Your ideal partner characteristics may be more of an unrealized dream than a reality. Research indicates that most couples settle with someone who falls way short of their ideal partner. Learn how that happens and how to deal with the disappointment, sense of betrayal and stress that this mismatch causes.
Wanting to feel valued and helpful to your partner is very normal and natural. It's frustrating when your efforts are rejected and problems just get worse. There is a secret to getting your help accepted and valued. It's about timing and setting the stage so that your partner will be receptive and hungry for your help. The right order of business is crucial. Learn the four step process to making sure your partner values your help.
Do you long to make the peace after tense interchanges with loved ones that make you wonder whether the relationship is still good? Perhaps you want to make things right so badly that you are willing to accept all the blame, be in the wrong and eat humble pie, just to make the peace again. Learn how you can do just that without losing face, without accepting all the responsibility for the fight and without putting yourself down. Discover how you can come from a place of entitlement to your feelings and needs and use that to set the scene for a new dialogue that creates peace by honoring and validating you and your loved ones.
If you are torn between being yourself but risking the rejection of loved ones in the process then you are stressed and it may come out in the form of lower back pain, reflecting unbearable burdens that you can't deal with. Discover how to find your power and strength to be yourself, grow and develop while hanging onto your relationships, provided you are up for some changes in the nature of the relationship.
If you hate your procrastination brought on by fear of commitment then you may be either ignoring it to get things done or living in limbo. Learn how your body can prompt you to face up to your fears by giving you a sudden attack of flu that disappears as soon as you understand and take care of the fear by sharing responsibility with your loved ones rather than bearing the unbearable load all alone.
If you are angry and tired of waiting for your partner to make good on a promise to commit to marriage and family then you are probably stressed and torn between staying in the hope of some movement and wanting to cut your losses. Learn 3 ways to help you decide what the costs and consequences are for you if you take the plunge and choose one side of your need. Take the pressure off yourself and your partner by looking at what is getting in the way and how to help your partner come out of the indecisive bubble.
Are you afraid that your partner's bad mood will bring you down and rob you of your good mood? If you try unsuccessfully to cheer your partner up so you can both connect from a good place then learn how to understand the tension and gap between you so that you don't feel like a failure. Discover how to come to terms with your varying emotional metabolic rates so that you will both be ready and available to one another when the tense moments have passed.
Want your relationships to be new and better in 2012? If you try and fail to keep New Years resolutions about being a better person, and having better relationships, then just stop. It's not that you don't have the will power or motivation. It's not that you have no endurance. You just need to tune into your natural built in renewal and rejuvenation mechanisms and use them to refocus your lens on your relationships so that they become more secure and satisfying. Learn three ways you can do that without even trying and literally become 'new' by rewiring your brain and creating constant newness from the inside out.
If you are infuriated when you don't receive an apology when someone has hurt you then you may end up stressed and helpless in your relationships. Learn how to communicate the impact the words and actions of others have on you so that they can tailor their behavior in ways that take your feelings into account.
When one partner shuts down and the other ramps up in a stressful conflict chances are that the men tune out and the women get heated up. Research indicates that male and female brains operate differently under stress making it more likely that couples will get frustrated and lose intimacy when they can't work things out. Learn three ways in which they can get on the same brain wave, same page and collaborate intimately on their joint problems.
