5 Polyamory Time Management Myths

Josh 0:00
All right, everybody. So today we're gonna talk about time management in polyamory, and specifically, we're gonna be talking about five myths around time management and polyamory that you need to know. So that's what we're gonna jump into today. Stay tuned.

Cassie 0:33
Here at Touch of Flavor, we teach non monogamous folks how to overcome their obstacles and build thriving relationships.

Josh 0:39
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Cassie 0:52
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Josh 1:02
I love that like it's- I don't know if it's better than like our unofficial like pep song, which for some reason, and I can't remember it's Dangerous by Big Data.

Josh 1:11
We just started listening to it.

Josh 1:12
For a long time. Yeah, for our podcast pep song. But, it's pretty catchy.

Cassie 1:17
It's got a nice little jingle.

Josh 1:18
So I like it. So Alright, folks. So you know, we've been seeing a lot of stuff floating around lately. A lot of questions, a lot of answers, some good some bad, about polyamory and time management. And obviously, with polyamory, Time management is one of those things and really relationships right? Time management is one of those things that is always, always a bit of a challenge, right. But one thing we've been seeing a lot of is we've been seeing a lot of myths floating around a lot of bad information floating around about time management in polyamory. So what we wanted to do on this episode, is we're going to cover five polyamory time management myths, that you should know. Alright, so let's start with number one

Cassie 2:00
The first one is I or we don't have the time to work on us or our relationship. And we see this a lot. We see this in all kinds of questions and in Facebook groups, and a lot of things that we that come across to us. And often how we see this presented is like, there's things going on, or things I need to fix. But I or we don't have the time to do it.

Josh 2:31
Rght. And that's obviously a myth, right? Because look, we all have different lives. But at the end of the day, we all have the same 24 hours in the day. Right? And we're all constantly in this place, where here's the thing: In our lives, right? None of us ever, ever, in our lives are in a place where everything gets done. Right? That just isn't how it works. Cassie and I I can tell you have kids, like everything in our life does not get done. It definitely does not get done. Right. So it isn't a matter of that it's a matter of what you choose to make the priority and what you choose to let fall through the cracks. Right. So it isn't about not having time to work on the problems in the relationship. It's about are we choosing to work on the problems in a relationship? Or are we choosing to put our time into other things. And you know, the problem with this, right? Is that when you're doing this, it isn't just about making these a priority. But what you wind up doing in this situation is now you wind up having these problems and these challenges and these difficult things and these things that are dragging the relationship down and dragging you down. Right. And what happens is, we just kick that can down the road, and it sits and sits and sits because we make other things more important. Right. And the problems just keep getting unresolved. So like there's never a good time to work on the problems. But it's about when you're going to choose to work on the problems.

Cassie 4:06
Yeah. And here's the thing. The I don't have time, or we don't have time... I'm gonna tell you a little secret is actually like a procrastinators out. And this might be something that you do consciously, or it might be something a lot of us do subconsciously, right, because we go through our lives super busy. We all relate to that. We know what it's like to have the kids the family, this, that, the other if you're listening to this, you know, during holiday time, right? Like there's a lot of stuff in our lives. So it's a really easy excuse to put off the things that we don't want to deal with. So if you need to work on your relationship, and you're dreading that and you're like, Oh, that's not something I want to do. Well, of course, you don't have the time for it. There's all these other things and it's what we all naturally do when we want to put something off and not face it right now.

Josh 5:00
Well, and I think, yeah, I mean, I think I mentioned this, but you're never the time is never going to magically appear to work on the problems, right? It's when you're going to choose that you're done settling for where you're at in your relationship, and you make the decision to work on the problems. And that has to come first. And once that comes first, you're going to find the time, because we find the time for the things that we make priorities. And the only way we fix the problems in our relationship is to make fixing the problems. And really, it's not about making fixing the problems when you really get right down to it, it's about making the relationships and the family, when you make those a priority. Right. When you make those being happy and healthy and thriving a priority, then you'll find the time to fix the problems. So the the making the decision has to come first. Yeah, good. Okay. So, Myth number two, Cassie.

Cassie 5:55
Number two, the lack of time is the problem in our relationship. Everything else is great. Everything's good. Except for the lack of time. And that's what's causing all of these other things that are problems that are issues that are stressors, is the lack of time.

