00:00
The best thing you can do for your children is to love their love your spouse, love their father, love their mother. And when they see you hugging in the kitchen and they see you telling them to get away from your door when you're in the bedroom, they chuckle. And they feel good. They feel good that the two of you are connected to each other and that there's no risk of ever losing either one of you.
00:31
Welcome to the family dialogs podcast. When children arrive, marriages are often told to take the back seat. But what if neglecting the marriage is exactly what puts the whole family at risk. Today, we're asking a vital question, if every spouse has core emotional needs, what happened to those needs once children career and chaos enter the picture, and how can meeting those needs actually protect our children and our family's future to guide us in this conversation, we're delighted to be speaking with Bill Harley. Dr. Harley is a clinical psychologist and a marriage counselor, best known for his international bestseller, his needs, her needs, building an affair proof marriage, which has sold over 4 million copies and has been translated into more than 20 languages. With decades of experience, Dr Harley pioneered a practical research based approach to helping couples identify and meet their deepest emotional needs, transforming relationships through Claire actionable guidance. He also built one of Minnesota's largest mental health networks. Created innovative remote marriage education via his marriage builders program, and continues to inspire couples through seminars. Writing and his long running radio show combining expert psychology with compassionate understanding, which are essential for lasting family love. Dr Harley, thank you so much. Welcome to our podcast.
02:12
Great introduction. Thank you for the introduction. I'm delighted to be with you.
02:17
Most welcome, as I was sharing with you before we started recording your book really helped me in the beginning of my marriage. You know, I have so many notes, because there's so many things that I learned, especially growing up in a single parent household, that I missed out without having the dynamics of, you know, seeing the male female dynamics when both parents are at home. You know, lots of parents are going through the process of loving their children and also trying to maintain a healthy marriage, and that can be quite difficult when they have so many stressors. In your book, you the core foundation of your book is about emotional needs. And before we get into that, in the beginning of your book, you talked about in the 1960s such a long time ago that you saw the deterioration of the nuclear family, and you've had decades to observe what has been happening. And I'm very curious to know what you've seen as it regards to the changes over time. Is there something new that pop up over the decades, or is it the same factors that are impacting the nuclear family?
03:31
Basically, there were several things that came together, kind of like a perfect storm. In the 60s, you had a change in state law regarding divorce, where, prior to the 60s, it was relatively difficult to get a divorce, and if you did get a divorce, almost all the money went to the wife. And so husbands were very reluctant to get divorced, and it kind of kept marriages together. You had basically one couple out of 10 that would get divorced, say, in the 40s, and then in the 60s, you had a situation where not only did the laws change, but people changed the the law, of course, was more it was easier to get a divorce. You split things 5050, there was really no protection for women. But at the same time, women wanted to be independent, and they developed a feminist philosophy that was somewhat anti male. So you had you had divorce. Easy. People changed. Women became much less interested in marriage. By 1981 the divorce rate was six was 51% in the nation and I. I witnessed it. I mean, I was there. I saw it happen. I I was counseling, I talked to people, and I started writing books, because I could see this deterioration taking place. And I knew that marriages can be great. Marriages can be stable. You can be in love with your wife. The rest of your life. She could be in love with you. Joyce and I have been married now 63 years we've been in love with all 63 years, at least I have been. I can't speak for her exactly, but she tells me that she has been. But the basic idea is that marriages in our culture today can work, can be fabulous, and I put a great deal of emphasis on romantic love. So when you read my book, his needs, her needs, it starts out with a love bank that basically, if you want to be in love for a lifetime, by the way, the bullet line has changed, or the subtitle has changed, it's now making romantic love last. So we took we pulled the building in a fair proof marriage, and we put in, it's the same book, same book, but we have a different subtitle, making romantic love last. So the question is, how do you do that? How do you make romantic love last? And my argument is that I've never seen a couple that wants to get divorced that are still in love. It is the glue that keeps marriages together. If you're in love with your husband and he's in love with you, there's no way on earth you would ever want to part from each other. And it also makes it easier to solve problems. It makes it easier to raise kids, it makes it easier to make money. There are just so many advantages to being in love. So my whole emphasis is, how can you be in love for for 63 years, like Joyce and I have been and I explain it to people in the books that I write,
07:03
yes, wonderful, as you, as you said, you know, the family is really the core foundation for children. And if you look, as a researcher, I often look back, and when you look at cross cultural research, it shows that having a healthy family put your children so far ahead as it relates to their success, whether academically, professionally, financially, relationship wise, their own marriages and so on. So if we can help parents to maintain that loving relationship between them, so that they give their children at least the chance to create something similar, and to continue generate multi generational success of a happy marriage, healthy home and so on. I think that is better for the society. For me, I believe the future is the nuclear family. If you don't fix the nuclear family. To me, there's so many things that will not be fixed, because a lot of the issues that we face as a society actually begins in the homes. In your book, the foundation of your book is all about emotional needs. And when you first wrote this book in 1986 so that's almost 40 years ago, you mentioned that there are 10 emotional needs that you kept seeing emerging among within the couples. When you counsel them and you said there are five that are really important to men and there are five that are really important to women, you do have people who are the outliers, where things are a bit different, but I want you to explain what these emotional needs are and also why both men and women downplay or really don't appreciate that their needs is not necessarily their spouse's needs and vice versa.
