If it feels like every time you try to get closer with your wife, she somehow pulls even further away...

You're not imagining it.

You’ve spent time starting more conversations, apologizing, explaining yourself better…

And somehow... none of it seems to bring her closer.

So by the end of today’s video you’re going to see why you have been solving for the wrong problem the whole time, and if you turn your focus onto the right issue you can completely change the entire dynamic and pull her close to you instead of pushing her away.

YOUR INSTINCT IS SOLVING THE WRONG PROBLEM

I don't want you watching this thinking you're stupid or weak for reacting the way you have to her distance or hot and cold behavior.

You're not. The % of my coaching clients that have all done the same thing is very high, not to mention I have made the same mistake many times in my love life.

You're human.

If someone you love suddenly starts becoming emotionally distant...your brain immediately treats that distance with panic and like it’s an all hands on deck emergency.

Every time you notice one of those moments of her feeling colder or more distant feels like the relationship is slipping through your fingers.

So what does your nervous system tell you to do?

Close the gap. Talk and fix it; almost force that reconnection and create another opportunity by trying to get her to sit down with you. 

Honestly our brain goes to anything, because doing nothing feels terrifying.

It's almost like watching someone close to you  drift out into the ocean who needs help.

Every instinct tells you to swim after them. You don't stand on the shore thinking, hmm, maybe I should wait and see what happens.

No, your instinct is to jump in and try to save them as fast as possible.

That's exactly what most men emotionally do in their marriage.

However, relationships don't work like drowning victims.

When she feels emotionally overwhelmed inside a relationship...

swimming harder toward her doesn't necessarily make her feel safer.

Most of the time, it would actually be comparable to swimming up beside her thinking you’re rescuing her but you’re just splashing water in her face as she is already gasping for air and trying to breathe and tread water. 

That's why so many men end up trapped in this exhausting cycle.

She pulls away...so he reaches.

She pulls away a little more...so he reaches harder.

Eventually every interaction becomes another attempt to close that distance.

And without realizing it, the relationship slowly stops feeling like a relationship and starts feeling more like a rescue mission.

That's a heavy place for both people to live.

And there is no issue with having the desire to feel close to your wife.

Of course you want closeness, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that…That's healthy.

The problem is believing closeness is something you can manufacture through enough effort.

And that's where almost everything begins to go belly-up.

YOU CAN'T MANUFACTURE SOMETHING THAT NEEDS CHOOSING

One of the biggest mindset shifts I ever had was realizing there are certain things in life you simply cannot force into existence.

Think about trust for a second.

Can someone decide to trust you because you asked them to?

No.

Maybe I will show my older millennial age here but, there is nothing more annoying than someone saying “yo…just trust me bro”

Like, why…why the hell would I trust you especially if you say it like that.

Can someone respect you because you explained why they should?

No.

Can someone feel emotionally safe because you desperately need them to?

Of course not.

None of those things are negotiated into existence, they are experienced..

They're felt. They emerge over time.

Contrary to popular belief (the belief that gets ALL of us men in trouble when we are facing this situation) closeness is not created by forcing or manufacturing the reduction of distance.

Closeness is created when distance no longer feels necessary.

That's a completely different way of looking at it.

Think of meeting someone new; the first time you meet them…

Most likely you’re not going to immediately tell them your deepest fears and unload your entire life story on them.

You’re not going to ask them to promise they’ll never leave you or stop talking to you ever.

Why?

Because closeness grows naturally.

Every interaction either builds a little more trust...or it doesn't.

You don't force intimacy.

You have to create the conditions where intimacy feels safe enough to grow.

Marriage is no different.

When your wife starts pulling away emotionally, unfortunately we have been conditioned by society (and our own panic) to unknowingly reverse that process.

Instead of rebuilding the conditions, we try to take the express train right to the outcome.

I know what it feels like, you want the hugs and affection back, the conversations and connection back that don’t lead to Nascar track circular frustrating arguments.

We don’t realize those things are the consequences, not starting points.

The less natural the connection begins to feel for her when you try to manufacture every piece of it back into existence. 

She will start sensing that every conversation has that end goal you’re trying to get to as fast as possible. 

That fear of losing her has a way of turning even good intentions into emotional pressure. 

When that happens, closeness doesn’t feel like a natural want to her.

Which brings us to the real issue.

What is the real problem if distance isn’t it? 

YOU'RE FIGHTING THE SMOKE INSTEAD OF THE FIRE

The real issue is trying to fight the smoke instead of the fire.

Imagine waking up in the middle of the night and you go downstairs and see your house filled with smoke. 

Obviously I hope you would get out and call the fire department, but say they don’t exist.

You panic and throw open every window, grab towels and start waiving the smoke toward the door and turn on every fan you can find to get that smoke out of the house.

You're working incredibly hard, but more smoke keeps coming and coming; you’re not actually dealing with the ultimate source, the fire. 

