Relationships

The Deeper Side of Love: Why Chasing the Spark Might Lead You Astray

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They’re great. Intelligent, funny, kind, reliable. Objectively you can’t see anything wrong with this person. And yet, you’re either finding yourself in a situation where you’re not really feeling the way you think you should, the spark has quickly died, or you’re questioning if it was ever really there to begin with. The words that...

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The Psychology of Romantic Love by Nathaniel Branden (Part 2) | Made of Lovely

The Psychology of Romantic Love (Part 2)

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In the last post (part 1), from Nathaniel Branden in “The Psychology of Romantic Love”, we saw how important it was for two individuals to show up from a place of fullness which comes from a strong and properly developed sense of self for romantic love to stand a chance. Romantic love is one of the greatest challenges and one of the greatest adventures of our existence. Some people believe that understanding romantic love kills it. This is tantamount to saying that consciousness kills. The exact opposite is true. Unconsciousness kills. Ignorance kills. Blindness kills. If we cannot deepen our grasp of at least some of the essentials needed for the success of romantic love, then there is nothing waiting ahead but more centuries of the same suffering we have behind us. Love is not at first sight. Love requires knowledge, and knowledge requires time. However, it’s not uncommon for future lovers to experience a sudden “shock of recognition” an odd sense of familiarity, a sense of encountering a person already known on some level and in some mysterious, seemingly inexplicable way (more on that in a minute). The experience of love, desire, and pleasure does not flow along a simple, unidirectional pathway but rather through a reciprocal cycle of continuing mutual reinforcement. Ergo, we perceive them as a source of real or potential happiness → Desire is born → Desire generates actions that results in the pleasure or joy → pleasure makes you repeat the cycle with an intensity to desire, love, and so on. Thus, love develops & strengthens within this cycle with time and in the right environment (which is comprised of the individuals and their dynamic). Couple Essentials Needed For The Success of Romantic Love We’ve already covered what each person needs to have on an individual level, but now it’s time to look at the dynamic of the two individuals coming together. The environment that this dynamic creates is really about: core needs being met (specifically: psychological visibility, joy/pleasure, admiration, and a place of safety). When people are discussing the challenges and the difficulties of romantic love, there is an issue they rarely mention: romantic love can be terrifying. When we fall in love we can experience another human being as enormously important to us, enormously important to our personal happiness. We allow that person to enter a private world within us, which perhaps no one else has ever entered or even known about. So there is a surrender, not a surrender to the other person so much as to our feeling for the other person. Without that surrender, love is aborted at the outset. Allowing another human being