163. Giving and Receiving
Feeling stressed about what to give your nearest and dearest this holiday season?
Today’s episode can help.
But this episode goes far beyond the giving and receiving of presents.
It’s also about how you show up in relationships - what you give to those you care about in terms of time, attention, energy and more.
Maybe you live by the golden rule, giving what you like to receive.
Maybe you’re more of a platinum rule person, giving what you think the other would like to receive.
Maybe you’ve never considered how you want to give to your loved ones, and you’ve been operating by a set of rules you’d rather discard.
This week’s episode will help you figure it all out, including how to have any uncomfortable conversations that need having and how to deal with the romanticized idea that people should just know what each other want.
If you want to have magical relationships that feel satisfying AF this holiday season and beyond, you’re in the right place.
You’ll learn how to give and receive in a way that fosters deeper connections and my top tips for creating a stress-free gift-giving-and-receiving experience.
My small group coaching program, Satisfied AF, is officially open for enrollment! Click here to schedule a consult call for Satisfied AF and we can figure out what’s not working in your life and career as well as how to transform it into something that delights you.
WHAT YOU’LL LEARN FROM THIS EPISODE:
What the golden rule and platinum rule entail.
The difference between giving what others wants to receive and giving what you want to receive.
How giving what you want to receive is a way of understanding yourself deeper.
Why guesswork and hoping other people read your mind leads to disconnection.
The power of being willing to ask questions about giving and receiving.
How to navigate gift giving and receiving during the holidays.
LISTEN TO THE FULL EPISODE:
FEATURED ON THE SHOW:
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I have one-on-one coaching slots available now. Click here to schedule a consult call so we can talk about how one-on-one coaching could support you in creating a magical life and career.
My year-long coaching and mentorship program, Unhinged AF, is the most extra, extravagant offering I currently have. One-on-one coaching, in-person or virtual VIP days, and special surprises. If this sounds like just the thing for you, book a consult call and let’s discuss a customized program that’s all about helping you break free from your current life and career to build something that truly blows your mind.
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FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:
This week we’re talking about Giving and Receiving.
The Satisfied AF podcast is the place to learn how to create a life and career that’s wildly delicious. Want a steamier sex life? We’ve got you. Want a more satisfying career? We’ll cover that too. And you can be sure we’ll spend lots of time talking about how to build connected, fun relationships that can handle life’s ups and downs. No matter what goals you’re working on, this show will help you create a one of a kind life that is just right for you. Join me, life and career coach Kori Linn and each week I’ll give you lots of practical tips, tools, and proven strategies to help you create all the satisfaction your heart desires.
Hello, hello, hello, happy Wednesday. I’m super excited to talk about today’s topic with you. Before we jump in, just a few quick things. Thing number one, if you love the podcast and would like to support us, the very best ways you can do that are to follow, rate and review the podcast and also to share the podcast. Whether that’s on your social media or just directly with friends, family and anyone you think could benefit. And for those of you who already have done these things, thank you so much. I appreciate you so deeply.
Okay, one more thing before we jump in, and that is I want to read a testimonial for you. I spend every week on the podcast teaching you things that I think will help you have a more magical and delicious experience of your life, your career, your relationships and all kinds of things. But I also think sometimes it’s really powerful to hear from someone who’s not me. And who better to hear from than one of my former clients?
So here’s what my former client Monica has to say. Also, her real name is not Monica because some people prefer to give their testimonials anonymously, so that name is made up. Monica says, “I hired Kori because I hated my job and my boss. I was desperate to change my life, but I was terribly afraid of making it even worse. I needed help.
In the end, I didn’t really learn to love my job before I left it, but I learned that I could love myself and my life, even if I didn’t know exactly what was around the corner in my career. Kori and I dug into why I was so inclined to say mean things to myself and the benefits of not doing that.
I also got a new job where, with Kori’s help, I negotiated for $25,000 more than the initial offer and a percentage of the company’s profits. Hiring Kori helped my economic bottom line, but it probably 100x my psychological bottom line. I came away with so much more love for myself.
With Kori’s help, I went from a person who asked why and for external permission, to a person who asks why not and offers myself permission.” Thank you so much, Monica, for that gorgeous testimonial. I’m so delighted with the work we did together and I’m so appreciative of you taking the time to write about your experience so I could share it with others.
There are so many things I love about this testimonial, and let’s just kind of go through it. First things first, even though the podcast used to be called love your job before you leave it, that’s not actually required. It’s just one way we can move forward in the work.
And as we talk about in the podcast episode where I talk about when to quit your job, the answer to which being whenever you want for whatever reasons you want, you’re always allowed to just quit your job or get a new job if that’s what you would prefer to do rather than learn to love it.
And that’s what this client did. And it was magical and marvelous. And she got a job that was a much better fit for her. Also, just because you could coach yourself to like something, doesn’t necessarily mean you should. It’s a case by case basis, right? It’s not a one size fits all answer here.
Another thing I really love about this testimonial is that even though Monica got what she hired me to get, which is a better job that felt better and to get away from her current job, I think the psychological benefits she talked about are even more important.
