On this episode of Investing for Freedom, Mike is joined by a very special guest, his wife, Kara Ayala! Mike and Kara announce that they are starting a couples’ mastermind in 2021, and give the 5 keys to a successful marriage. Enjoy!
“I’ve seen it in other couples, how much further and faster you can go places when you’re on the same page and working together, rather than each trying to do your own thing and having these separate lives.”
HIGHLIGHTS:
0:00 – Intro
1:00 – Kara and Mike are finally putting together a couples mastermind for 2021
2:05 – Mike explains learning with your partner is a great way to build a strong marriage
3:43 – You don’t have to go to everything together, but make sure you incorporate each other into some aspects of your life
5:30 – Mike and Kara explain the importance of connecting even when you have young kids
6:38 – Surrounding themselves with other couples has been a huge motivator for Kara and Mike
7:53 – The first key to a successful marriage is putting your marriage above all else
10:13 – The second key is dreaming and setting goals together
12:31 – The third key is to connect regularly by having fun and taking trips away
15:29 – The 4th key is remembering that you’re on the same team
18:46 – The final key for a successful marriage is holding space for each other
23:40 – Couples can go so much further and faster when you’re on the same page, doing life together
26:10 – Mike and Kara’s couples mastermind is for high-performing couples who want to raise themselves to a new level
FULL TRANSCRIPTION:
Mike Ayala: Thank you for joining me on the Investing for Freedom Podcast, today I’ve got my most favorite guest ever Kara Ayala with me.
Kara Ayala: So happy to be here.
Mike Ayala: We’re going to talk to you guys about something that’s near and dear to our heart today. Marriage. Pretty excited about this. So, it’s interesting. Cause Kara and I, you know, we’ve been on a journey obviously together for over 20 years, it’s been amazing. But the last couple of years we’ve had this I guess just kind of a desire on our heart. We’ve always, you know, we’ve always enjoyed working with couples and surrounding ourselves with couples that are, you know, pull us higher and everything else, but we’ve been considering the last couple of years of putting together a couples’ mastermind. And we’re going to go ahead and launch that in January of 2021.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. I’m super excited about it. I think, you know, with you and traveling with you sometimes, you know, events and talking to men and then leaving their wives out. And then also me going to things and women feeling disconnected from their husbands too. I feel like that’s a huge need for marriages, for them to like come together as one. And in their dreams and in their goals and it doesn’t have to be like separate.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. You know, and it’s such a good point. I can think of one couple specifically that are just an amazing couple. And I met them through a group that I was in a mastermind with. And you know, he would come to the events all the time, and then there was a specific event we would go to. And you know, Kara and I have often said this, like we did this investor summit at sea for a few years with the real estate guys. And I just can’t imagine what that experience would look like without you there. It doesn’t mean that it’s right or wrong. And honestly, like if, you know, you got stuff going on in life and you have little kids or whatever, and you can’t make it work, then you have to decide whether one should go or not. But it’s so much better when we learn and do that together. Because so many times I’ve been in an environment with you where I just think about it afterward. Like how in the heck would I go back and even begin to explain to you what happened there? And I’m thinking specifically of an event we did with the real estate guys in early January of 2016, I think it was. And through that event, I decided, we decided that I needed to sign up for this mastermind. And it was a $50,000 commitment. It was a big deal. And I can’t imagine if you hadn’t been in that room for two days, that we would be aligned. Not that you’ve ever told me, no, I can’t go do something, but also, it’s so much easier when you’re in that zone, in that environment. And again, I’m not saying that everything you do, you have to do together but creating this environment where we can grow together as couples, I think is super important. And so back to what I was saying you know, being on that cruise for a week-long and getting to meet people like Robert Kiyosaki and Ken McElroy and all these people we’ve had the privilege of hanging out with, I just can’t imagine not being on the same page. And I think that happens a lot of times in marriages, you know, whether it’s the man or the woman, it doesn’t really matter. One’s going in a certain direction and we’re not aligned. We’re not taking step-by-step.
