the car, being in the car for an hour, for him, it's probably an eternity. It's for us. It's like, well, we're just getting started. So yeah, I think this is really important. Like when you're meeting something in the moment, there's a calibration of all the different, factors of like, call this your nervous system. This he's nervous system. They're both intertwined. There's mine is our relationships. There's all of us. The family unit. So it's about honoring the deeper truth that's emerging in, in the collective. And that takes devotion. Because if you're like me and you're a human and you have certain ways of doing things in certain ways of, seeing how things should happen, then you're going to have expectations on experiences. You're going to have a way of wanting things to go, and life will provide you with the opportunity to meet the controlling parts of yourself. Yes, especially on a road trip. I feel I wrote a post last night and I, I spoke about how it wasn't my preference and I'm really enjoying that word. I had a beautiful chat here on the podcast to a woman named Jamie of probably like a month and a bit ago now, and she spoke about that. She used the word preference in relationship, like we have our preferences and then we have what's true. We have our preferences, and then we have who our partner actually is. And yeah, it was I spoke about in this post that it wasn't necessarily my preference. After being in New York, I got sick, my car got stolen. You know, I'd literally just got back from doing a 24 hour trip with our son to, like, home from New York. And then 5 or 6 days later, we were going on a road trip, seven plus hours to to your hometown. And there was part of me last week that was like, I really fucking hope you cancel this trip. I really hope that you see that my has been stolen, that I'm sick, that I'm unwell, that this just like isn't good for the nervous system of a harem of like really just like waiting for you to make that decision for us. And like, clearly was not my preference at all to go. And even though it wasn't my preference to go, I did not suggest that I did not say I don't. Oh, maybe I did say I don't want to go, I don't know, but I, I didn't, I didn't I didn't make you feel as if we shouldn't be doing this. And can you identify and I'm sure you're going to explain this, but like that's not you withholding a desire, right? No. And I really this is the piece I really want to get into that there's a difference between and this is I think is the nuance and almost like the evolution of feminine practice. A lot of like when a woman starts to be a practitioner of like bringing the full spectrum of feminine through in partnership. A lot of the time, the first thing that she really has to do is learn how to express her truth and learn how to stop pushing down her needs and pushing down her voice and caging out what she really means and learning how to bring her voice. Yes. Then I think that is the next evolution, which is like a refinement, which is what I was practicing last week, which is okay. Maybe my preference is to not go, but actually my practice isn't to go, hey, we shouldn't go because that's my truth. Deal with it. It was actually to go, yeah, my preference is not to go. And what's the truth for our family? What's the truth for our relationship? What is love asking me to do? What is what is the devotional practice of me in this partnership right now, which sometimes is going to ask us to let go of our preference and what feels comfortable or what feels like, what we would personally selfishly choose in that moment. And so for me, like my preference would have been to stay at home, not go in the car, not take our son in the car because he doesn't like the car. If we'd been to stay at home on the Gold Coast, we had other family here on the Gold Coast. We would have just been to stay and not do that. And yet I knew that my practice and the relationship was asking me. Our union was asking me. Life was asking me to do the hard fucking thing and to get in the car and to be in that practice. That was what devotion looks like to me. Last week. And that doesn't mean I was like a bit tantrum about it. The part of me even an hour into the car trip or she started crying heaps. It was a lot. We'd taken off at like 9 p.m. at night because we were driving overnight to hopefully have or sleep, you know, a lot in the car, given that he sleeps a lot at night. And then we pulled off and Fucking Blues Fest is on and we're like in this traffic thing. And I needed to go to the toilet. And there was part of me just internally praying that we would not. You know, she know that suffering is my third state. I will suffer through the throes of the deepest discomfort. And there was part of me that was just like, maybe now he will see that this isn't what is true for our family. Well, I just didn't want to be in the discomfort. And then even like when we arrived. Oh, and sorry, and this is the part I really want to speak into, is whilst that was happening and he was crying and we pulled off and Blues Fest was on and we were in the traffic and there and then I had asked you that week to, we were going to get a new. It was my preference to have a new car seat for our son for the trip, because he's kind of outgrowing his current car seat. And there's another car seat that our sister, your sister has that, is just more spacious, and I can actually lean over and feed him more easy while we're driving. Yes, it's a longer period, you know, longer car trips. And I'd asked you and reminded you a few times that that would that would feel really good for the car on. And it just wasn't something that you made happen before the trip. I forgot. And during that trip when like, yeah, just in the like in the, you know, intensity of him crying and everything, there was a part of me that just like, wanted to make you so wrong for forgetting that, like the part of me that was, I look like. You get. Excited faced. I know that the part of me that wanted to just like, like, punish you or remind you that you fucked up like this is he's crying right now. If you remembered to get the new car seat, this wouldn't be happening. He wouldn't be crying. We wouldn't be having to move through this discomfort. It's so easy to feel that towards a partner, though, when things are like when you're when things are challenging and the nervous system is red, lines like