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Coregulation for upleveling interactions and relationship bliss [Video]

Coregulation for upleveling interactions and relationship bliss [Video]

It’s been in the air, that partners, especially women, are really feeling disconnected and unsettled in their relationship. They are getting more and more in touch with feeling like something is missing, that there could be more, that just sitting side by side binge watching Netflix while their partner is also on another device, is just not enough to feel emotionally and relationally satisfied with their partner…  This is a wonderful awareness because it can be addressed… As opposed to feeling irritated and aggravated a lot of the time in the presence of their partner. No matter what their partner does, they find fault with it or it doesn’t satisfy… Even their partner’s breathing irks them- literally! Does your partner snore?

Couples don’t need to be fighting or thinking divorce for them to realize that their relationship can use some enrichment… That their relationship can use an upgrade, an upleveling… But of course, they can also be struggling.

Couples get into trouble when they approach their relationship from fear, from ego, from arrogance… Usually one of the partners feels like they do everything for the relationship and their life, and like their partner is the problem- they can’t even breathe properly! And, that they could be doing more…

This is exactly the mindset that creates funky dynamics and that keeps couples feeling stuck or from creating a radiant relationship… When one of the partners is feeling so disconnected, neglected, taken from granted, and the like, they go into control, micromanaging, demanding, critical, and even nasty mode… This makes their partner feel unappreciated, devalued, controlled, small, insignificant, and the like. Which makes them shut down even more and become emotionally, and even physically unavailable. Which in turns triggers the other some more… And so the cycle, loop, dynamic, repeating patterns go

It is usually the woman who feels the disconnect more and starts this cycle… Of course, it can be said that the man started by not showing up emotionally in the first place… But we have to plant the flag somewhere and it is easier to see it when we observe what is being done, versus what isn’t.

*Now, I said “usually” but the reverse is also true, and I used the genders for simplicity’s sake but please replace them as it fits your relationship. Just know that regardless of gender, the polarities still exist in the relationship in terms of feminine or masculine energy that creates the attraction between the two (both have both but lean more into one). If the binary language is offensive to you, you can translate this further and just suffice to say that there are different energies with opposing needs, they don’t need to be labeled…

The partners keep triggering each other with their relationship overfunctioning (pursuing) and relationship underfunctioning (distancing).

Once the partners pause and recognize that they are dissatisfied and constantly triggering each other, they can now become proactive about creating change in their relationship…

It is super helpful to shift how things are being interpreted- a lot of times the partners assume the worst, feel it’s totally hopeless, and feel like calling it quits. They throw up the baby with the bath water!

When what is needed is different perspective, realignment, and approach:

~ Embrace a Heart-Centered Approach – Move down from the head, logic, ego and fear driven overanalyzing, interpreting, assuming, and knowing best and knowing it all…  Move down to the heart and see and feel the blessings, beauty, joy, gratitude, ease, flow, appreciation, love… Cultivate this, expand it… Fill your heart, enlarge your heart. Connect with your sacred heart…

 ~ Embrace a Higher Estate – When you connect with your heart and lead from your heart life and your relationship become infinitesimally easier… Connect with compassion and unconditional love… Your partner is not perfect, as you are not… Your partner is also on a Journey, as are you… Have some grace for your experiences and really partner up in your great life adventure… 

 ~ Embrace a Higher Living – When you realign as we are saying here, you are automatically in a different reality! Things play out differently, work out better, easier, and smoother for the highest good of all. Life and your relationship become a dream come true… It is not that difficult to become your best self, create your best relationship, and your best life as the end of the day…

Ok, so this is all well and good in concept and philosophically you may be thinking, and asking what that means for the everyday.

Now that I shared the perspective shift for you to embrace, that creates a major shift in and of itself by the way… Let me bring it down to the clinical and practical so you can hang your hat somewhere.

