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Tantric Communication Practice

September 5, 2023 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

unhappy couple

Do you find that your communication with your partner never seems to hit the spot?

Are you often left feeling unheard? 

Unseen?

Or uninspired? (You’ve heard it all before…when you used to hang on their every word)

Even disrespected?

Today’s tantric communication practice can help bring about a radical change in your communication style with minimal effort.

Like much of tantra, this is a ritual, a practice

And like any practice the more you do it, the more satisfying it becomes.

It’s simple.

It allows each person to feel heard.

It invites you to listen to each other. To listen from the heart, rather than the head.

We often rarely listen to each other

In normal communication styles there is often very little listening going on. 

We are so used to constantly thinking, our partner has barely got started when we are busy analysing what they’ve said. And how it will impact us. 

Sometimes we are so busy waiting for our turn, working out what we want to say, we don’t really hear what our partner is saying.

Sometimes we check out of the conversation because we think we’ve heard it all before.

We can disagree with what is being said, and immediately try to impose our own point of view. 

Occasionally we can be in fear of what our partner might have to say.  So we either interrupt, ignore, invalidate or check out of their conversation. Because we literally want to protect ourselves from hearing it. 

Also too, we can be emotionally triggered by our partner’s words and either explode into unrelated emotion, or withdraw from it.

This simple tantric practice bypasses all of the above

It does so by getting us to focus on listening and really hearing each other. And nothing else.

It’s not trying to resolve anything.

It’s not trying to get to an outcome.

It’s about really listening, from the heart. 

With practice the space between you gets safer and safer to speak from the heart.

This can truly transform your communication by building trust and intimacy.

Which then allows you to, at other times, more easily resolve issues that arise between you.

It’s pretty good for your sex life too!

The tantric communication practice is called Heart Sharing. It doesn’t have to look as formal as this image but it gives a sense of how tantric communication feels.

Heart Sharing 

How does it work?

  1. You sit opposite each other.
  2. Both partners take a moment to feel into their hearts. You can close your eyes or place a hand on your heart to do this. (This sounds corny but it works.)
  3. See yourself and the person opposite you as divine, empowered beings, creating their own realities. (Ditto.)
  4. One person shares for 3-5 minutes (It’s good to set a timer here).
  5. Once the first partner’s time is up, the listener just says thankyou, NOTHING more.
  6. Then you reset the timer and the second person has their turn, the same as above.

The Speaker

The speaker just speaks, whatever is there.

Without any agenda, or trying to get a particular response.

They really hear themselves more.

Which can help them gain insight into what they are actually putting out there.

A valuable tip is that if you run out of things to say, you just wait, until something else arises. If nothing does, you just sit in silence.

The Listener

The listener just listens. (Yes, God, the Universe or evolution DID give us two ears and one mouth for a reason!)

Whilst they listen, the listener focusses on their heart (keeping their hand their can help).

This helps them hear their partner from as open a place as possible.

The listener notices any inner response or reaction they might have, like those listed above. And instead of speaking or reacting they simply take a deep breath or two…This allows them to stay present with what is being said.

It’s more than just talking

Sitting opposite each other allows more non verbal communication to happen as well.

Heart to Heart communication

The important thing to remember is that this is NOT about AGREEING with your partner.

It’s about LISTENING.

It’s about believing that everyone benefits from being truly heard.

And that being seen is a form of being loved.

As we said, this practice is not about resolving your issues. It’s about building trust.

Over time your sharings will get more and more clear and heart centred

Because you will feel safe, seen and heard. 

With practice you can let go of the timer and just let each person hare until they feel complete. (However, if it starts to feel one sided it’s good to use the timer again).

It works for women because they can speak without needing to be fixed. As she hears herself she can get clearer in what she has to say.

It works for men because they have the space between the words to feel heard. Men can tune in to a woman’s body language without being overwhelmed by her words.

Can You Allow Your Heart to Crack Open?

July 18, 2023 By Annette & Graeme 2 Comments

And what happens if it does?

When you choose to have your heart open, not what you might think.

We like to play it safe in relationship

It’s the fear of getting hurt in our intimate relationships.

We can get hurt in other areas of life and deal with it, but this one is the real biggie.

It leads us to consciously, and unconsciously, protect ourselves

To play it safe.

And we do stay safe.

But we don’t get what we truly want.

We miss out on what we want

Humanity has achieved incredible feats yet we still create great havoc and misery in intimacy.

