The Real Reason Couples Drift Apart (and How to Find Your Way Back)

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Sometimes the real reason couples drift apart isn't what they think it is. And it's usually not the conflict itself. There's something deeper happening underneath the arguments, the silence, and the fading spark. And once you understand it, everything about the relationship can change.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: We'll get back to that in a moment. Hi, and welcome to the You World Order Showcase podcast, where we feature life, health, transformational coaches, and spiritual entrepreneurs stepping up to be the change they seek in the world. I'm your host, Jill Hart, The Coach's Alchemist, on a mission to help

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Coaches and entrepreneurs amplify their voice, monetize their mission, and get visible. If you're ready to start attracting premium clients without chasing algorithms or hunting people down like a banshee on a mission, head over to Coachsalchemist.com and schedule your free client acquisition audit. It's the first step to building a business where your clients seek you out rather than you having to hunt them down. Today, we are chatting with Dr. Dan Snyder.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Dr. Dan is a licensed couples therapist, educator, and creator of The Intimacy Shift, a blueprint for moving from conflict to lasting connection. With over a decade of clinical experience and a personal journey shaped by trauma, healing, marriage, and divorce, he helps couples rebuild trust, improve communication, and rediscover his

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Rediscover genuine intimacy. His 12-week program has supported hundreds of partners in transforming conflict into connection. Welcome to the show, Dr. Dan. It's great to have you with us.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, it's great to be here. I'm looking forward to our conversation today, Jill.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Me too! So let me ask you the big question. What's the most significant thing, in your opinion, as individuals we can do to make an impact on how the world's going?

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, I love that question, because I absolutely want to make an impact myself, and…

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Dr Dan Sneider: want for others to think about the same thing, and of course, it starts with ourselves. So, the most significant thing that we can do is work through our struggles, our trauma, our history, so that we can show up as the best version of ourselves, and then the ripples spread outward.

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Dr Dan Sneider: So, for me, that started early. I started going to therapy in my early teen years, and I've been trying my very best to continue that work ever since, and create those ripples as I go, both in my professional work with couples and individuals, as a parent, as a member of my community.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: I couldn't agree with you more.

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Dr Dan Sneider: It all starts…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: with us. It used to be that people would tell you, don't be selfish, only think of others, but you can't. The old adage of, you know.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Pouring from an empty cup really is…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Is something that we have to take into consideration in everything that we're doing, and…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Filling ourselves up, understanding ourselves, and getting over our own… baggage.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: It's… it's a big deal.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: So, when couples come to you struggling with distance, conflict, or a fading spark, what do you see as the first real step towards building connection?

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, yeah, so, the reason that I named my program, The Intimacy Shift is because over the course of any relationship, there are going to be changes. There are going to be shifts in the way we connect with each other. And so, I work with every kind of relationship, from a brand new relationship in its early phases, through people that have been together for decades.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And the only constant is change, as we know, and so I want to help people and support them through each of those changes. And what can often get in the way is the skills and the practices that

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Dr Dan Sneider: We know help drive connection and closeness. People don't learn those, right? I didn't learn those in school, I didn't learn those in my household growing up.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And just like going to a gym to work on your body, there are exercises and movements that we know to build and strengthen muscles. Thankfully, there's wonderful research out there, proven skills that can help couples and help relationships to

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Dr Dan Sneider: Build emotional intimacy, trust, and closeness, to build physical intimacy, to have different passion and connection in their physical and sex lives, and…

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Dr Dan Sneider: You know, those are things that get in the way of connection when we didn't learn those things, we don't know how to do them. And then when we add on top of that changes to our lives, like new jobs, kids, empty nest, menopause, testosterone changes, the list goes on.

