Tell Them The Truth

A few months ago I heard Mike Robbins speak at an event I attended. I was extremely moved by his ability to convey passion, appreciation and gratitude through his presentation. Mike is a personal development coach, as well as the author of Focus on the Good Stuff: The power of Appreciation. Mike travels around the country empowering others and reminding them to focus more of their attention on what IS working, what they appreciate about those around them, and what they are proud of about themselves.

The following article is one of the many that he sends out on a monthly basis, I hope you enjoy it.

Tell Them The Truth
by Mike Robbins

Sometimes we think that appreciation is all about being “nice.” That’s not the case. Appreciation, in my opinion, is about recognizing the value of someone or something and about being able to empower ourselves and others. It is, however, also about coming from a place of gratitude, respect, and truth in our relationships with the people around us. Giving people honest feedback can be one of the best ways to appreciate them and let them know we that we care about them. This, however, isn’t always easy.

First of all, to give someone honest feedback you must have a foundation of trust and appreciation in your relationship with them. It’s also important to ask their permission and make sure it’s okay with them before you launch into your feedback.

Often we wait until it’s too late or we don’t say something because we’re scared about how they might react. It’s easy to say nothing or to just “blow smoke.” However, it takes real courage to speak your truth to another person.

The key is your intention. If your intention is to make a difference for that person, “clear” something that might be in your way with them, or help them see something they may not be able to see – you’re coming from a place that can empower and ultimately support that person. If your intention is to be superior, to show them how wrong they are and how right you are, or some version of either of these two things – you’re coming from your ego and your “truth” will most likely push them away.

I’ve recently been confronted with a number of situations like this in my own life. I’ve handled some of them very poorly - either by not speaking up or doing so in a self-righteous or ineffective way. There have been a handful of situations, however, where I’ve had the courage to speak up and say what was on my mind and in doing so something wonderful happened. Regardless of how we go about this, in the end it’s almost always better for us to speak up than not. We learn more about ourselves, get closer to the other person, and grow in the process.

When someone speaks a “hard truth” to me, I know that have a tendency to push back and defend myself initially. Once that happens, however, I’m usually able to hear their feedback and learn from it. Most importantly, I always appreciate their willingness and courage to say something honest and potentially vulnerable to me.

Look at your relationships - especially the most important ones. Where are you not telling the truth, not giving feedback, or worried to say something honest? What would it take for you to be willing to tell them the truth? What are you afraid of? What would be possible in your relationship with them if you spoke up?

I challenge to you to pick a few important people in your life that you’ve been afraid to speak your truth to and just do it. Remember that speaking your truth (with appreciation, honesty, and kindness) is a great gift for the people in your life and is one of the best ways you can acknowledge them and strengthen your relationship.

How will you speak the truth with appreciation and honesty?

Friends and Lovers

by Larry James, personal relationship coach.

I am learning to see my love partner without distortion; to value her as highly as I value myself; to give without expecting anything in return; to commit myself fully to her welfare. Only then can love move freely between us without apparent effort. It’s unconditional love between best friends.

When we are able to love in this selfless manner, we experience a release of energy. We cease to be consumed by the details of our relationship, or the need to operate within the artificial structure of exercises; we spontaneously treat each other with love and respect. Love becomes automatic.

My forever lover is my very best friend!

I believe that friendship among lovers is essential to unconditional love and is the primary ingredient for a deep and lasting love relationship. I trust her with the deepest murmurings of my soul. She knows the best and the worst of me and yet loves me through and through -- a friend as well as a lover.

In order to experience the kind of relationship I want, I accept the fact that, in order to understand each other, my love partner and I must have clearly developed channels of communication. I cultivate transparency of myself by being a master in the art of self-disclosure. I know that when the inclination to reveal myself to the one I love is blocked, I close myself to her and experience emotional difficulties. I promise to never hide behind a facade.