08:51
Yeah, basically. And I might add a caveat to that, and that is that people have argued that there are other emotional needs than the 10 that I have identified. They bring up global needs, global needs like, I want to be able to trust my husband, and so I but I want to, I want to put it into operational form. I want it to be something like, what would that look like? What would he have to do. And so we create the emotional need of openness and honesty to handle the issue of trust and and the so the 10 emotional needs are all things that you do. It's specific, it's operational, it's I give I have training for each of these so that you can actually learn to do that. Now, the other thing that you mentioned that that I noticed early on was that when I asked men to describe the things that their wife could do that would make them the happiest. So it was a different list than when I asked women, what could their husbands do that would make them the happiest? And they all had, I think almost everybody had the same emotional needs, but they had them in a different order. They had them in a different priority. And so what I told people was that the thing that's the most important to your spouse is probably not the most important to you, but your spouse can learn to be an expert, and you can be learned to be an expert in meeting emotional needs that might not be as important to you as your as they are to your spouse. And here's how to go about doing that. Here's how to make sure that you're meeting your spouse's emotional needs in a way that works for you. You're happy to do it. It's not as essential for you as the other, as the spouse, but on the other house, because you're partners and you need each other in life, you dedicate yourself to making each other happy. And that's how to do it. That's how to make each other happy. And it has to be consistent. It can't be on a one day a month, you know? It's got to be something you're doing on a regular basis. And that maintains love bank balances, and it makes sure that you are in love with each other, because no one else makes you as happy as your spouse does. That's the basic idea. It also helps avoid infidelity. And of course, all throughout the years, my my subtitle was building an affair proof marriage. If you're if you're meeting your spouse's most important emotional needs and you're in love with each other, the chances of you're having an affair is extremely remote. The basic idea is that the publishers that I worked with said that building a fair proof marriage was too negative. They wanted something more positive. So it's making romantic love last now is the more positive approach to things, but it's, it's really the same thing. It's and it is important in marriage to recognize that you marry each other for what the other person can give you. Now on the subject of children, my argument has always been that if you toot your children first, your marriage is going to be at risk. There's an argument to be kidding me made that the best thing you can do for your children is to love their love your spouse, love their father, love their mother, and when they see you hugging in the kitchen and they see you telling them to get away from your door when you're in the bedroom, they chuckle, and they feel good. They feel good that the two of you are connected to each other, and that there's no risk of ever losing either one of you.
12:56
I think that is so important that you mentioned that, because I know especially new mothers, might struggle with that a bit that they have this baby or this toddler to take care of, and they prioritize that to the detriment of the needs of their husbands. And I know I have a five year old and a three year old, so I know it can be very difficult to really meet the needs of your spouse when you have very young children who are so dependent on you, but if you neglect your husband, then the whole house goes into disarray, and you know, you don't love each other, as you mentioned, there's a divorce. Children are now in two, going back and forth in two separate homes. So we want to make sure we can keep the family together, especially when young children are involved, because, as I mentioned to you before we started recording so many marriages within five years of having the first child, basically fall apart, because the emphasis is the care of a child, and then the needs of the spouse is no longer seen as important or given enough significance. We'll get into what we can do. I think the best thing to do the conversation is to set up what these emotional needs are so that our listeners can understand and, you know, evaluate themselves and their marriages. And then for those who have children, what we can do to make sure everything is balanced when children are in the picture. So the first needs that you mentioned is affection and sexual fulfillment. And for women, affection is very important, and for men, sexual fulfillment is important. But again, there's a difference where women are like, Why does he need to want sex so much? Or why every time I hug him, it's a sexual thing. Can't he just be affectionate to me? So speaking to both fathers or husbands and wives, please explain why each of them. See things differently, and why affection as you can't you mentioned it in your book. It's the environment. Affection is the environment and sex is the event. So can you explain to our listeners?
15:12
Yeah, basically the whole idea of affection is so important to women because their security is more important to them than it is to the husband. And security. Affection creates security. If your spouse is telling you that He loves you throughout the day, gives you a call, tells you, ask you what you're doing, being interested in your day, it demonstrates to you that he cares about you, and affection is symbols of care, symbols that that be I need to be reminded that he cares about me, that he thinks highly of me. Now, when you have that environment of affection where you feel secure and you feel loved by your husband, making love is a lot easier because it isn't sprung on you suddenly. I mean, suddenly, you know you haven't talked to him for all day long. He comes to bed wants to have sex right away. That isn't an environment that most women find attractive, and so by having an environment of affection, and in my new book, I tie in the newest version, I tie affection and intimate conversation together as two chapters, and then I have sexual fulfillment and recreational companionship next, because affection and intimate conversation go together. I mean, to how you talk to each other is the best way to for him to express his care for you. And again, when those two emotional needs are met, most women have very little trouble accommodating their husband's sexual needs. So it's a basic problem that you see in marriage, that women complain about the fact that their husbands are or talk to them enough. Men complain about their wives don't have sex with them enough. And when I first started counseling, I don't do this now anymore, because it doesn't work as well. But I told one couple that came in that complained about that, I said, I want you to talk to each other for three hours at a time, and after three hours of conversation that is enjoyable for both of you, I want you to make love. So the couple comes to my office and says the husband said, it's the toughest assignment I've ever had. I never thought getting my wife to make love to me would be that difficult. And her argument was, I didn't like the idea that you were telling me I had to make love to my husband. Then I said, but didn't it make your marriage great? And they both agreed it was a great assignment, and they would continue doing that for the next week. And like I said, sometimes it doesn't take three hours of conversation, but you know what I mean, there has to be a connection. There has to be an emotional connection. And and it is something that is an environment. It's something that goes on all the time, not something that happens when he starts having a need for sex.
