by Debra | Sep 7, 2015
When we look at the question of, what is a healthy relationship, it may differ from person to person although most of us will have the same core list of non-negotiables. So maybe this is where we should start.
What are your non-negotiable items on your list for being in a relationship?
- Must have integrity. That means no lying. What if your partner doesn’t know they are lying? If someone isn’t being honest with themselves, they can’ be honest with you. So, this leads me to the next item.
- Must be doing psychological work. This enables them to know themselves and know when they are lying to themselves and therefore know when they are lying to you.
- Knows there is something bigger them themselves. They need to have their Ego or Inner child under wraps. This requires doing psychological work.
- Must be compassionate, kind, and loving. This also takes doing their psychological work. If they aren’t, they will judge and beat themselves up, and therefore judge and beat you up. Ouch, that’s not loving!
- Must have a spiritual practice. A spiritual practice combined with a psychological practice is key. Meditation, etc. without doing the inner child work will not help them learn how to not react to their triggers.
- Needs to be physically, financially and emotionally responsible. Again, I hate to be redundant but if they are stuck in one of these areas and they not doing their psychological work, then they may always be stuck in that area.
Are you getting the picture? If you’re not doing your psychological work, you won’t be able to be in a healthy relationship. If one of you is and the other isn’t, it will be impossible to have a healthy relationship. Why, you ask? Because the person not doing their work will project, blame, or won’t own their issues or wounding. This is where a spiritual retreat is critical.
A more direct list might look like this:
- Respectful
- Integrity
- Loyal
- Passionate about life
- Caring
- Forgiving
- Dependable
- Generous
- Patient
- Non-Judgmental
- Affectionate
- Authentic
- Expresses feelings
This is a list of what might be non-negotiable. If you look at this list, you will realize that if someone isn’t doing their psychological work, these will be hard to achieve. So, the message here is do your psychological work so you can have a healthy relationship with your partner, your kids, parents, friends and co-workers.
![Living In The Present Moment]()
by Debra | Apr 7, 2014
We hear it in books, see it on affirmations, and our teacher’s tell us all the time, breathe and be in the present moment. It seems so easy when it is said, but just try it. Bring your thoughts, your mind back to what you are doing for just 5 minutes. It’s amazing how many times you will have to bring it back. Our thoughts are running rampant through our childhood wounding, through our old belief system and then toward what action we should or shouldn’t take. Or we have the random thoughts intertwined like; what we are going to cook for dinner, did the mail come, is it going to rain this weekend, did I pay my phone bill and ouch, I think I just pulled a muscle. It seems like a billion thoughts run across our minds like tiny little ants on a mission.
Often we seem to have difficulties being right where we are in the present moment. We are either in the past or in the future. If we are in the past, it could bring a yearning for what we no longer have or guilt for what we have done. If we live in the future, we will be trying to get something we want that we don’t have or depressed about someone or something we may never have. Either way it creates suffering. When we’re at work, we can’t wait for the weekend; on Sunday we are anxious because we have to return to work. We obsess about things in the past and fret about what may or may not happen in our future. Our thoughts control our daily lives, leaving us in the company of our unconscious suffering minds.
Our thoughts are what cause our suffering. If we can manage our thought, our unconscious mind, our suffering could be minimized.
How do we manage our thoughts?
1. Watch them.
First, bring your attention to the thoughts. Just check in and see how active your mind is. For just one day, pay attention to all of your thoughts and do nothing about them; just watch them go by. You might be pretty shocked, I know I was. At first I was actually embarrassed at how silly they seemed to be and how many there was.
2. Don’t judge them.
When I first started watching my thoughts, I was amused at how out of control my thoughts seemed to be. There was never a quiet moment where I could just be. What we want to do is just observe our thoughts and not judge them. They are just thoughts, nothing more. When we judge them, we give them the power to control us.
3. See if they are creating suffering.
If we act like our thoughts are real, judge them, or act on them, this is what creates suffering. If we don’t give our thoughts any meaning, they come and go and are merely nothing but thoughts. A friend told me of a friend of her’s that just got diagnosed with cancer. My mind went to,”Oh my, maybe I’m going to get cancer! My mom had cancer at 43 years old.” I then start to worry. Do you see where my thoughts just took me? I might die of cancer. The reality is, cancer might be in my future and worrying about isn’t going to prevent that and it also might not.
4. Bring your mind back to the present.
When your mind goes running off the road, just say “thinking” and bring it back to what you are doing. Realize it’s just a thought and bring it back to the present moment. This isn’t easy, by the way. We have lived a very long time in our fantasies and delusions of our minds. Be careful about hanging out in your mind; you might be in enemy territory. When we buy into our thoughts we may be sabotaging our life.