you, if you had have done this, it would be easier and we wouldn't. This would not be happening. What is happening should not be happening. If you had have done this, this is and yeah, I forgot. Like I literally slipped my mind. I said I was gonna do it and I didn't do it, so I don't have an excuse. It's just that that didn't happen. And I think what I really want to get at here is that I felt that. And I don't think we are ever immune to feeling those things and having that internal dialog about our partner. I think when we shift out of the paradigm of like win, lose, that lessens. And when we learn to really see and hold our partner in that field of like, fierce love, that voice lessons and lessons and lessons and it still is there. Sometimes the part that wants to make him wrong with her, wrong, or wants to punish him or wants to point out how he fucked up or whatever it might be. And then as so that was kind of my internal dialog for a bit. And I think I even said like, oh, this would be like, I think I mentioned that Casey and then our son went to sleep finally, and I think I said to you, your mom is also in the car with us. Yeah. And but I think I laughed and I said, you. Oh, God, there was part of me that wanted to make me so wrong. I just wanted to, like, I just wanted you to remember how you forgot the car seat. And. And I just think this is where we're able to move through that kind of those denser, grittier moments in our partnership by actually being aware of that part of us that wants to punish. And instead of that subconsciously wreaking havoc on our partnership and us actually punishing him and us actually being passive aggressive and like closing Austin, you know, wanting him to be wrong and wanting him to feel how much he fucked up and all of that. Like leading in those moments when we're actually able to freely speak into the space. Like, I'll remember back that when we pulled off, fuck, I wanted to punish you like fuck. I wanted you to know how much you you did it wrong and how much having the car seat would have changed everything. And it was almost like me having a laugh at that part of me as well. And like that brings such liberation. How much of that is you regulating for yourself? Like having like a you? Because what I felt in the past is that that has been something that you haven't been as artful in, because for me, suffering is kind of what I learned to be like. I was an identity piece for me. For you, it definitely isn't. A like comfort. Whereas feeling good. So what I felt like is like you were able to regulate that, and I like using that word, but like you were like, cool, I'm uncomfortable. Discuss this guy that forgot the car, this husband that supposedly loves me and kiss me and would do anything for me. I forgot is an absolute fucking idiot for a dickhead. But in that moment you were able to, like, breathe. Literally. Take a breath. Yeah. And, like, check yourself and be, like, cool. He did forget it. And even if I yell at him, that doesn't get to change that. We don't have the car. And I think. It's going to change the experience that I'm having right now. Yes. And the actual truth, it was like, even if you were to get that car seat like that would have changed. Like our son was just magically not going to cry because of the car seat was a tiny bit more spacious, like he's been in that car seat before. And like that other car that you feel and he's cried like, sorry. It was also about me letting that voice be there, not pretending it wasn't there, allowing that to be a part of my experience, allowing me to feel the fire in the like. Oh, like. Oh, and the part of me that just wished I wasn't in that experience of my son crying and crying, crying. And in those moments, we want someone to blame right when we're in, in discomfort or when we're in an experience we don't want to be in, we're looking around, who is there to blame? Who can I blame this on? Who? Who did this to me? Who did this to me? So is the who is the victim a part of me that wanted to look at you and you like you did this to me. You are the reason this is happening. And whilst all of that was and this is why I love pots work and you know like some you know internal family systems but like pots working in terms of like knowing that there's many parts of us that are alive at once and the victim me, part of me was really alive. Them wanting to blame you and I could I could be the witness of that. And because I was the witness of that, and also not trying to make that part of me wrong, or push it down or pretend it wasn't there, I could be the witness to that without it subconsciously, just like coming out in the car by me being like, fuck you! Or like, why didn't you get the car seat? I told you to get the car seat. Why didn't you get the car seat? This wouldn't be happening if if you would have changed the course. I told you three times last week. All of that is true or not. All of that is true. But I did tell you three times I did do that. But also like, how is that going to? I'm a devotee of intimacy and liberation. How is that going to lead to deeper intimacy and liberation? It wasn't, even if it was true, I'd ask you three times that for me. There is no point in telling you that or reminding you of that. That part of me that wants to tell you, you fucked up. That part of me wants to remind you of that. But again, this is really when we step out of that, that dynamic or that paradigm that I think we're taught is the only way to relate is like, there's a winner and a loser. And if someone has done something wrong, we must remind them it's our duty to remind them that they've fucked up or that they did it wrong. Yeah, the thing that I'm like, just really like God and tell me if this is true for you, but I feel like your nervous system is capable of that story running through your, you know, your system. You're able to run it through and, and and you almost, you know, let the charge move through you without needing to project it onto someone else. So I think there's like the two pieces there. It's like you're not suppressing this by holding it in. No, you're allowing the story and that, that, that part of you to have space within your nervous system. And because you have that capacity, it doesn't need to then spill out and create, drama or a drama triangle with an, okay, you're I'm the bad guy. You're the victim, and I need to then save the