18:33
And what are some of those emotional, affectionate things that women do appreciate, that you've seen over the many decades you've worked with women, that men sometimes trivialize and don't realize how important they are.
18:49
And again, I think that men and women both tend to trivialize emotional needs they don't have, and they tend to make fun of them. They tend to think it's funny if they don't have the emotional need, and they think the other guy is they think that they're just being odd, you know. But I think that the the the affection I in the book, his needs, her her needs. I talk about a couple that I counsel where I asked the wife to tell me what she wanted her husband to do that would express his affection, and you see that list of things that starts in the very time they wake up in the morning, to the time they go to bed at night, things she wants him to do all day long. And that is a great expression of affection, because she she had this environment that she created in terms of specific things he did that made her feel loved. So I encourage every couple in that assignment that I have for affection of the person with the need and men will have a need for affection too. So. But affection isn't sex. So if what you want is sex, that's different. Affection is something you would give your children. It is a non sexual form of expression of care. So if a husband has that need to great make a list. The wife can learn to do that too. I've counseled a lot of women that are just unaffectionate. They don't have they're not affectionate their husband, they're not affectionate their children. They're just not affect and they have, and the woman has to learn to be affectionate in order to meet her husband's needs.
20:37
Yeah, you mentioned it. If you think about it like that, is non sexual, and it's even something that your children appreciate. So it is those spontaneous hugs. It is just asking how you are and that kind of thing. And as you mentioned in your book, it has to be non sexual for women to for most women, to really appreciate it. If you're coming to kiss on the neck and all of a sudden she feels you know, there goes, you again, kind of thing, but just to send you a text, thinking about you, how was your day? Message me when you get home, all that, that just the kiss, the hugs, when they leave and when they reunite at home, those things that are non sexual, that even your children enjoy when they see you for the first time when they return home, is so important that men have to realize, you know, maybe if you always have it that you are sexually turned on, then she will not want to really engage, because all the time when she wants affection, it comes with sex. And then you mentioned in your book, which is very relatable, but men then say, but I'm sexually attracted to my wife. What am I supposed to do? So you know, for people who have the same thoughts as we're speaking, what do you say to them about it?
21:53
There is a empathy that I think women need to have of husbands without making fun of them without being disrespectful. There was an art there was a whole issue of Time Magazine five years ago or so. That was on a experiment that a bunch of women did where they all took testosterone shots for a week, and the question is, how did it affect their sexual need? And they had a whole issue on these women talking about how horrible it was to go around needing sex all the time. And of course, my argument is that having a sex drive is not pleasant, it but it is physiological, and if you have an attractive woman at home, you're going to have a hard time keeping your hands off of her. Socrates once said when he was 70 years old that he was so happy that he had lost his sex drive by then, because now he could think about other things in life, rather than the next opportunity to have sex. So I think that if women understand that men have a sex drive because of testosterone that's in their system, if they lose that testosterone, they're not going to have much of a sex drive. And I work with men that don't have much of a sex drive, and their women want to know why he doesn't show more sexual interest in her, and he just doesn't have much of an interest in sex. And it is a it is a problem. You want your husband to be sexually attracted to you. You want that to be the case. It's just that you don't want him to overstep his boundaries. You know. You want him to be doing it in a way that in that that convinces you that he cares more about you as a person than he cares about you as a sex object. And I gotta tell you, as a man, that's a tricky assignment, difficult to do. I married, I married a gorgeous woman. Joyce is one of the most beautiful women I've ever seen in my entire life, and from a sexual standpoint, she is everything I've ever wanted. So the trick for me to be calm and deliberate and and not rush to have sex was something I always had to deal with. And she appreciates the fact that I find her attractive. Even at my age, I'm still finding her very attractive, and I think that women want their husbands to find their they just don't want their husbands to treat them as if sex is the only reason they're there.
24:52
Yes, and that's where the that's where the affection comes in that is not sexual. And you do have in your book the question. Scenarios that you know parents get couples, not just parents can complete to kind of get an idea of their needs isn't too with regarding the sexual fulfillment that men express their love through sex. Women, you know, might express their love in other ways, but for men, it's their primary way of expressing how much they love and care for you,
25:22
not necessarily. I wish that were the case. I think for for men, sex can be a very selfish thing, that when they make love, they are not expressing affection in the way they make love. And I've written an article, there's an in the in the article section that explains that sex is a can be a way of expressing affection, and in marriage, it should be a way of expressing affection so that that eliminates a lot of sexual acts that the act itself does not communicate any care at all for the other person. All it is is a way of having a sexual experience. So I would argue that when you make love, the Making Love is the important part, that you're you are looking at each other, that you are you, you're you're hugging each other. You're face to face. You are enjoying this expression of sex in a way that also communicates your love for each other at the same time. So that's what I try to communicate to couples, that they make it a love making experience, as opposed to a sexual experience.
