Stop Keeping Score in Your Marriage, w/ Jonathan & Meredith Van Viegen

Well, good morning. How are you guys? Good morning. Where are you guys?

We are in Panama, actually.

Panama, like the place with the canal?

Yeah.

Why are you there? Do you live there?

We, yeah, we've been living here for almost 5 years now.

What's that like?

Hot and beautiful.

But like super normal. It's super safe.

Yeah.

People are great. Yeah.

It's cheap. So we came here for like a, a surf trip 5 years ago and fell in love. Made it to you. Fell in love with this little surf town that we had gone to for just like a week. I broke my foot so we couldn't surf, broke it surfing. And then we drove around, looked at real estate, found this old beach house that needed a lot of TLC. And Jonathan's former, one of his many former careers was as a contractor. And so we bought this big old beach house in this little surf town. and renovated it and turned it into a surf lodge. So, we've been living there for the last, well, almost 5 years now. Amazing. Running this surf lodge. Jonathan learned to surf here, and now it's like such a core part of who he is. I can't imagine life. I'm like, what did we do before you surfed? What did you do? How did you stay sane and healthy? Yeah.

Yeah, I love that for you both. And I love the idea of like, how do you stay sane and healthy? Well, I'm very excited to talk to you. Is it 9:00 AM? Is it 10:00 AM?

No, it's actually 11 for us.

11:00

AM. Yeah.

And what happened for you last week? I was scouring a couple of those emails, but something happened for your family. What was that situation?

Oh.

Everyone came down with the flu.

Except me. I never got it despite being the nursemaid to everyone sleeping beside the sick children and everything. No, my older one brought it home from school.

Okay.

And she got really sick and she's pretty tough though. She like refuses Tylenol. She does not want— She just like fluids, rest, cold towels, and she gets through it. But my younger one is far more sensitive and reacts stronger. And so she ended up, we had to go to the ER twice for just IV fluids. It was nothing more, but she was responding to the fever by throwing up. So she couldn't like keep enough food and water in her body to stay healthy. So yeah.

Jesus.

Plus we were in the midst of, So, we've been doing a hybrid life between Panama City and our small surf town for the last year and a half so that our older daughter could do a proper year at school. And we've now moved back to the surf lodge sort of full-time for a couple months. And so, we were also doing that move. So, there's just a lot going on. So, thank you for your understanding and patience.

Oh gosh, I totally get it. And, you know, I feel like my life right now is hectic enough that I'm sort of at the whim of the email, the next email in my inbox.

Okay.

And so I spent some time watching you, Jonathan, on Instagram this last week or two. And I kind of wanna start here, if you don't mind. Like, what is it like being such a, like a character on the internet? Like a marriage character? Like a, like you, is that really you? Is that a persona that you play? Is that a, is that a shtick that you have? Is, or is that like, What is it like to like put in that work and tell that story in that way?

I mean, beyond the therapeutic benefits of it, because it's, it's extremely therapeutic for me.

For you,

uh, you're also just speaking your truth too, right? So I show up every single day just writing what I want to write and sharing what I believe about the world. Meredith likes the joke that when you come from such a history of trauma, especially me as a child. There's a lot of like emotion and passion that I can draw on when I want to create content. I'd say it's, it's definitely very flattering. I mean, I, I woke up today to a woman who just said, your reel yesterday changed my marriage. And, uh, so there's, there's definitely a lot of professional and personal pride that you get to take when, when, when when you're putting yourself out there. But on the other hand, it's a grind. There are moments of writer's block like this past weekend where I was just tapped out and I just didn't really have anything in my head to write. And so it gets a little bit difficult, but I'm blessed. It's been a joy. So

yeah. Meredith, what's that like for you?

I was just gonna say, it's funny to watch some of the comments, especially as he was growing really fast. Because, you know, as you say, the shtick, he's sort of got the surfer dude and he does the hair thing, you know, fixing his hair and

that

kind of stuff.

Which is totally me, by the way.

Which is totally you in a, he doesn't care what other people think and he's always kind of playing with his hair. But some people would take it the wrong way or get the wrong impression that he was some really sort of arrogant, narcissistic, like cares so much about how he looks. People accused him of putting highlights in his hair. I'm like, that's just from surfing. Like the dude barely gets haircuts, you know, when he's about to get ready to go on something, it's like 10-minute shower, shirt, and I'm going. Like,

yeah,

so there's the funny misconceptions people get. And, you know, I mean, I think the hair thing started as like, stop the scroll, right? That's what Instagram's all about. Like, how do you catch someone's attention in those first 2 seconds of a, of a reel? And then it just kind of stuck, right?