I will forever practice telling my love partner exactly what pleases me, decreasing her reliance on mental telepathy. I express preferences instead of demands. I believe that I can never know myself except as an outcome of disclosing myself to her.

In ways I may not fully understand, self-disclosure helps me to see things, feel things, imagine things, hope for things that I could never have thought possible. The invitation to transparency, then, is really an invitation to authenticity. It is also an invitation to allow myself to be vulnerable.

When I allow my love partner to see me for who I really am right now, I am less afraid I will be rejected in the future. When my love partner accepts and loves me unconditionally, I know I will never have to hide in the relationship in the future.

To have inner peace it is necessary to be consistently loving in what I think, in what I say and in what I do. I think thoughts of love. I speak words of love. I demonstrate unconditional love for my love partner in all that I do.

Openness means being willing to communicate my deepest feelings. There can be no intimacy without conversation. The only way my love partner and I can truly communicate is to tell the truth. Truthful communication moves love partners and creates a condition of unity, love and satisfaction.

For intimacy to grow in a healthy love relationship there can be no withholding; feelings - both positive and negative - must be shared equally between love partners. The act of withholding the truth is always potentially a lie.

The energy required for the self-discipline of honesty is far less than the energy required for withholding. My love partner and I are dedicated to the truth and live in the open, and through the exercise of our courage to live in the open, we become free from fear. Fear cannot exist whenever insight is valued above feeling frightened.

I listen when my lover shares without making judgment. My heart is always open to hear what my love partner has to say.

Someone said that it is possible to be together so much that we suffocate each other. Perhaps. I do not allow this to happen in my love relationship. I believe that love includes letting go when my partner needs freedom; holding her close when she needs care. I am committed to creating space in my relationship when needed.

At the heart of love, there is a simple secret: the lover lets the beloved be free. My love partner and I require different mixes of independence and mutuality, and the mix is freely discussed and renegotiated from time to time when necessary.

When two people in a love relationship are complete within themselves they do not experience the love they have for others as diminishing, detracting, or threatening to the love they share. They are secure within the relationship.

Insecurities bring forth jealousy, which, in effect, is a cry for more love. It is within your rights to ask for more affection when self-doubts surface, however, the indirect way that jealousy asks for it is counterproductive. Excessive possessiveness is inappropriate. Jealousy is the surest way to drive away the very person you may fear losing.

It is an irony that the more possessive I am, the more love I demand, the less I receive; while the more freedom I give, the less I demand, the more love I receive. I take great pleasure in watching my love partner be fully free and fully alive!

We encourage each other to widen our circle of friends. We each seek to ever expand our horizons. We enjoy celebrating life together and with friends!

I know that if I expect to be the only person who matters to my love partner I am setting myself up for disappointment. As wonderful as true love can be, no one person can meet all your needs. My love partner is, and will always be my very best friend, and she is not my only friend.

I fully expect my love partner to have other passionate interests other than me. To extend the freedom to develop her own interests in other people and hobbies can only empower our relationship. Freedom can never confine. It can never be detrimental to the relationship. It can only open up many exciting and previously undiscovered opportunities to enjoy life.

When my lover is pursuing areas in which she excels, she is happy. I enjoy her most when she is happy. People are easier to love when they are happy.

Trust is forever present in our love relationship; trust and deep commitment to each other, and loyalty and devotion. This allows us the freedom to care about people of the opposite sex and to enjoy friendships with them, and when we sit down together in the evening to share the events of the day, we do not have to ask if our love partner has been faithful.

The stronger and more secure we become, the more we are willing to be ourselves while encouraging our love partner to do the same.

Genuine unconditional love not only respects the individuality of the other but actually seeks to cultivate it, even at the risk of separation or loss. The ultimate goal remains the spiritual growth of my love partner, the solitary journey to peaks that can be climbed only alone.

I believe that no matter how committed my forever love relationship, I will always be "single" as well as a part of a couple. Unconditional love is a special, intense connection, and it is not an answer to all or even most individual problems. No one can make me happy but me.

