One characteristic satisfied and successful couples have in common is that they are part of each other’s lives.Duh-ah! I’m sure this does not come as a surprise. The trick though is how the partners are part of each other’s lives.
Partners have difficulties negotiating what this means to them and integrating a healthy approach to togetherness and couplehood. Their relating ranges from partners leading parallel lives where each barely knows what the other is up to and is minimally involved in the other’s activities, pursuits and processes to being completely enmeshed in each other’s world where there is little space for uniqueness, originality, and authentic selfhood.
The extent the relationship is characterized by these interactions impacts the resiliency of the partnership. This relating poses a danger to the couple as it extinguishes the sparks between the partners rendering them passionless.
Couples with no passion express dissatisfaction, lack of intimacy and connection and tend to feel dead in their relationship [Disengaged relational style], have a very conflictual relationship (misguided passion!) [Conflictual relational style], and/or become great friends (friendship is nice but not enough…) [Enmeshed relational style].
In any case, they are at risk. These couples usually do not fare well. The space between them is too great to bare, the conflict is too painful, and/or their interactions are too tedious and boring!
Continuing with such dynamics leads to inertia in the relationship, while it lasts…, and in the partners’ lives. This is how people get stuck and are generally unhappy.
The opposite is also true. When partners find a balance between togetherness and separateness, of being a couple while holding on to their individuality, when they create a true partnership where they get to explore, integrate and express their whole self, they are then able to engender passion and tap into the synergy intrinsic to couples.
Thus the couple is able to have a satisfying and successful relationship, create and contribute to our universe, live their life and be truly alive. The goal of our humanness…
Happy Balancing!!
~ Your MetroRelationship ™Assignment
Identify what is your style [or combination of styles] of relating: Disengaged, Conflictual or Enmeshed. Discuss with your partner the impact your style is having on your relationship and your lives.
Examine the contribution of your behaviors, activities and commitment to your style and their overall value in your life. Brainstorm and explore ideas of what to add to your repertoire that addresses your level of togetherness and individuality. Pick two ideas to integrate into your lives and do it now!
Copyright (c) 2016 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.
You might not have a chance if you keep this up: A tendency to look for weaknesses, gaps, holes, things to improve, deficiencies and the like, and miss the boat on capitalizing on strengths in your relationship. We bring this tendency to how we view our partner and how we relate with them. We look for their shortcomings, what they forget to do, what they could do better, and what else they can do for us. We use a lack and negative expectations lens. We filter our experience to prove our negative expectations. We expect our partner to fail before they even try.
It is imperative that we stop using this destructive lens and reprogram our thinking. When partners struggle in their relationship, they usually have a proclivity for assuming the worst about their partner’s motives and how they feel. They sell themselves short believing their partner does not like them or care about them, then go about relating from this perspective…
Can you imagine how differently you’d relate if you believed you are cherished as opposed to hated? You’d be a lot more open and giving, and a lot less defensive and mean.
It is imperative that we give our partner the benefit of the doubt, the opportunity to show us their greatness, and take a risk letting them show us their love and care. I know it is challenging to do this, especially when our partner has been operating with defense mechanisms, which are usually hurtful to us. But they can’t give us something different if we don’t give them the chance.
I encourage partners to do Appreciations to start reprogramming this undermining habit. This forces them to focus on the positives in their partner, interactions and relationship. They get to search, find and acknowledge their partner’s good qualities, efforts and investments. This shift in focus assists in rewiring the brain, creating a different brain circuitry, which allows a different experience to emerge…
Learning to focus on the positive and things we is an essential skill. It engages the gratitude center of the brain, which cannot be in a state of gratitude and a state of fear at the same time. We usually operate from a fear state that is driven by egotistical thoughts… It is time to make a concerted effort at operating from a gratitude state. This means operating from an appreciation and abundant position that is driven by Loving and accepting thoughts…
We are not our mind… We do have control over our thoughts… We get into trouble when we overly identify with our mind. We don’t realize that our mind is just a tool for Self expression, that we don’t use well at that. We create incessant noise with our negative thinking, ugly pictures and low or unrealistic expectations. We end up creating an unsatisfying self-fulfilling prophecy and prevent our self from Being! It is time to properly engage your mind.
Take charge of what you think, what scripts you run, how you interpret things, what meaning you assign, and what pictures you conjure.
Remember that what we focus on perseveres, what we imagine we create, and what we expect we get. Create the most outrageous vision of your most fabulous relationship, and then carry on as if it already is… The more adept you get at engaging your mind the more wonderful your life and relationship are.
Happy Conjuring!
