Building Connections: Strategies for Deeper Intimacy

Episode #1177

When a married businessman notices growing distance in his relationship, his natural instinct is often to treat the marriage like another high-stakes project. He throws himself into personal development, executes morning routines, reads books, and tackles household chores. Yet, despite putting in hours of work, he comes home to find his wife just as emotionally detached or physically distant as before. This creates a frustrating trap where a man tells himself, "I am doing so much for this relationship, so why doesn't she see it?"

The underlying issue is rarely a lack of effort; it is a fundamental mismatch between output and intent. Many high-performing men fall into intelligent procrastination, using self-improvement tools, routine optimization, and task completion as a protective shield. Working on oneself in isolation is comfortable because it avoids vulnerability. However, if a wife is asking for quality time, presence, and emotional availability, spending hours in personal routines does not meet her core need for emotional safety. This is where unmet expectations in a marriage can quietly create more distance. When a husband expects physical intimacy in return for self-directed effort, resentment builds on both sides, leading him to keep score while she continues to feel unseen.

Rebuilding connection requires shifting focus from personal self-improvement projects to active relational integration. A man must lower his guard, stop keeping score, and align his daily actions with the specific relational inputs his wife actually asks for. Learning to hold space for the woman in your life means being present and creating the security needed for her to feel seen. By focusing on consistency rather than immediate physical outcomes, a husband can establish a secure container of trust where emotional and physical intimacy can naturally thrive.

Timestamp Chapters

00:00 - Introduction and Episode Preview
01:37 - Reflection on the Journey and Daily Routines
03:42 - The Hidden Trap: Doing "Everything" Except What She Asked
06:03 - Scorekeeping, Resentment, and Unmet Expectations
07:17 - Intelligent Procrastination and Avoidance of Vulnerability
09:03 - The "Project" Mindset vs. Relational Integration
10:30 - Balancing Personal Growth with Actual Connection
13:27 - Physical Intimacy vs. Emotional Availability
15:08 - The Fire Analogy: Tending to Connection Consistently
18:54 - Focusing on Lead Indicators Over Lag Indicators
20:12 - Understanding Rejection Fear vs. Her Emotional Safety
23:23 - Creating a Container of Trust
27:06 - Practical Steps to Shift Your Mindset and Reconnect
29:48 - Changing Your Relationship Scorecard
31:00 - Closing Remarks and TPM Contact Information

RELATED EPISODES

• Leadership in Marriage: The Importance of Masculine Strength

• Woman's POV: Change She Can't Believe-Decoding Distrust in Transformation
• Unlocking True Intimacy: Why Her Trust and Safety Are the Keys
• Unlocking the Secrets to Trust and Connection in Marriage

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does my wife seem distant even though I am putting so much effort into the relationship?

Your wife may feel distant because the effort you are putting in does not match what she is actually requesting. Men often default to self-improvement routines, personal projects, or household chores, whereas wives often seek emotional presence, undivided attention, and vulnerability. When effort is spent in isolation rather than directly on relational connection, it fails to build emotional safety.

What is "intelligent procrastination" in a marriage?

Intelligent procrastination occurs when a man throws himself into productive, positive activities such as working out, doing routines, attending coaching, or reading to avoid the uncomfortable, vulnerable work of opening up emotionally to his wife. While the activities are beneficial, using them to avoid relational risk keeps the wall up between partners.

How can I stop keeping score and building resentment toward my wife?

To stop scorekeeping, you must ditch the internal narrative that your self-directed work entitles you to specific outcomes, such as physical intimacy. Shift your scorecard from what you think you should do to the specific relational actions your wife has asked for, such as spending phone-free quality time together or planning dates.

Transcription

Lawrence 0:00
Where's the intimacy, though?

Tim Matthews 0:01
Lower the guard, take down the walls, meet her where she's at.

Lawrence 0:04
Does he actually really know what he wants?

Tim Matthews 0:06
What's really going on beneath that is that he wants more physical intimacy with his wife, connect with his wife, resentments then build. It is such a positive thing. I'm not saying it's an either-or. It's kind of like intelligent procrastination. The issue is the expectation. You've got mismatched expectation. Success leaves clues. That's kind of the bottom of it. , you got to ditch the story.

