5 Tips for Relationship Balance 

By Roslyn Loxton 29 March 2011

1.  Have a clear understanding of what each other’s love language is?  You may well be feeling rather unappreciated because your partner isn't responding to all you do for them.  It is very common.  Some people love to be given gifts and to others, this means nothing.  Some people need to be told and others need to be shown.  Understand what works for you and what works for your partner.  Then you can do what works.

2.  Consider your needs carefully and not just your partners or your kid’s needs or anyone else's for that matter.  If you don't understand your own needs fully, how can your partner expect to understand them?   When you don't fulfill your needs you become unbalanced. It is difficult to fulfill others needs when you are feeling unbalanced yourself.  It is not a sustainable process.  

3.  Be generous in spirit and understand your partners needs fully.  This is easier to do when it is a 2 way street of course.  Sometimes our behavior is a result of an unmet need that we are blind to, we can feel unrest, but we haven't clearly identified what it is.  (These blind spots are were counseling or coaching really come into play)

4.  Share the vision.  Do what you can to understand the vision you both have for your life together.  When you share the dream, you can act like a team.  Some times you're pushing and sometimes your pulling, sometimes you're being carried and sometimes you’re doing the carrying.  If you don't have a shared dream, you can begin to harbor resentment for your sacrifices.  

5.  Let go of old baggage.  Easier said then done, and you will probably need help.  You don't put the last of the old milk into the new milk because it will make it go sour.  Harboring any level of resentment or feeling less then great within you can be a real catalyst in unbalancing the relationship.

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SELF SABOTAGE and BUILDING THE RESILIENT YOU!
by Josie Thomson

Most of the ways that we self sabotage are unconscious. The characteristics that come into play are those that Carl Jung referred to when he spoke of our 'shadow'. All of us have degrees of every personality trait possible - some we are comfortable to own, others we're not.  Our shadow includes both the parts of ourselves that we disown (and generally dislike in others) as well as those that we admire in others (but are too modest to claim for ourselves).  Simply put, Jung's philosophy is that in order to grow we must confront our shadow and begin to embrace and make peace with all of our character traits.

This process requires courage and commitment and is often best accompanied by working with a professional but you can begin on your own. Start by paying attention to the styles of self sabotage you favour. Once you become aware of these otherwise unconscious thoughts, you have the opportunity to challenge them with your inner dialogue.

Blaming

This method of self sabotage is pretty self explanatory. You believe that your circumstances are not your fault. Whilst it's possible that there is some degree of truth in this, blaming leaves you feeling powerless. Blaming often goes hand in hand with a 'victim' mentality which is equally disempowering. Ultimately, you are the only person who has the ability to change your situation. When you begin to take responsibility, you feel better about yourself and more in control of your life.

Likely self talk: 'She made me do it'; 'It's his fault'; 'Things are just really hard for me'.

Procrastination

How many times do you repeatedly put off an unpleasant task? The most common are doing your tax, tidying your desk/wardrobe/garage, getting your finances in order, starting an exercise program or a healthy eating regime. Procrastination is a very popular method of self sabotage.

Likely self talk: 'I don't have the time'; 'I'm too tired'; 'The time isn't right'.

Over Committing/Overwhelm

Many people over commit themselves. They say yes to everything and then find themselves feeling completely overwhelmed (and quite often resentful). This method of self sabotage often helps you to avoid your 'real' goals (the ones that would bring you the most fulfilment if you were brave enough to pursue them) by distracting you with a range of incidental activities.

Likely self talk: 'They need me - I can't say no'; 'I'm the only one who will do the job well'; 'I like to stay busy'.

Lack of Self Belief

This is quite possibly the most popular method of all. Like all others, it is also a self fulfilling prophecy. The less you believe in yourself, the less likely you are to take on new challenges and the more likely you are to believe you are unworthy of great things.

Likely self talk: 'I'm not good enough'; 'No one will want me'; 'I'm too tall; too short; too heavy; too unattractive; not interesting or not smart enough'.

 
Unclear Goals/Lack of Direction

This is a difficult area to tackle as it generally presents as an overall sense of confusion. Not being clear about what you want in life is often connected to not wanting to make the wrong choices.