~ Your MetroRelationship ™Assignment
Let’s do better with focusing on the good and new…
Pay attention to the things you like throughout the day
Focus on the qualities you are attracted to in your partner
Identify your partner’s strengths and how they make your life better
Notice anything new your partner is trying to implement, any efforts put forth and any nurturing gestures (focus ONLY on what is, NOT what is not!)
Observe how you allow the good to come to you and how you are able to receive the good that is given…
Copyright (c) 2016 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.
Our relationship is one of the biggest, most powerful asset and gift we have in our life! It is a true treasure chest worth a fortune. It can deliver unimaginable heights of satisfaction, peace, joy, love, happiness and success!!
To cash-in on this fortune we have to polish the gems on the rough, the hidden treasures.
Hidden Treasure #1 – Potential to Heal:
One of the unconscious reasons we are attracted to our partner is their ability to trigger us, get under our skin, believe it or not! They trigger us because the way they treat us and relate to us makes us feel at a deep level the same way we did growing up when our parents behaved in ways that bother (hurt) us. History is repeating itself. We replicate patterns in our lives.
To heal we have to break this pattern and get from our partner a different outcome than usual to our disagreements and treatment that meets our needs. This mends our wounds.
When we operate from a place of being healed, we are no longer as reactionary, triggerable, and raw. This allows us to relate with our partner from a more conscious and available place creating satisfying encounters. Also, we have our emotional and mental resources ready for use in more productive and fruitful endeavors!
Hidden Treasure #2 – Potential to Grow:
The other unconscious reason we are attracted to our partner is their appearing to be similar to us but also very different. They may seem down right opposite us!! They are messy, we are neat freaks. They are social butterflies, we like isolation. We need to talk about everything, they don’t want to talk about anything. Etc.
We are unconsciously attracted to this seemingly opposite person and their characteristics and coping mechanisms because these constitute parts of ourselves and ways that we are not aware of and in touch with and thus in our partnership we become whole and complete.
To actually become whole and complete, we have to grow, we have to learn from our partner’s oppositeness and start getting in touch with and owning the different parts of ourselves that we have denied, lost, and hidden.
When we operate from a more complete and integrated self, we have access to different characteristics, coping mechanisms and parts of ourselves that bring forth a full and aware self to engage in relating, thus eliminating friction and tension idiosyncratic to operating from a fragmented self. An aware and integrated self make us more resilient and adept in our relationship and life!
Hidden Treasure #3 – Potential to Create:
Borrowing from evolutionary theory, we partner up to procreate and ensure survival of our species. In our more advanced times, where our lives do not just revolve around ensuring basic survival, this concept can be taken a step further to include how well we procreate and what do we do in our lifetime to ensure the survival of future generations.
This includes first creating a healthy, nurturing and happy family where children can be raised into differentiated, happy, healthy, well-functioning, and contributing members of our society. And, second, tapping into our partnership synergy so that we can be real contributing members of our society.
Our partnership’ inherent synergy is a fabulous resource to assist in these processes. When tapped and focused it generates energy, flow and momentum for the couple that assists and promotes the achievement of anything the partners set their mind to! The sky is their limit!!
Our relationship is a gift that usually goes unwrapped! It is a wasted and essential resource necessary for our wellbeing and success. We need our relationship to heal, grow and create successfully, and we have it right there for our capitalizing! All we have to do is polish those gems!
Happy Polishing!!!
~ Your MetroRelationship ™ Assignment
Figure out how your partner makes you feel the negative feels you had growing up. You might have to go deep to figure out these feelings and the connection. Go easy on yourself, this is difficult stuff. Then share this new found insight with your partner from a non-blaming position asking them to just hear you out.
Finally, give your partner two specific behavior changes they can choose one from to do providing you with a different outcome than the usual and thus healing you. Make sure the choices you give meet your needs.
Copyright (c) 2016 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.
We all have dreams, wishes and goals. There are things we want for ourselves, our partner, our family. Sometimes though we find that it is difficult, if not impossible, to make our wish a reality.
We may want to start a new business, go back to school, learn a new trade, pick up a new hobby or project, throw a party, have the house a certain way, keep fit, enroll in activities with our children, have more intimate and fun moments with our partner, having another child, etc. But life gets in the way and we just dream about these and never see them materialize.
This is an ugly way to go about our days and our life. We are not really living when we barely make it through “reactive” tasks everyday and then the day is over. Some people go through their days just putting out fires and not getting anywhere.
The thing is that in partnership your wishes and dreams can come true. It is difficult enough to motivate ourselves and set ourselves up to achieve success without the added burden of fighting our partner in the process.
When our partner becomes our ally and a team player the energies that would normally go into convincing, cajoling, nagging, and compensating for them could be better put to use into making our wishes and dreams come true. Plus, when our partner works with us, life has a funny way of magically becoming a lot easier, fun and rewarding.