The dynamics get created because of our programming, patterning and conditioning… This is why we address this a lot… We want to deprogram ourselves to get out of the box and into a more authentic, expansive, and loving relationship…

Real down to earth and tangible practices help with this:

*I’ve written about these extensively in the blog and have done some videos as well – feel free to search for selflove practice, connection, reprogramming and the like for more. Though the concepts are not always fully expounded and contextualized know that everything I offer, even the fun and silly things like creating seasonal bucket lists and 30-day challenges, serve a higher purpose and good of all…

~ Self-Love Practice – This practice addresses your inner-child… Meets your needs, nourishes and resources you, and heals you…

~ Partner-Love Practice – This practice addresses your shadows (unknown, hidden, disowned parts of you)… Meets your partner’s needs, delights and resources your partner, and evolves you…

There is so much possibility, gifts, and blessings in there you can play there for eternity. Embrace them as a way of life… Like I like to say, embrace a Relationship Enrichment Lifestyle….

And, for a bonus practice for today that is totally embodied and relational and in real time- CoRegulation:

~ Coregulation Practice – This is a way to use ourselves in the moment to have our partner’s back, each other’s back… It utilizes our nervous system to resonate with our partner’s to influence each other’s estate. When we are resourced and intentional, we can stay calm, grounded, and available in the face of our partner’s reactivity which in turn helps them calm down, get grounded and soothed…  It helps as a calming agent and connecting mechanism in times of distress (and other times as well!). This is a great practice when and for addressing triggers, pain, and stress. 

  • Show up with warmth, calming presence and tone of voice, attunement, eye contact
  • Provide verbal acknowledgement of the other’s distress and experience, put words to it
  • Offer deep breathing or synchronizing breaths, eye contact or eye gazing, and gentle reassuring caring touch (don’t force hugs!)

When partner’s meet their own and each other’s needs, they heal and grow… And change their stuck repeating patterns… They deprogram…

Embracing a coregulation practice is a super loving way to be in relationship and to deepen your connection. Now this addresses what feels like missing in your relationship, and helps with building that connection you crave… Now that’s partnership, cocreation, and Love!

Check out the video version…

 

 

Watch our related videos on our YouTube channel

Get our FREE 1-pg downloadable Codependence Quiz to identify if and how you are impacted by codependence in your relationship- do you love too much?

Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…

With Much Love & Light!

 

PS: Related Articles
What about compassion?
Give the Gift of Understanding and Compassion…
5 Insights for your physical and mental health
Addictions impact mental health and success
Reprogram yourself with self-reparenting
Caring is not just for Mothers!
Mothering Vs Fathering
A simple way to change your programming…
Another simple way to change your programming…
Take off the identity mask you chose for your life
The ultimate tool for outsmarting your ego…
Prevent drama with self-regulation and co-regulation
Embrace the art of self-care for increased self-regulation and resilience
Loving practices for self-regulation and relationship enrichment

 

PSS: 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?

Interested in Couple Therapy, Marriage Counseling, Relationship Coaching, Individual Therapy or Support Sessions?

We can help with our private and group memberships:
Success Membership

Radiance Membership

 

Look forward to seeing you inside!

 

   Copyright (c) 2024 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

3 Powerful Steps to Take Your Relationship to the Next Level (VIDEO)

3 Powerful Steps to Take Your Relationship to the Next Level (VIDEO)

As the Love Month is coming to an end, our attention is now to focus on carrying on with the love theme… As being kind, loving and romantic for one month out of the year just won’t cut it…

To create an amazing relationship, we must be amazing partners… It is common to get sidetracked with the business of life and to neglect, or lose focus on, our partner and our relationship. Let’s set ourselves up to change this as our relationship is the cornerstone of our life! Follow these 3 powerful steps to take your relationship to the next level.

Of course, I’m assuming you are interested in becoming your Best Self, in being the Best Partner, in creating your Best Relationship, and living your Best Life. If you are satisfied with everything as it is and don’t want to continue to evolve and see how awesome you can make things, then we are not your cup of tea- and that’s ok.