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Dr Dan Sneider: You know, it exposes those, those faults and those missing pieces in our relationship.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: It's really hard as couples grow together, and I… and it could explain why often when people get together when they're really young.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And… and then when they hit about 30 or 40, they,

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: they don't know how to relate to each other anymore, because they haven't been taught the skills to continue that relationship, if it's really worth continuing. And, you know, sometimes relationships

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: You have just grown

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Too differently, and you didn't have the skills early enough on to understand how to talk to each other in a way that,

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: continues that connection. It's, like…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And the earlier you start, it's like, that's… that break can be really dramatic as you get older, and you… you become more established as an adult than a human being.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And so…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: the… the whole adage of really needing to educate people on how to do that, starting earlier rather than later, I'm sure helps.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Of course, of course it does. And I'll share a little bit about my story, because we all learn from stories, and, you know, having an example can really help for the people out there to know, like, I teach these things, this is what I do for work, but I am very much not coming from a place of perfection, or as though, you know, I have it all figured out all the time. I had to…

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Dr Dan Sneider: through a lot of trial and error and hard work, learn some of these lessons. And so, we all come into relationships with a story, with baggage, like you mentioned before. And so, for a lot of people in relationships, it can help very, very much to know how you show up in relationships, where that comes from. And so, for your listeners out there who haven't

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Dr Dan Sneider: studied or read about attachment science, you know, the way that we attach in relationships is this fascinating thing. And so, in my household growing up, I grew up in a dysfunctional, pretty chaotic home environment. I had a loving mother, so kind, so loving.

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Dr Dan Sneider: But not able to protect me, herself, you know, or my sister from the…

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Dr Dan Sneider: the hot and cold energy that my dad would bring home. We didn't know if he was coming home angry one day, or if it would be distance and silent treatment. And so what I learned from an early age was I really had to take care of my own emotional needs. I couldn't rely on other people's to take care of me, and so…

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Dr Dan Sneider: from an attachment perspective, that's what we call avoidant attachment. And so, my kind of default wiring because of that in relationships was to withdraw.

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Dr Dan Sneider: to get quiet, if we didn't have to talk about something, or if I could push those frustrated or angry feelings down and push them away, I would try to. Now, did that work for me? No, it did not work for me, even though I tried for a long time. You know, when we push feelings away or we avoid, it's gotta come out sooner or later. And so I would lash out in different ways that harmed relationships that I was in.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And so, the other side of that attachment perspective is anxious attachment. So other people listening might identify more with that need for reassurance in a relationship, feeling worried, on edge, scared, wanting to ask questions, wanting to seek closeness all of the time.

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Dr Dan Sneider: A little bit of that, totally normal. A lot of that can be overwhelming and really suffocating in a relationship. So, yeah, when we bring all that forward into our adult relationships, if we don't know that that's how we show up, we don't know why, then we end up in this cycle of arguments and disconnection, and we can't figure out what to do about it.

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Dr Dan Sneider: So, that's a good starting place for anybody listening, is to think about your history in relationships, how you generally show up when there's stress, when there's tension, and just knowing that is part of the battle, right? To being able to change that, and to be able to communicate what your needs are with your partner to get more close, to build that

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Dr Dan Sneider: connection. And there are a lot of, like, tools and practices that I teach couples to help with that thing.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And it's not just one-sided, because when you're talking about a relationship, there's two people involved, and you each come to the equation with your own

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: story, and your own history of relationships. And so, how do you… how do you help people with that? And are there more than one… you gave us one example of a type of relationship attachment,

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Way that you form relationships, but are there categories of…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Of ways that people form relationships?

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, yeah, so I'll start with the first part of that. So, there are two people, how do we get them…

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Dr Dan Sneider: talking to each other, communicating, or really both people involved. And I love working with couples. I was an athlete all growing up, and so I think about team sports a lot, and like, how teams function. And when we're in a relationship, we are on a team, right? We either win together, or we lose together.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And if we're keeping score, if we're blaming the other person, you know, saying, you always, or you never, well, the team's losing in that situation. A saying that I love and try to keep front of mind is, you can either be right, or you can be in relationship.