day and going, like, write my wrongs rather than just being like, yeah, cool. I didn't get to say yes. And we're on our way in the car, so I. I can't change what is happening. So therefore I'm allowing this to move through me. And what is what is in service to to love what is in service to my freedom? Is it to win or is it to, like win in this argument and then or to create a dynamic where I get to win? You forgot the Cassie. Yeah, well, I did this season this year, but you forgot the cars. Yeah, but well, I did this and you didn't do this and did it. And then all of a sudden, the car is thick with tension and frustration and anger and like volatility versus you actually having a nervous system to be with the the process. And I think this is like a lot a lot of relationships struggle with this because people don't train their own nervous systems to be with the parts of themselves that come up. Yes. I think this is like a lot of so what what I, what I'm learning is like this codependence where it's like, I need you to survive in this independence, which is like, I don't need you, but we might as well have a life together, cause it makes sense. But I'm going to be in a if it's not equal, if it's not fair, I'm going to let you know. And that's where the win lose comes through. And then this sort of this next stage of relating, which I think you're really speaking to really powerfully at the moment with all of your work and what I've witnessed in, the women at Full Spectrum and Live and the women that have come along to claimed and the women that are in your circle right now is that this is this, this deeper place you're taking into, which is this interdependency, which is where there's like, we actually get to create something greater together than we could ever create on our own. Yeah. I think it's like David date three stages of relating, like it's third stage intimacy. It's intimacy where you move beyond the individual of right and wrong. And this is what I want. This is what you want. Someone fucked up here in someone got it right or whatever that might be. And we step into third stage relating again, this is David Davis work, which is like embodied love, which is devotion to love. Right? Which is. And I'm speaking so much about this lately in my work that is ego obliterating. It's truly like, and I'm sure many people listening to this will feel that the the part of them that would not let a moment go by if that was them in the car of without reminding their partner that they hadn't done the course and they didn't do the course, they must that the the every cell of their body wants to remind their partner of that. Yes. And this is where it's really about practicing and this this isn't and this is why it's so nuanced that this isn't about pushing down what you really mean and building up resentment, but this is a more nuanced practice of instead of feeling like you need to express something to be right, what would what is devotion to love look like? What is devotion to intimacy look like? Like I am devoted in our partnership. We are both devoted to intimacy. I am I don't give a like maybe there's little moments but I would say this about deeply and this is why we don't necessarily fight in our partnership. We don't give a fuck about being right. There's very few moments in our partnership where I can feel you want to be right, or I can feel I want to be right. Thank you. And, you know, there was once a stage where that was more and more and more, but we care way more. We are so much more devoted to how close do we feel right now? How connected do we feel, how much love is in? How clear is the channel between our hearts? How much love is in this car? How much love is in this room? How liberated does the space feel between our bodies and in the field of our relationship? Like that's what fucking matters. And if you're devoted to that, it's going to ask you to put down the motherfucking sword, to put, put, put down the the artillery and the ammo. That's saying, oh, I've got a good one. I'm going to tell him that he didn't. I reminded him three times to put the motherfucking car. So he didn't he didn't like it's going to ask us to put that down. And that is that is ego obliterating. And there's so many dynamics that play out here. Like, for instance, I believe our dynamic before we started to cultivate this style of relating, which is deeper, more intimacy focused and more. And there's another winner and a loser. There's a deeper place that we both want to arrive at. So let's go there, and work together. There's there was a dynamic very much where you were the one that knew more, and I was the one that knew less. Therefore, I was the one that would be like, yes, you're right. And you like, yes, yes, I know. I knew. Better. And that's and that served me to be the one that didn't know as much, because then I didn't have to take responsibility. So I was able to be like, oh no, Meg's the god. She's the one that knows everything. She's she's done yoga, she's done manifestation. She has the crystal. I'm why I'm here. To let me. I have no idea what I'm doing. It's so crazy. She's she's never had a 9 to 5. That's how spiritual she is. That is the measure of spirituality. No, 9 to 5 carries crystals in a bra. Journals every morning and every night. Has three shipping containers worth of. Journals. Yes, and that's yoga. That is the epitome of spirituality. So I was like, oh my God, you're so much better than me. But that even then that's still serving like the the you're better than me, I'm less than. Therefore, I will do everything in my power to make you. To lift you even higher up. Yeah. And make you seem even better. Then again. Again, I'll do everything. All that dynamic was still in that 5050 like relating of like, oh, I'm less than, you're better than and together will will this will, this will work. But when we had to come in intimate you know the third state of relating where there's this like level of devotion for me, I had to speak up about things. I had to stand my ground. I had to also just like be okay with saying no. And that was like our nervous systems had to like calibrate and become more, I guess, holistic in, in, in being with the parts of ourselves that were seeking validation through our relationship. And, and now it's not around validation more so it's around like meeting the deeper parts of ourselves through through the