Our content and work are geared for partners and couples who are high achievers and performers and who want to take full advantage of what this life has to offer. They want to crack the codes and win at the game of life… They want to have a radiant and successful relationship…

If you are with us, take these 3 powerful steps to keep the love alive and keep enriching and nurturing your relationship. Let’s take your relationship to the next level…

 

The 3 Powerful Steps

We can only create the relationship and life we desire when we are intentional and proactive about it. An epic love affair with our partner, keeping the love and spark alive, and creating a meaningful life don’t happen by accident or by default…

The relationship and life we desire need to be designed and then created…

It’s funny to me when people ask, Should having a great relationship require work? The answer is a resounding, YES! But note that I don’t look at it as work though, you see… I look at anything relationship related as relationship enrichment, nurturing, tending, minding, creating and the like- and it’s lovely to do!

You wouldn’t go about building a house without designing it and having a blueprint first, would you? The following steps help with the design and the blueprint…

 

STEP 1 – The State of the Union…

 In this step, the idea is to assess how your joint life and relationship are going. You’d first review the overall quality of your life and relationship, and then specific aspects of them.

You can assess the things that are important to you now. There are seasons in life and in our relationship. Different things are important to us at different times. 

You might already have done a tremendous job improving, enriching, and enhancing the quality of your life and relationship so a higher-level assessment would be in order for you. You might already have a great relationship and life, but do you want to have an extraordinary one? How is your lifestyle, your legacy, your impact?

And, if you are struggling in your relationship and your life, you’ve come to the right place. You’d assess personal characteristics, mindset, skills, habits, self-management, resilience, and strategies both at the personal and relational level that affect how you go about creating your relationship and life…

You’d also assess your relationship mindset, communication and alignment, dynamics and patterns, connection and intimacy, collaboration and partnership…

What have you been working on and why?

 

STEP 2 – How Far You’ve Already Come…

 It is common for us to lose sight of the Journey we’ve been on, how much we have already accomplished, how far we’ve already come personally and with our partner…

In this step the focus is on acknowledging all the hurdles, all the challenges, all the difficulties we’ve been through and how we’ve managed to survive them and possibly even thrive because of them…

Here we get to give ourselves and the partnership credit for everything we have already addressed, fixed, resolved, learned, implemented, improved, and everything else. We don’t live in a vacuum, and we don’t live static lives. You have been on a Journey, you are better for it, alone and together. Grab all the yummy stuff that’s already here…

If you are having a difficult time finding the progress, the achievements, the successes – focus on all the attempts, efforts, and things you’ve tried to help you improve your lot. You have done plenty, believe me. Just give yourself and your partner credit for what you’ve already done. 

Your efforts might feel like they were in vain, but they were not. They are all a part of you and who you are Becoming… Nothing is a waste… Grab all the investment you’ve put into your relationship and your life already…

Celebrate that you’ve been living your Journey…

  

STEP 3 – On to What’s Next…

 You might have really enjoyed Step1 and Step2 and are really looking forward to this final step. Or, the first 2 steps felt like a 2×2 upside the head. Either way, this step helps you take things to the next level…

Here we get dust off our relationship and life blueprint… If you have been with us for a while, you might have your Life Vision handy… This is your North Star, your guiding mechanism.

Your vision doesn’t have to be written in stone, it can be revised, updated, and even overhauled as you go. But at any given time, you need to be striving towards something… Otherwise you are creating by default- and we don’t want that!

If you don’t have a Vision, now is the time to dream yours up… Make it a stretch, make it fun, make it meaningful… Cover all life areas- what would your Best Life look and feel like? What do you want to create? What’s your Partner’s role, contribution, and impact? How do you Co-Create?

This is what you want to build… This is what you want to create with your partner- Relationship and Life…

Take note of where you’d like to be, and how you’d like to be… What specific things or areas need attention?

Now that you have where you’ve been, where you are, and where you want to go you are ready to take your relationship, and life, to the next level…

Watch the video on The 3 Steps… Enjoy!