Likely self talk: 'I don't know what I want'; 'Nothing interests me'; 'What if I get it wrong?'.

With all of the above methods of self sabotage, the first step is to notice your dominant style. Most of us use more than one so begin by just becoming aware of your self talk. If you feel ready to challenge that thinking, find a way to reframe your original thought, for example 'I'm not good enough' could become 'I'm as good as I need to be to give this a go'.

Josie Thomson

QUOTE:

'The best years of your life are the ones in which you decide your problems are your own.  You do not blame them on your mother/partner, the ecology, or the economy.  You realise that you control your own destiny.' Albert Ellis

What others are saying about Great Thinking

1. Thank you.  It is hard to put into words the gratitude I have for you and the Coaching Series. 

Looking back over the past couple of months I am truly amazed at the amount I have learned and expanded as a person. 

I know in my heart and mind that I will continue to expand and dream and act on my dreams.  This is the most special gift anyone could ever give me.  I appreciate the strategies and find them very helpful but it is your individual and honest approach that makes your series more powerful.  JB

2. Hi Ros, I was really thrilled by our focus and clarity coaching session last week. As someone who is generally fairly enlightened, and analytical of my thoughts and behaviours, I was surprised by the number of "aha" moments I experienced during our session. Thank you for guiding me through that process and allowing me to be true to myself without fear of judgment. I have realised that the stories I've been telling my self, and the labels I've given myself and others in the past are not supported by any evidence! I have really been able to connect with my new identity easily, and KNOW that I will be achieving those goals!

3. Ros was able to help guide me in creating new thinking strategies and reconsider how I process information. This has made a significant difference in my life in terms of achieving goals, ensuring my priorities are in the right order and being all that I want to be.  I found the process rewarding and practical. I was focused on being able to see tangible results and achieve meaningful outcomes – which I did!! Thanks Ros!

4. In a world full of people aspiring to be coaches, Ros Loxton stands out as one of the best I have ever met. Ros not only has superlative coaching skills, combined with effective NLP techniques, but she has a genuine, heartfelt caring for the success of her clients. That deep level of commitment allows her to get the best results out of people, and to help them achieve and often exceed their potential. In my case, her coaching has taken me from average to excellent in a short time. I happily refer all my friends to her, and if you are looking for a great mentor, then you need look no further. Ros is the best!

5. Thank you for listening and giving me insight that I have never discovered.  You are brilliant at digging deep to the core and revealing things so that they seem simple and concise.  R.J

6. What worked Working through red flags and roadblocks.  I am really able to do this on my own now which is huge. J.J

7. What worked The Structure and the feedback and the ability of Ros to be fluid and guide you in a different direction to where you thought the problem was but upon reflection was somewhere else.  S.J.

The Cost of Love

Roslyn Loxton
28.01.11

Attraction, passion, flirting, excitement, lust, energy, happiness, fun, distraction, even nervousness are all delicious feelings associated with the explosion of fireworks of becoming attracted to someone.  Sometimes we are looking for love and sometimes cupid has his way and it finds us unsuspecting. 

So what is that initial surge of attraction, the beauty and fun and excitement in the beginning stages of partnership?  The primal energy flurries through our stomach and you can literally feel the energy racing between you.  Chemical reactivity.   The physical attraction is strong and inviting and there is an almost sacrilege importance to intimacy and  “the first time”.  When we connect as a partnership and develop a relationship what happens to this energy, this chemical activity and these incredible feelings and emotions as time passes? 

Roslyn Loxton from Me Us Them Coaching and Psychology explains that things change with time, they settle and the energy shifts and the personality of the relationship forms.  Like a growing baby becomes an adult or planting a seed, it sprouts and grows and then becomes a tree.  The “personality” that a relationship becomes, begins by either a conscious intention or a primal unconscious process.  Roslyn goes on to explain that the relationship that grows requires some fundamental elements in order to endure and thrive.  What are these fundamental elements?   Where do we learn about what they are?  Given we are not formally trained in what relationship fundamentals are, we often just fumble along, either striking it lucky, faking it or breaking it, divorcing.   Given that married couples are twice as likely to have children, (B, Disraeli ) there seems to be a cycle occurring.  Our children learn about how to function in a relationship by what they see around them.  There is no formal relationship education, just unconscious observations of what is happening around us.  The cost of love dying is beyond dollar figures, there are enormous emotional costs.  Whilst not all relationships live long and strong, the cost of separating can be greatly reduced by greatly reducing the negative emotions that go along with broken or finished love.  Removing blame and bitterness and taking the pathway of amicable resolve will enormously reduce the emotional and financial burden of ending a relationship.  Even in separation there can be alignment.

