5 Tactics for increasing connection

5 Tactics for increasing connection

How are you doing with your New Year Relationship Resolutions or Intentions? How are you doing with staying loving and nurturing post VDAY? Are you keeping up with your Connection Habits™?

Remember that to create change we have to keep a focus on what we want to achieve, focus on the progress and the result (not the lack of!), and how to continue to invest, tweak, and course correct to make it happen.

Creating and sustaining Connection is not easy. Partners might have a wonderful connecting moment, or intimacy, to soon after feel completely disconnected, alone, abandoned, and floundering…

The dance of connection and disconnection can become too much to bear. Partners learn to play it safe avoiding being vulnerable, intimate or close to prevent feeling let down and worse off afterwards.

Some partners work too hard at creating closeness and intimacy that they end up shooting themselves on the foot. The attempt becomes forced, inauthentic, restricting to the point that the intention to feel close is completely thwarted. We don’t want to force connection, intimacy, fun. The mere attempt has its opposite effect.

We want to be flexible, organic, real, present… When we show up with our authentic interested self, the rest is almost inevitable… Remember, your partner is just as interested in feeling loved and connected…

A lot of times the partner that needs more connection, as opposed to their partner that needs more space, thinks their partner is not interested in love and connection. This couldn’t be further from the truth. The only difference is in how they prefer to get love and connection. And, this encompasses timing, duration, intensity and so on…

Connection is impacted by how we choose to interpret moments and interactions, how we feel in our own head and body in general, how we choose Be in that moment or as a person… How we choose to do our Life… The more we have our own awesome life, the easier it is to create a joint one with our partner…

Here are 5 Tactics for Creating and Sustaining Connection:

~1~ Meet Your Own Needs ~ Too often partners have the misconception that their partner is there to meet their needs, even all of their needs! How ridiculous is this? Yes, partners can meet each other’s needs, but it’s not their job to meet the other’s needs. Partners are not to depend on their partner meeting their needs…

This might sound shocking to you. It is actually up to us to make requests, set up interactions and show up so that we inspire and create interactions that meet our needs… See the difference?

~2~ Your Partner is There to Be Loved ~ Your partner is in your relationship as a Gift to you. They are a mirror to help you continue to evolve… They are there for you to practice and enjoy giving love… They are not there for any other reason. The rest is a cocreation to have a lovely joint life and further enrich your human experience… 

~3~ Find the Middle Ground ~ Relationships are usually made up of a Pursuer Partner and a Distancer Partner… One needs more togetherness (usually the more female-energy partner), the other needs more separateness (usually the more male-energy partner)…

This is actually evident in our brain structures. Females have a larger “connection” area in the brain! I’ll spare us the evolutionary and biological aspects of this. But suffice to say, that we have different needs, expectations, preferences, and such. Our job it to find a balance between both styles and preferences, and to take into account individual idiosyncrasies…

~4~ Be Strategic ~ This is where all your Relationship Tools and Skills come into play. This is where you orchestrate interactions that meet both your and your partner’s needs. Where you identify good timing for specific types of interactions. Where you approach interactions appropriately to get your needs met.

Where you know how to show-up so you meet your partner’s needs. Where you have a reaching-out, checking-in, dating, intimacy, and such intentional approach so you create and sustain connection that satisfy you both.

~5~ Invest in Commonality ~ Be curious, explore, develop and invest in common interests. And, I don’t want to hear you have tried and can’t find any! Keep at it till you crack this. Having something in common to jointly play with builds connection and intimacy.

When you go about creating connection, closeness and intimacy this way, you are less likely to trigger and scare yourself and your partner and therefore minimize the need for the Dance of Connection and Disconnection…

The Dance is just a built-in mechanism to keep partners feeling emotionally safe… If you create safety off the bat, then there is no need to pull away to feel safe, regain stability… You can connect and pretty much sustain the connection…

Creating and sustaining connection doesn’t have to be so elusive and/or challenging… You can do this, just focus on how you are approaching it and what you need to adjust. 

ASSIGNMENT: Take stock of how your Relationship Mindset, your believes about Connection, and your approach to connection and meeting needs are getting in the way of enjoying more connection, intimacy and joy with your partner.