Josh 6:12
Yeah. And usually, it's just like, oh, you know, like, it's really great. It's just, you know, we just don't have enough time. So we argue about that, right? Or, you know, things are really, really great. You know, we're just, we're really disconnected right now. And we, you know, we not really feeling in love and things are pretty bleh. But you know, that's just because we don't have enough time to feed that connection and go on dates and do that kind of stuff.

Cassie 6:34
It's because we don't have enough time for passion or sexy time, or we don't have enough time for those deep conversations, we don't have time for fill in the blank. And that's why we feel sucky.

Josh 6:47
Well, and it's so interesting, because this is one of those myths that like, society as a whole feeds really strongly, right? I don't know how many people I talked to, where they're like, oh, you know, well, if our relationships bad, it's just that we just need to put more time into it, you know, just more into spending time with each other. Right. And there's a couple of things here, like this is this is really kind of silly, right? Because when you think about this, all you got to look at it, like and do two really easy examples, right?

Josh 7:20
On the one hand, you have people where you have one partner who travels like people who are truckers or, you know, people who have jobs as consultants where they travel a lot, or, I mean, you have people who maybe don't travel, but this was me before, who have jobs that are incredibly time demanding, right, and you might go into work and be there for three, four days that are going not be home. Right. And you probably know, some people like that, who have amazing relationships, even though they have very little time. And then on the other hand, I'm sure especially now post pandemic, you know, a lot of people who have been spending more time together than ever, and their relationships are worse than they ever were. Spending time together is actually become a problem.

Cassie 7:59
Yeah, they're trying to find an excuse to get out of their house. They're like, Yep, I have to pick up something from the store somewhere, right? We've talked to so many people who, now that they have that time together, they were expecting the issues that they had pre pandemic, the challenges that they had, when when they got this time, they were really expecting that there was going to be this huge shift. And lo and behold, many of the challenges have become worse.

Josh 8:31
Yeah, the problem isn't about the amount of time. I mean, yes, every relationship needs a certain amount of time to be fed. Sure. But once you get past that, right, that isn't the problem, and it isn't the problem most of the time when people are thinking that time is the problem, right? You know, this is the issue is that if the groundwork in your relationship isn't solid, spending more time together is just more opportunity for arguments, it's more opportunities to miscommunicate it's more opportunities to be sitting in the same room, but being miles apart on your cell phone, right? It's more opportunities to be in the house but ignoring each other. Right? It's more opportunities to feel alone, even though you should feel close. And that actually can cause a lot of problems.

Josh 9:14
It takes a relationship being very healthy to survive a lot of time together. Right? And this is the other reason too, by the way, that just putting in more time won't magically fix the relationship. Right? Because again, if you have a solid relationship and you need to spend more time together than the relationship is gonna, that's gonna go well. But if if you have problems, that's just the more opportunity for things to go wrong, right? It isn't about the amount of time. The amount of time does not determine the quality of a relationship. Right. And with that, like and I know you had something you wanted to throw in about, like, kind of myth 2.5 Which Just like "but I'm special".

Cassie 10:03
Ah, yes. But what about me? I have this job. And I work all these crazy hours or what about me? I've got 2, 4, 6, 10 Kids, what about me? I, I whatever. And here's the thing. There are some of you who have really challenging schedules, or really taxing responsibilities in your life. And that is true. But what also is true is that you still have time. And there's still ways to make things happen. And that's why you have different folks who are doing different things in their lives who are able to achieve so much time with their partners or doing stuff, and those who aren't. And so what we find is that what you're really saying is that I'm special in this bad way, that our relationship is special in this unique way different than anybody else's. And because of that, well, we can't find the time. Did you want to add something?

Josh 11:21
No, I don't think so. Um, let's move on to Myth number three.

Cassie 11:26
Okay, so what is it? Because you're right, I can't read your handwriting.

Josh 11:29
So Myth number three, is we just need a better app.

Cassie 11:34
Hmm. So that one. So, many times when we see questions, or folks talk to us on the phone, they're like, hey, so me and my partners are having problems or me and my partner is having problems. I want to know, What app do you use? We've tried Google, we've tried calendars. We've tried this. We've tried that. We've tried putting it on the refrigerator. And the truth is, is that it doesn't matter.

