Finding Healthier Relationships

Friendships, family relationships, intimate relationships and even relationships at our place of work or in school dominate our minds while influencing our daily experiences.  Nearly all of us want to have at least one or two good relationships in our life that we feel really good about. Relationships where we feel seen, understood, accepted and enjoy one another’s company when we’re doing something that we both enjoy.  Yet, finding, making and maintaining healthy relationships can be pretty tricky. So this is what we’re going to talk about today, but maybe not in the way that you might have heard this topic discussed before.

For the most part, when we’re looking to be more social and form new relationships, regardless of the type, we have an outward focus.  We are “looking for” a person. But I’m going to encourage all of us to take a different approach by turning the process on its head. Instead of first trying to find someone, it’s best if we take an honest look at how we are in our relationship to others.  But why should we do this?

A Visual for Thinking about Relationships

When we think about the relationships that we have or are seeking, we generally think about what we want and don’t want them to be.  Yet, there’s a problem with this approach because our psychological, emotional and social makeup (aka, habits, tendencies, responses, reactions, etc.) have a great impact on what kind of people are drawn to us and what kind of people we’re drawn to.  Let’s think of this in terms of Jigsaw Puzzle Pieces.

We all know that a jigsaw piece will only fit with one other piece.  No matter how badly we want a piece to fit with it, if it’s not the right one it just won’t work.  The shapes have to be perfectly aligned for them to work. This is like us in a relationship with another person.  We have our own shape, and everyone else has theirs. However, the shape that we say we want just might not resemble how we really are.  It can also be the case that we repeatedly choose relationships in which our pieces fit perfectly with someone…but that it makes for a really toxic situation.  Why does this happen? Because sometimes our makeup attracts and is attracted to people who fit but are not good for us (and we are ultimately not good for them too).

If we take an honest look at ourselves by spending periods of time reflecting and talking with our therapist, we can get to know ourselves as we truly are.  If we don’t do this, then our lack of awareness remains low. What we need to do is to learn, objectively, how we relate and react to others, express ourselves, and uncover our beliefs and expectations about others and the world.  The reality of each of these is what creates our shape. As we start to master self-awareness and learn to observe our thoughts, emotions and relationships in real-time, we can further investigate our makeup. So becoming more aware is important but this doesn’t necessarily mean that our relationship patterns will change.  So how do we do that?

Changing Our Relationship Patterns and Choices

As I’ve mentioned many times before, we can’t change other people.  Consequently, if we want to experience a healthier relationship, then the first thing we have to do is to focus on changing ourselves.  We can always ask the other person to do things differently, but nothing is guaranteed. In fact, sometimes the relationship might need to end or for us to change our boundaries with them in order to resolve things.  These can be tricky to navigate so take your time if you need to and talk with your therapist.

If you’re in a position where you’re looking to form new relationships, be sure to focus on choosing different types of people that don’t fit your pre-existing shape.  But when you do this, you need to be willing to do things differently. To help illustrate this, I’m going to share a story about a client that I worked with several years ago.

Comfortable Dysfunction to Healthy Relationships that Scare Me

This client, for whom I’ll call Theresa, came to me after she had ended a relationship with a man who had considerable mental health and addiction problems.  She was also working multiple jobs and not making much money despite being very intelligent, holding a master’s degree and a hard worker. What was impressive about her was how much courage she had during our sessions because many of the things that she shared were very embarrassing for her.  But she also demonstrated a lot of courage outside of our sessions because she made numerous changes despite being very anxious about them. For a handful of months we focused on dissecting her relationship history, including her relationships with her parents. Most notably, her father had been an alcoholic and died when Theresa was in her early 20’s (she was 30 when we started working together).  This loss was very difficult for her because she and her father’s relationship had become strained when she was in high school. Consequently, when she moved out after high school they didn’t talk much.