Roslyn says a healthy relationship is when a couple is well aligned.  Synchronizing and being supportive of each other for who we are, not what we could or should be.  This alignment is ultimately what would kick in after all of that invigorating exciting energy subsides from when the relationship was in its inception.  One necessary element to a healthy, well aligned relationship is the individual being well aligned within them self.  Misalignment will function completely differently to alignment and will determine the capacity for a relationship to endure and thrive or become clunky and doomed for failure or divorce.  Roslyn goes on to say it is worth educating our self in relationship fundamentals; after all, relationships are at the core of our existence.  In the absence of formal education through our school systems, we can still proactively seek to become more conscious and masterful in the knowledge and art of personal alignment and relationship fundamentals.  Whilst they may seem like words or activities that don’t apply to you, it is these very things will be the indicators of how happy and successful our life is.  It seems as a society, we tend to accept the costs of broken love or relationship beak down as a part of life when what we really need to be doing is learning how to navigate through the journey that relationships take.  Me Us Them offers 5 relationship journey navigational tips. 

Tip 1.  Understand.  Most people don’t really understand themself.  Know what your personality profile traits are and how to get the best out of them.  If you are not educated as to your natural operating style you can tend to be at the mercy of it.  A bit like being given a new space ship to drive but not understanding what all the bells and whistles can do.   So you push and tweak the bells and whistles in the vein hope that something good might happen to improve your journey.  Try Googling free personality profile tests or reading books like Personality Plus to broaden your self-awareness.

Tip 2.  Perspective.  We are well acquainted with our own perspective and we can tend to only see situations from our perspective.  Putting yourself in the other persons head long enough to explain what their perspective is allows you to understand the other person.  This is simple and at the same time, not easy to do.  We often just want to be right or for the other person to be wrong.  We want to own our perspective.  This is about being the bigger person and being more focused on having an amicable outcome where you can understand and support each other.    Being fully understanding of the other person’s perspective isn’t about giving up or backing down, it is about focusing on a win/win outcome rather then focusing on being right.

Tip 3.  Visualize.  See a clear picture of what ultimately you would like the relationship to look like.  How would you like your relationship to function?  How do you treat each other?  How do you speak to each other?  How do you let each other know how much you love each other?  How do you spend quality time together?  When we see a clear picture of what we would like the relationship to be like, we can take responsibility for our part in that.  Love and generosity breeds more love and generosity.  Equally selfishness and bitterness breeds more selfishness and bitterness.  When you can see clearly how you would like your relationship to function you can function that way yourself.

Tip 4.  Attraction.  The law of attraction is about what you attract to yourself.  How attractive are you being to the very things you would like to attract to yourself.  A leaf does not attract a bee, a flower does.   This is about you.  You, taking responsibility for being who you need to be physically and emotionally in order to attract what you desire into your relationship.  Steering away from blaming anything or anyone but yourself for what you haven’t attracted to yourself or for what you have attracted to yourself.

Tip 5.  Love.  Love is a verb.  A verb is a doing word.  To love is to do love.  The more you do loving things, the more love there is.  This is particularly important for those who feel the love is gone or dwindling.  Do things that mean love.  Treat your partner with love.  If you cannot feel the love, then you have allowed something else to move in and reside in the place of love.  You can with effort put love back into its rightful place.   Do loving things and have loving expectations.  We attract to our self what we expect.

Me Us Them Coaching and Psychology are Brisbane based and provide Coaching and Psychology support through personalised Coaching and regular workshops. 

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Reference:

B, Disraeli.  Divorce Stats Australia

Retrieved 06 January 2011 from

http://www.mydivorce.com.au/divorceadvice/divorce-statistics-australia.htm