- 6 months ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hz4gvztIDZo In this episode of Rich in Relationship, Rich reads powerful listener letters and dives into one of the most misunderstood skills men can build: emotional fluency. He unpacks why men so often struggle to identify and express emotions—and why this struggle is not a weakness, but a result of cultural conditioning.
Rich gives you practical tools to locate, name, and experiment with expressing feelings in a way that builds trust rather than tension. You'll discover how emotional fluency leads to real leadership—in your life, your marriage, and your mission.
And finally, this episode sets the stage for what’s coming next: turning emotional awareness into vulnerability that leads, not collapses. Because opening up is not falling apart—it’s stepping up.
📩 Want to share your story or join Rich’s upcoming men’s group or book project? Email rich@richinrelationship.com with “My Story” in the subject line.
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LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/rich-in-relationship
Website - https://www.richinrelationship.com
Rich gives you practical tools to locate, name, and experiment with expressing feelings in a way that builds trust rather than tension. You'll discover how emotional fluency leads to real leadership—in your life, your marriage, and your mission.
And finally, this episode sets the stage for what’s coming next: turning emotional awareness into vulnerability that leads, not collapses. Because opening up is not falling apart—it’s stepping up.
📩 Want to share your story or join Rich’s upcoming men’s group or book project? Email rich@richinrelationship.com with “My Story” in the subject line.
Follow us on social media for more relationship advice:
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/richinrelationship/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/richinrelationship/
Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/richinrelationship/_created/
Tiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@richinrelationship
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/rich-in-relationship
Website - https://www.richinrelationship.com
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00Today at Rich in Relationship, we're going to talk about the most misunderstood skill a man can build, emotional fluency.
00:09What is it and how do we get there from here?
00:12I keep hearing that I need to get in touch with my emotions, but no one ever taught me how.
00:17Emotional fluency means you don't just have feelings, but you know how to name them.
00:22You know what the source is of the emotion.
00:25You know where that emotion is taking you, and you can express it in a way that appears responsible, like it's yours, not your partner's.
00:36Welcome to another episode of Rich in Relationship.
00:39I'm your host, Rich Heller, and today we're here to talk about how to feel it, name it, and lead with it, the power of emotional fluency.
00:47And if you're new to this podcast, emotional fluency is the label that we've been putting on.
00:53What does it mean if you're a guy who wants to connect with his wife?
00:59How do you do it?
01:00What's the tool?
01:01Emotional fluency.
01:02You fool.
01:03I'm telling you.
01:04And we're going to do this episode a little different.
01:06I've got some listener questions I'm going to read.
01:09It's going to guide us through this journey.
01:12So here is the first letter.
01:15Are you ready?
01:15I keep hearing that I need to get in touch with my emotions, but no one ever taught me how.
01:21Where do I even start, says Jason, who's 44 years old.
01:26We've talked a lot in this podcast about how most of us were never really taught how to build emotional fluency.
01:35And emotional fluency, when you're, let's talk about what's the concept of fluency first.
01:40All right, fluency means you don't just have a word for it.
01:43It means you can talk about that word inside, outside, upside down, and right side up.
01:49Emotional fluency means you don't just have feelings, but you know how to name them.
01:54You know what the source is of the emotion.
01:56You know where that emotion is taking you.
01:58And you can express it in a way that appears responsible, like it's yours, not your partner's, to your partner, right?
02:07Very often as men, we tend to go to blame, right?
02:10And I really, I feel badly speaking for all of masculinity in this way.
02:15And it's true, really, of human beings, right?
02:19If you look at the wider culture, it's very rare that we hear someone say, the buck stops here.
02:26There's a problem at the airport and a president says, oh, it wasn't me.
02:30It was those past presidents who did it.
02:32There's a problem with international affairs.
02:35Oh, it wasn't me.
02:36It was the ambassador.
02:38Or it's those guys over there.
02:41Well, that happens in marriage all the time.
02:44The truth is that as men and women do this too, we have a tendency to say, when you do X, Y, and Z, it makes me so mad.
02:53And truthfully, as guys, mostly the feeling we like to talk about is mad.
02:57We might talk about happy after we've gotten some.
03:00Let's be honest.
03:02Really, let's be honest.
03:04How often do we talk about happy and what does happy mean?
03:07What are the feelings that lead to happy?
03:10How often do we see our partners in pain and go, you know what?
03:16I know what that feels like.
03:18Very often when we see our partners in pain, what we say is, who did this to you?
03:23I'm going to go get them.
03:24That's not a bad response.