Yeah, but it's, uh, but I was thinking about it, like, I mean, 2 and a half years ago, I I was no one. No one knew anything about me. And Instagram definitely changes you when you kind of grow. And I mean, we're potentially moving to the US now because I got a book deal and then the following and continuing, and then we got approved for a visa. So it's been life-changing for sure.

That's totally a separate conversation. I think I hear Canada. Are you Canadian?

Yeah.

And does that make it easier to move to Panama?

Uh, Panama, you, you basically, you need to invest. So we, we bought a house here, so we were able to—

Got it.

Uh, get residency. But the US is a totally different ballgame. Like it took 6 months to put together the petition to apply and get accepted. And

yeah,

you know, you had to get reference letters and whatnot. But yeah.

'Cause as Canadians, we can go to the US as tourists and visitors anytime for 6 months. Yeah. But you can't work. And there was just so much opportunity developing for Jonathan through all of this work that it was something we started considering.

Yeah, I, I kind of want to, I want to linger a little bit on Instagram just for a second. I, I sort of, uh, accidentally went viral a couple weeks ago. I was invited to be on a podcast for a guy who's got a pretty big following. He's a celebrity. Um, and so I've spent the last week kind of watching his their podcasts grow or their YouTube video grow. And I'm just a character in that. And I was like going, oh, the people are paying attention. People see me, they have comments, they're commenting about me. And they're mostly commenting about him, but like they're commenting about me. And I was like, this makes me feel good. And this, should that make me feel good? And oh, that makes me feel bad. And should that make me feel bad? And, you know, how do you sustain kind of your own sense of self while measuring your— Uh, I don't know if the right word is success, but sort of measuring your success or your identity against something that you just put out in the universe and sort of hope it lands. How does that work for the two of you? Is it, is it a, is it a gift? Is it a challenge? How do you

understand it? Excuse me. It's, it's definitely kind of both. And I fortunately remember so much. And so back in 2017, I was, I, I was working as a therapist in Northern Canada and I'd have to drive 3 and a half hours to get to where I needed to go in. Um, in person to do sessions.

Oh, wow.

In the community. And back then I was listening to Tai Lopez. And if anyone knows Tai Lopez, he's an internet marketer that kind of blew up and got giant. You know that Here in My Garage guy talking about his like Lamborghini in his garage?

Yeah.

Anyway, he said, he said something profound back then. He, I'm sure he still says it, but if you don't have haters, you don't have attention. And What I took from that, what he went on to say was, first they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, and then they join you.

Huh.

And when you wrap your head around that, like there's always gonna be people that disagree with you, people that support you. Your job is to just go out and change the world in the way that you wanna do it and connect with the people that care about you. So I welcome the haters, I welcome the people that laugh, It's the indifference that I wouldn't want because then I wouldn't think that I was making a difference in the world. And so, so what lights me up is to just like make people crazy and laugh about it. And, you know, they can laugh at me and, you know, 'cause I say some pretty crazy things that in our field as therapists that people don't agree with.

Yeah.

Um, not like over, over the top, but it's just, you know.

But kind of contrary to what the current popular mainstream sort of view on certain things is. Yeah.

Well,

and I always like to say that Jonathan was like made for social media, 'cause he legitimately does not care what other people think of him.

Interesting.

And he's a good person, and good thing. I sometimes joke, I'm like, man, if you were like a sociopath, he'd be like the worst person, because he just doesn't care what people think of him. He knows he's a good person, he knows he's a good man, and he's just out there speaking his truth. And so like, I sometimes would read the comments and I'd start feeling emotions about it, the like, oh my God, what are they saying? And are they judging? And he's like, pfft. He just, it does not affect him.

Yeah.

And I mean, if you get a comment from like sort of a legitimate person who has a legitimate debate with you or difference of opinion, you will happily engage in like an intelligent debate over a difference of opinion. But when it's just like the internet warrior hater comments, it just, I mean, he would just like do laugh emojis or like, you made my day in response and stuff to them. And so,

If you get a hater, do yourself a favor and go and get 10 more. Honestly. Okay. These are words straight from Tai Lopez's mouth. Go get 10 more because then you know you're doing a good thing in the world.