26:50
Yes, and you know, again, one of the favorite, one of my lines from your book, is that the affection is the environment. So for men listening, create the affectionate environment so that the event, which is sex, can occur. You know, the the other two needs you mentioned are intimate conversation and recreational companionship. And women lean more to the intimate conversation. You see more women with that and men needing more recreational companionship. You mentioned in your book that you know, in the beginning of dating and so on, lots of women would engage in the activities of their spouse, but then once they get married, that kind of tapers off, and the man is left thinking she was so much fun. She used to go hiking with me. She used to sit and watch football with me. What's going on here? So, you know, first we started off with a woman in the first two but can you explain to women why recreational companionship is so important to men? And then we can talk about for men, why intimate conversation is so necessary.
28:05
Yeah, basically, I think recreational companionship is an important need for both men and women. I think that when you're thinking about love bank deposits, you want to feel good while you're with each other. My argument has always been that one of the easiest ways to make love bank deposits is to do something fun together. And if you both enjoy hiking or you both enjoy some kind of a sporting event or an outdoor event, as long as the event itself keeps your attention focused on each other, and that's something I have always argued that the recreational experience should be something where you are together and and that you are Joyce and I had season tickets for the Vikings years ago, and Joyce and I would go together, and she would ask me at the end of The game who won. She never paid any attention to the score or anything else. She just looked around at all the people that were there. And I don't know that that would have qualified as a recreational activity for Joyce and I, because, first of all, it obvious. We obviously weren't connected during that time, and she wasn't really having any fun. Had a baseball game. We went to a double header one time, and after two innings in the first game, she got up and left and said, I just, I'm just not going to go through two games like this, you know. And she took the kids with her, and of course, we all left together. But I learned early on that recreational companionship has to be something both of us really look forward to. A recreational event eyes us together. We're thinking together. We're enjoying life. Together. We're holding hands while we're doing this. That's the recreational activity that makes love, bank deposits.
30:08
If you have no idea, or you never really thought about, what the recreational activities could be that connects you to you also provide a questionnaire to help them you know, couples, to see what their interests are and to find those activities that they can bond together about. You know, how important is intimate conversations, especially for women that men don't really understand. For us as women, we can get together as girls, and we can talk for hours on end about, you know, our vulnerabilities or struggles or wins or dreams and everything. And men don't seem to they might seem, you know, see that as a bit weird, and it might be difficult for a lot of men to know how to navigate and create more intimate conversations with their wife. So explain, you know, the importance of it and how the men who never had that experience growing up, how they can, you know, try to initiate those intimate conversations.
31:19
Well, all of the emotional needs can require training. My attitude has always been that I can take two people that have never met each other, if they will do exactly what I tell them to do, I can train them to meet each other's emotional needs, and they will eventually be in love. So the question really is here I've got a couple that are married, and they come to me saying my emotional needs are not being met. So my answer is, well, you do do exactly what I tell you to do, and I will train you to meet each other's emotional needs, and that's what I've done throughout my entire career. Now, if the person isn't willing to be trained, then of course, I can't do anything to help them, but in the case of intimate conversation, I train men to engage in what I call the five, the four friends, the four friends, the two, two friends Are content. Friends and two, two friends are delivery. Friends, the one friend, the content friend is, is understanding each other, and you do that by inquiring, by asking questions, by answering questions honestly. Intimate conversation begins with conversation about each other. The first friend of conversation is you need to talk about each other. I need to ask you about your life. You need to ask me about my life. We need to be able to make sure that we're being honest with each other. We're being able to talk openly. I don't, I don't hide anything from you. The second content is topics of joint interest. In other words, that you and I are both interested in geology, we'll say. And so we're able to talk about the Yellowstone National Park and how and the geological things that are going on, and we might even make go for a trip there, because we have this joint interest in something that's out there, but we can have this conversation about this without actually being in Yellowstone. And so that's the second so it's either about each other or about favorite topics that we both enjoy. Now, the other two friends have to do a delivery, so one of them is giving each other your undivided attention. In other words, you should be looking at each other. You should not have your cell phone in your hand while you're having this conversation. Put it away. Bury it somewhere. When you're out to dinner, it should not be there. You should have emergency only if your children are needing your care, fine, but not otherwise you don't look at so you've undivided attention, and then the other one is making sure that the conversation is balanced. You should both be talking at the same time. The fact that one person is a good listener is not good enough that you both have to be good listeners and good talkers. So you basically have to do it now that that's my training Pro I train people to do that. So I train a man. I say, I want you to spend time with your wife tonight for two hours where you are giving each other your undivided. Tension. You're talking to each other about each other. You're talking about topics of favorite, favorite conversation. You're balancing your conversation. Sometimes they use a chess clock to time how long each person talks. They need to talk about same amount of time, and you need to know you're given undivided attention. That is a winner for women. Women love it. Women love it. And I talk about the four enemies of good conversation, which is basically arguing with each other during this conversation, making demands, being disrespectful, being angry. But the basic idea is that you can be trained. I used to run a dating service, and I would train men in how to engage in intimate conversation. Because if they could, if they knew how to do that, chances are the woman would give them a second date, and that they knew that they were appreciated and they were there, the guy is interested in them. They would want to know more about the guy. So the basic idea is an image conversation is many people have argued that it's the most important emotional need. I wouldn't, I wouldn't argue with them about that. I think when it comes right down to it, our conversation with each other in marriage is bedrock essential, that it's that it's a great conversation,
36:29
yeah, yeah. It's, you know, it's the self disclosure is so important because it shows a certain level of vulnerability that I'm willing to share things about me that you wouldn't know otherwise, and then I am hearing the same from you, and it creates a special thing of feeling like you matter and you're important to that person, because they're sharing information that others wouldn't necessarily know or you wouldn't know unless you know it's been volunteered. You know, the next ones you mentioned our honesty and openness and physical attraction. The physical attraction. Why are those two also important to keep the the emotional needs going the especially, you know, as it relates to the physical attractiveness. Sometimes people say, you know, you should love me the way I am. Things change. We get old and so on. Why are you putting that kind of pressure on me and so especially for men, why is physical attractiveness so important? Women like it too, but it seems like there's a more leaning towards a male need. And for women, the openness and honesty. I think the openness and honesty ties also into intimate conversations, right? Because it's a self disclosure thing.
