Love and Relationship Advice Blog

Could it be possible that we all unconsciously tell ourselves lies in almost every moment that keep us from having the love, relationships and the life that we really want?

Consider just for a moment that this could be true and then consider this next question...

What limiting lies do you tell yourself and what problems do they create in your life and relationships?

If you're like most people, your quick "flinch reaction" to the question we just asked you is "I don't tell myself any lies, I'm honest with myself and everyone else."

Or your answer might have been, "I know other people that lie to themselves all the time but not me."

We've been wondering about this question quite a bit over the past few days since we've been listening to Steve Chandler's audio program "17 Lies That Are Holding You Back and The Truth That Will Set You Free."

What we have discovered is that yes...we, you and everyone else do indeed tell ourselves more lies than we can even imagine and these "lies" that limit us and keep us from having the courage to create what we really want.

If we're all consistently telling all these lies to ourselves, what are some of the common ones?

Here are a few...

-I'm too old
-I can't have what I want
-I can't afford to do/have that
-He/she will never change
-Great passion is just for newlyweds
-There's no way that can happen
-My life/relationship will never be better
-If I'm committed to my children, I can't have a passionate,
close, connected relationship
-I'm not rich enough, smart enough, thin enough, etc.

The list can go on and on but you get the idea.

Since we love to tell stories from our own lives to explain our ideas, here's a good one about some limiting lies we've been telling ourselves lately...

We've just recently moved to another town and our habitual ways of doing things have certainly been turned upside down.

In all of this chaos, we've noticed that we haven't always been as kind with each other as we normally are. In fact, at times, we've made up a lot of lies that we've told ourselves about what's going on between the two of us.

Here's a really simple thing that happened the other day that disconnected us from one another...

Susie and a friend had unpacked about 30 or more boxes of books (we have a huge library) and placed them in four general categories on the new shelves that we had purchased.

It took several hours for the two of them to do this and Susie was proud that the boxes were up off the floor, unpacked and the cardboard had been recycled.

When Otto got home, he was distracted by a lot of things and Susie felt that she didn't receive "enough" appreciation from him. She told herself the lie that he didn't appreciate her efforts.

A couple of days later, Otto looked at the books on the shelves and sighed to himself that they needed to be arranged in better order.

You can guess that Susie didn't take too kindly to Otto's innocent remark about the work that had to be done. She told him that she wanted more appreciation for the work that had been done from him.

Otto then was triggered and he came back with the comment that he didn't feel appreciated either for all of the things that he had done for our move and relocation.

While all of this sounds pretty petty, keep in mind that we've been very tired and not at our best.

But that's exactly when we are challenged to clean up the limiting lies that we tell ourselves.

So the lies that we were each telling ourselves had to do with not feeling appreciated by the other and that translated into not feeling loved.

When we were finally in a place where we could open to each other, we decided that this idea was certainly a lie that we would not believe.

We then decided that we would deal with any future misunderstanding or disagreement between us by only addressing what's happening in this moment--what each of us is feeling about the situation that's coming up and our motivations behind our words and actions.

We would not allow the limiting lies to disconnect us.

Sounds pretty basic, doesn't it?

We've discovered that when we are under a lot of stress, like anyone else, we're not at our best and it's a great opportunity to go back to basics and uncover the lies that we are telling ourselves.

So, we go back to our first question...

What lies are you telling yourself and what are you willing to do to stop telling yourself those things?

In our little drama that we told you about that came up this week, we were willing to talk things out, get to the bottom of what was really going on and open to each other. We were not willing to stay stuck in the lies.

How about you?

What about the times you say things like... "you always" and "you never."

Or

The times you tell yourself "what's the use, nothing is going to change."

Or

The times you tell yourself that "you just can't have what you want."

Or Worse yet...

The times you tell yourself any lie about your limitations in your relationships or any area of your life.

There's a famous quote by the writer, Richard Bach that we just love and it simply says...

"Argue for your limitations and sure enough they're yours."

We urge you to "stop arguing for your limitations." When you do, you'll open up to a whole new set of possibilities (the ones that have been there all along.)

When challenges come up for you in your relationships...

Even if the other person chooses to stay stuck, you can always change what you are telling yourself. This will help you to open more quickly and resolve whatever is going on much more quickly than if you don't change or shift from what you are telling yourself.