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Dr Dan Sneider: So, if you're focused on being right, then the relationship takes a hit. So one of the very first things that I will, help couples with is finding areas of agreement where they can both say, like, yes, this is something we both want, and now we're on the same team.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Often, you know, both people

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Dr Dan Sneider: want to feel close, want to feel connected. We can disagree about how to get there, but I'll start with that point of agreement. Okay, we both want connection. And then the first step in my intimacy shift framework, is creating a time and a space for the people in that relationship to sit down and work on

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Dr Dan Sneider: their relationship. I mentioned earlier going to the gym to build muscles. You know, we want time set aside so that the relationship can develop its skills and tools and work on itself. So at intimacyShift.com, I have a 12-page PDF that goes through all 6 steps in this intimacy Shift framework for conversations that I'll talk about.

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Dr Dan Sneider: But step one is creating that time to talk. You know, you can create it as a calendar meeting. For a lot of couples, it's like a Sunday afternoon.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Where they sit down to talk about the relationship.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Now, the first pushback that I normally get from couples who are struggling is that, well, we argue when we try talking about our relationship, Dan. You want us to talk more about it, won't that just create more conflict? So, that's why step one is just getting on the same team.

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Dr Dan Sneider: finding time to talk. The other 5 steps will help the conversation to go better, and to build that connection.

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Dr Dan Sneider: But a lot of couples don't approach connection as a skill, as a habit, and a practice. So that's why I want people to be thinking about putting time in specifically for this.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: I… I've done this in my own relationship, in that I walk with my husband every morning. We leave our phones at home, and it's…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: It's an hour walk.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: We talk to each other.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: You know, we talk about everything.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And the relationship gets in there, because, you know, we're… we're together, and that's what we're doing. But…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: I agree with that, I guess that's what I'm saying. It's really important to have a time. We do it every day, we're not doing it right now, but normally we do it every day, and

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: it's just what we do. And if we miss a day, we feel it. That even if you're, like, once a week, or if you have dinner together that's just the two of you, not, like, the kids involved, because when you start adding other things into the equation, I can see how

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Your focus can shift from each other.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: to,

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: to the other things that pop up. So, you've said that waiting for things to get better with time is one of the most damaging pieces of advice out there. Why doesn't time heal these relationship challenges, and what actually does?

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Dr Dan Sneider: So, I, again, as someone with default wiring to avoid, to… to,

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Dr Dan Sneider: withdraw or to push things away and to the side, I can understand that,

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Dr Dan Sneider: that habit of mind, to wait, to let time cool things down. The problem with that is, again, change is the constant. And so the more time that passes, the more people will…

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Dr Dan Sneider: change, develop new relationships, new outlets. Scar tissue can grow over things. And if it is left alone, it will often grow bigger, not smaller.

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Dr Dan Sneider: I know for myself, if there's something that I am upset, hurt, frustrated by, the more time that passes, the larger that it will grow, and I will have self-talk that becomes more blaming.

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Dr Dan Sneider: more thinking, they did that intentionally, and we call that resentment, right? We all know what that feels like. The feeling word for it is resentment, but…

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Dr Dan Sneider: How it shows up in our bodies is that blaming language, that belief that things were intentional, and the disconnection just magnifies.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And so, sometimes we do need a short cooling off period. I'm a big believer in stop means stop, pause means pause. If we are in a conflict, and a person needs a break, and they need some time to cool down.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Like, that's a different kind of thing. But the general rule of thumb found in the research, and a lot of this research that I'll mention is from John and Julie Gottman, who, if your listeners haven't picked up any of their books, I highly recommend. They have…

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Dr Dan Sneider: decades of research and experience on couples and on relationships. And what they have found is that 24 hours is the…

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Dr Dan Sneider: magic number for time before coming back to talk about things. If we wait more than 24 hours to come back to a topic.

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Dr Dan Sneider: it's been left alone for too long, one person is gonna feel either overwhelmed or shut down, and, you know, it can be anywhere shorter than that. Sometimes I just need a 5-minute break, you know, let me walk around the block, let me get a snack, let's come back and talk about it. And for other people, they need to sleep on it, let's come back to this tomorrow. But we don't want too much time to pass.