  • Identify where you need to upgrade your believes, approach, tools or skills
  • Take an action to proactively address it
  • Create a recurring behavior around it to consistently invest in the change

Here is to another Loving week! Make every day count! 

 

QUICK UPDATE: I’m postponing the upcoming 1day virtual Relationship Enrichment Bootcamp™ a little to allow me to create an even better experience for you. 😉 Stay tuned for the new date and how to register! I can’t wait, it’s coming out fabulously!!

 

Complete the Assignment, and share your takeaway, insights, and results with a note in the Comments box at the end! I’d love to hear how you are using this content.

Happy Connecting!

 

 

   Copyright (c) 2020 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 a variety of Successful Couple content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com

 

Enhancing Love in Your Relationship (Pt3 of 3)

Enhancing Love in Your Relationship (Pt3 of 3)

How is the most romantic, loving, nurturing, pink/red week of the year going for you? Doesn’t it feel so lovely to step up the usual TLC and focus on treating your partner? What do you do when you want to step up showing your love?

You don’t have to go the whole pink/red flavor, but do put on a more Loving lens… Let’s commit to stepping up our Loving game every day! [To this end there is a sneak peek announcement at the end of the post!]

I don’t know about you, but I’ve learned, admittedly a little later in life than I would have preferred, that to grow, evolve and become our full, best, truest and most authentic Self we have to embrace the stretching in a very particular way

Obviously, I do I believe in change, growth, development, always improving and such… But this stretching I’m talking about has a slightly different flavor… It’s almost imperceptible to the inexperienced eye…

I’m talking about Commitment… And, obviously I also know and understand commitment… So, to be singling this out as part of the secret sauce that makes all the difference is bizarre. Anyone who is married or in a long-term relationship, or professional career, or business, or any endeavor that requires an all-around investment from themselves would say they are committed to that endeavor.

That’s exactly the point. We commit, but do we really Commit?

This brings me to today’s issue, Part3 in our 3-Part Series on Enhancing Love in Your Relationship:

Part3: Really embracing commitment…

The Commitment I’m referring to goes beyond being in something and even being in it for a long time, and even being in it for the long haul. That’s the commitment we usually think of and live by. We commit and we stick it out. 

But the Commitment I’m referring to, oh boy. It’s that commitment x10. Can you even imagine it? Again, I’m no stranger to commitment, but embracing everything with this level of Commitment, oof that’s where the juice is… That is what creates real movement, gets real traction, manifests epic change, transformation…

This next level of Commitment means there are no outs, ever. This means we show up with our best self, always. This means we put in our best effort, all the time. This means we stretch beyond our comfort zone consistently and learn to live with being uncomfortable… This means we make this a part of life, a part of our Journey.

Yes, we are not perfect. But, when we strive for the above we are our most perfect Self in those moments… That’s what I’m talking about. This level of Commitment where we go above and beyond as often as possible, as much as possible, as best as possible. Yeah…

Can you honestly say this is how you live your life day-in-and-day-out? There aren’t many who can say yes. For if you were, you would be living at the top of your game in all areas of your life… Are you there? How are you settling? Where are you settling? Where are you not investing enough? How are you not showing up?

When we keep our commitment to ourselves, we build integrity, self-esteem and success.

When we keep our commitment to our partner, we build trust, intimacy and a strong relationship.

And, this goes from the smallest of commitments like keeping your word to take out the garbage, to stepping it up every day on how you show Love…

It takes guts to live life and show up to our relationship with this level of Commitment. It takes guts to play full out in all we do. It takes guts to live our Best Life and to create our Success Relationship.

This level of Commitment, to keep really stretching into your bestest Self and into being the bestest Partner you can be is where the rubber meets the road. This is it.

Don’t just be committed. Be Committed. Play full out. Step it up. In all you do. Transcend the little you, your Ego, and embrace your Higher Self. Show up with the good stuff, ALL. THE. TIME.