 

MONTHLY THEME GUIDE: Dating Your Partner

APPLICATION: Now that Love Month is over, is time to set up for more Loving throughout the year… Take your relationship to the next level with a plan for working out the kinks and continuing your nurturing…

Set time aside to explore the steps for yourself, process them in your Journal, make a list of specific things that stand out, highlight the things of note:

STEP 1 – The State of the Union…Review the status and state of your relationship and your life. The overall feel and the specific areas. Take note of these as well: Relationship mindset, communication and alignment, dynamics and patterns, connection and intimacy, collaboration and partnership… What is your current area of focus, and why?

STEP 2 – How Far You’ve Already Come…Review and capture all the ups and downs in your relationship and your life. Identify the patterns, the lessons learned and the things you accomplished, addressed, and resolved. Give yourself credit for all the effort invested. Give yourself, and your partner, compassion for the Journey you are on.

 STEP 3 – On to What’s Next…Review your Life Vision, or create one…, to serve as your North Star for going forward. Filter everything in your relationship and life against this Vision as you go to help streamline, focus, stay in alignment, and on the right path…

IMPORTANT: Schedule time to meet with your partner to share and get on the same page. Give them a heads-up beforehand so they are not blindsided and so they can do this exercise themselves or at least have given it some thought.

Grab these for your takeaway:
~ Areas of focus to smooth out kinks in the relationship
~ Adding/continuing relationship nurturing activities
~ Corrective measures to your lifestyle and goals/projects to course correct and better align with your vision

 

When you are intentional about what you are creating, you’ll create what you desire…

Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…

With Much Love & Light!

 

PS: Masterclasses

If you missed this month’s Masterclass, or any previous ones, you can still get them through our Member Center with a Lifestyle Membership!
Enroll HERE

This month’s Masterclass
Relationship Enrichment Mini Retreat-
Connect More Deeply, Rekindle Your Love
Keeping the love alive is not easy. Relationship slumps are common, but they don’t have to do you in. Come learn how to recharge your relationship and rekindle your love.
Includes Recording and gorgeous Workbook of transformational processes

 

 

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

5 Relationship Boosting Activities to Keep the Spark Alive (VIDEO)

5 Relationship Boosting Activities to Keep the Spark Alive (VIDEO)

You know, it’s not enough to desire to have an amazing relationship. For us to have an amazing relationship, we have to want it and create it… This is where partners go wrong. They might just expect it to happen on its own.

They don’t necessarily know how to go about creating their extraordinary relationship. Or, they try but their attempts don’t pan out… Sometimes the relationship might feel like a dry sponge, it needs more than one drop of water for it to work well as a sponge… Embrace nurturing your relationship, use the 5 relationship boosting activities to get you going…

Note though, that any relationship strengthening, enrichment, and nurturing exercises and activities can’t happen in a vacuum. In and of themselves they won’t do much…

The key is to have a Relationship Enrichment Mindset™ to recognize the relationship as the cornerstone of our life, to decide to have a radiant and successful relationship, to choose to be the Best Partner, and to embrace relationship enrichment and nurturing as a lifestyle…

One such great addition to your lifestyle it to Date Your Partner… Aside from doing the Connection Habits, the Delighting Your Partner and other nurturing tactics, it is important to stay romantically engaged to keep the spark alive…

The 5 relationship boosting activities help bring the romance back…

 

Relationship Boosting Activities

You can add these to your repertoire of activities you integrate into your lifestyle to create your extraordinary relationship…

1 ~ Reminiscing – We have very short-term memories for the good stuff… We tend to forget all the good we’ve been through… During Couple Time, Date Night, special time set aside for this, or on the go, bring back memories of special moments, cute situations, fun experiences, anecdotes, pranks and anything else that sparks joy and connection and brings a smile to your faces.

