All I seem to keep coming up with is questions …

But then, as some of my clients would tell you, I am very fond of throwing the odd challenging question to burst, like a grenade, through your thinking! So why change now?

Maybe that’s the link!

The action that your relationship needs at the moment is to sit and be inactive long enough to read these questions.

And then answer the ones that are making you feel least comfortable. Yes I said least comfortable.

SweetP … (love of my life for 37 years –OMG, soooo long!) SweetP and I make it our business to have regular in-depth conversations. It’s a way of keeping ourselves honest with each other. Of course, one dilemma is to even decide what we’ll talk about! Funnily enough we never seem to run out …

Over the years, we’ve realised that when we’re considering potential topics, the ones we actually desperately need to talk about are the ones we react to with an internal wince, a quick frown, a fluttering gut-tightening, or other tell-tale signs! If a topic sets off that feeling of “get me out of here” fight/flight, then that’s the one!

Of course you can cheat yourself and your partner and not show those internal belly flops are happening, but who does that benefit?

Have you got your beverage ready?

What beverage? The one you’re going to have while you read through this list of questions and note your internal responses. The beverage that’s going to buy you the time to be honest (at least with yourself) and admit what topics are the hot buttons in your relationship?

Are you ready to do some thinking about your relationship?

Are you ready to prepare for action on your relationship?

Are you ready to find the direction that conversations, and actions need to take for the sake of that relationship?

Here goes:

• How content are you in your relationship right now?
  • How has that changed over the last 3 months?
  • The last year?
  • The last 5 years?

• How much sparkle and life is there in your relationship right now?
  • What are the signs of sparkle and life that have appeared/disappeared in the last 12 months?
  • How much have you contributed to the arrival/departure of that sparkle?

• How much conflict is there in your relationship right now?
  • How much do you contribute to the conflict?
  • What are the strongest repeating themes in your conflicts?
  • What is your usual behaviour during the conflict?
  • What patterns of behaviour have you noticed in your partner?
  • How do you go about healing the relationship after the conflict has subsided?
  • How much effort do you put into that healing process?
  • How has that degree of effort changed over the last 12 months?

• In what areas of your relationship do you consider yourself superior to your partner?
  • In what areas of your relationship do you believe you are inferior?
  • How is that power struggle benefiting your relationship?
  • How comfortable are you with your position of superiority/inferiority?
  • What have you done to change that?
• How do you go about solving the problems that crop up in your daily lives together?

• How much effort do you put into solving the little issues in your lives?
• How much appreciation do you receive for that?
• How much appreciation do you show for your partner’s problem-solving efforts?

• How often does your partner really get to “know” how much you love her/him?
  • How do you demonstrate that?
  • What evidence do you have that your message hits home?

• When did you last actively “work on your relationship”?
  • What did you do?
  • How much improvement did that make to the connection between you both?

• How do you demonstrate that your love for your partner is unconditional?
  • When might your love appear conditional to your partner?
  • How might your attitudes be affecting your unconditional acceptance of your partner just as he/she is?

• How often do you discuss your relationship, outside of conflicts?
  • How satisfied are you with your level of contribution to that?
  • What might you do differently that could positively impact the relationship?

• What might be actions you could take that would build the connection between you?

• What are you prepared to do, for the sake of your relationship?
  • What are you not prepared to do, for the sake of your relationship?

• What do you need to release, for the sake of your relationship?

Is that enough to get you rolling?

Oh, but don’t forget to take action once you’ve done your thinking.

Don’t let it all overwhelm you.  Just pick one simple baby step that you could take for the sake of your relationship.

And take it…

By the way, let us know how you go!

Photo Source: Couple by Dragunsk Usf

Your partner and relationship are the source of your second greatest opportunity!

Second?

Well of course! Your first opportunity lies within your Self. But that same authentic whole and real Self is also what will maximise the potential of your Second Opportunity for happiness!

So my Simple Tips for Happiness in Relationships?

