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Intimate relationships - progress with process
For most of us, there are one or two relationships in our lives where we want more than friendship. Hopefully you are in love. If you are married then you are in love or at least you were in love. You married your
spouse because when you saw them it sent a warm shiver up and down your back. They are or were a special person for you. Is that warm feeling still there? It’s too easy to loose the magic of a special relationship.
It takes work to develop and more work to sustain an intimate relationship. It takes a process.
If you want more intimacy, then you must establish, foster and grow an ability to communicate safely with your spouse. Intimacy is about vulnerability. To be soulmates, you have to share souls. To let someone into
your life far enough or deep enough to see the innermost you is not easy. To share your soul, even a little, is not natural. Life has “taught” us to keep our guard up. Self preservation keeps us from letting people
“get too close”. What about your spouse? Is that where you are now, on guard? Is it where you want to be? If you want a more intimate relationship then you have to establish a way of getting there, a process.
The process is a separate thing that the two of you build together. Decide you have one, because you do, and decide that you love each other enough to be vulnerable enough to build it. Use special words like “process
check” to talk about the way you feel and how things could change to help you feel more loving and loved. Separate the process from progress. An example: we might be figuring out how to get the car in for servicing,
that would be progress, and all the sudden I feel the mood of the “conversation” has changed. We were “having fun” trying to get the car taken care of and now it’s a “fight”. Perhaps someone’s tone wasn’t what they
intended. Perhaps someone said, “I took the car in last time” and it came out sounding like “You never help with this”. When it goes from “fun” to “never”, quit talking about the car and start talking about the
process that you have for deciding who is going to take the car. Say something like “process check”. Agree that you will let your guard down and be receptive and non-judgmental when you’re process checking. Say
“process check” and then talk about your feelings and how what they said made you feel. Stop the misunderstanding when it happens. Reestablish a “fun” way of getting done what you want or have to do. Our souls are
connected by threads. Each time you allow a misunderstanding or “bad” feeling to develop, a thread is broken. Each time you develop trust and understanding, you add another thread. When you have enough threads
connecting your souls then nothing can break the path you have established for mutual sharing, sustenance and joy.
Try this:
Establish, foster, grow and nourish a process to develop and sustain intimate relationships. To get the magic in a relationship, especially to get the magic back into a relationship requires work. You have to want to
be close. You have to be willing to be vulnerable. To be soulmates, you have to be willing to bare your soul. Magic happens later when you sustain and nourish each other more and more automatically. Want more
intimacy? Make progress with process.
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