Dr. Bill's Blog: Insight on maintaining healthy relationships and living a more fulfilled life

Road Blocks To Love

Just as there are methods and means for creating love, there are defensive processes that can obstruct it. Let’s take a look at some of the main love-killers.

Globalization: “Everybody does that.” Globalization essentially obscures the truth. If someone doesn’t want to admit that he or she has some responsibility in the problem, globalization is a perfect distraction.

Blame-shifting: “And you do the same thing but worse.” Another excellent way to shift the blame away from yourself and back onto the other person.

Victimhood: “I’m so good to you, and you treat me so badly.” The victim is always innocent and good. This is an emotional double whammy. “Not only are you picking on me but you should feel guilty because I am so good.”

Gaslighting: “I was just kidding; can’t you take a joke?” “Noise? What noise?” This process is more insidious because it is an effort to make the other person feel crazy in order to gain power and control.

Entitlement: “You’re the one who made me angry. You deserve it.” Entitlement is like a free pass to behave however you want to because you are the aggrieved party. This kind of behavior is a surefire defense because nothing gets through.

Denial: “I’m not angry.” Denial is an emotional way to slam the door on any form of communication about what went wrong.

Displacement: “Just because you had a bad day at work, don’t take it out on me.” Displacement happens more than most people know or understand. It’s important to tell our partner when we think this is going on.

Guilt: “I work my ass off to give you everything and you can’t even make me some tea.” Guilt is often part of playing the victim, but it can also be used as a control mechanism.

Shame/Blame: “You’re a human slug. You never do anything.” This process is essentially infantile because there is no empathy or compassion in it. Infants and children are not expected to be compassionate, but adults are.

Stonewalling: “This is the way I am; take it or leave it.” Stonewalling is exactly that: it shuts down communication. Another form of stonewalling is simply to say nothing.

Projection: “You think I’m stupid, don’t you?” This process is very common because most people are not in touch with how insecure they feel, so what they experience feels like it is coming from the other person when it is really coming from within.

Devaluation: “You really could lose some of that extra weight.” Devaluation is a defense against caring and needing anyone. The less others mean to us, the less we need them.

Constructive Communicating

As we look at what it takes to sustain a loving relationship, it may appear to be quite daunting. I try to support couples by explaining that if they can learn effective problem solving, it will only be difficult in the beginning. If we can evaluate and understand what causes negative communication, both from our own assessment and from listening to what our partner is telling us, our reality will, in time, meet our expectations. We may go many months or even years between serious conflicts once we know how to create a loving environment that is rich with humor and loving kindness.

Learning to evaluate the way we’re communicating, and to talk to our partner in constructive new ways, can be a challenge in itself, especially if the old ways are deeply ingrained. So I work with couples to help them change their interactive style and incorporate the elements of effective communication. Effective communication involves our ability to recognize what it is that we are feeling, then what it is we want. In this process, we take time to initially assess what is wrong or what we need to communicate. Next, we make sure that the other person gets the message the way we are intending it. Then we recognize and express what the problem or the need is. Once we have defined the problem or the need, we can then look at possible solutions that both people feel comfortable with. Most important in this process is to listen with empathy, tolerance for differences, and understanding about what is being said, and to provide feedback to show that we recognize each other’s positions. The dialogue below contains most of the elements of effective problem solving. This may look easy, but guess what, it’s not.

He:   When you withdraw, it scares me. My parents withdrew from me when I didn’t behave the way they wanted, and my girlfriends rejected me because I didn’t behave the way they wanted, so when I get angry or upset with you I’m afraid to show it because I’m afraid that you’ll throw me away. So I push you away.

She:  I will never throw you away because you get mad at me, but I will get upset if you don’t tell me what’s bothering you. It always comes out anyway. We have to tell each other how we feel without tearing away our love for each other. When I say something that is insensitive and you shut down, and then I get more angry and critical, we are just repeating our old patterns. How can we make this different?

He:   We could start by understanding what we are doing to alienate each other. Then we could take some time to find out what we are after. Once we know, then we can help each other to give what we need and want.

The key elements here are support, understanding, and a willingness to reflect on one’s own behavior. Using self-knowledge and feelings to resolve conflicts together creates a compassionate and loving outcome. The more a couple can create these kinds of conversations, the better they will be at creating love that lasts.

When Do We Know That It's Over?

