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  • Bring the Spark Back Challenge

    Bring the Spark Back Challenge

     

    Relationships are like breathing – inhaling and exhaling, closeness and disconnected, receiving and giving, connection and autonomy.

    “We must be open enough to receive each other” Terry Real

    Often in couple counselling I witness couples who have simply lost touch with how to receive the other, how to connect and share themselves on these levels:

    • physically – we don’t even say good morning any more or hug. We used to exercise together everyday.
    • emotionally – we just don’t talk about the intimate stuff, our needs or feelings anymore, its all about the kids
    • sexually – the erotic pleasure has died and no one initiates sex anymore. If I do I feel like I am going to get rejected
    • intellectually – we don’t share our thoughts or our ambitions, concerns, questions, experiences or insights we literally do our own thing nowadays
    • spiritually – we used to connect in a way that it felt like a spiritual experience, now we can’t even look at each other.

    Sound familiar? Our brains are geared up to automate our life so that it is easier to survive, that means we automate each other too! Tricky if you want to ensure the spark remains. It means being mindful of your relationship, taking responsibility for what you bring into the relationship daily, how you receive the other and what opportunities you take to initiate closeness.

     

    Getting Started

    A couple of things you might want to look at first.

    1. How do I receive my partner? How do I listen to him/her? Do I really hear what they are saying, their feelings and needs?
    2. How do they know I am listening and receive them?
    3. How do I listen to my feelings and needs so I can communicate them clearly?
    4. How do I offer myself, am I under sharing (withholding maybe because I assume they won’t hear or be rejected) or oversharing (because I feel they will reject me?)
    5. What is one thing I can commit to doing differently?
    6. How can I approach my partner to invite this as a new possibility in relationship?

    So heres the deal: We automate each other, so we assume a lot of stuff about the other, which means we alter the way we approach our partner stopping ourselves from asking and negotiating. Then the passion dies! But it is still there, it just needs work.

     

    Giving Up the Defenses

    Interested in bringing the spark back into your relationship?

    In the age of cultivating mutually agreed upon Couple Bubbles where our relationships are safe havens we have to both take care of each other and the relationship. The connection, intimacy, discussions, and emotional wellbeing of a relationship is a two person job. That means you!

    So to help make it work we have to give up a few things:

    1. Wanting to win or be right all the time – both lose!
    2. Controlling your partner to get what you want – they will just disappear into themselves and the passion dies, there will be a pay back!
    3. Revenge if it doesn’t go the way that you want – do you really get your needs met or is this just a tantrum because you don’t want to fess up to them?
    4. Oversharing self expression – what is it that you are covering? Whilst ranting are you really connected or is it a way of avoiding true intimacy?
    5. Withholding or withdrawing (under sharing) – when you withdraw you are not trusted and come across as hiding something. What would it take to put your best foot forward and say it how it is?

    So now that you are aware of some of the strategies you “may” have employed to get your needs met without really discussing them we can take the next step.

     

    Get Clear

    What do you really want in your relationship? What are you prepared to offer to improve it today? Often we wait for the other to get us, hear us, respect us but in the waiting we are simply avoiding and the gap grows bigger, and the resentment more apparent.

    Renew your vision together. Often over time the reason we came together changes. We do those projects, raise the kids and then we need to revision the next phase of our relationship….What fun! Remember this is two person system – Together we revision.

     

    Lets Play!

    Remember you are in a relationship, so this is a joint project. Lets start small.

    Coming back to each component in your relationship. If one area is fully satisfied then the relationship can withstand, for a time, other areas where it maybe lacking.

