So Much Happier Blog
Surge Forward or Have Patience?
“Every great and deep difficulty bears in itself its own solution. It forces us to change our thinking in order to find it.”
Because we live our lives in a constantly changing landscape of influences, we're always learning about the possibilities that are open to us, and the new ones constantly appearing through the creativity and interactions of the billions of other people who share the planet with us. The flow of ideas through which we move makes it possible for us to be learning things without even realizing it. Our minds are continually synthesizing everything they take in, giving us access to the building blocks with which to come up with our own new ideas. Often we disregard such ideas without even fully vetting them because of old programming left over from the past; this slows down our own progress, as well as the progress of humanity as a whole, by depriving it of your potential contributions, which is why it's a good idea to stop sometimes and take stock of what you really want. You may find that your old goals no longer satisfy. When you really open your mind to what would excite you most to work toward, you may find that it's time to make adjustments.
If you never do this, you may find your energy and enthusiasm tanking without realizing that it's because you're not moving toward anything that feels truly inspiring. For instance, I have a client I recently worked with who had been starting to yearn for a particular change, but hadn't really admitted this to him/herself until we sat down together and there was some dedicated time and space to say, "You know, I think what I really want most right now is this." It turned out to be something quite achievable, and within a week, everything was being arranged in a new way to support the stated goal. This person was relieved and energized, and couldn't wait to do the work of actualizing the new plan. And isn't that where we'd all like to be—enthusiastically meeting life every day and enjoying the tasks we take on?
On the other hand, it's also very possible to be vigilantly on the lookout for new opportunities and feel that they're not showing up, which can be particularly frustrating when we see how quickly everything is changing around us, including for other people we know. My best recent story about this is my own. I had been looking for ways to make a change in a particular area of my life for what felt like way too long without feeling like I was getting anywhere—despite doing everything I could think of that seemed in line with my desires. When a new opportunity finally did arise, I had an epiphany about why the process I'd gone through to get to that point was actually going to end up being important and useful in ways that were previously unforeseen.
Without telling the whole long story here, I'll just say that that the new state of things included a resolution to something old and very thorny that I'm still not finished dismantling, but that will feel like a great accomplishment to me when I am. It wouldn't sound all that splashy to everyone, but I feel like I've gained higher, more satisfying ground and a deeper understanding of the good that can come of something that has been extremely difficult for me for a long time. I see a bigger, and quite expansive, picture now of where this fits in the context of my life, and there were times when it seemed like this story would never make any sense. All this is really to say that sometimes the only thing to do is persist, because the alternative is to lie down and give up. If you do persist, the creative, constantly aware parts of your mind that are always working may eventually reveal patterns to you that you did not see coming at all. The moment when it all coalesces can be a gorgeous, stunning thing that is worth the wait. I'm still not super psyched that this whole thing took as long as it did for me, but feeling like it was all to a purpose makes all the difference in the world.
Sometimes one of the hardest things in life is to know whether you should be surging forward or waiting for opportunities to align. This will always be individual and therefore mysterious, something no one else can dictate to you. But I think finding the balance here involves both making space for awareness by reexamining your circumstances with regularity to find what's true for you in the now, and being willing to persist and have patience when it looks like there's no possible resolution to your problems. Things will keep changing, and eventually, those changes will align to help your cause if you're paying attention and ready to seize the moment.
Where in your life do you think you need to reexamine right now and where do you need to have patience? This is a question to ask yourself often. It can really get the creative parts of your mind activated and working for you. You might want to do this with someone else, taking turns talking through both sides of the question. If you try this and have any useful realizations, I'd love to hear about it in the comments section below. I hope you end up with new realizations that keep you moving ever onward and upward.
Not Again!
“What’s so fascinating and frustrating and great about life is that you’re constantly starting over, all the time, and I love that.”
Life moves pretty fast, but many of us feel that the progress we most want is slow in coming. Learning new things, finding or creating the right opportunities, and starting new ventures often takes waaaay longer than we want it to. Frustration is a common complaint because the experience of working hard and never seeming to get anywhere is commonplace. Because I'm pretty sure that you can relate, in this blog I want to address how we can deal with being in this stew of frustration.