Is this challenging? Heck yeah. This even intimidating if you are not used to thinking close to this way… We are not used to giving it our all. We are not used to not getting sucked into the noise of life. We are not used to not getting mired in the drama, the options, the exits, the easy and superficial way of life. There are so many ways in which we do this…

Start paying attention to how you take the easy way out. How you let yourself off the hook. How you show up with the less than your most splendid version of yourself.

Start noticing how this way of life has let you down, for you are not where you want to be yet in all areas that are important to you. Start noticing how you let others down and how you don’t create the best relationships you can. Start noticing how you are settling and sabotaging your best life and your best relationship(s)…

Is this how you want to go down? How you want to be put to rest? How you want to have lived your life? Is this how you want to have spent your Human Experience? I hope the answer is NO.

So, what are you going to do about it? How are you going to mean your commitments? How are you going to be Committed to living your best life and creating your best relationship?

Valentine’s Day is tomorrow. Use this as an inspiration. Again, no need to do the pink/red if that’s not you. But again, how will you step up how you show up? Tomorrow is also Friday. And, the beginning of a long holiday weekend. Hey, the sky is the limit. How will you step it up in your life and in your relationship?

How will somebody else looking in know that you are Committed to your Cause? What will they see you doing differently? How will you be stepping it up?

ASSIGNMENT: Are you ready to enhance the love in your relationship?

  • Make a list of all the ways in which you fall short of being the partner you want to be.
  • Make a list of all the ways you’d love to be if you were the best partner you want to be.
  • Commit to eradicating 2 behaviors / habits that perpetuates the Fall Short list.
  • Commit to establishing 2 behaviors / habits that fuel, inspire, motivate and drive the Best Partner list. Consider becoming great at Connecting…
  • Create a system, routine, to support the Commitment to becoming the Best Partner… Enhance your routine with Connection Habits™.

Wishing you an amazing relationship overflowing with Love. Have a fabulously loving Valentine’s Day! 

And, to keep things rich and gorgeous past Valentine’s Day, I finally get to share it!, we are having a virtual Relationship Enrichment Bootcamp™ on 3/7/20! Yay! This is going to be a fabulous event to help you learn how to take your relationship to the next level, regardless of the current state it’s in… Stay tuned for registration information, in the meantime SAVE THE DATE!!

Complete the Assignment, and share your takeaway, insights, and results with a note in the Comments box at the end! I’d love to hear how you are using this content.

Happy Committing!

 

 

   Copyright (c) 2020 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 a variety of Successful Couple content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com

 

Enhancing Love in Your Relationship (Pt2 of 3)

Enhancing Love in Your Relationship (Pt2 of 3)

Don’t you just love Love Month? This is it, one-week left to Valentine’s Day. Are you a VDay lover? You don’t have to be! I get how commercialized and gross the holiday gets. Non-the-less, I love the concept and prettiness of it, so I indulge and invite others to do so as well. What do we have to lose by being more Love Aware? In the spirit of Being Loving, here is a little love nugget for you, for experiencing more Self-Love..

I’m sure it comes to no surprise to you that the people who are the hardest to please, who are very critical, judgy and demanding of others are also that way with themselves. Not much Self-Love there. Hey, this might be you, this might be your partner. I know, I’ve dealt with this part of myself. And boy, what not a pretty side that is…

This brings me to today’s issue, Part2 in our 3-Part Series on Enhancing Love in Your Relationship:

Part2 – To love your partner, first love yourself…

That part creates a negative and lack state of being that doesn’t serve anyone… For starters, it won’t help us get more of what we were trying to get. It is literately repulsive energy. We push others away when we operate this way…

But most importantly, we are the ones that have to sit in those nasty juices when we engage that part. It doesn’t feel so good. We trigger parts of the brain that generate anxiety, depression, anger, etc. When we experience those feelings, we can’t be in a loving state… We are very far off from the place that generates the good feelings, and that allows for being Loving…

It’s even worse when we are the target of our own demandingness, criticism, and hatred. The beatings that we might give ourselves are just downright obnoxious. Have you paid attention to your inner dialogue when you are in one of these moods?