to become so vitally important to us creates the possibility of loss. It lies in the possibility of the other person’s not loving us in return. Or falling out of love with us. Or dying. Need creates a vulnerability that can be frightening and enraging. There is a tendency not to own the fear, not to face it honestly, not to recognize it for what it is, but to rationalize it, to justify it in terms of sweeping generalizations about men or women, to avoid confronting the anxiety and hurt that is at the real root of such talk. Since most people have already experienced painful feelings of rejection in childhood, they are in effect primed for catastrophe, primed for tragedy when, as adults, they fall in love. They “know” that love means pain, hurt, nonacceptance, and loss. In addition to childhood experiences, they may have been emotionally bruised or battered in earlier love affairs. Therefore, they “know” that love means torment. In the last post, we talked about the importance of communication. However, this fear is itself a massive barrier to communication. When a couple in love quarrel, it is very common to see each of them shut down, disconnect from the depth of their feelings for each other, disconnect from the depth of their love, so as to protect themselves in case things don’t work out. They become impersonal, remote, and even hostile. They are afraid, but they do not acknowledge that they are afraid; instead, they throw up defenses, throw up barriers. They do not remain open and vulnerable. In consequence communication becomes blocked. When they talk they rarely express what they are actually feeling. Their communication is a distortion because their deepest feelings are a forbidden expression. This is why resolution in conflicts can be so difficult. They do not talk to each other from their core, they talk from behind their masks. Again, this is why romantic love takes courage and maturity. It is not the fear of loss that destroys us. It is denying the fear. If we own it, if we express it, we discover that gradually it disappears. And even if it is still present, it does not manipulate us into behaving in ways that sabotage love. But if we make ourselves unconscious of it, if we deny it, then we become its unwitting pawn, and we find ourselves mysteriously withdrawing from our partner, or becoming inappropriately critical, or wondering if we do not perhaps long for our freedom, or practicing some other maneuver that will subvert our happiness. Nathanial Branden The Proper Context for Romantic Love To Be Born The foundation of a relationship lies in basic similarities. The excitement of a relationship lies in complementary differences. The two together constitute the context in which romantic love is born. We are most likely to fall in love with the person who we experience basic affinities & complementary differences with simultaneously. However, the principle of basic affinities and complementary differences applies equally to immature love. Immaturity is the failure of an individual’s biological, intellectual, and psychological evolution to an adult stage of development. When we encounter a person who has learned survival strategies similar to our own, whose manner of being-in-the-world is one we recognize intimately on a subconscious level, whose coping and adapting processes resemble those