We don’t get the love we signed up for.

We don’t get the love that pulls us out of ourselves, that gives us the sublime WOW factor we secretly long for.

What does happen?

So what DOES happen if you decide to really fully, exquisitely open your heart to your partner?

If you give it your all with no holding back.

Whether your partner does or not.

What happens is that you learn what it is like to have your heart open.

You get to live from your open heart

You want to be in service and devotion to your partner (two words that have become dirty in the age of ME).

They become more important than you.

At least part of the time.

You forgive them their mistakes.

And you give them opportunities to touch your heart again and again.

When you open your heart, YOU are actually opening YOUR heart.

At this level it is nothing to do with the other person.

It is you experiencing and learning what it is like to love.

It matters less what the other person does, it’s just you learning to live from your open heart.

Even if they leave, you still have your open heart.

To give to the next person. Or to invest in some other part of your life.

What we fear most is actually less painful than the pain we experience when we’re hurt with a closed heart.

Closed hearts create more suffering

When our hearts are closed it is so much easier to hold onto the story. To hold on to the suffering, the drama of what he did, she said, on and on back through time.

There is SO much pain in that closed hearted place fed by the ego. The pain is never ending as long as we choose it.

When our hearts are open and we are choosing love no matter what, it is scary but we choose to stay in the now.

We can feel the hurt, we can let it in and allow our magnificent hearts to heal it.

We can cry, scream, yell and rail at the universe but we get it. We heal.

We make love more important than the pain.  

We can create healed relationships with the one who hurt/left us.

We can own our part in what was created between us.

Our partners can be inspired to meet us there.

Sometimes we can even see our existing partners in a whole new light and fall in love with them all over again.

Not in a dewy eyed fairytale, but in something real, raw and open.

This is the next stage of relationship the world is waiting for.

Where we stop loving from the ego. From simply getting all its needs met and only giving when it suits us. Where we remain in control, protected and hiding our heart.

Where we stop looking for the bad in our partners so we can justify protecting ourselves. Where we can point the finger and say “See…look at what they did/are doing! I need to protect myself”

Where we start to see the good in our partners and stop pushing them away because our pain seeking selves are too scared to let them in.

Where we start taking care of our own nervous systems and choose safety, love and belonging, rather than hurt. Where we learn to surrender our defences.

Where we can do the work, own our worth, stop avoiding, stop people pleasing. Or any of the hundred and one ways we have to avoid love. 

Where we stand up to be counted and be someone who can be counted on in relationship.

Where we choose love over fear.

We can hear the cacophony of voices saying, but what if…? 

What if this kind of love isn’t real? 
What if our partners are not really worth loving this deep? 

What if they don’t return our love? 

What if love hurts?

We get it. It’s scary. 

We challenge you to not make it about the other person.

We invite you to look at your own capacity for love.

There is so much you can learn and heal and grow in.

And funnily enough, more safety to be found.

For support in navigating yourself to your open heart contact Annette and Graeme here

Celebrating Your Relationship: What are the Benefits and How to do it

November 30, 2022 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

Did you know that celebrating your relationship can actually enhance it??

Often when we actively focus on our intimate relationships we focus on what is wrong with them.

This might be because when everything is going ok we tend to put them on automatic pilot.

We unconsciously believe that our relationships will take care of themselves and that they will always be there when we want them. Kind of like falling back into our favourite old sofa with the faded cushions, or our favourite David Bowie tshirt worn soft  with washing.

This is SO not true.

Our relationships are a reflection of ourselves.

And like us, they’re a force of nature that is always changing.

Our relationships are either growing or dying, they’re never standing still.

That’s why taking the time to celebrate them is a good thing.

It helps them to grow. Celebrating our relationships is like sprinkling them with a dose of water, sunshine and a dash of Miracle-Gro.

This might sound like a fairly superficial thing to do.celebrating your relationship

Yet researchers at Stanford University in the US have found celebration has such a positive effect it’s set to become the next big thing, the new wave of gratitude.

Why is this so?

Well, it’s partly because we so often focus on the negative, or fear producing parts of our relationships.

We do this because our minds most instinctive response is to protect us, to keep us safe, in order to procreate the species.

And to show us where change is needed. Fear = action = change.

The downside of this protection is that can make our relationships appear in our minds to be more negative than they really are. Which is reinforced by something called confirmation bias. Our minds keep looking for what is familiar that make it seem true. This is our tendency to interpret new evidence as confirmation of our existing beliefs or theories.