Hey, guys, welcome to this episode. If you're anything like me, you are tight on time, and if I was about to sit down and watch this, I would want to know what I'm going to get out of it. So, real quick, if you decide to watch the rest of this, we're going to dive into one of the most common traps that I have seen hundreds, if not 1000s, of successful men fall into. How you can avoid it, and three practical ways that you can get out of it.

In essence, one of the most common stories I hear men tell themselves is, "I am doing so much. I am putting in so much effort to this relationship. Why doesn't she see it?" So we're going to dive into what's really going on beneath that, how you can overcome it, and some quick strategies that you can use to shift out of that and into a place of connection with the woman you love. We'll see you inside.

Hey, guys, welcome to another episode of the TPM Show. I am your host, Tim Matthews, with an incredible guest, Wild Card.

Lawrence 1:37
Hi, Tim. It's great to be here. Really looking forward to thi

Tim Matthews 1:40
Why do I sense that you're lying?

Lawrence 1:42
No, I am really genuine. I always look forward to our sessions. These are great. This is therapy for me.

Tim Matthews 1:47
Curious, , because obviously when we finish, we just literally go our separate ways. , maybe a couple of nice messages. "Hey, that was great to see you," blah, blah. And then it's like we don't talk really again until we come back.

And I was thinking about this on, like, the ride home last time. I'm thinking, what's it like for him? Definitely, I love it. Brings up things for me, things to reflect on. But I'm curious, what is it like for you when you leave, and are you thinking about things? Are you applying things?

Lawrence 2:18
It's, it's really good. So it's about a three- or four-hour journey to get here, and I always want to make an effort to come because I really believe that what the work we do is incredible. What you guys do, the movement, and all of that, I'm, I'm in, 100% in.

So on my way up, my, my mind's firing with, what's Tim gonna say? How are we gonna? You know, what's the conversation gonna go like? So it's kind of, it's a, it's an experience for me from the moment we, we start it, and then we get here and, and we have our conversations and stuff, and then I get in the car and we head back because I've got a dog to look after and a house and, you know, all the stuff that needs looking after.

And it's another journey back, and it just gives me some really good reflection time to, to think about what we've talked about and to just apply some of that. So I have an ARS, Alpha Rise and Shine morning routine, and so then you usually find the next morning I'm walking with a dog and I'm thinking about things that we've, we've. But I'm also, my mind's also then racing onto, well, what does that mean for me? And what's the next subject we could be talking about?

So, I, I, I love the whole experience. But, you're right. We do kind of, we come, we hit the, hit the ground running, and then it's like, right, see, I got to go.

Tim Matthews 3:36
Well, you don't know what we're about to talk about.

Lawrence 3:39
I have no clue.

Tim Matthews 3:40
Fantastic.

Lawrence 3:41
That's the way you like it.

Tim Matthews 3:42
I do. I was recently speaking with one of the, my, one of the men in the inner circle who I also work with one on one. Incredible guy, and he has been stuck in a little bit of a loop lately, and his problem is that he wants more physical intimacy with his wife. That, that's kind of the, the bottom of it.

Um, and his story is that he's doing so much. And the issue is, well, the question that I posed to him, and transparently, I've been guilty of this in the past. I'm sure you have as well. When I get into what it is, and I'm curious whether the listeners resonate or not.

But when he says he's been doing so much, what he means by that is, I've been putting in so much effort, which looks like him attending coaching calls, doing his routines, reflecting on things, reading things, helping out around the house, again, connecting with more of the guys.

Tim Matthews 4:57
He's been putting in a lot of time and effort. But the issue is, he's not doing the thing that his wife has asked. His wife just wants him to spend more time with her. That's really it.

So whilst he thinks he's over here applying himself and trying and putting him through these points, putting himself through these trials and tribulations, it's kind of avoiding doing the one thing that really needs to be done, which is connect with his wife.

