You know that place where love, pleasure, or success just leveled up — and then some sneaky sabotage pops the bubble? That's upper limiting. Nothing is wrong with you. It's a human condition.

Mike Elliott and Courtney Wren-Mabbutt sit down with Gay and Katie Hendricks — pioneers of conscious loving and body intelligence, authors of 40+ books including The Big Leap and Conscious Loving — for a deep dive into how couples upper limit their love the moment it expands. Gay and Katie share how three days of ease used to flip into criticism, victim loops, and weeks of repair… until they learned to see the pattern and recommit to expanding their capacity to give and receive love.

You'll hear the origin of the upper limit (Gay's ice cream sundae story), why unconscious intentions ride shotgun with your conscious vows, how deeper love reveals where you're stuck, and why trading every content fight for "oh — upper limit" changes the whole game. They go into body literacy (the Big Three: anger, grief, fear), spiritual bypassing vs. befriending the animal body, play instead of "working on" the relationship, and what 25+ years without criticism actually feels like.

This episode is packed with lived wisdom for conscious couples who want more love without the sabotage loop — and a clear invitation to recommit, expand, and enjoy the we-space.

Guest resources:

Hendricks Institute seminars (incl. Katie's Nov 2026 Art of Showing Up):
https://hendricks.com/

Art of Showing Up (Nov 6–8, 2026 · Ojai):
https://hendricks.com/seminar/the-art-of-showing-up-in-person-seminar-ojai-ca/

Foundation for Conscious Living (dozens of practice videos):
https://foundationforconsciousliving.org/

About Gay & Katie Hendricks:
Gay and Katie (Kathlyn) Hendricks are pioneers of conscious loving and body intelligence. Through the Hendricks Institute and the Foundation for Conscious Living, they have supported hundreds of thousands of couples, written 40+ books (including The Big Leap, Conscious Loving, and The Conscious Heart), and taught that relationship is a laboratory for expanding your capacity to give and receive love — one recommitment at a time.

Connect With Us:

The Initiated Man — Mike's men's community for doing this work in brotherhood, not alone:
https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/TIM

The 2:2 Couples Container — private, intensive couples work with Mike & Courtney:
https://www.thesacredwe.com/2-2-container-details

Sign up for our couples list:
https://www.thesacredwe.com/thesacredwe

Bringing the Oracle to Him:
https://www.courtneywren.com/bring-your-oracle-to-him

Rebirth 1:1 with Courtney:
https://www.courtneywren.com/containers

Work with Mike:
https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/coaching

Email: transform@itsmikeelliott.com | relating@courtneywren.com
Instagram: @mikeelliott.relating | @courtneywren.relating

Trigger alert: it's not him — it's you. (Well… not entirely you.). If you're aching for him to do the work and finally meet you emotionally — and you know what you've been doing isn't helping — Courtney and Mike go into the feminine's role in sacred relating.

They name the "if he changes, everything will be fine" shadow, the wall women yell over, and why mothering him kills polarity.

The invitation is a different seat: land in Me, know the little girl who's hyper-vigilantly managing him, and embody desire so he can actually feel it — consent before hard talks, fierce love, and delivery from the oracle (not accusation). This isn't another layer of self-blame. It's radical responsibility and freedom: do your part of the dance so the alchemy can come online.

Connect with us:

• Free: Bringing Your Oracle to Him → https://www.courtneywren.com/bring-your-oracle-to-him

• The Initiated Man: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/TIM

• The 2:2 Couples Container: https://www.thesacredwe.com/2-2-container-details

• Couples list: https://www.thesacredwe.com/thesacredwe

• Courtney 1:1: https://www.courtneywren.com/containers

• Mike coaching: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/coaching

Email:

transform@itsmikeelliott.com | relating@courtneywren.com

IG: @mikeelliott.relating | @courtneywren.relating

3 Somatic Practices for Deeper Connection

👉Sign up for a FREE guide here: https://www.sacredrelating.com/deeperconnection

When you feel disconnected from your partner, it’s rarely just about them. In this episode of The Sacred We, Mike and Courtney share why the disconnection so many couples feel isn’t ultimately about the relationship — it’s a disconnection from God.