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The Psychology of Romantic Love by Nathaniel Branden (Part 1) | Made of Lovely

The Psychology of Romantic Love (Part 1)

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As we keep diving in to this concept of building a strong, stable, and lasting relationship house. We will see some overlap or even a repeat of concepts.  Just like in building a house, the elements/materials are intertwined, connected, and build upon each other. The idea is that as you keep learning, and keep hearing the same concepts presented in different ways that they will begin to resonate & register with you on a much deeper level. Today we are looking at the work of Nathaniel Branden, from his book “The Psychology of Romantic Love”, to be able to acquire some of the elements of our house’s walls, windows, foundation, and even a little bit of the ground on which the house is built. Let’s start with the question: What is love? Or perhaps more specifically romantic love? To paraphrase Branden’s answer: Love is two individuals sharing from their fullness. Romantic love is a passionate spiritual-emotional-sexual attachment that reflects a high regard for the value of each other’s person. That attachment is experienced as passionate or intense, at least to some significant extent. There is some sort of spiritual affinity, some deep mutuality of values & outlook, some sense of being “soul mates”. Deep emotional involvement. Strong sexual attraction. Mutual admiration. – Nathaniel Branden Romantic love like every other value in life requires consciousness, courage, knowledge, and wisdom to be sustained — without putting irrational and impossible demands on it. Basic Human Needs We experience love as a source of fulfillment for profoundly important needs. Love in a general sense is our emotional response to that which we value highly. But love is more than an emotion; it is an evaluation (either “for me” or “against me“, and “to what extent“) and action tendencies. Love is the highest, the most intense, expression of the assessment “for me“. Thusly, romantic love can respond to some of our basic human needs. Not that we will die without them, but they make an enormous contribution to our well-being and to our efficacious functioning (aka survival value). Here are some of the most important: To be able to participate in this kind of needs fulfillment, the requirement is that love becomes each person sharing from their fullness. But what makes up this fullness? Those are the pre-requisites that each individual must meet. Individual Requirements for Romantic Love to be Possible We each are islands of consciousness — and this is the root of our aloneness. To be an individual, experiencing a unique perspective on the world, and to be self-conscious is to encounter the unalterable fact of one’s aloneness. Aloneness entails self-responsibility. No one can think, feel, live our life for us, or give meaning to our existence except for us. To most people, this fact is terrifying. People would rather live in denials: refusing to think and following uncritically the beliefs of others, disowning one’s deepest feelings in order to “belong”. The tragic irony of people’s lives is that the very attempt to deny aloneness results in denying love. There first must be an “I”, a self — then there’s the possibility to know the exquisite joy of one self encountering another. Therefore the overarching requirement for each person is truly proper development of self (aka maturity). If a person is stuck in a child-like state, we will see how that makes it near impossible for them to be able to show up in the way that romantic love requires. Prerequisites In this post, we’ll cover the prerequisites that each individual must have because the absence of them become formidable barriers: Be careful about black and white thinking, absolutes, the all or nothing. You may see you have some of these, and others you need to acquire. Romantic love does not require perfection, it simply requires a good foundation built on a strong sense of self — which you can develop. Balance and degree are key issues. Without proper development of self, it seems an individual will keep struggling/floundering until either they acquire what is needed or the relationship comes to an end.  Self-Esteem Is Needed For Romantic Love Self-esteem means confidence in our personal efficacy and worth. It is the integrated sum of self-confidence and self-respect. It is the experience that we are competent to live and worthy of living. It is the experience that we are appropriate to life and its requirements & challenges. It is self-trust, confidence in our ability to think, to cope, and in our right to be successful & happy. It is the feeling of being worthy, deserving, entitled to assert our needs & wants, to achieve our values, and enjoy the fruits of our efforts.  It is a sense of basic competence and a sense of basic worth. It is believing, “I am lovable, worthy, deserving, and capable.” Essentially, we must enjoy our own being, to be happy in a profound sense of who we are, to experience the self as worthy of being valued and loved by others. Self-esteem is also a continuum — not either you have it or you don’t. So degree is of the upmost importance. It is self-esteem that gives us the courage not to fight change, not to fight growth, not to fight the next moment of our existence. Our greatest chance at permanence lies in our ability to handle change. We must be in the moment, feel it, experience it then let go, then move onto the next moment and the next adventure. And we cannot demand always to know in advance what that will be. Stillness is impossible. The moment can be lived, but it cannot be captured. This attitude requires self-esteem and is important for romantic love — love has the greatest chance to endure when it does not fight the flow of life but learns to join with it. Let’s look at three specific things around self-esteem that impact romantic love: self-acceptance, autonomy, and worthiness. #1 Self-Acceptance The old adage of only being able to love