Which can lead us to feeling stuck in our relationships.

We just ruminate on the bad bits without actually doing anything constructive to change what’s not working.

a happy coupleThis mindset can also lead us to unconsciously see our partners as a source of pain, rather than one of love or pleasure. Which causes us to unconsciously put up walls to protect ourselves when we’re around them.

Which makes deep intimacy, the place where our walls come down a little (or a lot) so we can connect with each other, seem scary. At least, scarier than it otherwise might be.

Deep intimacy always involves a little bit of fear, because of its very nature. It’s more than just sharing our time, company and points of view. It’s about revealing parts of ourselves we otherwise keep hidden from the world.

So, celebrating our relationships works at many levels to enhance them.

Celebrating reminds us of what is good in our intimate relationships.

Celebration not only makes us feel good, it draws us closer together. Because it helps us to open our hearts. It even works on our unconscious mind. It helps this part of us to see our partner as a positive source of love and pleasure. This helps us drop our walls around them a bit more, creating more rewarding intimacy.

How DO we go about celebrating our relationships?

It doesn’t have to be anything large.

The main thing is that it is genuine.

It can be:

  • As simple as taking the time to hold your partner and look them in the eye. Then saying “Out of all the people in the world I’m really glad I am sharing my life with you
  • Reflect on some wonderful times you’ve had together (even if they were a long time ago).
  • Having dinner together, getting dressed up, making it a special occasion. Doing it with the intention of celebrating your relationship
  • Buying your partner some flowers, or a small, meaningful gift you madea couple scaling heights
  • Trying a new adventure activity together- hiking, skiing etc
  • Go out for ice cream in your pyjamas
  • Reflect on the your best lovemaking experience- what made it great?
  • Go to the beach and build a sandcastle that reflects your relationship
  • Read parts of a steamy novel to each other
  • Make love slooowly- whilst celebrating all the times you have made love together celebrating making love
  • Play hide and seek- spice it up!
  • Watch a sunset or gaze at the stars or the moon together
  • Do couples yoga
  • Play “never have I ever” and learn something new about each other
  • Write each other a love letter
  • Have a photo shoot, take playful shots of each other and make a collage
  • Do whatever it is that is fun for the two of YOU.

Couple Communication: Finding the Gifts in your Messiness

June 24, 2019 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

We often call couples communication the finer art of the shit fight.

This is because it can get messy at the speed of light!

Part of the skill in couple communication is in learning how to get better at staying out of the messiness.

Another important part is getting better at dealing with the messiness once you’re there.Couples Communication can quickly get messy

Problems in communication are usually seen as the No.1 issue in relationships.

If effective communication in an intimate relationship was easy, everybody would be doing it. But if it isn’t don’t beat yourself up. Graeme and I have been doing it with awareness for years now and we still get caught up in domestics at times!

Couples talk is particularly difficult because communication here isn’t just an exchange of information and ideas. It’s the one place we can’t avoid the messiness of feelings, emotions and deep human need.

Not to mention that we’re communicating with someone who is extremely important to us. Someone that we don’t want to lose by messing things up. We probably carry fear too, about going back into places where we’ve been hurt in the past. Or where we’ve hurt our partner.

What’s really going on when communication gets messy?

Mostly what happens in moments of painful communication is that we make what is happening wrong. We put up walls around the discomfort that occurs inside of us.

Couples CommunicationMessiness might look like ‘something being wrong’, yet despite appearances, it’s actually part of your relationship growth cycle. Much relationship conflict comes from making the messiness wrong. And from losing connection with yourself as you try to avoid the uncomfortable feelings that result.

When you lose this connection, your partner becomes the enemy and you drop into strategies of defensiveness and protection. You seek control, rather than connection and understanding.

 

“Almost 90% of all human communication comes from the (usually unconscious) need to control.”
Saying What’s Real, 7 Keys To Authentic Communication, Susan Campbell, PhD

Exploiting the truth

In our human messiness, our logical minds try to help out by rationalising our behaviour. We exploit elements of the truth to get us off the hook of hurt. Speaking from our unfelt emotion, we go to elaborate efforts to justify our position. We also get very convoluted and irrational in our story-telling.