So what this then does for him is he then starts to make up this story that I am doing so much. She obviously doesn't understand what he is doing because he's doing it kind of in secret and in a cave. He retreats into his cave, figures things out on his own, thinks about what he's going to do, comes out of the cave, tries harder at something that his wife hasn't asked for, and then gets frustrated and resentful when it doesn't bring them closer together. Then he starts to keep score.

Tim Matthews 6:03
Oh, okay. Well, now I've done this. Now I've done that. Now she's not doing this. She's not doing that. Resentments then build, and usually what then happens is they come together and have a, a big argument. She's surprised. Where the hell has this come from? And he's like, "Well, I've been putting all this effort." And her response. What do you think her response is?

Lawrence 6:29
I, what? What effort? Well, I don't see it. I still don't. I never asked you to do any of those things.

Tim Matthews 6:36
All that I asked you to do was spend more time with me. All that I asked you to do was put your phone away when we were together. All that I asked you to do was treat me like a priority, just like you treat all these other people like a priority.

You take all their calls. You're always there for them. You're super present. You're super engaged. You prioritize your time with them. You prioritize going away with them. Do all the, they get the best version of you? And then when you come back to me, you're tired. You don't want to do anything.

Lawrence 7:11
I'm laughing because I've heard it firsthand about my own relationship.

Tim Matthews 7:17
And I think this is a mistake that, a trap, rather, not a mistake, that I think a lot of the guys in the movement fall into, and it comes from a good place because the work that they are doing is genuinely done with good intent. But also, I believe they're avoiding. It's kind of like intelligent procrastination, right?

The guys that we work with are super smart guys. The issue with them being super smart is that they also tell super smart stories, so they can really convince themselves that this is, this, the story is real. And they're very good at stacking the evidence for it. Very good. They're great storytellers, fantastic. I get it. I've been there.

But it just, there's an avoidance piece. There's a procrastination piece because he knows in this moment that if he was to do the, the one thing his wife is asking him to do, which is connect with her, it means that he has to get vulnerable. That's. It means he has to lower the guard, take down the walls, meet her where she's at, be emotionally available in those moments, and that's what, in this, with this particular gent, that's what scares the hell out of him.

So it's easy for him to keep the wall up and point the finger as it's her fault because she isn't reciprocating, because she isn't wanting to have sex with him or whatever it may be, right? But she's over there on the other side saying, "Hey, can you see me? Hello, hello, I'm over here. Do you want to go on a date? Do you want to do this? Do you want to do that?" So, I think there you go.

Lawrence 9:03
I think it's a great thing to bring to the table because, you know, I've lived through that. I've lived. I've done that myself. You know, and I think as businessmen, as people who like strategy, like tactics, you know, when you, when you come to a movement like this and you're told, okay, this is an ARS. This is a thing. This, get your house in order, sort your life out. You know, wake up, activate yourself, become, you know, aware of what you're doing, and we go, right. Okay, great. Another project. I am my own project, and we go, okay, fantastic, and we get stuck into it.

ARS every morning. This is it. I know this is going to reap benefits. The reward is there. I've got my plan. I'm going to do this, then this, then this. Then she'll love me. Then she'll be. She won't. She won't be able to stop herself from just fawning all over me because I'm going to be this incredible guy.

My wife turned around to me about a year into the movement and said, "It's really good that you're working on yourself. I can. I can see what it's doing." You, she said. "It's not doing anything for me. I can't feel it. And I mean, I feel the. I feel you. I feel your, you being different. We're still not having. Where's the intimacy, though? Where, you know, I still don't fear."

And I was like, but, but we've sat down and we've talked. I've, I've gone through the steps. Look, there was a step here that talked about Clean Slate, and I, and we sat down and had that conversation. Yes, we did. She did. She said we did do that.

Tim Matthews 10:13
And then there's too much time in between until the next point of connection.

Lawrence 10:27
Because it was on the program that that's, you know, rather than the...

Tim Matthews 10:30
The point is integration, right? It's, you know, you need to, yes, to your point, embody the lessons and such. And why do you do that? To put yourself in a way better position, right? Because, you know, when guys come into the movement, obviously so much of their worth and their identity has gotten wrapped up into what the wife thinks of them. Does she approve of them? Does she disapprove of them? And the guy has become very deactivated, right? As we say.