37:45
It is, yeah, it's very important to recognize that men that think they know everything about their wife. When I first met my wife, and so easy for me to talk to her about herself, but now they know, now I know everything about her, so there's no point in asking her any more questions. And as a psychologist, I know for a fact that there is no way everybody, anybody, can know the other person there is Joyce. And I have been married 63 years, and there's still a lot of things I'd like to know about her. And the basic feeling that I have about I think that, for example, you know, there's a questionnaire we have on our website, the marriage builders.com personal history questionnaire, which gives you some ideas about questions you can ask. So if you have problems saying, why, you know, I'm I'm kind of struggling with, I think I know enough about you. I don't need to ask any more questions the personal history questionnaire. Would be something that maybe you haven't maybe you haven't asked those questions before. There's also the ungain. The ungain has a lot of questions that you can ask people about themselves, that just goes on and on, but honesty and openness and an intimate conversation go very well together in the sense that a conversation has to be honest and considerate. Some people say, Well, if I'm going to have an honest conversation, I have to tell my spouse how disappointed I was in the way they behaved the other day. And my attitude is, well, that's okay, but you got to be careful how you express it. You don't express it as a disrespectful judgment. You express it as a something that you would have liked to have seen differently. But the basic idea is that be Be careful about how you treat your spouse, but I want you to be honest. I want you to be open, but be honest and open with respect, and that's the key to the whole. Thing, physical attractiveness. My my basic feeling about physical attractiveness is that it's an emotional need that comes with the body and and there's nothing I can do about it. I just find women physically attractive and more so than men. That makes me heterosexual, and the basic idea is that women can do more to enhance their physical attractiveness. If they can do more, they should do more. I put a great deal of emphasis on weight. In my book, 90% of the complaints that men have about their wives. Physical appearance has to do with weight, but I will say this that I heard the other day, somebody told me, men only have one emotional need, and that's physical attractiveness. And the guy was hadn't read my book. But the basic idea is, it's a big deal. It's a big deal to men, and even after you're married, it's very important to see your spouse as the most attractive woman in the room. I've always felt that way about Joyce,
41:11
No, the thing I was thinking of as you were mentioning too, like how all the needs intertwine, because if you as a husband, see physical attractiveness as very important. A motivating factor for women is if I'm getting the affection that I need, I feel loved, I feel accepted, I feel appreciated, even though I don't want to do this strength training, you know, because I you know, I feel so loved and appreciated by my husband. He also wants to make him happy. I know he loves when I'm fit, and he loves to see me work out. And it's a reciprocal thing going on, because if I'm having the intimate conversation, if I'm getting openness and honesty from you, and I feel affection from you, naturally, I want to give that back, and I might not feel like going on the treadmill, but, you know, I love my husband. I feel loved from him, so I'm going to at least put in the effort so I can see how it's also all come together. So for especially for men who might say, Oh, I tried to take her to the gym, she doesn't want to go, and all that kind of thing, there might be a multitude of issues going on, but I think the chance is higher if she's feeling appreciated, she's feeling the affection, the love, the self disclosure is there and everything, and there is an incentive to reciprocate, even if she doesn't feel like doing it, right?
42:34
Yeah, something I've told women, men and women both for many years is that exercising together is one of the best ways to make love. Bank deposits together. Because when you exercise, it if you finally get yourself in good enough shape so that exercise is fun and exercise should be fun, exercise releases endorphins and and and when you have when you've gotten to a point where you're exercising up so that you know what I'm talking about. You know that you're it makes you feel good to exercise when you are together and exercising those that endorphin effect transfers to each other. One of the problems that you have in in marriage is having a personal trainer of the opposite sex. Why is that? It's because you're when you are exercising and you've got a trainer of the opposite sex. That person is making massive love. Bank deposits in here, love bank. And you're making love bank deposits into into his I love bank, so I strongly encourage both everybody to have personal trainers of the same sex. If they have personal trainers and that they should do their exercise together. They should figure out how they can both enjoy exercising in the same room.
