00:00 

Hey there, welcome to Intentional Living with Tanya Hale. This is episode number 341, "Choosing to Be All-in." Welcome to your place for finding greater happiness through intentional growth, because we don't just fall-into the life of our dreams...we choose to create it. 

00:22 

Alright, hello there, my friends. So glad to have you here. Thank you for joining me. Christmas ended. We just had the new year. Isn't this amazing? 2025. I always think it's fascinating that people say things like, "I hope 2025 is good to you." And I kind of like to take the opposite stance. I hope that I'm good to 2025. Alright? I hope that I make the impact on this year that I want to make, that I choose to step into creating the life that I want. And I hope that you choose to do the same thing as well. Don't let 2025 take charge of your life. You take charge of 2025. 

01:03 

Okay, a couple ways you can do that. I have classes starting this week and they are not full yet, so I still have room. So, they're going to be Wednesday nights. If you are interested in those, I have two. One of them is called "Mindset Reset." And that one is going to be talking about kind of going back to the basics of the mindset work that we do. Talking about our circumstances, our thoughts, our feelings, our actions, our results, how all of those work together. We're going to be talking about growth mindset and fixed mindset, ideas that were put forth by Carol Dweck in her book "Mindset." We're just going to really be diving deep into more of that. So if you are a New Year's resolution person or if you're a resistant to New Year's resolution person, this is really a good fit because we're not going to be talking about setting specific goals. We're going to be talking about changing the way that we think about our lives to be able to change our lives in the way that we want. So that's "Mindset Reset," that's gonna be a great class. 

02:04 

The second one that I'm doing is called "Relationship Reset" and this one's gonna go back to the basics of relationships: what are the basic foundational skills that we need to have that most of us in this middle-aged generation were never taught, we were not given anything close to the information that we need. So like everything we talk about I really hit on the on the podcast, but this really does it in a way that hits it home. So you're going to get chunks of podcasts that all talk about the same thing and then we come together as a class and we discuss them and talk about them. 

02:43 

The people who have listened to lots of my podcasts and then done one-on-one coaching with me and then come back around and taken a class are just amazed. They're like "I thought I knew all the things," and yet the class just expands and helps their information get broader and deeper and really dig into concepts that are helpful. So if either of those sounds sound interesting to you get on and get signed up for those. They start on Wednesday so you're not going to want to miss that. 

03:15 

And then the last thing that I just want to remind you of is January 14th, I have my next talk with Tanya. I realized last time that there were a few problems with the links that I had gotten set up. So I really apologize for that if you wanted to join in on the December one and weren't able to. But I think I've got that fixed. If I don't, go back into my website just go to the "contact me" button and send me an email and I can get you the link for that. So these, because of the link problems, have not been highly attended and I don't know if this one will either. 

03:52 

So last time I had one person who reached out to me with an email and she got a free coaching session and it was brilliant and it was so fun and I enjoyed it. And so if you're the only one that shows up you can get a free coaching session and that's a great deal for you and it's a great deal for me because I love to coach and I love to help you gain clarity. So those are a couple of things going on. 

04:13 

So this let's jump into today's topic. I just want to say that this is one of those topics that when I finish writing it I just can hardly wait to start recording it because I just feel so strongly about what we're going to talk about today and I just can hardly wait for you to look at things differently hopefully and to see something maybe that you haven't seen before. We're talking about choosing to be all-in in our relationships and I'm going to start off with a confession that in my first marriage, in many ways, I was not all-in. So you may have heard me tell this story before if you've been listening for a bit, but I will revisit it again. 

05:00 

So I met my previous spouse when we were both attending Brigham Young University and we worked at the same place. And through a series of events, one night he ended up giving me a ride home after work. And I knew him at work, but I was kind of like, whatever. And I think he was kind of the same, right? But I wasn't interested in him romantically at all, but we ended up sitting in the car and chatting for several hours. And in the course of that discussion, I had a very distinct impression that I was supposed to be with him. And I interpreted that as to mean that I was supposed to marry him. 