We invite you to try this out in your life this week .

Just try to be more conscious of the things you say to yourself both consciously and unconsciously.

We bet you'll be amazed how often you tell yourself you can't do or have something that you really can in your relationships and life.

Posted by Susie and Otto Collins at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Breaking up and having to deal with a broken heart is something that most people dread. They sometimes spend years putting it off when they know that it's really the "right" thing for them to do. While we're certainly about helping people create the relationships that they really want, we know that sometimes in order to have what you want in your life, you have to leave the partner you are with.

So the question is--Are break-ups really as bad as we all perceive them to be?

There's a new study out that seems to shed a different light on the topic.

Eli Finkel, an assistant professor of psychology at Northwestern University, whose study appears online in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology says "We underestimate our ability to survive heartbreak."

He goes on to say--"People who are more in love really are a little more upset after a breakup, but their perceptions about how distraught they will be are dramatically overstated when compared to reality."

So if we "dramatically" overstate our distraught feelings before we break up, how can you look at your relationship and situation in a way that is more grounded in reality?

Here are some ideas to help you make your break up decision in a healthier way and to survive a break up if one comes your way...

1. Look at your relationship as it really is right now. Don't look at it with fond memories of what could have been or maybe even what was. Maybe the relationship was just what you wanted at some point or maybe it wasn't ever the way that you wanted. In your mind, don't try to make it something that it isn't, might have been or wasn't.

2. Look at you and your partner's level of willingness to commit to making your relationship better. A relationship takes the commitment of two people to make it great and while one person can certainly make changes within himself or herself--one person can't make the commitment for both people. There has to be a desire on the part of both people to create the relationship that they each want--with each other.

3. Start taking responsibility for how you are helping to create this situation and this relationship. Relationships are never about one person. They are about how two people interact with one another and ways that they push each other's "buttons." Look at what you are doing to create what is currently happening.

4. Look toward what you want. It's sometimes far easier for some people to look at what they don't want and stay stuck there. Start thinking about what you do want and then be on the lookout for it--especially in your partner. Start taking responsibility for creating your life the way you want it to be.

Posted by Susie and Otto Collins at 01:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This week we've got a great relationship question for you...

"What approach or philosophy about relationships or marriage would create the highest short- and long-term payoff in your life?"

In other words, what would be the best thing you could start doing or start doing more of to create more love and connection (or anything else) in your life?

With this in mind, we challenge you right now to think of a relationship that you want to make better...

It could be your relationship with a spouse, a child, a co-worker, a friend, an acquaintance--you get the idea.

Now, think about how you'd like this relationship to be more of the time.

Maybe you want communication to be better between the two of you. Maybe you want more honesty or more openness. Maybe you want to be "you" more of the time and for some reason you aren't able to be "you" in this relationship.

To show you what we mean, we're going to talk about 3 approaches or philosophies that we use in our relationship that keep it alive, connected and growing.

While these ideas are not in any particular order and certainly aren't the only ones we use to create the close, connected relationship we have, they are applicable for any type of relationship.

We offer them to you here as examples of how you can make some simple shifts to create stronger, more loving relationships.

Don't discount their simplicity, because their simplicity is part of their power to create the kind of relationships you probably want more of...

Idea or Approach # 1 Honesty

You may think that honesty as a "philosophy" is something that is a "given" in relationships and pretty obvious. But in many relationships, it isn't.

Even though there may be a lot of love in the relationship, one person may not feel safe being honest and may not trust that he/she will be fully understood. So there's a lot that isn't said and a lot that is assumed. When there are assumptions, resentments usually follow.

Emotional honesty is sometimes the most difficult kind of honesty to deal with. But what we've discovered is that when we know what we are feeling, we are better able to interact with others and each other from a place of love and connection. When we are not trying to hide our feelings from ourselves or others, we are better able to move through difficulties.

Committing to emotional honesty, first with yourself, is a very positive step toward creating your life and relationships the way you want.

Next...

#2 Willingness to Open to Each Other

The degree that you are able to open yourself to another is the degree of safety and trust that the two of you have between you. A man we know told us that he had noticed that his teenage son was starting to share with him his hopes, dreams, conflicts and much more.

