How can we transform our relationships--making them closer, more intimate, more creative, more satisfying?
I've seen that happen in my own life. And the change came, not from working on the relationships, but from loving myself.
What's made the difference: love for myself, comfort with who I am, the feeling of being on my own path, and knowing what I feel and what I want.
When I love myself, I still enjoy and want love from the other person, but I don't feel desperate for it, like I'd disappear if I didn't get it. I don't feel like I'd do anything, even try to be someone I'm not, just to be loved.
When I feel comfort with who I am, I can feel right away if I'm still comfortable when I'm with this other person. I can judge a potential partner not by looks or achievements, but by whether I feel even more myself when I am with him.
When I have the feeling of being on my own path, satisfied with and excited by what I am doing in my life, I'm not going to be jealous of my partner's accomplishments or needing him to be smaller so I don't get too anxious. Nor will I need him to accomplish more so I can ride along on the accomplishment wagon.
When I know what I feel and what I want, then I can communicate my desires -- and be open to hearing what my partner wants as well. When I know what I want and I trust that, I don't end up resenting the other person because I haven't said what I needed and they didn't read my mind.
Perhaps the biggest gift I've received in the relationship area was the certainty that grew in me after many years of inner work, that the other person's feelings belong to them.
Growing up in an alcoholic/codependent family, I soaked up the idea that when Dad was depressed, it was the job of all the rest of us to handle his feelings for him. My mother didn't show her feelings at all, so I had her feelings for her too.
When I started getting into relationships, it was nearly automatic to believe my partner's fears and angers were my fault and my responsibility. In the resulting tangle, no wonder it was hard to feel myself.
I even thought that's what "love" meant!
Many years of inner work using a process called Focusing have shifted all this for me. I can sit with my partner when he's upset, but it doesn't become my upset. It belongs to him. When my nephew is in tears over his own relationship woes, I am there... but I don't offer advice unless he asks, because that's his feeling, not mine.
The space I have for connecting with others is much bigger now, because I am myself, not all the people around me. It feels great!
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