    1. Physically – connection rituals help us feel secure, intimate, that we matter and are loved!
      • Start with a ritual to connect you both as you launch the day. It doesn’t have to be big (a cuddle before you hop out of bed, coffee together in the morning, breakfast together, a morning walk) but do it daily. Both ensure it happens.
      • Then add a landing ritual – how do you land the day together? Do you go to bed together or does someone full asleep on the couch? Do you read to each other? Do you tell each other about your day? Connect over dinner? Create that landing ritual together.
      • Welcome home hug – Ok this is not one of those “Hi darling and a peck on the cheer gigs” it is an real tender embrace whereby holding each other until you are both totally relaxed (yep more than 5 secs) – Why? Then you don’t bring all that stress from the day home and you feel instantly connected with each other – Win/Win right?!
    2. Emotionally – Make a time each week to share your needs, feelings, withholds (remember does that thing that happened 5 years ago really have to be brought up weekly? Drop it) so as a couple we can take care of them together. We really don’t know how it is for the other unless we share. Be Bold, its worth it.
    3. Sexually – Take the quiz! Do you know your partners turn ons and offs? You will be pleasantly surprised to discover and recover them by simply asking. Maybe they don’t know – so take Emily Nagoski’s quiz and share.
      • Start with eye gazing!
      • Do the 3 minute game by Betty Martin
      • Organise date nights – yep you would be surprised how many couples never take each other out on dates! Do you think it is time?
    4. Intellectually – Share your day, your thoughts, your ideas, dilemmas, feelings and needs – so you get to know each other again. Saves assuming!
      • Mutually amplified positives – that sunset, that ice cream, and Oh My that standing in the rain naked – rope the other in too.
      • Share novel experiences – what are those adventures that you have put on the back burner and the too hard basket – share them
      • Create new memories by doing one thing different every week
      • Remember you are each others best friend. You chose the other to share your life with so lets do it.
    5. Spiritually – bring your partner close,
      • tell them what you love about them,
      • describe what you see in their face
      • eye gaze
      • meditate together

    And above all play! Adults forget to have those pillow fights, feed each other, hop into the shower together, surprise each other with a spontaneous adventure. Remember it is Christmas – be your partners gift!

    by Brenda Sutherland B. Soc. Sc. (Psych) Founder and Direct and Couples Counsellor at The Awakening Group Pty Ltd

  • Are You an Island or a Wave?

    Are You an Island or a Wave?

     Soothing Each Others Nervous System in Relationship

    by Brenda Sutherland

     

    Winter is a time of regrouping, revisioning, renewing as we are asked to go inwards and assess what is working and what is not, at the same time rest. Over the last weeks I have witnessed many couples fighting more than usual, separating or contemplating separation. One of the key factors missing in staying connected and creating a secure functioning relationship is understanding how to:

    1. Keep each other safe                                  2. Stay connected daily
    3. Soothe each others nervous system           4. Misreading cues
    5. Identify each others attachment styles        6. Protect vulnerabilities
    7. Manage Thirds (Competing Forces)    

    These are only a few!

    The missing information, is its not personal, it is psychobiological.

    How do you trigger your partner off? As Stan Tatkin author of ‘Wired for Love’ puts it

    “There are No Angels, No Devils in relationships” 

    If your partner is an Island (Avoidant) do you give them an escape route when you ask them to connect, or demand they hop off their island immediately? Key: Give them an escape route: i.e. “When you are ready…” “I don’t want to stop you from what you are doing but before you go could you hug me” 

    The reality is Islands need an OUT (as they are auto-regulators – I do me) and need an exit route to be available.

    If your partner is a Wave (Anxious/Angry-Resistant) and reject your praise, feedback do you retreat or approach them with loving words? Key: Go towards them with loving words, even if they reject them!

    Waves (external regulators – you do me) need an IN i.e. loving words, as their greatest fear is to be abandoned and rejected. But here’s the key a wave attachment style will reject the first loving words just to see if you can hold them, then if you approach again they soften.

    We are complex yet so simple when we develop a manual, from a psychobiological approach, on each other!

  • I’ll do it for you, even if it costs me my happiness

    I’ll do it for you, even if it costs me my happiness

    An insight into Family Constellations 

    Maria was distraught. For two weeks now she had been having panic attacks and didn’t know why. She was desperate for them to stop, as they were worsening. This was the reason she had found her way to counselling. Two weeks prior her partner of five years had asked her to marry him and she had said ‘yes’ and with such excitement she told her family he had proposed. The next day though she found herself getting extremely anxious, doubting whether he would be a good husband or father, not trusting his ability, questioning who she had been living with over the last five years. As the days went by her anxiety grew, until she found herself experiencing full-blown panic attacks. What had happened?

    Maria’s panic attacks are not unlike many symptoms that appear that are connected to the family lineage, as we are part of the family soul.

    What is the Family Soul?

    We all are connected to a family system or soul that reaches many generations past. We are limited by this history as well as strengthened by our ancestors. A family system is governed by:

    • the need to belong; those who are born into a family (whether survived or thrived), brought into a family through marriage, or who have taken a life from this family, in other words, ‘those who belong’, belong. If anyone is excluded they will be represented by a family member. This is often seen in children of divorced parents, whereby a parent has been criticized by the other, out of hidden loyalty the child will side with the parent excluded and criticized. We are only at peace when everyone is included.