Kara Ayala: Yeah, totally. And I think, I think a lot of times when like you were saying, like, it doesn’t mean you have to go to everything together, but like make sure that you are incorporating some things together, because like you said, I don’t think that we probably would be where we are today if I wouldn’t have had been at that event. And you, at that first event at the real estate guys. Just because I think when you put yourself in those environments you can go home and explain it all to them, but it doesn’t, it’s not the same because you’re not in the energy of that room and in the presence of what’s happening. And you don’t feel that like pulling on your heart of like, yes, this is where I’m supposed to go and the changes that you’re wanting to make. So, I think that it is super important, whether you know, decide there’s been many things that you’ve done alone and many things that I’ve done alone. But I think for the majority of things, we’ve always kind of came together and invited each other on our journeys. And if you do experience something, now I kind of know what that is. Like if you come home and you tell me, oh my gosh, this changed my life. I know because I’ve been in those rooms with you and I know what it feels like.
Mike Ayala: Yeah, we’re going to get into shortly here. You know, just some of the keys that we believe you have to have in your life in order to have a successful marriage, but one of those is to connect regularly and have fun. And just over the last couple of weeks, Kara was on a trip. She’s in a mastermind with Kayla Craft. And I mean, that’s totally changed your mind and mindset and really just set you on a trajectory that’s really amazing to watch. I’m super excited to see where just that whole experience takes you, but simultaneously I was on a trip as well with GoBundance, which I talk about a lot. I was in Austin with the champions group, which is part of GoBundance. And so we come back both of us being gone and yes, it’s challenging, you know, our kids are older and they’re 20,18 and 16, but even when they were younger, like we made some of this stuff working, we always kept our kids first. But when you know that you know that you know that you need to do something, you’ve got to go. And so, anyway, Kara and I were both at these different events and we made a point to come back and connect and that’s one of the keys is to connect regularly and have fun. But as you were saying, like, you understand, I understand not like while I wasn’t in the room and I don’t know exactly what you went through or what the changes were and you can’t recreate that. So that’s not what we’re saying, but we took the time to intentionally connect and spend a lot of time together that next, well, actually I was going on another trip. So, we had like this short window, but I felt like we really connected over the next couple of days. And that’s extremely important but imagine a couple’s mastermind where you can do this together. And we’ve, you know, we’ve done some real estate events and different things together, and obviously, we’ve grown together in business. But imagine a mastermind where we can intentionally grow together as a couple and then go off and do whatever it is that we do individually in our businesses, careers, and investing and our roles as fathers and our roles as mothers, but then come back and intentionally connect with a group. We think that it’s going to be pretty amazing.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. And I think too, like surrounding yourself with other couples that are like, as committed as you are to their relationships and to their families and to their businesses, like, it’s not a, you could have to pick one of them, but I think being surrounded with other couples has been huge for us too.
Mike Ayala: Yeah, totally. I love it. So the crazy thing, and this is why I think you know, Kara and I’ve been talking about this for a while, but we really feel the need to launch this now more than ever, marriages are under attack and this isn’t, you know, I think this is something that’s been going on for a long time, not just in the United States, but in general, you know, the divorce rates over 50%. And there’s a lot of reasons for that. But when you look at everything that’s going on right now with COVID and the chaos in the world, and, you know, couples literally being trapped in their homes together, we’re not used to that. And I think the onslaught of assault on marriages is I know it is it’s as strong as it’s ever been, but it’s financial, it’s personal, it’s relationships. The kids are trapped at home. There are all these things that have been going on. And if we don’t figure out first and foremost how to pull ourselves out of that and lift ourselves up, but also do that as a couple. This is going to get worse.
Kara Ayala: Yeah, I agree. Should we talk about the five keys to a successful marriage?
Mike Ayala: Yeah. Do you want to jump in, or you want me to?