Josh 12:06
The truth is we use Google Calendars.

Cassie 12:08
We- Well, the truth is we use Google calendars. Yes. Because that's the that's the best way to do Poly. Um, but honestly, honestly, aside for Google calendars, because I do have to give Google a little prop there. Right? It one of the easiest ways to keep track of your own life and your partner's lives, is Google calendars. But at the end of the day, you and your partner could have a written schedule on a refrigerator and use that. And it's funny, because when we work with our clients, one of the questions they bring us is like, what's the best way to do this?

Josh 12:43
Whatever you all are going to use.

Cassie 12:44
Whatever you're going to use. That's that's the answer. What are you going to use? So it's not about having a better app? Or a better, you know, gadget for keeping track of your time that's going to heal that bridge between you and your partner when it comes to spending time.

Josh 13:02
Yeah, no, and this is the thing, right? The app is never the problem. I mean, if you're asking what apps should we be using? You're asking the wrong question, right? At least if the question is we're struggling with time management, what apps should we be using? What apps should we be using is a fine question, right? But we're struggling with time management, what apps should we be using is not the right question, because it isn't about the app, right? People who are on the same page can make any app work. We know households that have calendars like-

Cassie 13:35
Big whiteboards.

Josh 13:35
Big whiteboard calendars. On the wall. we use Google I know people who use Cozy. I know it, but it doesn't

Cassie 13:41
Trello. Whatever.

Josh 13:41
But it doesn't matter. Yeah, that isn't the point. If you're having problems with scheduling with people getting their time needs met. It isn't about what app you're using. It's about the conversations that you're having around time management and the way that you're approaching those conversations and the attitude and spirit in which you're approaching those conversations and trying to make sure everybody's needs are getting met and the tools that you have to come to effective agreements in those negotiations, right. It has everything to do with the conversations that you're having around time with your partners, and the expectations that you have around time, and nothing to do with what app you're using.

Cassie 14:24
So point being if you're having conflict around scheduling and time, it ain't the app problem.

Josh 14:30
Or not even conflict. But if you're just unhappy around time, like it isn't the app. The app isn't the problem. Right. Anything else you want to add to that?

Cassie 14:44
No, I think that was pretty straightforward. It's just it's one of those things that we see so often because it's easy to go well, if I just had this thing, this tool, it would fix the issue and what you really want to be focusing on is if you're unhappy with the time if you're unhappy with the way the conversations are going, if you're feeling like you're not able to get on the same page, it doesn't really matter what tool you're using to organize your schedule. It's about the conversations and the interactions you're having with your partner.

Josh 15:18
Alright, myth number four, we need to wait for the time to be right.

Cassie 15:23
Hmm. So this is a little different, then we don't have the time. Because this is typically where people are acknowledging they have time, they can do stuff, but it's not the right time. Like right now I'm working on that, that promotion at work, or we have that Friend's Wedding that's coming up, or, you know, we've not been in a great place. So we're gonna wait until we're in a better place to have those conversations or to do those things. It's this idea that if we just sit on it, there's going to be these moments, and times that are so much better to deal with the thing, or to fit the thing in. And a lot of times we do this, when we're putting off good things, too. It's not just about putting off like hard conversations. It's Oh, right now I, I have the option of working 40 extra hours of work this week, and I'll just put off that date night with you again, I'll just put off that other time of hanging out with you.

Josh 16:26
Or there's just this project that needs to be finished. I need money to renovate the kitchen. I'm really gunning for this promotion at work, you know, works a lot of it, but it's not always work, right. You know, with parents, you see a lot of like, oh, we really just can't get time with each other. You know, like it really needs to be-

Cassie 16:41
As soon as football season's over. As soon as it's over, we'll start doing our stuff.

Josh 16:46
You know who you are. Right? You're talking about kids football?

Cassie 16:49
Yeah, yes. I'm not talking about the actual football season. That's a whole other story. And there are some of you, too.