relationship. And that's where, you know, the out of forgiveness, the out of compassion, the out of being with, the other as they go through something becomes a devotional practice has been many times where I've been, fucking wet blanket like that. Hasn't had any, any integrity that hasn't stood up for himself. It hasn't had the ability to see what I was capable of and if she would have put me, you know, if you're to, like, localize that and to say that that is Jacob in that moment without seeing the full, I guess, the full trajectory of my path, you could be like, yeah, you're not in integrity, you're not in your masculine, you're not a worthy partner. You're failing. Therefore, I'm going to leave. And if that is that, you know, if that's how. We would just to approach relating and just take it as this formula based thing. You wouldn't actually be able to be devoted to me. You know, this isn't comfortable for me. This isn't what I want. My desires are not being met. Therefore, I'm going to go and find someone who can make them. I think that is where the art of devotion comes in when we are supporting our partner through healing, but then also our partner when when they're absolutely killing it. Can we celebrate them? Can we actually, like, reflect back how amazing they are as well? And this is like, for me, when we move from like validation into, like deeply meeting each other. And that's an ongoing practice. I feel, Yeah, I want to, I want to deepen into the pieces. Spoke about the art of forgiveness because I think this is something that if you do desire, if, if you want to feel deeply connected in your partnership, if you want to step out of that, there's a winner, there's a loser. And really step into that third stage relating the, the relating of, of like deep devotion to love. I'm feeling like we call that the, the channel between the hearts being clear, which really means the difference. Like when you spoke about before in the call. Like, we all know the feeling in a relationship when the when there's the air is like thick where it just feels so disconnected and it's just like air, right? Really, it's about being devoted to clearing that when that arises and coming back together, the space between our bodies. And if you're devoted to that and want to experience that, you must be devoted to the practice of forgiving and letting go. And let's use the car example, the car seat example, like I it was a choice to let that go. Yeah. I could have chosen to hold on to that. I could still be fucking holding on. I know, I should know that. I think I got it in your back pocket. I can see the part of me that would of. I can see the part of me even 5 or 6 years ago that would have. And, you know, I could have held on to that, that in tire car trip and it could have been a painful car trip. I could have held on to that the entire weekend, and still been trying to punish you for creating a painful car trip. I could still be holding on to that because that would have been led to a shitty weekend, and I could all still be holding on to the fact that it's all because you didn't put the car seat in, and we would have had a, we would have had a good trip if you would have put the car seat in like such a small fucking thing. But these, these small micro moments and fractures are truly what kills a partnership. It truly is what kills upon a ship. And I'm not saying again, to hold on to resentments. No, that's the opposite of what I'm saying. But I'm also talking about sometimes love is going to ask us to just let the fucking thing go, to not make it a thing, to go, okay? I reminded him three times to put the car seat and he didn't. That's okay. Can I be okay with that? Can I not have to make him feel wrong or small or like an idiot for that right? That's for me. That's a liberation. I'm a woman devoted to feeling liberated in my body. And because of that, I choose to forgive. I choose to let go. I choose to make things not a thing. I choose to make some things a thing. I think what I'm saying, I think what we're appealing to is like each other's humanity. Yes. Like where you expecting your partner to be perfect? Yes. I'm. Where are you when they aren't perfect? Using that as collateral to not not just belittle them, but to then use that for your own, gain your own advantage to position yourself above them, where then you get to utilize that to create more, authority or more of a hierarchy with. And they're constantly playing. This playing is like, I need to make up for all of my wrongdoings. I fucked up, I left it, I forgot to get the fucking car seat. I'm sorry. It does sound like it's. It isn't. Actually. It sounds like it's three times. Three times. All right. I'm just really wanted. Because this happens. I wish this in women all the time. And I really just want to speak to the woman right now that would be listening to this and is like, oh, oh yeah. Like, I don't have to make that a thing. I could have asked him three times and then I could have just let it go like I, because I know what that feels like. And I just really want that woman to know that it's a choice. What? It's a choice to remind him many fucked up. And it's a choice to go, oh, I can just let this go. Yes. And also in your letting it go, I also get to like, let myself be human. And I'm not going to run around trying to make up for it. Yeah. And like literally be on edge for the next week being like, have I ever done enough to make up for that thing. I fucked up full stop. Next. There's so much scorekeeping that can fuck up a relationship because neither of parties are willing to let it go. Oh my gosh. Just knowing like that we're human. We're gonna make mistakes. And the world is busy. Like the world is busy like there's a lot of noise. There's a lot of things going on. So you're going to forget something, you're going to fuck up. You're going to be human at some point in your life. And that is going to require the art of forgiveness to be practiced in your relationship if you actually want to go the distance. I think so many people are so individuated and they're so independent and they're so wound now. Actually, red flag, you fucked up. There's so much bullshit that goes into this, relating world around, oh, no, you're not in integrity. You're not perfect, you know, you're not masculine enough. You're not this. You're not that. Oh, he didn't buy the roses, dude. We're fucking human. Like