Mike and Courtney open up about what it means to build a God-led relationship: the different names they each use for the divine, how spirit guided them to each other and into the very home where this podcast was born, and the daily practices — prayer, gratitude, communion — that keep them connected to something bigger than themselves and to each other.

They also unpack two often-misunderstood spiritual concepts, communion and matrimony, not as church rituals but as spiritual initiations every soul moves through — the ongoing practice of staying intimate with spirit and keeping the heart open, again and again, no matter what arises. If you’re ready to understand your relationship as sacred ground for your own awakening, this conversation will meet you there.

Connect With Us:

• The Initiated Man — Mike’s men’s community for doing this work in brotherhood, not alone: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/TIM

• The 2:2 Couples Container — private, intensive couples work with Mike & Courtney: https://www.thesacredwe.com/2-2-container-details

• Sign up for our couples list: https://www.thesacredwe.com/thesacredwe

• Bringing the Oracle to Him: https://www.courtneywren.com/bring-your-oracle-to-him

• Rebirth 1:1 with Courtney: https://www.courtneywren.com/containers

• Work with Mike: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/coaching

Email:

transform@itsmikeelliott.com | relating@courtneywren.com

Instagram:

@mikeelliott.relating | @courtneywren.relating

Every couple knows this dance: she reaches for more and he braces, or he tries to fix what was never broken and she feels unseen. In this episode, Mike and Courtney unpack two of the most common wounds in relationships — the "too much" wound in the feminine and the "not enough" wound in the masculine — starting with a reframed reading of the Adam and Eve myth through a goddess mythology lens.

Then they get real: earlier that same day, Mike and Courtney had their own version of this exact rupture, and they walked through the entire thing — what was said, what was heard, where it went sideways, and how they repaired it. It’s an unfiltered look at how these ancient wounds show up in a real marriage, and what it actually takes to soften them.

If you’ve ever felt like you were "too much" for your partner, or like nothing you do is ever "enough," this conversation will change how you see that pattern — and your partner.

Connect With Us

• The Initiated Man — Mike’s men’s community for doing this work in brotherhood, not alone: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/TIM

• The 2:2 Couples Container — private, intensive couples work with Mike & Courtney: https://www.thesacredwe.com/2-2-container-details

• Sign up for our couples list: https://www.thesacredwe.com/thesacredwe

• Bringing the Oracle to Him: https://www.courtneywren.com/bring-your-oracle-to-him

• Rebirth 1:1 with Courtney: https://www.courtneywren.com/containers

• Work with Mike: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/coaching

Email: transform@itsmikeelliott.com relating@courtneywren.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mikeelliott.relating/ https://www.instagram.com/courtneywren.relating/

What if your relationship didn’t need one more insight — just a better dance? On this episode of The Sacred We, Mike and Courtney sit down with licensed marriage and family therapist Dayna Mullen, who has spent 18 years studying under Stan Tatkin and building a marriage of her own around the same principle she teaches every couple who walks through her door: secure functioning.

Dayna unpacks what Stan Tatkin calls the "couple bubble" — the shared ecosystem a couple creates when they agree the relationship comes first, not one partner’s needs over the other’s. She walks through what secure functioning actually looks like in daily life: the rituals that hold a marriage together, the practice of sitting on the floor to co-regulate instead of trying to talk through a fight, and the golden rule she and her husband Dennis live by — moving at the pace of connection, not the pace of being right.

The conversation goes deep on what secure functioning asks of each attachment style. Dayna names the specific sacrifice for the avoidant, the anxious, and the disorganized — and why none of it is really a sacrifice once you feel what’s on the other side of it. She and Courtney also draw a clear line between secure functioning and codependence, two things that get confused constantly, and talk candidly about why couples build endless structures for their kids and almost none for their marriage.

This one is for anyone ready to stop doing relationships alone — even inside a relationship.

About Dayna Mullen:

Dayna Mullen is a Registered Psychologist, couples therapist, and international relationship coach with more than 25 years studying what makes relationships work, professionally and personally. She helps high-functioning couples go beyond communication tips to the attachment patterns and nervous system dynamics that create real safety and connection. Married 23 years and a mother of three, her mission is to change the culture of relationships.