43:59
This one is a bit touchy, because things are changing where women are now out earning men in a lot of ways, and for women, the financial support, the financial security, can be important. I want you to speak on that, even if she is financially secured in her own profession, why it's important for men to understand that she will still need to see that you have the ambition. You have goals. You want to work hard, you still want to provide for your family, even though she she might be earning a little bit more than you. And then we can talk about for women too, why men need their men cave and they need their quietness and peace.
44:42
Yeah, the basic feeling that I have about the man cave. And I, I know John Gray, I've met, you know, I, we've done seminars together and stuff. I don't believe in The Man Cave. Okay, I don't, I don't believe in a man cave. And, and this is one of the areas that he and I. I have, have not agreed on on numerous occasions. I might add that he's on his, I think, third or fourth marriage now, you know, and I think the man cave might have something to do with it. The basic feeling is that I want to be integrated with my wife, and I want my wife to be integrated with me, and that doesn't mean that Joyce and I are in the same room all the time. I have my office and she has her office, but my office is not a man cave. She can come in anytime she wants. In the middle of this interview that I'm having with you, she could open the door and say, Bill, there's something I need to talk to you about, and I would have to tell you that I'll be back in a couple minutes. So the basic idea we have every right to impose ourselves on each other. We do it in a respectful way. I am integrated with choice. Now let's suppose Joyce earned more money than I use as an illustration in the financial support about a woman who was a multimillionaire, and she leaves her husband, she leaves all of her money in a trust and says to her husband, I want you to support me now the question is, did he marry her for her money? If he did, he would be very bitterly disappointed. But on the other hand, her argument was, I want to know that you didn't marry me for my money. I want to know that you married me because you loved me and you are willing to support me financially, even though we have to have a much lower quality of life, which I am willing to have to know that you didn't marry me for my money. And it is so interesting because men, I don't think it's a good idea to marry anybody for their money. I have counseled so many couples where it's the husband that's got all the money and the wife marries this well, wealthy guy, thinking that she's going to live a lap of luxury and be really happy. And it just doesn't work. Basically, you got to marry for the person, himself or herself and and the idea is that you could take all your money away and you start it all over again, and it would be difficult. But on the other hand, you're still together, you have each other and and that, I think, has to be the, the bedrock now, at the same time, a woman does want their husband to show initiative in in developing a career. And I think men that don't have careers can get themselves into a whole lot of trouble. I don't like the idea of men, and I know it's very popular today, many of the women that I know their their husbands stay home with the kids I am. I worry about that kind of thing because I know that women view a husband's career as a a a way of showing his love for her. He does this to support her. So it's a tricky conversation that that financial support and domestic support that we haven't talked about yet are two of the more controversial needs that I talk about.
48:42
You know, as you mentioned that, you know, there are studies that say that that have shown that when a woman loses her job, the risk of the marriage falling apart is very low. However, when a man loses his job and his income, the risk of the marriage falling apart is pretty high, so you might be onto something that women still need to feel that you care about me, and this is a form of protection to show that you love me by providing, no matter how small it is that you work really hard to provide for me and make sure me and The children are doing well. We want to look at the last two which is for women that the man is a good father, and for men that they have admiration. So a lot of fathers think being a good father is I work 7080, hours a week, and I provide the money. I'm never there at the football games. I'm never there at the musical recitals. But I'm a good father, because I provide this beautiful home, this wonderful car, this beautiful car, and the college tuition, all of that. So I am a good father. Explain. Why it's not just being a financial provider that makes you a good father?
50:06
Yeah, and I think things have changed a lot since I was first married. I was married in 1962 so in those days, basically women stayed home and watched the kids and men went to work, and I must say that in my in the way I raised the kids, I worked 70 hour weeks. Now it's interesting to recognize that I was still dating Joyce. During that time, Joyce and I had a very romantic dating relationship, but I worked very hard, and I am an entrepreneur, so I had four or five businesses going at once, and along with my college education, my PhD teaching and all the rest of that, so I've always been involved a lot of activities. I was not the father that couples have today that they basically my grandchildren that now are raising small children. The fathers are deeply involved in the raising of the children, something I never did. Now I have a book out called his needs her knees for parents, one of the books I wrote, The book argues that it is important for you to be a great father. And in that chapter on parenting, I talk about what a good father does, and we and I talk about quality family time. What does that mean? What do you do with quality family time? And if you say you don't have time for quality family time, you're wrong, because if you if you look at your schedule, even if you work 70 hours a week like I did, you'd still have time. There'd still be time in your schedule for quality family time, 15 hours a week, and then you also have another 15 hours a week for undivided attention to give your spouse. So you could be a workaholic like me and still be a good father and a great lover. You can do it all. You can't do much of anything else, but that's what you do. That's what you can do. Now, the basic problem that I think couples have today, and the reason I wrote his and attorneys for parents, is they put the children first, and they don't pay any attention to each other. So I wrote the book saying, I know you love your children, but if you, if you really love your children, you're going to have to spend a lot of time with each other where the children are not with you. And that's the now, the whole book is about making sure that you stay in love while you have, especially small children. I don't think you've seen that book his attorneys prepared.
53:06
No, I haven't read the version.
