Blog
9 Qualities for Determining the State of Your Union
"On a scale from 1 to 10, how happy are you as a couple?"
Mr. and Mrs. Smith is a movie that's spoken to me for a long time.
It was trying to tell me something about long term committed relationships.
I sat with it for years before I figured it out.
Even though it's from a cis white heteronormative framing, it's still about two people experiencing what I call The Relationship Journey.
Heal Within The Stone Hearth of Your Relationship for Fire and Light
You.
Me.
What do we know about supporting long term relationships to thrive, to flourish...
To experience the fullness of being human...
To explore the richness, depth, passion, and connection of being alive?
Here is what I want for us. Are you with me?
Here is what I want for us:
I want a relationship where we experience a connection, a close bond, an attachment.
I want a relationship where I can read your cues around what you need and want, and you can read mine...where we're willing to learn one another's cues and respond to them.
None of Us Wants to Be Abandoned...and how I want us to love more and deeper
A client wrote to me recently and asked,
"Can you help me to want her less...care about her less...and love her less than I do so that I am not putting pressure on her to communicate with me or have to be intimate with me emotionally?
Is that realistic?"
Gently Support One Another's Bodies and Sexuality with Loving Touch
Sit down with me?
I'm picturing us nestled around a small, square table.
The flat wood is darker, and the texture offers my chest calm and grounding sensations with a reminder of the outdoors.
Maybe you're across from me so we can look at one another.
When I felt the trauma of Trump begin to soften in my body, I couldn't ignore what came next
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The rawness of my core wound comes around every year.
The most vulnerable thing I could ever do is ask if you'd spend my birthday with me.
Even as I write the words, tears flood my eyes and spill over.
A knot clenches in my gut, and my throat becomes so tight it's almost impossible for me to breathe.
I try to swallow it down, but the icy terror in my heart threatens to heave up and out of my body.
Do you want to pull me in closer or push me away?
Do you need space right now?
Or do you want someone to pull you in close?
We all have fears of abandonment in one form or another.
We just have different ways of managing those fears.
Three Ways to Return to Our Priorities in Pandemic Times
We have been doing this pandemic thing for over five months now.
Social distancing, sheltering-in-place, masks, hands-washing, working from home, online learning.
In some ways I've adapted.
In other moments I've completely lost my way.
This is How to Orient Toward Thriving in a Pandemic
At some point in the last few weeks I’ve sunk deeper into the realization that
Things aren’t going to change anytime soon.
I realized I’ve been treading water.
Legs scissor-kicking underwater.
Several days ago I threw a glass at the floor and shattered it....
I wasn't angry.
I wasn't triggered.
And several days ago I picked up a glass and shattered it on the floor.
I was frustrated.
I was beyond my capacity.
This is How To Give Yourself What You Most Need Right Now
I feel like I'm in the tornado outer funnel right now...
Just hanging on...
And hoping I don't get spit out in a manure patch.
This was shared with me recently, and I thought, That's about right.
Deep Safety in Your Relationship Requires This
ARE YOU 100% IN YOUR RELATIONSHIP?
Commitment to a romantic relationship means:
Being there when your partner(s) need you
Investing in their happiness