With coaching, we can use our time together to create really specific results in your life, whether that’s getting a new job, whether it’s getting a raise, whether it’s finding a significant other. But it’s the relationship you learn how to have with yourself, that self-kindness, that self-compassion, you take that with you when we stop working together and you can use that to achieve any goal. And it creates a sort of resilience that is really magical for being able to tackle difficult things.
Also the way we work on creating your specific result in coaching is also something that’s repeatable. So you can take the way that we worked through one goal and you can use those skills to work through all kinds of other goals. Thank you so much, Monica, for your kind words.
Now let’s move on. Let’s talk about giving and receiving. So for those of you who celebrate the December holidays, giving and receiving are a big topic this time of year. And we are going to talk a little bit about gift giving and gift receiving, but I also want to talk about kind of just the giving and receiving of who we are in our day to day lives, in our relationships and how we show up.
Okay, so first things first, let’s talk about the golden rule and the platinum rule. The golden rule is do unto others as you would have them do unto you. The platinum rule is do unto others as they would have you do unto them. So to break those down, the golden rule is like, give what you want to get. And the platinum rule is give what other people want to get.
I think there’s a lot of value to each of these rules, and I don’t think either one is necessarily something you have to follow all the time or ever if you don’t want to. So when it comes to how we show up in relationships, I think there’s a lot of value to the idea of giving the kind of energy, attention and care that you would like to receive. But I do think paying attention to what the other person wants to receive and how they like to be attended to, loved and cared for also really matters.
So the way I think about this for me is I remember being in a relationship, this was like a million years ago, way before Alex Luchini. And we were having conflict, me and the person I was dating. And I remember, like when you’re angry or when you’re upset, it’s like I would feel the urge to respond a certain way. And then I would think about how do I wish a person would respond to me during conflict?
And that is how I would try to show up and who I would try to be in the conflict, which I wasn’t always capable of. And I’m still not always capable of it. And if you want kind of more details on that, I think the episode on connection orientation is a different way of framing this same conversation.
Here’s the other thing, though, so sometimes what we want from other people is for them to be kind, for them to be gentle, for them to be giving us praise. And so we can think about, like, am I being kind? Am I being gentle? Am I giving praise? But something I’ve really thought about a lot more in my life as I’ve gotten older is, I also want people to be honest with me. I want people to tell me no. I want people to say like, I actually have a boundary around that.
Now, it’s not always pleasant when people do these things, but I think you can have a much deeper connection with people, a much more satisfying, functional relationship if you’re able to say no thank you to them and if they’re able to say no thank you to you.
So I think level one of giving what you would like to receive is like, yes, showing up with kindness, having patience, being willing to assume positive intent, things like that. But I think level two is being willing to say things that could ruffle the relationship a little bit in the short term, but can create more connection and more delight and more love and more belonging in the long term.
This also has some overlap with my ideas around disappointment and around like, when do you want to disappoint people? Do you want to disappoint them early on? Or do you want to let something go on and on where you’re giving more than you want to for weeks, months, years, and then you disappoint them later and there’s all this built up resentment and stuff like that?
Okay, so that’s layer one and two. Now, let’s get into layer three, which I actually think is super fun. When it comes to giving what you want to receive, you can do that to another person, right? You can give to the other person what you would like to receive from that person. You can give to the relationship what you would want to receive from the relationship. But guess what? Guess who else you can also give to? That’s right, you can also give to yourself, right?
So if you get a piece of paper and you sit down and you write a list of what you would like to receive, maybe from somebody, a specific relationship, let’s just say it’s your significant other. You get your paper, you write down all the things you would like to receive from them. And, yes, you can choose to give those things to them. Yes, you can choose to filter those things through the frame of like, these are the things I like, what are the things they like? Should I subtract some of these? Should I add some others?
But a third layer is, oh, these are the things I’m craving. These are the things I’m desiring. I can give those things to my partner, but guess what? I can also give those things to myself.
And I want to be really clear that we’re not doing this in a hyper-individualist way where we’re on our own, not depending on other people, not being interdependent, not having relationships, not being vulnerable, not sharing our needs. I’m just saying that in addition to being in relationship with other people, you’re also in relationship with yourself.
And yourself is the one relationship that is going to keep going with you, no matter what happens until you die. And maybe beyond that, right? I don’t really know what happens over there. But relationships end. The people we date, as much as we love them and maybe we’re in a partnership that we consider a life partnership, eventually that will end whether we die or the other person does.
Or sometimes things that we think are going to go until we die, don’t, right? Sad news and I’m sorry about it. But developing both the ability to show up as the person you would want to be with in how you behave towards someone else, it’s also showing up as the person you want to be with, because you are the one who is always with yourself.
So that might look like giving yourself praise. That might look like giving yourself reassurance. That might look like telling yourself you look cute today. That might look like telling yourself that you did a really good job on something. It might look like setting up a fancy dinner for yourself, or ordering takeout or buying that special bottle of champagne and just putting it in the wine fridge until the day comes when you’re celebrating something big.
There is also a fourth layer to this, which is in addition to giving what you want to receive to the other person and to yourself, you can also make requests, right? We’re a big fan at this podcast of making requests. And requests are great, both for how you show up in relationship with each other and also for literal gifts.