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Dr Dan Sneider: You know, we want to be in connection and in harmony. It's the way that we have evolved as animals, the way that we're wired for closeness, that if we wait too long past that time, we drift apart, and it takes more effort, more work to come back together, if we can.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Yeah, I'm gonna circle back to that part that you talked about in the beginning about setting a time, scheduling time. That also helps people in terms of

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: not hitting people. We call it not being in that box.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Around our house.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: sometimes people are focused on other things, and if you want to bring up something that you really need to talk about with this person, and their mind is focused elsewhere, it's really not fair to that person. Even though it might be, like.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: I really… I've… I've… I've let it go too long, and now we need to talk now.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: You need to have that time. It is really an important… important aspect.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: So, your approach blends highly researched therapeutic techniques with your own personal experiences of trauma, marriage, divorce, and healing. How does that combination shape the way that you support other couples?

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, I love talking about this, because as someone who's been…

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Dr Dan Sneider: like I mentioned, going to therapy since they were a teenager, I've been able to see the way that therapy and coaching and just people out in the world talking about therapy and relationships evolve and change. And I think that's wonderful, because again, like.

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Dr Dan Sneider: change… the change happens, right? And the way that therapy happened…

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Dr Dan Sneider: 25, 30 years ago, is different today. We know more.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And so, when people think about therapy and counseling, they often think about, well, that's a space where I get to talk, share all my stuff, the therapist is mostly listening.

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Dr Dan Sneider: maybe offering gentle guidance, or trying to find insights from childhood and from the past. And that is true about therapy traditionally, and it's incredibly helpful, especially for individual therapy. For couples counseling, what we've learned, and more and more recently, is that

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Dr Dan Sneider: You know, in couples counseling, if the therapist is more just sitting quietly, they're gonna watch the argument and the conflict happen in front of them.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And what I will say to clients who are having the same argument in front of me that they had at home, I'll say, well, you've already had this, you already did this argument. If we're here working to change it, we need to do it a different way.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And that's where I will be a little bit more directive and coach and teach them through some of these skills and practices. And sometimes people are a little caught off guard by that, because they expected in therapy something a little bit different. But that's what we have found in modern couples counseling is much more helpful. You know, we want people to have tools and skills and to practice them so that

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Dr Dan Sneider: At home, they can learn them, you know, and use them themselves.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And so what I bring to that, my unique blend, is a mix of my story, like I mentioned, the house that I grew up in, going to counseling from an early age, and then playing out some of those same things in my own relationships. So, I show up as myself in my live sessions for the Intimacy Shift program, for therapy sessions with clients who are in state

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Dr Dan Sneider: that I'm licensed to work with them. And so, in all of these places, I'm both

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Dr Dan Sneider: Teaching the research, teaching these proven skills and techniques, and then really helping couples set goals and making objectives so that these things change.

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Dr Dan Sneider: You know, I love the people I work with, but I don't want to see them forever, week after week. You know, I don't want them coming back for years and years. I want them to learn the things that they need to learn, and then, you know, gently and lovingly, like, they go back to their lives.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And so often, too often, people are in therapy, you know, endlessly, kind of forever, and there's a status quo. Things kind of stay the same. And I try to bring, you know, again, that mindset from my life and from the research, so that we can see real change quickly, and set goals to work towards.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Wow, that's amazing. So, do you work with people one-on-one, mostly, or through your coaching program, and is your coaching program a group program, or is it more like a course? How does all that look?

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah. So, I've moved a few times in my adult life, so I'm licensed, and I do work with couples and individuals one-on-one, as a therapist in Illinois, Colorado, Florida.