This is because our logical minds are compartmentalised, and their separate parts come up with different points of view. They can do this at the same time, even with totally opposing ideas! We then argue as if they all make sense. We take something that’s 10% true and elaborate it with 90% bullshit to make ourselves feel ‘right’ (ie safe). Graeme and I call this ‘going down the rabbit hole’.

Going down the rabbit hole

All this story-telling creates ‘mind-generated’ feelings that are mostly irrelevant to the feeling that was originally triggered. Couples Communication- couple arguingWe’ve known couples who’d get into near-relationship-ending fights over the simplest of issues. This is because each person held tightly to their chosen 10% truth/90% bullshit story.

Get curious about the messiness in your Couple Communication

Rather than getting caught up in the messiness of your 90% bullshit and trying to understand it, try something different.  See if you can identify the strongest negative point you’re trying to make (it’s usually about your partner).

This is where the gold is in your Couple Communication.

You can tell it by the sharp increase in emotion, the increased volume in your voice. It might be the knife twist in your gut or the desire to commit some kind of physical violence.Couples Communication getting violent

When you’ve identified it, counter-intuitive though it may appear, simply notice the response in your body that it creates. You might notice you’re tensing your shoulders, contracting in fear or wanting to attack, pull away, or go blank.

Getting grounded

Take a breath in and slowly let it out again, feel your feet, get grounded in your body. Taking this deep breath helps to soften your reaction. Your body will intuitively begin to feel safe, allowing you to thoughtfully respond rather than react. Any emotional discomfort will then pass more quickly because you’re not resisting it or escalating it.

Man being groundedThis will help you intuitively identify your 10% truth in the situation. Ask yourself what you’re avoiding in yourself by pushing this point? Most likely, you’ll see that it usually involves owning something imperfect and vulnerable about yourself that you want to hide.

At this point it seems easier to own it than to face going further down the rabbit hole. This is the gift of the messiness, it helps you get real if you know where to look.

Deflating your partner’s 90%

Take a risk if you sense that your partner is getting lost in their mind’s 90% bullshit and trying to hook you into their drama. Identify and own YOUR part in the 10% truth, because it will be there.

This truth is why the two of you unconsciously chose to be in relationship with each other so take the risk and show up here.  Doing so will change the fabric of your relationship.  Telling the truth, no matter how challenging it might appear from the outside, will reward you with an inner strength that is worth the risk.

The truth in you will help your partner to reconnect with what is true in themselves, if they can hear it.

Taking a breath and getting grounded helps you get present with what you’re saying and hearing.Creating Safety in Intimacy

It helps you realise that there is nothing you really need to prove, protect, defend or hide.

When you get this, you’ll find that love arises, making it easier for you to each change what you’re saying into something useful. And to listen more clearly.

This creates greater intimacy and closeness rather than misunderstanding, pain and separation in your relationship. It allows you to see your messy couple communication as a potential gift rather than a threat.

This blog is an excerpt from our book Coming Together: Solving the Mystery of Intimate Relationship, to see it click the link.

If you would like any personal support in your Couple Communication email us here.

 

 

 

Letting Go Of The Fairy Tale…

July 5, 2018 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

We’ll show you how letting go of the fantasy of happy ever after in your relationship

Can be the best thing that ever happened to it!

Despite how modern we’ve become, unless we’ve turned fashionably cynical, most of us still carry in our minds the old-fashioned idea of the perfect fairy tale relationship that’s happy-ever-after.wedding couple

It looks a unique way for each of us but it has the same flavour of effortlessness.

We come to a relationship believing that if we find the right person, claim ownership of them, then set up house and have a family, we’ll somehow smoothly grow old together into our twilight years…all the way to a shared burial plot.

Holding onto this childish fantasy makes us lazy.

We take our relationship, our partners and even love itself for granted, making them our last priority instead of our first.

It’s like we believe that once we’re in a relationship, everything will magically be OK because we love each other.

water running down drainWe do the same with our sex lives, believing they should just happen spontaneously.

Yearning for this impossible mental picture drains our energy and attraction for what’s real, causing us to, consciously or unconsciously, demean what we have or look around for something better.

But real-life relationships don’t have to be less than perfect.

They can actually be better than we’ve ever imagined – literally beyond our wildest dreams!

Having an ideal fantasy makes the future seem safe and comforting, because we assume it’s certain.

Yet it’s as if we’re saying to life, “I know what’s coming, I know what to do and I don’t need any help.”