Yeah.

Interesting.

And I was gonna say, I think the reason that you sort of blew up when you did, 'cause you'd been online for a while before that. Do we remember in Japan? We lived in Japan for a year. He was like starting his YouTube channel in a different way then and stuff. and trying to find your voice and trying to figure out how to do all this. And it was really, yeah, 2 and a half years ago when you started on Instagram and you stopped trying to take the middle ground, you stopped trying to like not offend anyone or not like ruffle the feathers of other perspectives, other people. And you just started speaking your truth.

Mm-hmm.

Saying what you really have learned about marriages and relationships and what makes them work. You weren't scared, I think, anymore. Not that you were scared before, but you know, you found your confidence to be like, no, this is what I see. You can disagree with me, but this is how I see it. And that really blew you up.

Yeah, for sure.

Meredith, what do you think about relationships and marriage and how it, how they make 'em work? Like as, as a, as a sidecar, I don't know, how do you perceive yourself? Are you an equal partner? Are you like a kind of watching, are you, are you an engineer over there and you're kind of doing your own thing and checking in everyone? Like what's your role in this whole game?

Well, you know, it's funny, I will have to figure out what that like name is, that label. I was actually just saying to the women's circle last night, I've started running women's circles as part of our group coaching programs. And I was like, I sometimes don't know how other people work on their marriage and fix their marriages when their husband is not a couples therapist. 'Cause like Jonathan is just— He is 100%. He's like living it every day, right? And I mean, our marriage improved drastically when he went back to do his master's in this and became a couples therapist, like— He wasn't that when I met him at all.

I always tell people that we don't have, I don't have a perfect marriage, but I don't have any excuses.

Right, yes, yes. You guys know it all. You should know it too.

I'd be like, yeah, so. Totally.

But I mean, I've been along for the ride all the way through. I don't know what it was when we first got together. Everything we've ever done has been collaborative and connected in some way. I mean, there were times when we had separate jobs, But

tell 'em your theory about what makes marriage work, about the husbands being more—

Oh, this is something someone told me on a plane once, that in a relationship you want the man to love the woman just a little bit more than, and like be just a little bit more invested and a little more passionate than the woman to the man. You obviously have to have like, I love him. Sure. He's amazing. He's a great husband. But it's like, if you're gonna have a bit of an imbalance, You want to have the guy be just that little bit more into it and invested. So, and that's, so there's a little snippet.

Yeah, I can build that argument. I have always, I always tell my couples that marriage isn't 50/50, it needs to be 60/40 where both partners are trying to be the 60.

Oh, that's a good way to put it. Yeah, yeah.

And then you got 120, so you have a little bit of like energy to burn if you're doing it right.

That's a great way. I mean, Jonathan talks about putting the other person's wellbeing ahead of your own. and showing up better today than I did yesterday. And, you know, just sort of that constant thinking, not like taking care of the other person, but like, what can I—

Investing in them.

Well, that too. But what can I do and bring into this relationship to help them and make it better? And if both people are doing that, then, you know, you can really thrive.

How do the two of you do that?

I clean up her breadcrumbs and peanut butter toast cutting board every morning.

He does. Yeah, he does all the dishes. You know, the— I make him go surfing. Like, I never say no to him going for a surf. And I've watched, like, we have Surf Lodge guests who kind of watch how we live. And some of them have said after he comes running out from a session, I got an hour, I'm going surfing, see you. And I'm like homeschooling and writing business emails over here and dealing with Surf Lodge people here. And I'm like, yeah, yeah, go have fun. And they're like, really? I'm like, yes.

Simply put, there's no complaining in our marriage. Huh. Zero.

How do you do that?

It just doesn't, it doesn't work.