So, how can you invite your partner to team-up with you so you can create your dreams and have your wishes come true? Here are 10 ways to get your partner on your team:
Show appreciation for the things, efforts and sacrifices they do and make
Focus on the positive
Give constructive feedback, only when asked
Ask your partner to brainstorm alternate solutions when you are both stuck on how to resolve something
Compromise – give in an inch
Show kindness, gentleness and thoughtfulness
Give lots of TLC (tender, love and care)
Show them you are listening (repeat back what they say) and understand their point of view (from their perspective not yours)
Don’t do the tit-for-tat game
Trade favors
When you operate from this “nice” place your partner will want to spend time with you, be with you, make life easier and share it with you. They’ll be in your team and help you create the life and partnership you want. So, go ahead and “invite” your partner into partnership!
Happy Partnering!!!
~ Your MetroRelationship ™ Assignment
Have a discussion about concrete behaviors you and your partner need to be of support to each other to allow each of you to accomplish and achieve your personal goals (i.e., trading babysitting, cleaning the house out of junk food, shopping for healthy foods and snacks, cooking healthy meals, sharing household chores, tweaking sleeping schedules, scheduling work out routines, putting certain amount of money for a specific endeavor, etc.)
Copyright (c) 2016 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.
Being seen and accepted for who we are is a basic need that specially plays out in our relationship. I find that the driver behind most conflict and dissatisfaction in relationships has to do with the partners feeling they can’t be themselves in one way or another.
Partners impart this message to one another in different ways: Giving open criticism, telling the other how to be and do things, being very helpful and taking over, undermining the other’s efforts, minimizing or dismissing the other’s experience.
Withdrawing from interactions and in other ways, not keeping promises, forgetting or not honoring agreements, refusing to compromise, interrupting or changing the conversation, making digs and I’m sure you can identify others.
This (re)traumatizes partners and has a massive negative impact on the quality, and success, of their relationship.
As human beings we have the Prime Directive to be our Authentic and Unique selves. This is our gift to our world and humanity. It is our reason for Living. It is our job to fully engage our Selves and make a Contribution flowing from our Experience… When partners judge, criticize, control, demean, sabotage and other goodies they prevent each other from embracing their awesomeness, their Legacy, and from (identifying and) fulfilling their Life’s Purpose.
Therefore, there is incongruency for partners between the experience in the relationship and their sense of Self. This is where all the disagreement, not getting along, questioning, ambivalence, turmoil, etc. comes from. Partners fighting is an actual fight for survival – for survival of the Self!
Here is where the balance between security and identify needs comes in. There usually is a gender manifestation around this where the women (more female energied partner) champion for we-ness and togetherness and the men (more male energied partner) champion for individuality and space.
The approach to bridge these seemingly opposing needs is to set up a system that supports and encourages both: Staying connected to our partner while taking time for our Self and our pursuits, or doing things our way…
Bridging Needs System:
Strategy – Set up plans to pursue a hobby, interest, socializing, and the like or doing something your way that includes built-in safety around this for your partner: Sharing the Why this is important to you, details involved for transparency (safeguarding trust), and how to stay in connection or synchronized.
Management – Manage the feelings that come up in making and bringing up the plans; and in receiving the news of your partner’s plans. Fear of some sort usually comes up for both partners for different reasons…
Development – While not together or entertaining your partner’s different approach make the most of your separate time or differences. This is a huge opportunity to learn more about your Self, fine tune your craft, share your Gift, replenish and recharge, connect with others, expand your repertoire, stretch your comfort zone, and invest in your Self in any way that enriches your Journey.
Reengagement – Don’t beat up your partner upon reentry, or completion of engagement! Share any struggles you might have experienced from an opportunity-for-growth place, not as a mechanism to manipulate and control to take care of your neediness… Stretch to share and receive what was learned, enjoyed, gained, etc. Remember: It’s OK to be separate.
Synergy – Stay tuned for how you are growing as a person, as a couple, and as agents of Change…
Employ a Groundhog Day approach to your system – review how you did, where you might need assistance, what could improve, and what to tweak in your process next time. Keep doing this striving for a masterpiece system with the knowledge that it’s a work in progress and perfection doesn’t exist.
Complete the MetroRelationship (sm) Assignment below to help you effortlessly implement this, make changes and immediately start experiencing the relationship you want.
Happy Groundhoging!
~ Your MetroRelationship ™ Assignment
Take a moment to discuss this approach with your partner and create your Bridging Needs System. Explore which step might be particularly difficult for each of you and why, speaking about your own potential struggle. Do not speak for your partner… Share the why from a Self Development place, not from a blaming your partner place… Support each other in your individual stretch and growth.
Copyright (c) 2016 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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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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