Learn more about Dayna:

Website: https://www.alignmentpsychology.ca/dayna-mullen

Email: daynavmullen@gmail.com

Connect with us:

• The Initiated Man — Mike’s men’s community for doing this work in brotherhood, not alone: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/TIM

• The 2:2 Couples Container — private, intensive couples work with Mike & Courtney: https://www.thesacredwe.com/2-2-container-details

• Sign up for our couples list: https://www.thesacredwe.com/thesacredwe

• Bringing the Oracle to Him: https://www.courtneywren.com/bring-your-oracle-to-him

• Rebirth 1:1 with Courtney: https://www.courtneywren.com/containers

• Work with Mike: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/coaching

Email:

transform@itsmikeelliott.com

relating@courtneywren.com

Instagram: @mikeelliott.relating | @courtneywren.relating

You already know something needs to change. The Initiated Man Program is where it starts. Join The Initiated Man Program today →https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/TIM

Do you have a partner who avoids hard conversations, avoids taking responsibility, and seems to get farther away the more you reach for connection? In this episode, Mike Elliott breaks down what avoidance really is, why it shows up in relationships, and how it quietly ends up running the show when it goes unaddressed.

Mike shares how avoidance affected his own first marriage, and what changed once he stopped fighting it and started meeting it with compassion. You'll hear the exact language that helped him and Courtney turn avoidance into vulnerability, why criticism makes it worse, and what to say instead when your partner feels far away.

Whether you're the one who pulls away or the one doing the reaching, this episode offers a real, practical path back to connection.

Connect with us:

• 🔥 The Initiated Man — Mike's men's community for doing this work in brotherhood, not alone: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/TIM

• 💚 The 2:2 Couples Container — private, intensive couples work with Mike & Courtney: https://www.thesacredwe.com/2-2-container-details

• ✉️ Join Our Couples List: https://www.thesacredwe.com/thesacredwe

• 🌹 Bringing the Oracle to Him: https://www.courtneywren.com/bring-your-oracle-to-him

• 🌀 Rebirth 1:1 with Courtney: https://www.courtneywren.com/containers

• 🤝 Work with Mike: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/coaching

Email:

transform@itsmikeelliott.com

relating@courtneywren.com

Instagram:

@mikeelliott.relating

@courtneywren.relating

To the mamas holding it all together while still longing to feel like you — Courtney's Holy Mama community is opening its doors soon. Join the waitlist to be the first to know:https://www.courtneywren.com/holy-mama-waitlist

Before she was ten, Courtney had been diagnosed with panic disorder, generalized anxiety, and ADHD — and put on the first of what would be over a decade of psychiatric medication. In this solo episode, she tells the real story behind those diagnoses: the night terrors that started in infancy, the panic attacks that felt like dying, the label of "problem child" that followed her through school, and the slow unraveling of her trust in her own body.

At 20, sitting at what she calls her rock bottom, Courtney chose to stop looking outside herself for a fix. What followed was years of somatic therapy and nervous system work that did what medication, energy healing, and a dozen specialists couldn’t: it healed her. By 29, her anxiety, panic attacks, ADHD symptoms, and PCOS were gone.

This isn’t a story about blame — Courtney is clear that everyone around her, from her parents to her doctors, was doing their best with what they knew. It’s an invitation to get curious about what a child’s nervous system is actually communicating, and to imagine what becomes possible when we stop treating a diagnosis as a life sentence. She also shares a first look at her upcoming course, Parenting the Nervous System, launching this fall.

If you or someone you love has ever been told a diagnosis is just "who they are," this episode offers a different way to see it.

Connect With Us

• The Initiated Man — Mike’s men’s community for doing this work in brotherhood, not alone: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/TIM

• The 2:2 Couples Container — private, intensive couples work with Mike & Courtney: https://www.thesacredwe.com/2-2-container-details

• Sign up for our couples list: https://www.thesacredwe.com/thesacredwe

• Bringing the Oracle to Him: https://www.courtneywren.com/bring-your-oracle-to-him

• Rebirth 1:1 with Courtney: https://www.courtneywren.com/containers

• Work with Mike: https://www.itsmikeelliott.com/coaching

Email:

transform@itsmikeelliott.com

relating@courtneywren.com

Instagram:

@mikeelliott.relating

@courtneywren.relating