Is that your temperament? Is that just a decision that you made? I mean, how do you—

I think it's temperament, I think it's cycle, I think it's pattern. But, you know, I say with pride that the 4 of us, 'cause we have 2 daughters, we'll go out, 'cause we live at the beach, we'll go out for a surf day, we'll all go surf, we'll be exhausted, you know, it'll be 5 o'clock, 6 o'clock, we'll come home, And I'll go and collapse with the girls on the bed watching TV or Netflix while Meredith will go cook for an hour. And then an hour after that, she'll come and play with my hair as we're watching our episode of Homeland. And there's, you gotta ask yourself, you know, in what normal relationship would that ever exist where she would just allow her husband to just go collapse while she was to continue to work for an hour? And it's because we don't measure We don't timestamp moment by moment. So, you know, she'll invest, but then there'll be days where I'm doing 6, 7 sessions with clients and they're out with the family going to the beach, playdates, going to the pool, and it doesn't come back towards her where I'm resentful that I'm stuck, you know, when it's a gorgeous day out and they're getting off to live their best life, right? So you kind of have to It's kind of like children with eating. You don't, you know, those difficult eaters, you don't go meal by meal and look at a child and say, oh, they're a terrible eater because they're refusing one meal. You zoom out and you look at a week. And so, I would say we do a really good job of that where we don't timestamp the minor moments where I think a lot of couples get locked in on, and that's what they catalog, that's what they timestamp, that's what they remember, and that's where the resentment grows.

Yeah. And I feel like we're both pretty good at bringing things to each other before they get to a place of resentment or difficulty. It's funny.

Which happened last week.

I actually can't even remember what I came to you with. It's rare for me. Jonathan jokes that I'm like the most emotionally stable person he knows. So I don't actually come to him with very much, very often that I'm like, hey, we need to talk about this, or I want, this bothered me. But there was something and I can't even remember what it was.

It was like my jar of peanut butter. Remember? No, no, no. No, no, it was in the condo where I was, I was kind of sick, and I was coming out and leaving all my stuff on the counter.

Yeah, yeah.

No, it was like so it happens. But

but I was able to

go to him and say two three years.

Yeah, I was like, "Look, I've been taking care of two sick kids. I know you're getting sick, but when you came out and made your toast and made your lunch and just left it all over and didn't clean it up, like that suddenly was like, 'Uh, I need that little extra help.' So he's like, 'Mea culpa. You're right. I'm sorry. I was just feeling so." worn out and I just needed to go collapse. So, it was over in a moment. And like, look, I don't even remember what, he had to remember for me what it actually was. So, I don't know, I feel like we both do a pretty good job of pouring into the relationship enough. Like you say, the 60% and the 60%. Mm-hmm.

So,

there's that extra sitting there. So, when things do get tough or someone does do something that's thoughtless or lazy or whatever, There's like a cushion, you know?

You know, one of the thoughts that runs through my mind is that feedback, the complaining. I just call it complaining that couples do with each other. If we can complain about the same thing—

You're talking about like sort of basic everyday bickering moments?

Just basic everything. You know, you did this. Why can't you do that? You're always this, you're always that. And, uh, you know, I sit and you sit with couples all the time too. If we can complain about what hurts, we should also be able to complain about what heals. So why aren't you complaining to me about the fidelity I've given you for the last 15, 20 years? Why aren't you complaining about the loyalty, the transparency, the honesty? And people don't— people struggle really hard to do that. They struggle to see all the warm blankets that they wrap themselves in called their marriage that make them sleep well at night. And they just focus on that little bit of draft or that exposure that makes them feel cold.

Okay. I think you're doing something clever, but I might not understand exactly what What do you parse that for me a little bit? Complaining about the things that are going well, like complaining obviously has a negative connotation, but what are you ultimately trying to surface?

Well, it's like what we ruminate on, right? If we're ruminating on the things that hurt, why aren't we ruminating on the things that feel great?

There you go.

Right? So I'm just flipping that word. I'm saying like, if you're gonna complain about anything and you're only complaining about the bad, you should also be able to complain about the good, but you don't because, you kind of don't even, you know, keep it front and center, right?

Yeah. So. As in talk about it.

As in talk about it. It's just, you know, you gotta talk about it.

How old are your girls?

10 and almost 14. My God, I keep doing that.

Yeah, okay. Mine are 19 and 22, or like they're 20 and 24 basically. Oh. 19, they're 4 years apart, but they're, you know.

Please give us some advice. We're coming up on 14.

We're gonna blink and be there. It's crazy.

Uh, if you've— anybody who's listened to the podcast more than once has heard me say, I think parenting young adults is harder than parenting young kids. Um, it has been, I mean, it's the challenge, right? Because parenting young kids is mostly about meeting their physical needs. But when you have to now add their legitimate emotional needs as adults, like they're legitimate, like opinionated, fully formed, advocating, you know, trying to like figure out how to establish themselves. kind of piece, that process of transitioning from, you know, you are a prop that I carried around literally in a traveling, you know, seat to you are a person that I'm trying to reckon with as an equal is a pretty challenging thing. But I love it. I love anticipating being in a healthy adult relationship with my girls. That's the kind of a thing that we're focused on right now, so.

