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172 | The Growth Gap: Choosing Yourself Without Losing Each Other with Marriage Coach Maggie Reyes

  • Emily Reuschel
  • 1 day ago
  • 4 min read

header for 172 | The Growth Gap: Choosing Yourself Without Losing Each Other with Marriage Coach Maggie Reyes

Listen to The Growth Gap: Choosing Yourself Without Losing Each Other with Marriage Coach Maggie Reyes on: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Your player of choice

What happens when your personal evolution begins to stretch the space between you and your partner? In this deeply honest and compassionate conversation, Emily sits down with feminist marriage coach Maggie Reyes to explore what she calls The Growth Gap, the tension that arises when one partner is actively growing, healing, or awakening, while the other clings to what feels safe, familiar, or expected.


Together, they unpack how to navigate seasons of self-discovery, faith shifts, and identity work without losing connection or abandoning yourself. Maggie introduces her signature “Power of One” philosophy, rooted in systems theory, which teaches that when one person in a relationship changes, the entire dynamic begins to shift. Through humor, real-life stories, and grounded examples, she offers practical tools for honoring your transformation while creating deeper intimacy, even when your partner isn’t “doing the work.”


They discuss what it means to “go first,” how to recognize the difference between fear and disrespect, and how to communicate your growth in ways that invite curiosity instead of defensiveness. Maggie also shares powerful re-frames around resentment, compassion, and the myth that both partners must grow at the same pace or in the same way.


Whether you’re deconstructing long-held beliefs, exploring new layers of yourself, or simply feeling the growing pains of change within your relationship, this conversation is a breath of relief and a roadmap for love that expands instead of contracts.


Meet Maggie Reyes:

Maggie Reyes is a Master Certified Life Coach and Marriage Mentor who helps high-achieving women create relationships that feel like sanctuaries instead of cages, often with the partner they already have. As host of The Marriage Life Coach Podcast and author of the bestselling Questions for Couples Journal, Maggie blends humor, heart, and practical psychology to make relationship transformation feel approachable and even fun.


Through her signature Marriage Mindset Makeover, Soul-Centered Communication framework, and her viral Growth Gap Workshop, Maggie supports women who are deep in their own evolution, doing the therapy, the coaching, the journaling, while their partner might not be on the same path. Her work teaches that one person’s growth can shift an entire relationship, and that thriving partnerships are built on curiosity, compassion, and courage, not control.


In this episode, The Growth Gap: Choosing Yourself Without Losing Each Other with Marriage Coach Maggie Reyes, we cover:

  • What The Growth Gap is and why it happens when one partner evolves and the other resists change

  • How to honor your personal growth without abandoning your relationship or yourself

  • Maggie’s “Power of One” framework and how one person’s transformation can shift the entire relationship

  • The myth that partners must grow at the same pace (and what actually sustains long-term connection)

  • How to communicate your insights and new awareness without triggering defensiveness

  • The difference between fear, indifference, and contempt, and how to know which you’re facing

  • What to do when your growth brings up tension around faith, identity, or worldview differences

  • The mindset of “I go first” and why it’s key for creating healthy change

  • Why curiosity, consent, and compassion are essential for meaningful conversations

  • How to know when growth differences are workable, and when they signal deeper misalignment


Loved this episode?

Share it with someone navigating their own season of growth and relationship evolution. Your shares, ratings, and reviews help Wild & Waking reach more women who are ready to expand, evolve, and rise together, one brave conversation at a time.

Connect with Maggie Reyes:


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About Wild & Waking: 

Wild & Waking is more than a podcast—it’s a sacred return to who you’ve always been.


This space is for the woman standing at the edge of everything she’s outgrown. The one who’s checked all the boxes, followed all the rules, and still feels the quiet ache for something more honest. More alive. More hers.


She’s begun the unraveling—of roles, expectations, identities that no longer fit. She’s remembering the voice beneath the noise, the rhythm beneath the hustle, the truth beneath the performance. She’s reclaiming her joy, her intuition, her fire. And she’s rising—not as a version of who she was told to be, but as the truest expression of who she already is.


Hosted by soul expansion coach Emily Reuschel, Wild & Waking is for the spiritual entrepreneurs, coaches, rural changemakers, and conscious leaders dismantling old paradigms and creating new ways of living, leading, and becoming. Through raw conversations, deep reflections, and embodied wisdom, we explore what it means to awaken a life of abundance, authenticity, and purpose.


This is for the woman who holds both sacred rage and radical joy. Who moves with reverence for the seasons of her life. Who isn’t afraid to break cycles, speak truth, and dismantle what no longer serves—not to destroy, but to create. To rebuild a world rooted in the celebration of difference, the beauty of nuance, and the power of sovereign, embodied leadership.


If you’re ready to come home to yourself—fully, fiercely, and without apology—welcome.


We’ve been waiting for you.


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