05:36 

And a little bit of background there, I had recently gone out with a man that I really liked and he had told me that he couldn't date me anymore because he didn't feel that he could connect with me. So in language that I know now that I did not know then, he was telling me that I was not being vulnerable. And he couldn't connect with me because I wasn't being vulnerable. And at the time, I didn't know what he was talking about. And so I had been making it a matter of prayer and saying, "Heavenly Father, help me understand what I don't know here, like what was going on and what do I need to learn from that experience?" So when I felt the prompting that my previous spouse was the one who could help me figure it out, I also believed that I was supposed to marry him. 

06:21 

And so we're sitting in the car and I have this feeling come over me and it was really, really strong. And after some tense moments of sitting in the car, I discussed my thoughts and my feelings with him and he agreed and we left the car engaged. And I know, I know, if one of my children ever did that, I wouldn't, I would, oh, I don't know what I would do, because I know that they get to be adults who get to make their own decisions, but we would find some way to at least have a good discussion about it. 

06:53 

But here's the thing, my previous husband and I both had really busy work and school schedules and it was May when this happened and we got married in August. And so we had about three months. And during that three months, we were both going to school, either part-time or full-time and we were both working full-time. And he also had a five-week military training to go to during the course of that summer and we ended up getting married in August. So as you can imagine, with only three months and very limited engagement with each other, we really didn't know each other at all. And it's safe to say that neither one of us was really excited and happy to be marrying the other. But we did feel that getting married was the right choice. So we just dug in and said, "okay, well, we'll just do it." A lot of faith there, right? 

07:44 

I will say that the first many years of marriage, well pretty much all my marriage, I really really struggled to be married, to be happy in the marriage. I was angry that I didn't feel that he ever had to work for me and he probably felt the same, right? I was angry that we were such a difficult fit, that we just weren't even friends who enjoyed being with each other and yet we were married. And when I would tell him that I wanted to be friends he would say "I don't even get it. That doesn't make sense to me. I need a wife." Probably our definitions were just different but there was just this space of loneliness and I look back and I can see that I wasn't ever all-in. 

08:29 

So let me clarify, though. I was all-in on the concept of staying married. That's why we were married for 24 years, right, because I had this thought right? I didn't get married to get divorced. But I didn't know what "all-in" even meant other than just staying married even when it's hard. I really had no concept of what it meant to be "all-in," to be committed heart and soul. 

08:54 

So let me amend this story a little bit. I think I was all-in on the ways that I knew to be all-in. I worked hard to do the things  that I felt I was committed to do, like all of the checklist-y things. I cooked, I cleaned, I had sex a few times a week, I bought presents for special occasions I said, "I love you" a lot and I read marriage books. And I generally just did all of those kinds of things that I knew how to do. And yet my heart didn't really ever choose him for two reasons that I can currently understand. 

09:31 

One, I had no concept of vulnerability in marriage and how vital it was. I had never really had a relationship that required that kind of vulnerability from me. So I didn't even know how to go there. And two, I didn't want to be really more vulnerable, even had I understood it, because he never felt safe to me emotionally. And as I look back, I can see my brain was protecting me because it was not a safe emotional place. But to have a healthy successful marriage we have to choose our spouse and choose to be all-in. Like, "heart and soul" in, not "checklist" in. 

10:12 

And this is the element of being all-in that I want to discuss with you today. Are you all-in on checking the boxes for your relationship? Or are you all-in committed to investing your heart and experiencing the personal growth that this entails? Do you have your feet grounded in the concept of being married and you're going through the motions, but your whole body is leaning out and away? Or is your body leaning in towards your spouse, willing to do everything to have the soul-to-soul connection that so many of us crave? This leaning in space is challenging. It can be scary and vulnerable and it is also the only way to get the type of connection that we desire. 

10:59 

So here's what I've learned since my divorce and especially since my miraculous marriage to Sione: there is a level of intimacy that is available to us only when we are doing hard work on ourselves. Work with a capital W, right? It requires personal awareness. It requires a strong sense of self, vulnerability, learning to truly accept and love the other person at levels that we have never been capable of loving before. It requires self-confrontation and true deep honesty with the other person and with ourselves. 

