Developing Intimacy and Dealing with Relationship Triggers
Developing Intimacy and Dealing with Relationship Triggers
Relationships. Place where we struggle, mess up, where all our attachment issues, fears, pain, trauma, but also place where our greatest lessons stare us right in the eyes.
We all know that feeling : your stomach is a little queasy, you're ready to run, your chest contracts, you see your comfort zone whirling behind you. Like all good things in life, Intimacy can be exhilarating and terrifying. We both crave it and we run from it. We desire to be seen, known, loved in all our power, and we are terrified of not being enough, of seeing something in ourselves we don't like.
Intimacy : Into-Me-You-See
Interpersonal relationships, romantic or otherwise, are where the spiritual practice, self-growth, and healing all gets put to the test. It's easy to say we've changed until we are forced to practice and inhabit that change in the presence of another. In truth, the stakes are always higher in relationship. Our relationships are where we struggle, mess up, where all our attachment issues, fears, pain, trauma, and beliefs about ourselves and the world come out from the trenches. It is also where we find our greatest lessons staring us right in the eyes.
Many of us are plagued with a sense of feeling unseen and unheard (cue old trauma narrative and a society where quick "likes" replace deep connection). These feelings are often rooted in very real formative experiences, leaving us with a void to be filled and a desire to be loved as we are. Yet as we grow and evolve, this feeling becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. When we are too afraid to reveal ourselves, we make it impossible to be accepted and seen. When we begin to consistently contract, even with those closest to us, we not only lose out on the potential to deepen connection, but also on the potential to see ourselves in new ways. Undoing this attachment knot starts with asking where we have been avoiding intimacy in our lives.
What we are willing to risk in relationship reveals to us what we value. What we are not willing to risk in relationship reveals where we may be hiding from ourselves.
In other words:
Are you willing to risk vulnerability - and the potential for shame - for the sake of deeper connection?
Are you willing to risk disagreement for the sake of authenticity?
Are you willing to risk being seen for the sake of true intimacy?
Relationships are mirrors for who we are and qualities in ourselves we were previously unable to see.
Whether you have been hiding in your romantic relationships, friendships, or your relationship to yourself, there has never been a better time to deepen our capacity for vulnerability and empathy.
“We’ve been trained to believe that relationships are hard because we have to alter our lives to accommodate another person. Truth is, they are hard because we have to face ourselves and in doing so, confront generations of conditioning that’s convinced us it’s unsafe to be vulnerable and open our hearts. A relationship will always demand that we overcome parts of our past in order for it to survive.”
My best advice for any relationship (friend, romantic, self): Focus your time on people that trigger you in all the right ways. I know that sounds counterintuitive, but hear me out. It's useless to seek out friends or romantic partners who won't hurt or trigger us, who won't reflect some of our biggest wounds back at us - this is a normal part of being a human in connect with others. The trick is to ask yourself first about the ways you want to grow, the kind of person you want to be. When you know this, you can assess in any difficult argument or situation if this is pushing you to grow in the right ways. Focus your time and energy on nurturing the relationships that push you to be who you want to be.
One of the things I value most about my partner is his ability to help me vocalize my needs. He's an amazing model for clear needs communication, and triggers me in this area in all the right ways. I'm am imperfect and my relationships are too. I struggle to be clear about my boundaries, needs, and desires at times - because I grew up in a place that didn't let me know that my needs were valued. Having emotional and physical needs felt dangerous, and it was rare that good things happened when I asked for them. As an adult, I've had to relearn needs communication, rejection sensitivity, and honoring that I can't have all my needs met on my own. Resentment builds when we don't vocalize or even realize the ways we've undermined our own needs. And while it's painful, it's been immensely helpful to build this skill in messy, imperfect ways.
So what's been triggering you these days in your relationships to others or within yourself? Are you growing in the ways you want to be and are your relationships supporting this?