• Show up as the most self-aware and real You that you can dig around and find.
  Think about it?  Isn’t “sincere” and “real” the best kind of person you can meet and deal with?
  When someone is heart-breakingly honest about their skills and talents, and their fears and failings, doesn’t that vulnerability attract your admiration?
  Knowing Yourself  and presenting the Authentic You is the most scary and attractive characteristic you can ever offer to anyone, but especially a Loving Partner!
• Be prepared to Love Your Partner with all his/her failings rather than despite them.
  If you thought that you were going to get perfection when you began a committed relationship you must have been forgetting your own imperfections!
  So you have two choices, when faced with flaws. Pretend they’re not there and remain endlessly disappointed. Or offer acceptance of that person just as they are and allow them a chance to grow in front of your eyes. I know which one I think is more exciting to be part of!
• Listen with two ears and talk with one mouth!
  All of us Relationship Specialists bang on endlessly about communication and that’s because without it there can be no relationship. No communication = sham and hollow relationship!
  And the simplest way to do that effectively is to work on the 2:1 principle (2 ears and 1 mouth)! Bearing in mind that your talking will include questions starting with opening gambits like who /what /when /where /why /how, your aim is to get a sense of what it’s like to walk in your partner’s shoes. You won’t always get there but being seen to try to achieve that also wins you their love and appreciation. Go on I dare you!
• Use Love Languages to Deliver a Laser Message of Love.
  Knowing your partner’s Love Language is critical. All relationships lurch and swing through the pendulum of highs and lows. At both ends of that spectrum, it is hard to receive messages of love through the flurry of your own emotions. So if that message of love is offered in a “foreign language” then it’s potency is diluted or lost all together! So it is imperative to talk in your partner’s love language to send that message of love – most particularly in moments of crisis and stress. Don’t know about your family, but those moments of crisis and stress can crop up pretty regularly in our world!
• When the inevitable conflicts occur, fight fair.
  Disagreement /fighting /conflict are all perfectly normal events in any relationship. The key to the endurance of any long-term relationship is your ability to heal the relationship after the conflict. If you’ve thrown poison, your chances of healing the relationship after the fight has quietened is seriously diminished.

They sound simple of course!

But all tips are. But like I keep saying, “Done is Better Than Perfect!!”

Don’t expect you can be perfect at working at your relationship, but this is one of those situations when persistent trying is the best you can do. (Of course bearing in mind those five tips, “trying” includes asking for feedback, advice, help and forgiveness.)

So Which one could do with some improvement in your relationship?

What are you going to do about it?

How will you do it?  And When?

My intention for this month is to work harder at reflecting on and acknowledging both my positive and negative attributes so I can show up as an excruciatingly honest lover and wife.

What about you?

Photo Source: 56.365 by K Thompson Studios

What happens when you fight in your relationship?

What’s that? You’re telling me you never fight?

Okay some couples are definitely conflict avoidant. Or at least one person in the couple is severely conflict avoidant and that ensures that conflict rarely gets allowed in!

That happens because somewhere back in time (either as children or even in the early part of the relationship) one or both individuals discovered that conflict was very dangerous and with probably very good reason. Whether that reason is still valid is another matter.

The upside of being conflict avoidant is that the boat doesn’t really get rocked and that’s probably quite peaceful. (I wouldn’t know because I’m a regular boat rocker!) The downside is that frustrations and different opinions don’t get aired much. So nothing much changes in the relationship. And that’s where I start to wonder about the value …

Of course most of us have regular conflicts in our relationships and that’s perfectly normal.

May I just repeat that?

Conflicts in a relationship are normal!

May I just qualify that a little?

Normal conflict does not include physical abuse. Nor does it include persistent contempt and humiliation that amounts to emotional or mental abuse.

Gottman’s findings suggest that it is how you heal the relationship after conflict that ultimately is the predictor of the longterm health and wellbeing of your relationship.

So I’m left wondering what you do to improve your relationship and to help heal the relationship after conflict?

In fact, what do you currently do during conflict?

If you’re like me then:

• you’ll be pretty good at hopping up and riding your high horse!
• you’ll be loud and get louder as your frustration rises.
• the words always and never seem to appear out of nowhere even though you know they’re not helpful or even true!  (”You never want to discuss our problems” which is of course completely untrue!  Poor SweetP!)
• you’ll be full of “shoulds” that would ensure your partner changes into something you would never actually like but think it sounds perfectly reasonable to expect in that moment!
• the sheer effort of trying to control your emotions will lead you to tears.

Thank heavens not everyone is like me! However you’ll probably have your version of traits that you air during a fight and probably despise yourself for later in calmer moments.