Relationships start out with such promise. Everything seems so perfect. The way they look, speak, smile and the newness of it all is so sweet. Then over time the power of the beginning attraction begins to fade like the sun setting on the blush of a rose. First there are those disappointments, he forgets your birthday, she has a strange attachment to her brother, then the squabbles, until finally you feel alienated and you don't know how you got there. Don't know if my readers remember Citizen Kane by Orson Wells, but there is a breakfast table scene that plays out the arc of a failing relationship. It's done in about seven small scenes ending with the two of them in total silence. So how do we know when a relationship is worth saving, or we should throw in the towel?

There are some very real clues about what makes a relationship fail and what makes is sing the Star Spangled Banner. Clue #1. Are you able to look at what you might be doing to cause the current conflict? If not then probably you should be a confirmed bachelor and save yourself the trouble of getting left over and over again. Not being able to look at yourself is the most important characteristic for a lasting relationship. Clue #2. Are there any substance abuse or alcohol problems? This one is a no brainer. If we are high we can't get by. We have to be conscious if we want to connect with our partner. Getting high is a way to not look at our pain and suffering or whatever is bothering us, so it just remains and comes right back, ergo no relationship can withstand ground hog day. Clue #3,4,5. Is this person overly anxious, depressed or has Mommy or Daddy issues that are not worked out? No way. Clue #6. Can this person be sexual? What distinguishes a marriage or a relationship from a pure friendship is sex. So, if that is not working, nothing else will unless both of you are asexual. Clue #7. Does this person have anger or rage problems? This is not going to be a fun relationship and you will burn out on the tantrums. Clue #8. Can they deal with their own stuff? Paying bills, being on time, cleaning up after themselves may not seem important but over time they will wear you out.

If you answered yes to all those questions, jump out the back Jack or get a new plan because you are in deep do do. If your relationship is going to work you will need to know something about yourself, you have to be able to be reasonable and willing to work on stuff to see your part in it, and be clean and sober. These are the givens. But don't be surprised when someone in your family shows up with a complete wreck who they plan to change. Changing someone has to be off the table or you will be under it. The best way to tell if you can make it with someone is that you know the worst of them and it's not so bad. If you can take the very deep down crud of another person and still be on your feet, you will make it. Hang tight, do the work when it comes up and in the meantime have some fun, you deserve it.

How Love Is Made

Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don’t know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of witherings, of tarnishings.

—Anaïs Nin

The way a relationship begins is often a far cry from what it’s like after many years of being together, and what it’s like is what we make it. If our partner asks for help and we don’t give it—or if we take a moment to consider our partner’s point of view; if we feel entitled to scream obscenities when we’re angry—or if we pay close attention to our partner’s needs; either way, our actions will have consequences, positive or negative. To ensure that the love we begin with is still there 10 or 20 years in the future is thus a constant process of making and creating a loving environment.

When people talk about the “work” of relationships, what do they mean? Simply that if a relationship is to stay intimate, loving, and happy, it requires some effort on our part. We need to be compassionate and consciously available; to make sure we understand our partner’s point of view before we express our own; to speak and act respectfully; to check our defenses at the door and empathize instead of falling into tit-for-tat retaliation. During arguments we must remember who it is we love and what our intentions are for the relationship. At the same time, we must be aware of what is causing our anger, which may mean holding on to it until we do understand it. To find love is a miracle; to keep it takes focus. Relationship is at its core very simple, but simplicity is a complex process.

People have made war in the name of love, spent fortunes in love’s pursuit, and even died for love. And although there are many ways of loving—from affectionate friendship, to the infatuation of love at first sight, to the romantic love that arises after infatuation fades, to the consummate connection that is forged in an intimate process over many years—they share a common heart. Diane Ackerman writes in A Natural History of Love:

So it is with love. Values, customs, and protocols may vary from ancient days to the present, but not the majesty of love. People are unique in the way they walk, dress, and gesture, yet we’re able to look at two people—one wearing a business suit, the other a sarong—and recognize that both of them are clothed. Love also has many fashions, some bizarre and (to our taste) shocking, others more familiar, but all are part of a phantasmagoria we know. In the Serengeti of the heart, time and nation are irrelevant. On that plain all fires are the same fire.

Others have recognized that fire, too, and given it names of their own. Pioneer psychologist Harry Stack Sullivan wrote that love is the state in which the needs and feelings of the other are as important as or more important than our own. Jean-Paul Sartre wrote of love as a wish or call for the other to come out. Sigmund Freud is well known for describing the two most important conditions in life as love and work. Milan Kundera describes love as interrogation. These notions of love all have a common theme: an intense feeling that pulls one’s thoughts and desires toward the loved one.