For some, this is so habitual that this is the only thing they know, and it’s their most prevalent state of being. My heart goes out to them as I understand how challenging and painful it is to live in this state. I’m a recovering self-beater myself. LOL

Isn’t this such a hard way to live in our own head? This conjures a picture of a home filled with garbage, poor lighting, vines crawling up the walls, and barbwires popping up here and there… Definitely, not pretty, safe or joyful…

What does this mean? This means our job is first and foremost to stop being mean to ourselves. This means learning self-compassion and being gentle with ourselves in our thoughts and actions. This means stopping the beating self-talk as soon as it’s recognized. This means not entertaining our scripts.

This means not having outrageous daily agendas and to-do lists. This means not setting ridiculous deadlines. This means not overcommitting ourselves. This means not overbooking ourselves, our family and our children.

This means taking it easier. This means taking it easier more. This means allowing lazy time. This means showing up for ourselves. This means setting healthy boundaries. This means asking for help and allowing support. This means showing vulnerability. This means embracing a rich self-care practice. This means being loving toward ourselves as much as we can muster it… What!? What a concept… (sarcasm)

Once you allow yourself to even consider the possibility of this…, you automatically start shifting your state, and feeling better! Tada! It is that simple… Crazy, I know. But the key, is to do this consistently with the goal of rewiring yourself… The initial goal is to learn to stop your mean side on its tracks. The more advanced goal is to be a recovering self-beater. (jk)

The more advanced goal is to rewire yourself so being nice, gentle and compassionate toward yourself becomes more second nature. So, you don’t have to be so vigilant. So, you don’t have to monitor and tweak so much. All of it becomes so ingrained that it becomes more of who you are…

Actually, embracing this concept sheds this defense mechanism and terrible habit and sabotaging wiring allowing your truer Self to shine through… Focusing on letting go of the noise, clearing the nonsense, and replacing it with kindness and compassion creates a fertile ground for your dormant real Self to awaken…

When we seek this, when we allow this, when we embrace and encourage this, is when our state feels amazing. This is when we trigger the feel-good parts of our brain… This is when we engage the compassion, gratitude, happy and connection center of the brain… This is when we can show up with Love. This is when we can be our Loving Self. This is when our true nature radiates through, this is when we are Love.

And, so from this place we can really Love and show love to our partner… This is at the crux of it all… Don’t be sucked into “doing” love for Valentine’s Day, or in general, in your relationship. Do be sucked into Being and Giving Love instead.

ASSIGNMENT: Make a list of all the different ways you are mean to yourself. Start with the very practical and obvious in how you run your days and your life. Leave the stuff inside your head as part 2… Be as thorough and inclusive as possible. Grab it all. Including things like, buying a gazillion gifts for Christmas and staying up very late for a week to wrap them all…

Look at your list and pick 3 items you currently do that you commit to addressing this month and commit to no longer doing…

Be really nice and loving to yourself by not shaming or beating on yourself for your list!

Be really nice and loving to yourself by meaning business and gently but committedly addressing your 3 items to eradicate them from your lifestyle.

Wishing you much gentleness, compassion and love. Wishing you a very Loving week leading up to VDAY, and of course every day from now till forever.

Stay tuned for next week’s issue, Part3 of this 3-Part Series on Enhancing Love in Your Relationship!

Complete the Assignment, and share your takeaway, insights, and results with a note in the Comments box at the end! I’d love to hear how you are using this content.

Happy Loving!

 

   Copyright (c) 2020 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 a variety of Successful Couple content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com

 

Enhancing Love in Your Relationship (Pt1 of 3)

Enhancing Love in Your Relationship (Pt1 of 3)

Valentines’ Day is just around the corner. Whether you are into Valentine’s Day or not is irrelevant. The point of this and the upcoming issues is to focus on: How you do Love… For remember, that where we focus our attention our energy goes, and what we focus on grows… So, let’s make sure we Focus on Love and Relationship Enrichment, shall we?

This is the first issue of a 3-Part Series on Enhancing Love in Your Relationship:

Part1: If you can dream it, you can create it…

I’m sure you’ve heard the saying that, If you can dream it you can achieve it (do it)… I’m a super proponent of this concept as it is supported by brain science… Brain scientists report that when we dream something that the neural pathways within the prefrontal cortex get activated.