Josh 16:56
Here's the thing, folks, like there's never a good convenient time to focus on your relationship. And I will say this, this to everybody here. Good relationships, thriving relationships don't come from doing what's convenient. Right? It comes from doing what works. And the fact of the matter is, you know? Well, I said earlier that, you know, we said earlier that blaming your relationship problems on time is really silly, because there's people who have very little time that I'm very great relationship, you will have all kinds of time. Obviously, at the same time, you know, the time that you have, you want to be spending some of that with the people that you love, doing things you all enjoy, you want to be spending that working on your relationship, you wanna be spending time doing those things. And there's never a convenient time to make your relationship a priority and focus on it. Years ago, I had a partner at work, a work partner, not a partner, partner. Right?

Cassie 17:54
Co-worker.

Josh 17:54
Co-worker. Yeah. And we were talking about kids. And you know, I was like, oh, man, you know, it's really just, Cassie and I've been talking about kids for a while. It's really just not a good time to have kids. He was like Josh, if you're waiting for there to be a good time to have kids, you're never gonna have kids. Another kid we had one of the time, if you're waiting for good time to have another kid, you're never got another kid. Like, there's never a good time to have a kid. Right? And we wound up have having another kid. And he was right, there was never a good time to do it. It was never a good time untill there was a kid, right. And that still wasn't a good time. It just was right. I love her to death. But like, as far as the timing, that's how that went.

Josh 18:33
And I'm saying this because there's never a good time and never going to be a good time to focus on your relationship. And this is what winds up happening. And listen, I've been here and Cassie has been here. And our clients have been here and everybody's been here, right? But we get caught on these things where we keep telling ourselves later, later, later, later, later. As far as the relationship, and we put spending time with our partners, we put spending time with our families, we put improving things and fixing things, we put those on the back burner, right?

Josh 19:04
And then you know, we look back 10 years 20 years later, and realize that we've been settling and our family's been settling for relationship this whole time that have been pretty crappy. Like from like, not great to totally shitty, depending on how your particular relationships have been. And we've lost half the time that we're gonna have with the people in our lives, and you can't get it back. Right.

Josh 19:34
There is never a good time to make the relationship and spending time and fixing things and just enjoying time together and making that happen. There's never going to be a good time. And so if you're waiting for a good time, you're going to be waiting not forever. You're gonna be ready waiting until you've lost enough years of that to go oh crap, I'm not willing to do this anymore and you decided to make the focus the only way that you get to have those thriving relationships is by choosing to make that a priority and choosing to make time and space for the people in your lives as the only way that that happens.

Cassie 20:14
Yeah. So I think that brings us to our last myth.

Josh 20:19
What do you think myth number five, which is this is one of yours time is supposed to go certain places.

Cassie 20:26
Yes, we all have time obligations, I'm obligated to spend time with my kids, I have an obligation to spend time here and there. And what it comes down to is a lot of us believe that we have to spend time a certain way, it has to look this way. In order to be a fantastic employee, we have to be obligated to working that overtime or obligated to working the extra hours. To be the perfect parent, we're obligated to do every single activity with the kids.

Josh 21:07
To be a good partner, we are obligated to split our time, our free time completely evenly among all of our relationships.

Cassie 21:15
Yes. And the thing is, is that we we get to this place where we start to really do everything scheduling wise, out of obligation, out of what we're supposed to be doing, versus being intentional with, one: who the time is most important for. Your time is most important for you. And I'm not saying we don't care about our families and our kids and our partners. But how you spend your time, well, the first person you should be looking at is you. What do you need, what do you want? So we start looking at it that way. And then we start looking at like the obligations of how things are supposed to be divided in order to live up to standards that we let ourselves create from other people or other beliefs or things like that.

Josh 22:08
I think the biggest problem with this isn't even... we could have a whole nother conversation about, you know, time with your loved ones being obligatory versus something that you're doing because you appreciate and enjoy it. But when when you're talking about this cast, see what sticks out for me as I think the bigger problem isn't so much the obligation factor. It is you're letting your time, which is really your most valuable resource, especially when it comes to your relationships, right, you're letting your time be pulled out and taken unintentionally right without really intentionally deciding where the time goes.