No, that makes sense. We have that long-term game view as well. I mean, a lot of the decisions we've made in the last 14 years about life has been about how do we keep that family unit connected and tight and solid. And I mean, that's probably our number one goal. You know, when things are stressful and stuff's going on in the business and whatever's happening, we always just circle back to we have our health and we have our girls.

Hmm.

Like the world could burn down around us, like your business could implode, whatever could happen, but we have our health and we have our girls. And that ultimately is the most important. So,

Yeah,

but it's the challenge. I remember being told when they were little, little kids, little problems, big kids, big problems. And it's like the bigger they get, the bigger the problems, right?

Yeah.

So I hear that.

Well, I, I just woke up one day and realized that like I've been in an adult relationship with my mom for 30 years, you know? Like I was in a child— I was her child or in a childish relationship, child-parent-child relationship with her for say 18. And I guess it's not 30, but whatever it is, 28, 38, 48, 35 years maybe. So I'm like, oh, that's where the bulk of this thing is. Are we gonna get along as adults? And how do you play? I mean, I think your, your worldview of timestamping, not in the moment, but in the kind of the longer game is one that I can really get, get behind. Um, and then how long have the two of you been together?

18 years together, 17 married. He's a fast mover. He is not a patient person. And when he wants something, he goes and makes it happen. So he proposed after 3 months. And we, uh, we got married 10 months to the day after our first date. So

crazy.

Yeah, we just did it.

Would you say in your relationship that there's been, uh, a moment or a, an era that was a significant shifting moment for you? Like, did something— like, when you look back and say there was a before and after and it's right about here?

Yeah, I would say up until the first year of my daughter's, my eldest, Life. Those first 6 years were the hardest. And just the two of you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then that first year with our daughter.

That coincided with him starting his degree in marriage and family therapy, like when he started his master's and started learning so much that, that was part of that shift.

And it was a, it was a terrible cycle. So I struggled with tremendous anger issues. And so then the more angry I got, the less— well, I'd say the more she pulled away or continued to build that wall between us. And it was essentially— it was the second time she said to me that she didn't think I was funny enough that really pushed me to— I think I started therapy again with my psychologist and then quit shortly thereafter and started my graduate degree in marriage and family therapy. And That's kind of where things changed, I'd say. Yeah.

Wait, you didn't think he was funny enough to offset the anger or you didn't think he was like, you were just insulting him because he was like, what do you mean?

You know, it's funny. I come from a family and I've learned a lot about my family and being with Jonathan 'cause his family's the opposite to mine in many ways. And we were a family that would sit around the dining table and tell stories and talk for hours, laughing, joking, And it was only well into our marriage that I realized that there was a lack of depth and substance to all of it. But on the surface, there's a lot of laughter and connection and funny times. And so that feels like connection, but there isn't a whole lot underneath. And so in our early times together, I mean, we had laughter and jokiness in the early days, and then when we had a— couple big fights and his anger came out, it did. It's like I started putting up sort of these defenses and I think we lost some of that connection that allowed for that relaxed—

Well, and I'm not a natural comedian. I wouldn't put myself in the same category as Robin Williams. No,

it's not.

I just work. That's, I work and if I'm not working, I'm thinking about I need to work. And so—

And, but I think over time I just came to appreciate and value and recognize that it's, there are multiple qualities a person can have. And my dad has a sense of humor, but is horribly emotionally unintelligent, extremely intellectually intelligent, probably on a spectrum somewhere, highly successful in his field, but no idea how to have an adult relationship with his daughters. And so I'm like, I got the funny guy with nothing else.

Mm-hmm.