When we asked him what had changed between him and his son, he said that he had quit trying to "fix" it for his son and instead, he has learned to simply listen to him. The two of them are much more willing to open to one another because there is a new-found trust between them. There's also much more ease and flow in their relationship.

In every relationship, we can choose to open a little deeper to one another to allow more trust, love and connection.

How can you open more?

This is the third idea we'll share with you...

#3 Always Have And Keep A Commitment to Connection.

When you commit to connection, you have to challenge your "stories," your defensiveness, being right and anything else that separates the two of you.

Committing to connection means paying attention when you get triggered and telling yourself something positive about your relationship or your true feelings for the person. At these times, it's also helpful to remind yourself that you have made the commitment to connecting and keeping that connection strong.

When the two of us become disconnected for some reason or another, one of the best ways we use to regain our connection as quickly as possible is to simply remember that we've made a commitment to do
so.

Our commitment to connection is important to us and we think that it's a great way make any relationship better.

Would a commitment to connection be a positive step that you could take in your relationship?

Probably so.

What we have discovered is that it takes no more energy and effort to work through issues, upsets and challenges than it does to stay upset and keep yourself distant and disconnected.

So... with our way of looking at it-- if it requires the same amount of effort to create a connected relationship as a disconnected one, why not go ahead and go for the best?

That's what we do and what we recommend you do as well if you want connection instead of disconnection more of the time.

Posted by Susie and Otto Collins at 01:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If there's one thing that we know from first-hand experience, it's how challenging it can be to stay connected during major (or even minor) changes in our lives.

We're in the process of moving from a small town and house where we have lived for many years to a larger city about an hour away.

If you've made a move like this yourself, you know the amount of "stuff" that has accumulated during those years--and you have to move it, sell it or give it away.

For us, the challenge has been to find ways to stay connected through the stress of selling our house, buying a new one and preparing to move to our new location.

We know that moving is not the change that can create challenges for a couple to stay connected. We'll list just a few and we're sure you could add many more to it...

* Birth of a child
* Loss of a job
* New Job
* New Boss
* Child leaving home for college or moving out
* Financial challenges
* Health challenges
* Death of parent
* Becoming the care-giver for a parent
* Death of a child

And the list could go on and on...

The changes that can challenge your connection can be major ones or even not-so-major ones. Believe it or not, even planning and going on a vacation or the kids starting back to school can create disconnection!

So how do you keep your connection through changes, whether big or small, that come up in your life?

Here are some ways that we've used throughout our moving process and have helped us...

1. Make your steps clear
Don't assume anything. Talk with your partner or family member about
plans that you are mentally creating and about your motivations and
reasons for those plans.

We are constantly communicating, from the very smallest decision like
where to store boxes that have been packed to larger decisions like what
furniture we want to sell, take with us to the new home or give away.

If you're not constantly communicating your mental plans and your
motivations behind those plans, it's easy for the two of you to create
situations where you are at odds and there's disconnection.

2. Make sure that you truly listen to each other
During times of stress and change, it's very easy to not focus your
attention on listening to your partner or the other person. You might
be distracted or in a hurry and listening simply isn't a priority.

If you want to keep your connection strong, make listening to each
other a priority. Stop your busy-ness, take a breath, sit down and
talk and listen. When you do, you'll discover that things just seem
to go more smoothly.

3. Make sure you keep your sense of humor
Keeping a sense of humor can be a challenge in stressful situations
and not usually possible when going through something like the death
of a child.

What we've discovered is that if we can find something to laugh at,
especially during this move when contracts have fallen through or
closing dates have been changed, we are better able to keep our
connection strong.

4. Keep Focused on What you Want
It's so tempting when your life gets stressful with lots of changes to
focus on what is being left behind or what "used to be."

We've kept our connection and regained it when we've lost it by
changing our focus to what we are going to rather than what we
are leaving behind.

No matter what the changes are in your life, if you both focus on
what you want, you'll be able to move toward it rather than be
holding on to the past.

There's no doubt about it--the changes that you go through in
your life can play havoc to your relationship and can create
disconnection.

If you are going through any kind of change right now, we invite you to be proactive in creating and keeping a strong connection with your partner or others. If you do, you'll find that you are better able to see the light at the end of the tunnel and you might even start enjoying the process.

Posted by Susie and Otto Collins at 10:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)