So many people want other people to read their minds. And I think movies and TV have actually made this much worse because we have this highly romanticized idea that people read minds and they’re really good at it, and I fall for this too. And we watch TV and read books and watch movies for pleasure, but our brains absorb the patterns that they see around us all the time.
And so I do think a thing happens where, because we’ve been fed the narrative over and over again that this is what love is, this is what connection is, this is what relationships are, this is what romance is, we forget sometimes that the media that we’re consuming is actually literally scripted. It’s not real life. It’s not how things necessarily go when they unfold organically.
And in real life it’s really useful to use your words and to tell people what you want, to tell people yes, to tell people no, to tell people explicit information about what you want to have happen. Which circles us back to if you would like people to be explicit with you, then maybe try being explicit with them.
And I realize that can feel vulnerable. It can feel yucky. It can feel awkward. But it can also lead to really magical outcomes. And like I have a really spectacular relationship with my significant other and it didn’t happen magically or by accident. And I firmly believe that it happened because we were both willing to say the hard thing with love a million times, and then a million times again, and then a million times again.
Okay, so let’s review. Giving what you want to receive is a way of understanding yourself and understanding the kind of relationships you want and understanding how you want people to show up in your life, and then being reflective of that. Showing up that way for others with that secondary awareness that they might want something slightly different than me and I’m not going to just force feed everyone what I would want.
Like I love champagne, Alex Luchini doesn’t love champagne. So if I wanted her to buy me a special bottle of champagne, it would not make sense for me to then buy her a special bottle of champagne because she doesn’t like it and then it would just be mine. So I mean, that’s not the worst case scenario, but then I’m really just buying a present for myself. So I think it’s nice to just be honest about that.
Whereas Alex Luchini prefers red wine and certain kinds of beer, and also she doesn’t drink as much as I do. So she doesn’t put as much of a like, ooh, this is fancy, we’re fancy, we’re celebrating. So she actually, where I would like champagne, she might prefer a back rub. She might prefer me to go do an activity with her that I usually don’t do. Like, she loves to go to Home Depot all the time. I do not love to go with her to Home Depot, it’s just not my favorite place. But she loves it when I go with her.
So whereas a bottle of champagne might feel really special to me, it might feel more special to her if I went to Home Depot and then helped her out, and asterisk, by help her out, I mean standing nearby while she does some kind of home improvement project. But if you dig down to the essence, it’s easier, right? So I actually probably should have said that at the beginning, but we do things imperfectly here on this podcast so let’s talk about it now.
There’s a podcast episode about what’s the essence of a thought pattern? There’s a part of that here too of like, okay, give what you want to receive, but what’s the essence of what you want to receive? The essence of what I want to receive is I want to feel special, I want to feel loved, I want to belong, I want to be celebrated.
A lot of that is going to apply to a lot of people. And then you can think about what would help them. Not that you can ever truly create an experience for them, but what things do you know would have a high likelihood of them having that experience? And if you don’t know, you can, again, use your words and ask people. You could say, hey, I really want to celebrate you. How do you like being celebrated?
Again, I think we place such a huge emphasis on mind reading, but I think we get mind reading wrong and then we try to do these things for each other and then it falls really flat because it’s not the thing the other person would have wanted. And then instead of them feeling cherished and special and celebrated, they feel this disconnect of like, they don’t actually know me. They don’t actually know what I like.
I also think, again, I think we think asking questions about, hey, how would it feel good to be celebrated? Like, we think that’s really unromantic. But what if it’s the most romantic thing, is to be willing to admit I don’t know everything about you and I would like to know about you. And even if I think I know about you, I’m going to ask you about you. Because guess what? People change and maybe they have new answers.
Okay, so I feel like we were reviewing and then I got sidetracked by additional points, which I think were important and relevant. So I’m not mad at it. But give what you want to receive, dig into the essence of what it is you want to receive. Does that make sense to give to the other person based on what you know about them? If you don’t know, you can ask yourself follow-up questions, you can ask them follow-up questions.
And then this isn’t just about giving the things that are super fun and yummy to receive. Sometimes it’s also about giving the things that do feel awkward or uncomfortable, like setting a limit or a boundary. And then navigating through that with love and care and knowing that that is part of creating a gorgeous, intimate, connected relationship as well.
And the beauty of that, to just talk about it for a minute, is it takes guesswork out. Like I have so many clients over the years who’ve been afraid that people are mad at them and I’ve spent so much of my life being afraid that people are mad at me. And if people are willing to tell you when they’re mad at you and you’re willing to believe them about that, then you don’t have to fucking waste that time anymore wondering if they’re mad at you.
So I would argue even if it doesn’t sound great to you to hear when someone is mad at you, I think hearing it and being able to have a loving, considerate conversation about it is actually much better than being lied to and kind of getting the feeling based on how they’re behaving that they are mad at you, but no one ever telling you explicitly.
That’s my pitch. I’m a big fan of explicit communication. You’re allowed to do it differently and have your own preferences, but that’s what I’m going to talk a lot about on this podcast. So take it with a grain of salt, always.
And then the final piece is you get to give to yourself too. When we find out what we want to receive and we think about how we want to give that to other people we’re in relationship with, we’re also people we’re in relationship with. And I think that’s so beautiful because when you give the things to yourself that you want, then you’re nourished, like in an emotional way.