Healthy Relationships:Partners in the Journey

Article written by Robert Burney, Spiritual Teacher, codependence counselor, grief therapist, author.

A healthy romantic relationship is about two whole, independent people choosing to become partners in the life journey for as long as that works for both of them. This is, of course, a theoretical concept. Because of the cultural dysfunction and emotional trauma all of us have experienced due to the human condition, we are never, in this lifetime, going to be a completely whole healthy person with no emotional wounds - and we are never going to meet someone else that has no emotional wounds.

The goal is to be in the process of healing and to choose a partner who is also in the process of healing. Then we have the opportunity to achieve some True emotional intimacy and to have some companionship on our journey. The person who can support us in our journey is also going to be the teacher we need to push our buttons so that we can bring to Light the emotional wounds that need to be healed and the subconscious programming that needs to be changed.

If we expect a romantic relationship to "fix" us so that we can live happily-ever-after then we are setting ourselves up to be victims. If we define a successful relationship as one that lasts forever and meets all of our needs, then we will end up blaming ourselves or the other person when that insane expectation is not met. (That a relationship could last for the rest of our lives is not an insane expectation but if we believe that longevity is the only way a relationship can be successful we are setting ourselves up to sabotage the relationship and not appreciate the gifts we are receiving in the now.)

It is vitally important to make healing and Spiritual growth our number one priority so that we can look to the other person for help and support - not expect them to rescue us and give us self worth. Healing is an inside job. My issues are my responsibility to work through, it is not the other persons job to compromise her self to accommodate my fears and insecurities. If I am choosing wisely when I enter into a relationship then I will choose someone who will be compassionate, patient, and supportive of me while I work through my issues.

And no matter how wisely I choose, or how much healing and recovery the other person has had, she will still be a human being with her own issues to work through so she will not always be able to be patient, compassionate, and supportive. For one person to expect another to always be there for them, to always have the space and time to be available to us, is another insane expectation.

We do want to choose someone who is willing to work through issues. When another person is willing to do the work with us, a relationship can be an incredibly nurturing, magical space to explore what True Love means - some of the time. It can not be that all of the time. There might be periods of time - days, weeks, even months - where things are going beautifully and it feels like we may have reached "happily ever after". But then things will change and get different. That is how the life process works - it will not be someone's fault. It will be a new opportunity for growth for both people.

Two people who are working through their issues and are willing to do the grief work, can turn an argument about some stupid, mundane life event into some mutual deep grieving. That is True emotional intimacy.

When we are willing to own our power to be the neutral observer who can see our responsibility in whatever is happening without shame and judgment, and can also have the courage and willingness to hold the other person responsible for their behavior without shame and judgment - then the magic can really happen.

Two people who have negotiated some guidelines to help them in times when they are vulnerable and reactive - can transform an argument about some symptom into an opportunity to heal some core wounding.

The way that can look is:

an argument/disagreement starts about some behavior that is upsetting (someone is late, or forgets something that is important to the other, or says something in an insensitive way, etc.);
at some point one of the individuals says "Time out. I think I might be reacting to some old stuff.";

The other person backs off the argument enough to say "How old are you feeling?"; etc.

Two people who have created the space to do this can then get down to the cause underneath the reaction, which might be something like: one person is reacting out of the child inside who never felt important, respected, or heard - while the other person is reacting out of the inner child who was always being criticized and given the message that there was something wrong with them. At that point, they are dealing with the core cause of the reaction not the symptomatic behavior. They can achieve a place of True emotional honesty and intimacy where they can get in touch with their individual wounds and grieve together. That is the kind of emotional intimacy which can form a very deep bond and be Joyously healing for both people.