We close ourselves off to the vast potential of life that’s so much more than our minds could plan.

We keep trusting in the fantasy, rather than in ourselves and in love.happy couple

How about trusting in what’s real instead?

Falling in love with what’s here and now,

and with not needing to know

opens us up to the magic of what lies beyond us.

What do we mean by magic?

Magic is things that happen mysteriously and are impossible to explain or understand.

This magic could be newness, surprise, chance, serendipity or merely coincidence but it adds interest, and even enchantment into our relationships.

staircaseIt can also refer to the surprising changes that occur from putting in some hard work and commitment.

Trusting in love means we don’t need the safety of knowing the end result, we know that what we most desire lives on the other side of fear and certainty.

Trusting that each step we take in the here and now creates the next step, and the next. And that each step  creates our future.

What is it that you’re putting into your relationship right here and now?

Openness, energy, desire, honesty, curiosity, creativity, playfulness, vulnerability, courage, humility or love?

For ways to move from fairy tale to real and lasting love join us for one of our Couples Retreats.

Activity: Letting Go Of The Fairy Tale 

Recognize and be willing to grieve the loss of your idealized fantasy relationship. For relationship to last your childlike ideals must die in the face of reality so that what is genuine, authentic and magical way beyond anything your limited mind will come up with can grow. Take a breath, relax, nothing is wrong here.

  1. Together or separately write all your dreams of perfection down on a piece of paper. The more you come up with the better. This might bring some fear and quite deep sadness, depending on how attached you’ve been to your fantasy, know this is healthy. Just let yourself have a good cry if you need to.
  2. Light a candle in a safe place and burn your paper.
  3. Imagine leaving these limitations safely behind you with a fresh new page appearing for you to create on.

Vulnerability: Curse or Blessing?

April 17, 2017 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

Vulnerability: The Blessing And The Curse of Intimacy

We’re caught in the trap of desiring intimacy but resisting vulnerability with all kinds of mind games and psychological protection. In the end we think it is easier to learn the skill of vulnerability…vulnerability prevents body armouring causes sexual numbness

We’ve been told that vulnerability is a scary, dangerous place. In fact, vulnerability is simply deep openness. It’s beautiful. In fact, it’s how we actually create intimacy. Without it we can share each other’s company, do things together and share common interests. But without it we stay on the surface of each other, and of ourselves.  We repeat- vulnerability is the deep level of openness and availability that will make your relationship work. Being vulnerable means we’ve let our psyche’s emotional walls down, allowing ourselves to be seen- both by others and by ourselves. It can happen in moments of joy, such as at the birth of your child, being fully loved by another, being given a moment of grace when you feel most undeserving, as much as in moments of fear. In fact, it’s in the openness and space created by vulnerability that love can enter, we have to make space for it. Love can enter by itself and magically create a connection yet if you’re willing to make vulnerability a practice you will experience a much higher level of Big Love in your relationship, and in your life.

vulnerability mends a broken heartVulnerability is always scary but any danger comes from our lack of understanding and inability in dealing with it. When we think of vulnerability we’re conditioned to think of something being wrong, that we’re literally in danger. Vulnerability has warning signs around it saying ‘don’t go there, don’t go there’. From here we make the logical choice to try and defend ourselves or attack that which is making us feel vulnerable. When we do this we miss out on the love, connection, healing and self-understanding that lies on the other side of our vulnerability.

The key in Vulnerability

Is if you can make the paradoxical choice to make your vulnerability ok and welcome it in our need to defend ourselves drops away.

When we make vulnerability ok, choosing to feel it, allow it, even welcome it in, we are in a very powerful place.

We’ve been taught that vulnerability is about exposing or opening ourselves up to another person, or to something outside of ourselves. We call this vulnerability without. In vulnerability without our focus is on opening ourselves outwards where we leave ourselves vulnerable to attack or rejection, especially if we are looking for something from the person we’re opening to.  It is emotionally risky because in doing so we expose the mask of our most unfamiliar, helpless and wounded self.

From here we either:disconnected couple

  • Contract in our feelings, creating an experience of intense emotional and even physical pain
  • Go into a story to justify our fear or woundedness, whether it is true or not
  • Become desperate for the person we’re exposed to to validate or comfort us
  • Pick up on any potential threat in what our partner says or does and react, whether the threat is real, or our projection
  • Go on the offensive, attacking the other to stay safe in ourselves
  • Close down as soon as possible and put our defences back up

Many a relationship has been destroyed by attacks that come from the discomfort of this kind of vulnerability.