we're all having a human being in experience. And the practice here is like, can I grow with this person? Can I love this person? Can this person, can I continue to love this person? And in that loving learn more about myself. And it's such a gift. And you've told me this because you are incredible forgiveness. You know, there's you are. So this has been something I've had to deeply practice in our partnership. And I think that's why I understand how beautiful and liberating it feels to practice this and offer you this. But you have always offered me this. You have always been so incredible at this in in terms of if I say I'm going to do something and then I don't, you're like, that's okay. Or if, you know, I take long, I say, I'm going to be 30 minutes working and then I'm like an hour and you're looking after our show, like whatever it might be, you, you don't make a big thing out of anything you ask us. So you've always given me such a deep gift of grace and compassion. And so this is something I've actually learned from receiving from you, because it's been so many moments where I've maybe in the past, held you to such a high level of perfection. And then I take a moment to go, oh, what would that feel like if you were doing that for me? And I'm like, that would feel fucked. That would feel so unloving, that would feel like such pressure that would feel so icky. And so I really learned by how you love me and the grace you offer me to reciprocate that and to love you better. And I'm so grateful for that, because it's not only it's probably very liberating and freeing for you to receive that from me. And again, I don't always get it right, but it's also just so fucking labor. It's such a gift to practice that, to feel, to not have to carry that. It's, it's it's heavy to hold someone to such a high standard to perfection. It's heavy to expect so fucking much from someone and to be hyper vigilant in terms of watching them, to see if they're going to fuck up and to think that it's your duty to remind you when they fucked up or you didn't do it. And I remind you that like that, that's that's a lot to carry and a lot to hold and a big role to play. And it's so fucking exhausting. Just feel what it's like to not have to need your partner to be a certain way. Yes. What if they can just be there? That's this. But that's truly this. And that's like Peter Crying talks about. This is like you're so much in so many of my favorite teachers and like, what if they just then right now, what would it feel like to let go of needing needing to get it right? Yeah. Like if you're projecting onto your partner that they need to jump through this hoop, step over this, barrier and take these 17 boxes just to get your love. What do you think that's doing to their nervous system? What kind of, what kind of conditions are you placing on the love that you give to your partner? Number one. And what does that doing for you? Like, where are you, like, literally guarding yourself from from giving and receiving. But then where are you creating this dynamic? Your partner has to, like, literally be activated and have cortisol running through their body just to get loved. And this is you know, and I know, you know, this makes me emotional. But also knowing like there's a part of me like the little boy me that's like I'm I'm bad, there's something wrong with me. I'm a bad, I'm bad, and I need to make up for that. So my entire life has been an attempt to prove that I'm not bad and I'm working on that. And that's a big part of my journey, is like, I'm actually not bad. So I don't actually have to do anything to make up for that. But all of this work that I've been doing, it's not actually to get to this point to realize, oh, I'm not actually a bad person. I'm not inherently a bad. There's not a bad boy that wants to hurt. Oh, that's just I'm just me. And similarly, like, you know, I call her little Maggie, but little Maggie wants to, like, do so. Well, it's like, oh, when you get locked in your office and you lose yourself in your work, it's like, that's just because you're passionate and you care about your work, and I'm not going to shame you for that. I'm not going to force you to be if you're not at it. You know, within five minutes of when you said you I'm not going to fucking. You know, I know that you're passionate. I know that work your work is important to you. And I know that your family's important to you as well. And I know how to artfully move with you now rather than holding you to this rigidity. And one thing that, Ryan approaches us in our facilitator training is rigidity leads to fragility. If you are so rigid in your conditions around love and around relating, you will become a fragile person. You will be reactive. You will be, destructive. You will be, you will create, a, a heart that is hard to access because you are so rigid in the way that you move and you have all of these conditions. So for me, my practice is like, how few conditions can I have around my love for you? And you have been an incredible offering. Of practice for for this practice. And there's things that drive me up the fucking most stunning. But I have the nervous system to be able to move it through my body. I'm like, is her clothes on the floor actually going to kill me? Is it actually going to cause me to die, or can I just step over them, or do I just pick them up and throw them in the corner? Can I push on? Like, why am I making this into something that is right or wrong? Why am I creating these rules? Yes. And when you're away, I actually had this and I haven't brought this to you yet, but I think it's something that I would love and I would love for us to create, like the guiding principles of our home together. And what I realized like, oh, it's not about me making make wrong for the way that she moves through the home and and does things know just like it's like you're not here to make me wrong for forgetting that it's just like. But what are some guiding principles we can put in place that allow the flow of life to happen more gracefully, more smoothly, more lovingly? I like cool. All right. We get to actually have a conversation about this now and speaking to our needs at once, and our desires without the artillery. I need you to be more. You need to be more in integrity because you've got that. It's like, let's let's look at what we need for the next two years for our son to make