Kara Ayala: Sure. So, I think number one, we put was putting your marriage above all else. And I think with that, comes being committed. I think, you know, when you’re committed to something, you’re going to make it work and you’re going to show up as your best self, but putting your marriage above all else. I think that that’s something that is hard in the beginning stages when you have kids and stuff, or maybe the later stages, depending on when you have kids, because your kids demand so much of you that it’s easy to just do whatever they want, or if you have a business or, you know, your career is really taking off, it’s easy to say, well, I know that they’re going to be waiting for me later on. So, I think that that’s such a huge thing. And we’ve been there where we haven’t put our marriage first and where, you know, I haven’t taken a trip with you because of the kids or, you know we put our businesses before our marriage before, but I think the importance of keeping that a priority and not that you ditch your kids and ditch your business and ditch your careers, but like making sure that like that is taken care of above all else has been huge.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. And I think there’s little you know; this is not a hundred things that you have to do in order to create those boundaries. It’s literally just creating one, two, three little boundaries. Your kids have to understand that not only do you need individual time but that as a couple, you need time. And if you don’t teach them those boundaries, they don’t know. It’s not their fault that they come, you know, pounding in your room at seven o’clock in the morning when you’re trying to sleep in on a Saturday. It’s not their fault that when you say, Hey, mom and dad are going to go outside and have a glass of wine and have a date, they don’t understand what that is. And so, you have to create those boundaries, but it’s the same thing with business. And even as couples, it’s really important that we communicate through that with each other and with the kids.
Kara Ayala: Yeah, I agree. And I think like, you know when your kids are younger, you have to just really, you know, rely on babysitters and make it a point, like to find people that you trust that can watch your kids for a couple of hours. I mean, you don’t need a lot of time to connect. You know, even during busy times, like if you can find, you know, one night, a week to just really connect and even if you can’t find a babysitter like maybe you put the kids to bed early that one night and you stay up a little later than you normally would just to make that connection. I think that that’s going to be really important too.
Mike Ayala: Yep. Anything else on that?
Kara Ayala: No.
Mike Ayala: Cool. The next one.
Kara Ayala: Dream and set goals together. This one’s probably one of my favorites and I think that this is something that we have always been really strong with. I mean, I can even remember when we were dating, and we would sit up all night just like talking about our dreams and where we wanted to be. And I think that that’s really held us together is we’ve always dreamed really big together and believed in each other’s dreams.
Mike Ayala: Yeah, I remember early in our marriage, you sat down and it was just a little piece of paper and said, you know, what are some of the things we want this year? And I don’t know, you know, I think even dreaming is something that you intentionally grow into, but then it was like, we want a new couch this year. I don’t remember what it all was, but I remember you pulling out that piece of paper later that year. And basically, we had achieved everything, even though we didn’t keep that in front of us. It wasn’t like something that we looked at every day back then. But we had achieved everything on that list. And so, I think setting that intention, even if you’re not consciously thinking about it, your subconscious is working on that. So I think we’ve always been pretty good about dreaming and setting goals together, but we’ve also, you know, just back to the mastermind and you know, a couple of years ago we did the couples goal setting retreat with Jeff Woods and Jay Papasan and Wendy. And that was a big transition for me because it’s one thing to dream and set those goals, but it’s another thing to measure those. And I remember even just going through the one thing I was looking at the 411 all the time and 52 date nights started showing up on there. And we’ve always been pretty good about date nights, I think. But you know, that’s something that you and I don’t miss, unless we’ve got some out of town thing or something, it’s like, I look forward to it. It’s actually like Thursday nights. It’s my getaway. So, dreaming and setting goals together. Super powerful.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. And I think the setting goals too, like you said, like actually putting it on paper and having some kind of way to measure it. I love how we’ve been setting our goals. The last, maybe four years it’s been. I feel like that that’s really has changed, you know, the 52 dates or whatever, know, like actually putting a number to things even in our physical, you know, health, things like that making it like it’s something that you can measure just really brings it down and then you can, like you used to always say, then you can adjust like, Oh, maybe this isn’t really a goal that I want to achieve. I’m not willing to put in the time for whatever it is.
