The Argument Was Never About the Dishes.

The Argument Was Never About the Dishes

As many of you would know by now, Puerto Vallarta does not magically fix your relationship. But what it will do is make sure you are having the same argument with a better sunset behind it.

I have sat with people who moved here chasing a fresh start, and couples who have loved each other since before the malecón had streetlights, and after enough authenticity there is something that is common with everyone. Underneath the differences of time together, accents and relationship status, the same three questions are on repeat. Am I loved? Do I belong? Am I safe here?

We have all been handed the scripts. Use I-statements. Do not go to bed angry. Plan the date night and always communicate more. Yet still the same fight keeps finding its way back into the kitchen, just often wearing a new outfit.

The Fight Is Never About the Fight

When someone says you never listen to me, they often mean I feel invisible. When they say fine, forget it, they mean I’ve given up hoping you will understand. Every complaint is an unmet need wearing a disguise, and most people have been speaking that encrypted language their whole adult life without ever getting to what is underneath.

Our culture rewards holding it together — the good old “stay calm and don’t make it a big deal.” We all know the catch cry: no drama please. But emotions do not evaporate because you refused to say them out loud. They leak into your tone, the way you storm out the door, and into the silence that grows between two people who love each other yet can’t put a finger on what really went wrong — too many moments swept under the carpet.

Who Is Actually Talking When You Fight

One of the most powerful tools I use with my clients that bridges this gap is UPLVL Communication™, created by Kenya K Stevens of Progressive Love Academy. Because by the time the walls are up, it is rarely the adult in the room doing the negotiating. It is the five-year-old who got overlooked, going a few rounds with someone else’s nine-year-old who was never enough.

Inside the UPLVL system is the venting container — a structured way to say the thing that has been building and festering. When your animal self (emotional) and ego self (righteousness and perspective) have a safe place to be heard and soothed, and the listener knows they have done nothing wrong, true freedom is created and experienced.

Another very powerful tool I use is a deeply connecting way to communicate that has you knowing and feeling how loved you are, that you belong in the relationship and are therefore truly safe to share your authenticity. I am constantly witnessing couples share pieces of themselves with one another where they previously did not have the courage to do so. Even couples who have been married for years. It is surprising how often we modulate ourselves so as not to rock the boat with a partner. That is not authenticity. That is withholding.

This Is Also Where the Good Sex Lives

Living somewhere this alive, warm and relaxed, it feels absurd to settle for a relationship that is polite and beige. Puerto Vallarta does not do polite and neither should your relationship. It is not about being the perfect communicator. Nobody needs that. But these tools will let every part of you finally get heard — the wounded and excited parts — so you can get back to the good stuff. And if you were wondering, in this place of authenticity is where the good sex lives.

Where to Find Me

I bring this work into my practice here in Puerto Vallarta, one-on-one and in small groups. Book your discovery call to speak more on how this can work for you.