Vulnerability Within

on the other hand is opening in to ourselves, holding on to ourselves rather than to another. It is about literally opening inwards rather than opening out. This Crying man being told I don't love you anymorevulnerability within ourselves becomes a place of strength, going beyond our weakness to where we no longer feel the need to hide or protect ourselves. We find we are not weak and helpless but vast and powerful. We’re less dependent on our partner’s response. We’re totally emotionally open and available to ourselves and to our partners, even to love itself.  We surrender to ourselves, our mind sinks into our heart. We’re freer and more connected to our essence.

We don’t say these things lightly

When we say vulnerability within ourselves leads us into experiences of more love than we ever dreamed possible we’re very serious. As a society we are becoming more physically comfortable, smarter and more in control of our ego selves and our world. We have an ever increasing number of ways to escape feeling discomfort. The byproduct of this shift is more loneliness and depression and missing out on the gifts Big Love can bring. We’re creating more external success but our question is, does this replace the value of Big Love itself? Experiencing Big Love, love beyond description is one of the benefits of facing our vulnerability.

If we stop buying into the fear stories of vulnerability we find it is a feeling like ‘come and get me world, do your worst because here I am, with no more walls and nothing more that can hurt me!’

What makes vulnerability uncomfortable is merely our resistance to it. The more willingly we embrace the power of vulnerability within the easier and more rewarding intimacy becomes.

“Vulnerability is the birthplace of innovation, creativity and change” Brene Brown

Understand that if you only experience pain and not freedom in your vulnerability No oral sex orgasmyou have probably remained contracted in your feelings rather than fully dropping though them into the essence of you that lives underneath your pain and your story.

Holding on to yourself

is choosing to stay present with yourself and your feeling body whilst you show up, no matter what you feel. In this way intimate communicating becomes an act of self acceptance, validation and love, a way of maintaining your sense of self and becoming intimate and available in your relationship at the same time. This is the magic of intimacy.

In his wonderful book Passionate Marriage David Schnarch, Phd states that “Intimacy hinges on validating yourself rather than trusting your partner to make you feel safe.” 

Making vulnerability OK and practicing taking your vulnerability within takes both courage and practice. Choose respectful places to practice your vulnerability in, places where you can hold onto yourself if it is unseen or rejected. Ask permission of the person you’re sharing with if they’re open to your sharing. You can start outside your relationship if with your partner feels too big, or start with subjects with manageable levels of vulnerability for both of you.

 Vulnerability Practice:

When you are next sitting down with your partner (or a friend), practice your ABC, look them in the eye and notice what comes to you as something about yourself that would be challenging for you to share. Ask their permission first and choose to share it, using ‘I’ language. Share whatever it is without looking for any particular response. The importance is not what you are sharing but the opening you’re creating in yourself by sharing it. Hold onto yourself and validate yourself for going there. Don’t need your partner to do it for you, if they do see it as a beautiful bonus.Heart to Heart communication

The magic in all of this is that because you are taking this risk in showing with your walls down and your partner is more than likely to feel drawn towards you rather than to reject us as you fear, for your exposure of your essence creates attraction. And if they do happen to reject you, you are ok because you are connected fully to yourself so there is no abandonment and little pain.

‘I’ language

Go to any personal development workshop and you will most likely be invited to speak in ‘I’ language. This happens for good reason. Our culture has a habit of saying ‘you’ when we really mean ‘I’ or ‘me’ that subtly disconnects us from feeling our own experience fully. Saying “I” also lets the other person hear us more easily as we are clearly talking about our own experience.
Make it a habit to practice ‘I’ language when talking about your own experience.

Your partner’s response: Remember your partner’s response is about them not you, just as your response is about you not them.

What we are responsible for is about us. Remembering this makes it easier to hold to ourselves when sharing.

Supporting someone in being vulnerable: If someone asks you to hear them share something vulnerable there is much you can do to support them:

Bring all of who you are into the moment:
Clear your mind
Connect with your body
Breathe into your heart
Gently focus your eyes on them
Be in silence
Don’t try to understand them at an intellectual level, let their words penetrate you, feel their heart
Feel what is behind their words
Meet them in who they are being
Validate them
Share what their sharing may have touched in you, which is a beautiful way of validating their offering.