Sometimes when I work with clients on frustration, we get them to a place of feeling great, but they immediately start to worry that the frustration will just return. And I have to agree—it will! Just as achieving proper hydration today is a feat you'll need to repeat tomorrow even if you ace it today, managing your emotional life and your thoughts is work that will always need doing. Sorry if I've burst your bubble because you thought there was such a thing as being perfect and "done." It may look to you from the outside like some people have it all together and are beyond internal turmoil. Trust me on this, except for perhaps the odd below-the-radar enlightened master among us, they're not!
If we live in a constant state of frustration, it's because we're not appropriately 1. blowing off steam and 2. allowing novelty into our lives. We cannot ignore and repress anything that even smells like an emotion for decades at a time and expect to feel calm and unconflicted. Emotions are actually there for a reason. They send us important messages about what's not working for us so we can become aware of the problem and fix it. If your emotions seem huge and painful, unless you have a chemical imbalance of some sort or have experienced significant trauma, it's probably because you've ignored smaller waves of emotion, and now they've become more intense as they've piled up. If you do the work required to become aware of what they're pointing to and deal with that issue appropriately, you'll find relief. I know almost none of us is taught how to do this, but there are various ways. I think you know I'm a big fan of Tapping, which not only helps you to release excess built-up emotion, but also to quite naturally find root causes and new perspectives on your situation that will help you to change old patterns. As far as the novelty piece of the equation, when you're frustrated, don't you feel like it's just same thing day after day after day? Well, maybe it is. And maybe that's because you're not trying new things, seeking diverse outside viewpoints, or making new connections to break your logjam. These two things can get you unstuck from continued frustration fairly efficiently, opening up new possibilities that allow you to feel freer.
The last tactic I want to mention is the cultivation of more robust spiritual, mental, and emotional endurance—translation: Patience. The ability to continue striving to stay conscious, and continue learning and attempting to produce better results every day for extended periods, even when progress is slow, all without freaking out, is very well worth cultivating. In our instant-gratification culture, this may sound like just about the least enjoyable thing ever, but little to no enduring work has ever been created without it. Take a look at this blog for hints about how to increase your capacity for patience. Hopefully all of these elements together will help to buoy you up the next time you feel stuck and frustrated. No one enjoys feeling stuck, and when you're in that place, you're not able to be the best self that will most benefit your happiness, as well as the world around you.
When You Assume...
“One of the most sincere forms of respect is actually listening to what another has to say.”
Ok folks, here we go with more on communication skills. This is an area in which improvement gains you greater power in all areas of your life, so time devoted to it is never wasted. Unless you're a hermit on a mountaintop, you need these skills every day, so we're going to stick with the subject until we've covered what I think are the most helpful general ground rules to remember when talking with other people, whether they're your closest loved ones or perfect strangers.
This next one can prevent combustion when your discussion is approaching a flash point, so don't disregard it because it seems too simple. Here it is: Make no assumptions. Now, you might be thinking, "Right, sure, I get it." But this is much harder to do than it seems at first glance. To really hear what someone else is saying, you often have to continue listening past when you might think you've gotten the message. No matter how close you are to another person, they remain distinct from you, always changing, and ever surprising; it pays to remember that. No one likes for you to assume you know everything about them, because today something may have changed. Sometimes people change so slowly that we don't see it happening, but conversation will reveal new viewpoints.
In order to be part of an authentic exchange, we need the courage to be willing to hear about others' changes, even if they affect us. It's natural and good for all of us to continue to learn, change and grow throughout life. We are supposed to progress, with the accumulation of experience, toward wisdom. Each person with the necessary health and capacities is on their own adventure toward this end. It is ungenerous to try to hold someone in a stagnant place because that's more comfortable for you. If you fear the ways in which others' changes will affect you, that means you have work to do. If you don't do your personal work around that, you'll be unable to truly hear and understand another person.
