Category: Healthy Relationships
How to Manage Feelings With Perspective-Taking
The way you look at things — your perspective — has a lot to do with your mental health and happiness. Abraham Lincoln said, “Most people are as happy as they make up their minds to be.” That says something about the power of perspective-taking.
But do we really have control over our emotions through point of view? You could argue that we can’t help feeling what we feel.
Emotions Are Both Automatic and Manageable
It’s true that emotions can just happen. That’s a good thing. When a baby is hungry or scared or hurt, it becomes upset. The baby’s cries help ensure needed care arrives.
In adult life, when your partner doesn’t come home as expected, you worry. Voicing your concern would (ideally) help you both adjust to improve your trust and safety. If someone you care about smiles and says, “I’m so glad you’re in my life,” you would probably feel good. You might share the feeling of happiness back in some way. These emotions arise naturally.
Yet we also need to function … Come Read the Rest
How to Keep Love Growing in a Relationship (2019)
“Love has a kind of magic. It’s able to do amazing things.” That’s what researcher Dr. John Gottman said about great friendships and love relationships, in a TEDx talk.
Social science tells us, those who enjoy healthy friendships and love also enjoy:
- Greater physical health
- Greater mental health
- Greater wealth
- Longer life (10-15 years longer)
- More successful children
Despite these benefits, we know about half of US marriages end in divorce. Knowing so many relationships die before partners can enjoy the gifts of long-term love is sad. What don’t we know? What we can learn?
Falling in love is terrific. You feel fireworks without even trying. You’re so happy together. You feel excited, desired, and thrilled to give and receive attention. That’s not the problem.
The challenge is learning how to make love grow after it starts.
Why Lasting Love Takes Different Work than First Love
Lasting love is different, because now you’ve had a chance to annoy each other. Can you still let the good times roll? Can you still feel positive right … Come Read the Rest
How to Get a Resistant Teen Into Therapy
You may have decided to get your teen into counseling because an issue has you concerned. Signs your teen may need therapy include:
- Your teen’s life seems full of anxiety or stress.
- You’re worried about how much time they spend online or gaming.
- You’re fighting all the time. You may want to connect in a more positive way.
- Your child may be out a lot, and you’re worried about the lack of contact.
- Your teenager seems shut down.
- You’re worried about risky behaviors, such as cutting, alcohol or drug use.
- You can see your son or daughter is emotional or hurting, and you don’t know how to help.
You want to be supportive. You want to see your child happy, enjoying friends, and embracing life.
But sometimes it seems your words and your love can’t get through. Your family may simply need more resources, especially if your relationship is strained at the moment.
Why Some Teens Resist Therapy
One challenge of raising a teenager is that everything is in flux. Your child is indeed thinking, … Come Read the Rest
Family Therapy: You Don’t Need a Crisis to Benefit
“Being able to feel safe with other people is probably the single most important aspect of mental health; safe connections are fundamental to meaningful and satisfying lives.”
Bessel van der Kolk, MD, from The Body Keeps Score
When I think about a family, I think about a place where it’s okay to be who you are, and feel safe. Family therapy is where we help you build a system of safety and support together.
In a healthy family, you feel you belong in its circle of friendship and care. You know deep down you don’t need to have a perfect body, a certain kind of success, or a pre-approved lifestyle to feel accepted as a member.
Family life teaches you about boundaries – your own, and how to honor each other’s. You learn what you’re afraid of, what makes you happy, and how joy grows when you celebrate together. In a healthy family, you feel able to trust each other with your needs and stand up for yourself when you need to.
Family Therapy Helps
… Come Read the Rest
The Purpose of Marriage: To Secure Your Safety and Connection First
Three relationship experts share their findings about the purpose of marriage for strength, safety and belonging.
Drs. John Gottman, Sue Johnson, and Stan Tatkin have studied how relationships impact each partner’s sense of wellbeing. They identified traits of healthy relationships and the struggles or weaknesses of troubled marriages in their research. Here’s what each might say on the purpose of marriage (non-religious):
Dr. John Gottman: Marriage is where partners learn to build a rich climate of friendship, love, respect, and meaning.
Dr. John Gottman once told a crowd: “For a relationship to feel right, it has to be a very rich climate of affection and humor and fun and intimacy and empathy.”
That doesn’t mean you should avoid talking about what’s not working.
Being happily married isn’t about denying problems. That’s not even possible.
It surprises many to learn, most issues married couples argue about aren’t solvable. Even in happy marriages about 2/3 (69%) of problems don’t go away. They keep showing up in one form or another.
