We all have our holidays traditions, but are yours giving you joy and filling your heart? Following holiday traditions doesn’t mean driving ourselves into the ground with so many to-dos just to check off the boxes of all the things that should get done during the holiday season. I think it’s time to rethink all the extra things we do just for the sake of doing them… Uplevel your holidays with enriching traditions.
But can we even tell the difference between just holidays to-dos and meaningful traditions we value?
If the task or plan feels heavy, burdensome, tedious, or overwhelming, that’s a pretty good sign that it no longer resonates with you, or possibly never did. It can also mean you might be going about it an outdated way, or that there are wounds and patterns that are getting triggered…
Traditions and rituals promote the identity of the couple and the family and serve to transfer values and meaning to the next generation.
If your holidays typically leave you feeling spent, triggered and all out of sorts, that’s a good indication that the way you go about the holidays is not serving you.
Here are some examples of thing I’ve come across that you might relate to:
Spending hours hunting deals on Black Friday and Cyber Monday and thereafter
Buying things just because they are a good deal
Getting distracted or triggered by all the hoopla of the sales and deals
Going beyond means to buy gifts and putting spending on credit cards that already carry balances
Going to a multitude of parties, outings, and other gatherings spreading ourselves thin
Overindulging in food and drink and other substances
Letting go of self-care and mindfulness practices because the daily routine changed
Decorating and gifting with candy and other overly processed consumables
Doing holiday cards, albums, calendars, mugs, pillows, and the like with photos of the children
Giving chotskies for the sake of giving something
Participating in multiple drives and volunteer opportunities
Cooking and baking, or catering, as if for an army and having most of it go to waste
Staying up till hours of the night cooking or wrapping presents
Having the holidays revolve around gift giving
Having celebrations revolve around alcohol/substances consumption and monitoring
Having the ritual of going back to the stores to do returns the day after Christmas
The theme here is in overdoing, overindulging, and overall excess- all usually at our, others, and the planet’s expense in one form or another…
I challenge you to review all your holiday to-dos, traditions, and rituals for what is enriching, meaningful and joyful about them. How are they encouraging and promoting your values? And, to identify if they are just a bunch of checkmarks on your list or excessive.
Decide now how you’d like the rest of the holiday season to go. What do you need to tweak in your approach to have truly replenishing and rejoicing holidays.
APPLICATION: Invite your partner and family members to do a Holidays Review…
~ Review your to-dos, traditions and rituals for their tediousness and heaviness or enrichment and joyfulness quotient ~ Identify if your approach is capturing and reflecting your true values (not what you value because of a pattern or defense mechanism and as a form of compensation…) ~ Decide what you will no longer do and take an action toward eliminating that as necessary ~ Decide what might be missing to add spark, meaning and joy and take an action toward integrating more richness flowing from your values ~ You’ll know you are on the right track as you feel delighted and joyful as you make progress towards designing and planning your holiday celebrations
Let the focus these holidays be on genuine and generous giving, not on checkmark giving…
Let the season be truly magical by entwining the essence of the holidays with the essence of you and yours.
Enjoy (be) the holidays, don’t do the holidays…
Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…
With Much Love & Light!
PS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?
Copyright (c) 2022 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication? Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
Although you might appreciate your partner, do you really appreciate them? Or do you appreciate them when they do things for you and when they conform to expectations… Is your appreciation based on their doing and superficial qualities, or their personal characteristics and essence… How much do you appreciate your partner?
Depending on the length, status, and quality of your relationship, you might have varying degrees of appreciation on conditions and appreciation for its own sake…
There is nothing wrong with appreciations on conditions, we do want to appreciate everything our partner contributes to our life.
It’s interesting that some partners refuse to appreciate or acknowledge their partner’s contributions. They believe what is being contributed are things that should be contributed as being part of a relationship…
These are the same partners that don’t appreciate their partner’s complementary characteristics, preferences, tastes and the like…
And these are the partners that always have complaints about their partner and their relationship. They focus on what didn’t get done, on what went wrong, on how their partner didn’t meet their needs, on how their partner wasn’t their best self…
It is a lot of work to be in this kind of relationship. There is little grace for imperfections, mistakes, limited bandwidth, wobbly moods, low energy, etc.
The interactions are very ego and fear based. The partners are focused primarily on their side of the equation and what they get… By the way, this is the second stage of relationships, the power struggle…
But imagine that you feel strong enough within yourself, consistently take care of yourself, and consistently address the scripts and programs that come up…
And imagine that as a result, you don’t filter your experiences with your partner through your fear lens, your scripts, and your needs… That you are able to see your partner for who they are and not what they do for you…
Then, what would you see? Wouldn’t you see an amazing human being, who is choosing to share their journey with you, and share themselves the best they can…
Regardless of where you fall on this spectrum, the main question still remains- How much do you appreciate your partner? Whether you tend to have appreciation on conditions or appreciations for their own sake, how much do you let your partner in on this?