For many of us, that intense pull is the defining characteristic of a romantic relationship—and the thing that makes being in love so irresistible to us. We think of romance as the stuff of grand gestures, selfless acts, and consuming feelings of till death do us part. We yearn to be filled with the contentment that the thought of love conjures up. But real love is more than romantic thoughts and feelings passively received. Real love is actively made, and we must consciously choose to make it, not just once but throughout our lives together, over and over again.

An excerpt from "Happy Together".

For more information go to www.happytogetherbook.com

How Valentine's Day Can Ruin Your Relationship

How Valentines Day Can Ruin Your Relationship

Candlelit dinners replete with a fine bottle of wine, diamonds, roses or imported chocolates. NOTE TO MEN: If you haven't planned or purchased something from this list, you're more than likely going to have a horrifying night (and you won’t get lucky either) this Feb. 14th.  Why? Because unrealistic expectations are not just about women, but men too. We all fall into the Valentine’s Day trap and beyond. The problem with romantic fantasy is that it starts long before our first big Valentine's purchase or even before our first kiss.  We've been hearing the “happily-ever-after” fairy tales since we were in kindergarten and we've grown up with a steady diet of the diamonds-are-forever commercials.

The commercialization of Valentine’s Day has given rise to great expectations and just as often great disappointments if the gift giving is not enough to meet our romantic fantasy. These expectations have evolved over time and with the help of jewelers and car makers have encapsulated our longings to be loved with an equally open wallet. This profligate giving of expensive tokens has become the opportunistic statement of our enduring emotional wishes. We all want someone to think we’re special, that we can’t live without them! What better means of satiating our need to be loved than coughing up a diamond or two. The problem is that we may not have the means to meet the need. 

So it is with Valentine’s Day. As our expectations soar with the coming of this much ballyhooed holiday, we can make out the problems that may come with it. It is not that gift giving is bad or that we should not give them but if we are making a connection between the size and cost of the gift with the quality of our love we are creating an expectation that can cause a deep emotional rift in what may be an otherwise healthy relationship. 

Ted Huston, a professor at the University of Texas developed a project in 1979 that followed 168 married couples for fourteen years to see what factors were present in successful long term marriages. He found that couples who entered their relationship with high expectations were far more likely to experience conflict and disenchantment. 

Huston found that even though there is a change from courtship to marriage in the adage that “all finance’s love football” it will not ultimately ruin our relationship. He concludes that the greatest harbinger of hope for couples is of all things friendship. It appears that those couples who managed to keep their expectations realistic and concentrated more on the way they interacted with each other proved to be a winner over the long haul. 

When we think about friendship with our lover what immediately springs to mind is: what’s friendship go to do with romance? Long term love is sustained not by romance alone but by the daily activities of following through on promises, showing up, being there when we are needed, owning up to our responsibility for our part in an argument, and first and foremost by being the kind of person who is worthy of being loved. 

So we ask ourselves how in the world can I be best friends without losing the romance? Not so easy. To do that we need to find out what makes romance and what breaks it. The critical piece that ruins relationships is the inability to resolve conflicts. Here’s where it gets tricky. When conflict arises what do we traditionally do? Usually we get defensive. The best offense is the best defense. Of course if we expect our mate to be romantic and it does not happen we find ourselves complaining and then the defenses come out like July 4^th. The key is to express our disappointments in a way that doesn’t feel critical to our mate. Conflict is normal but our ability to resolve difficulties without alienating our partner is the key to long term romance. Here are just of few our my favorite defenses to avoid. 

Globalization--"Everybody Does That"
Blame-Shifting--"And you do the same thing but worse."
The Victim--"I'm so good to you, and you treat me so badly."
Gas-lighting--"I was just kidding; Can't you take a joke?"
Entitlement--"You are the one who made me angry; You deserve it.
Denial--"I'm not angry."
Displacement--"Just because you had a bad day at work, don't take it out on me."
Guilt--"I work my ass off to give you everything and you can't even make me some tea."
Shame/Blame: "You are a human slug; you never do anything."
Stonewalling: "This is the way I am, take it or leave it."
Projection: "You think I'm stupid, don't you?"
Devaluation: "You really could lose some of that extra weight." 

If we can avoid these toxic defenses we are most of the way there. We have also found that the most common reason for alienating our partner is the inability to be influenced or just plain old not listening. If our mate tells us that Valentine’s Day is really important and that flowers say it all to them about being loved and we can’t find the momentum to pony up a few buds then we have not been listening. 

The next big thing we need to know for Valentine’s Day is showing appreciation. Valentine’s Day is a great occasion to thank our partner for all the good things they do throughout the year that we really do appreciate. Bringing home the bacon, cooking dinners, being a good friend and taking care of business are all great attributes to acknowledge to our partner. It also doesn’t cost a whole lot to write it all down in a card. 