“The way you become divine is to become wholly human”. Bishop Shelby Spong

If you would like to learn how to practice vulnerability within join us for one of our upcoming events here

 

Training for the hardest job in the world

February 7, 2017 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

 

That’s being in authentic intimate relationship…

And it’s a job we receive very little, if any, relationship training for…

Intimate relationships can look very different from the inside to what we hoped for at the beginning, can’t they? The person who started out as our soulmate somehow becomes the one put on earth simply to frustrate us! From the seeming the best person in the world to be around to one that can feel scary and even unsafe.

If this is you, then you’re not alone.Tantric Touch in the grass

Even though you might be thinking everyone else seems to have their relationships sorted we can tell you that this is not true. People have been doing relationships for thousands of years and though their nature keeps changing the one constant is that they all offer their challenges.

We often hear that problems in relationships are simply due to poor communication but we’ve seen the reasons are more complex than this singular factor. Especially in today’s world where our expectations of relationship are higher than ever before. We want our partners to be partners, lovers, friends, providers, nurturers, buddies, therapists, mind readers, sex Gods and much more. Our lives themselves have become more complex, involving much change and challenge, we’re living longer than ever and our relationships need to be resilient enough to cope. Not only this but the person we choose in relationship with may not be the boy or girl from down the road we’ve known all our lives but someone from across the country or across the world, with a different set of beliefs, perhaps a different culture or vastly different life experience. Love doesn’t seem to adhere to any particular sets of rules.

Our intimate relationships are now expected to offer us:

Safety/Security/Support/Comfort/Belonging
Familiarity/Identity/Certainty/Longevity
Curiosity/Pleasure/Excitement/Adventure
Fun/Exploration/Playfulness/Edginess
Intimacy/Connectedness/Freedom/Autonomy
Love/Sex /Mystery/Meaning

Remember when relationship was automatically about strolling down the aisle and committing to stay together “till death us do part” no matter what? For some of us it may still be. We’ve been taught to plan our futures according to this currently existing model of relationship in society. We’ve wanted to grow up, fall in love with someone of the opposite sex, get married, have a successful career- at work if you’re a man, at home if you’re a woman. We’ve aimed to live together in this ideal family unit that will be there forever and a day. Yet no matter how we try our lives don’t necessarily conform to these ‘rules’. We fall out of love, our work becomes more important than our relationships, we fall in love with someone of the same gender, we get ill and change the way we think about life, our children build our relationships or tear them apart, our goals change, we fall in love all over again with the same person or with someone different. The old ‘rules’ no longer apply, yet we still feel like we’re failing if we haven’t abided by them. This is why we need a new model of what intimate relationships are.

We like to focus on fixing the communication aspect of relationship because it seems like it should be an easy thing to fix, but the bigger picture of the relationship means it is not that simple. We believe that part of the struggles that occur in relationship are due in part to a lack of adequate training.

happy coupleOur intimate relationships are potentially the most important and fulfilling part of our lives yet we receive very little training for them.

Let’s face it, if we were offered an extremely challenging job requiring multiple skillsets we weren’t sure we had very few of us would be willing to sign on without negotiating some training and ongoing support. Particularly if our income was based on the quality of our daily performance. It wouldn’t make sense.

So why do we do exactly this with our relationships, stepping into them blind and not asking for help?

It’s largely because everyone around us does exactly the same, including those we learn the most about relationships from, our parents. It’s as if we carry an inbuilt belief that once we get in to a relationship everything will magically be ok because we love each other. It’s the same with our sex lives, they should just ‘happen naturally’. So it’s easy to take them, along with our partners for granted, getting into the habit of making them our last priority instead of our first. This unconsciously creates the loss of spark in long term relationship we dread, leaving us thinking that we’ve fallen ‘out of love’. And in this disposable world we can fall into the trap of constantly having an eye out for a replacement, seeking a new and supposedly easier option, draining further energy from our current relationship and reducing its chances of survival. We see this over and over again in our work, couples thinking the spark has gone, when actually it’s just been dimmed by the suffering that’s been put on top of it.

Heart to Heart communicationThis is why it’s vital to get the training you need to address the challenges your relationship offers rather than bury your heads in the sand, becoming machine like and operating from habit, wishing things were different without taking action. Or doing the same things over and over and expecting different results. This is just suffering.

Where you’re at is not your responsibility. Staying there is your choice.

