Ensuring Your Relationship Works:
Relationship Is Vital for Good Health!
We are social creatures – of that there is absolutely no doubt. Anybody who
has lived at least 50 years on this planet will have understood that its
absolutely essential to be in a
relationship to maintain good emotional and
physical health.
Video on the benefits of relationship
In this situation, it's hardly surprising
that when a relationship breaks up people experience such high levels of
anxiety, depression, worthlessness and fear! These are all common
responses to the breakup of a relationship, although its also equally
common for people to experience anger and depression.
This
in turn explains why its so important to most people to keep a
relationship going even when that relationship appears to have gone beyond
its sell by date – although, in fact,
relationships can
almost always be sustained, and there are very good arguments for making sure
that you do put the maximum amount of effort into sustaining a relationship
even when it appears that divorce or separation is inevitable – particularly
if you have children.
If you're already in the throes of a
breakup, then you might want information about reconnecting with your partner, because most
people who breakup from a long-term relationship – and some who breakup from a
short term relationship – often feel they've made the most appalling mistake,
and want to get back with their partner as soon as possible.
In general, what we find as relationship
therapists is that people breakup because they cant communicate effectively.
Also, the emotional issues which arose in
their childhoods, and which haunt them to this day, are still uppermost in
their minds. So, when dealing with a partner in their relationship, a lot
of people will actually respond emotionally rather than intellectually or
rationally. This could be described, in fact, as reacting rather than
responding. This is a great opportunity to heal old emotional wounds from
the past by using a system
of personal growth called Shadow Work. (A
Jungian term.)
There are
many clear
advantages to be gained from being (or staying) in relationship, and it's
no wonder that people desperately seek out such a situation in life. As
social creatures were all programmed to be in relationship, not just for
the emotional and physical relief we get from sexual pleasure, but also
from the interaction of ideas, from the support and emotional well-being
that comes from having a partner to talk to about our difficulties and
problems, and also, inevitably, from the fact that we need to communicate
to maintain our social status.
Liking comes from a feeling of
closeness and affection derived from a mutual understanding and a
degree of empathy.
How easy is it
for a woman to love a man whole heartedly?
What’s essential here is that you seek to engage with somebody who has essentially the
same values, beliefs and attitudes as yourself. Without that, there is
plenty of evidence to suggest that (at least in the longer term) a
relationship won’t survive.
In the short term, however, likeability and
liking are much more tied into particular behaviours: empathising, reflective
listening, paying attention, being fully present your partner, and indeed
simple things like apologising when somebody’s upset.
You might think it extraordinary, but there
is plenty of evidence which demonstrates very clearly indeed that simple
apologies, offered to your partner even when you don’t believe you’ve done
something wrong, can really make a big difference to a relationship’s
chances of survival.
Another thing that’s important is maintaining
a positive attitude to your partner. It turns out that when people offer
less than five positive affirmations for every negative interaction in a
relationship, the prospect of long-term survival of the relationship is
really quite low.There are simple things that you can do which are very helpful in sustaining
a relationship. But in addition, you do need to do the deeper work to get
rid of
emotional
baggage from the past.
And by the way, nowhere is this more true
than in the field of sexual problems. If either the man or the woman in a partnership has some issue with sex or
some kind of sexual dysfunction, be it low sex drive, premature ejaculation
or delayed ejaculation, then it’s extremely important to attend to this, to find a
therapist who is capable of dealing with it, and to get it sorted out.
The reason? When a couple are making love
successfully in a relationship and in particular when the woman’s having
regular orgasms, we know that the relationship will be much more stable and
happy outside the bedroom than it will be if the sexual connection between
the partners is failing or non-existent.
One of
the big issues for all of us in our society is entering into a
relationship which makes is happy – and which can be sustained over time. One of the
reasons we seem to have such difficulty with relationships – whether
entering into them, staying in them, or leaving them – is that we aren’t
taught by anyone, at any time in our lives, the things we need to know to
deal with the emotions associated with a relationship effectively.
Getting Back Together With Your Ex
Boyfriend Or Girlfriend
One of the problems you're going to have, is the tendency we all have to
revert to the old patterns of behaviour that are so strong and powerful –
in other words, your partner do something that triggers you, and before
you know it, you're reacting in just the same way that you always did.
This isn't going to help your relationship! You know these things, because
you probably use them – after all, you're human! Tit-for-tat – a
competitive strategy where you each try and outdo each other in terms of
badness or misdemeanours or wrongdoings. Well, you get the idea!
