Soulmate Skills

It’s Halloween in America.  A holiday celebrating all things scary.  We want to alert you to your own personal Halloween of which you may be unaware.  Beware of the Watchers.  They’re the ghosts of powerful people from your past for whom you may be unconsciously performing.  Here’s a test:  Do you give your partner what he or she really wants–like acknowledgement, sex, affection?  Or are you knocking yourself out doing things your partner really doesn’t care about–like cleaning the house, leaving no dirty dishes in the sink, or working long hours for extra pay?  If you answered Yes to the latter, you may be living your life trying to please the Watchers–people (like your Mom or Dad) you carry around in your head whose potential disapproval you’re trying constantly to prevent.  This Halloween banish those ghosts.  Here’s how to break the spell:  Say to your Watchers,  “I’m not here to live up to your expectations!”

The results are in:  You can honeymoon forever!  Research from Bianca Acevedo, PhD (http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/what-the-wild-things-are/201010/can-romantic-love-last-forever) confirms that romantic love–yes, you heard it right–romantic love– is an attainable lifetime goal for relationships.  Don’t think your relationship has to settle into mere companionship.  It doesn’t.  What’s more romantic love is good for you.  As Jim wrote me many years into our marriage, “You are my twin; my heart’s desire; you set various parts of me on fire…And as we go from day to day in a seemingly quotidian way, The splendor of our lives hold sway, And God looks down to seek–His two lovers.”

What takes a fifth of a second, gives you a rush like a cocaine high, and touches your heart?  Falling in love!  We liked this study from Stephanie Ortigue at Syracuse University.  (See http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/10/101022184957.htm)  It happened to us too.  I walked into that meeting room the first day of my doctoral studies.  Saw one man in profile.  In a split second, took in his intelligence, his beauty, his wisdom.  Thought, “He looks like a psychologist; probably wouldn’t be interested in me.”  Responded to the first part of my thought; ignored the second part.  Walked straight to the chair next to him and sat down at his left hand.  I haven’t left his side since.  That fifth of a second changed my life.  So, if you think the time is passing slowly until your beloved comes, in a fith of a second, your soulmate will appear.

There’s another way to check for the goodness of the relationship you’re in.  Jim’s 1989 letter to me captures it:  “As I was coming from the dentist’s yesterday, I ran into my favorite school comrade from my master’s program.  I hadn’t seen her since before you and I met.  As we talked, I noticed that I was more open, more loving, much more boldly emotional.  It felt so nice to watch myself enjoying the fruits of yours and my precious relationship; to see the change in me because of you.  Your femaleness is so damned good for me!”  Can’t you just hear the expansiveness in Jim?  That’s what to look for in yourself.  Does this relationship; does my partner open my soul?  Am I expanded by this relationship?

You have Inner Critic shoulds that keep whole chunks of your personality submerged.  Locked away.  If they try to emerge, the feelings of defectiveness lead you to push them back down into your subconscious mind.  And that takes a toll on closeness in your relationships.  Because if the condemned parts of yourself were to be exposed and others see it, your Inner Critic would lead you to feel the pain of humiliation.  And there’s the connection:  I have to stay distant from you; can’t let you know all of me.  If you did see all of me, especially those hidden parts, you would surely reject me.  This is why Anthetic Inner Critic work is so crucial to high-voltage soulmate relationships.  As you get free from your Inner Critic; as you no longer accept its condemning messages, you move toward welcoming all parts of yourself.  And so you open yourself to letting others see you too.  Now you can connect the dots:  Self-Acceptance…Closeness.

They met in a crowd.  Recognized each other from long ago.  She told me she reflected on whether to dive into this relationship.  An inner guiding part said, “Life is urgent.”  She told me, “The vibes were good enough that I could take that risk.”  And they did.  She mused, “If I could create a fantasy relationship, this would be it.  It is excellent.”  What do I see in her?  She followed her spark to go the event, met him, felt the attraction.  Then she used her rational mind to assess, “Is this a good risk?”  He passed the test.

“I’m waiting for the right time to talk to him about it.”  We can’t tell you how many times we’ve heard those words.  Our advice?  Don’t wait for the “right” time.  Jim’s 1989 letter to me explains why:  “”How pleased I am at the way we bring up issues and glitches and process them immediately (I know there’s nothing seething inside, and that makes me feel calm and secure).”  So that’s it.  When you talk about feelings as they come up, you’re no longer sitting with it inside, where you’ll start to seethe about it.  Like us, you will feel calm and secure.

“I am so grateful we had the extra hour together.”  Here I was writing to Jim in 1989 about a wonderful thing that occurred when we were parting in the Dallas airport after having spent five days together.  We would board separate planes to fly back to our homes 2,000 miles distant from each other.  We did not want to part.  We had just consummated our sexual relationship.  And during that time had decided we wanted to get married.  We were saying our goodbyes when the airline announced that my flight was delayed:  We would have another hour together.  Here’s how I interpreted that serendipitous hour:  “Surely we have an indulgent God, who smiles on us, surrounds our lovemaking, then says, ‘My children, have an extra hour together.  I give it to you freely.’”  Now in 2010, as I read that letter again, it gave me a new perspective on this current moment in our life.  Jim’s stroke in 2008 was not the end of his life.  We have had two more years together so far.  Again I sense the work of an indulgent god.  I wanted to pass that idea on to you.  How is that indulgent god working in your life and relationship?

The Baker’s Dozen:  when you give something extra.  In relationships, always giving something extra may be a clue to love addiction.  Here’s how it sounds:  “I have to offer something extra to get people to like me.  I can’t just be myself.”  Here’s how it looks:  You offer something to keep people attracted to you.  Could be money, gifts, sex, listening to their complaints, letting them live with you.  Or perhaps walking on eggshells, not making requests, not challenging what people say.  Here’s how it feels:  Angry.  Resentful.  Used.  Taken Advantage of.  Now we want to tell you what drives such love addiction:  Your Inner Critic.  It tells you you are so defective, no one would want you just for you.  It adds that if you were to assert yourself, they will surely go away.  You’d be all alone.  So you pretend not to be angry.  The solution?  Get free from your Inner Critic.  Here’s a good place to start:  “Inner Critic, I have the right to be what you call defective.  I have the right to assert myself in relationships.  People who value me will not go away.  Those who don’t value me don’t belong in my life anyway.”  If this is hard for you to believe, read our book, Disarming Your Inner Critic.  We have lots more help for you. 

They’re like Eden–those first months of your relationship.  Then an argument (what Jim and I call a “glitch”) occurs.  Such trouble in paradise can really rock your relationship.  Four months into our relationship Jim wrote, “The closer one gets (the more merged) the more skills people need, because stuff will get triggered if we get close.”  So, be encouraged, dear ones, if you’re aiming for closeness, you will have arguments.  We all have land mines of emotional pain that will blow up when our partner is close enough to trip the mechanism.  Here’s what you need: skills.  Skills for working with anger and hurt.  That’s our specialty.  Read our skills page; study Disarming Your Inner Critic; call us for an appointment.  We’re here to help.  As Jim said, “We are equal to the task: we know how to deal with the tangles.  That is more precious to me than gold and rubies.”  So, are you wondering if those arguments you’re having mean that you should break up?  Before you answer that, learn these skills, apply them during your glitches.  See if you don’t create a new Eden.