11:38 

This is the space of being all-in that I never understood when I was in my 20s and 30s and 40s. I was doing the best I knew how and I was successfully checking boxes and I was a great wife when I look at all the checked boxes I had. But my best was woefully inadequate in creating the kind of intimate friendship and partnership that I craved. And I know that I was not alone in that. I know that so many of you are in the same space that I was. Sometimes I refer to this space as "leaning out." You may be staying in the marriage but rather than leaning in toward each other to rely on each other and share to know and be known, we lean out away from each other. We don't leave the marriage but neither do we invest in the marriage emotionally. 

12:36 

And this is the space where I feel so many people are living in a miserable marriage, in a tolerable marriage. As humans we desperately crave the connection but we are resistant to, and scared of, the vulnerability required to achieve said connection. So we stay married but we don't really put our heart and soul into it. We don't lean in. Now this may be because we don't know that we're not putting our heart and soul into it and this is the place where I feel I was much of the time in my previous marriage. Or we may be leaning out intentionally because we don't trust the other person. It doesn't feel like a safe place. Or we don't trust ourselves which is also a place in my previous marriage that I believe I was intuitively tapping into but wasn't consciously aware of. 

13:23 

Here's the truth about any relationship: we have no control, zero control, over how the other person shows up. They may respond to our vulnerability with kindness and compassion or they might be dismissive. But they get to be how and who they want to be. We only have control over how we show up and whether we have our own backs in the process or not. And this is what makes marriage and these relationships so tricky. Often we will struggle to show up vulnerable because we aren't sure it's a safe place. I think one reason my previous husband and I struggled in this arena is because both of us intuitively knew it wasn't safe, so our brains didn't even consider an alternate, vulnerable way to show up. 

14:17 

And none of our primitive brains want to show up vulnerable in a place where we could be hurt. The truth is, showing up vulnerable with someone and having them shoot us down is really only a serious problem when we aren't strong in our own sense of self and in our reasons for showing up vulnerable in the first place. That doesn't mean we just want to go around  being vulnerable in every arena we enter, but in these close relationships someone has to be vulnerable first. Someone has to have the courage to risk getting rejected. And if you have a strong sense of self, if you have your own back, you can know that even if the other person rejects you, that you won't reject yourself, that you will be happy, that you showed up vulnerable because that is the type of person you ultimately want to be. You will be true to yourself. 

15:17 

So when you're not sure if your spouse will accept your vulnerability, how do we summon the courage and the strength to show up all-in, to lean into the relationship? First, we have to have a strong sense of self. We have to trust us to be kind and compassionate to ourselves if things go sideways. We have to love how we are showing up, even if the other person doesn't. 

15:46 

Second, we really need to clean up our love. It is so important that we drop the expectations that the other person will show up in any specific way when we express love or vulnerability of any sort. If you have not listened to my "Clean Love" Podcast, number 92, write that down right now and go back and listen to it right after this, because on that one, I talk about such a vital concept to so much of what I teach, but I talk about how important it is that we don't express love with an intention to get the other person to do or say anything, to respond with similar affirmations or to treat us in a specific way, but rather we express love because we feel love, because we want them to know of our love. We don't tell them they look amazing because we want to return compliment. We don't tell them that we love them because we want them to say it back. We don't do loving things expecting them to return loving things to us. "Clean love" means that we just love in feeling and in work and in action because it feels so darn good to love and that's the person we want to be. Love is the best feeling in the world and we can choose to feel it regardless of how the other people in our lives show up. 

17:09 

And third, we have to commit to integrity until we show up with strong honesty and kind honesty. We are not choosing to be all-in. This is the "no-backburner issues" concept. We have to choose to have tough conversations, to rock the boat. And we can do these things with kindness, with sensitive activity to what might be difficult for the other person to hear, and with an intent not to do harm. Honesty is vital to the foundation of a healthy relationship. To create intimacy, it is imperative that we are honest in every way about every thing. That is showing up as an equal partner. Intimacy in marriage is living truthfully. It's not withholding the truth because we don't think they can't handle it for whatever reason. 