 

Understand that as a result of this lack of training when things go wrong you blame either your partner or yourself for being inadequate, uncaring or not good enough, rather than seeing a person simply lacking in skills. A person just like you, who dearly wants connection, who is probably trying just as hard, hurting just as much as you, and is just as much in the dark as you.  So the next time you want to cast blame or judgement for your hurt, take a moment to remember it’s not so much a lack of lovableness creating the friction in your relationship as a lack of knowledge and skill. This makes is easier to give each other a hug, rather than a blast.

If you want to learn more about how to be good at relationship come to an event, or contact us today…

 

 

 

 

 

Best Ever Relationship Tool!

December 6, 2016 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

It’s breathing!

You’ve probably never thought about breathing as a relationship tool, but it is a powerful one.

Not to mention all the benefits breathing has to offer you as an individual, apart from the obvious one of keeping you alive!

Breathing In is the first thing we do when we’re born.Woman breastfeedingcanstockphoto40881870

Breathing out is the last thing we do before we die.

And the way we breathe in between not only keeps us alive, it has a significant impact on our quality of life in between…

Maybe you’ve noticed how your breath changes depending on how you feel: short and shallow when you’re stressed, deeper and slower when you’re relaxed. Your breath changes when you yawn, sigh, cry or laugh. Not only that but you can change how you feel by actively changing your breath.

We invite you to fall in love with breathing…

This alone will change your relationship! And the exciting thing about quality breathing is that it’s effects are cumulative- the more you do it the quicker and more longer lasting the impact.

From a relationship point of view breathing can:

  • Awareness of our breathing connects us to ourselves. This is a good thing as the more we’re connected to ourselves the more we have to share with another.
  • Deep breathing helps us get relaxed, present and grounded, making it easier for us to know what to say and to hear what our significant other is really saying!
  • Help move emotions through our bodies, avoiding stuckness and mental drama. The more we breathe the more we feel, release and shift.
  • Increase access to our intuitive wisdom and our heart’s truth as well as bring mental clarity.
  • Accelerated breathing increases our sexual pleasure, deep slow breathing spreads it through our bodies, producing altered states and even spiritual experiences!

 

Research shows that breathing does a lot more too!

Amongst other things breathing:

  • Decreases stress and promotes relaxationrelaxation for female desire and arousal
  • Helps to decrease anxiety and depression
  • Increases happiness and optimism
  • Increases self awareness
  • Improves focus and concentration
  • Improves sleep
  • Strengthens our ability to regulate our emotions
  • Improves symptoms of trauma
  • Reduces impulsivity, cravings and addictionsFreedom
  • Decreases stress and regulates our body’s level of cortisol, the stress hormone
  • Strengthens our immunity by altering the genes responsible for them
  • Reduces pain and activation of the pain centres in the brain
  • Improves digestion
  • Oxygenates muscles for better function
  • Detoxifies and releases toxins, removes carbon dioxide from the blood, replacing it with oxygen

Someone who is less stressed and depressed, more aware, happier, thinks clearer, sleeps well, regulates their emotions, isn’t ruled by addictions, stress or pain with a healthy tummy and fitter body would be much easier to be in relationship with, don’t you agree?

So take a pause and breathe…

Breathing mindfully can also help your relationship by helping you become less reactive. Can you imagine if instead of saying something mean, you were able to mentally step back and chill before talking? Wouldn’t that be nice? If the state of your mind affects the breath the reverse is true as well and here’s how it can help your relationship. The next time you’re arguing with your partner try taking longer, deeper breaths. Notice how that can quickly reduce anger and connect us with ourselves, allow us to look at the situation from a new perspective.

 

And last but not least breathing is a natural aphrodisiac

Oztantric intimacyIt helps us be more present with our lovers and will not only spread your pleasure into a more full bodied experience whilst increasing the intensity of your orgasm and build sexual stamina.

Falling in love with your breath will help you fall deeper and stay in love with your partner, with yourself and with life!

Breathing Activity:

An optimal breath comes by breathing deeply in through your nose into your belly, allowing your belly to fill, expanding up into your chest and exhaling through a slightly open mouth.

Try practicing breathing (mindfully) as often as you can remember.

Put up little notes around the house, at your computer, on your dashboard, in your meditation, when you exercise, getting ready for sleep, helping you wake up, put a breathing reminder app on our phone, anywhere and everywhere…

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Graeme 0457 966 696
Annette 0437 966 696

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