How is it then that we can tell the difference between realistic expectations and what we have come to believe is our romantic due? Central to our Valentine wishes is the reality of what it takes to make it work. Making sweet music is only a part of the equation. Love over time is something we create, we make it from whole cloth, we fashion it from what we find in ourselves and within one another. If we can pay attention, be a safe and secure person to be with, be willing to find a compromise when needed and being a caring mate will get us where we want to go. It is the common touch, the helping hand, being reasonable, fair, open and emotionally connected that are the ingredients of true romance. When I speak to women about love, what they say is not so much hearts and flowers as it is about someone they can depend on. A good sense of humor and a positive attitude more often than not will trump romantic ideals.

When we add it all up it is not so much the loot we come up with but how we treat one another that will ultimately save our relationship. Respect cannot be bought, and it’s the same with friendship. Our ability to be kind, empathic, compassionate and tender will determine the strength and durability of our relationship over time. Relationship success is inevitably linked to our knowledge of what we truly need from one another and for having made peace with our own fantasy expectations.

These basics of love and relationship are fundamental to a lasting intimacy and knowing the fundamentals is a critical component for all great teamwork. Relationships are all about being a good team player. By being there for each other, for tenderness and warmth, we provide lasting proof of our commitment to making it work. Interestingly enough Ted Huston found that men who exhibited what were termed “feminine” traits were more often successful in their marriages. It appears that positive behaviors like nurturing, tenderness and caring actually do work.

I remember early on in my marriage my wife gave me a very generous Valentines Day gift. After expression my displeasure at the over-the-top nature of the gift she said to me “but I want to make you happy.” What I said to her in response made her stop in her tracks. I said “It’s not your job to make me happy, that’s my job.” She was stunned and relieved at the same time. Feeling like we must make our mate happy is a tremendous weight to carry and many a Valentine is based on that premise. Valentine’s Day is a celebration not a responsibility. If we can carry that in our hearts and make each day a special Valentine by being the kind of person we are proud of, we are doing the every day Valentine’s Day work that makes love last. 

Enduring love does not solely lie in gift giving or in the lovey-dovey  cooing and oogling of lovers. Love is the exhaust from the small things of every day life. Being there at times when we are needed, showing appreciation and helping out more often carry the day. So much for great expectations. To that end a rose in your teeth, a song in your heart and breakfast in bed are not a bad start. 

www.happytogetherbook.com 

Virtual Dating

Let’s face it, internet dating is a bit dicey. Sure it’s the new town hall and it certainly is a place to meet eligible people. But as we pour over the myriad of glowing profiles in our quest to find a suitable person, we soon find these sometimes aggravating patterns. One more profile that touts long walks on the beach and candle lit dinners and I am ready to lose my lunch. What really irks me about online dating is the creep factor. It’s a perfect place for guys to prey on lonely women by saying they want a committed relationship but really just want to hook up and move on. Truth be told, we just don’t really know who we are really getting online because it's a great venue for making stuff up about ourselves and we can still be anonymous. It doesn’t mean we should not try to find someone online, we just have to be careful.

So, how can we sift through all the false information to find the true right person for us? There are some simple rules we can follow to tilt the odds a bit in our favor. First off, don’t believe anything you read, seeing is believing. It's common practice as we all know to lie about our age, fluff up or finer qualities and make like we are the living embodiment of the American dream. Of course we all want to put our best foot forward, but buyer beware, there may be more to the picture than meets the eye.

Some actual ways of knowing someone has everything to do with where they’ve been. Some things to think about might be where and who do they come from? What is their education, career, goals in life? Who do they most respect? What are the events that have shaped them? What are they like when they are angry? Do they talk negatively about their previous relationships?  

Ultimately, none of these factors can compare to who someone really is in the clinches. Conflict resolution, negativity and defenses are the make or break issues over the long haul. We can meet the most fetching or handsome person and the two of you can have everything in common, but if you get into it with them and they go for the jugular, you won’t be with them or you won’t be you if you do. So, really it’s all about whether they can handle a good fight constructively and what their general outlook on life is.

One thing we don't usually read about in a profile is whether they are self critical, depressed, anxious or bipolar. Our relationship with ourselves is the template for how we are with others and it can be well hidden online. If we hate ourselves how in the world are we not going to hate who we are with? If our mother or father were a nightmare and we haven’t come to terms with it, there is going to be hell to pay down the road. Do they have they ability to hang in there when times are tough, will they be there for you when you need them? No matter how a relationship begins it’s what we make it into that really counts.