18:06 

I have clients who want to hold back because they know their spouse has a lot going on at work and they don't want to burden them with their own struggles. So they keep quiet and they don't share, they don't get vulnerable. And that can be both a one-up and a one-down position, right? It's moving us out of equality. It becomes one-up when we think they can't handle hearing about my stuff because they already have too much on their plate. It will burden them. They're not strong enough. And it can be a one-down thinking when we think that my stuff isn't as important as theirs. Their struggles aren't as important as their struggles. To be an equal partner, we have to learn to step into equality, into really believing that both of our stuff is important, that my wants and needs are just as important as his. 

18:56 

And really being all-in means that we are willing to show up completely and honestly as us. And as mentioned before, often we will keep our feet in the marriage, but we are leaning out. We are refusing to engage in anything that would be vulnerable. If there isn't a guarantee of validation from our partner, then we aren't going there. And though this keeps us safe in isolation, it keeps us unsafe in intimacy. Leaning out isolates us. It inhibits us and even shuts down any form of intimacy. Leaning out feels safe, but it denies us of intimacy. 

19:45 

And here's the catch: not having intimacy feels unsafe. It's a catch-22, and this is why so many of us are struggling in our marriages. We are in physically, meaning not leaving the marriage, but we're not in emotionally, we're not engaging our heart and soul. Our feet are in the marriage and the rest of us is leaning out. We want to feel safe and so we lean out, but we don't feel intimacy and so we feel unsafe. So we can't win in the scenario. True intimacy in our marriages requires truthful living, not withholding. It requires leaning in even when we're not sure how it will be received. It is giving up the control of what happens. Not sharing or withholding honesty is a way that we try to keep control. If I'm not honest, then at some level, I think I have control over whether or not they will hurt me. We think that we will be vulnerable only when we have proof that they will respond in a vulnerable way as well. 

20:58 

And yet we have zero control over how they show up. We have to be willing to risk exposure. We have to be willing to be hurt. Often we think we will only show up vulnerable if we're positive that we won't get hurt. And yet there is never a risk-free relationship. There is always a chance that our person will be distracted and say something hurtful or that they will change their mind about how they want to engage with us. But when we falter, when we hesitate to show up all-in, we start to create a spiral of both of us leaning out that then creates this tolerable life where we're both miserable, where our feet are in and our hearts are out. Being all-in means we risk showing up honest and vulnerable even when we don't have proof that they will respond in kind. 

21:55 

So many of my clients start learning this as we work together. We often focus on showing up the way we want even when our spouse doesn't. How do I show up as an equal partner being honest and vulnerable even when they may do something hurtful in response? And I'll be honest, it takes a lot of courage. It takes a lot of sense of self to step into an equal space when we aren't sure and might even be positive that our spouse won't show up the same way. 

22:28 

Here's what we do create when we take the risk: self-respect, self-love, and a stronger sense of self. When we have the courage to show up honest and vulnerable, even when we don't have any proof that our spouse will respond in kind, we are creating greater strength, greater love, greater respect and trust for ourselves. We can't control how our spouse responds to us being all-in, but we can control how we respond to us being all-in. We can be kind and compassionate. We can celebrate our courage and our strength. We can love ourselves for showing up the kind of person that we really want to be. And how our spouse responds over time is good data. When I talk about being honest and vulnerable, I want to be clear that we're not just talking about the tough discussions. I'm also talking about the good stuff as well, telling them how much you love them, what you love about them, that you choose them, you're expressing gratitude, you are acknowledging their contributions. 

23:35 

Often we hold back on the great things that we could contribute like this as well, because it can feel vulnerable. But the reason it will feel vulnerable is because we have a more reflective sense of self, and we are needing their validation of our love declarations in order to feel safe and worthy. But when we have a strong sense of self, we have more courage to share love and kindness without hesitation, without needing a response and validation, and the more our sense of self grows and strengthens. It's a paradox to be sure. We think that vulnerability will make us weak and powerless, and it actually makes us stronger and more powerful. There's an undercurrent belief that if I stay guarded, I have more power, where when in reality, when I'm guarded, when I'm leaning out, I feel small and powerless. I feel less in control. I feel out of alignment with who I really am. 