Now, humans are social mammals, so you’re still probably going to be seeking and desiring connection with other people. But there’s one thing where we’re seeking and desiring connection and it’s going to be fun and interesting, but we’re nourished. And there’s another thing where we’re sort of like emotionally starving inside and then we’re seeking connection in this way that’s very desperate and we’re not able to be like, oh, does this connection make sense for me? Does it feel good? Is it reciprocal, because we’re too fucking hungry and we’re just looking for any nourishment.
So I think that’s why being clear on what you’d like to receive and going out of your way to give it to yourself on a regular basis also sets you up really well to have magical relationships that feel really yummy and delicious to you. Because you’ll be nourished and then you’ll be able to make excellent choices about what relationships you want to be in and how you want to show up in those.
O>kay, now let’s talk about giving and receiving as in actual literal presents. First of all, I think a lot of the things I’ve talked about already apply. Like if you would want to receive something and you dig down to the essence of what that something is, that could actually be a useful indicator of what you might like to give somebody else.
Also, though, I think that thing about saying no and saying the truth is really relevant here, too. So when Alex and I first got together, there were several times when she got me presents that I didn’t like. And, listen, this is a thing because culturally we’re taught you be grateful, you never look a gift horse in the mouth, just say thank you and then do whatever you want with it later. And it’s like that politeness, that smiling, you never want to seem ungrateful in our culture.
But here’s the thing, I wanted to have a long and happy relationship with Alex and I wanted Alex to know me. And so I wanted to be honest with her when I didn’t like things, even though I knew it was going to be uncomfortable in the short term, because I wanted the payoff for the long term. So this is always a choice you get to make.
Like there are people in my life that I’m not super close to, if they give me a gift and it doesn’t land, I’m probably not going to say anything. I’m probably just going to donate it and it’s fine. But Alex and I have a very close relationship, we are partners. And even though this was early in our relationship, I took the relationship very seriously. Like I could tell this is a serious relationship and I’m planning for longevity here. And so I wanted to act accordingly.
So one of the ones in particular, what she got me was she made me a sand garden. And so it was like a beautiful pot filled with sand and then we had all these rocks because I like to take rocks, like pick up rocks sometimes when I’m traveling or when I see pretty rocks, right? And so she got the thing and she put the sand in it, she put the rocks in it. And when she gave it to me I literally cried because, and you might not know this about me, I fucking hate sand.
It’s not that I hate the beach. It’s not that I hate the ocean. I just, I don’t like sand. I feel like it’s very messy. It’s very gritty. It gets everywhere. Like the beach, I’ll go to it but it’s not my preferred destination. I would much rather go to the woods or maybe the mountains. And so I didn’t want a rock garden in a box full of sand. And I wanted to be known by her and so I was willing to do the painful, uncomfortable thing of saying, like, I don’t like this president.
And now Alex and I laugh about it. We laugh a lot about it. I mean, I think that was like my first birthday of us being together. So we’d been together for almost a year and, yeah, it was a risk. But also, I think it speaks really highly of Alex and the kind of connection we had cultivated that she handled it like a champion. She was just like, okay, I didn’t know you didn’t like sand.
I could see why it made sense to her as a present. So I was really clear with the way I explained it to her that it was very thoughtful, it just wasn’t for me, right? And so she basically gave me a little pass for a different present, which I ended up getting something else and was very happy with it.
And here’s the thing, again, it’s not the most romantic thing in the way we think about romance in a Hallmark movie or a book. But in our relationship, in a lot of ways it actually is the most romantic thing because it’s me telling the truth, when I was pretty sure the truth was going to be disappointing to her. And her loving me anyways and me loving me anyways, and me loving her anyways, and her loving herself anyways, and us moving forward and it becoming an inside joke that we can laugh about.
And in a lot of ways, it’s brought more joy to our relationship than a present that was a really good fit because it’s part of our story and it stands out because it didn’t work out the way it was supposed to.
So maybe you thought I was going to teach you how to give the perfect gift, and that’s not what I’m doing because I don’t know how to do that. Well, actually, all the stuff I said before is probably as close as I could get in that kind of advice. But again, it doesn’t have to be perfect to be good. It doesn’t have to be good to be meaningful.
Sometimes it can be the absolute least perfect present, or a present that really doesn’t make sense to the other person for reasons you did or didn’t know. And it can still be part of a wonderful, beautiful connection. It can be something you treasure for years to come or it can be something you laugh at for years to come. And laughing at things is just a different kind of treasure, let’s be honest.
And to really circle it back, I gave Alex what I would want to receive, which is I gave her the truth. I gave her honesty. But I gave the honesty with kindness because, yeah, there is a part of me that when I give someone a present always wants to be told, thank you so much. Good job, I love it. But not if that’s not true. The deeper part of me wants to know the truth and wants to have a deeper connection. Again, if it’s someone I’m building a deeper connection with.
If it’s someone I’m not, it’s not like you ever have to do this. It’s just something that’s available. But what I will say is the truth, even when it’s uncomfortable, creates space for deeper intimacy. And when we don’t tell the truth, we don’t create that space.