So there is a lot of merit in doing those things. The issue with those things. So let's go back to The Activation Method. The tool that we give the men is called the Triad of Connection. It's not called the Triad of Independence. That's right.

So there's three parts to it: the Live Like a King system, which is to put the guy back in a better position. The next part is The Hidden Motives Technique, so you can better connect and communicate with your wife and understand the hidden motive behind what she's really saying, right? And then the Clean Slate Method. It's supposed to part of the fire, so you can then build on it.

And to your point, I do think, again, it's a trap. I think because it's growth, it is such a positive thing, and I'm not saying it's an either-or. I'm not saying you either grow or you choose to connect, but you've got to bring your growth into the relational arena so that you can connect with the woman that's in front of you.

Lawrence 11:59
100%.

Tim Matthews 12:00
Not taking her opinion to heart, being able to recognize a safety test and pass it, being able to now, obviously, you bring your SMV as well, right? So there's sexual market value, so there's a level of attractiveness. But you do that for you because you feel better. You feel good. You have hobbies and interests for you because you like to do those things. They're the things that lift you up and fill you up, right?

And you can bring that fullness into the relational space with the wife, and from that place, it's much easier to connect. And like I said, I get it because it's, it's so easy to. I think you said it really well. Oh, I get to be my own project. It's so easy to get lost in that.

Lawrence 12:45
It is. I think the, the whole kind of self-help thing. You can go down a rabbit hole. You know, you can be on social media. You can, you can go and find 1000 supplements and 1000 options and 1000 ways. You know, the thing to do.

What I did with TPM was you pick a thing and then you lean into that thing and you stay with that thing. And I've been with the movement for four or five years because it works, and it's, it's focused, and it takes you on that journey. So after that first year, you do start to learn to, to integrate it a bit.

But the other thing that, that struck me as you were talking was, you know, does he actually really know what he wants? You know, because he wants intimacy. He says he wants sex, or he wants intimacy.

Tim Matthews 13:27
Well, good question. He wants physical intimacy without the emotional intimacy because he's afraid. That's the real issue for him right now, right? And we've been working on this for a few months now. I've wrote him some, designed something out for emotional availability, him to be emotionally available to his wife.

And there's been hurt caused on both sides, and they've both got walls up, and they both lack in trust and are rebuilding trust. So I understand it, but in order for both people need to take a risk. If trust is going to be rebuilt, it means taking a risk. So he has to be willing to take a risk and stop telling himself the story.

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Tim Matthews 15:08
That he is doing so much. Because whilst that might be true, and he is doing a lot, some of that is because it's for himself, and that's fine. Some of it is because it's just being a good teammate, like, you know, doing the dishes or just taking care of shit that needs to get done. You know, you know, you know, it just is, right? You just get it done because it needs to get done.

But then there's the relational piece, and that's the bit that he was really afraid of. He's doing much better with it now, but it's taken a lot for me to really drive this point home.

The other thing I said to him, I think this was three weeks ago. This was after I did a training with the IC guys on Inner Circle men on quality time. Had them audit the calendar. Looked at, they looked at how much quality time they've been spending, what type of kind of time is it, and all this kind of stuff.

Long story short, this particular man was very eye-opening for him. He realized that he wasn't spending barely anywhere near enough quality time with his wife. It could go weeks in between them doing anything.

And I asked him, "Look, you keep on saying that you want physical intimacy, but do you, do you ever think that the output that you're expecting in this relationship is disproportionate to the inputs that you're giving? It'd be akin to growing a business and expecting it to output a ton of profit, yet you're working 10 hours a week in it. It's just unrealistic. So the issue isn't the relationship. The issue is the expectation. You've got mismatched expectations."

Lawrence 16:58
He's putting all this effort in over here with all of the routines and the doing the work that he's doing, but the, the amount of stuff that he's doing in terms of the intimacy piece is minuscule.