sure that when we do go home, it's super easy. And yes, we do need the the new, carseat. Yes. But, you know, it would also feel really good. Why don't we book a motel halfway? Why don't we take two days to get there and maybe we can stop? I think we can, like, slow down. Where? Where was I? Still in a rush. Where was I still trying to get there? Make the most of the days that we had out there because, you know, time is time is of the essence. Okay. So next year let's already start planning next, next use Easter. That feels exciting to me. What would it look like to actually leave a day early and stop halfway? And we can still have it? Not in Glen Innes. I only have to drive four hours and then the next day I only drive four hours. That feels way better. Yeah, I want to I want to just, like, circle back to what you were saying around, like, how few conditions can I have on loving this person I'm in partnership with? And I just think that with, like, everything that you just spoke to was just. And the way you, you spoke, it was just so fucking impeccably beautiful. And how are we going to podcast every fortnight now? I think we need to wait. Yeah. That like that's that's it makes me emotional because that's it. We, we, you know, we teach a lot. We speak in relationships a lot. But if we could distill it down to one thing, like even beyond the fucking masculine and feminine, I love those energetics and teaching those energetics. And I think there is such truth and they can be so supportive and game changing in partnership. And what goes so fucking beyond those dynamics is can you look the man or woman in the eyes that you're in partnership with, and can you be just in the fucking practice of accepting them? And release seeing them from the grip of who you think they need to be for you. Because that is what is actually holding you back from experiencing the love and the intimacy that your heart and your body and your soul is deeply aching for. And so often. Yeah. It's this like and I see this in women and I've, I've felt the embodiment of this in my own experience. It's like when I had such high expectations on you and so many conditions on you that felt so, that felt so harsh and hard in my body. It was only amplifying the part of me that wanted to stay in control. It was only amplifying the part of me that didn't trust life and was like, okay, you need to be X, Y, and Z, and I need to keep an eye out to see that you're being X, Y, and z masculine enough so I can be feminine, I can relax. We really. What if the practice was, can I love you as you are? And can I relax into life in myself in this partnership? And I also know that that is so simplified. And there is there's nuance to this, and there are so many other things that, you know, are involved, like safety and all these things that support us to create that and experience that. And we need to be choosing someone that we truly want to practice that with. But if we all distill it down like, that's the fucking practice, accept the person you're in partnership with. And if you really fucking struggle to do that, and if you're actually not willing to do that, leave like leave full stop. There is something and there's a humility, you know, like, actually there's someone out there that can love you better. Yes. And this is why I am not like admitting to yourself, I am not willing to love this man or woman where they are. Wow. Look at the amount of conditions I'm placing on them. That's not fair. What would that feel like to them? Am I a pleasant person to be in partnership with? Probably not. Like if you're placing so many expectations and so many conditions on your partner, you want most likely not a pleasant person to be in partnership with and then maybe sorry, maybe they can perform and tick the boxes, but they're still going to go. This is an unpleasant experience. Maybe they can be more masculine and ask you on the date and bring you home the roses. But if it's from this place of you must do this. So I feel good. So I love you. That's not going to be it's going to be performative. It's not going to be authentic from them. It's not going to create true, deep, authentic intimacy. It's a circus. It's I'm performing for you. I'm performing for your praise and performing for your validation and performing for your love. Performing for love is exhausting. And I truly believe, like what you just shared around like I have, I am not able to. I'm not capable of loving you without conditions is a very different statement to you're not worthy of my love. Can you repeat that? I am not capable of loving you without conditions. That's that. Create and either create the create a very unpleasant experience for both of us. Versus. You're not worthy of my love. I can do that. I can do better. There's a real sovereignty. There's a real ownership there. Like, hey, I actually I'm not the one to love you because I don't have the capacity to be with the deeper parts that require this. Therefore, this isn't actually the relationship that is going to serve you or me. And we have a saying, you know, our men's work in our academy, which is the honorable death, and, you know, I've coached men through really, really shitty break ups. It's suck because they both, deep down want what's best for each other. And sometimes that is for the relationship to dissolve. And I tell the men, give, give the relationship an honorable death. So when the time comes for you to reflect might be a month, it might be a year, might be a decade. You can reflect back and you can be grateful that relationship happened rather than seeing it as a failure. Yes. And I think that that's a so many people are willing to see that. Are willing to see that the relationship is no longer serving them, and they're not willing to actually sit down like, hey, can I actually can I actually remove these conditions? Or if I can't, can I let this go? And I think that's, you know, what you said, you know, you let go. The relationship is the love is more more important than the win for you. Love and connection is more important than Jacob. You need to know that you forgot the KC love was more important in that moment to you. Yeah. And then after that, we had a laugh, I fell asleep, I fell asleep, you fell asleep? Yes. You got. Yeah. You had, you had. Yeah. You got you for 4 or 5 hours of sleep. So like but if we had have created that tension then there would