Not that the relationship can’t become more intimate in other ways, right? Relationships are made up of lots and lots of micro moments. But when you choose to tell the truth, it does create space for you to know the other person more deeply, for you to be known more deeply and to build more intimacy between you two.
If you enjoyed this episode about giving and receiving, if you’re inspired and you want to have the courage to show up as your authentic self in relationship, to tell the truth even when it’s uncomfortable, if you want to develop the ability to hear the truth, even when it’s uncomfortable, then I invite you to come and work with me.
I currently have space for some new one on one clients and I would love to support you as you step into the next version of yourself who tells the truth with ease, who hears the truth with love and compassion and who builds deep, deep intimacy in any relationship she wants to.
All right. That’s what I have for y’all this week. Thank you so much, have a lovely week. I’ll talk to you next time.
Thank you for joining me for this week’s episode of Satisfied AF. If you are ready to create a wildly delicious life and have way more fun than you ever thought possible, visit www.korilinn.com to see how I can help. See you next week.
The Satisfied AF podcast is the place to learn how to create a life and career that’s wildly delicious. Want a steamier sex life? We’ve got you. Want a more satisfying career? We’ll cover that too. And you can be sure we’ll spend lots of time talking about how to build connected, fun relationships that can handle life’s ups and downs. No matter what goals you’re working on, this show will help you create a one of a kind life that is just right for you. Join me, life and career coach Kori Linn and each week I’ll give you lots of practical tips, tools, and proven strategies to help you create all the satisfaction your heart desires.
Hello, hello, hello, happy Wednesday. I’m super excited to talk about today’s topic with you. Before we jump in, just a few quick things. Thing number one, if you love the podcast and would like to support us, the very best ways you can do that are to follow, rate and review the podcast and also to share the podcast. Whether that’s on your social media or just directly with friends, family and anyone you think could benefit. And for those of you who already have done these things, thank you so much. I appreciate you so deeply.
Okay, one more thing before we jump in, and that is I want to read a testimonial for you. I spend every week on the podcast teaching you things that I think will help you have a more magical and delicious experience of your life, your career, your relationships and all kinds of things. But I also think sometimes it’s really powerful to hear from someone who’s not me. And who better to hear from than one of my former clients?
So here’s what my former client Monica has to say. Also, her real name is not Monica because some people prefer to give their testimonials anonymously, so that name is made up. Monica says, “I hired Kori because I hated my job and my boss. I was desperate to change my life, but I was terribly afraid of making it even worse. I needed help.
In the end, I didn’t really learn to love my job before I left it, but I learned that I could love myself and my life, even if I didn’t know exactly what was around the corner in my career. Kori and I dug into why I was so inclined to say mean things to myself and the benefits of not doing that.
I also got a new job where, with Kori’s help, I negotiated for $25,000 more than the initial offer and a percentage of the company’s profits. Hiring Kori helped my economic bottom line, but it probably 100x my psychological bottom line. I came away with so much more love for myself.
With Kori’s help, I went from a person who asked why and for external permission, to a person who asks why not and offers myself permission.” Thank you so much, Monica, for that gorgeous testimonial. I’m so delighted with the work we did together and I’m so appreciative of you taking the time to write about your experience so I could share it with others.
There are so many things I love about this testimonial, and let’s just kind of go through it. First things first, even though the podcast used to be called love your job before you leave it, that’s not actually required. It’s just one way we can move forward in the work.
And as we talk about in the podcast episode where I talk about when to quit your job, the answer to which being whenever you want for whatever reasons you want, you’re always allowed to just quit your job or get a new job if that’s what you would prefer to do rather than learn to love it.
And that’s what this client did. And it was magical and marvelous. And she got a job that was a much better fit for her. Also, just because you could coach yourself to like something, doesn’t necessarily mean you should. It’s a case by case basis, right? It’s not a one size fits all answer here.
Another thing I really love about this testimonial is that even though Monica got what she hired me to get, which is a better job that felt better and to get away from her current job, I think the psychological benefits she talked about are even more important.
With coaching, we can use our time together to create really specific results in your life, whether that’s getting a new job, whether it’s getting a raise, whether it’s finding a significant other. But it’s the relationship you learn how to have with yourself, that self-kindness, that self-compassion, you take that with you when we stop working together and you can use that to achieve any goal. And it creates a sort of resilience that is really magical for being able to tackle difficult things.
Also the way we work on creating your specific result in coaching is also something that’s repeatable. So you can take the way that we worked through one goal and you can use those skills to work through all kinds of other goals. Thank you so much, Monica, for your kind words.
Now let’s move on. Let’s talk about giving and receiving. So for those of you who celebrate the December holidays, giving and receiving are a big topic this time of year. And we are going to talk a little bit about gift giving and gift receiving, but I also want to talk about kind of just the giving and receiving of who we are in our day to day lives, in our relationships and how we show up.
Okay, so first things first, let’s talk about the golden rule and the platinum rule. The golden rule is do unto others as you would have them do unto you. The platinum rule is do unto others as they would have you do unto them. So to break those down, the golden rule is like, give what you want to get. And the platinum rule is give what other people want to get.