But partners who stay happy make sure … Come Read the Rest
How to Ease Someone’s Troubles by Holding Space
“I need space.” You’ve probably heard this or said it. What does that even mean? It’s about holding space for emotions. To understand each other and ourselves, we need to make room for thoughts and feelings.
Holding space is essential to wellbeing and relationships. It’s like giving a gift of gentle attention to yourself or someone else. To make sense of what we think and feel, we need each other’s input. We learn about the world and ourselves through relationships.
Holding space is about being present and emotionally available. Noticing your emotions makes them more manageable. Tuning into emotions is vital to connecting with others who are important to you.
What Does It Mean to Hold Space?
A definition of holding space is: To notice thoughts and feelings within you and between you and another person, to acknowledge them.
Another good definition is from Connor Beaton’s guide for men about holding space:
Holding space is the process of witnessing and validating someone else’s emotional state while simultaneously being present to your own.
Holding space … Come Read the Rest
3 Relationships Skills that will Impact Your Happiness
We’re bombarded with ideas for building happiness in relationships. Media show smiling parents, laughing children, and romantic partners basking in the glow of love.
You don’t have to buy what they are selling. Love and friendship thrive on actions you can learn.
Here are 3 science-based skills that help build happiness in relationships. They can help you move toward more meaningful connections in your life.
- Get to know your attachment style
- Nurture affection
- Develop self-compassion
1) Get to know your attachment style.
We know that parent-child relationships have a huge impact on how we learn to relate. Research on attachment styles explains a lot about why people approach relationships the way they do.
A basic definition of attachment is a deep emotional connection with another person for protection and comfort. An attachment bond can span space and time.
Infants naturally seek someone to attach to for safety and soothing. So do adults.
Based on that first relationship, we learn we can either 1) feel secure, 2) avoid closeness, 3) reject emotional needs, or 4) expect … Come Read the Rest
11 Important Signs Of Trust In a Relationship
You could say a close relationship depends on trust.
To feel close, you need to open your inner world — your thoughts and feelings — to another person. You have to trust your partner to care about how you feel and to respond.
As you find your partner cares about you and treats you kindly, you can risk being vulnerable. If you can’t trust your partner to respond to your needs and your relationship well, it’s hard to make love last.
Trust deepens each time a partner makes the other feel seen and accepted. Each time two people turn toward each other emotionally, trust recharges. One person says, in some way, “I need you,” and the other responds, “I’m here.”
Trust can fade too. The more couples emotionally tune out and turn away, the more they risk draining the power of trust from their love, until its strength runs out.
“My guess is that if you do nothing to make things get better in your marriage but do not do anything wrong, the … Come Read the Rest
How to Keep Love Strong with Friendly Eye Contact
Eye contact in relationships has a huge impact on making you feel loved.
When love is new, eye contact can be spine-tingling and exhilarating. “When we gaze into each other’s eyes, we are looking at somebody who isn’t predictable. We’re reminded we don’t really know them fully, and that’s exciting,” explains psychologist Stan Tatkin.
Once you know your partner better, you start to predict how your partner looks. You start to assume how he or she is feeling. So you don’t gaze into each other’s eyes as much. Now there’s a danger you’ll stop seeing and feeling seen.
It’s time to look in on the nervous system – specifically, on procedural memory. That’s the brain’s way of ingraining responses along nerve pathways to put certain actions on autopilot. Your brain creates procedural memories, so you can perform complex tasks like walking, with attention to spare.
Daily Life Demands Lots of Doing Without Looking
You probably learned to type, ride a bike, or tie a shoe. At first it takes time to master the … Come Read the Rest
7 Signs Your Partner Makes Your Relationship a Priority
Modern life puts a great deal of pressure our relationships.
Does this sound like you? You struggle to balance work, family and “me” time. You scramble to keep up with loved ones, friends and colleagues. Maybe you’re juggling childcare, elder care, house care, health concerns or car problems. You wonder when you’ll ever find time for your to-do list.
What about your partner’s wants and needs? How do you let all those emotions in? Do you feel stretched to the breaking point?
Some couples seem to take life’s demands in stride. They seem to draw strength from each other. How do they do it?
A relationship that provides a source strength and support often has a foundation of “us first.”
So what does it mean to put the relationship first?
What Putting Your Partner First in a Relationship Means
Making your spouse or partner a priority means your partner’s emotional needs are as important as your own.
You make your partnership a place where each person fully belongs. Putting your partner first … Come Read the Rest