 2 ~ Complimenting – We are great at complaining and pointing out what we don’t like and what’s been done wrong… How about we flip that on its head and focus instead on acknowledging, appreciating, and pointing out all the good things. And, how about making it a point of praising and complimenting our partner daily going forward…

3 ~ Wishing – We are usually too focused on the daily grind to pick up our heads and think and plan for the future. Specially for the fun things… Couples get in a rut as this happens and it becomes harder to think of fun things to do, to plan them and to actually have fun doing them… Invite your partner to create a joint Fun Wish List and/or Bucket List of things to experience together. Enjoy the brainstorm and building the anticipation.

4 ~ Experiencing – It is not enough to live in the same home, raise our children, and go on vacation a couple of times a year. Relationships need meaningful, touching, and fun moments to become memorable and feel special. Partners need to feel each other, enjoy each other, and enjoy life together. Play with your bucket and wish lists to have great experiences and have great fun together, create amazing memories to cherish for a lifetime.

5 ~ Touching – Make it your business to touch your partner… This includes all kinds of touching- putting your hand on their shoulder, arm, or lower back, holding hands, kissing good morning and good night, cuddling, hugging, kissing, caressing, touching more intimately, making out and go from there…

Our relationship is what we make of it… Our relationship is what we make it… 

 

Watch the video on the 5 Relationship Boosting Activities… Enjoy!

 

MONTHLY THEME GUIDE: Dating Your Partner

 

APPLICATION: Choose a Relationship Boosting Activity to play with and integrate into your life this coming week:

1 ~ Reminiscing – Set time aside to remember the good times
2 ~ Complimenting – Praise and compliment your partner on something daily
3 ~ Wishing – Create a Fun Wish List or Bucket List together
4 ~ Experiencing – Map out and schedule your fun experiences
5 ~ Touching – Experiment with different ways of touching your partner…  

Creating an extraordinary relationship doesn’t have to be challenging. All that is required is the will and being intentional about it… You CAN create the relationship you desire… Keep the spark alive!

 

Wishing you all the joy, connection and love today and always…

With Much Love & Light!

 

PS: Masterclasses

❤️‍This month’s Masterclass
Relationship Enrichment Mini Retreat-
Connect More Deeply, Rekindle Your Love
Keeping the love alive is not easy. Relationship slumps are common, but they don’t have to do you in. Come learn how to recharge your relationship and rekindle your love.
Includes Recording and gorgeous Workbook of transformational processes 
Register HERE

 

❤️‍If you missed the embracing a Self-Love Practice Masterclass, you can still get it through our Member Center with a Lifestyle Membership!
A Self-Love Strategy for Creating Your Best Life-
Stop Self-Sabotage, Increase Resilience, and Generate More Joy Includes Recording and gorgeous Workbook of transformational processes 
Enroll HERE

 

 

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

Excellent communication also helps increase our bonding

Excellent communication also helps increase our bonding

Communication skills and tools are not just necessary for getting on the same page, making joint decisions and problem solving effectively. They are also indispensable for more deeply understanding each other and warmly flowing in our interactions with our partner. Excellent communication also helps increase our bonding.

Feeling understood is an existential human need… In feeling that the other “gets” us, we feel Known and that we exist… Feeling understood engenders feelings of belonging, being accepted, and safety. This is pretty much at the core of things! This is why it’s super important to use our skills and tools to make sure we get our partner, and others, when we are in our interactions with them.

And, with that it goes without saying how super important it is to show them that we got them… This is where the validation step in the Intentional Dialogue comes in. This is the step that partners forget in interactions that crashes the conversation and possibly even leads to a fight.

Equally important is to communicate so our partner can understand us, and to seek confirmation that we were understood.

Interactions don’t have to go south… Most of the time when couples refer to communication problems, they are actually referring to emotionally charged issues and conversations. They can’t communicate well when they are triggered… Which makes complete sense! Employing communication tools and skills has a lot to do with managing ourselves and being mindful to not trigger our partner… Removing roadblocks to communication goes a long way.