I think there’s a lot of value to each of these rules, and I don’t think either one is necessarily something you have to follow all the time or ever if you don’t want to. So when it comes to how we show up in relationships, I think there’s a lot of value to the idea of giving the kind of energy, attention and care that you would like to receive. But I do think paying attention to what the other person wants to receive and how they like to be attended to, loved and cared for also really matters.
So the way I think about this for me is I remember being in a relationship, this was like a million years ago, way before Alex Luchini. And we were having conflict, me and the person I was dating. And I remember, like when you’re angry or when you’re upset, it’s like I would feel the urge to respond a certain way. And then I would think about how do I wish a person would respond to me during conflict?
And that is how I would try to show up and who I would try to be in the conflict, which I wasn’t always capable of. And I’m still not always capable of it. And if you want kind of more details on that, I think the episode on connection orientation is a different way of framing this same conversation.
Here’s the other thing, though, so sometimes what we want from other people is for them to be kind, for them to be gentle, for them to be giving us praise. And so we can think about, like, am I being kind? Am I being gentle? Am I giving praise? But something I’ve really thought about a lot more in my life as I’ve gotten older is, I also want people to be honest with me. I want people to tell me no. I want people to say like, I actually have a boundary around that.
Now, it’s not always pleasant when people do these things, but I think you can have a much deeper connection with people, a much more satisfying, functional relationship if you’re able to say no thank you to them and if they’re able to say no thank you to you.
So I think level one of giving what you would like to receive is like, yes, showing up with kindness, having patience, being willing to assume positive intent, things like that. But I think level two is being willing to say things that could ruffle the relationship a little bit in the short term, but can create more connection and more delight and more love and more belonging in the long term.
This also has some overlap with my ideas around disappointment and around like, when do you want to disappoint people? Do you want to disappoint them early on? Or do you want to let something go on and on where you’re giving more than you want to for weeks, months, years, and then you disappoint them later and there’s all this built up resentment and stuff like that?
Okay, so that’s layer one and two. Now, let’s get into layer three, which I actually think is super fun. When it comes to giving what you want to receive, you can do that to another person, right? You can give to the other person what you would like to receive from that person. You can give to the relationship what you would want to receive from the relationship. But guess what? Guess who else you can also give to? That’s right, you can also give to yourself, right?
So if you get a piece of paper and you sit down and you write a list of what you would like to receive, maybe from somebody, a specific relationship, let’s just say it’s your significant other. You get your paper, you write down all the things you would like to receive from them. And, yes, you can choose to give those things to them. Yes, you can choose to filter those things through the frame of like, these are the things I like, what are the things they like? Should I subtract some of these? Should I add some others?
But a third layer is, oh, these are the things I’m craving. These are the things I’m desiring. I can give those things to my partner, but guess what? I can also give those things to myself.
And I want to be really clear that we’re not doing this in a hyper-individualist way where we’re on our own, not depending on other people, not being interdependent, not having relationships, not being vulnerable, not sharing our needs. I’m just saying that in addition to being in relationship with other people, you’re also in relationship with yourself.
And yourself is the one relationship that is going to keep going with you, no matter what happens until you die. And maybe beyond that, right? I don’t really know what happens over there. But relationships end. The people we date, as much as we love them and maybe we’re in a partnership that we consider a life partnership, eventually that will end whether we die or the other person does.
Or sometimes things that we think are going to go until we die, don’t, right? Sad news and I’m sorry about it. But developing both the ability to show up as the person you would want to be with in how you behave towards someone else, it’s also showing up as the person you want to be with, because you are the one who is always with yourself.
So that might look like giving yourself praise. That might look like giving yourself reassurance. That might look like telling yourself you look cute today. That might look like telling yourself that you did a really good job on something. It might look like setting up a fancy dinner for yourself, or ordering takeout or buying that special bottle of champagne and just putting it in the wine fridge until the day comes when you’re celebrating something big.
There is also a fourth layer to this, which is in addition to giving what you want to receive to the other person and to yourself, you can also make requests, right? We’re a big fan at this podcast of making requests. And requests are great, both for how you show up in relationship with each other and also for literal gifts.
So many people want other people to read their minds. And I think movies and TV have actually made this much worse because we have this highly romanticized idea that people read minds and they’re really good at it, and I fall for this too. And we watch TV and read books and watch movies for pleasure, but our brains absorb the patterns that they see around us all the time.
And so I do think a thing happens where, because we’ve been fed the narrative over and over again that this is what love is, this is what connection is, this is what relationships are, this is what romance is, we forget sometimes that the media that we’re consuming is actually literally scripted. It’s not real life. It’s not how things necessarily go when they unfold organically.
And in real life it’s really useful to use your words and to tell people what you want, to tell people yes, to tell people no, to tell people explicit information about what you want to have happen. Which circles us back to if you would like people to be explicit with you, then maybe try being explicit with them.
And I realize that can feel vulnerable. It can feel yucky. It can feel awkward. But it can also lead to really magical outcomes. And like I have a really spectacular relationship with my significant other and it didn’t happen magically or by accident. And I firmly believe that it happened because we were both willing to say the hard thing with love a million times, and then a million times again, and then a million times again.