Mike Ayala: It’s so good. So, connect regularly and have fun.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. This is what we talked about earlier. I think that you know, going on vacations together is really important as a couple as well, even if it’s just a weekend getaway when the kids are little, you know, but as they get older, if you can get a week away, like that is super important for you to connect and remember why you fell in love in the first place. Because I think that that’s oftentimes why couples end up not being together later on in life because they have been putting their kids and then the kids leave. And they’re like, who are you? I don’t even know who you are because they haven’t taken the time to have fun together and to laugh and to just be silly and do fun things together.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. And I think you know, as you’re sitting here saying this, I think the thing that really separates couples who win from those that don’t, and even people who win, we all have these thoughts and I’m thinking backwards to different phases. You know, you had this thing that when the kids turned one, we would like when they turned one, we would go away. Yeah. Leave them. That’s something that we needed to do in order to keep our marriage first and also give you time away from the kids. And, so, you know, people get those thoughts all the time. I don’t know if it’s in the headphones. It’s pretty loud. What was I saying? Oh, going away. I think a lot of people have those thoughts, but they just don’t act on it. And so, it’s really important. I, you know, I don’t think that we’re necessarily anything special that we’ve had these ideas about goal setting from the time we were married or taking that time away when they’re one year old or even I had a mentor, we had a mentor early on in his name was Ron Lewis and he had this 7-7-7 rule. And we didn’t directly adopt it, but basically, it was like every seven days they had a family day and every seven weeks they took a mini-vacation and then every seven months they took a big one. And so, we set a goal early on to travel with our kids. And we did that consistently. And that was just always something that was part of us. So, I think the key to this though, is making sure that you get away as a couple. I think that’s really what you were honing in on. And it doesn’t have to be some extravagant trip, like you said. I mean, it’s just connecting once a week, even is important.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. And like you said, you know, like when they were little, like when they’re, you know, really little, like, it’s sometimes hard to leave them and there’s no reason to, if you don’t have to. But I think, you know, making sure that you do take that time once they are, you know, maybe weaned and stuff like that, you do take that time to go away because also your kids need a break from you. I know we think that they just want us all the time and they do, but they also need a break from you as much as you need a break from them. So, I think it’s really healthy for the kids and for you as a couple too.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. You know and again, just on this note, I mean, connecting regularly and having fun, there’s just something that’s rattling around in my brain. We also need to, this doesn’t really have anything to do with connecting regularly and having fun, but I’m going to say it because we’re here, understanding what the other person needs to and when they need that time away is super important. And that’s not something that, you know, we’re always great as people, but also communicating what you need. I think that’s super important. So, the next one is, remember, you’re on the same team. I think this is pretty important because a lot of times, again, there’s a lot of stress in the world. There’s a lot of financial stress. There’s a lot of pressure to, you know, build our careers and all this stuff. And at the end of the day you know, we tend to lash out and take things out on those that are closest to us. And we really need to remember we’re on the same team.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. Even I can think back when Dylan was in the hospital when he was little, and I remember a couple like sitting down with us and telling us, because it was really hard. It was really stressful telling us that we needed to remain on the same team that, you know, cause it’s easy when you’re in those situations to kind of point fingers and blame. Not that it was either of our faults that he had to have surgery, but that’s just a natural human reaction is to take the blame and put it somewhere else or, you know, take out, like you said, lash out on each other in times of stress. When really, if we could, we took a step back. And I so appreciate that couple of just telling us that because it was so stressful and that was probably our first like very stressful time in our marriage, but taking a step back and being like, Oh man, we’re on the same team. You could do so much more together. When you’re on the same team and going in the direction that you both want to go into, because at the end of the day, most of the time you both want the same outcome. So, remembering that like, or if you have like struggles with your kids, you’re parenting your kids. Maybe you parent a little different, but you’re still on the same team. You still want the same outcome for your child. So, focusing on that part.