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The Relationship House | The Roof: Getting What You Need

The Roof: Getting What You Need

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If you’re new around here, this post is part of a series and we are talking about all the elements (in great detail! lol) of building a strong & lasting relationship house. Today’s post is on “The Roof”. And yes, this is not how you build a REAL house, from roof down, but we are moving that direction because the most simplistic (or easy to understand pieces) are at the top. As we move down, the pieces become a bit more complex. So having a roof is great, it keeps you sheltered. It’ll probably protect you somewhat from rain or sun. But it’s obviously, not the ONLY piece. If you were to ONLY have a roof, well… you’re probably not going to survive the elements. All of that to say, and to reiterate, that you need all of the 5 Golden pieces. The roof is really about learning an important lesson, which is: everyone has needs, but can be different in how they like a need to be met (aka the strategy). This is important to realize that your partner is not exactly like you. When we think things like, “Well if my partner really loved me then they would do XYZ” this is detrimental to the relationship. However, if we can begin to understand that that’s actually a very misguided belief, then we may be able to become curious. We then might be able to think, “If that’s not true, then what might my partner do in attempt to show me that they love me? And if my partner is not exactly like me, then perhaps I think I’m being loving towards my partner by doing XYZ but maybe that’s not actually the message they are getting…” Another way to look at this is: when people don’t do what you would “naturally” do, then the tendency is to think that they don’t love you or truly care. But really, this is what happens when you try to fit someone into your “meaning box”. Again, people are not like you, they are also NOT mind-readers, and it’s your job to communicate what things you need & want. Hopefully, we’re beginning to lay some ground work around questioning the thoughts we have. If you haven’t already heard of the book The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman (first of all, what rock have you been living under?!), Chapman is a counselor who noticed that there was a major disconnect in the couples that he was helping. He would have people give more compliments, or do more things around the house, but it didn’t seem to resonate with some people — they felt just as sad & unsupported as ever. Then he finally realized that there’s these 5 categories that people were falling into. The categories are: Words of Affirmation, Acts of Service, Gift Giving, Quality Time, & Physical Touch. As people were able to “categorize” themselves, it gave their partner more of a roadmap — or in other words, a direct route to the person’s heart. And this is a wonderful place to begin learning about your partner (and yourself!) when it comes to what is going to speak to their heart. I think that this book is fun, and does a wonderful job at highlighting the differences between people. However, I think this book is really only one shingle on the roof. As we begin to learn more about attachment styles (that’s coming further down the post pipeline) we’ll begin to see how certain attachment styles tend to have certain love languages vs. it being about the individual (ex: Anxious Preoccupied tend to really need words of affirmation, quality time and physical touch; whereas the Dismissive Avoidants typically like Acts of Service & Gift Giving.) Chapman states that the language is usually fixed unless there’s a major life change, but I have not found this to be true. Needs tend to be multiple, and not a simple category. For example, You could be getting plenty of quality time with your partner, which does makes you feel better/more loved to a degree, but you can still have that lingering feeling of “it’s not enough” / a need being unmet. And when in true relationship turmoil/worry those things only minimally make a difference if a difference at all. (We’ll cover why that is in more detail in another post.) Again, it’s not to say that there is no merit to The 5 Love Languages but it is such a tiny piece in a much grander puzzle. The book does however, perhaps unknowingly, teach a very important skill: the ability to start to become aware of needs. And this is the lesson: The roof to a strong relationship house is in the giving, asking for, getting, & being able to receive what we actually need. Identifying Needs In order to give, ask for, get, or even receive what we need all starts with being able to identify needs. Being able to identify needs seems to be a struggle that many people have (so if you have ever thought, “What are needs? I don’t even know what my needs are.” You’re not alone!) Many people are so out of touch with themselves and their inner worlds they have no idea where to even begin. There’s actually hundreds of words to express our needs (maybe even thousands), however, they more or less can be put into basic categories because they are essentially different ways of saying the same thing. I’m sure we’re all familiar with Maslow’s hiearchy of needs, and this is a good example of a categorical classification: Similarly, are Manfred Max-Neef’s fundamental human needs categories (“Human Scale Development” approach vs. hiearachical) : There might be other models that show similar needs by other thought-leaders, but hopefully, just by showing you two models you can see the overlap. This overlap is there because all humans have these same fundamental needs (you might prefer different words even from those of Maslow or Max-Neef), but

