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The
Feature Articles
New Article
"The
Best Ways to Develop a Lasting Relationship"
Conscious
Communication Series
Part 02
"Express
Yourself
with Purpose"
February
2007 Part 01
"Dress
to Express"
January 2007
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March 2007
Do you want to develop a lasting relationship, the type that everyone dreams
about, feeling that romantic desire to find one special person that you can
develop a strong, fruitful and joyful relationship with, create a loving
family together and grow old together? Well you can, and it all starts with
you.
There are a few specific qualities or attributes that those who wish to
develop their relationships in a way that are going to last will need to
cultivate and work on and it all starts with you.
The first and foremost quality that needs to be cultivated is love. Now
we’re not just talking about your capacity or ability to express love to
your partner, but rather your capacity or ability to feel and know a deep
level of Self-Love.
You need to be able to love yourself before you can truly love another, and
the level by which you love yourself, you will be able to love. So love
yourself, look at who you are, the qualities you have and realize the things
about you that are lovable, those aspects of your personality, your being
that radiates and draws others to you.
To work on your Self-Love, look at your life and find ways that you can show
yourself more Love Mentally, Emotionally, Physically and Spiritually.
You can do that by actively thinking positive thoughts and not allowing
yourself to create or dwell on negative or ‘fear-based’ thoughts which are
the opposite of ‘love-based’ thoughts. Next you need to govern your
emotional states and not allow yourself to be swallowed or consumed by any
destructive or negative emotions that may arise from time to time.
You can easily manage your emotions by remaining relaxed and clear-headed,
‘in the moment, the now’ and not in your Mind, not thinking too much, but
rather, enjoying and living life.
When we allow our minds to run wild they often have a ‘mind of their own’
and if unchecked you soon realize that you feel stressed, or upset about
something that happened earlier between you and your partner and don’t
realize that the reason why you’re upset is because you’ve been associating
negative thoughts and emotions to whatever situation you both went through,
making mountains out of small problems and poisoning the very fabric of your
relationship in the process.
Now if you stay within the moment during the day and don’t allow yourself to
regurgitate negative emotions from things that are already in the past,
you’ll do away with most of the negative tension in your relationship which
will allow the love between in your relationship to flow. Just as the “NOW”
is about flow, the present moment never stops but flows continually and
perpetually, so should the love in your relationship.
Showing Love to yourself physically means that you take care of your body,
have good personal hygiene, get plenty of exercise both for functional
strength and endurance, “Eat to Live” not “Live to Eat”, take time to just
be by yourself and relax, even get yourself a massage now and then when you
need it at the local spa. There you will find many other people all loving
their body as well, and you never know, you may just meet someone you like.
Start off slowly, but gradually add more and more things in your life that
you enjoy and that you love, that bring deeper meaning to your life, and
that will greatly enrich your life, because you are spending the seconds,
minutes, hours and days of your life doing what you love, what brings you
joy and peace.
Then when you are living a life of love, evolving, physically, mentally,
emotionally, and spiritually, you will be able to radiate immense and
intense love and joy throughout all your relationships, because they will
all contain a human being with an expanded capacity for love. Relationships
that contain two people who live a life of true love, both for themselves
and the other are sure to last, no matter where their lives take them.
So you can see how important it is to start with your own ability to love
yourself first before you can truly love another, because if you are say
‘self-deprecating’ and overly hard on yourself regularly, you will do the
same to your partner. If you can forgive yourself even when you make
mistakes you will be able to forgive your partner when they make mistakes as
well.
Now, with love, we next come to acceptance. What you accept completely you
can love, what you don’t accept you cannot, so if you practice accepting
yourself completely, you can love yourself completely, and this is the same
with the relationships you live.
If you are having problems with your partner, to overcome them, start by
accepting them completely. Don’t try to change them, just accept them, and
from that acceptance will spawn that dynamic and intense unconditional love
which will overtake you completely, and deepen the bonds within your
relationship that keep you together.
Another way to work on your capacity for unconditional acceptance is to
realize that whatever is NOW and exists in this moment you MUST accept
because there is nothing else. If you both were supposed to go to the movies
and they showed up to your house late, instead of immediately getting upset
and not accepting what happened, realize that what happened is already in
the past and is therefore ‘what is’, or part of your ‘life story’ already.