have been the whole season of like, okay, now we have to do repair. My mom's in the car. This is awkward. You know, all of that. Your nervous system and your awareness and your, you know, your felt sense allowed you to be a practitioner of of of embodied love. Yes. And I just want to like speaking to what you said then like, then we would have had to done repair, but your mom was in the car. Then we were at the camping spot and there were other people. Yeah. Like that moment of me not forgiving you and not letting go. Me choosing to hold that and hold you hostage to that moment of you forgetting, yeah, would have tainted the entire seven. Plus our car ride, the entire weekend. It would potentially still be in the channel between our heart. And I just really want everyone listening to hear that that, like, that's what kills partnerships. That's what not wanting. Like that's why you're not wanting to make love or feel. You're not feeling deeply connected to your partner. That's why you're feeling this like blah. Because there was a small moment that you either held on to right or didn't clear. Which then taints the entire relationship. It's the way in which you then move. It's, it's, it's what's tainting the space between your bodies and you relate with your bodies. And this is where like really seeing the partnership as a field, like an energetic field. And I feel like we don't use this language of speaking to work. But I think it's it's something we practice in an unspoken way is that we're attuned to the field of our partnership. Right. And we are very devoted to keeping that field impeccably clear. Yes. And that channel between our hearts impeccably clear, which means we don't hold on to shit. We choose to forgive quickly. We choose to let go. We choose to free that other person. Right? Because we are more devoted to keeping that energetic field clear, clean, full of love and connection, rather than being more devoted to feeling more powerful and more right. Oh, more of a winner than the other person. And again, I think this is truly a paradigm shift. This takes practice. And it's it's it hurts because it hurts the ego. Yeah. It it's painful. It feels like an embodied death because there's a part of you that's like, oh, this motherfucker needs to know that he's wrong, that he did me wrong, that he fucked up and this this is the actual embodied moment to moment practice. To feel the part of you that wants to make him wrong and to breathe into that, even to laugh like I think this is I'm such an advocate in relationships to voice the pot. Like, if you're practicing this next time and you feel the part of you that's like my partner, you know, forgot to put the car seat in the car after I told him three times, he needs to know that I need to three times. I need to remind him of this. Like to actually notice the part of you, the one that you can say to him like, hey, I can. Hey, there's this part of me right now that wants to make you wrong. I want to punish you like, oh, like just a voice that is so liberating. Instead of actually having that play out in a really slimy way. And I think to when you let the full charge move through your nervous system, when you own that and you regulate yourself afterwards, we were laughing. I was like, I don't know when was speaking. Maybe it was at the campsite was like, when we got to that tunnel the second time, we pulled off a bar and I could feel that you were like, we should just turn around, right? You were feeling like, let's just go home. Let's just go back to our bed. Let's wake up. Let's go get coffee somewhere. Let's just have all of that familiar things. It's a make. We can make pancakes at home. I think we could just do that. And you're like, yeah, yeah. I was like, oh, like, you get to laugh about that. Yeah. That the humanness of it, you know, the human condition, which is to want things to be a certain way. Yes. And that's normal, I think. I just want to say one last thing, and I feel like we're we're really tightening this, this conversation up into a nice sort of final piece is getting it freeing. Your partner is like to do that. You've got to be you've got to free yourself first. You've got to let it go through. Forgiveness doesn't come from it does not come before letting go first, letting go of the need to be right, the need to be the winner like you in that moment. Let go of like, hey, I'm letting go. And then the forgiveness isn't necessarily you saying, hey, I forgive you for forgetting the coffee even though I asked you talk feel that it's not a manipulative. It's not that the forgiveness is like you returning to love. It's not an outward. Forgiveness is not outward. It's not. It's not about. That is so I love that you love me for that, because it's not words. And so often we can perform forgiveness to someone. Hey, it's okay, I forgive you, but in an embodied way, you know? But in our body, we're holding that. And in our body, we're being hyper vigilant to watch. If he doesn't again, because, yeah, I repeat, fucking does it again. Because now I can say, hey, you did it again. And last time that like, it is, it's this. It's an embodied forgiveness. It doesn't need words. It's literally this, this freeing energetically from any kind of tentacles that want to like, oh, like, what's the what's the what? I'm looking for tentacles that hook into your partner and want to hold them hostage to. That and literally harvest their energy. Yeah, yeah. And so that's what that's what true forgiveness is to like. It sounds so like oversimplified, but it's like letting it go. Like letting it go. Not so in two weeks time when you're in a fight, you bring it up. Even though you said in the car, I forgive you, but bringing it off and being like, you know, I can't fucking trust you like the car seat thing and like this. Know if you're really letting it go, you. It's not in the backpack waiting for a fight. You freed your body of it. And maybe you're listening to this and you're like, how the fuck do I do that? That feels so hard. This is a practice. And, you know, let's continue to speak into this will come into our work. This is what I do with women, the embodiment work to be able to practice this and be a practitioner of this. It's okay to fuck up. It's okay to fail. It's okay to make mistakes. And if you are a practitioner of this and you want to work on this like this a relationship is a beautiful place