But I wonder …

When you’re having these fights do you know what outcome your partner actually wants out of this dispute? Do you even know what you want? (I’m certainly not too sure at times!)

As Peter Pearson says:

When the emotional brain is the ringmaster in an argument, the logical brain is a disengaged bystander. Couples can argue for one heck of a long time while neither person has a clue about the desired outcome.

So I’m wondering what would happen if you simply stopped mid-fight (or even walked a way for a few minutes to cool down and then returned) and simply asked!

• Would that take the wind out of your full sails?
• Would that pull you off your high horse?
• Would it stop the argument in its tracks?

And you know what, it would begin the healing as well.

Because the answer would actually short-cut the debate, and start the problem-solving that is needed for action. After all, a fight is really an indication of how overwhelmed you both are by the problem. And overwhelm goes hand-in-hand with paralysis! While you’re paralysed you’re not acting to make effective change.

Seeing this will be a whole new way to argue, it might be an idea to try this on a simple fight, rather than a “will we move to another country”-type fight. A taking-out-the-rubbish type fight might be a better place to practise.

And of course stopping mid-fight requires you to take a breath and that might help as well.

Hmm. I wonder how many of you will try it?

Perhaps you could tell us if you do, or if you’ve tried it before? How helpful was it?

Ahhh wonder! It is a wonderful thing isn’t it?

If you read self-development literature, you are left with the impression that if your life lacks a purpose then somehow you are failing yourself, your children, and the world. The message seems to be that if we don’t have a purpose we’re just not measuring up.

In the world of relationships, there are many expectations. In disillusioned relationships, much of the currency is in the form of unmet expectations.

So I’m reluctant to add having a purpose to the relationship “shoulds” that hang like boulders around our necks.

I figure that just like you learn to pick your battles with your adolescent children, there are other more important relationship “battles” to attack, than having a purpose!

To me, it is far more important for the relationship to nurture joy in the hearts of the participants, and deepen the connection with their souls than that there be any particular purpose!

What the hell does that mean?

On a daily basis I’d love to see partners:

• saying “I Love You” in their partner’s Love Language
• asking for forgiveness for causing hurt
• making time to talk about more than just who’ll take out the rubbish
• encouraging the other to be the best person they can be and providing the support to achieve it

The expectations that we bring to our relationships are unique, varied, and often arduous.  Among the couples I see, they tend to fall into these broad stereotypes.

• Enduring love
• Unstinting Fidelity
• Blind support
• Persistent attention to meeting needs
• Children
• Joint unified parenting
• Physical and economic security
• Regular sexual satisfaction
• Equity and consensus in decision-making/problem solving
• Equal contribution to household and external jobs/roles

These expectations eventually become the source of much of our conflict patterns.

Why? Because partners often have different definitions of these seemingly simple/obvious expectations.

With different definitions of all these supposedly mutual expectations, and in the absence of clear understanding by both parties, we set ourselves up for disillusionment and discontent and a multitude of fights!

When we’re in that early romantic phase of new love, neither party thinks it necessary to sit down and talk carefully or negotiate a clear understanding. And if it does occur to us to raise the topic, it can seem churlish or even pessimistic to try.

“Of course this person I adore so much thinks only of pleasing me. Of course, we each have the other’s best interests at heart! Of course fidelity means the same thing to him as it does to me. Of course she understands my needs and will meet them with ease. Of course we have the same values, if we didn’t we’d never have fallen in love!”

Do any of those sentences match your thinking way back at the beginning of your relationship?

Do you recall the first time you realised that your partner’s expectations didn’t quite match yours? Do you remember the sinking feeling as you realised that somewhere along the line a win/lose was heading down the track towards you both? Did you worry that it might be you who came off second best?

What happened? What is often the outcome of these simple oversights?

Disillusionment? Resentment? Blame?

All those and more!

Did either of you shoulder the responsibility for your contribution to the situation? Did either of you begin a conversation that might bridge the lack of understanding or begin to negotiate a new enlightened beginning?

Not many couples do, so if you said no then you’re not alone.

So let’s not get too worried about purpose when there are far more pressing issues in modern day relationships.

Even the best and most enduring relationships have episodes of disillusionment, resentment, blame and all manner of other negative feelings.

It’s what they do to heal the relationship after these toxic storms, that makes the difference between continuity and divorce!

So forget purpose!