“Yes it’s 8:15 and they were supposed to pick me up at 7:30, and the movie
was for 8:00, so since ‘it is what is’, why get upset about it, and ruin
your evening together, the precious time you have to be with each other, to
show love and be in love?“
In the Now, you can choose to realize that and relax and deal with the
situation with love or not, but starting from acceptance will remove a lot
of the tension and ‘negative energy’ that could quickly sour your
relationship if allowed to be released. Remember, the expression of love is
through “Giving of Self” and “Accepting as Self”
To Live as Love is to Give of Self and Accept
as Self
Along with Love and Acceptance is Self-Value. Many relationships fall apart
even though they both contain two people that are loving and accepting,
because one or both didn’t value themselves enough, even to the point of
feeling undeserving, as if they weren’t good enough to be with the other
person, or felt inadequate or lacking.
Even though insecurities are often caused by a lack of Love or Acceptance of
Self, you also need to develop a strong sense of Self-Value. To work on your
Self-Value, you need to be Aware of your own value, which no one can reveal
to you, you must now look inside and then see for yourself what makes you a
valuable person, worth of someone else’s love and passion.
Most people are visual and so will first think of things visual or
materialistic, but look deeper into you are as a person, and see the things
you’ve grown to become, not just what you’ve achieved, because all of those
things like fame, fortune, status, you can lose and so aren’t really who you
are, and should not be what your relationships are based on, otherwise they
become more of a ‘trade than a gift’, where I give you this for that,
instead of I’m moved to give of myself because of love.
In your day to day life, ways of increasing your Self-Value is to value your
time and energy and start seeing things in terms of energy. When you look at
your life as energy, you as energy, and that there’s a limit to how much
energy you can either ‘spend or invest’ into your relationships, with only
so much time available to do it in, you quickly realize how valuable your
energy and time are, and you start to manage them and show yourself more
Self-Respect and Value which is what Self-Confidence is based on.
Then you realize that you need to do things that will increase your energy,
which are Love and Acceptance, which increases your Value and Energy, which
you maintain through Self-Respect, giving you a sense of balance which grows
your confidence.
____________________
"Energy exists as a vibration".
You need to increase your rate of vibration, and then maintain that balance
to sustain a more enriching life.
Many relationships have peaks of high and low energy, and that is fine, as
you both need time to recharge. Maintain a higher level of energy in
your relationship, and you’ll be able to sustain a relationship that's both
long and lasting.
____________________
"Show them the same love and acceptance, value and respect within them that
you’ve learned to know within yourself."
____________________
As your confidence within yourself grows, it will both infuse and amplify
that same energy within your relationships, as they grow and evolve with you
as you live life.
That same energy creates the last ingredient that brings everything
together, and that is Integrity. Integrity is the energy or constitution of
the relationships you have. Integrity is what creates trust and trust is as
important to a relationship as water is to the body.
Without trust your loving relationship cannot last, however when you express
Integrity and create trust, the foundation of your relationship becomes
strong, unshakable, and able to withstand even the toughest emotional
whirlwinds or hurricanes that life may bring your way.
Integrity is what will keep you along your path and keep you showing love,
even when the Mind wants to complain or retaliate. It is what will keep you
accepting your partner, even when you think you don’t agree with them or
understand them.
Integrity is what will keep you valuing your energy and theirs as well, only
expressing and using your energy to be positive, and loving toward one
another. Integrity is what will keep you honest and trusting with one
another, having both respect and confidence in each other that you will be
true to each other and only each other.
So practice expressing and living with integrity throughout your life, both
in your own integrity and honesty with yourself and who you are, and within
all your relationships and dealings in life and you will be creating a
strong and steadfast foundation for success in life.
This is your life, your relationships we are talking about. If you are
willing to take the time needed to really work on yourself, and not hold
back, developing and expanding your capacity for Love, Acceptance, Value,
Respect and Integrity, you can be confident that not only will you be able
to live an enriched life and experience more joy in your relationships, you
would have achieved the ability to truly create a deep and lasting
relationship that will be destined to create the truest and most loving
stories of your life.
David Vassell
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