to do it. Running a business is a beautiful place to do it. You know, we're in a home right now where there's two growing businesses. There is a six month old child. There is, like a long term relationship. There's many facets for us to be practitioners of this. And I just truly believe that you will, in the way that you see your partner will reflect the experience that you have in relationship with them. And I think that what you've been capable of doing is, yes, not holding me as this version of me that is that that is the failure or is the fuck up or is I forget for one you. Yeah. Acknowledge it, you process it and then you let it go. And I just, I just want to bring one more piece in. One more piece. Of it in. And again I'm using this I'm using this example without charge. Without animosity. It is not in the channel between the hearts. I swear I love I know. It's such a good. Example. I love examples when you know, I know that people love examples and love something that's so like rooted and real and so, where was I going with that? Where was I going with that? In the car, if, you know, I think in, in the times when we want to make our partner wrong, it's a really beautiful question to go. What am I making this mean? Like, what am I making this mean? And does this truly matter? Like, does this truly fucking matter? Like, what would be the point? Why do I want to tell him and remind him that he forgot the car seat? Why do I want to do that? Like, honestly? Like, can I be so deeply honest with myself in terms of why are I want to? I want to remind him because, like, the car seat would have helped the journey. We wouldn't know what's underneath that. Oh, I want I want him to know we fucked up and I want to be right. I want him to feel like I want that power dynamic of being right. I want him to feel small. I want him like that's most likely the truth. That's the truth of that dynamic. And we need to be. So this is going to be if you want to be in the practice of this, like ask that when you when you find yourself wanting to remind your partner or point out how they did something wrong or whatever is why, like, why do I want to do this? I want to be right. Ooh. That's confronting. Ooh. And can I be devoted to love? And. Yeah, it's it's vulnerability can be a scary thing. So, like, we totally get it. I think this is, you know, the more we practice this, the more open we become to, to love. And that means that the ego has to go on the fire and the identity, the the who we thought we were starts to slowly dissolve. Yeah. And that's that's a process. And relationships are a great place for that process to unfold. I love this conversation. Are we feeling connected? Always channel between the hearts. Clear? Well, not always guys. Sometimes we feel disconnected. But not for very long. No, because. Because we are especially devoted to resources. Right it and this house. I mean, it's it's nothing without that. What we need this is you can't walk through this house cause you can feel it in the air. There's disconnect. There's animosity, there's separation. What do you mean. When we're not connected? Oh, God. Yeah, it doesn't feel like a home. No, it's. Like a shell. Okay. Our home is built on love. This house is built on love. Live love, love. Love, love. Love. But not. I think that's why wherever we live, I. That's the foundation. Like, it's not what the house looks like. It's not how good we are at maintaining our our checklist for each other. It's like are we is the channel between the hearts clear? How many can is there is fewer conditions on the love that I'm bringing to the relationship into the world? Because then I feel free. I feel free to give. I feel free to receive, and I'm not having to jump through hoops. I'm not having to tick these boxes and I'm not having to be something that I'm not to exist in this world. Yeah, I want to end with this. So many women listening to this want, want their man to to be more masculine. I'm saying that with quotations. Yes. You want him to be more masculine, don't like your practice. Is relinquishing the conditions you put on him. Because the good boy will try and tick the your conditions. The good boy will try and perform like. Oh, mommy. Okay. Yes. You want me to be this? You want me to be more masculine for you? You want me to be like. You don't actually want that. You want him in his free, true, full expression. And that means you offering a field of be whoever the fuck you need to be. And I will love you in that. And I will. I will be the part of me that is now. Uncomfortable. Uncomfortable, wants to control, that is like is triggered by that. Like that's the gift. That's how you truly offer your man the space and the field for him to revise. You get a job and go after your dreams. No, no, that's not the masculine I was talking about. Like, like more masculine. Like, just buy me this, do this, this. No, no, like. Like what? Like, yeah. Do is like, wear that shirt that I. That makes you look masculine, but, like, with a beard really embraces his masculine. He is untamable, he is uncontrollable. And there is nothing that will stop him from going after what he desires and pursues his own version of greatness, which is, you know, he's souls calling. Don't make you uncomfortable, and that's your. Practice. And it also. Takes to be with the discomfort. It will also be the thing that takes you to where you deeply want to go. Yes, it may not look like he thought it was going to look like, but you will feel the way that you're you're saying you want to feel, which is deeply connected, deeply in love and, deeply met. Love it. Love you guys. Process sensation. We will see you soon. See you in a little bit. Peace. Yo yo yo. Thank you so much for tuning in to another episode of sex, love and Everything in between. Now, if you'd like to stay connected with Megan, you can head on over to Instagram and follow me at the Jacob O'Neil. And where can people find you? Love her at the dot, Megan O. Amazing. And yeah, guys, check out the show notes for all other information in regards to what we've got coming up. And yeah, we're super, super grateful that you guys have taken the time to listen in to this podcast. If you do have any topics or any questions, like I said, hit us up on Instagram and we'll see what we can do apart from that. Have a beautiful, beautiful rest of your day. Thanks for being. Here. Big, big love.