Dealing with your wife pulling away and creating that emotional distance, the lack of affection, the separate bedrooms.

Those are ALL the smoke…

I know, especially at the beginning when you panic, most men become completely consumed trying to remove those symptoms thinking:

"How do I get her talking again?"

"How do I make her affectionate again?"

Those questions are all aimed at the smoke, when the fire usually looks very different. 

Her feeling years of emotional pressure, walking on eggshells, feeling unheard, losing admiration, and losing that emotional safety. 

That is what has to change…think about if like this:

If you somehow convinced her to spend more time with you tomorrow...

Would her emotional experience actually be different?

Or would she simply be spending more time inside the same emotional dynamic that's been exhausting her?

That's an uncomfortable question but it’s also why getting physically closer rarely fixes emotional distance.

It is actually just going to fire up the spotlight and put it RIGHT back on the problem.

She comes “closer” to you but her underlying emotional experience hasn’t changed.

Understanding THAT changes what you focus on completely.

You can start asking the question of what made closeness so difficult for her in the first place?

And that generally lies in the complacency that has taken place over the relationship, and the day-to-day emotional experience of living with you that can all aggregate into her feeling less and less heard or emotionally safe. 

That is why when you start to try and fix things, a lot of men run into the question of like “why now, why is it now that you’re wanting to make things right”?

And it’s both a fair and unfair question to ask…because if you have the right intentions, how do you really answer that?

It isn’t that you were ignoring what helped maintain and spark the connection all those years, you just didn’t know what you didn’t know. 

So it can feel unfair to you if she is right, and on her end it can feel fair because…it’s been so long of this repeated experience in the relationship for her.

But ultimately, that is her emotion speaking and if you have the right intentions and the right understanding of what you have to do to get that connection to start forming again, that question becomes moot.

So let’s talk about the things you have to start doing if you want to build that connection with her again. 

MEN WHO TURN THIS AROUND STOP CHASING MOMENTS

The best way I can put this that works is that you have to stop chasing moments. 

You don’t have to be frustrated thinking you have to be this perfect man who knows every right word to say in every moment. 

It all starts with getting out of the mindset of trying to make every single interaction “the one” 

You stop living from emotional scoreboard to emotional scoreboard racking up the interactions wondering if you are winning her connection back..

Instead...you have to become remarkably consistent first and not collapse if she goes hot and cold. 

Your wife has probably experienced months or maybe years of reacting to your reactions.

She carries emotional responsibility for you that was never supposed to belong to her.

When you begin leading yourself again she will slowly realize that she’s no longer responsible for that.

That doesn't GUARANTEE reconciliation, nothing can do that.

But what starting to lead yourself does is remove one of the biggest, if not THE biggest, emotional burdens that your relationship quietly developed. 

And that's where genuine attraction is given the space to grow again.

START SOLVING A BETTER PROBLEM

So I will leave you with something practical that you can start to do…

Tomorrow morning, don't wake up asking,

"How do I get closer to my wife today?"

Ask yourself,  How do I make being around me feel emotionally lighter than it did yesterday?

You hear people say you have to get 1% better every day. That is exactly how to look at it and that should be the mission need to be on. 

Instead of trying to get in another conversation to sway her, or even avoiding conversations because you don’t want to say the wrong thing and make things worse, just focus on naturally creating calmer conversations. 

Instead of trying to get reassurance...become more naturally reassuring.

Instead of trying to earn another chance, you can put your focus on becoming the guy who builds up your leadership and that “chance” will naturally find it’s way to you. 

You can't force her to move towards you but you can definitely become someone who no longer makes closeness feel emotionally taxing to her. 

That's where your attention belongs as a starting point,  because you have to ask yourself…has what you have been doing up until this point worked?

If it hasn't...maybe the problem isn't your effort. Maybe it's the direction of your effort. 

I know for me, all of the things you’re probably doing did not work and left me asking the same questions over and over. 

YOUR NEXT STEPS

So if you've been feeling like every attempt to reconnect only pushes her further away, I hope this video gave you a stepping stone to looking at things a different way.

The problem you’re facing is believing emotional closeness can be created simply by reducing emotional distance.

But the real transformation that works isn’t measured by that one conversation; it is about growth into the guy who consistently presents a different emotional experience for her that is genuine.

That's what leadership looks like.

So if you want to see the blueprint to put you on the path that can start to bring her closer to you again, go watch my free Relationship Rebuild  masterclass that is linked in the description and pinned comment below.

If you watch that free masterclass and it resonates with you, at the end of it you will have a chance to apply and work with me directly where we will strategize your specific situation and time collapse your transformation by making sure you’re focusing on the right things to become the leader that will spark that reconnection with her.

Again, the link for the free masterclass is in the description and pinned comment below. 

And if you’re trying to save your marriage and it feels like nothing is working, also check out this next video right here.