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. And I think, you know, just communicating through that as super important. I remember, you know, when I say there’s a lot of outside forces, you know, you might, if you’re listening to this, you might, Oh, well, you know, that’s easy for you to say, you guys have this perfect marriage. Nobody does. There’s outside forces on everybody’s marriage. It’s how you come together. And remember that you’re on the same team and you fight through that battle with each other instead of against each other. I’m thinking of a time in like, 2007. We had a big customer that basically they went bankrupt. It was a big gold mine and there was some mismanagement and some EPA issues. And so, they went bankrupt owing us like $400,000, which was a ton of money for, you know, our company at that point in time. And I was working a lot. We had simultaneously we’re heading into 2008 and we had to lay off like 30 people right at Christmas time, super challenging time. And I was stressed out. I was grinding. I was working a ton and I’ll never forget you saying, you know, this isn’t you. I don’t remember exactly how you said it, but basically this isn’t you, you’re gone all the time. You’re stressed out. And I’m like, well, what do you want me to do? Like, you know, we could lose everything and you’re like, what are they going to do? Take our kids. Like, that’s a great example of remembering you’re on the same team. And again, I don’t remember exactly how you said it, but just bringing us back to that core basis of like, you couldn’t lose everything and that’s okay. Like you can start over. Sometimes there’s outside forces that come against you and there’s nothing you can do about it, but what you can do is making sure, you know, make sure that we remember that, that we’re on the same team and pull together.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. And it’s all about that perspective, right? You could lose everything, but really what matters, what really matters in your life.
Mike Ayala: Are they going to take our kids? No. Like yeah, no way our kids are still going to love us. We’re going to be fine. We’re not starving. There’s food on the table. So, the last one is holding space for each other. I think this is super important.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. And I think the holding space, you know, when you maybe might not be on the same page, maybe one of you is growing more than the other at a certain time in your life. I know there’s been times where you’ve grown more or faster than me, but I feel like you’ve always given me grace and like invited me in and then also like with each other’s dreams too. So, I also remember a time where you had this huge, huge dream and it was just like so big that it overwhelmed me. And I thought it made me feel like we weren’t going to have our family. Like we were going to lose something. And I remember really just struggling with that at that time. And I remember God telling me, give him space, allow him to move into that. It’s not your responsibility to like to create these controls around it. And I remember calling you and telling you, I think you were on a road trip. Like I’m, you know, I just want you to know I’m giving you space. Like you can go ahead and dream all you want about this. Like go for it. And just me, I mean, I don’t even know if it did anything for you. I think it was more about me but allowing that space and trying to control what you were doing of, you know, you still haven’t even fulfilled that dream today. And that was probably, I don’t know, five years ago. So allowing me to say you know, go ahead and you can do this and it created space for you to really dream and I’m not trying to control you if that makes sense.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. Well it totally makes sense. And you know, like you said, you don’t know if it even did anything for me, it can’t not do something for the other person and both of us really, because if we are pulling together. You know, sometimes we need that space, but it happens with both of us all the time. You’re growing in areas that I’m not, and I think it’s just not being judgmental. It’s giving them that space and trying to understand too. Wendy Papasan in that couple’s goal-setting retreat said something that you know, Jay’s dream was to always have a ranch and she’s like, ha ha, that’s funny, whatever. But she said, it kept showing up on his dream list every year. And so then finally she’s like, okay, he’s serious about this. And even though it wasn’t like necessarily her dream, she got into alignment with that. And then they were able, and I think she even doubted it for a while. But once she got in alignment, then things started happening where it was able to come together and you know, it doesn’t have to be huge things like a ranch. It could be literally like; I want to take a girl’s trip once a year or twice a year. I want to take a guys… there’s so many things that if we don’t sit down and communicate about it, what do we really want? And that’s where that holding. Sometimes you probably think that things that I want to go do are crazy. And it’s like just…
Kara Ayala: All the time.