This part of the brain is the executive, taking action, part of the brain. In very simple terms, this activation serves as instructions for action… If you can see it in your mind’s eye, you can create it…

This is a key component of high-performance and achievement no matter what industry or context… We are more familiar with this concept within the sports arena, where we hear top athletes recount how they do mental imagery or rehearsal in order to improve their performance.

In the personal development and success circles this is referred to as Visualizing, where we see ourselves in our mind’s eye achieving our desired outcome… Another version of dreaming is Visioning, where we envision/capture a future desired outcome, usually through Inspiration…

For example, a football player might Visualize playing an amazing game prior to the big game because he has a Vision of winning the Super Bowl.

Visioning produces a Vision, a static output, a picture of a desired future outcome.

Visualizing produces a Process, a dynamic output, an ongoing rehearsal of attaining the desired future outcome. 

When we integrate these tools into our repertoire, we increase our chances of success, of achieving our goals, of creating what we desire… This way we can create our successful relationship and meaningful life… We can have our world class life, our best Human Experience…

So, the first step is to create your Vision… If you haven’t done this as part of your New Year Strategizing, here is another opportunity to step-up your game… And, in staying with this Series’ Love Theme, focus on the Relationship Visioning part… Envision what kind of relationship you want to have, ponder these and whatever else is important to you:

  1. What does your relationship look and feel like on a daily basis?
  2. What are its characteristics? What’s its Brand? How would others describe it?
  3. How do you do closeness, intimacy, passion and desire?
  4. How do you do fun, adventure, and keep things fresh?
  5. How do you enjoy each other and each other’s company?
  6. How do you support each other and create unwavering trust?
  7. How do you make decisions and cocreate a smooth strong partnership?
  8. What kind of home and family life do you create?
  9. What are your children learning about creating a successful relationship?
  10. What would others want to emulate about your relationship? How do you inspire other couples?

The second step is to Visualize you doing your amazing relationship. Walk through your Vision and see yourself showing up with the best version of you, you as the best partner you want to be, You 2.0:

  1. What is the best version of you? What character strengths are you showing up with more? What character flaws are you retiring?
  2. What items tend to create tension or friction with your partner? How are you getting ahead of them?
  3. What instances tend to get you that are not that important in the whole scheme of things where you are giving grace, latitude, margin, taking-the-high-road?
  4. What skills or tools do you need to attain to address growth areas, break impasses, and get unstuck? What action are you taking to attain this?
  5. How are you removing roadblocks? How are you showing up differently when roadblocks are removed?
  6. What nurturing and caretaking behaviors are you integrating into your daily, weekly and monthly routine?
  7. What playful, flirting, wooing behavior are you integrating into your daily, weekly and monthly routine?
  8. What are you doing to keep things inviting, exciting, spicy?
  9. How are you showing your partner they are a priority?
  10. How are you stretching to take the relationship to the next level…?

You see how the mere dreaming, imagining of what you’d like and how you can start creating it gets the juices flowing? Notice, that there is not one mention of what your partner is doing. Notice, how the focus is on what you do. Notice, that you have power to be who/how you want to be and create the relationship you want? Isn’t this exciting?!

ASSIGNMENT: Make a date with yourself to sit in contemplation, without distractions, and create your Relationship Vision and what to Visualize about it.

Place your Vision where you can review it frequently.

Integrate a habit of Visualization into your Daily Routine to really prime your brain into integrating You 2.0 into how you show up to your relationship.

These will give your brain the instructions to create the relationship you desire…

Take this a step further, take two actions to address any of your Visualization items…

Great relationships definitely don’t just happen! They take intentionality and mindfulness from the partners to consistently nurture and enrich it… Focus on what you do only…

Give yours a nice dose of attention this Love Season!

Stay tuned for next week’s issue, Part2 of this 3-Part Series on Enhancing Love in Your Relationship!

Complete the Assignment, and share your takeaway, insights, and results with a note in the Comments box at the end! I’d love to hear how you are using this content.

Happy Visioning!

 

 

   Copyright (c) 2020 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 a variety of Successful Couple content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com

 

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