Tim Matthews 17:07
Completely minuscule. So when I asked him that, hey, there's a mismatch here between outputs and inputs. It was kind of eye-opening for him.

I think the final point that kind of drove it home, when you start a fire. Let's say you're out in the wild, or even you're at home, right? When I say wild, I mean, like, wild camping, not like this primitive caveman-type guy that's, you know, trying to light a fire with, you know, just his two stones or two stones. But I said, look, when, when you go to light a fire, you, you know, you lay the fire, then you spark it. You need to just lay some more kindling on it, and eventually it takes, and eventually it burns.

You have to build it up. But what you keep doing is you start to get the fire going. There's a little flicker and a little flame, and then you walk away from it, and then you come back two days later, like, why is the fire out? Well, dude, you, you stopped tending to it. You stopped adding the fuel to it. You stopped giving it things that actually make it burn.

Lawrence 18:11
And I think that can be, it can be quite disheartening to do. So you, you do something, you see a little bit of a flicker or an ember growing, and you think, great, and then you, you kind of, you do, you go away or you step, step away for a minute, and, and it's go, it goes out. So you then go back, and I think the women in our lives can feel a little bit, what's going on, if you come back again, if, if you're constantly there all the time and everything changes too quickly.

So there's, there's a balance, actually. I think there's a balance between, to build that fire, you wouldn't, you wouldn't, and suppose it's the same analogy. You'd build the fire, you'd put a little bit kindling on, then you'd build, you'd fill it a little, peel it a little bit more, a little bit more, a little bit more. In my, my case, I came along, got a whole load of solid wood, and threw it on the fire straight away.

Tim Matthews 18:54
Go back to what you were saying there. As you were feeding it, what you focused on?

Lawrence 18:58
On the, the growth and the strength of the fire and the...

Tim Matthews 19:01
Focused on the process, not the outcome.

Lawrence 19:03
Yeah.

Tim Matthews 19:04
And, but he, when he's saying, "Oh, want more physical intimacy," doing something, and then when he's not getting the outcome he expects, like, immediately, he's, oh, well, I may as well go over here. Oh, shit! I got to go back to the fire now. The relationship's getting a little bit cold.

Lawrence 19:20
Oh, it sounds a bit needy, and it sounds a bit.

Tim Matthews 19:23
Well, it is because he's told this story that he's doing so much, which has meant he's built up resentments, and he's started to keep score. So he's then not wanted to be the one that takes the risk to build the fire. He's like, well, why should I? I'm doing so much. But the reality is, yes, that may be true. You are doing a lot for yourself, but you aren't doing anything to tend to the connection.

Lawrence 19:48
So, so let's talk about the risk thing a little bit. The, you know, they both got to take a risk. The risk for him, in his mind, is that he's going to be exposed, von. Emotionally reject, rejected, emotionally laid bare, and with the potential for being hurt. And for her, same, I guess. I'm not going to open up again. This guy's been, you know, been away.

Tim Matthews 20:12
Hers is more of a safety issue. She doesn't, the emotional safety piece because of how the relationship has gone for the past 10 to 15 years. She's, she's felt a certain way because of certain behavior. So her risk is, if I open up, it's less about rejection; it's more about, will I get hurt? Will he let me down? Can I trust his word? Can I trust his word? Will he be there for me? Will he see me? Like, can I be myself around him? So, kind of classical emotional safety pieces.

Whereas his, to your point, is the rejection. If I take a risk and, and show her my desire for her, or ask her on a date, or whatever it may be, and she says no, which there could be a ton of reasons why she says no, right? You can talk about that, but instead of leaning in, he leans out. See, I knew it. I knew it. I knew it. Because that goes back to the story. I'm doing so much, keeping score, building resentments.

But again, the, the, the issue here. There's, there's a few of them, obviously, but that whole idea of focusing on the, the outcome and not the process, it's kind of like when you build a business, right? Let's say your lag indicator is profit. So ultimately, you want to make profit. Let's just say. But it's a lag indicator. It doesn't always show up relative to the frequency or time of the actions. There's a delay to it, hence being a lag indicator.

