Intimacy Pact – How Have You Created Yours?

Believe it or not, we all create our own intimacy pact with our most significant partners and INTIMACY PACTwith everyone else in our life.  We allow a certain amount of closeness, a certain degree of allowing the other person to know us, depending upon the specific Intimacy Pact we have created for each relationship.

Some of us appear to be so intimate with everyone, even total strangers.  Notice the apparent amount of self-revelation on Facebook and other social media sites.  Pay attention to what you see posted on social media and what you know about that same person in their actual life.  I have seen, in many cases, an extreme discrepancy. Continue reading

Other People Make Relationships Difficult – 3 Questions To Ask Yourself

“Some people have all the luck,” my friend recently told me.  “I always choose the wrong men.”  She went on to explain her latest relationship fiasco and how her partner got defensive, “as he always does,” and broke up with her.   Her immediate response was to blame him for not being good at relationships, for not caring enough and for not appreciating everything she did for him.

RelationshipCommunication

The part that my friend left out of the equation was the subtle and not so subtle ways that she pushed her partner away and stopped him from feeling safe in her presence.  She forgets to mention the numerous times she unfairly criticized him, told him what she thought he should or should not do, and refused to listen to his perspective on a problem. Continue reading