So, what have we learned from all this meandering here? Relationships are complicated. It takes time for all the personal stuff to rise to the surface. We need to see how they will be during difficult times and how they resolve issues inside and out, or put another way, from within and between. There are certainly many aspects of a person that will make them known to us over time. Time is the key factor for the internet set. Trust is earned, respect is created from who we are and love is an activity. For all these factors to be present in a love relationship we have to be patient.

So, when you are reading the profiles, it is a good to remember that this is someone’s fantasy about themselves and who they truly want to be, but we do need to know where the rubber meets the road. Are they really that way or is it just a shtick that they think will lure us into believing that they really can leap tall buildings in a single bound. Who may actually show up may be quite different than their publicity page or what we refer to as their profile. Not that there are not many people who are totally being true to themselves but we never really know if that dog can hunt.

Here are some tips to good dating.

1. Can they show up on time?
2. Are they respectful?
3. Do they have a decent sense of humor?
4. Are they willing to talk about themselves in ways that are not flattering?
5. Do they have good relationships, friends, family?
6. Do their ex-wives or husbands like them and are they speaking to their children?
7. How do they define themselves, in true terms?
8. Are they educated or employed?
9. How negative or defensive do they seem?
10. Are the plants in their home still alive?

How A Good Fight Can Save Your Relationship

Lannie and Dave were out for breakfast one morning and suddenly wham! Without warning, their mood flipped from light hearted to anger in a split second. They were in a fight. He had picked up his cell phone and answered it. She went ballistic. Why? Because they had an agreement about no cell phones at meal time.  They both had stressful jobs so meals were all about connecting.

Dave: What?

Lannie: We had an agreement and you broke it.

Dave: Geez, lighten up, big deal, I had to take the call.  

Lannie: If you would keep your promises I wouldn’t have to be this way.

Dave: Hey, most of the time I do and the minute I don’t do it exactly, you have a fit.

Lannie: You're so unbelievably selfish.

Dave: You’re such a nag.

They went downhill from there. Can you guess as to what went wrong in this interchange? Basically everything. They were defensive, critical and stubbornly held on to their positions. Why would they do this at the expense of their relationship? Ah, the paradox? We want to have a good relationship but alas, the forces within will not permit it. Let me explain.

We live in a world within that in many ways was determined when we were very young. Usually the systems we build to cope early on are the culprit later on. In other words what saved us then is killing us now. How so? Well, we can’t see it but our system developed those skills because as children we could not bear the pain, so our psyche came in to help us out. Here it is. All children and that means 100% of all children respond the same way to the same conditions. If they felt too distant from their parents they will try to make up the difference by being perfect to bring them closer. Being perfect does not go unnoticed by the child who feels less than the perfect idealized self in his or her head. He therefore devalues his true self in favor of the self that he feels is more acceptable.

Often when couples fight their early traumas are colliding with each other except they don’t know it. It’s what I call the confluence of pain. When couples have no clue as to what is causing their argument they wind up in emotional cul-de-sacs that spiral round and round with no end in sight.

Cut to breakfast with Dave and Lanni and we see these issues rearing their ugly head in the form of how Dave couldn’t own up to what he had done and defended. Lanni for her part was miffed that he had not kept his promise but was not letting him off the hook. To have acknowledged her would be like confirming his worst fear, that he was inadequate. For her to let him off the hook would mean that she was giving in. Now we’re getting somewhere. Taking this idea forward to what a good fight might look like, we can use another scenario that would not include their deeper issues.

Lannie: We had a deal to not talk on the phone during mealtime.

Dave: You’re right, I’m sorry. I understand and agree that it is important to have this time together. It’s just that sometimes I get compulsive about the phone and can’t help myself.

Lannie: I can see that. How could I remind you without making you feel criticized?

Dave: Just tell me that you love me.

Lannie: You’ve got it, I love you.

End of story. In real life it’s more of a struggle but the bare bones are there. To fight well, we need to feel that at the end of it we are closer than we were before the fight. To clear up misunderstandings, affirm the other person and find solutions are the natural ingredients of good conflict resolution. That something has been cleared up, that some truths were exposed, that we know something more about the person or we have unburdened ourselves of something that was in the way are means to an end toward intimacy.  