Josh 22:54
So I think the bigger problem rather than the obligation becomes that when you approach things from Oh, in order to be a good employee,I must this. Or in order to be a good... and you're just assigning your time by all these rules instead of really sitting down and intentionally looking at what you want your relationships to look like how you want to be with the people in your life, what your biggest priorities are, you're doing that without intention, and 90% of the time, you wind up spending your time in the wrong places, you wind up spending your time in the places that don't get you what you actually want, right? It doesn't get you the things you say are important to you.

Cassie 23:29
Yeah, you end up in places where you feel and I keep saying obligated where you feel like you have to be or should be, versus what you're deciding. And you mentioned that I think that's the key factor here. And we've talked about this and brushed this a couple of times so far. But it really has to be a decision of what your priorities are. Or your priority. Because there's only- you can only have a priority. You can't have multiple priorities.

Josh 24:00
That's a language thing.

Cassie 24:02
That's a language thing, but where you're putting those things, where you are focusing, and we can only focus so many places before we're not focusing anywhere.

Josh 24:15
Yeah. So okay, so those are the five myths, right? Don't have time to work on the problems. Lack of time is the problem, itself. We just need a better app. We're gonna wait for the time to be right. Right. And, you know, time supposed to go certain places. Right? And you know, there's a lot of problems that come up when you believe one or most of us are believing more of those myths. Right?

Josh 24:40
The first is you spent a lot of time just not focused on the important things. Like when you, when you really don't spend your time intentionally and really looking at like what is the priority in your life? What makes you a happy, healthy human? You know, what is it you want to be looking back and really where you really spent your time you wind up spending time on a lot of unimportant things. Right. And this may be everything from like, TV to, and I'm fine with TV, right? But from TV to, you know, working a billion hours at a job that at the end of the day like, isn't the most important thing to you, right? To just whatever I mean even looking to spending the time with your partners in ways that doesn't actually feed you, right?

Josh 25:31
Like how much of that time with your partners is spent, like I said, like sitting, you know, on opposite ends of the room on your cell phone ignoring each other and feeling alone. Right. So spending time, lots of time not focused on the most important things. That is, that's one of the big problems this causes, right.

Josh 25:48
The second problem is it really causes us to settle in our relationships, like when you're in a spot where you aren't going to prioritize the relationship and you aren't going to put the time into it and you aren't going to fix the problems, right? You're so often settling for less than you deserve. And then your family and your partners and the people in your life deserve. Right. And particularly when you talk about not working on the problems you're going through life with, with relationships where you're arguing, you're feeling jealous, or you're disconnected or you're not having intimacy, or you're feeling alone. And they're all solvable problems, but instead of solving them, you settle for them and tolerate them. And you're just all of you are unhappy for months and years, purely because now's not the time to work on things. Right. Letting problems go unsolved, I think that's kind of similar.

Cassie 26:51
And the thing that we see when folks, and I'm just going to be honest with you, whenever you let something sit on the back burner, right, and this is what I tell my clients all the time, nothing just sits on the backburner and just stays that way. Things catch on fire eventually, right? Like like something's going to burn down if you just leave it back there boiling away forever. So it ends up becoming this slow fester in your relationship. Because when you don't feel those things, like you went through a whole list of things that you're feeling, when you feel lonely, when you feel upset, something eventually boils. And our relationships end up kind of becoming lesser and lesser than. And that nobody wants to be in that place. No one wants to feel like they are, are slowly drifting apart from their partners that they're, they're just waiting for that final straw until one of them like snap at each other and say the things or do the things that they didn't want to do in their relationships. So it's really about that, it's eventually going to get worse, it's eventually going to brew.

Josh 28:08
The other problem is when you're not intentional with your time with your partners, and you leave problems unsolved, you actually don't want it enjoying the time you have. And this is this is that discussion we were having earlier about why some people can have little time together and great relationships, and some people can have all the time in the world together. And it's just it's actually worse the more time they spend together. Right? It's because when you have problems in your relationship, and when you spend your time arguing you spend your time upset or you spend your time feeling disconnected and lonely, right? Well, then when you do have time together, and some of you do have very demanding jobs, I have been there, right? Like as like any of you who've heard me talk about my background like, I was a homicide detective for years, right? Like I would go into work. And I would not come back for days, and I would come back and I get called in the middle the night again, like

Cassie 29:00
And then you'd be home and you'd sleep for a day.