Okay, so let’s review. Giving what you want to receive is a way of understanding yourself and understanding the kind of relationships you want and understanding how you want people to show up in your life, and then being reflective of that. Showing up that way for others with that secondary awareness that they might want something slightly different than me and I’m not going to just force feed everyone what I would want.
Like I love champagne, Alex Luchini doesn’t love champagne. So if I wanted her to buy me a special bottle of champagne, it would not make sense for me to then buy her a special bottle of champagne because she doesn’t like it and then it would just be mine. So I mean, that’s not the worst case scenario, but then I’m really just buying a present for myself. So I think it’s nice to just be honest about that.
Whereas Alex Luchini prefers red wine and certain kinds of beer, and also she doesn’t drink as much as I do. So she doesn’t put as much of a like, ooh, this is fancy, we’re fancy, we’re celebrating. So she actually, where I would like champagne, she might prefer a back rub. She might prefer me to go do an activity with her that I usually don’t do. Like, she loves to go to Home Depot all the time. I do not love to go with her to Home Depot, it’s just not my favorite place. But she loves it when I go with her.
So whereas a bottle of champagne might feel really special to me, it might feel more special to her if I went to Home Depot and then helped her out, and asterisk, by help her out, I mean standing nearby while she does some kind of home improvement project. But if you dig down to the essence, it’s easier, right? So I actually probably should have said that at the beginning, but we do things imperfectly here on this podcast so let’s talk about it now.
There’s a podcast episode about what’s the essence of a thought pattern? There’s a part of that here too of like, okay, give what you want to receive, but what’s the essence of what you want to receive? The essence of what I want to receive is I want to feel special, I want to feel loved, I want to belong, I want to be celebrated.
A lot of that is going to apply to a lot of people. And then you can think about what would help them. Not that you can ever truly create an experience for them, but what things do you know would have a high likelihood of them having that experience? And if you don’t know, you can, again, use your words and ask people. You could say, hey, I really want to celebrate you. How do you like being celebrated?
Again, I think we place such a huge emphasis on mind reading, but I think we get mind reading wrong and then we try to do these things for each other and then it falls really flat because it’s not the thing the other person would have wanted. And then instead of them feeling cherished and special and celebrated, they feel this disconnect of like, they don’t actually know me. They don’t actually know what I like.
I also think, again, I think we think asking questions about, hey, how would it feel good to be celebrated? Like, we think that’s really unromantic. But what if it’s the most romantic thing, is to be willing to admit I don’t know everything about you and I would like to know about you. And even if I think I know about you, I’m going to ask you about you. Because guess what? People change and maybe they have new answers.
Okay, so I feel like we were reviewing and then I got sidetracked by additional points, which I think were important and relevant. So I’m not mad at it. But give what you want to receive, dig into the essence of what it is you want to receive. Does that make sense to give to the other person based on what you know about them? If you don’t know, you can ask yourself follow-up questions, you can ask them follow-up questions.
And then this isn’t just about giving the things that are super fun and yummy to receive. Sometimes it’s also about giving the things that do feel awkward or uncomfortable, like setting a limit or a boundary. And then navigating through that with love and care and knowing that that is part of creating a gorgeous, intimate, connected relationship as well.
And the beauty of that, to just talk about it for a minute, is it takes guesswork out. Like I have so many clients over the years who’ve been afraid that people are mad at them and I’ve spent so much of my life being afraid that people are mad at me. And if people are willing to tell you when they’re mad at you and you’re willing to believe them about that, then you don’t have to fucking waste that time anymore wondering if they’re mad at you.
So I would argue even if it doesn’t sound great to you to hear when someone is mad at you, I think hearing it and being able to have a loving, considerate conversation about it is actually much better than being lied to and kind of getting the feeling based on how they’re behaving that they are mad at you, but no one ever telling you explicitly.
That’s my pitch. I’m a big fan of explicit communication. You’re allowed to do it differently and have your own preferences, but that’s what I’m going to talk a lot about on this podcast. So take it with a grain of salt, always.
And then the final piece is you get to give to yourself too. When we find out what we want to receive and we think about how we want to give that to other people we’re in relationship with, we’re also people we’re in relationship with. And I think that’s so beautiful because when you give the things to yourself that you want, then you’re nourished, like in an emotional way.
Now, humans are social mammals, so you’re still probably going to be seeking and desiring connection with other people. But there’s one thing where we’re seeking and desiring connection and it’s going to be fun and interesting, but we’re nourished. And there’s another thing where we’re sort of like emotionally starving inside and then we’re seeking connection in this way that’s very desperate and we’re not able to be like, oh, does this connection make sense for me? Does it feel good? Is it reciprocal, because we’re too fucking hungry and we’re just looking for any nourishment.
So I think that’s why being clear on what you’d like to receive and going out of your way to give it to yourself on a regular basis also sets you up really well to have magical relationships that feel really yummy and delicious to you. Because you’ll be nourished and then you’ll be able to make excellent choices about what relationships you want to be in and how you want to show up in those.
O>kay, now let’s talk about giving and receiving as in actual literal presents. First of all, I think a lot of the things I’ve talked about already apply. Like if you would want to receive something and you dig down to the essence of what that something is, that could actually be a useful indicator of what you might like to give somebody else.
