Have you noticed that both your best and worst behaviours are saved up for the ‘love of your life’, and that you will do things and say things to your life partner that you would never say to anyone else. Have you also noticed that you are willing to accept more toxic behaviours and more toxic communications from your intimate partner than from anyone else.
You probably answered yes to both of those questions, especially if you are in a high functioning relationship.
You see, great relationships are about personal growth and development and this means dealing with your most personal issues. The more intimate you and your partner become the more you each become the trigger for the other that brings up the secrets, the denials, the irrational behaviours and in fact both the best and the worst you’ve both got to offer. This is both awful and wonderful.
It’s awful because who wants to feel that way. Let’s face it, most of us spend a lifetime trying to avoid having to deal with these issues. It’s wonderful because once you know the issues that you’ve been carrying around, you can get rid of them, once and for all.
Invariably the issues date back to your childhood, so they’ve been there for a long time. There’s nothing like an intimate loving relationship to stir them all up and of course the experience can become very emotional. But once you deal with these things, they are gone forever. And that’s not only a huge relief but it leaves you with so much more energy. You may even start to clearly see how, without realising it, you’ve been putting lots of your precious energy into keeping these things hidden for years. When they are no longer there, all that energy becomes available for you to do other things.
So the next time you are thinking that perhaps this life-partner is not the right person and that maybe you’d better bail out before it get too much, just keep in mind that getting rid of the one person in your life that triggers your issues is most likely to land you right back to square one; sacrificing all of your energy and success potential to spend your life pretending that everything’s just all OK. Once you really know how, you’ll find that you can live much better than that.