Blaming rather than listening – when
your partner says something important to them about the way you're
interacting with them you don't respond by giving them space to speak
considering what they're saying, you just launch an attack straight back
Powerplay – where the main objective
of your relationship appears to be to be the one who is always right, the
one who knows best, or the one who "wins"
You did this, I did that – another
strategy where you try and blame your partner for what they did when
they're talking about the way you behaved.
Escalating – where the trivial
discussion becomes a major argument, apparently of its own accord, without
you quite knowing how it happened
Dirty tricks department – where you
deliberately play dirty by hitting your partner in the most vulnerable
areas of their psyche
Taking the moral high ground –
pretending the your the innocent party, and that you've done no wrong
Uncontrolled anger – a reaction
which never helps calm things down!
Pointing out your partner's failings
– telling your partner what's wrong with them is never gonna help lead to
a rational discussion
Calling for support – enlisting
other people, either physically, or in their absence, to support the
argument that you're putting forward about your partner's failings and
inadequacies
Quoting from the past – it may be
true, but recalling things that happened years ago is not can help
establish harmony in the present
Sullen and silent - just being
sullen and silent the opposite of what you need to have an intimate
relationship which is, in case you've forgotten, open and honest
communication
Blaming – I told you that would
happen if you did that, and you didn't listen; it's a common line in
relationships but it's not a very helpful one
Indirect attacks – another common
strategy where people can't say what they're feeling directly, making
unpleasant digs and offering putdowns at your partner, particularly in the
presence of others, is very destructive
Storing things up and then letting the floodgates open
– usually happens because you're not brave enough to say something until
you have a certain level of anger propelling you, at which point you lose
control say far too much, that becomes damaging
You can identify many things that people do in relationships that are the
opposite of open honest communication and not on the above list. Good
heavens, you probably know about some of them yourself!
None of these add up to reflective listening or open and honest
communication.
So going back into a relationship with someone to whom you reacted in this
way in the first place has a risk. Obviously, the risk is that unless
you've grown, you going to behave in exactly the same way that you always
did.
If you can take the time to think of an example of when you used each of
these and any other strategies in relationship to put your partner down
and browbeat, and you can consciously decide that you're not going to do
that anymore, you going to stand a much better chance of actually reaching
the point of open and honest communication.
You see, a lot of what happens meet your ex is going to be down to your
intention. What is it that you intend to do through rebuilding your
relationship? Presumably, to have a harmonious and loving relationship? If
you can set that clear intention, and then you can actually commit
yourself wholeheartedly to doing whatever it takes to establish such a
relationship, then your frame of mind is going to be a lot more likely to
it about than if you're vague and indecisive.
Another useful technique is
mindfulness, aka living in the now – in other
words, you can make a decision to step around the past, and what it's
legacy may be for you, and to take the time effort to live in the moment
with your partner now.
Dating
One of the toughest parts of dating is sorting through all of the people
that you can meet and figuring out which ones you should pursue more
seriously. Every time that you go out on another date with the wrong man
or woman, that is an opportunity that you are missing to look for the
right one. It can help a lot to have a few questions in mind for how to
get to know someone on a date so that you can learn who a person is much
more quickly.
When you look at how your date is dressed, for
example, you should ask yourself how you feel about what you see. The
clothing that a person chooses for a date can say a lot about him or her,
and there is no single right answer. One person might love to see that
their date has put in a lot of effort, while another might worry that it
hints that he or she is potentially high-maintenance.
You
will always want to ask your date a few questions about his or her career
and what it is like. You should never fall into the trap of being
convinced that only people in one career or another will make a suitable
mate. What is worth your attention, though, is how this person feels about
that career and what he or she plans to do about it. You may feel strongly
about being with someone who is driven by career ambition, or you might be
interested in finding someone who is a little more laid back and
interested in going on amazing adventure vacations.
Asking this type of question is a great way to
figure out which camp a person falls into.
You should also ask your date about how his or
her day went. This is a great way to get a conversation rolling with
something that is not too heavy of a topic, but still tells you a lot. We
all have our own level of interest in things like gossip and tolerance for
things like complaining. What a person will share with you on a date hints
at the type of things you could expect to be hearing about over the course
of a longer relationship.
Having a few specific questions to get to know someone in mind is valuable
because it also helps to get the conversation going in a way that can give
you a real insight into a person. If you are both just nervous and talking
about whatever comes to mind, you might end up wasting an entire evening
on something trivial like what has happened on a television program
recently.
These can be
fun conversations to have, but you are better off if you can get a sense
of who your date is quickly. That way, you can focus on only having future
dates with the sort of people that you can see yourself building a future
with.