Or I've got this guy who, I mean, you still make me laugh and we still have fun together and I love nothing more than seeing the big smile on your face. But I'm like, okay, well, would I give all the good up that I have here? The honesty, the hardworking, the, you know, commitment, the like adventure. I mean, I was sitting in a house in Toronto before I met him wondering how to make my life happen. And then I met this guy who's like, let's move here, let's travel there, let's do this. He'd already like, Lived in Japan for 4 years, spoke the language, then moved to the Netherlands, lived there for 6 years, started his own business. Like, he just did stuff, and I found that fascinating, and I loved that. So, I don't know, I think over time, I just really learned to value what I had instead of sitting there looking at this little piece that I didn't have. And that sort of, I think, all was also during the time that you were doing your degree. Mm-hmm. You were learning about yourself, about your anger, about your childhood, about what it had done to your brain chemistry. And we were getting just better slowly at dealing with conflict, at working through it, at navigating it together. And so, I mean, it doesn't even cross my mind anymore. When you tell that story, I'm like, I can't believe I was such a jerk. Like, how could I say that? And like, it's just not a thing anymore.

Like, and this is the thing that I share with the couples all the time, is that when we start talking about someone's identity, our spouse's identity, you're walking so close to the cliff's edge. That you're going to fall off. The ground is not going to hold because no one's identity can weather that type of negative feedback. So yell at me about my behavior, things I say and do. But when we start talking about the person,

yeah,

you know, we're in deep trouble. And so when she said that, that, that was earth-shattering for sure. And didn't know that we'd make it, but yeah, we did.

And I think a piece at that time that also was going on was also we had moved across Canada first. We'd left the Toronto area and moved to Northern Canada, but like near Alaska. So we had 6 years there where our girls were born. So we were away from our families. It was like just us building the new, you know, friend version of a family. And then we left to travel full-time. And so then you're like traveling Asia, living in Japan, even further removed from family. And in a funny way that brought us closer 'cause we like just had each other and we had to, work through that. We no longer had a family of origin to kind of fall back on. And I think that strengthened things for sure. Yeah.

Jonathan, what do you have to say about anger now? Like, what is your relationship to anger as you understand it in your sort of in your evolved state, I guess?

Yeah, well, it's— anger is— it, it's something that we don't want to eliminate completely in men because it's what keeps us alive, you know, in the neighboring horde is coming to raid the village and steal our cattle. We need anger.

Yeah.

So, as men, you know, and I remember clearly a time we were in Thailand and taxi drivers was going to rip us off or not take us where we needed to go. And then, I get nice and big and then sure enough, we're going where we want to go. So, it serves a purpose, but, you know, with your 5'4 ballerina of a wife, anger is not going to help you out any. And, So, for me, what I tell my clients and what I do with myself is I just embrace it and I wear it as a badge of honor, something that I talk about, something I'm not ashamed to share with people about my own version, my own history. In the book I wrote, I spilled a lot of beans, spilled a lot of tea on some of our worst fights that she and I have had. And, there's a ton of embarrassment there. But I think the more you lean into it as a man, the more you normalize it and are able to talk about it. We know as therapists, if it doesn't, you know, bacteria grows and thrives in mold in the darkness, right? So the more you shed light on it, the more you talk about it, the more you can be open about it, the more influence and control you gain over it. So these days, you know, if I get angry and it's now, it's just like a mild tone shift. And then the girls are like, daddy's angry. And, you know, I'm like, I just raised my tone ever so slightly, but it just becomes easier. And then you start understanding that you can control your anger. And I had a therapist in Texas a couple years ago that I was reaching out to and working with, and he introduced me to this idea that most, 99% of the stuff is just paper tigers. It's not real tigers. And so little things like that. But I would say probably the biggest shift was you know, understanding that we don't, as men, need to be ashamed, embarrassed, guilty about our anger, because if we do, we're gonna hide it. So if we reject those emotions about ourselves, we open ourselves up to take control and influence over anger. So it gets a lot easier to manage.

I wanna talk about tigers. I don't know if I know exactly what you mean when you say paper tigers. Can you tell me that? Because, but then I wanna talk about tigers and Japan. So what does the phrase paper tigers mean to you and that therapist?

Well, so I probably have undiagnosed general anxiety disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder from my childhood that's survived throughout. So for me, any threat feels so existential. You know, if I'm angry with my, annoyed with my, you know, a professional connection, I'll have Meredith write the email for me because I know I'm gonna like lay into the person.