The prospect of change can be frightening, no doubt about it, so you will be best served by finding ways to handle your fears. Feeling fear is part of the human experience, but like all emotions, it's a signal with a message for you. If you can hear and acknowledge the message, you will usually feel better immediately to some extent. Then what remains is the work of deciding which actions you will take to remedy the cause of the emotion. I cannot emphasize enough how much EFT/Tapping can help you with this kind of work—finding both clarity and the willingness to respond to your emotions appropriately. EFT is an amazing, free tool that is gentle and easy to use. I suggest that you and become comfortable with using it. Even just using the basics can give you significant support in dealing with your emotions.
It's great to acknowledge when someone else's communications strike fear into your heart once the other person has had a chance to say their piece. That helps you not to expend energy hiding how you feel, and it gives the other person the opportunity to consider your place in their process so that you can work out a plan that works for both. However, generally I suggest that you start by checking what you've heard to make sure that you understand. Put what you think they've said into your own words and see whether they agree that you're on the same page. If you are, then you can explain your immediate reaction, as well as your willingness to compromise or work together—or your need for something else entirely. If you immediately spin out when you think you may have heard something you didn't like, you'll tend to get lost in your own thoughts, and any hope of really understanding and finding common ground with the other person goes out the window. It's all too easy for unfortunate misunderstandings to ensue. If you think they're being a jerk, and you repeat back what you think they've said calmly to make sure you understand, they'll appreciate the opportunity to rephrase if they did not communicate clearly. It also gives them an opportunity to hear how what they said sounds, and sometimes people will rethink their position when they realize that it sounds mean or inappropriate.
Reminding yourself that it's your job to allow others to be who they are, and that it's right for them to have the opportunity to follow their own path, may be necessary. So may be the willingness to keep revisiting a subject if understanding can't be reached immediately. Sometimes the greatest leaps in our facility with communication skills come about because relationships with those we care most about challenge us to step up. This process may not always be fun, but it is rewarding if you refuse to give up. The ability to listen calmly and remain open to communications from others is a valuable life skill that will enable you to understand others on a deeper level, make better choices, and relate to them in ways that ultimately work for you.
A Small Light in Darkness
“Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.”
In a previous blog, I wrote about the importance of basic meditation as a foundational tool, and the balancing effect of having a regular, deep experience of quiet and focus. Now I want to move on to one of the practical uses of this tool: Leveraging your intuition.
Now, before you decide that this is a “woo woo,” impractical concept, give me a moment to illustrate one of the ways in which your intuition can make a positive difference in your life. Every day in my coaching, as I use EFT (meridian tapping), my clients and I are often struck, and sometimes astonished, by the useful information that surfaces from unseen depths of the self. This is particularly noticeable in cases where we’re working on physical pain that we suspect or know has an emotional component. If the client has any experience at all with meditation, it’s usually not hard for her to ask a leading question of herself and wait quietly and calmly for an answer. That question might be something like, “What is the upside to having this problem, in other words, why might I be afraid to let it go?” While the client’s conscious mind might be certain that she is ready, willing and eager to move beyond the problem, given a few moments of quiet and space, some other part of the self may answer that the problem is a part of her identity, and she’s not sure who she would be without it. Other objections that surface might be that once the problem is gone, there’s no excuse for not being successful, and that might feel like a lot of pressure, or that if the client lets go of the problem and is able to succeed, others might not like her anymore. Often, when such an answer reveals itself, she will say that she truly had no idea that this objection was in there. With the new information on our side, we can make progress for her. Without her ability to find quiet, that little voice would have been impossible to hear. Usually once we start working with the new information, the pain will move, change, and lessen, sometimes permanently. This process is just remarkable to be a part of. But if the mind is always whirring like a hamster on a wheel, it will be harder to bring these natural moments of insight to the surface where we can leverage them for real, noticeable change.
Some people seem to be born with more intuitive talent than others, and some people are sure that they don’t have this capacity at all. I think it’s possible for everyone to have a valuable relationship with their intuition, but cultivating that relationship takes some time and effort—just like any relationship, whether we’re talking about one with other people, your body, mind, or spirit. Some other areas in which a relationship with your intuition can bear fruit are your ability to zero in on what you need in any given moment, or what direction will be best for you to take in the pursuit of a goal. Getting more in touch with it can also help you get a clearer “gut feeling” about someone else’s character or intentions, or whether someone you’ve just met has potential as a good friend or business associate for you. What’s difficult about opening up this capacity is that in the beginning, you have no idea whether an impression is right or not, and you’re likely to feel like you’re just making it up. Your conscious mind will try to tell you that only it is valuable, and that your efforts in this regard are ridiculous and futile. It’s only by allowing yourself to relax and wait, acknowledging but then releasing mind chatter, that you have a hope of becoming more adept at sensing something genuinely helpful.