53:09
Send me your send me your address, and I'll send you a free copy. Thank you. But anyway, that book is basically a book about how to how to maintain a great marriage while still being great parents. And so the balance is something that you really need to, need to think about, that you are fully aware of,
53:32
yes, with a three and five year old, you know, that goes right into what I wanted to talk to you about now, because, yes, this is a perfect scenario where you are married and you don't have children, and you can easily meet these 10 emotional needs, but when you have little human beings that you need to care for pop up into the picture. How do you go about that? You know, what are when children come into the picture? What do you see as the first emotional need that gets taken away from either mom or dad? Which ones do you normally see taking the hit the most?
54:10
Quite frankly, it can be all. I talk about four emotional needs that are bedrock, essential, intimate conversation, affection, sexual fulfillment, recreation, companionship. Those are the four romantic, emotional needs. And I maintain that you can, you can do that. And I'm witness to somebody that has done that throughout my entire life, with my wife, even though I'm a very busy person, and she is busy. I mean, she has a career of her own. People would come into my office when I had 32 locations and biggest network of clinics in Minnesota, and they would see Joyce's picture. Oh, you're Joyce Harley's husband. You know she was, she, she was a reading the radio. She did, she did. Concerts, great singer. So she has a she has a career of her own, but we managed to be together alone a minimum of 15 hours a week for our entire lives. So that's what I tell couples. I said, you can have you have the time. The question is, what's your priority? And then, and then you have to make that time the best time of your week. It's not something that you say, I got to check it off my list because Dr Harley told me to do it. It's something that you have to work out so that it. It's I know that when I dated Joyce, it was my reward for all the work that I did that day. That's how I felt about it. I can finally do something I enjoy. And of course, she enjoyed it too. But the basic idea was that it has to be the best 15 hours of your week.
55:52
I'm thinking say, for example, there are many parents like myself who have two children or more under five. How do you find those 15 hours a week to really be intimate by the time you're done at the end of the day, you're both depleted. So how do you even date each other when you have multiple children under five? I think
56:17
I talked to you earlier about the book that's on my website that I've never published, dating the one you married. And in that, in that series, I talk about four couples. The first couple is like you and your husband, so you don't have to look at couple two, three and four. But then I go into obstacles, and the obstacles I talk about are a new baby, children under the age of five, child care. These are obstacles that people find in your position. And so if you look at that series, and it's got its own tab on the marriage children's website, go to obstacles and you'll see an obstacle that you would look at and say, yeah, that's my obstacle, all right. And and you see how I handle it. Now, Joyce and I do a daily radio show, and so if you read, if you if you look at that and say, you know that's not working for me, then you, write an email to me, MB radio at marriage builders.com and we will address that topic on our radio show and then and discuss it. How do you solve that problem? But my argument is that if you got a million dollars to date each other for 15 hours a week for 10 years, you'd find a way of doing it.
57:47
Yeah, it might mean, for example, it might mean that some parents might prefer to have the children fall asleep whenever they want. It might mean you have to shift and say, Okay, we're going to have a strict bedtime, between seven and eight or eight or nine, all the children must be asleep, and then maybe the hour or two before you both get exhausted, that's when you date each other. I think I don't want you know. Maybe you can comment on it. People might think dating meaning necessarily to go out to a restaurant and so on. But there are dating things you can do at home, too, to really connect with each other, right where,
58:26
especially, especially with young children, with children your your your age, Joyce and I have always left the house. Our dates have always been we've gone somewhere. And I can remember when we were first married and I bought a house, the money I spent on child care was more than my mortgage payment. And so to some extent, it has always been a very high priority in my in my in my marriage, but I talk about co ops in that dating, the one you married, how to form a co op, how to form a childcare Co Op, so that you can somebody will watch your kids while you're watching theirs. But the basic idea is that that if you knew that, if you knew that, you'd get the million dollars at the end of 10 years, but for 10 years you have to date each other 15 hours a week, you'd find a way of earning that million dollars, see, and I, I think that it isn't that it can't be done, it's that you have other priorities that turn out to be not as important.
59:29
You know, I was thinking too as you were speaking. You know, say, the 15 hours a week dating one of the things that maybe sometimes parents don't even realize that an emotional need is not being met, because they might say, there are no arguments. We're not, you know, there's no I don't feel friction, so things are fine. What are some of those subtle signs that they're not fine because, not because they're not having those explosive disagreements, but an emotional. Need is not being met. What are those little, tiny things that whether men or women Miss regarding their spouse, that an emotional need is not being met?