And most importantly, when we are mindful of how we show up and how we communicate we are investing in protecting, nurturing, and strengthening our bond

 

Strengthening Our Bond

Therefore, it is imperative that we are very intentional and mindful about how we communicate with our partner and what the focus of our conversations are. For who doesn’t want a lovely and strong bond with their Lovey? Right?

I invite you to add having Meaningful Conversations to your Couple TimeLet’s not use couple time for just more binging on Netflix.

Awareness and consciousness about yourself

Do you know what triggers you and why? Do you know what core wound and defense mechanisms you keep playing out, what you contribute to your repeating patterns? Do you know what your needs are and how to meet them? Do you know your Love Language? Getting a deeper understanding of yourself in this way is enlightening and a great investment in your personal development…

Then, sharing this with your partner and integrating your new awareness into your interactions is truly transformative…

Awesomeness and uniqueness about yourself

How well do you know yourself? Your personal strengths and characteristics, values, and dreams? Exploring these for a fuller awareness and knowing of yourself is a beautiful undertaking to enrich your personal experience.

Then, you can share your understandings, discoveries, and what you make of them with your partner. Isn’t this a gorgeous conversation?

Aspirations and passions about yourself

Have you identified your Purpose, what drives you? Are you focused on that purpose daily? Do you have a vision of your future and your life? Do you have clear goals and milestones? What are you working on? Are your projects, tasks and routines in alignment with your Vision? Getting some clarity around these and aligning your life accordingly makes life so much easier and pleasurable…

Then, share what you are up to, your desires, fears, and possible roadblocks with your partner for additional alignment and meaning…

Aren’t these delicious? Imaging these are the topics of your conversations most of the time… This is what gives our interactions depth and meaning. These interactions are what strengthen our bond, bring us closer and guide our relationship and life. This is how we create radiance and meaning in our relationship.

 

APPLICATION: Select the area about you that you want to explore, gain a deeper understand, more clarity and direction to play with… Set some time aside to indulge in this exploration, and then bring your discoveries, insights, and desires to your Couple Time

  • Awareness and consciousness about yourself
  • Awesomeness and uniqueness about yourself
  • Aspirations and passions about yourself

 

In developing ourselves and owning our sparkle, with bring more radiance to our relationship…

Be curious, be playful, be vulnerable, be available…

Share yourself more in your interactions and communication, strengthen you bond!

Wishing you much joy, connection and love today and always…

With Much Love & Light!

 

Copyright (c) 2021 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

Does it feel like you Love TOO Much?

Does it feel like you Love TOO Much?

Do you think that you love your partner more than they love you? That you care more? That you do more for the home, the family, and the relationship? That if it weren’t for you, things would fall apart? You are not alone in this. It is very common for one partner to do more nurturing, caring, and making sure everything is ok. Does this sound like you? Do you do the caretaking for the family and the relationship? Does it feel like you Love TOO Much?

If we care more and love too much, then by implication it feels like the other cares less… Nobody wants to feel like their loved one doesn’t care as much… It doesn’t feel good to feel less cared about… It doesn’t feel good to love too much…

When we love too much, we lose ourselves in the caring and caretaking… Everything we do is for the other/s, with the other/s in mind, and we don’t even think about our needs, preferences, and wishes. We don’t even figure in the equation.

What happens next is that our whole routine revolves around our loved one/s, our whole week and lifestyle revolve around our loved one/s, our whole life revolves around our loved one/s… We lose sight of who we are, what we are meant to do, of our growth, of where we want to go and who we want to become, and of our actual Journey…

We become myopic, we miss the forest for the tree. We focus on the minutiae of the everyday. We get distracted by others’ whims and agendas and by bright shiny objects. We bang around without purpose.

We fill our days with crap – a bunch of meaningless tasks and a lot of running around. Our tasks are not related to projects. Our projects are not related to goals. Our goals are not related to our vision. We are just wasting are precious time, our precious limited Life Energy…

Some don’t even have outlined tasks, clear projects, established goals or a driving vision… So, you see how easy it is to get lost in the everyday. To focus on what our partner is doing or not doing. To micromanage our home and our loved one/s. To get overly involved in other people’s business. To care about the concern of others. To take over other people’s responsibilities. To take it all on because it’s easier to fill in our void with others’ stuff…

Then we wonder why we feel overwhelmed, anxious, lost, blah, bored, resentful, exhausted, taken for granted, lonely, alone and the like.

