Executive Marriage Coach – Love Tips for the Holidays

Love Tips for the Holidays

Do you find yourself emotionally confused this time of year?  You want to be closer to people you love, you want to experience peace and joy and yet it seems so stressful and hard.  You think about those you miss and grieve for and those who have let you down.  You may look forward to family gatherings and yet feel anxiety about them.  You want to slow down but there is so much to do.

I want to offer you a couple of ways to shift your perspective and take charge of your holiday experiences.

1.   Think like an anthropologist. This is especially helpful if you have to deal with family dysfunction or you end up feeling like a frustrated kid at family gatherings.  An anthropologist goes into a group or community and becomes a part of them and at the same time observes, studies, and learns about them.  He or she is present and connected but never loses objectivity.  For you it may work like this:
a.    Watch how people interact.  See the familiar roles people take on.  Look for the patterns of interaction.  How much is absolutely predictable?
b.    Observe yourself.  How do you feel?  What role do you fall into?  Can you see your attitude or reactions change?
c.    Don’t judge people or the experience you feel.  Simply make notes and let it be.
d.    If you stay objective you can choose your responses.  Don’t put pressure on yourself to perform but realize you are in control of yourself and yourself only.

2.     Love relentlessly. You may find yourself reaching out to one you love hoping for a deeper connection and are disappointed by the response.  Your natural reaction is to defend yourself by either lashing out or pulling away.  Love, however, respond differently.  Love steps into the disappointment and honestly engages, sharing its heart’s desire and the impact of the other’s hurtful behavior.  Love does not try to control outcomes but is clear about its hopes and expectations.  To love relentlessly may sound something like this for you:
a.    I really want to feel more connected to you.
b.    When you push me away I feel hurt, lonely…
c.    This is what I hope for from you….
d.    I’ve noticed how hard you are working and I want you to know how much I appreciate you.
e.    I was unkind to you yesterday and I am sorry.
f.    What can we do to work on this?

3.  Be kind to yourself. You will not be perfect and yes you may feel overwhelmed and inadequate.  It’s OK.  See yourself with compassion and forgive yourself.  Take some time to breath, reflect, and feel what you feel.  When you start to feel more in control of yourself you can relax a bit more.  Take time to allow Divine Love to comfort you and give you inner strength.  When you feel better you will be much more able to spread the love, hope, joy, and peace that the holiday season represents.

Executive Marriage Coach – How to Stretch your Love Capacity

Why won’t you meet my needs? A client recalled this lament from his wife, which in essence was the accusation: “you have the ability to meet my needs, you’re not doing it, and furthermore you’re not doing it on purpose”.   Upon further exploration it became clear that in spite of this man’s efforts to meet his wife’s needs he could not satisfy her demands.  She had taken on the role of victim and projected blame onto him.  He, in turn, felt helpless and stuck and projected blame back onto her for being impossible to please.

This situation illustrates a common struggle in marriage relationships.  The real problem is a misguided assumption that one’s spouse is responsible for and capable of meeting our core needs and fulfilling us.  That is not possible any more than any other external source can validate us, fulfill us, and make us whole.  Wholeness is a journey that happens from the inside out and is both an emotional and spiritual process.  We must own that responsibility for ourselves and open ourselves to love from within, from our spiritual source.  Then we can effectively give and receive love in our external relationships.

This client came to see that once he got clear about the issue of responsibility there were several commitments he was able to make to his wife.  These are commitments to support her in her journey towards finding wholeness at her own pace, to be engaged and present in the relationship, to create a loving space for her to learn, and to not blame his wife for what she needs.  Paradoxically letting go of the expectation of meeting another’s needs allows us to be instrumental in helping our partner get those needs satisfied.  This may not result in what you hope for from your partner but it is worth doing anyway because in the process of keeping these commitments you will be stretched and increase your capacity to be a loving human being.

Executive Marriage Coach – Enjoying the Fruits of Love

What a weekend!  A friend of mine was telling me about the wedding of his son and new daughter-in-law this weekend.  He had several good observations.  One was the joy and pride of seeing his son grown into a mature young man making a commitment to a lovely young woman.  He talked about the joy of being a father and how important it has been just to be a loving presence in his son’s life. Several of his son’s friends seemed to be missing that from their own fathers and often sought to engage with him for some sort of recognition.  My friend also shared how great it was to welcome a daughter into their family, noting they only had two sons.  He said his wife gave a moving toast as she said this young woman had not become their daughter-in-law but their daughter-in-love.

My friend’s story resonated with my own experiences of being the father of two girls who have grown into lovely and strong women.  For me and my wife, being a loving and consistent presence in their lives has been wonderful for us and provided fertile soil for them to grow in. They have both found strong and loving men to marry and are now starting their own families.  It is very satisfying to witness and be a part of.  We have now entered the delightful stage of being grandparents.  Our first granddaughter is now 19 months old and this weekend our younger daughter gave birth to her first child and our second granddaughter.  It is wonderful.

There is nothing better than indulging deeply in the fruits of love.  My friend and his wife and I and my wife have been blessed no doubt, but we are not special people with unusual gifts or talents.  The fruits of love are the result of planting the seeds of love early and often and then cultivating and nurturing those seeds into maturity. It is simply engaging in the practices of love on a consistent basis over time that yields results.  Of course some have more difficult circumstances than others, but you can always choose love and choose to be present in the lives of those you love.  I encourage you to be in it for the long term.  The fruits are delicious.

Executive Marriage Coach – Allow Love to Heal You.

All of us have scars from past experiences that cause pain and conflicts in the present.  Until we allow healing of the wounds from those things long ago hidden away they will continue to surface in one form or another; self-destructive behaviors, physical or emotional symptoms, or recurring patterns of conflict in your relationships.

We seek various and sometimes desperate ways to heal and fulfill ourselves. The problem is we are not created to fulfill ourselves. Nor are we created to find fulfillment, deep-down fulfillment that our souls long for, in our relationships.  Seeking fulfillment of our deepest needs outside of ourselves is like a race with no ending.  It will exhaust you.

Instead we are invited to rest in the knowledge that we are of Spirit and created to find fulfillment in God.  We are loved perfectly and completely. Life serves the purpose through experience of understanding this love more fully.  When we stop seeking and start receiving we can then live not to fulfill ourselves but to express ourselves.   Marriage and other intimate relationships then take on the purpose of loving rather than demanding that our partners fulfill us.  It is love that heals us. Love is why we are here.

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