When I’m going for an intuitive answer, I have made it a habit to stop when I feel unsure if my logical mind is making things up, clear thought away, and try again. If the impression really came from my intuition and not my mind’s machinations, it will come back in a similar way a second and even a third time, and I gain confidence that this idea might be helpful enough to run with. It’s fine to apply your mind to the question of how to use that information, and it’s a great idea to keep your wits about you as you choose how much to invest in it, especially in the beginning. This is not an exact science, and it’s always good to have a backup plan! As you keep playing with this process, you may find yourself gaining confidence in your relationship with the less conscious parts of yourself. I can tell you from experience that they have a lot to offer.
If you want to get started on opening up that intuitive box, experimenting with Tapping really is a great way to start. For instance, if there’s something you’ve been resisting tackling, you might not be sure why you keep finding reasons to procrastinate. If you start tapping and state how you’re feeling, how you just don’t want to do that thing even if your own inaction is starting to frustrate you, and then ask yourself why you don’t want to do it, you might be surprised as the clarity that results. The tapping will probably increase your ability to focus and be patient, and wait for any answer that might come up. If nothing does, well, no loss! You’ve just spent some time doing something that calms the body’s stress response and increases the likelihood that you’ll get a good night’s sleep! If you do this for just a few minutes each day, I strongly suspect that you will have an experience before too long that will prove to you that this Tapping thing really does do something. As mentioned last week, if you stay focused on your intention to improve the flow of your intuition and just keep trying without pressuring yourself too much, you increase the likelihood of success, as well as your ability to notice it when it happens.
Once you start to build some confidence in your ability to intuit information that is personal to you, you can then move on to greater orders of magnitude (for most people, at least), such as sensing information about subjects less related to you. I do find that we all have different intuitive propensities, just as some people find that they’re better at math or learning languages rather than learning about history once they start delving into those subjects in school. Some find it naturally easy to understand what someone else is feeling, while others might find that they can sometimes get a sense for who is calling on the phone without consulting caller ID. This can be a fun area to experiment in. Again, just use your common sense and tread lightly in relying too heavily on this kind of information. It’s only one aspect of the sum total of all information available to you in any given moment.
I hope you are able to see how even just this one benefit of a meditation practice can contribute measurably to your progress, even if only in very specific pursuits like using EFT. Sometimes people don’t make an effort to learn to meditate because the benefits don’t seem immediately practical, but what if your practice could lead to letting go of even some of a physical discomfort you might have? What if it could help you become more confident in the life choices you make for yourself every day? Getting started with meditation may not be the easiest thing you’ve ever done, but you can start small with just a few minutes here and there and still make overall gains. I know I’m never sorry that I’ve spent time on this because of all the ways in which it contributes to my life positively. There are many different philosophies and techniques out there. Dig around and find one that makes some sense to you and give it a try. Even if you never become more than a casual meditator, there are benefits waiting for you.
We're Not Gonna Take It!
“Have patience. All things are difficult before they become easy.”
This week, I’ll be addressing a subject that is right up there with politics and religious debates in its ability to annoy just about everyone: The virtues of patience. Now, before you run screaming and try to pretend you didn’t even read this far, let me assure you that this blog post won’t be about trying to make you feel bad for not having any. I hope it will give you a few new angles from which to consider the concept of patience.
Let’s start by addressing the opposite, which is, I think, far more familiar to most of us leading a typical modern life. Things are hectic and we’re trying to balance so many different parts of life and self all the time. This is demanding and difficult. Here are some specific thoughts on why we tend to spend so much time in some variation of this state:
· With the advent of hyper-connectivity, we are constantly aware of hordes of other people anytime we glance at one of the many screens to which we have access. We can see what millions of other people are thinking, doing, and achieving at the click of just a few buttons. It can seem like others have a lot more of the good stuff in life than we do, at least if their own narratives are to be believed. Those who are at all competitive may feel the need to do more in order to keep up at every turn.