So you don't focus on profit necessarily. You might keep an eye on it, you might report on it monthly, quarterly, whatever, but day to day, you're going to focus on the lead indicators. What are the behaviors that drive the profit? The small daily actions. What we're going to do in sales? How many dials? Or what are we going to do there? Right. So that you and the team are focused on the lead indicators.

The lead indicators, to your point, is the stalking of the fire. The lag indicator is the fire, the size of the fire. How long does the fire burn? But for it to burn, it's still going to need continual fuel.

So in this instance, for him, luckily, he's, he's coming out of this story now. He's seen it. I've been hitting him pretty hard over the head with it for week on week on week. I just will not let go. He needs to. He has to see it. And he got to the point where I said to him, "Listen, if you don't want to change this, that is completely fine. I, I don't. You don't need to change it for me, but just know your relationship will not work. You will not rebuild it with this story in your head."

Lawrence 23:01
No.

Tim Matthews 23:01
Where you are building resentments and keeping score. It won't work because any time that she does anything, you're gonna say, "See, I told you so," and you're gonna...

Lawrence 23:12
Withdraw or reject it.

Tim Matthews 23:13
Yes, so you need to change that story around. I'm doing so much to, what can I do? How can I connect? It's like a relay.

Lawrence 23:23
It's almost like he's doing the exact opposite of he wants, what he wants to do. I think rather than focusing on the end goal of intimacy, physical intimacy, he needs to focus on creation of a container of trust, and that's the consistency. The consistency of her approach, because she's, it won't seem like so much of a risk for her if there's a, if there's a container of trust.

If he's turning up regularly, stoking the fire, you know, having the conversations, like initiating the conversation, making, come into her with having fun, having, having a laugh, just all of the things that will create a thing where that she can relax a little bit into him, you know.

And, and if he, if he focused on those things, then if he, what he's doing at the moment is he's, he's looking at, he's, he's doing one thing, creating, creating a feedback loop to say, oh yes, it, you know, see, see, I know it wouldn't work, you know, I, and, and maybe even turned into some self-hatred, that kind of RC. I knew I was shit. I, you know, I'm. I know I'm not good enough. That, that whole kind of piece coming back as well. Or she's, she's this and she's that.

Tim Matthews 24:28
I knew I couldn't trust her. Knew...

Lawrence 24:29
Knew I couldn't trust her.

Tim Matthews 24:30
That's the big one thing. I knew I couldn't trust her. I knew she'd do that. I knew she'd let me down. Basically, I know it's not safe for me to open up. I need to keep myself.

Lawrence 24:39
I think he needs to build a container of trust for him and for, for him first, for himself, first of all. That, that whole kind of building yourself up, the be, do, have kind of narrative. You know, got to be the guy that he wants to be, not just try and do the things that he thinks should be. And he's got to build that container of trust for her as well. That, that, that sense of, I'm here. I'm re, you know, I'm consistent. I'm not going anywhere. This is not a new fad for me, you know, and all of that, and just build those two containers.

At some point, there will be a point where he will, they'll, they'll have to address the physical intimacy issue, and that could be through a fun game or, or, you know, a conversation that they have or whatever.

But we're talking to one of the guys in my pack, and he, he got divorced. His marriage failed. What he called, I wouldn't call it failed, but he, you know, he got divorced. They split up. They separated. They got children, and, and now they're back together. Now they're, they're building back a relationship.

And he was just saying the other day, I've come to the realization. I really want her. You know, we've moved back into the same house. We've, you know, we're getting it back together. You know, the, the movement, the, the pack has helped, and he's, he's really getting, you know, getting a really good feeling that this could go somewhere. And it's down to those, those little things that he's done.

He's been consistent, not just for himself, not just because he felt like that's what he needed to do, but he's been consistent with her, and she's felt that, and she's lent in a little bit. And the trust, the, the, the risk issue doesn't become a risk because it's like it feels natural, but it's a long process to get there.