Josh 29:03
And the problem is, and this is what you need to understand is that the busier you are, the more precious that time is. But when you have these problems that are unsolved, right, or when you're unintentional with your time, then the precious time that you do have together. Best case scenario is lame and worst case scenario, like it just is sucky and arguing and drags you and your relationships even further down. And that's a problem. Right? And then you wind up regreting your ruined time.

Cassie 29:38
Yeah. And what happens is that, you know, for those of you who have the limited time, you know that when you've spent time with your partner, it goes south because you're arguing about something or the two of you're just in that icky space or where you can't feel connected or you don't feel loved or you don't feel valued. And you're just sitting there, and then later you look back on it, you're like, oh, it could have been that good weekend, we could have had that great anniversary, we could have had that awesome holiday. But.

Josh 30:13
Special dates, especially.

Cassie 30:15
Yeah. And you end up sitting with that regret, or sometimes even guilt because you feel bad that you couldn't make that time, a good time with your partner.

Josh 30:27
Well and you also just wind up sitting in the same problems for years and years and years. Right. And this all wraps together, folks is what we talk about how everything in our relationships is connected, but you know, this all wraps together because you don't address the problems. And then the time together sucks, right, and then you don't address the problems. And now you don't want to spend time together, because your time together is painful and awful. And, you know, it's upsetting, and it makes you feel even more alone. So you spend less time together, you don't enjoy the time that you do have, right. And then because you're not enjoying your time with each other, well now, focusing on the relationship definitely isn't the priority. Better spend more time, you know, working on that the hobby or working on that, you know, that project at work, right? And now you're not fixing things and you know, and it's just the cycle of not enjoying the time that we have the other, letting the same problems fester, and settling for less than we deserve in all of our relationships. Right? So that's the problems that come from believing those myths. So I want to talk about like what is true. Like if those are myths, you know, those those five things that we discussed at the beginning of this... What is it that is true? And, Cassie, let's start with the fact that like we kind of mentioned this, but that everybody has the same 24 hours in a day.

Cassie 31:48
And it's true, we all do. And again, I'm not going to say there isn't some of us who have more things to juggle. But our time and where we put it is really based on the decisions that we make and how we go about our time is how we get valuable time. And making those those decisions about valuable time. So what am I choosing to do when I do have the space? So obviously, there's things that you have to do. Most of us have to go to work, most of us have to take care of kids or do some unflattering fun things. But when I'm not doing that, what am I choosing to do? What are the choices that I'm making?

Josh 32:39
And even around those things, you have choices. And this this factor of everybody having the same 24 hours in a day has been hugely impactful for me, right? Because it's just a truth that you really can't escape from. And like I said, you can come up with 100 reasons why your situation is different. But you know what, everybody can come up with the same thing. Right? What separates the people who have thriving relationships out is that they decide what to make a priority.

Josh 33:02
One of my favorite quotes when working with our clients around time management is from Brian Tracy. Right, who's a productivity author. And he has this quote that there's never enough time for anything, there's always enough time for the most important things. And this is true for all of us, you're never going to get everything that you want to get done in life, not in life, right? Whether or not you find time for your relationships, to build them, to feed them to heal them, all of those things. It's a decision that you make, and it's based on where you put that on your priority list. Because you're always gonna have things to get undone. The question is whether or not the things that get undone is your family and your relationship and the people in your life. And the people who are most important to you, whether those are the things that suffer, right?

Josh 33:46
When you make the decision that that's not okay. And you make the decision to make the relationships, to make your family, to make your partners, your kids as people in you lives a priority. That is when and only when you'll find the time to do that. And this is something by the way that all of us still have to decide every single day. It's the same thing for Cassie and I Right. Like we have to balance serving the clients and the business against the fact that we've got to eat our own cooking and make sure that we're actually like, spending enough time to feed the relationship, which is difficult when you're running a business out of your household. Right. Like and dealing with clients and people all over the country and serving people.

Cassie 34:25
I told somebody the other day and they were like, Hey, Cass, can I get on your calendar on Saturday? And I was like, No, I'm spending that with my family. We've got some things that we've got to do and some some stuff that's got to happen, because we have to find that space for those things that are our priority.