· The world seems a lot more crowded than it used to because of the constant crush of new information. With all the people out there doing things, it seems less likely that what we have have to contribute will be seen, acknowledged, and valued. Before the free flow of information was possible, you could be a major contributor in any market by following rules that had been in place for thousands of years in business interactions. Now the rules have changed almost overnight, and continue to evolve at a rapid pace.
· We need a great deal of flexibility and a willingness to learn constantly in order to succeed now. Until you become comfortable with always being in flux, which may take time to learn, all your discomfort might build up in ways that boil over and stop your momentum until you can regroup.
· The world population is growing at unprecedented rates. If you're paying attention, you notice that there are new and worrisome problems connected with this change for which we don't currently have solutions.
· In many places, there are more people on the roads and riding public transportation than ever before, as well as in lines at supermarkets and other necessary stopping points. It can seem like everything is more difficult and time consuming because of the crowds everywhere you turn.
So what is this mythical thing called patience? There's a cultural idea many of us have inherited that tells us patience is a virtue of the very good, and very boring. Patience is not fiery or exciting, and we're often told that people need to be a hot, brightly burning mess in order to get anything great done. We’re given examples of all the great artists who lived hard and flamed out early. Well, that might be fine if you knew what you were passionate about early in life and had the means to pursue it; on the other hand, what if you'd like to live past the age of 30 and have the option to continue learning and doing new things as you go? You’re going to have to last and be able to keep yourself moving. There will always be ample reasons to be impatient in this fast-paced world, but impatience is not a fun or creative state to be in. Because it destroys our ability to apply ourselves in a focused manner over time, mastering impatience is necessary if we want to achieve anything that requires consistent effort.
I like to think of patience as the ability to wait for glorious results and enjoy the work you need to do all along the way to achieve your goals, avoiding having a meltdown that stops your progress anytime something real or imaginary gets in your way. When I put it this way, it probably sounds pretty reasonable and necessary, right? I think the idea that being a patient person means being either deeply, impossibly good or passionless really needs to go!
Here are a few ideas for increasing your capacity for patience, broken out into the areas of self that is involved. Since most cultures today emphasize the mind, the mental solutions may seem more familiar, but they all work together and should be considered:
Mental solutions:
· Read biographies/autobiographies of people you admire. I guarantee that these will not read, "I was born, and then everything I ever wanted happened without my lifting a finger." Even if the person was born into wealth and privilege, his success was not that simple. This puts you in the good company of others who have worked for what they wanted. It also reminds you of the value of a good story, which is what you will create by staying in the game.
· Contemplate how more people on the planet also means more brain power and creativity available to solve the world’s problems and improve quality of life for everyone. Would you want to go back to a time in which there was a lot of unoccupied land, but no essential services? No dentistry? No emergency medical care? I wouldn’t. No, thanks.
· Remind yourself that reality T.V. tempts us to believe that succeeding overnight with little effort is a viable route to our goals. In fact, most of those featured in these programs have done plenty of work behind the scenes to get where they are, if only the work of promoting themselves—which still counts as work!
· Make an effort to become aware of mental nosedives when you are indulging in them. You don't have to be in a deep meditative trance to notice your own thinking. Let's say you just got your 5th book rejection, and you're frustrated. You might think something like, "This book is going nowhere. I don't know why I bother. No one cares about what I have to say. No one likes me." We all string together thoughts like this sometimes, but it's probably clear to the observer that a few publishers passing on your project has no correlation to whether or not people like you. You actually do have power over what to think about yourself and your life, but first you have to practice noticing your mental habits. Then, you can begin to change them by talking gently to yourself as you would a friend in distress. In the above example, you could say to yourself, "Wait a minute. I have plenty of people in my life who like me, and if not, I can make new friends. I bother because I like writing and know I have something to say." Time to be your own best friend! This is another essential life skill that most people never acquire, but being able to give yourself an effective pep talk can be invaluable when you’re working on challenging projects.
Physical solutions:
· In short, take care of your physical body. Ignoring these needs makes it a lot harder to be patient.