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Dr Dan Sneider: and North Carolina. So if you're living in one of those states and you're looking for one-on-one support, you know, I'm licensed and able to work with you. The Intimacy Shift program, I set up as an education-based program. It's all online.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And there's 12 weeks of sessions, that… it's a group format, anyone can join, and the focus is really on, you know, those people who are motivated for change, and over 12 weeks want a lot of information, tools, practices, homework in between, and from week 1 to week 12, we really script out

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Dr Dan Sneider: you know, goals and changes to work towards. And like I said, that's available for anybody, and it's very much to teach and to guide through those objectives and those goals. And it's really been amazing. I've had couples who

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Dr Dan Sneider: have, you know, not had sex, not been physically intimate in their relationship for over a year, come to that program, learn skills, tools, motivated to change, and then be able to reclaim physical intimacy in their relationship. Many couples who have

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Dr Dan Sneider: For all of the reasons I've mentioned, intimacy in their relationship has changed. That could be trust and connection, betrayals, and…

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Dr Dan Sneider: Just people changing over time, stress, and have gone from feeling like roommates, walking on eggshells, to really re-finding and sometimes building for the first time, you know, trust and closeness and passion.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And so I really love the work that I do, and be able to guide people through these changes. It's really wonderful to see the vulnerability and the bravery that people show up with.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: That's amazing. So, who's… who's your ideal

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: client, I guess would be the way to put it, but .

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: who If… if somebody's listening to this, and they're experiencing what things.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Would… would you say would be the… Call me tomorrow, I…

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, so the majority of people that I work with that are going through some of these changes are couples in their 30s, 40s, sometimes a little older, sometimes a little bit younger, often have kids still living in the home, although I am seeing more and more couples where their kids have recently left the home, and now there's just the two of them.

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Dr Dan Sneider: But a lot of the people that I work with are in that really insane, busy part of life where they are parenting, they are working, and they're trying to navigate their relationship on the side. More often than not, in male-female couples, the woman in the couple is the one who has decided this needs to change, I'm going to do something about it.

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Dr Dan Sneider: I'm going to find a tool or a resource to help with. And, you know, as a man, I feel comfortable saying this. Often in relationships, men are more willing to avoid, to withdraw, to say everything's fine, but to…

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Dr Dan Sneider: Be irritable, to be withdrawn, and… and so it is often the woman that, as the…

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Dr Dan Sneider: manager of the household is the one seeking out help and support. So that's often who I connect with first, and as a male therapist, and as someone who, you can tell, is willing, you know, and able to say, like, these are the ways that men often show up. These are ways I have shown up.

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Dr Dan Sneider: That the fit is really good there, because men will feel often more comfortable with a male educator or someone teaching this, and not feel as ganged up on. I wish that wasn't the case all the time, but that's why that's my ideal client, because these dynamics do exist, and ignoring them doesn't change them, but that's often what happens.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: I like that a lot, and it's something that…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: I think people kind of gloss over is that…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Usually, women are in this sort of a role with coaching, and… and it could be because women are, like.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: We experience it, we see the red flags, and we're just like, we have no idea how to get our partners to come along, and…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And if we do, then they're faced with, you know, two women who aren't going to understand me.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Whereas if they… they come and they see, oh, there's a guy here, and he's done it himself, and he knows… he can see where I'm at, and he's been trained to understand what she's feeling, but…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: But they're not gonna be, like, two women telling a guy how to be a guy.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: It doesn't… doesn't often work very well.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: So, at the beginning, we mentioned that the real reason couples

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: drift apart often isn't the conflict itself, that there's something deeper, hidden, happening underneath. What is the deeper thing, and how does understanding it become the turning point that changes everything?

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, yeah, so at the surface level, I, you know, you can imagine all kinds of similar stories of, you know, I do all the cooking, you never help, you know, I always initiate sex, you never do, like, those are important things, but they, are masking the…

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Dr Dan Sneider: The hidden part, the underneath part, where, you know, all of us as social animals, you know, our drive for

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Dr Dan Sneider: connection, to feel seen, to be seen, and to be safe being ourselves with another person is the core part underlying everything in relationships. Everything comes back to that.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And when we can…

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Dr Dan Sneider: Get below the surface of, you know, whatever has, you know, built up and irritated us, you know, that day or those weeks.