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what makes relationships last | made of lovely

The Blueprint: A Detailed Guide on Dr. Gottman’s Teachings

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If you recall from my last post, The Five Golden pieces For a Lasting Relationship, one of the elements is: The blueprint for your house.  I like this analogy of a blueprint because a blueprint really gives you a good overview of what to do and what not to do.  It’s a solid plan for success. And while a plan doesn’t necessarily include instructions for what to do in specific trouble-shooting circumstances, or why certain things are still going wrong (more on those in up coming posts), it’s nonetheless a very important piece. In other words, this is not the ONLY piece. It is 1 of 5. The blueprint for success is laid out in the teachings of Dr. John Gottman. If you study anything related to relationships and psychology you will likely have heard about him. But for those of you who haven’t… Dr. John Gottman is a psychologist, professor, and researcher who operates from a research-based approach to relationships. He studied 3,000 couples over 40 years. And uses other research to draw conclusions. He’s a huge proponent of evidence vs. a psychologist’s experience and subjective opinion. Because of the research he’s done, he’s able to predict divorce/separation with a 94% accuracy rate! Not only can he predict IF a couple would split but he could also predict WHEN. (Which is pretty unprecedented. Right?!) The best part: he shared how he can do that. (Which means you can do something to create lasting love! Yay!) So that’s what we’re going to dive into today. Heads up: Get cozy, be prepared to “save your reading spot”, because this is going to be another deep dive! (You know how I love having ALL the info in one place. lol) The Masters vs. The Disasters In his research he found a clear distinction between two different types of couples. One type seemed to create an atmosphere of disconnection, negativity, and constantly miss opportunities to connect. He called this group The Disasters. The other group, while not perfect, tended to have more relational skills, positivity, and connect in small ways so that the pair grew together in love. He called this group of people The Masters. So what are the core principles that Gottman identified in these couples that can either lead to the death or the success of a relationship? Let me tell you… What is Love? The best place to start is by knowing what you’re aiming for. Gottman defines love as revering each other and having gratitude that you are in each other’s lives. “Love is the most sacred experience we can have. True love is woven out of honoring and understanding each other’s unique gifts, vulnerabilities, and eccentricities. Your journey is not going to be like any other couples. Being in love isn’t static – it deepens over time. Falling in love is also falling into knowledge. Endearing love comes when we love most of what we learn about the other person, and can tolerate the faults they cannot change. A long-term committed relationship will hit bad patches. We’re going to have to accept the detritus of mistakes and regrettable incidences we are going to create.” – Dr. John Gottman At the most basic level, the things that kill relationships, can be distilled into two simple things: Deception & the yearning for emotional connection that seems unavailable from the partner.  So let’s dive into the specific things that either kills or builds lasting love. #1. Negative vs. Positive One big thing that Gottman noticed between the disasters and the masters was an outstanding tendency towards being positive (aka nice) vs. negative (aka hostility, anger, meanness, etc.). When in conflict, the masters would have a 5:1 ratio of positivity. They would crack a joke, briefly change the subject to re-regulate, or do things that were defined by Gottman as a “repair” attempt. He also noticed that when in conflict, these couples would often remain neutral (vs. mean –  which is what he calls being in their naughty box). So even though these couples may go into the naughty box for brief moments during conflict, overall they spent more time in the neutral or nice boxes.  Further, when these couples were just hanging out the ratio of positive to negative jumped to 20:1. The thing about staying in the negative is that it starts to create what Gottman calls, negative sentiment override (NSO for short). “Negative sentiment override is when your bad thoughts about your partner overrides/distorts any positive or neutral thoughts about them. Present AND past experiences get ‘over-written’ as dark, lonely, negative despair. Negative sentiment makes it all feel hopeless, and there is constant doubt about the relationship.” – Dr. John Gottman When you’re unhappy you don’t notice 50% of the good things that your partner does (Robertson & Price) What’s more is that the Zeigarnick effect means that naturally you tend to forget things that are ‘done’ or are ‘finished’. This is why positive things tend to be forgotten quickly, while negative things leave more of an “open loop” in our minds. This finding shows us that positive emotion has a shorter “shelf-life” and doesn’t tend to be as powerful as negative – it takes a great deal more positive to cancel negative! This is why that equation of 5:1 is not balanced.  Negative has more power/ability to affect pain/damage. Whereas it takes more positive to heal. For the disasters, Gottman began to recognize that while these couples had an overall trend of staying in their naughty boxes & a propensity towards negative sentiment override, some very specific negatives were most corrosive to the relationship. The 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse He called the most corrosive negatives, The Four Horsemen of The Apocalypse as these led to a couple’s demise if they happened a majority of the time. Criticism says, “There’s something wrong with you. You are defective.” This looks like blaming your partner and making them wrong. The focus is on them. Example: “You know I’ve