    • the need for social order; This ensures everyone is given their rightful place. In a literal sense, this means those who come first, come first. For example, partners take precedence before children unless in a blended family then each others children come before the new partner. We are born into a special place in our family, that is the first born’s place is before the next child and so on. If out of place, a child will feel burdened, be treated as a parent, or may take the place of a lost child or previous partner resulting in strange dynamics.

    • the need for equilibrium; that is the balance of giving and taking governs the sharing of resources, but also ensures that which has been taken is given back to maintain equilibrium. We feel innocent only when equilibrium is maintained and guilty if it is imbalanced or righteous and embittered if we give too much and do not receive.

    Systems Thinking

    The majority of therapists look at issues presenting within a client on a personal basis, such as ‘what does the client need to change, integrate, realign within themselves for this issue to be resolved?’.

    A Family Constellation facilitator looks beyond the individual or person engaging systemic thinking to look in the direction the symptom (in this case panic attacks) points to within the family system to bring to light the entanglement.

    As members of a family we are symptom bearers pointing to what has not been resolved in the family system. We are all connected, and our soma, behaviors, reactions, emotional patterns or struggles often tell a story of what beckons to be acknowledged in the family that was unable to be resolved, or seen back many generations. We are in subconscious devotion to the family system and all who are connected to this out of love and to ensure the family system stays balanced.

    An indicator that a client’s presenting issue is systemic is that the symptom or issue persists no matter what interventions are applied. The dynamic is: ‘I have this symptom and I don’t want it’, and the family soul says ‘that is how it is’ until this is acknowledged.

    Words are Worlds

    Back to Maria’s panic attacks. My question on hearing her story would be: “who in the family (lineage) would be panicking about marriage?” In Maria’s case, together we looked in the direction of the panic, tracking it using a genogram, noticing hotspots such as accentuated words. She explained that her grandmother (mother’s mother) was Italian and grew up in a little village in Italy, was Roman Catholic and on her honeymoon her newly wed husband announced that he had a mistress, who was pregnant. So ‘who would be panicking around marriage?’ Grandmother!

    This highlighted the systemic principle belonging (as the mistress had to be included in the family as well as the child born of this affair) and the guilt and innocence governing belonging. As a symptom bearer Maria was reliving Grandmother’s panic. Clients have access to the entire family system therefore a simple visualization to include everyone and the panic attacks disappeared. She married her partner and now has a child.

    Your body tells the family story

    Family or Systemic Constellations gives the client a new somatic experience of what they know in their gut to be true. The format this can be done within is

    a) a group whereby participants are chosen to represent a member of the family and are placed to highlight the dynamics between each and the governing principles in play, or

    b) in ones minds eye as a visualization whereby the facilitator gains all necessary information from the client, words, their soma such as eye gaze, breath, how a client holds their body, attachment styles and the clients intention or

    c) using props such a figurines, stones, shells, or seeds that represent family members. How these are placed in relation to each other and the feelings invoked by each allows the facilitator to gather a picture and prove a new healing picture.

    I will do it for you

    Many years ago a client came to see me, she frustratingly spoke about having spent thousands of dollars trying to cure her chronic fatigue to no avail. I asked if she was an only child of divorced parents and with complete astonishment she said ‘yes’    My question was: “who is she holding the burden for?”

    Wanting to see if my hypothesis was correct I asked her to close her eyes and picture her parents in relation to herself, where would they be standing, she said “either side of me and I am standing in the middle!”

    A child out of their absolute love for both parents will do anything to bring about balance in the family by holding the burden. As hubris as this maybe it is not their job, each child is the little one with a need to take their rightful place, their social order in the family, i.e. those who come first come first. The client leaves their parents with their fate. Holding such a burden or taking a position in between parents holding the burden is too much for a child to hold causing chronic fatigue.

    The healing picture or remedy in this case was to ask the client, ‘what is one movement she could do to change this?’ In her minds eye she took one step back so the parents could look at each other and address what had yet to be dealt with between them and in most cases see the love that remains.

    A week later she very excitedly rang to say that she had no chronic fatigue symptoms and hadn’t for a week. She is symptom free still to this day.

    We all come from perfect families

    The family soul continually, as does nature, moves to bring about balance, to acknowledge those who are excluded, to ensure everyone has their rightful place in the family, and the balance of giving and taking is equal.

    The Awakening Group offers weekend workshops in Family Constellations, webinars with international facilitators and Facilitator training programs throughout Australia www.student-awakening.theteamserver.com/courses Brenda Sutherland is available for individual sessions.