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Dr Dan Sneider: into, you know, I want to be seen, and I don't feel seen right now. I want my feelings to be held, space to be made for them. You know, when we can have that conversation, again, that's an area of agreement, right? I'm always trying to find that for couples, because I know that the two people, whoever they are sitting across from me.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Both people want to feel seen.

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Dr Dan Sneider: and want space for themselves to be held in the relationship, and whatever the surface issue is has, been the tip of that iceberg. So we peel back those onions, and when in a session, this is…

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Dr Dan Sneider: Like, just the best when it happens in a session, when we can lower our guards and get below the surface, and instead of…

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Dr Dan Sneider: you know, the people looking at me, telling me what the other person did. They turn, you know, in their chairs or on the couch, and they face each other. They start talking to each other, their tone softens.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Sometimes I'll ask, sometimes they'll do it all by themselves. One person will reach a handout for the other person, just as a touchpoint. That's just the best, and that's when I know that things have shifted in their relationship, and we have made big progress towards trust, connection, and that kind of intimacy that people need. We say we want it, we really

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Dr Dan Sneider: need it. It's a core human need, and it's magic when that happens.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: It's so beautiful. So, when you're doing this in the 12-week intimacy program, does… do you have couples show up together on Zoom? I mean, do these kinds of things happen in the program itself, or is this just in the one-on-one coaching?

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, yeah. So, for the Intimacy Shift program, I do a mix of live and then, you know, asynchronous, just because everybody's schedules are different. So, getting two people to be at the same place in the same time can be a challenge. So, if one person's able to be there live, and then the other person in the relationship watches the recording later.

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Dr Dan Sneider: that works, and I have that happen. If both people are able to be there together, then they can do some of the exercises in real time at once, and that's also great. But either way can work. And so over that 12 weeks, it's, you know, one hour each week, live, with me teaching skills and giving opportunities to practice things in the

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Dr Dan Sneider: moment, and we can roleplay and we can practice things as individuals, or if both people are there as a couple. Either way works. And then…

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Dr Dan Sneider: Those sessions are recorded, available for people to watch later, to watch again, to review things, and there's homework in between each session. So each couple is gonna create their own map, you know, each couple is a little bit different, gonna have their… their patterns, their cycles of, you know, how their conflicts develop, what their core issues are.

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Dr Dan Sneider: So, each person or each couple will create their own roadmap, and will create their own objectives over that 12 weeks to work on, largely in between sessions. So there's that week in between to practice things and work on things before we meet again the following week.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: That's awesome. And so, the community aspect of it… I love communities, groups. You learn so much from other people, because somebody else will ask the question that you're too chicken to ask.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Mmm.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Do you see that happen often in your communities?

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, I do, and the feedback that I get is the validation of, like, oh, there are other couples that

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Dr Dan Sneider: also, you know, struggle with having… you know, a lot of times it's sex. Sex is often that question that everybody's thinking, and, you know, someone will ask, but, you know, that validation of seeing, like, oh, there are other people here who are also struggling, and who, you know, love each other, want things to work out, but, you know, we're having an issue connecting sexually, or there's been infidelity.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Or porn addiction, or something that we think it's just us, or there's shame associated with it. And we can look around at that group and see, you know, oh no, we are all human beings, and there are other people that are also navigating this, and there's hope for us, there's hope for them, and so, yeah, that validation piece of being in community is a huge part.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: I like that you bring up the shame part of it, too, because shame happens on both sides when infidelity happens, or when the trust is broken.

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Dr Dan Sneider: And…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And oftentimes there's societal pressure in two ways. One is that You should just leave them.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: That's not always the right answer.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: for that couple. But they feel like, you know, if they don't leave the relationship, that there's something fundamentally wrong with them, and that they're enabling this other person, rather than figuring out what the reason was for the transgression.