03:26I'm just saying sometimes what they need from us first is I know what that feels like.
03:30And so this episode is all about how do we get to that place where not only do we recognize our emotion, but we have a word for it and we know how to explain it to our partners so that they can have the opportunity to connect with us.
03:47Why is this so important?
03:48If you haven't figured it out, women feel that they need their feelings felt before they do anything else.
03:58Guys feel that they need to take an action before they can really talk about their feeling.
04:04We'll almost go with things differently.
04:06In fact, very often the complaint that I get from a lot of couples is the woman will say, nobody hears me.
04:12I don't feel heard.
04:13I don't feel listened to.
04:14And the guy will say, I don't feel understood.
04:18I don't feel respected.
04:19And it's because as men, I'm talking broad generalities here.
04:23Not all of you may be like this, but most men, they're about getting the job done.
04:28They're about getting to the goal.
04:29They're about fixing the problem.
04:31Most women want to explore before they act.
04:35Now, one is not better than the other.
04:38In fact, one without the other is kind of like having one leg instead of two.
04:42The reason why men mostly marry women and women mostly marry men, I'm not saying there aren't exceptions, is because we need that other leg.
04:52If you are a very exploratory, emotional person, you need a little help with the linear thing.
04:57If you're a very linear, goal-oriented person, you need a little help with the exploratory.
05:01And I'm here to tell you that because it's been a male-operated society for thousands of years, we have some catching up to do.
05:11Because they know how to be linear.
05:13They've been dealing with our stuff for thousands of years.
05:17We now need to up our game.
05:20So here's what another listener asks.
05:23Darren, who's 40 years old, he says,
05:25Well, Darren, Brene Brown did studies on shame.
05:38And what she came up with was that for men, when they have shame, shame means I feel like there's something wrong with me.
05:46I do these things because there's something wrong with me.
05:48Or I act this way because there's something wrong with me.
05:50Or I feel this way because there's something wrong with me.
05:52When men experience shame, they either blow up or shut down.
05:58And so the first thing is to identify what's the shame.
06:02What is driving me to feel I have to keep my emotions locked down?
06:07Or what is driving me to explode volcanically?
06:10Why isn't there some middle ground here?
06:13First, you need to identify what's driving that.
06:15Once you identify what's driving that, you need to get that both of those reactions are very extreme expressions of emotion.
06:22So if something happens and you go from zero to 60 emotionally instead of zero to 10, which is what the situation calls, you're having inappropriate or unwarranted emotion.
06:33And what that means is there's some old emotion.
06:36Might be shame.
06:37Might be some old anger.
06:38Might be some old hurt coming up.
06:40But the only way that you're going to get there is to start to know you're having it.
06:46So before you blow up, I guarantee you there's some things that happen.
06:51You don't think about it.
06:52What you think unconsciously, what you're thinking is like, I keep this locked down because if I blow up, I might kill someone.
06:58Unconsciously, that's kind of what's going on.
07:00Consciously, you're just frozen.
07:02And when you're frozen, you're going to notice that there, you may notice physical symptoms of the emotion.
07:08So the starting point for identifying a feeling, if you're feeling very disconnected from your emotions, is what are you feeling in your body?
07:16Is your neck super tight?
07:17Is your chest tight?
07:19Are you clenching your jaw?
07:21Is there tension in your stomach?
07:23The first thing is to just do a body scan.
07:27And most of your emotions are going to be held somewhere, not in your arms and legs, everywhere else.
07:33Notice where you're holding tension.
07:35And if you're still not sure what the tension is about, ask yourself, ask, ask, you literally ask yourself.
07:42I would say, put your hands on the area.
07:44Let's say you're feeling tension in the back of your neck.
07:47Put your hands on the back of your neck and go, what is this feeling?
07:51Oh, wow.
07:52This feels like it might be, I got some jaw clenching going.
07:55I might be angry.
07:56What, what could I be angry about?
07:58But the first thing is just to label it.
08:00So, or you might feel pain in something in your stomach and put your hands on your stomach.
08:05You can't see it.
08:06If you're watching the video, cause you haven't gotten the lower part of my head, my hands are
08:09on my stomach and just say, what is this feeling in my stomach?
08:13This emptiness.
08:14Oh, it feels, oh, I feel so alone or I feel so sad or I feel so hurt.
08:19Right.
08:20And you don't have to, or you could just say, I feel so alone.
08:23I feel so sad.
08:23I feel hurt.
08:24It doesn't have to be with emotion, but just notice it and label it, right?