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The Pendulum Swing

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Before we dive into the five pieces of building that relationship house we discussed in the last post, there’s one other concept that’s really important to grasp. While I don’t know your specific starting point, there is a common experience that we all have when we begin to challenge our internal belief systems. I came across the label for it while watching a YouTube channel called The WuWeiWisdom, but the description resonated so well that I want to share it with you. It’s called: the pendulum swing (we’ll discuss the swing part in a little bit). On a pendulum there’s essentially three points: one far end, the middle, and the other far end. Living on the ends of the pendulum will give you black and white thinking. However, we want to stay away from the ends, and land somewhere in the middle. The Healing Journey & Your Misguided Beliefs While on a healing journey, part of the journey’s requirement is: reprogramming our misguided beliefs. These misguided beliefs show up in a variety of ways, but they are essentially the meaning that you are assigning things. And that meaning is not typically accurate. It’s especially inaccurate when it’s rooted in fear. The person who harbors misguided beliefs has a tendency to have black and white thinking. Or in other words, no other possible options exist in their mind – it’s either this or that. Such as, “Either you love me, or you don’t.” It’d be hard for the person who holds that belief to fathom that someone can love you AND not be sure they want to be with you. This doesn’t mean they’re lying or that they don’t actually love you. (Head explosion? Yea, I know.) Before you’ve done any reprogramming it’s hard to understand how that sort of scenario can even exist because it “conflicts” with the current information you have stored in your brain. You can only see the side that you’re “naturally” inclined to and its opposite. But the good news is that you can update that info. The pendulum is a tool that helps make us aware of the contrasted misguided beliefs that live on the ends of the pendulum. Which means, we will have to practice finding the middle. Let’s look at this in a less abstract way. The Pendulum in Real Life Imagine this scenario: you don’t live with your partner, you shoot them a good morning text at 9am, but your partner doesn’t text you back until 10pm. Depending on your own “meaning-making” tendencies (aka misguided belief systems), you will interpret that event to mean something. It could mean.. “If I was on my partner’s mind then they would text me. They must not really care about me/I don’t matter to them.” “There’s no reason someone can’t find 2 mins to send me a text out of 12 hours. They must be seeing someone else and that’s where their attention is.” “It’s not hard to send a text, I must be more into them than they are into me.” “Maybe I should end things with this person before I get hurt.” “Good. I’m glad this person isn’t so needy. I don’t want someone controlling me, and taking all my free time. I prefer having less closeness anyways.” The “meanings” can go on and on — and be more or less extreme. But hopefully you are getting the feeling that these aren’t healthy resolves. These are meanings that are coming from wounds within the individual, such as, “I don’t matter”, “I’m not good enough”, “I’m not lovable”, “I am rejected”, and “I will be abandoned”. If we look at the contrast of these (aka a healthier individual’s response) it might look like one of these.. “My partner must be having a busy day today. I’m going to call my friend to see if they’ll be available tonight to go see that show I’ve been really wanting to see.” “My partner will text me when they’re available. Even if that happens to be tomorrow. It’s perfectly fine, because I have many other things I need/can/want to do.” The healthier response is not to assign meanings rooted in fears. This person is happy without their partner, but equally happy to allow for interdependence. This is where the pendulum comes into play. Again, a pendulum has three points: one far end, the middle, and the other far end. If we continue with the scenario from above, hopefully you can see that on one side of the pendulum (let’s call it side A) is codependency rooted in a fear of abandonment. That’s why the meaning, or narrative, becomes “I don’t matter/ I’m not good enough/ I’m not lovable/ etc.” The method on this end to avoid the pain of abandonment, is to have extreme closeness. And on the other far side of the pendulum (let’s call it side B) it’s hyper-independence still rooted in the fear of abandonment/rejection. The method on this end however, is to have separation as a way to avoid the pain of abandonment. The middle is the balance between the two, where fear does not reside, but healthy interdependence does. Swinging On The Pendulum When we need to rewire that belief/way of thinking, it preliminarily causes a conflict within ourselves which causes us to swing from one extreme to another. This is because we don’t yet know what to think/believe when we’re given new information — it “conflicts” with the information we have stored in our brains so we tend to go to the opposite extreme. That is the pendulum swing (taking things from one extreme to another). So, if you were to tell the person who lives on side A that they are a bit too clingy/needy, they might swing and say, “What? You want me to be cold & detached? If I don’t need the other person, then what is the point of the relationship?” (Or some variation of that.) This is a swing to the other side of the pendulum

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The 5 Golden Pieces for A Lasting Relationship | Made of Lovely