In a way, Theresa felt like she had lost him to alcohol for many years and then she lost him again, without any chance of mending the relationship, when he passed away.  As we talked about her upbringing, she began to realize how deeply this relationship had affected her. She realized that the social anxiety that she had experienced since she was very young stemmed from their interactions.  She also started to understand that her passive, accommodating and even enabling relationship style was born from this early relationship. This was her shape, and it naturally rendered her in relationships with men who were similar, in various ways, to her father.  Her father didn’t meet her needs but she was expected to meet his. As a result, she learned to not ask for things and to expect very little, if anything, from him. We found out together that this had transferred to how she related to her intimate partners. It took a while to discuss and form all of these connections, but her willingness to consider them was so impressive; even when they were painful to talk about.  Then, during one session, we started to discuss the possibility of her dating again.

Rather than jump into a relationship, we talked about how she could approach dating in a way where she could slowly get to know the other person.  At times she and I would joke around about how she should bring her next date into a session so I could evaluate them…but of course that never happened.  That’d just be messed up for so many reasons! Nonetheless, she went on dates with different guys and we discussed her reactions to them and what she observed.  We also helped her refine the kind of person and relationship dynamic that she wanted. This meant that she needed to not continue to see many of these people, and breaking things off was difficult for her because she never wanted to upset anyone.  By ending these, she grew stronger. She was changing her shape by going through this each and every time. But then she met a guy that she really liked and felt very comfortable with. They shared many of the same interests, general lifestyle and she was hopeful about where the relationship might go.

As she continued to date him, her anxiety spiked at various times.  She didn’t know what to do with his kindness, his genuine support, and how accepting he was of her.  All of these things, the things that she wanted, really scared her! In fact, she almost ended the relationship at one point because of these fears.  They had convinced her that something was wrong and that it wasn’t going to work out. Luckily, she was open to giving it more time because she soon realized that her fears were driving her choices.  Again, she faced these fears and pushed on. Over time, their relationship became better and better. She challenged herself to be genuine, even though she was terrified of being rejected or judged. She pushed herself to accept and trust his kindness and support while still reflecting on her discomfort.  The more she did this, the more comfortable she became and the more she loved him and the relationship.

As a side note, she and I also worked on helping her find a job that paid her a wage that more closely matched what she should be making.  This was also a struggle because she needed to quit her other jobs and take a risk on something new. It was wonderful when she found something new and while it wasn’t her dream job, her financial situation improved dramatically.  It gave her the space to live and struggle less. But let’s get back to how things finished up in therapy.

With a new job, a healthier relationship and new ways of doing things, we started to reduce our sessions.  Eventually, we stopped working together because her life was going well. I found out a year later that she and her boyfriend got married and continued to be very happy together.  While this story has a nice positive ending, keep in mind that she spent many months unhappy, anxious, sad and exhausted. We also spent about a year and a half meeting each week and her working hard the entire time.  Her willingness to endure all of this discomfort, experiment with change and to stick with her convictions ultimately resulted in some great things happening for her.

Final Comments – Change Takes Time

When we’re suffering, our patience tends to be pretty low.  We want to experience something better and as soon as possible because we’re desperate for relief.  As much as our dominant culture has programmed us to look for quick-fixes, that they are possible and should be expected, we need to completely let this go when it comes to our psychological and relationship health.  Changing ourselves is literally changing our brains. It’s possible at any age, but it takes time. I know for a fact that all of us can get ourselves to a much better place in our lives if we put in the work and stick with it.  However, what none of us can know is how long it will take, how many changes we’ll have to make, how many disappointments we’ll have to experience or the type of support we’ll need. As a general rule of thumb, the severity of our difficulties and the amount of time that we’ve been stuck in unhealthy patterns, the longer it will take to feel better.  However, if our willingness and courage is high, like Theresa’s, then change can happen rather quickly…though it might not feel like it. You’re worth it, all of us are, so keep at it and don’t give up on your future. Change is inevitable and how things change for you in the long-run can be greatly influenced by what you choose to do…or not do.