08:28That's the first part is notice it in your, first notice in your body and then try and
08:35put a name to it.
08:37On the topic of naming, we've got another listener here.
08:42Brian, who's 51 from Michigan says, I've got maybe three emotions I can name.
08:48Angry, tired, and fine.
08:50This is really funny.
08:52Those are my favorite three emotions too, Brian.
08:54I'm either angry, tired, or fine.
08:56And mostly I'm fine.
08:57How's work today?
08:58Fine.
08:59How are you feeling?
09:00I'm tired.
09:01My mom and I had this conversation for years.
09:03She said, how are you doing?
09:04At the end of the day, I'm tired.
09:06She said, you're always tired.
09:07What's up with that?
09:09So Brian asks, where do I find the words for the rest?
09:14You might want to look at what led to tired.
09:18Tired is usually either you're doing a job that's physically exhausting, which many of us
09:23are not, or you've had a day that leads you to feel tired.
09:27You may still feel some energy in your body, though.
09:29You could be tired and have trouble going to sleep.
09:30That's a sure sign that there might be some other emotions there.
09:34And if the only feelings you have are angry, tired, and fine, fine is not really an emotion.
09:39Fine is a label that we use to push other people off.
09:41Tired is a way of saying to people, you know what?
09:44I just, I'm tired.
09:45I just don't want to talk about it.
09:47Fine and tired push people away.
09:49Angry is very clear and guys tend to be comfortable with angry because angry feels empowering,
09:56but there are these other feelings.
09:58So there's, there are four basic food groups in, in emotion.
10:03There's mad, which we just talked about, angry, sad, glad, and afraid.
10:09And if you're tired, you may have some sad going on, or maybe you are frustrated for so
10:15long that you're emotionally exhausted, maybe you have some fear going on.
10:20You know, we do not like to own that we have fear as guys.
10:23And I'm here to tell you that it is okay.
10:27So just like we talked about, when you're locating these emotions in your body, you want to get
10:34used to, just get used to putting labels on them and notice your reaction to those labels.
10:39Wow.
10:39You know what?
10:40When my boss was talking about how business hasn't been good, I may have gotten a little
10:46scared there.
10:47I may have wondered if my job was on the line.
10:49That's fair.
10:50That's okay.
10:51Now it's not unusual for me to hear guys say, when I hear my boss talk about that, there
10:56were some bad businesses this month.
11:00And I was, I, I'm thinking I might have to look for a new job.
11:04They skip the part that leads to, I think I might have to.
11:08So the part of that, Lisa, I might have to is I'm afraid before you go to the, an action,
11:15I want you to just identify the emotion, right?
11:17The tendency is we tend to skip over the emotion and go to the action.
11:20What I'm asking you to do is to start adding a step.
11:23What's the emotion leading to the action?
11:26And I want you to do this every day.
11:29Now, once you start naming those emotions, you can start actually working on making sentences
11:38with them.
11:39Is this reminding you of something?
11:41It's kind of like, first you learn the alphabet, right?
11:43The alphabet is there's a tension in my body.
11:46Where am I feeling it?
11:48Then you learn how to make small words.
11:52So you name what the tension is.
11:55Now you're going to learn how to put some sentences together.
11:58Becoming emotionally fluent is just like learning how to read or write.
12:03So Elias, who's 39 says, even when I kind of know what I'm feeling, I'm not sure how to
12:10say it without sounding weak or awkward.
12:14Wow, Elias, first of all, I just want to acknowledge that took a lot of guts to admit, even though
12:22nobody on the show knows which Elias at the 39 years old there is out there.
12:28The chances are none of your friends heard this.
12:30It still takes a lot just to admit it.
12:33Thank you for writing that into me and for giving me this to work with.
12:36I just want to acknowledge and validate that you took that risk.
12:41Now, let's talk about the weak and the awkward part.
12:47John Wick, he's only weak and awkward when he's been shot.
12:51Who was I just watching?
12:52The accountant?
12:53The accountant is often awkward just because he doesn't have a lot of emotions.
13:00And when they come up, it's uncomfortable for him.
13:02Let's face it.
13:03The image that we're given as men in our culture is we're not really supposed to have emotional
13:09language.
13:10We're not really supposed to talk about our feelings.
13:13So it's going to feel awkward at first because the man box, which we've explored with Dr.
13:21John Schinnerer, tells us we stay in your box, minimize your emotions, get the job done.
13:28And we know that if your marriage is going to thrive, not just not end, but thrive, what
13:36she really needs is for you to be able to put words with your feelings in them.