Mike Ayala: Just because we don’t understand it, it doesn’t mean it’s not important. And giving that you know, whether it’s business goals, investing goals, personal goals. I mean, I can’t understand some of the things that you would want to do and vice versa, but it’s important that we hold that space for each other.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. And then just allowing each other to grow into, you know, there’s probably been times where you’ve seen like the potential in me or that I’ve seen potential in you, but not like that nagging just like holding space of like, Hey, you know, like when it’s time for him to arrive at this thing or me it’ll happen and not being that like nagging voice.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. Well, and if you think about just your personal process and struggle at times, all of us, I’m not pointing to you. Sometimes it takes us a while to sort through what we really want. And this is why that five-part formula is so important. What do you really want? Why do you want it? What are you going to do to get it? Measure results and adjust. It’s so important because sometimes what we think we want, I’ve learned to slow down a little bit because I’ve gotten in situations where I got what I wanted, but it really wasn’t what I wanted. And so, I think slowing down is important. And on the subject of holding space, you know, there are certain things that sometimes I think I might want, and I might say it like 15 times, but I’m not moving through it quickly because I have to really figure that out. And if I can’t figure it out, then imagine your spouse, like trying to dictate, you know, Hey, move through this quicker. Not giving us grace, not giving us space. We need to do that for ourselves first and foremost, but for each other, it’s super important.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. And I think that giving permission to, if you end up in a place where you have something you don’t want giving yourself permission to decide, you don’t want that. And that it’s okay to not continue on whatever that journey is too.
Mike Ayala: It’s so important that we don’t judge ourselves. And I think even as important that we don’t judge each other. We are on the same team. It is super important. What else you want to talk about?
Kara Ayala: I don’t know. I mean, I just think that couples and I think that you can go so much further and faster. I mean, I’ve seen it in other couples that have modeled it to us of how much further and faster you can go places when you’re on the same page and working together rather than each trying to do your own thing and having these separate lives. And then you come together like at night and eat dinner together, like doing life together. And I think a lot of times you start out doing life together, but then as you know, things start coming up in your life, your work or your career and your kids, it’s easy to just start kind of slowly growing away from each other.
Mike Ayala: Yeah and it’s interesting sitting back to you and this is why we’re so excited about launching the couples mastermind because you know, there’s a lot of events for her. There’s a lot of events for him. There’s a lot of events for families. You know, I just look around and we’re so blessed to be surrounded by just amazing mentors and people everywhere. You know, just again, you were on a women’s retreat for five days, seven days, and I was gone for five. You know, and we’re out, I’m with a bunch of men, you’re with a bunch of women and yeah, we come back and we connect but imagine having a space that’s designed for couples to win together. I’m super excited about that.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. I’m really excited about it too. And I think that’s a little bit selfish of me because I want to be surrounded by other couples that want the same things that we want. I think it’s so powerful when you have those other couples around you that, you know, they’re encouraging you and they’re giving you permission to like go after your dreams big and there’s no. I think that’s one thing that I’ve noticed is like, you know, you want to surround yourself with people that are going to celebrate your wins. As you know, like sometimes it’s easy to go with your friends and be like, complain, you know, have a drink with them and complain about all the things, but who are your friends that you can go with and say, this is what’s happening and the awesome things that are going to keep cheering you on to, and you do the vice versa with them.
Mike Ayala: You know, that’s such a great point that you bring up about it being selfish. And I agree with that a hundred percent. And you know, as a side note, there will be an application process. We’re going to be super selective about who we get in or let in, because that’s what we want. We want to spend a year with amazing couples that not only were, we’re going to create a space, we’re going to facilitate a space where people can grow together. But the reality is we’re going to challenge each other and we’re only going to accept couples that will level us up and you know, force us to step up. So, it’s such a great point.
Kara Ayala: So, who would this be for?
Mike Ayala: So, this is for high performing couples and, you know, families who they want to have a consistent place where you know, their marriage and family can be the number one focus. And so that’s a big thing for us. Couples who want to have the support and working through, you know, goal-setting, execution, taking their relationship, families, businesses, investments, all of that stuff to a level that they never knew was possible. Again, we’ve done this, you know, we’ve been in masterminds where you’re growing, I’m growing, but it’s designed around me as an individual. So, to have that for couples I think is going to be amazing.
