Relationships

The experiences throughout life that has the biggest impact on how we live but it is never taught to us. We all learn from relationships, both current and past, yet few of us challenge our understanding of what we learned to fit our own values to keep us connecting with purpose.

Do you recognize any of these scenarios?

• Relationships never seem to work out for you. Something always goes wrong and you’re tired of it.
• We have been married for years and get along fine but I want something more.
• You want your children to watch and learn to handle conflict and relationships differently.
• You often feel hurt and unhappy in relationships. Anxiety and pain are like constant companions.
• You unintentionally sabotage your relationships. You are doing something that damages your relationships, but you can’t seem to help it.
• You sacrifice your needs for the sake of the relationship. You give too much in your relationships and end up feeling depleted and resentful.
• You don’t feel worthy of a healthy relationship. You feel unlovable. A healthy relationship with a loving partner just doesn’t seem possible.
• You long for a fulfilling relationship, but fear you will make the same mistakes as you have in the past. You are afraid to open yourself up and be vulnerable.
• You argue too much; you don’t seem to resolve things. Poor or destructive communication continues to damage your relationship each and every day.
• You’re exhausted by the turmoil; you can’t continue this way any longer. You’ve been hoping things would change, but it only seems to get worse.
• You rarely feel connected to others; affection, closeness and sex are rare or unsatisfying. You either don’t feel safe to reach out to your partner, or you don’t feel loving towards him or her.
• You feel lonely; The feeling of emptiness is gnawing at you, but you don’t know what to do about it.
• You feel hopeless; you’re worried that any of your relationships are doomed to fail. You want to save your relationship, but you know you need experience and guidance from others who do relationships differently than you have ever been taught.

Why I do Relationship Work

I am a wife of 14 years, mom for 13 years, psychotherapist for 12 years, daughter, sister, friend, trainer, coach and entrepreneur. In each role I have consistently discovered that I am learning over and over again how to do relationships as life keeps moving forward. I have worked with all ages on multiple topics, in which I have found the core concerns for people (including myself) is directly linked with relationships to some capacity.

So, with the combination of desiring my own growth and with wanting to move clients forward to their own relationship success I started studying relationships more in depth. As I am somewhat of a systems nerd, I have learned to recognize that each relationship in every environment in your life serves you for growth. I have learned to make sense of neuroscience, attachment, nervous system regulation, mindfulness, human behavior and multiple therapy models within the context of relationships and their purpose.

While I believe it is important to look at the “why” behind the way individuals do relationships the way they do, I have experienced that its critical to be in the presence with someone who is willing to challenge you and teach you the “how” to make changes that you didn’t even know existed.  As much as I have a passion for counseling, I find relationship coaching the additional layer that that propels people forward. This defining your own vision of what you want for your relationships that meet your own values and not societies labels is freeing.