13:41So try a sentence frame.
13:43I've given you I statements a lot.
13:46An I statement is the first thing is I feel.
13:48I just try to start with I feel sad.
13:52I feel hurt.
13:54I feel afraid.
13:56I feel angry.
13:58I feel glad.
14:00I feel joyful.
14:01I feel good.
14:02Do do do do do do do.
14:03Like I knew that I would.
14:05Sorry.
14:06But I feel nice like sugar and spice.
14:08Those are not emotions.
14:09Start with I feel and put real feelings in there.
14:13I want to be really clear.
14:15I feel like you're not really listening to me is not a feeling.
14:20That's using the word I feel in a sentence.
14:23Unless there's an actual feeling in there, you're not expressing a feeling.
14:27So I feel mad, sad, glad, or afraid is what I'm talking about.
14:31Then try after you've done that a few times.
14:33Try I feel hurt, boss.
14:36I feel scared, boss.
14:38I feel scared when you tell us business has been bad, boss.
14:43Maybe you don't want to go to your boss and say that.
14:45I feel scared when you say you want to go out for a night with the girls again and you just went out the last three nights.
14:57And then try expanding that I feel when because.
15:00I feel scared when you're going out with the girls again after going out with the girls for three nights because it seems like you never really want to be here with me.
15:11That's almost blamey.
15:13Let's try that again.
15:13I feel scared when you go out with the girls three nights in a row because I really need to spend time with you and I miss you.
15:22That's about me, less about her.
15:25So that's really ultimately where you want to go is I feel when because and really important because be about you, not her.
15:33And the tendency is to make it about her because what we want to say is,
15:36Ethel, you've been out with the girls three nights in a row.
15:40Who are you seeing?
15:42I know you're cheating on me.
15:45You're making me very angry and maybe even a little anxious.
15:48That's what we want to say.
15:50But she won't hear that.
15:52So I feel a little angry and a little anxious when you go out with the girls three nights in a row because I love you and I miss you and I'm scared.
16:02Something like that.
16:04If you can't do that with her, try doing it in the mirror with yourself.
16:10Try journaling.
16:12Try writing it.
16:14And it might be that you try it with her and you don't quite get it right.
16:20Here, Carlos, 47, makes the point that I made earlier.
16:23He said, I said, I feel like she doesn't respect me.
16:27And she said, I wasn't expressing a feeling.
16:30What am I missing?
16:31Well, Carlos, what you needed to say was, I feel disrespected.
16:37Is disrespected a feeling?
16:40Disrespected.
16:40Is that an emotion?
16:41If that were mad, sad, glad, or afraid, it would probably be hurt.
16:45I feel hurt when you go out with the girls three nights in a row because it seems like my needs are not being respected.
16:57That might be a way to put it.
16:59I feel like she doesn't respect me.
17:01It's not a real feeling.
17:03It's close, but it's not quite there.
17:05So you want to think it through.
17:06What is the feeling?
17:07And break it down to, I feel like, when, because.
17:12I got one last question.
17:17Marcus writes and he says, so in real life, how do I build this into my day without making it weird?
17:25And like, truthfully, in a culture where men don't talk about their feelings much, you want to be careful about that, right?
17:33Remember, I started to talk about the thing you could say to your boss.
17:37Well, a way you could say that to your boss that wouldn't be weird would be, hey, boss, when you talk about business is bad, I know you're just talking.
17:46But I need you to know that I get a little scared because I got a wife and three kids that I'm trying to support and I want to make sure I can support them.
17:54That would be a way that wasn't weird.
17:56I think what makes it not weird is framing it in a way that the listener can receive.
18:03So if you're talking to your boss, you're speaking to him about your concerns.
18:07If you're talking to your wife, you're speaking in the context of her concerns.
18:10If you're talking to your bro, you're talking in the context of his concerns.
18:15I want you to practice this coming up, all right?
18:19I want you to name one feeling located in your body and identify the thing you need or want.
18:30And if the feeling is joy and you're feeling in your heart, the thing you need or want might be to express it.
18:38But most guys don't call me up and say, oh, bro, I was listening to your podcast and I just felt so much joy.
18:46Right?
18:47Honestly, it's probably not going to be that one.
18:50Again, try writing about it.
18:53If you can't write about it, try doing it in the mirror or try doing a video recording or get yourself an accountability buddy who's more going to work on this with you or get in touch with me.
19:06Like, Richard, Richard relationship and let's get a men's group going.
19:11Well, we can work on this together.
19:12We can work on where do our feelings hang out?