Kara Ayala: Yeah and like the goal setting, I think if you’re wanting to learn how to set goals together, I think we’ve created a really awesome process for that. So, it’ll be fun to share the way that we set our goals together and how we track them throughout the year. And to share that with other couples and see them really fulfill their dreams and their goals together is going to be just amazing.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. And I don’t mean this from a scary perspective, but imagine, you know, having a level of accountability, not only from us but the people around and again, there’s always an adjust component. There’s grace in our world. If you guys decide that you want to adjust that, then that’s fine, but we’re not going to just let people slide. I mean that we don’t want that. At the end of the day, we want accountability. And I don’t want that to sound like a scary thing but imagine being surrounded by 10 or 12 couples that are not only holding you accountable, but you know, they’re your cheer squad, right? They’re pushing you along. They’re there to, to help you along the way. And we’re going to have monthly connections, but you’ll also connect with everyone in the groups. That’s going to be huge.
Kara Ayala: Yeah. And I think if you’re wanting to like grow as a couple and have fun together, we’re going to have a lot of fun. We’re going to have like really awesome experiences and things like that, where we go on trips together, but we do fun things as couples. So, I think that that would be if you’re interested in that.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. Should be super fun. So, we’re going to launch this in January. That’ll start with the first, basically the goal setting retreat. And then from then on, we’ll have, again, monthly connection points. We’re not going to get into all the details right now, but super excited for that bucket list trip too, cause those that, I mean, just imagine having you know, a trip with the most amazing couples it’s going to be so fun.
Kara Ayala: Yeah, It’s going to be awesome.
Mike Ayala: So, who’s it not for?
Kara Ayala: I think this is super important because you know, if you’re struggling in your marriage, this might be tempting for you, but this is definitely not a place where if you’re, you know, this is not a place alas stitch effort for your marriage. So, I think that that’s super important too like, you know, if you are in that place, there are definitely other options for you like therapy and things like that. But you know, we’re not counselors or therapists and nor do we desire to be. So, we definitely want couples that are for the most part whole in themselves. I’m not saying that you have to have a perfect marriage because there is no perfect marriage. We all know that, but you’re not going there expecting this to fix your marriage, I guess.
Mike Ayala: A hundred percent. And again, it’s super important, you know, to point that out. I mean, we’re not looking for perfection at all. But you know, this is not for a wife that’s dragging her husband to be part of a group or a husband who’s dragging their wife. We want to be very selective and I don’t care if this ends up being one couple we’re going to have the best year ever with that one couple, if that’s what it comes down to, I don’t think it’s going to be. But yeah, we’re not looking for, you know, that spouse that’s dragging the other one along, any of that stuff. If you want to literally have your best year ever and grow as a couple and be challenged by other high-performing couples, this is for you. Is there any other people that it’s not for?
Kara Ayala: Yeah. I think that sums it up. It’s just really, really for people who want to grow together and experience and have adventures together and just have fun.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. I love it. If you’re interested, how do they reach out?
Kara Ayala: I think the best way is if they go to, what is it, www.powercoupleswin.com and you can enter your email in there. There is, I know Mike mentioned it, there is an application process because we are going to be selective of who is in this group. And that’s just for the integrity of the whole group.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. So just kind of a little timeline here. I mean, we’re going to start taking applications here shortly. Again, just reach out to www.powercoupleswin.com. This launches in January. So, you know, we’ve got a couple of months to work through this and make sure we curate the right group, but we’re only going to probably take 10 couples, maybe 12 max. So, it will be limited, and we want to keep it tight for specific reasons. But you know, if you’re interested, I’ll reach out and we’ll get the process going.
Kara Ayala: Yeah, I’m excited.
Mike Ayala: It’s going to be fun. I’m excited to grow with you.