24:39 

I'm sure most of you have heard the concept that the person who has the most control in the relationship is the person who is least invested in it. And I've heard that, and I've even believed that for years. And on a superficial level, it makes sense. But I have changed my views a bit in the last little while. Now I believe that ultimately, the person who is the most secure in the relationship is the person who shows up invested, the person they want to be, living in alignment with their values. They give up trying to control the other person and step instead into really controlling themselves. 

25:20 

In living the truth they want to live, in caring for another person the way that they want to care for them, this person will have more power, more strength, more joy, more peace. This is the person who really is in control of their inner world and creating what they want in their life. This is the person who has the most power in the relationship because they choose to show up the person they want to be. And ultimately we are choosing to love them for our sake, not for theirs. We are choosing to love because it feels amazing and even powerful. We are choosing to lean into the relationship to give it our all and we are willing to risk some pain and maybe even some rejection in order to do it. 

26:12 

We can live a small tolerable life. We can say that everything is fine, that we're fine, we can walk on eggshells and live small and set our wants and needs on the shelf and continue to nurture our resentment if we choose. Or we can risk being all-in.  We can risk being vulnerable, opening our heart and expressing love and compassion just because we want to. We can risk showing up vulnerable and asking for what we want and need. 

26:44 

But here's the thing about risk: it's scary because we don't know what will be at the other end of it. And risk is exciting because nothing in our lives will change and get better until we are willing to take a risk. Either everything will stay the same or everything deteriorates. Or we take a risk and we open the door to the potential of things getting better. And I will say they will always get better in some way when we take a risk. You may not always get the outcome of a more engaged spouse that you would wish for, but it will get better because you will have stronger confidence, more self-respect, more trust in yourself to do hard things, more ability to show up equally. You will have a more clear vision of who you are and what you want. 

27:39 

Here's an example. Let's say that you and your husband have a pretty roommate relationship. You get along pretty well and systems work for the most part, but you ache for some intimacy. You want meaningful conversations. You want to go for walks hand in hand, chatting about your day. You want to work together to make something better in your home. You want to cuddle next to each other while watching a movie and you want discussions about your hopes and dreams. And you want to talk about gospel questions that you have and fears about your future. And right now you don't even get close to that. Information seems to be on a need-to-know basis. He is resistant to sharing anything other than facts. You withhold physical affection because you're afraid he'll think that you want sex. You get annoyed by stupid things that you know are ridiculous, but you can't seem to help yourself. 

28:30 

You may be really unhappy with this situation, but the thought of rocking the boat terrifies you. What if you share a hope or a dream with him and he makes fun of you, or he tells you you're stupid, or he ignores you? That's painful. When someone we love doesn't see us, doesn't acknowledge us, doesn't cherish us, it hurts. So why in the world would we want to be vulnerable in this situation? Because being vulnerable is the key to getting what you want. Taking a risk is the key to change. When you have the courage to step into some vulnerability, you don't know how he will respond. But we have to change our viewpoint from worrying about how he will respond to being the person that we want to be. We want to be an equal person, an equal partner, who knows that what she wants matters. And thus far you know that playing small, not talking about the tough things, not being vulnerable, is just creating more of the same roommate relationship. 

29:41 

But if you choose to step into the unknown, if you choose to be vulnerable, knowing you will be proud for being willing to make a strong decision and have your own back regardless of how he responds, then you have stepped into growth and a stronger sense of self. When you choose to be all-in, he might be a jerk about it. Okay, good data. But what if you choose to be all-in and he isn't a jerk about it? He might not jump right into vulnerability himself, but maybe he doesn't respond with any sort of negativity. That's good data too. Maybe later on then you choose to ask a more vulnerable question of him like, "what's different about your life today than what you thought it would be 20 years ago?" And maybe he responds with something meaningful and you respond with acceptance and kindness. Okay, maybe he wasn't as deep as you had hoped he'd be, but he may just also be testing the waters. He may be asking himself, "is it safe to be vulnerable?" Can he go there without being dismissed or ridiculed? There's a possibility that your protective mode warns you against vulnerability and his protective mode warns him against vulnerability. And that's why you're both still in the marriage, but leaning out. 