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Dr Dan Sneider: for lack of a better word, to occur in the first place, and I think in community that.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: That can really help you understand that, you know, not everybody does

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: succumbs to that peer pressure of, you don't have to leave. There's no right way to do a relationship. There's a way that works for the two people in the relationship.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And if you can get to that point where you can, navigate these issues, and, you know, like you said, we are all humans, we are all doing things all the time to each other, for each other.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: that work and don't work, and it's being able to come back and say, you know, I'm sorry.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Please forgive me, and mean it, and want to change. Asking for forgiveness is different than asking to be excused from bad behavior. If you have no intention of changing, don't apologize.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Figure something else out.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Agreed, yes. Yeah.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, and, you know, mutual appreciation, but yeah, by talking about these things, we normalize that, and…

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, it is simple advice to just leave, you know, deal breaker, the end. And for some people, in some situations, that fits, but we don't talk enough about the many, many people who have worked through major challenges in their relationship, because it's half of us, you know, at least. It's hard to do research on this because of the shame, and

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Dr Dan Sneider: trying to get information, but, we know for sure that, at all different kinds of levels, you know, that there is infidelity in relationships and people working hard to stay together, and the more we can…

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Dr Dan Sneider: Normalize that that happens, and then give tools and resources, then the, you know, the better those relationships can feel, the more hope other people in the community can have for their relationships, and…

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Dr Dan Sneider: And then we're right back to the start of this conversation, which is that ripple effect. If we do our work, then it can spread outward. And, you know, I very much want these conversations to happen, rather than being alone at your house, feeling like something happened to you, and you're the only person, and you can't talk about it. Because I have had that experience myself in different ways, and, you know.

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Dr Dan Sneider: I know how painful that is.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And it helps, you know, you talk about the ripple effect. When you model this behavior for your children, no matter what age your children are at, it helps them to understand that they can get into relationships, and relationships change and adapt.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And there are ways to navigate these things that… Aren't all or nothing.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: You know, we've kind of moved into a society where it's, you know, we're madly in love, or we're broken up.

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Dr Dan Sneider: But the real truth is, the day-to-day living is…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Where most of us exist.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And how to navigate that in a way that brings joy and happiness most of the time. Not all of the time, because there's…

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: There's always gonna be those days.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yes.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: So, I know you offer 6 steps to unlocking healthy, intimate conversations with your partner. You want to talk about that a little bit, and where people can find that?

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Dr Dan Sneider: Absolutely. So, the best way to connect with me is at intimacyShift.com.

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Dr Dan Sneider: or theintimacyShift.com. I grabbed both domains, just in case. So either one of those will get you to the same place. If you leave your email address there, then you automatically get this, 6 proven steps to having the kinds of conversations we've been talking a little bit about today. So that first step is being on the same team.

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Dr Dan Sneider: carving out that time to work and talk together, and the next 5 steps are all about making that conversation fun, connecting, and helpful. You know, I don't want that to be painful, something that people dread, talking about our relationship. You know, I want it to be a positive experience that we look forward to. And so that's a 12-page guide with examples.

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Dr Dan Sneider: some of the research that I've mentioned, and just a really good tool, and a good way to learn more about my style and my approach. If you want to work with me more, then I will have your email address, and we can connect for other opportunities, like that 12-week program.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Awesome. Thank you so much for joining us today, Dr. Dan.

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Dr Dan Sneider: Yeah, thank you, Joe.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: You can learn more about Dr. Dan and the 6 steps to unlocking Healthy, intimate conversations with your partner at theintimacyShift.com.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: And we'll be sure to put those links in the show notes below. Thank you for joining us today. If you're ready to amplify your voice, monetize your mission, and start attracting premium clients, your next step is simple. Head to Coachsalchemist.com and schedule your free client acquisition audit.

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Jill Hart-The Coach's Alchemist: Join us for our next episode as we share what others are doing to raise the global frequency. And remember, change begins with you. You have all the power to change the world. Start today and get.