· If you're not sleeping enough, you will be irritable and reactive, and you won't be able to think clearly. There's really no way around it. Find the number of hours that works best for you by experimenting.
· You also need high-quality nutrition in order for your body to function well. Learn about nutrition yourself or get help with a basic plan.
· Regular exercise increases your energy, stamina, and strength and helps manage stress. Find something you like to do to get your body moving.
Emotional solutions:
· Anger is the enemy of patience. Most of us have huge stores of built-up anger caused by a lifetime of incidents, which we've swept under the rug because we've been taught that it's rude and unacceptable to express it. If you want to build your capacity for patience, you're going to have to deal with your anger. While there are lots of suggestions you can find for doing this, in my experience, nothing is as effective as EFT/Tapping for processing old emotions without any destructive side effects. Plus, you can do it yourself anytime, anywhere, for free.
· Other old emotions and traumas may be partly behind those previously mentioned negative thought spirals. You may find that processing old disappointments, humiliations, and other discomforts makes it a lot easier to avoid the nosedives over time, because now those memories aren’t dragging you down every time you’re challenged. Some things you can't just think yourself out of because they’re not purely mental. That’s why modalities with physical and emotional aspects are so important.
Spiritual solutions (these are best when they respect your beliefs and traditions, so you’ll need to find what works best for you):
· Ask for help. You can ask people you know or ask for help from some spiritual force, but the act of being willing to ask and being open to receiving help can be transformative on its own. Sometimes if you can relax a bit, you can find creative insights coming to you that were not available before.
· Acknowledge that you don’t know everything about how things you want could come into being. Everyone has different strengths and talents, and that’s ok. If we work with ours and let others work with theirs, and trust that it can all work out, life is more enjoyable and holds more opportunity. Embrace mystery. Allow blind faith to work in your favor.
· Spend some time every day thinking about things you’re grateful for. This is not about denying what may be wrong in your life or trying to discipline yourself about having negative feelings. It just helps you to remember that those aren’t all your life is about. It helps you look forward to enjoyment that you already have access to. Some people like to write these things down. When you’re in bed going to sleep or just after waking up can be a nice, relaxed time to appreciate what’s good in your life.
Allowing yourself to be more patient doesn’t mean you have to deny that you want things, or that there are things in your life that you don’t like. It’s healthy to learn to dial down your moments of full-on freaking out so you can smooth out your experience of life, exhaust yourself less with needless lows, and make faster progress toward your goals. Don’t be afraid to consider ways to bring more of this virtue to life. If it helps, tell yourself that this means you’re being a rebel in this stressed-out, stretched-thin world. I dare you to start making serenity trendy!
To Love and Be Loved
“Those who have never known the deep intimacy and the intense companionship of mutual love have missed the best thing that life has to give.”
A discussion of love and belongingness needs would certainly not be complete without a look at romance and intimacy, so that’s what we’ll focus on this week. In case you haven’t noticed, the world we live in is obsessed with romantic love, and the dream of intimate relationships between “soulmates,” pairs of people who seem to have achieved perfect harmony. Practically every song on the radio and every story line ever written include stories of loves won and lost. While many of us do seem to yearn for a deep sense of intimacy and connection with another, others find the idea of this less compelling, or find that what they yearn for is outside the accepted norm of romance; for some, what feels like a truthful expression of self in this realm will lie well outside the much idealized (but less often achieved) happy long-term monogamous relationship between two people. The good news is that, whatever your vision for yourself, there are likely many others in this wide world who want to achieve something similar, and with whom you might find what you’re seeking. Your chances of success are greatly enhanced if you’re willing to be honest with yourself and others about what that is, and courageous enough to stand up for it.