31:03 

And of course, doing something different, doing something risky, is going to freak out your primitive brain. Whether you are very unhappy in your marriage or just a a little bit dissatisfied in your marriage, your primitive brain will choose familiar over unfamiliar and risky any day of the week. The unknown freaks your primitive brain out and it screams "danger, warning, warning, warning." Let's be honest. You are not really in danger if you are choosing to be vulnerable. Is it uncomfortable? Yes. Is it scary? Absolutely. And is it necessary for something in your relationship to shift? 100%. You have to be willing to take a risk if you are going to create anything different. Only in choosing to be all-in will you find out what your relationship is capable of. 

32:04 

When we are both waiting for the other person to be vulnerable before we are, we're at a stalemate. We are stuck in limbo because somebody has to move for the relationship to change. Your strong sense of self, your courage and determination,  let those nudge you into movement, into a place where you are willing to take a risk to get something better. This is your opportunity to create a living marriage, one that is growing and changing and sustaining, rather than a stale marriage, one that is lonely and isolating. Choose to be an agent to yourself and to your marriage. Primitive brain wants to straddle. It wants to lean out to protect you, but to create the lives and the relationships that you want, you have to be willing to lean in, to be all-in, to choose your partner and to choose the relationship. 

33:04 

Trust yourself to be the change agent and trust yourself to have your own back, regardless of what happens. And remember that nothing will change for the better if you don't do something to change it for the better. And here's the thing: your decision does not have to be forever. Maybe you lean all the way in and in the course of the next few months, you get some very clear data from your spouse that he doesn't want that type of intimacy, that he's not willing to invest in it. Then we can make our next move from that space with that data. But at least you are now in a place of movement and growth, a place of progression. You can change your mind and choose to end the marriage once you've collected more data. 

33:50 

A decision now to be all-in isn't a forever decision. Many of us though, leave the marriage without ending the marriage. We leave emotionally. We leave by not engaging. We leave by shutting down. We leave by protecting. But we are miserable and afraid to end it. Often, we can be afraid to move into an all-in position because we are afraid of things not turning out the way we would want. We don't want the negative consequences if our spouse doesn't also choose to engage more or to be all-in, so we stay in a protective, stalemate stance. 

34:34 

But here's something I want you to remember: you can stay all-in now, and it doesn't have to be forever. The more data you collect, the clearer your decision will be. And if your spouse doesn't want to engage, that still doesn't mean you have to end the marriage. It just means you get to decide your course of action with a spouse who doesn't want to be all-in. How can I stay in this marriage, continue to show up as an equal, continue to keep my self-respect intact, and stay married? I have a lot of clients who are like, "listen, I don't want to get divorced. It's too much of a pain. It's too much social stigma. It's way too much effort. I want to stay married, but I'm married to somebody who doesn't want the emotional engagement." And we work with that. We can find a way to make it manageable. Sometimes all you're going to get in that situation is tolerable. And for some people, that's OK. They would rather stay in the marriage and not have the upheaval to their lives and to their their family. And that's OK. Some people decide it's not worth it for them. But whatever data you collect in choosing to be all-in, you get to decide how to show up. 

35:58 

In the meantime, promise you being all-in is your best bet for creating something great out of something that may be struggling for air. I promise you will be better and stronger and in a happier place wherever you ultimately end up if you choose to be all-in today. Having the courage to do this is part of growing up. Creating the kind of relationship that we inside crave. Having the courage to do that is part of growing up, and I love growing up. Gosh, darn it, this space that I'm in here is like nothing I've ever had before. It's the most beautiful space. And I'm so grateful that I have a spouse who chooses to be all-in. 

36:50 

And I'm grateful that I'm choosing to be all-in as well. And here's the here's the deal, my friends: this is a tough road and this is Work with a capital W. I will tell you, working with me is not easy and it is work. And it is work worth doing because we are always happier when we are the person we really want to be. Make 2025 your year to create the person that you want to be, to be who you really want to be. You can do this, my friends. Have a great, great, great week, and I will see you next time. 

Bye. 

37:37 

Thank you so much for joining me today. If you would love to receive some weekend motivation, be sure to sign up for my free "weekend win Friday email: a short and quick message to help you have a better weekend and position yourself for a more productive week. Go to tanyahale.com to sign up and learn more about life coaching and how it can help you get to your best self ever. See ya!