The evening breakdown, this really has to do with relationships. Now in this talk, I’m going to talk about your relationship with a significant other, but you can apply this to a roommate situation or somebody else that you’re very close to that you see on a regular basis. Now, I got this tip from Tim Matthews, owner of The Powerful Man Group. Now, The Power Man has a website and a Facebook group for you guys. I really recommend you go check it out.
There’s a lot of value that Tim supplies there. This evening breakdown is something I try to apply to my life with my wife and I want to share that with you. It really comes down to six key factors.
The first thing is really just creating a space where you can always feel seen and heard. Now when I talk about that, I’m not just talking about a physical space. It could be a kitchen table and I do recommend that, but it’s really creating a safe space, a safe environment where everybody can feel that they can say what’s on their mind and what’s on their heart and not feel that they have to be defensive or walk on eggshells. Look, if personal development is new to you, especially relationship development, you might find it very easy to be defensive and not even know it and maybe people don’t feel comfortable talking to you. If that describes you and you’ve worked on this, then you need to take that back a notch and understand that people, they still recognize your old ways of being. It’s up to you to create that safe space over and over and over again.
Once you’ve created the safe space, what do you do? Well, then you ask you partner hey, did anything come up for you today? Tell me about your day. Did anything come up? Was there something important? What happened? Also, did I trigger you in any way? Now, if you’re not familiar with what a trigger is, it’s something definitely worth studying, we’ll cover it in another Daily Growth Hack or maybe even a deeper dive. Essentially, a trigger is something that happens when you initially react. You jump, you get angry, defensive, something along those lines.
You want to ask your partner hey, did I trigger you in any way? That way you can solve those triggers right away since triggers usually some reaction that somebody says or does something that really triggers you due to a past emotional experience, something usually happened when you were a child that you’ve taken into adulthood, extremely common. Once you know how to recognize triggers, you’re going to see them everywhere. Did I trigger you in any way? Then another question, hey, what are your celebrations for today? What are the big celebrations, the big accomplishments? My wife and I would always talk about what are the three best things that happened to you today? It’s a common question we have on our couch, tell me about the three best things.
Oftentimes in our society, especially if you watch the news and you have all this negative media, people are always talking about this is the bad things that happened. Well, just as easy as it is to talk about the bad things that happen, you can get in a situation where you’re constantly thinking about all the good things that happened. Once you get into this pattern, your life begins to change. You start to see good things rather than all the bad. Now, another question you say is how are your goals progressing? How are the things that you’re working on, things that you’re passionate progressing? All too often in relationships, what seems to happen is you just lose sight of those. You have a partner and you know that their goals were three, five, six, 10 years ago, but maybe you haven’t talked to them about what their goals are this week, this month, maybe even you haven’t talked about it in years.
What are their dreams? Just like you, their goals and dreams and aspirations change all the time and are ever flowing, checking with them to see how it’s going for them. Then also, how can I support you or how can I even support you more tomorrow? What can I do to be on your team? In fact, I don’t even want to be on your team. I want to be your MVP. How can I support you? What can I do for you? The last question I ask is hey if we live like this every single day, would we experience everything we’re worthy and capable of experiencing? That’s a question I pause on purpose because that’s a question that most people don’t think about. Look, if you lived every day like you did today, you’re driving a car, if it’s early in the morning and you’re listening to this or you’re watching this at work, wherever you are, think about yesterday or think about what’s happened previously.
If you live every day like today, would you be experiencing everything you’re worthy and capable of experiencing? Now where this question gets me almost every time, I say almost because I really work hard on it, but sometimes I notice it’s not and this is what I need to do to move forward. Then I share that with my partner because you remember the previous question was how can I support you more tomorrow? Now, if my partner’s not experiencing everything that she is worthy and capable of experiencing, I want to know how I can support her so she can do that. Every day should be a life worth living and that’s what we want to make it. This is your evening breakdown. Agan, I just want to say use this with a partner if you have one.
If not, think about another loved one you do. This is something you can do, check in every night or you can do as a Sunday wrap-up. Sunday, you can also use this as a check in for the week. It really depends on what’s best for you. I love it and I hope you will too.
Stay tuned. September 1, we’re launching Author of Your Own Story University. Hope to see you there.
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