And now they're having conversation. Now, after all of that, and all, you can imagine the amount of conversations and emotional opening that they've had to have, now they get into a stage where they're starting to talk about intimacy, maybe sharing the same bedroom, you know, all of that sort of stuff, and it's, it's wonderful to see. But it's taken a lot of work on his part to build himself up and activate himself and build, and build that, and build that container of trust for her to lean into. And during that period, there was no physical intimacy.

Tim Matthews 26:37
I think I know who you're talking about. I think so. Well, if, if not, then there's another guy in a very similar spot who I've been working with.

Anyway, three practical steps for someone that's listening to this who finds himself telling a similar story. Hey, I'm doing so much, craving more physical intimacy, but seems to be stuck in this space of just distance.

Lawrence 27:06
Three things.

Tim Matthews 27:10
If you can.

Lawrence 27:10
I think the first thing I would say is that it's be, do, have. You've got to be the person you want. If you're, if you, if you are, if you're saying to yourself, "I want, I'm a person who wants more physical intimacy." Be that person. You know, live out that way. You know, put yourself across that way.

And that would lead to the second point, which I think would be, you know, have some regular check-ins. You know, actually put something in the diary. To your point about the diary, do something that seems not very spontaneous and not very sexy, but to say every Thursday evening I'm going to create some time, we're going to create some time.

And, and I suppose that would lead to number three, which would be to engage her in that. You know, engage, help her to, or not help her, grow the container with her. Include her in all the things she's, he's doing. If he's over here doing this, all this self-help stuff, include her in it. Discuss, discuss it with her.

Say, like, actually, I'm thinking what would be really help, good for us to, to avoid any of this kind of miscommunication that's coming up. Let's, let's have a check-in every, every Thursday, just half an hour. Start with 10 minutes, if you like, just to, you know, check in. How, how are you doing? How's our relationship? How do you feel about our relationship right now? How do you feel about the future? What, and what's practically going on this week? You know, in your diary, anything. Just a quick connection, you know, to include her in it. That's what I would say.

Tim Matthews 28:38
I like that. I think the first thing I would say is you got to ditch the story. You got to ditch the story. If this is a story that you're telling yourself, then you've, you've got to ditch it. You've got to move on from it. Got to stop keeping score, and you've got to stop building the resentments. That'd be the first thing.

Second thing I would say is change your scorecard. Write down the things that she has actually asked you to do to connect with her. Not the logistical things around the house, but the actual relational things she's asked you to do. And then, if necessary, check off every day or every week whether you've done them or not, because that's your scorecard.

Not everything you think you should do, but the things that she has asked you to do. Whether it's to sit down with her without your phone and just have a chat, whether it's she's asked you to go on a date once a week or whatever. And to your point, you could always agree on some of those things together as well. Are you going to nurture the connection? Could be the question.

And the third thing I would recommend is surround yourself with some other men that have solved this. I just think there is an incredible amount of value in being around men who have gone before you.

Tim Matthews 30:06
And also men who are beside you as well. But men that have gone before you that can kind of give you a little bit of solace, you know, give you a little bit of hope, make you realize you're not alone, right? And there is actually possibility on the other side of this.

At the end of the day, success leaves clues, right? And I think it's, I think it's huge to be around other men that have on the journey and even achieved it.

Lawrence 30:34
100%. I think, you know, I think that's the, the, the beauty of the pack system is that, you know, we'll talk things through with guys, you know, like the guy in my pack, and, and they'll say, "I'm thinking of this," and, and everyone in the pack will take a deep, you know, breath, go, oh, and then there'll be kind of feedback session.

And it'll be like, well, maybe couch that in a different way. You know, if you want to do that, maybe think about that. And they're like, oh, okay, you know, and it's like, we've, we've been there, and we've mastermind the idea, the mastermind.

Tim Matthews 31:00
Exactly. Guys, thank you for joining us for another episode of the TPM Show. My name's Tim Matthews, and if you want to find out more about what we do here at TPM, then send an email into VIP. That's Very Important Person at The Powerful Man.

One of the team will pick it up. Whether it's The Activation Method, the Inner Circle, the Alpha Reset, The Brotherhood, whatever it may be, one of the advisors will be able to share more information with you.

Until next time, we'll see you again on the TPM Show.