Good fights are like professional boxing, there are rules. No hitting below the belt, no rabbit punches, no yelling, taunting, name calling or swearing. These are the basics. Take the time to cool off, make sure you acknowledge the other person, define the problem, find out what each one of you can do to make it better and then push for production. This is what works. So, why can’t we do it? It’s because fighting is complicated. There are many layers and levels of pain and defenses that can easily be a part of the mix. That’s why we need to see anger as informative but not expressive. Anger tells us that something is hurting us or frustrating us. Is it old or new?

A good fight can lead to a stronger connection when we know what we are really fighting about and what is actually at the bottom of our disagreement. If we grew up in a critical environment we will naturally be more sensitive to anything that feels like criticism. If we feel like we are stupid because we were told we were and our partner makes us feel that way, defenses will immediately occur to protect us.

All good fights are fought fairly and after both people have cooled down and reflected about what was bothering them. This does not mean it won’t start out angrily. Anger is normal. It’s what we do with  anger that matters most. It’s not what we say so much as how we say it. If we can deliver the message by taking the other person into consideration we will deliver the meaning differently than from our sense of entitlement to rage. After all they hurt us and they must pay. Not if you want a relationship.

Truth be told all good relationships begin with the one we have with ourselves. If we are self critical we will be critical of our mate. If we are self loathing we will end up loathing our mate. On it goes. Resolving our inner antagonism goes a long way toward building an outer harmony.  

All good relationships whether internally or in the outside world operate the same way. Compassion, understanding, respect and empathy works and criticism, defensiveness, contempt and shutting down don’t. The struggle is to create a balance between what we need to do for ourselves to make us feel fulfilled and what we need from our loved ones to feel filled up. That we matter, that kindness counts, and if we are to be truly loving with our mate we must first be internally accepting. It’s self acceptance that creates a place for love to come in and go out. The more we are able to release ourselves from what binds us, the more we listen to the feelings, needs and concerns of our mate, the more we will be truly happy together.  

Some tips:

• Adjust our expectations to fit with reality. If it’s not working it’s probably not realistic.
• Be true to your word. Keeping promises makes your life work better.
• Everyone counts including you. Everyone matters.
• Never repress or express anger. Take time to look deeper.
• Never assume. Always check them out.
• Almost nothing is personal.
• Listening is key.
• Acknowledge first, then make your point.
• Don’t hide your feelings, put them on the table, but with compassion.
• Ambivalence and alienation are normal. Talking about it makes it go away.

We all want good relationships but find them to be at times difficult, vexing and unnerving. Yet, we crave closeness and love. In the struggle to find it and maintain it we inevitably become better people and ultimately learn more about ourselves. In the end it is better to get it out then hold it in, what we don’t say is held within and creates distance between couples. So, armed with a healthy process we have the opportunity to create a new intimacy with every fight. Fight on. 

For more insight on creating and maintaining a happy relationship, check out Dr. Bil's new book:
Happy Together: Creating a Lifetime of Connection, Commitment, and Intimacy

 

What Is Intimacy?

There are two major components to feeling intimate. First there
is intimacy with ourselves: the personal intimacy that comes from
being  familiar  with  our  own  inner  truths,  our  dreams,  beliefs,
feelings, thoughts, wishes, and desires. Second, there is intimacy
with our partner: the connection we cultivate when we bring this
personal  process  into  our  primary  relationship. This model  for
relationship  intimacy  includes  emotional  availability,  empathy,
care-taking, tender responsiveness, and bearing ambivalence during
difficult times. How we are with ourselves and how we relate to our
partner is a critical part of the dance between our inner and outer
worlds, an interplay that can either enhance or inhibit our capacity
to be happy together.

Intimate activity can take many forms, from giving each other
the freedom to explore individual interests to developing mutual
values, hopes, and dreams. Intimacy that is created from an open
dialogue about our inner and outer worlds ultimately teaches us
about ourselves and who we are as people. As we develop a language
for our relationship by expressing our feelings and thoughts, we
meld our two separate worlds into one whole.

A loving relationship arises from attending to our own thoughts
and feelings and to those of our partner. From this process we
produce shared values, beliefs, feelings, and interests. To reveal our
true self in the presence of another in this way, if done with care,
can be enlivening, enlightening, and joyful. What could be more
satisfying than understanding with greater compassion because we
know someone better? But to achieve this kind of contentment both
in our relationship and within ourselves involves an evolution of
understanding. It is a process, not a short-term goal. We hear the
adage that it’s not the destination that counts, but the journey. There
is no point where we have “arrived,” but a real sense of moving up a very long stream. Harmony comes from shining insight into places along the way, and with that light removing obstructions
block our ability to love deeply and intimately.