The 5 Golden Pieces for A Lasting Relationship

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My ten year relationship, to a man I loved deeply and imagined a future with, ended. Truthfully, not because I wanted it to, but because I just couldn’t live in the internal state I was in any longer. Being alone had to be better than being with someone & still feeling unloved, lonely, anxious, and other unpleasant feelings. Right? (The answer is yes btw, but there’s more to it which we’ll talk about later.) I’m not sure if when I made the decision to end things, if I fully understood the amount of fear and panic that would ensue shortly after me saying one morning, “If you don’t want to try then I can’t stay here anymore. I’m done. I have to leave” Followed by a shocking reply, “…. yea. I think it’s for the best.” But this story isn’t about how to recover from the crippling effects of a breakup (I’ll save that one for another time). No, this is about 4 years of research for the answers to all the questions I had.  The most pressing: what makes relationships work & last? It’s true that having similar core values is important and even having similar trajectories help (wanting marriage and kids, etc.). But those things have not proved to be very “reliable” in my experience. They are helpful for lessening conflict, but not stand-alone predictors of success for a lasting relationship.  For example, “on paper” my ex and I: enjoyed each other’s company, rarely fought, were always respectful, had similar trajectories (at least initially), had harmonious living habits, loved each other’s families, shared many core values (like personal growth & development), both came from families where our parents were happily married for 30+ years…the list went on. But I couldn’t understand how we could have most of the things you find listed as “necessary ingredients” to lasting love, and yet, things still went the way they did. Sure, I could say, “Well some things just don’t work out. It is what it is.” But that’s not me. I like to deep dive and find out WHY. So down into the research rabbit hole I went. I didn’t watch an ounce of TV for 6 months, and then very little for the next 2 years. Instead I spent every shred of free-time learning. I listened to psychologists while I cooked, walked the dog, got ready for the day or bed, drove places, cleaned, and while I worked out — any time I could listen I would. When my eyes and hands were free, I read. And what I found has been seriously life-changing (and that’s what I’m going to continue to share with you in this blog series).  One day, an epiphany came to me in the form of a picture. All of the “dots” of everything I’d read, watched, & tested came together.  It was the picture of a house. I realized that there’s actually a minimum of five pieces needed (to varying degrees, depending on which pieces you already have) — without the five pieces (and The X Factor) there’s just a slim chance the relationship is going to make it.  The more pieces you have and the more sound/solid you are in each of the pieces the better the relationship, and the more fulfilled you can feel. The House – 5 Golden Pieces for A Lasting Relationship As I’ve mentioned before, everyone has a different starting point, so some of these you may already have or do quite well. While other things you may really need to double-down on. Let’s adopt the mentality of staying curious even when we think we may already know something. I’m going to break each one of these down in much greater detail in upcoming posts, however, here’s a very general overview: #1 The Blueprint These “instructions” show us a good overview of many of the intricate details of the house. They show you to avoid criticism, defensiveness, stonewalling, and contempt. They urge you to turn towards bids, and be mindful of the positive interactions vs. negative. The instructions show you how important gentle soft communication is when it comes to requests from our partners, and the importance in the quality of friendship that you have with your partner. They also let us know, that we’re probably going to make a mistake at one point & knowing how to repair is worth its weight in gold.  It shows us the importance around a few key ingredients like safety, trust, trustworthiness, and attunement. However, “instructions” alone don’t build the house, so let’s see what else we need. #2 The Roof Yes, starting with the roof is not the technical way to build a house, but the “upper” concepts are the easiest to understand, so we’ll work top down. The roof is sort of a “cherry on top” it can add a little bit of comfort, but a roof on its own can’t really shelter us. We’d have to stand there holding it up, and that would be exhausting. So we see that it has importance, but it also needs the other pieces. So what does the roof translate to? It’s the things that you need. If we can identify our needs, meet our own needs mostly, ask specifically for what we need, be able to receive, and give love in a way that is more in the language that our partner speaks then this is a useful tool to have so we can feel a bit of comfort. #3 The Walls This connects the floor to the roof, and can be thought of as the thing that helps “hold things together”. This is where we see relationship skills coming into play. How well can you communicate with your partner? Are you able to smoothly navigate differences? How well can you relate & collaborate? Understanding how to have tact and speak in a way that can be heard by our partners is essential. The thing is, even with the best communication skills

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Want To Improve Your Relationship? Here's What No One Taught You |Made of Lovely

Want To Improve Your Relationship? Here’s What No One Taught You.

