Relational Growth: The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

Sometimes we fight for an idea of what we want a relationship to be rather than face what’s really here…

Part of the human condition I guess…

But at some point the truth kicks and kicks until it can be ignored no more…

Broadly speaking, there’s 3 ways to look at these situations.

If you wanted a snappy blog title, you could say, they’re the good, the bad and the ugly 😉 – although we’ll not take them in that order:

➡ 1) YOU ATTEMPT TO MAKE THEM CHANGE…

Good luck with that, and just wishing and wishing is a recipe for limbo.

Getting into a place of ‘needing’ or even ‘wanting’ THEM to change in order for you to be happy or fulfilled gives all your power away and puts an enormous amount of pressure on them and the relationship.

Dialogue can of course inspire your beloved to stretch and discover for themselves what’s true for them… But ultimately their shift must come from THEIR true inner desire to do so, or it will be unsustainable and only perpetuate the cycle.

This then, would be ‘The Bad”

➡ 2) YOU LOOK AT YOURSELF…

Look at your dissatisfactions, your issues, your judgements and how they are mirrors for your internal world…

That, in my experience, can be a great use of any conflict brought on by the growth impulse. Certainly it can help you become more conscious of your own unhelpful patterns. But at some point it reaches its limits, actually becomes counter-productive and demands a relational collaboration…

If you put all the weight of relational responsibility on your shoulders (in other words, if you enter the mode of “I must fix myself to make the relationship work”)… Well, you’re actually disempowering your beloved and putting huge pressure on yourself. It’s a set up for relational failure. It puts you in a reactive, rather than pro-active state.

If your relationship is in a rocky space, and you take this road, you will, most likely, only cause yourself additional suffering…

It’s ‘The Ugly’

➡ 3) YOU ALIGN FULLY WITH WHAT YOU WANT...

You get super clear on what YOU want to experience, let go of everything you’ve created in the relationship and open to where life is pointing you.

This drops any judgement of what they are, or are not doing.

It has no agenda for them, and doesn’t make ‘who you are’ wrong in anyway.

This may challenge you to set clear and healthy boundaries, but boundaries are a clear prayer to the Universe that lay out who you are, and what you wish to experience in your relational life.

You are simply saying from your own clarity “This is what I would like to experience, this is where I am heading. I’d love you to come and you are free to choose if that is what you want to”

It empowers them. It empowers you.

And any dialogue from this place, will come from a deeply wholesome space within you.

I strongly encourage you to trust that, even though it might get rough in the adjustment, what you want is also seeking you and life will find a way… with or without them…

This would be “The Good”

Letting Go Of The Outcome

The main objection I hear to “The Good” is an understandable fear of what you will set in progress by getting clear on what you want and speaking it.

Will it end the relationship? Am I being selfish? What will the larger consequences be?

We are so culturally trained to deny what we truly want, and cling on for grim death to the status quo. Letting go of what has been that is undesirable, is literally that. Letting go of what is undesirable. There are so many ways it can resolve into ‘the desirable’, and relationally that may be with or without the same person – but in the end, this is your life and you do deserve to live the life you desire.

The NPA Process is amazing for bringing you back to you and letting go of outcome, especially relationally. You can learn how to do it yourself with my video course. And if you would like some 1:1 support through this process of relational alignment, get in touch. You can find details of my sessions at www.joelyoungnpa.com/sessions