Dating is a
tough job where we need to try to find out as much as we can about a
person quickly without ruining the mood by making it feel like it is
turning into a job interview. If your questions are too obviously
pragmatic, like coming out and asking something like “How old do you want
to be when you get married?” you are likely to just kill the romance and
scare a person away. When you are figuring out questions to get to know
someone, you need to make sure that you keep it on a level that gives them
the opportunity to express who they are.
One of the most important questions that you can ask is what the other
person does as their primary occupation and how he or she feels about it.
This will be school for some, while others will have an established
career.
The details of
the tasks involved are not as important as what the position says about
your date. Is this a person who expresses a lot of ambition, or is work
just a way to get enough money to adventure and have fun in other parts of
life? It is usually best to look for someone whose attitude toward career
is similar to your own.
Some people
look for loyalty and steadfastness while others are solely concerned with
how much fun they can have with your friends. Either way, it is a good
reflection of whether you are the type of person he or she is likely to
find attractive as a companion.
The connecting thread among all good questions for a first date is that
they give a person the opportunity to express a lot about who they are
without demanding any information that feels like it is personal to the
point of being inappropriate. It would feel weird to most of us to have a
virtual stranger immediately ask how many children we would like to have.
Read here what determines the success of a first date.
Asking
something about whether your date grew up in a large or a small family, on
the other hand, gives them a less direct opportunity to talk about family
size and how they felt about it. This maintains a much more comfortable
atmosphere where you each get to share as much information as you want,
but nothing beyond the point where you are comfortable.
Establish Great Communication About Sex
One of the important things that men and women
really need to get to grips with is communication about sex. For one thing
when was the last time you reassured your female partner about her
attractiveness in bed? The truth of the matter is that men are insensitive to
women’s needs when it comes to sex, and very often women don’t express their
needs in a way that men can respond to.
For example, men should really appreciate any
effort that a woman makes to be sexy, because she’s actually trying hard to
accommodate her man’s needs, as she see them — even if these in fact are not
what he actually needs! Women see a big difference between having sex and
making love; they also see a difference between sex and romance. And they
certainly see a difference between desire and passion.
They attach emotion and meaning to sex: much
beyond >physical
pleasure and gratification — they want intimacy, tenderness, soft words,
attention, and the feeling that they mean something to the man who is making
love to them. And of course while men want these things as well, the fact is
that what they want mostly, perhaps more than anything else, is physical
relief from the sexual tension they experience.
Patronising observations like “men think with the wrong head” don’t even
begin to encompass the lack of understanding that women have about the sex
drive and its intensity in men. Is it wrong for men to give women the romantic
trappings that they want just so that they’ll have sex?
No! Of course not – it’s actually quite natural,
it’s part of the seductive chase that men find incredibly rewarding and
exciting.
And I suspect that matter the women find it incredibly exciting and rewarding
as well, but they just need to know with greater certainty that men are
feeling attracted to them in a way that goes beyond physical release.
What about the question of having an orgasm? Well
there’s nothing wrong with expecting a woman to have an orgasm, and indeed
wanting her to have an orgasm, and there’s certainly nothing wrong with trying
hard to make sure that a woman does have an orgasm.
However asking a woman if she’s had an orgasm is a definite no-no, because
it’s a double bind for a woman. If she says no, then the man’s ego is
destroyed, and if she says yes, when she hasn’t had one, she’s introducing an
element of distrust and insincerity into the relationship.
Knowing how to make a woman climax is vitally
important, there’s no doubt about that, but doing so must be done with
sensitivity and care. Much of a woman’s ability to reach orgasm, to come, is
in her head, and although being turned on mentally will enhance her ability to
come physically, the fact of the matter is that she’ll need to be prepared
with foreplay.
And anything that interferes with her transition
into an orgasmic state will certainly be upsetting for her. So enquiring about
how she’s doing just before she comes can instantly take her orgasm away from
her. And the worst orgasm inhibitor for many women is asking her if she’s
almost there. The truth of the matter is that men need to understand how women
come, and they need to be sensitive to the fact that it’s a very different
process in most women to the process for men.
So stop focusing on just
giving a woman an orgasm:
slow down so that she can focus on every sensitive nuance of the experience
she’s having before she even gets to orgasm. And don’t forget, when you ask
her if she’s come, she may well think that your inquiry is not about her
welfare, but about your pleasure and satisfaction in knowing that you were
able to make her orgasm. That’s not terribly considerate or romantic for a
woman, and it’s certainly not a great idea for a man to put his ego before his
woman’s sexual satisfaction!
In other words, consideration for the other
persons needs is paramount in any relationship, regardless of whether or not
you understand where they come form or why they have arisen. You simply are in
no position to make judgments about your partner because you haven't lived her
experience. Harmony is established through tolerance and mutual respect, which
can only flourish in an environment of acceptance and love.