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Have you ever had the experience of an “ah-hah” moment when you discover a golden nugget or a “piece of the puzzle” you’ve been missing? Often times, we simply don’t know what we don’t know. But if we can start to bring awareness and understanding to the situations that we’re struggling with, then there’s a lot to gain. So, that’s what I want to do today. I want to open the conversation and your mind to some “puzzle pieces” that you’ve maybe never known about, or perhaps you’ve had a very surface-level understanding of them. This is going to be a series where we continue to deep dive together. So let’s start from a general overview of the three elements that can really improve a relationship. *There are many different types of relationships. What I will be talking about is “traditional” heterosexual couples, in momogomous relationships. That’s not to say that there aren’t things to learn here for “non-traditional” couples, because I think there still is. You’ll just have to independently account for the nuances in the differences. You, Him, Me, Her, and Us. How many entities do you think are in a relationship? If you said five, you’d be correct. While there’s two people, there’s essentially: If you don’t know about the five entities then you’ll have a harder time pin-pointing the areas that need awareness and attention from you. Again, if you don’t know what you don’t know how can you course-correct? You can’t. So let’s get you in “the know”. The Big 3 To Improving Your Relationship So now that we understand the “players” in the game, we can look at the actionable things within them. And it all boils down to three elements that can really improve the quality of your relationship. Let’s talk about each of these so you can start to have an awareness around what areas you may need to pay some attention to. Relationship Skills Relationship skills can be hard to master, or you may even feel like “they don’t work” but it’s usually because The Big 3 don’t work in a vacuum — they’re always simultaneously happening. The point of learning relationship skills is so that you can have tact. In other words, to be able to speak in a way that can be heard by your partner. And even if you can communicate with your partner without the other two items, it’s not likely to be as effective as it could be. So yes, you’ll have to be sharpening multiple skill-sets at once (don’t worry you’ll see some concrete examples as we go through this series). So if you’re wondering if this is an area that could use a little attention, here’s some symptoms of needing to sharpen relationship skills: I’m going to be diving into the skills in a lot more detail as I publish more posts, but I’ll list out a few of the top ones (mostly around communication & learning how to speak in a way that your partner can hear). The skills that you may need to learn how to do: Understanding Your Partner’s Internal World Before I even dive into this, I have to say you cannot control another person. Understanding how someone works is not a way for you to manipulate them to get what you want. You also have to start with the base understanding that: This is a lesson in accountability. It’s imperative that you own the part you play and the pieces that you are responsible for. If you have the M.O. to blame your partner, you can keep doing that, but I promise that road leads to no where. If you want to improve your life and your relationship you need to hold yourself accountable (again, be careful here about the pendulum swing, which looks like you beating yourself up and making yourself wrong. Shaming yourself serves no purpose. Accountability does wonders though). So, why then is understanding your partner so important? It helps you not take their actions personally, and it can help you communicate with them in a way that does not activate their attachment wounds. For example: Criticism is a bad strategy to use on it’s own (we see from Dr. Gottman’s research that it’s actually a big reason as to why couples split up), but it’s even more triggering to the dismissive avoidant. If you know your partner’s attachment style is a DA then you’ll have a general roadmap about them (e.g. they have a very deep fear about abandonment so they put up walls to keep themselves safe, they have a major shame wound, and often implement tactics to create space/distance, etc.) You’ll know how to approach conversations with consideration of them, which, will make it easier for them to help you get your needs met. It’s a beautiful dance that becomes easier when you understand the steps. To understand your partner makes for a win win situation. While you cannot change your partner, by you taking them into consideration, and you showing up differently, they will also have to show up differently. The simple merit of doing something differently means you will garner different results. If you make it safer for them to be their authentic self, you will see a change in them. The change may not always be the one you hoped for, but at least you will gain a lot more clarity. Your next steps will be crystal clear and no longer accompanied by fear or doubt. So, what are the things to gain understanding of? I’m going to dive deep into each of these (& more) in future posts, but to name a few: Understanding & Healing Your Internal World This is the single biggest area that can make the greatest impact. The best way of thinking about this would be like you’re wearing foggy/dirty glasses. Everything you see has to be filtered through those lenses. If you want to see things more clearly we’ve got to take the

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