Josh 34:44
Right? And you have to do that intentionally like you have to look and this is this the other thing because you know you gotta you got to pick those priorities intentionally. You have to be intentional about actually lining up your time with your priorities because and Cassie was mentioning this earlier. But so often what happens is, we just give our time wherever it's asked for, right? Whatever obligation asks for it, or we give our time according to like, whatever rules we grew up with, of like, where's the right place to spend our time, instead of really looking at, like, if our goal is to have amazing, happy, thriving, loving relationships? What do we need to do with our time to actually make that happen? And then when we're spending time with each other, right? How do we do that intentionally, and make sure that it's fun and fulfilling, and people's needs are getting that rather than like, you know, we're sitting in the same room feeling miles apart.

Josh 35:34
But here's what's awesome, it is a decision. And it's a decision that you know, anybody can make, as far as choosing when to shift the priority, right. And when you do that, that's when you get to make the most of the time you have, that's how the people have thriving relationships, and who don't spend a lot of time together, manage to make that work. Right. And, and not just to actually enjoy the time that you do have however much, or however little of it, there may be, but to actually have thriving and healthy relationships. Because when you don't let those problems fester, when you don't settle when you make making the relationships, what you want, and what you deserve. And the people in your life deserve a priority, and you fix those problems. Right? When you make them a priority, then you find the time to fix those problems, it doesn't just make the time that you're spending the other more enjoyable, right? But it makes your relationships thrive and sometimes makes relationships survive, because sometimes they might not if you don't fix those problems.

Cassie 36:43
And the other amazing thing is that when you start spending that time, and making your relationships thrive, well, then you start being able to be creative, more creative. And then and then you might dig into those like apps or those other things or whatever. And it makes everything easier. So not only making your relationship thrive, but like you start to be able to come to easier solutions for some of the actual challenges that are there. Like the the work schedules or the things, those things that are there, those real things that are real obstacles become even easier to deal with, when you dealt with the relationship, the way that it needs to be dealt with.

Josh 37:26
Folks, if you're in a spot where either you need help navigating the time management end of things, right, whether it's getting a straight for yourself, or navigating it with your partner, because they're on various different pages. Or if it's like you're like, Man, I do need to make my relationship priority, I do need to, you know, stop settling for these things. And now looking at that I have these problems that I don't know how to move past, you know, any of those areas that you're stuck, like, that's exactly what we help people sort through, like, go to atouchofflavor.com/talk, you'll see our calendar, grab a time up on that calendar. Right. And you know, one of us will hop on the phone with you at the time you selected and like we will walk step by step through where you're stuck, right, and what needs to happen to enjoy your time together and to have thriving relationships, right?

Josh 38:21
Because it's one thing to- it's one thing to think about doing that. And it's another thing a lot of times to actually get a plan to put that into action, right. And so we'll walk you step by step on that call through like, where you're stuck on those things like what you want your relationships to look like and what you need to do to close that gap. So that you have that going forward. And you can start actually making the most of this time that you do have. Right so like I said, atouchofflavor.com/talk. Take you to our calendar page, grab a time, and we will be happy to help you. Cassie, Is there anything else that you want to throw in?

Cassie 38:59
Just we'll see you next show.

Josh 39:02
Yeah, everybody. It's been great talking to you. Have a fantastic week, and we will catch you next time.

Josh 39:13
Thanks for tuning into today's show. We release new episodes every week. So make sure to subscribe.

Cassie 39:19
If you're ready to transform your relationship and you'd like to see if you're a fit to work with us. Here's what I want you to do next, head over to atouchofflavor.com/talk and book an appointment to speak with our team. We'll get on the phone with you for about an hour and we'll get you crystal clear on three things. What's really not working in your relationships, what your dream relationships would look like and a step by step plan to close the gap and save your family even if nothing has worked before.

Josh 39:47
We talk with hundreds of non monogamous folks like you every year and here's the truth building loving, thriving relationships that doesn't happen on its own. You need expert guidance to make that happen. And unfortunately when you're building relationship outside the box that's impossible to find and we get it. But that's exactly what we do. We've helped clients all over the world, save their families get the passion back and become best friends again.

Cassie 40:11
So if you want to see if we can help you do the same head over to atouchofflavor.com/talk. I'm Cassie

Josh 40:19
And I'm Josh. Let's talk soon.