19:15What are the words?
19:16We can work on being emotionally fluent in a way that's comfortable with other men.
19:20Imagine that, right?
19:21Because this isn't just, it isn't just about talking to our wives.
19:25It's about getting out of the man box and being whole and complete human beings.
19:31Because whole and complete human beings can be vulnerable without feeling like wusses.
19:39Now, the next episode is supposed to be vulnerability without weakness.
19:42But the truth is, if you're vulnerable, right?
19:46You're exposed.
19:47You can't be, if you have walls up, you're strong, but you're not vulnerable.
19:53So, weakness kind of goes with vulnerable, but we don't want to think about it as weakness.
20:00We want to think about it as strength.
20:03I'll give you an example of strength.
20:05I'm having a conversation with my wife right now about four topics that we haven't been talking about
20:13that I feel like we should be talking about that have to do with some work I did with her,
20:18some help I need from her, a future project that we can't quite get our minds wrapped around
20:25on this, like on the same time, timing or urgency, right?
20:30Things like that.
20:32And the conversation I have with her goes like this.
20:36It goes, honey, you know that email I sent you six weeks ago?
20:39And I'm not crapping you.
20:41This is how it goes.
20:42Six weeks ago, I'm not like, this is for real.
20:46And you remember how I reminded you over the last couple of weeks about it, and we still
20:49haven't talked about it.
20:50And you know, where she goes, she tests it, tests me, where am I coming?
20:54She says, oh, well, I feel like you're criticizing me with that email.
20:57Okay, I get it.
20:58And I feel like we really need to talk about that stuff.
21:01And I'm doing my best to make this safe for you.
21:04Because I feel like if our relationship is going to keep growing, if we're going to keep
21:08being closer, if we're going to take it to the next level, we really need to be on the
21:12same page.
21:12And she says, well, what if we fight?
21:14And I say, you know, we might fight, it's possible, but I'm not in this to fight, right?
21:20I really want to, I know we have different opinions about this, and I think something
21:24new and different can come out of this.
21:26And I want you to know I'm not going anywhere.
21:28I'm waiting for you to, you know, I don't know what to do, how to be, how to be so that
21:32you feel safe enough to talk about this.
21:34And I think I literally said that, what I just said to you, I literally said, I don't
21:38know what to do, how to be.
21:39Like I corrected myself.
21:40As a guy, I want to do it.
21:42I want to do it.
21:42I want to do it.
21:43As a woman, she wants me to be vulnerable.
21:46And I said, look, she said, all right, we can talk about it.
21:48And I said, I said, take a week and let me know when and where you want to start this
21:53conversation.
21:54And we'll start having it like a little bit at a time that's vulnerability without
21:59weakness.
21:59Now there's the chance that she's going to be slap me right in the face and never talk
22:04about it, right?
22:06That's possible.
22:07That's the vulnerability part, right?
22:09The vulnerability is you, we bear our hearts.
22:11We say what we want.
22:12The strength is I'm here.
22:15I love you.
22:16I got you.
22:18I'm going to keep making it safe until you're ready.
22:20That's the strength.
22:21The strength is I want us to go to new heights together.
22:27I want our partnership to be tighter than ever.
22:30And that's why I want to talk about this.
22:32I don't need to beat you down.
22:33I don't need to criticize you.
22:34I don't need to blame you for this.
22:36What I need is for the two of us to create something new together.
22:41Can you feel that?
22:42I feel it as I say it.
22:43Can you feel that?
22:44She can too.
22:46That is, my friends, is what we're talking about here.
22:49And I will add that in that conversation, I'm just noting, I didn't use a lot of emotion
22:56and maybe I need to.
22:57You know, maybe what I need to be saying is, I'm going to self-educate at the end of this
23:02show.
23:02Hey, you know, I sent you that email six weeks ago and I'm a little hurt and a little sad
23:07that we haven't talked about it yet.
23:09Maybe I need to do that.
23:10You know, when I send you, I feel a little hurt and sad that when I send you an email
23:14of things I want to talk about, you don't respond because honestly, it feels a lot like
23:18when I was a kid and I used to go to my mom and dad with stuff and they never had time
23:21for me.
23:22Maybe I need to lay it out like that, right?
23:25I'm going to try that and I'll let you know how that goes.
23:27Anyway, next episode, vulnerability without weakness, opening up without falling apart.
23:33If you like what we're laying down here, subscribe, like the podcast, share it with your friends.
23:39And in the meantime, have an amazing day and an awesome tomorrow.
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