I'm going to co-opt this story. I don't know if I'll call it paper tigers. I might call them Japanese tigers. We visited Japan last spring. My daughter was living there for the spring doing a language study program. And so we went out and visited, and I think we were in— I don't remember where we were exactly, but we went to this palace, and it was the one that you walk through and the floors squeak, and they're like, this is for ninjas. But anyway, there was all these murals on the wall, and they were murals of tigers. And the tigers looked cartoonish and ridiculous. And part of why they looked ridiculous is because the Japanese artists had never seen tigers. They had only seen pictures of tigers that had been given or imported from Japan, or sorry, from China. And even those tigers had been replications that were drawn from tigers that were in Korea or something. I don't know if I got my geography right, but like these were third generation tigers. that looked like ridiculous cartoon tigers that we were all like, hahaha. But as far as the feudal Japanese, you know, samurai era people knew, these were the most fierce creatures on earth. But in some ways they replicated kind of the paper tiger syndrome in that there's no way you would be afraid of these things if you saw them. You got a book deal. Tell me about your book.

Well, it's, it needed to be something that wasn't just a typical self-help book that you get through the first 2 pages of. So it was about a year and a half ago, the publisher reached out and asked if I'd ever thought about writing something. And so I kind of went back and forth about, you know, what am I going to teach couples? And landed on this idea that I was going to create 3 couples, one struggling with infidelity, another with conflict, high conflict, and another that was struggling with long-term emotional decay. And so I basically took them through, each couple through 5 sessions with me. Interesting. And we moved through my work and gave a ton of my interventions and scripts and questions and conversations that the reader will be able to use. So I wanted people to be interested in the stories, in the dialogue, and then find the nuggets that they can apply to their own relationship. So, I love that. So it turned into this kind of narrative nonfiction book that, you know, the idea was that those busy adults, parents, could just, you know, get through a chapter, 15, 20 minutes, fall asleep, and, you know, have a good night rest.

But then wake up actually wanting to read the next chapter, as opposed to just the first chapter of, you know, the self-help book, and then life gets busy and you forget about it and never go back to it.

Did you read it, Meredith?

A million times.

She was the editor. She did everything.

Yeah. It was interesting learning about this whole book publishing process. And I think it's probably different for fiction work versus nonfiction where like he's the expert and the authority. And so, I actually have a background in writing and editing. And so, I helped him like storyline. I read every chapter multiple times. I did the proofreading, I did the copy edit along with the publisher, but You know, I was sort of behind the scenes, so I'm super biased. I think it's really good.

Yeah.

I'm really excited for people to read it and find out if I'm wrong, but I, I'm not a nonfiction reader. I read fiction all the time. I always have a book on the go. I even all through my master's degree, when all my friends are like, I don't have time to read, I'm like, I still read every night before bed. I'll finish my textbook reading, but I still want that fiction. It's like, cleanse my brain. And so, but I always try to read nonfiction 'cause I wanna better myself and be smarter and learn new things. And I get through like a chapter or two and I'm like, ugh, no. And I'm like, never finish the book. So I'm really hoping this one's different for people who, you know, wouldn't normally make it through or would find it boring or something.

Mm-hmm.

I don't think it's boring. It's got like all these stories of his childhood, what happened with, to him from his dad, our marriage, his even thoughts like about the people sitting in front of him. Like, you know, his thought of, I can't believe you did that. But that's not what he says as a therapist, but it's what, you know, you're human. You hear these stories from people and your thought must be like, what? Yeah. And professionally you then give an appropriate response. So,

Yeah.

He kind of, it's like being a fly on the wall and inside his brain is what I say.

So the book is coming out in November, like, right?

Yeah.

So, um, maybe right about now. I think this episode will publish right about then. And what do you hope it does? Like, what do you want the book to do in the world?

I would say that the biggest thing is I feel I've been put on this earth to save a million marriages. So if people can read this book and find something in it that's going to give them another day, another week, another month, another opportunity, another reason to recommit to their relationship because they have the questions and they have the tools that give them that confidence that they can actually influence the outcome. That's my passion. And I say this all the time, I'm not a divorce coach, never wanna be. I wanna keep families together. I wanna keep couples together. So that's my goal for the book for sure.

Do you have any idea where you're at vis-à-vis your million?

That's a good question. I, I mean, we're—

We're halfway there. We've got half a million. You saved half a million marriages.

We're, we're well over 100, probably 150, coming up on 200 million views on Insta, across Meta, across social media. Like, if there's been some trickle-down effect, you know, then, then I'm happy. You're probably there.

Yeah. You probably got it.

Yeah.

I'm retired.

Never really know. Yeah.

