Healing the Energy of Relationships

To heal the energy of your relationship, accept the other person just as they are right now.

Update your databanks. A healthy relationship occurs in the present. If you try to relate to an old memory of a person or a fixed idea of how they should be, you are ignoring who they are right now. Their current behavior may not jive with your expectations. This leaves you feeling frustrated and your partner feeling confused. We often fear the loss of a relationship when a friend or partner changes, but if you do not relate to who that person is today, you are not really relating to that person.

A good first step is to be in the present and listen. Listening is hugely underrated by our culture, but it is a wonderful way to honor another human being! When someone simply gives you their undivided attention, you feel cared for. If you listen fully to another, you find out who that person really is, right now.

You can also discard thoughts and feelings that are out of date. For instance, you see your husband reading a mystery novel and you recall that he once said he dislikes mysteries. You want him to be consistent. Like most human beings, he is not. You can put that fear about his changed preferences in a little imaginary helium balloon. See it drift off into space, where it explodes into millions of tiny pieces. Sound too easy to be effective? Try it!

Break unhealthy agreements. People form unhealthy (usually unspoken) agreements when they believe they cannot risk being genuine in the relationship. Agreements with others can be helpful, saving us from having to renegotiate the relationship over and over. Agreements are very common in the work relationship. There are certain things most of us know we can never say to the boss. In healthy personal relationships, the agreement can be easily, questioned, discussed or modified.

But agreements can become rigid, controlling and unhealthy. They determine how much you must support each other, how much you must agree with each other, how often you phone, what behavior you accept without comment and what behavior is not okay. Often agreements support a lopsided balance of power, such as, “I will be your friend, and in return you must always agree with me.” An unhealthy agreement keeps you from being genuine.

You can step out of such an agreement by simple intention. This is most effective if you think about what the agreement entails and imagine ripping it to shreds or setting fire to it outside your personal space. The other person or people will sense this unconsciously and often react by taking steps to reinforce the relationship. You could lose a relationship by breaking an agreement. However, the result is often a more genuine version of the relationship. I would not necessarily recommend breaking harmless agreements at work if you value your job.

We are all psychic, at least subconsciously. We can tell when other people have outdated thoughts about us. We know when others are not really listening. You cannot really hide your true feelings. When you are with another person, listening and accepting him or her right now, that person can tell. They will almost always respond very favorably to this kind of acceptance and will feel better with you. When you heal thoughts and feelings about a person, the relationship heals on both sides.