1:00:09
Well, the questionnaire marriage builders, the emotional needs questionnaire, which you can download free of charge, on the marriage builders website, the questionnaire section, you can download it, and I know of couples that fill it out every year. Every year they fill out their emotional and and the idea there are some people that are just not arguers. They just don't argue about anything. They just hide, hide their their emotional reactions to things. This emotional needs questionnaire gives them an opportunity to express themselves. I'm counseling a couple right now where the wife has pretty much kept quiet throughout their entire marriage about the husband's independent behavior. So she finally said to him, I want Doctor Harley to counsel us, because he has what you need, and so I am. I am getting him to date her now on a regular basis, and she is now, and I give her the freedom and the right to complain. I talked to her separately every week from him, and I say, How is he doing? Well, he's doing better, but we're not quite there yet. He's still, there's still a lot of things going on in his life that I know nothing about, and I want him to be proactive in including me in the decisions he makes. And so those are the things that I'm encouraging to do. But she's a very quiet person. She doesn't complain about anything. This is a type of person that needs to fill out that questionnaire every week,
1:01:57
every year, so it's a yearly marriage checkup. And they
1:02:02
also, they also, they fill out the they fill out the questionnaire. And then they also read, they spend New Year's day reading the entirety of his needs, her needs. Now one of the, one of the interesting things is, I encourage people to use a a highlighter when they're reading the book to highlight areas they want to communicate to their husband. In other words, I'm saying things the way they want their husband to hear. And so they highlight it. And so you see a copy of his and his attorneys with a blue and yellow highlighting and and they choose a different color to show what they now, sometimes the blue and the yellow are highlighted over each other, and it's whatever blue and yellow look it's that purple, I don't know. But anyway, the point is that they both want to hear it. But I think that I know a lot of people that are reading his needs her needs every year, from cover to cover,
1:03:04
just to keep them on track. And so I like that you mentioned, you know, you focus so much on the 15 hours a week to be together, because, again, you can easily slip into a roommate kind of scenario if you're not dating each other, if you're not doing the things that you used to do together. It might not be to the biggest extent or frequency, because you have children, but it's still so necessary that even if you have really long young children to connect, and some people might say they might not have the babysitting funds, but you said the co op is a good thing. Maybe if you live close to extended family, that might also be a good thing as well. You know, we're going to be wrapping up this conversation, and so I want to ask you if there's anything else that you'd like to say to couples, especially couples with children, about the importance of keeping the marriage as as the priority, the health of the marriage as a priority for the overall health of the family. Or is there something you want to reiterate as it relates to all of that and why it's so important to love each other, date each other as much as possible, or weekly, you say, date each other on a weekly basis to maintain that love.
1:04:21
Yeah, and basically, Joyce and I have a have a little, a little plaque that says, the best thing you can do for your children is to love each other, to love their love their parent. And Joyce and I have loved each other throughout our married life. Our children are fabulous. They've done extremely well. They are very happy to have been raised by us, but our primary focus was on each other, and both of our children know that. Both of our children know that that we love each other. I can remember my mother telling me, and I thought. Was strange at the time. I don't think I've ever told my children anything like this, but my mother told me, once, I love your dad more than I love you. Now I don't know why a mother would ever say something.
1:05:13
Yeah, that's tough. I was probably
1:05:15
doing something wrong, but the basic idea is that my parents loved each other more than they and I've turned out fine. My sister is turned out by my brother is turned out by. All of us have done great, you know, but my parents, my parents, loved each other. Now I got to tell you that you can't parse it out. You can't say you love your spouse born, you love your you love them all. You love them all. You wouldn't want anything to happen to any of them. But when it comes to a choice point like spending time together, the priority has to be with your spouse as opposed to your children, or it won't get done.
1:05:59
Yeah, children are the product of their environment, and so it's you as the adult to maintain that healthy environment, and part of that is to create that healthy environment together, right? If it's if the healthy environment is not there, think of all the emotional issues that children may experience because of that. And I think that's a very important message for also mothers, because we are more guilty of really emphasizing taking care of our children and making them priority, but to remember that if you don't prioritize your marriage, then the whole ecosystem that a child needs to thrive in is not going to function. So it's really important to do that. It's such a pleasure speaking with you, especially after reading your book many years ago, and now I thought, you know, it would be amazing to have you in my inaugural podcast to say, hey, family is important. A very healthy family is important for our children's development. Thank you so much, and I will definitely have all your links regarding where they can go to find the date in the one you married on the website, and all your social media handles will also be included in this episode, so parents who want to work with you, can also work with you. One last question, your marriage builder, is that a self paced course, if they are not able to meet with you live? Or how does that program work?
1:07:33
Basically, we have the our primary program is you buy his needs, her needs and love busters and the book, five steps to romantic love. Yes, the word, and that's all you need. Okay, three books and and you do everything that I recommend, and you fill out the question and fill out the worksheets and five steps romantic love. And you'll never need a counselor, but if you need a counselor, or or you need help, or you need encouragement, or if you got a spouse that isn't on board, you got, we call them the reluctant spouse. So I never see a couple that they both are willing to do what it takes to make a great marriage. I never see them. Yeah, I see a couple where one wants to work on the marriage and the other, and the other is a reluctant spouse. We try to get the reluctant spouse on board with coaching. We have coaching. We have more extend extensive programs that are described in our website, but and then we have a radio show. So basically, we have a lot of ways of reaching people.
1:08:42
And I noticed that your radio show is also available as a podcast. I saw it on Spotify as well. So for persons who might not be in the US, they can also tune in using the podcast the various podcast apps. Thank you so much again, and we hope that all parents listening feel or be inspired from this conversation that, yes, raise the little ones. There's a bit tiring, but we can still love each other. We can still have that romantic love and not drift off into the roommate scenario by having those 15 hours together and dating the one you love. Thank you so much for joining us. Dr Hart,
1:09:20
enjoyed your joint having bye, bye, you.