Does your partner know what you appreciate they do and who they are? How do they know? Do you tell them? Do you tell them in real time? Do you make special time to share this with them, to do appreciations?
We start all our sessions with Appreciations, and we encourage our couples to do appreciations on their own- to have Appreciation Time. These never get old and it’s a wonderful way to nurture your relationship.
An appreciative heart is an abundant and expanded heart…
APPLICATION: Share the concept of Appreciation Time with your partner
~ If you don’t already have Appreciation Time in your relationship, discuss creating space for this to relish each other
~ If you already have Appreciation Time in your relationship, discuss what you love about this practice and ways of enhancing it…
Our Partner is one of the most important people in our life, wouldn’t it stand to reason to fully understand why and to let them know why we appreciate them so…
Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…
With Much Love & Light!
PS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?
Copyright (c) 2022 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication? Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
Stop withholding when you have an issue with your partner. You can still be nice… Unfortunately, when we are upset with our partner, we tend to closedown shop. We are no longer open for business. And this is not just about being intimate.
We take this to the next level. We lose our courtesy, we can’t appreciate, we get mean, and we can even become uncaring, underhanded, and spiteful. When the opposite is required to sustain a radiant and successful relationship… Being super generous…
I’m sure you can identify with the above. There is actually a spectrum of this experience. Sometimes when we are upset, we might even want to ditch the relationship…
I want to make a distinction about being upset and annoyed with our partner and being triggered.
Things might bother us, we might not agree with something, we might be disappointed, we might be put out or inconvenienced, and the like – such is being in relationship.
But when we get triggered, different filters come on… We forget who we are, we forget who our partner is, we forget the moment and we are thrown into an abyss of pain…
~ It’s like we got kicked in the chest and we can’t breathe… ~ It’s like we are thrown off a cliff and are free falling…
Our very survival feels threatened at some level…
When we are triggered we forget the current year, we forget we are not interacting with our caretakers from growing up, we forget we are radiant energetic beings, that we are awesome, that we have everything we need inside ourselves, and that everything is OK…
We get thrown into our little story of our little/lower self with our little life where everything is scary…
So, it makes complete sense that it would be very challenging to care about our partner’s feelings and their needs when our survival feels threatened… We can’t possible concern ourselves with being nice when we are in that state…
This requires lots of self-love, compassion, understanding and grace…
But this is not what I’m talking about here…
~ I’m talking about our regular upset and annoyance that we can easily address. ~ I’m talking about arguing for argument’s sake. ~ I’m talking about making points out of principle. ~ I’m talking about proving yourself right and your partner wrong… ~ I’m talking about trying to win over your partner. ~ I’m talking about doing relationship math, keeping score cards and doing tit-for-tats… ~ I’m talking about holding our ground just because we think it’s our boundary. ~ I’m talking about operating from our lower self because we are too lazy to clean up the moment!
This is not way to create our amazing relationship. What’s the point in all that?
How about we embrace the higher road, align with our higher self, and operate from generosity instead? When we are triggered, we are not ourselves – this requires special attention. But when we are just upset or annoyed, we can do a lot better!
And please know that I know that even this request might be too much for you. If you are finding that you are struggling, and it feels impossible to be generous because you are too depleted, then that’s the place to address. Focus on repleting yourself first.
Have a hooky day, a self-care day, a slower day. Be gentle, be compassionate. Give yourself lots of love…
Be super generous with yourself, and then with your partner….
APPLICATION: Maybe it’s time to rethink generosity… Maybe it’s time to reconsider the Law of Reciprocity…
~ How about we give just to give ~ How about we give with gusto ~ How about we concern ourselves with giving vs what we get ~ How about we actually receive what we are giving… ~ How about we appreciate what we get…
Gratitude, thankfulness, appreciation, giving and receiving are not as simple as they seem. Some have to be more intentional about these to enrich their relationship, and their lives…
Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…
With Much Love & Light!
PS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?
Copyright (c) 2022 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication? Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
Is our partner really separate from us, or are they a part of us? It is obvious that our partner is a separate entity from us. They have their own body, their own brain, their own most things… Yet, we treat them as if they are a part of us that we own… But maybe they are a part of us in a different way… And we just don’t know how to better relate to them from that perspective… Maybe the answer is to embrace your partner as a blessing…
It’s interesting what happens in relationships when the partners still have a codependency operating system… They lack boundaries and personal ownership. They suffocate their partner by entrapping them, and by spilling and projecting their stuff onto them. They control, manipulate, and coerce. They act as if the partner belongs to them, and they live in the other’s circle…
This is unfortunate as it mucks the beauty and gift inherent in their partner and the relationship…
When partners operate dirty like this, it’s very challenging to make heads or tails of what’s happening in the relationship. So, the first order of business is to establish some effective loving boundaries and increase personal ownership, so the spinning, looping, and drama can stop.
