Episode 162: The Importance Of Emotional Attunement In Relationships

How presence & awareness creates healthy relationships

There are a number of factors that would appear to boost the chances of having a relationship that continues to be healthy and successful over time. One such element is the degree to which you continue to be aware of your partner's emotional experience. The longer we stay together the more likely that we will both change, grow and develop whether we intend to or not. The person you started in relationship with may not be exactly who you experience today.

It is vital that we continue to invest interest and time into our partner. The more awareness and presence we can bring means we can avoid stumbling into relational blowups and being baffled as to "how did we get here?"

Emotional attunement also allows us to put the brakes on when the challenging discussion is escalating into real damage to the relationship territory. It allows us to see when our partner is beginning their repair attempts and wanting to move back into relational harmony. It allows us to continue to be present for the moments of true love and intimacy.

Episode 154: Tough Conversations To Preserve Our Relationship

Embracing challenging topics for better relationship health

If we are serious about having long term healthy relationships then we need to be able to have potentially challenging conversations. Even the most successful relationships are faced from time to time with anxiety, stress and temptation. Life has a way of sometimes making our best-laid plans and ideas look trivial.

As a couple, can we commit to being willing to work on our fight form? How as a couple do we improve bringing up the topics that are tough and risk a heated exchange? Can we work as a team on how we could have handled that last argument better? Are there daily tasks that are a source of irritation that we are trying to ignore? How long can we ignore those daily irritations before they build into a major explosion in the relationship that is way harder to work through?

This episode explores some of these questions and more.

Episode 119: Essential Negotiation Points For Relationship

4 essential areas that keep a relationship on track

Modern relationships are challenging and there are some many ways to get distracted and get off track as a couple.

In this episode, I explore the exceptional framework of Dr Pat Allen, who is in my mind one of the most effective contributors to making modern relationships work. Dr Pat Allen identifies four key areas that are essential for couples to negotiate to keep the relationship on track.

Those areas are Time, Space, Money and Play. In this episode I will look at little deeper into these areas and why it is important to set time aside to work through these points of focus.

Anything that helps keep our relationship growing is well worth the effort and allocation of time to explore.

Episode 110: Covid and Relationship Strain

Promoting relational health in stressful circumstances

We are going through exceptional times! External pressures can help to bring a couple together or pull a couple apart. How in times of increased anxiety and strain to we build our connection, love and support for one another. Minor differences can be amplified in periods of extended stress. This episode looks at a few things to be mindful of, and also what to do to promote relational health.

All the best in this challenging time and beyond!

Episode 63: Picking A Romantic Partner

Laying the foundation for healthy relationships

This episode is inspired by the number of people with whom I have worked who are tired of playing out the same painful dynamics in relationship, time and time again.

What can we do to ensure that we are giving ourselves the best opportunities to attract in people with whom we can work together to have healthy, stable yet passionate relationship dynamics?

Starting from a place where we feel equal to our partner not superior too or less than is a good commencing point and sets up good foundation.

Failed relationships can cost us so much emotionally, financially, spiritually and even physically. Hopefully this episode provides you with some navigation points to help maximise relationship success.

Episode 50: Fostering Intimacy

How intimacy transforms relationships

With so many relationships not going the distance and people in relationship wishing for a more intimate connection with their partner, what is missing?

Many people express a desire to be more intimate and then find that they are unable to sit in the vulnerability that arises as a result. Instead of challenging our partners to be closer, the paradox is we need to examine and understand what it takes for us to be closer.

This episode looks at some of the differences in Self Validated Intimacy vs Other Validated Intimacy and what are the consequences in relationship when we adopt either pathway to attempt to bridge the gap between self and another.

When we can really begin to know who we are, validate that and not be reliant on solely the positive reflection of our partner to feel good about self, relationships can transform!

Episode 43: Understanding Verbal Abuse

Elements that make up Verbal Abuse in relationships

Verbal like physical abuse happens behind closed doors and the victim can feel isolated, confused and as if they somehow are to blame.

This episode uses Patricia Evans' insightful book "The Verbally Abusive Relationship" as a reference and a resource.

Through understanding some of the patterns of toxic verbal abuse we can reclaim our right to healthy relating or keep an eye out for our friends and family members who may be in this type of terrible experience.

What are some key red flags to look for in relating between two people, and what happens when we are playing by different relationship rules that we weren't informed about?

Episode 42: Elements of Secure Relating

How do we know that we are in a relationship that is built on a foundation of secure relating?

What are some of the key aspects to help us navigate into the kind of healthy relationships we desire to have?

This episode explores some of the key elements that are consistent in relationships that have secure attachment at their core. Knowing this assists us in keeping relationships on track or side step finding ourselves stuck in avoidant/anxious relating with our partner for too long.

I hope you find this episode a helpful resource.