Relationships go through predictable, typical growth cycles, but occasionally they become stuck, requiring help to help us understand what’s going on behind the surface and how our signals may have been misinterpreted. We frequently seem so disconnected from the places we want to travel or the emotions we want to experience in our relationships from the things we do, think, and say. Most of the time, nobody sets out to listen poorly. The majority of people don’t intentionally try to distance themselves from or disregard their loved ones. Nobody intentionally sets out to bother, belittle, moan, or lodge grievances against their spouse. Often, all it takes is a little tweaking to realize how we are influencing one another. In our personal interactions, we all yearn for intimacy and closeness. The majority of us yearn to be important, heard, and understood; we want to feel like we matter. But these are the emotions that are absent far too frequently. Even though we may know how we want to feel, we frequently don’t know how to get there. We can find ourselves again mired in unending negative cycles of the same patterns, leaving us feeling helpless. Unsure of what to do next, we wind up carrying out our routine in the hopes of getting a different outcome.