Embrace Your Partner
Once the partners have this under their belt, once they more fully own themselves, not the other, and can stand still, then they can witness their partner… They couldn’t see their partner before as they only saw projections of themselves and were only privy to the other’s resulting reactivity and sensitivities…
With cleaner interactions, the partners can start understanding their relating and dynamics better. They can also now better see their partner… And what a beautiful sight that is!
Now they can see the gift that their partner is– how they are a mirror that reflects us, how they provide the opportunities for growth and evolution, and how they provide a safe haven for exploration and practice…
This is a true Partner, beyond a partner with whom we create a practical daily life… With this Partner, expansion is possible…
Through this partnership, we are not separate… Through this partnership we commune at a higher level where we are One…
By owning our seemingly separateness we are able to experience our true togetherness, our Oneness…
When we can transcend the mundane, the triggers, the ego in our interactions with our partner, that’s when we can truly commune with them and witness our wholeness in our Oneness…
And this is how our partner is a Blessing in our life…
APPLICATION: Take a beat to reflect upon your relationship and your partner…
~ How do you entrap them? How do you control, manipulate, or coerce them- how do you jedi-mind-trick them? What do you project onto them? How do you invite them into the drama?
~ Where can you own yourself more and take full ownership of yourself?
~ How does the Blessing of your Partner, enable expansion in your life?
When we stop the spinning and looping, we have a cleaner experience with ourselves which allows us to have a clearer and more expansive experience with our Partner…
Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…
With Much Love & Light!
PS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?
Copyright (c) 2022 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication? Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
You know, we tend to over complicate things when we can easily be in love… We have this ideal of how we want our partner to be that we constantly measure them against… Our partner is also on a Journey and they are perfectly imperfect. For us to measure them against some ideal is totally unfair, not to mention that it also sabotages the success of the relationship… It’s so silly to do this when it is so simple to create your best relationship.
You’d think that because it is so simple that most relationships would be successful- amazing and long lasting… Unfortunately, as we very well know, this couldn’t be further from the truth.
But what if we were to focus on the simplicity instead of how challenging things are…
What if instead of analyzing everything, dissecting everything, talking about everything and such, what if we were instead to take the simple path?
This can be the danger of doing a ton of certain therapies and doing tons of certain programs- we get lost in the weeds…
I remember this one couple we worked with, they managed to turn all the tools and different approaches into weapons… Over analyzing and dissecting everything ad nauseum, policing each other as to who is doing things right, and trying to gain favor with their therapist… There was not redirecting them when they got on that train…
Being in relationship means we don’t try to win against our partner! If our partner loses, we lose and vice versa…
~ What if we were to just show up with our Essence, no scripts, no expectations, no judgements, no control or rigidity, no other fear and ego-based concoction? ~ What if we were to allow our partner to have their experience without making it about us? ~ What if we were to have our partner’s back and accept them fully? ~ What if we were to be well intentioned, be gracious, be compassionate, be curious, be open? ~ What if we were just to Be in our relationship without white-knuckling it, controlling it and being attached to outcomes?
What if we were to relate to our partner as if they ARE our Ideal Partner? Instead of measuring them against our ideal partner, treating them as if they are our ideal partner…
When we let go and show up with Transcendence like this, opening to the present moment, to what is, to who we are, and to who are partner is, that’s when we are in real connection, that’s when we Become One, and that’s when the magic happens…
Stop working so hard at making your relationship work… Invest in your relationship, by Being in your relationship…
APPLICATION: In your time of quiet, ponder, meditate, journal on defining your Ideal Partner-
~ Capture their characteristics, mannerisms, habits, strengths, growth areas, and so on
~ Capture how they’d behave towards you, how they’d treat you, how they’d connect with you
~ Capture how you’d feel about them, about being with them, and being with them
~ What kinds of feelings would you be feeling? How would you show up to your days? What kinds of things would you be doing? How would you be in your relationship? How would you be towards your partner?
Great- now generate those feelings for yourself, show up those ways, and be those ways…
We think our relationship awesomeness depends on doing all kinds of relationship stuff and on our partner being all kinds of specific ways… We have it all wrong…
Our relationship awesomeness, depends on us being our awesome selves and being awesome to our partner… It’s actually quite simple…
Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…
With Much Love & Light!
PS: Do you need support taking yourself, your relationship, and your life to the next level- actually living a healthy, happy, harmonious and overall abundant life?
Copyright (c) 2022 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication? Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Couple Strategy™ that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly connection notes in your inbox with Personal Development and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
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Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT has been in the mental health profession in varying capacities for the past 20+ years. She is the Founder and Director of metrorelationship.com a psychotherapy and coaching practice specializing in working with busy professional and entrepreneurial couples who are struggling getting on the same page and feeling connected. The work helps couples create a radiant and successful relationship and meaningful life by becoming a strong partnership and increasing their connection, intimacy, and fun. Emma is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Relationship Strategy™.
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