Creating intimacy is a lot like building a house. We start with a solid
foundation of truth, acceptance, and reality; we lay out the rooms
of our desires, fantasies, wants, and needs; we frame the windows to
our soul, wire in our emotional connections, add the hardware of
values, joy, and sexuality, and join them all together to create a home.
The raw materials for our building are drawn from a dialogue about
what we want, need, and value about ourselves and our mate.

The dialogue of intimacy, as we’ve seen, is about knowing who
we are and what we want from life together and making agreements
based  on  realistic  expectations  and  shared  values.  

The married are those who have taken the terrible risk of intimacy
and, having taken it, know life without intimacy to be impossible.
— Carolyn Heilbrun

The Five Secrets to Being Happy Together

Relationships are messy. There is always something to clean up. They function like a giant pinwheel of thoughts and feelings swirling around in a heady mixture of love and need. Daunting, to say the least.  Even though we know the statistics for marital bliss, we still find ourselves in some primal dance compelling us to search out a proper mate. Throwing children into the mix makes life even more complex and challenging. But, do not fret, hope is on the way.  Armed with a few essential skills you too can tackle the tricky process of navigating the straights and narrows leading us toward a positive inevitability. Being happy together is what we yearn for, but getting there is the rub. Here are few secrets to digest on your way.  

Secret #1. Cool Off First.

It is absolutely essential that you do not try to solve a problem or conflict when you are upset. It’s not natural to hold in your anger but that’s exactly what’s necessary. In thirty years of doing therapy I have never witnessed a problem being solved when people are angry. This goes for me too by the way. If it doesn’t work in my house, you might as well throw in the towel.

Secret #2 Acknowledge First.

Once you have cooled off, which might take some time, then you are ready to talk. The secret to problem solving is to acknowledge what your partner has said first, then make your point. Hearing and understanding is the key to conflict resolution. Once we feel heard we are usually 90% over it. It helps immensely to bring in our partner’s ideas, thoughts and feelings into our own, so we can make agreements that are comfortable for both people.

Secret#3 Use the Royal “WE.”

Be sure to use the word “we” as often as possible, along with I want , need, prefer and would like to. We are too quick to point out what our partner is doing wrong and short on showing appreciation. Starting a discussion with something positive like “I know that you are a good person and you are trying your best to help but…” Being objective as opposed to subjectively feeling like the victim or victimizing helps to keep the process on track. Try to see the issue from their point of view before you put your point out there.

Secret#4 Get to Know Yourself and Choose Your Words Wisely.

Having some knowledge about who we are is critical to being a happy person. Being a happy person is the key to being happy together. If you know where your sensitive sore spots are or what makes you mad, happy or what you want, what your values are, what you believe in and what your direction in life is, makes everything run more smoothly. Relationships are as healthy as the people in them. To be a person who is worthy of being loved because you are kind, understanding, compassionate, respectful and empathic elicits a loving response. Being loved is in our hands. We can make it or break it. Watch what you say, words have power.

Secret#5 Carpe Diem.

There are times in every relationship where we can create a lot of love and good will. Like when our partner is sick or how we respond to birthdays, special events, anniversaries and other critical moments as they will either help or hinder our ability to be happy together. Love after all is a creation, we can make love or we can squelch it depending on whether we seize the moment. We so often miss those opportunities for connections and instead cause our partner to suffer needlessly. People tell me that they are just not that kind of person, like it is written in stone. We are who we want to be, we make the choices, we are driving our own life, so make good ones and send a card, make a call, and bring some breakfast to your ill spouse. You will get the love and care back in spades.

Obviously, there is more to this picture than five easy steps. These are some essentials that can tide you over until you make the big choice to be fully committed. Then and only then can you take the next step into the full adventure of intimate human experience.

Want more tips and advice on having happy relationship?  Check out the Happy Together Website, featuring Bill's New Book HAPPY TOGETHER: Creating a Lifetime of Connection, Commitment, and Intimacy

To Be Is to Be Seen

The other night I am sitting with a couple and I am watching a spectacular fight, complete with the choice words, snarling responses, disrespect and defensiveness. I am feeling the hot blast as I am trying to calm them down. Finally they sit back with a smugness that makes me want to smack them. Obviously, I don't, but in a calm voice say "well how did that work for you?" They both blurt out "It didn't." The question forms in my mind "What causes this kind of explosion and how does a couple stop this kind of war? These vitriolic confrontations can go on and on until they are completely exhausted with no resolution only to start up again. What's the culprit in this negative interchange? What causes this kind of interaction to get so out of control?