To be willing to be conscious and emotionally honest with ourselves is a courageous act of faith that will allow us to progressively increase the number of moments in each day that we have the ability and freedom to be happy and Joyous in the now. To find another being who is willing to join us in this adventure, and to explore True emotional intimacy with us, is a priceless gift to be cherished and treasured.

Healthy Relationships: Emotional Honesty Necessary

Article written by Robert Burney, Spiritual Teacher, codependence counselor, grief therapist, author.

The single biggest problem with most relationships is that there are too many people involved. A romantic relationship is supposed to be two people in partnership sharing of who they are, sharing their hearts, minds, bodies, and souls with each other.

Anyone who has not done their emotional healing is bringing a plethora of people into any relationship they get involved in. Some of these people include: parents, siblings, relatives; ministers, teachers, the junior high school bully; everyone that they have ever had a romantic relationship with; the Prince and Princess of fairy tales, the lyrics of songs, and the characters from books and movies. Just to think of how many ghosts are in the room, when two unconscious people are interacting, is mind boggling.

Anyone who is unconscious to how the people and events of their past have shaped who they are today, is incapable of being present in the now and having a healthy relationship. When we are reacting unconsciously to the emotional wounds and old tapes from our childhoods, we are being emotionally dishonest in the moment - we are mostly reacting to how we felt in a similar dynamic in the past, not clearly responding to what is happening in the present.

The single most important component in a healthy relationship is the ability to communicate. We cannot communicate clearly when we are in reaction because we are not being emotionally honest with ourselves.

We all learned to see life and self from a dysfunctional perspective - from a perspective that taught us it was shameful to be bad or wrong. We learned to blame. Since the perspective of life which civilization is founded upon is black and white, right and wrong - we got the message that if we could not figure out how to blame someone else, then it must be our fault. Toxic shame is the feeling that I am somehow defective, that there is something wrong with who I am as a being. That feeling of being defective is so painful that we are willing to do almost anything to avoid sinking into that abyss of pain within.

So we blame someone or something outside of ourselves to protect our self. A dysfunctional civilization which teaches us to look outside for our self worth, also teaches us to look outside for a villain.

Codependence is an emotional defense system which tries to take ego credit for things that go the way we want them to, and blames someone else when they do not.

If a person has not been working on healing these emotional wounds, then any feedback will be felt as criticism - as being wrong or bad - and the persons defense system reacts by becoming defensive. The best defense is a good offense, as they say, so many times we go on the offensive pointing out where the other person is wrong or bad. When confronted we blame. We either blame the other or we blame ourselves - in which case we sink into depression and despair, into alcohol, drugs, and food, etc.

This is the reason that most relationships turn into power struggles about who is right and who is wrong. Who has more right to feel victimized by the other. We come up with whatever justification and rationalization we can to deflect the blame from ourselves - as a way of self preservation.

These behaviors are not bad or shameful. They are the inevitable dynamic set up when two people, who have not healed their emotional wounds and changed their dysfunctional programming, interact. We are powerless over the dynamic until we start becoming co-creators of our life by healing the past so that it is not dictating our life today.

It is impossible to Truly hear what another person is saying when we are busy loading up the big guns for our counter attack. We cannot be present in the moment if our emotional defenses are triggered by what is happening now. And these triggers can be a tone of voice, a gesture (pointing a finger), a word or phrase, almost anything. When old wounds are gouged we are pulled out of the now into our feelings from the past.

Once we start learning how to recognize when we are reacting and being defensive, then we can start getting more emotionally honest - with our self and with others. When we learn how to intervene in our own process so that we are not living life in reaction to old wounds then we start being capable of having healthy emotional intimacy. When two people are both working on their healing there is a possibility of communication and emotional honesty.

The more we heal the past, the fewer people are intruding on our relationship in the moment. Those people - our parents or past romantic partners - will still be in our psyche but we will be conscious enough to recognize them when they start invading the now. Then we can communicate what we are learning about our self from our reactions to our partner and share our pain and fear and anger and sadness with her - that is True emotional intimacy.