Anyone who has been in love knows that the feelings that result are intoxicating, blissful, both calming and energizing, inspiring. The chemistry of what happens in our bodies when we’re in this state is very real, and it all just feels, well, really good! Often effortlessly so. It’s natural to want to stay in it. However, maintaining this state over time requires some effort, the building of numerous skills that must mature with practice and experience, and the willingness to be challenged repeatedly. In some ways, this kind of love is even more challenging than familial relationships specifically because we are not related (at least let’s hope!) Your family members didn’t choose to be related to you, but they always will be. In romantic partnership, we’re clear that the other person always has a choice in whether to stay or walk away, and knowing this creates constant vulnerability. If one hasn’t done the necessary work to feel like a successful independent person who can comfortably live alone, this vulnerability can feel nearly unbearable. Human beings are social creatures who come pre-set with a terrible fear of being rejected and alone. Allowing love in is, in some ways, a radical act of optimism and one of the greatest leaps of faith it’s possible to make.
Vulnerability in relationships is also a product of allowing someone close enough in to really see us for who we are. In revealing ever more of ourselves, we give the other ever more chances to judge us as not good enough, and to wound us with that judgment. For many people, the fear of not being good, not being enough, is the worst of all. The idea of letting someone else see us clearly, and giving them the opportunity to confirm it if they will, can be terrifying. But one of the greatest benefits of taking a chance on love is the opportunity to be seen with our faults and loved anyway. This doesn’t happen every time—obviously—but when it does, it can go a long way toward helping us to heal from our fears of inadequacy. There’s no substitute for working on bolstering our self-worth from within, but real, accepting, caring love rewards our radical leap of faith by unleashing radical forces of healing. I think part of the reason so many of us pine for it is that we instinctively know the truth of this. While sexuality need not be a part of the equation in order to experience this kind of healing, there’s nothing like feeling that we’ve shared all the aspects of ourselves with another and still been acknowledged as worthy and lovable.
In order to keep love alive over time, here are some of the essential skills:
Courage. Love is not for the faint of heart. Maintaining enough vulnerability to foster intimacy can be taxing. Sometimes you’ll get hurt. You’ll need to have the courage to take another chance on this happening again and again even as you work on ways to hurt each other less. Relationships are not perfected overnight. Some relationships are easier. Others are harder, but offer great rewards that make the difficulty worth it. Each relationship is different.
Flexibility. Being truly close to another can be a wild ride. Each human being is unique, and we are so complex to be, to some extent, unpredictable always. Remaining close to someone over time means being willing to allow them to grow and unfold even when that is inconvenient for you.
Curiosity. If you can’t find others genuinely interesting, your long-term relationship prospects are slim. Intimacy requires taking an active interest in another and being willing to share in their revelations; you must be willing to be thrilled by their life as well as your own.
Generosity. Being close to someone else over time requires that you be willing to give as well as to take. If a partner feels that the balance of generosity is unequal in a relationship, they are likely to withdraw, and rightly so.
Openness. A good long-term relationship must be built on honesty and truth; it must allow both parties to share the best of themselves, and at least some of the worst of themselves. It also needs both parties to be able to openly adore the other much of the time. No relationship is all sunshine and rainbows, but if we’re unable to show love and appreciation openly, the relationship will not feel good. We also need to be able to allow ourselves to be adored and accept the love of the other.
Creativity. Each relationship being unique, there are no standard solutions that will work for everyone in all situations. Problem-solving skills are crucial in your ability to keep love alive. Issues will crop up, but if you come to the table with a determination to find a way through that works for all parties, and put your thought and creativity behind the pursuit, you are far more likely to find an excellent solution.
Patience. Sometimes solutions to the problems that arise will take time to find and implement. Sometimes we must live with discomfort. But being truly present in an intimate relationship can spur tremendous growth and excitement in life.
There are plenty of other fine qualities that aid in the maintenance of intimate relationships, of course, but these are a few to get you thinking. Are there others that you’ve worked hard to hone? Add a comment below to share what you know about making love work.
Despite all of our best efforts to perfect the art of being happily close to others, mystery will always be a part of our relationships. Chemistry is mysterious. How, why, and when people change is mysterious. Our evolving desires are mysterious. As much as we might like to feel an unshakeable sense of stability in our intimate relationships, it’s best to continue to strive to be comfortable with the idea that some things will always be unknown. It takes humility to admit that there will always be things we don’t know, but in this information age, it should be obvious that no one can know it all! Acknowledging this makes it easier to enjoy the surprises without feeling affronted by them, and that allows the journey of love and intimacy to be a lot more fun.