The basic issue is that couples who end up screaming at each other are not listening or acknowledging one another, so they ramp up the intensity to get through. When someone is not listening our knee jerk response is to say it again, then again until finally we are screaming. There is often a deeper issue that is causing the intense response. As we peel off the layers we see that the origin for the screaming and retaliation is often based on the belief that we are not important, invisable, worthless or weak. So, we go the other way and make ourselves bad and powerful instead of weak and helpless. We will always choose to be bad and powerful over weak and helpless.

If we are really interested in solving problems and ending conflict we have to take these things seriously. Our natural intuitive response to our partner is to be defensive but that response is always counterproductive. So we have to go counter intuitive to acknowledge our partner. Acknowledgement is magic. Once we acknowledge our parnter in a conflict, it disappears. Something like "I hear you, when I come home late and don't call you it makes you feel like I don't care about you and that I am with someone else so you get angry and want to hurt me like you feel hurt, I get it." If that is followed by "I will try to make sure that I call you and let you know that I am thinking about you and will also try to get home earlier so you don't worry about me." This kind of comment will usually end of the argument right there. They can also add what the other person wants and get some acknowledgement for that as well. But clearly the argument is over. The rest can be about what we want and need from each other.

So, if it is so flippin easy why doesn't everyone do it? Well, it's not so easy. It is actually quite hard to go counter to our natural intuitive response, especially if it is connected to some deeper wounds. Emotional wounds are just like physical ones but we can't just slap a band aid on it and it will heal up. Internal wounds are vigorous and create energy of their own that has to come out. Pain acts like a pressure cooker, it sits in the background building and building until it blows up over sometimes a very small incident. This pain has to be looked at, understood and processed through grief and compassion so that it can come out in a healthy way and become neutralized. This will prevent it from building up in the system and then blowing up in a heated argument. This takes a commitment to creating a stronger identity about who we want to be with others, so we have a goal to work towards that can help us stay centered during conflicts. Something like compassionate, understanding, respectful and empathic as an identity.

So, when we find ourselves being defensive, critical, contemptuous and blaming, we need to find our way to acknowledgement to see what our partner is trying tell us about ourselves. What complicates this problem can be that our partner is simply dumping their unhapiness or frustration onto us. In that case acknowledgement would look a bit different. "I hear that you are telling me that I am selfish and mean and I will think about that, but I would also like you to think about it too." These issues can get very difficult to unravell, but if we are compassionate and empathic we are in the best place for resolution. Patience, perserverance and tolerance can be special tools in this process.

So the next time your partner is trying to tell you something or is sarcastic, mean or critical, take a beat and consider how you want to respond. Then restrain yourself from throwing the potted plant at them and instead acknowledge what they are saying. If none of this works, make that call to your local therapist and get a neurtral third party invovled.

Even though if feels so much better to believe we are right and they are dead wrong, it doesn't go very far in the resoluion process. To make conflict an important part of forming true intimacy and trust is the goal. Getting there is a struggle. Vive la revolucion...

 

 

To Embrace The Struggle

We all have our notions or what a good relationship entails and conversely what makes it go wrong. Then why is it that we can't seem to follow our own wisdom? We know that yelling, anger, needing to be right, defensiveness, criticism and withdrawal to punish doesn't work, so why do we do it?

I used to be so surprised when a couple would be screaming at each other and use the most mean and hurtful words, all in the name of getting something they want. For example a couple will be raging at their partner for not giving them sex and I am thinking to myself that this kind of discussion will most likely not land them in bed together. Truth be told they are responding to an emotional wound about the size of Texas. Judging by these reactions it is somewhat easy to extrapolate that these people were neglected and hurt early on and are just now screaming about it.

The most difficult of all of this is our inability as humans to see what we are doing. We believe that we are right our partner is dead wrong and they must be punished. This problem is at the heart of most failed relationships. Not only must we be able to see ourselves clearly but we need to be able to see our partner as well. There is also the need to be compassionate, considerate, civil, contained, even tempered, solution oriented and kind. Yes, and let's throw in empathy while we're at it. To expect ourselves to be able to attain all that will only make us feel defeated and bad.

The challenge in relationships is not so much that we need to attain the ideals of compassion, understanding, respect and empathy, but we see them as directions or goals that help guide us like a lighthouse beacon steering us away from crashing onto the rocks of our daily conflicts, trials and tribulations. These ideals, myths and fantasies are the essence of what it means to be human. Our deeply embedded internal conflicts will always be a part of our relationship life. It is not perfection or that we can successfully reach these goals that are ultimately important, but to know where we are headed and embrace the difficulty in getting there. What can help to bring us together is our ability to communicate about the struggle to attain such ideals.