Yeah. I don't know. I don't know about that. If I would be able to, I started book number 2 last weekend, so it's, uh,

yeah.

Yeah. My publisher's a little shocked. He's like, yeah, I think he's shocked cuz they, they know if I give them the book, then, then they gotta make a decision to publish it or if I'm gonna go somewhere else. And, um, so yeah, it was funny.

Yeah. His brain never stops. He, he always has another idea and another new thing.

Yeah.

So

yeah, it's, it's kind of wild talking to the two of you because there are so many overlaps in who you are and how you've navigated the world. People who listen to the podcast regularly will be like, oh yeah, that's like Zach. Oh yeah, that's like Zach. Two daughters. Anger is my drug. I just finished my own book. I used a sort of a fictional conceit at the center of it to help people like find themselves in it. That just so many pieces of resonance. So I'm I'm rooting for you. I'm rooting for your book. It's called Choosing Us, which sounds like the two of you are doing. You're doing that all the time. You're choosing us and your family and. That's very cool. I'm happy for you. And I'm looking forward to, I'm looking forward to reading it. It's exactly the kind of book I think that I would, uh, resonate with in part because I don't want somebody to tell me what to do. I want to have an opportunity to think about what, what I do in that space and in that place. And I guess I get to kind of look at it through the lens of both the couple struggling. We've had struggles in all of the places that you named, and then also the lens of being a therapist and sitting with people and go, I wonder if I would make that move or how to make that move or what that move would be like. Mm-hmm. So it's very cool to talk to you both. Where do we learn more about Jonathan and Meredith or Jonathan or Meredith? How do you want the world to continue to discover what you're up to?

Probably the best place is to head on over to Instagram, Jonathan Van Viegen. That's where I'm most prolific these days. I've picked up Substack, so I'm writing over there as well. Same username, Jonathan Van Viegen. And I've got a little YouTube channel under the same name that people can kind of pop in, find my videos. I do podcast swaps and host interviews and stuff like that. And then obviously you can go grab the book from your favorite retailer, Choosing Us. So

yeah. The website is also jonathanvanviegen.com. It's just go find his name. You'll find him. Yeah.

Yeah. We'll publish that video. We'll publish this podcast right around early November. So it's available now. Go check out Choosing Us, find Jonathan Van Viegen, learn more about what he's up to. And then understand as well that Meredith is a massive part of, of all that makes this, this machine tick.

We joke that we're like a one and a half man team. 'Cause I work on the business with him.

I'm the half, she's the one.

No, I do a lot with it and for it. But yeah, I'm becoming more and more sort of a part of the group coaching. The women tend to really enjoy having both perspectives to talk about. And I'm able, I think I really wanted to say about the anger, the biggest thing I think that we've learned about it that has really helped me support him in working through it, 'cause anger can easily be a like, get away from me. You like, don't be here. Don't talk to me like that. Not doing this, is how much underlying the anger is fear.

Hmm.

And when I have learned to recognize his fear triggers and that it's just coming out as anger, that gives me a whole lot more empathy and compassion and ability to like help him calm down and stay with him to like regulate. And now I don't really have to do it anymore. But there was a phase where that was really helpful for me to understand. Instead of just being like, you're being an asshole, get outta my face. I'm like, oh, you're scared that this thing that I made a mistake on is gonna affect our livelihood and your ability to provide for your family. And so therefore it's coming out as this big thing. Yeah. And you see it as a giant tiger and not the fake one painted on the Japanese palace. Yeah. So.

I also started or reinvested in Substack this year and I for sure, 100%, One of the next articles I'm gonna write is about these Japanese tigers, these paper tigers that, um, are not, uh, really as scary as they seem. So, um, I think that's very cool, Meredith. The way I would phrase that sometimes is when your partner is acting out, uh, it's important to investigate what they're saying about themselves, not what they're saying about you. Mm-hmm. So if he gets angry and you're like, oh, you're telling me I'm a problem, or you're telling me I'm whatever, I need to get defensive about this. You can go, oh, you're scared. Is it really? It's a gift to him and to the relationship and to yourself. So I love that you're practicing that. So very cool. Thanks so much for coming on Marriage Therapy Radio. I think I'm joining you at some point, so I look forward to continuing this conversation and diving into things that, uh, that I'm gonna definitely be thinking about over the next couple of weeks.

So sounds amazing. Zach, it was great to meet you.

Such a pleasure.