It’s easy to distract ourselves from ourselves by loving too much… This is easy to do when we don’t fully own ourselves, for what else are we supposed to do… If we don’t have ourselves, at least we have others…

We have nothing else to care about so we put all our care on them… But then we feel bad because we care more than they do… Then we don’t feel cared about enough…

We create a super hurtful and harmful cycle… We neglect ourselves and our lives. We feel stuck, empty and unhappy. We wonder what’s the meaning of it all… We are missing the forest for the tree!

If we were to just stand still, be present, and look inside ourselves, we would find the answers. We would feel safe, connected, inspired, abundant and see the purpose of our life…

So…

    • Stop doing for your loved one/s what they can do for themselves.
    • Stop micromanaging.
    • Stop obsessively checking in and on everything.
    • Stop redundantly tracking everything.
    • Stop doing stuff for the sake of doing stuff.
    • Stop filling your life with junk.
    • Stop doing stuff that doesn’t serve you.
    • Stop saying yes to other people’s agendas.
    • Stop __________________.

Stop wasting your precious Life Energy on pursuits that don’t enhance your Journey in some way… Minimize the chaos, the mundane, the minutia, the redundant, the excess, the spinning, the grind…

Stop loving too much, for when you do you also enable others to not do for themselves… This is actually not helpful, you cheat them of the possibility of them figuring it out… Being too helpful is not helpful… Just stop.

Focus on what brings you joy and helps you create your Best Relationship and Life. On what moves the needle forward in your Journey. What enriches your life and the life of the people you love… Not by fishing for them but by teaching them how to fish and by collaborating… 

Loving TOO Much is not a great quality, it’s not a character strengthIt is actually a sign of codependence, a quality that holds back the people involved…

When we love too much, we become codependent where the members of the relationship/s are held back from their full potential by the dynamics they create. The helped person can’t learn and have self-agency. The helper becomes obsessed with the other at their expense. Neither side wins. This contributes to stuckness in relationships…

 

APPLICATION: Find three behaviors/tasks you do on a daily basis that are Life Energy sucking and Signs that You Love TOO Much… Figure out how to stop engaging in those behaviors by replacing them with healthy, effective and productive ones, for example:

    • Have a system for doing food and other shopping so you don’t run out of things
    • Prep food and snacks
    • Teach children how to make their bed and make it their responsibility
    • Teach children / discuss with partner how to pick up their stuff and put dirty clothes in hampers
    • Agree on who puts the dishes in the dish washer and who empties it
    • Design lunchboxes duty and agree on who is responsible for putting them together
    • Create a morning routine where everyone is responsible for getting themselves ready and ready to go
    • Have a place for backpacks, lunchboxes, school papers, school activities supplies/equipment, etc. (to have been packed up or prepped the day before!)
    • Have a place for coats, gloves, scarves, shoes and such
    • Don’t run stuff your children forget to school
    • Prioritize money producing tasks at work or completing your important project’s tasks
    • Block off time to do focus work
    • Don’t have a million errands to run after work
    • Have a streamlined afterschool, evening and bedtime routine
    • Block off selfcare time, couple time, social media engagement time, etc.
    • Have a system for doing laundry a couple of times a week only
    • Select a recurring time to do home admin tasks and synchronize with your partner

Loving too much is not the way to go. To create a radiant and successful relationship, and meaningful life, we are to fully own ourselves and empower others to do the same… We are to shoot for Interdependence in our relationship/s with extreme personal ownership, reciprocity and collaboration.

We want to love compassionately and passionately and give our relationship/s our best, not our worst by loving too much…

Wishing you much joy, connection and love today and always…

 

Copyright (c) 2021 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.

 

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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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