Also, though, I think that thing about saying no and saying the truth is really relevant here, too. So when Alex and I first got together, there were several times when she got me presents that I didn’t like. And, listen, this is a thing because culturally we’re taught you be grateful, you never look a gift horse in the mouth, just say thank you and then do whatever you want with it later. And it’s like that politeness, that smiling, you never want to seem ungrateful in our culture.
But here’s the thing, I wanted to have a long and happy relationship with Alex and I wanted Alex to know me. And so I wanted to be honest with her when I didn’t like things, even though I knew it was going to be uncomfortable in the short term, because I wanted the payoff for the long term. So this is always a choice you get to make.
Like there are people in my life that I’m not super close to, if they give me a gift and it doesn’t land, I’m probably not going to say anything. I’m probably just going to donate it and it’s fine. But Alex and I have a very close relationship, we are partners. And even though this was early in our relationship, I took the relationship very seriously. Like I could tell this is a serious relationship and I’m planning for longevity here. And so I wanted to act accordingly.
So one of the ones in particular, what she got me was she made me a sand garden. And so it was like a beautiful pot filled with sand and then we had all these rocks because I like to take rocks, like pick up rocks sometimes when I’m traveling or when I see pretty rocks, right? And so she got the thing and she put the sand in it, she put the rocks in it. And when she gave it to me I literally cried because, and you might not know this about me, I fucking hate sand.
It’s not that I hate the beach. It’s not that I hate the ocean. I just, I don’t like sand. I feel like it’s very messy. It’s very gritty. It gets everywhere. Like the beach, I’ll go to it but it’s not my preferred destination. I would much rather go to the woods or maybe the mountains. And so I didn’t want a rock garden in a box full of sand. And I wanted to be known by her and so I was willing to do the painful, uncomfortable thing of saying, like, I don’t like this president.
And now Alex and I laugh about it. We laugh a lot about it. I mean, I think that was like my first birthday of us being together. So we’d been together for almost a year and, yeah, it was a risk. But also, I think it speaks really highly of Alex and the kind of connection we had cultivated that she handled it like a champion. She was just like, okay, I didn’t know you didn’t like sand.
I could see why it made sense to her as a present. So I was really clear with the way I explained it to her that it was very thoughtful, it just wasn’t for me, right? And so she basically gave me a little pass for a different present, which I ended up getting something else and was very happy with it.
And here’s the thing, again, it’s not the most romantic thing in the way we think about romance in a Hallmark movie or a book. But in our relationship, in a lot of ways it actually is the most romantic thing because it’s me telling the truth, when I was pretty sure the truth was going to be disappointing to her. And her loving me anyways and me loving me anyways, and me loving her anyways, and her loving herself anyways, and us moving forward and it becoming an inside joke that we can laugh about.
And in a lot of ways, it’s brought more joy to our relationship than a present that was a really good fit because it’s part of our story and it stands out because it didn’t work out the way it was supposed to.
So maybe you thought I was going to teach you how to give the perfect gift, and that’s not what I’m doing because I don’t know how to do that. Well, actually, all the stuff I said before is probably as close as I could get in that kind of advice. But again, it doesn’t have to be perfect to be good. It doesn’t have to be good to be meaningful.
Sometimes it can be the absolute least perfect present, or a present that really doesn’t make sense to the other person for reasons you did or didn’t know. And it can still be part of a wonderful, beautiful connection. It can be something you treasure for years to come or it can be something you laugh at for years to come. And laughing at things is just a different kind of treasure, let’s be honest.
And to really circle it back, I gave Alex what I would want to receive, which is I gave her the truth. I gave her honesty. But I gave the honesty with kindness because, yeah, there is a part of me that when I give someone a present always wants to be told, thank you so much. Good job, I love it. But not if that’s not true. The deeper part of me wants to know the truth and wants to have a deeper connection. Again, if it’s someone I’m building a deeper connection with.
If it’s someone I’m not, it’s not like you ever have to do this. It’s just something that’s available. But what I will say is the truth, even when it’s uncomfortable, creates space for deeper intimacy. And when we don’t tell the truth, we don’t create that space.
Not that the relationship can’t become more intimate in other ways, right? Relationships are made up of lots and lots of micro moments. But when you choose to tell the truth, it does create space for you to know the other person more deeply, for you to be known more deeply and to build more intimacy between you two.
If you enjoyed this episode about giving and receiving, if you’re inspired and you want to have the courage to show up as your authentic self in relationship, to tell the truth even when it’s uncomfortable, if you want to develop the ability to hear the truth, even when it’s uncomfortable, then I invite you to come and work with me.
I currently have space for some new one on one clients and I would love to support you as you step into the next version of yourself who tells the truth with ease, who hears the truth with love and compassion and who builds deep, deep intimacy in any relationship she wants to.
All right. That’s what I have for y’all this week. Thank you so much, have a lovely week. I’ll talk to you next time.
Thank you for joining me for this week’s episode of Satisfied AF. If you are ready to create a wildly delicious life and have way more fun than you ever thought possible, visit www.korilinn.com to see how I can help. See you next week.
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