Let’s get back to basics and start talking about important things.

Let’s accept that things have gone awry before, and will do again.  Let’s just face what we have here and now in our relationships. Let’s find ways to be more happy, have more fun, feel more love and nurture each other and the families we have around us.

That’s not just enough, that would be bloody sensational!

Photo Source: It’s all about love by Candida.Performa

Better Relationships are a journey not a destination! It’s all about the journey because let’s face it you’re never going to get perfection ie reach the destination, so you might as well saddle up for the ride.

Now I could get all serious and prosaic about it again, and belabour this whole point but I think I might go off on a pleasant tangent instead.

This month, I’d like to remind us all that journeys can impact relationships in many ways.

Do you remember the journey to your wedding?

I remember being scared and anxious and excited and hopelessly happy all rolled up in one white frothy ball.

Do you remember the satisfaction of buying your first house together? Do you remember driving in the driveway on settlement day?

We had to hide my growing pregnant baby belly from the bank manager because my salary was being considered. But the day we took over the property was so exciting even if we didn’t have enough furniture to put in it. Every new flower we found in the garden was exciting! And every new bill made us take a deep breath. We had a mortgage and we felt alternatively grown-up, and out of our depth.

Do you remember the trip to the hospital with your first baby?

Ours was the big non-event! Two and a half weeks overdue and not in labour! What a dud! The trip home ten days later with the little baby breathing and squawking in the back seat was terrifying. We were parents and we had no bloody idea where to start!

Do you remember your first holiday or night away from the kids? Or are you still waiting for that?

We couldn’t decide whether to sleep for endless hours or opt for wild passionate love-making. We felt close again!

I could keep going but I reckon you get the message.

What have been the significant moments on your journey and how did they feel?

One big highlight was the year I surprised SweetP with the bright yellow hired convertible and proceeded to take him on a week-long trip driving the Great Ocean Road with the hood down (the heater and seat warmers on if it was cold) and music blaring as we wound our way around on the journey he’d always dreamed of.

So what about you?

Photo Credit: 12 Apostles 2 by TomaB on Flickr

“…to love and to cherish, from this day forward…”

Or at least some variation of those words were part of many of our wedding ceremonies.

So having said those words some time ago (in my case 35 years!), when did you last catch yourself cherishing him/her?  And even if you’ve never married and said those words, when did YOU last catch yourself cherishing him/her?

It’s a funny old-fashioned kind of word really!  Certainly not one that trips over the tongue in everyday language.

It begs the question, “is the concept old-fashioned and out of favour” as well?  Is it just plain passé to cherish these days?

Before we can come to a conclusion, we’d best work out just what does “cherish” mean?

Cherish – a Definition

According to dictionary.com, cherish means

1. to hold or treat as dear; feel love for: to cherish one’s native land.
2. to care for tenderly; nurture: to cherish a child.
3. to cling fondly or inveterately to: to cherish a memory.

So what does that tell us?

When I see the definition, I see

• Actively loving
• Nurturing
• And remembering (making memories)

But, WHAT is it you cherish?

Is it some bits and pieces, or the whole box and dice?

I know of one man who still cherishes the relationship (and the wife) he left many years ago!  Why?

He can see the wonderful children the relationship (and his wife) bore.  And now he can see the grandchildren that have fulfilled him better than he could ever have imagined.  He knows the relationship itself was over a long time ago, but during the healthy phase of it there were many memories laid down which he can only cherish now, because of the wonderful things they still symbolise!

How about you?

How would anyone know that you cherish your relationship?

In particular, how does your partner know you cherish it?   What signs would your partner see that tell her/him that you cherish your connection?

“Cherish Your Relationship” Tips

Let’s find a few ways to demonstrate active loving, nurturing, and making memories.

• the most obvious one is a marriage ceremony itself.
  I had a man in my consulting room the other day telling me how important the relationship was to him.  Together for 7 years, they weren’t married.  Now I’m not saying you have to be married.  But taking that step, that commitment, does seem to alter a couple’s perception of their relationship.
• the once-a-month “date”
• the flowers that come home on payday
• taking your wife out for dinner on your children’s birthdays
• always celebrating/marking your anniversary
• renewing your vows at special anniversaries – either just the two of you, or in front of all your friends all over again!
• empathy and listening when your partner has a problem they need to talk about e.g at work or with a friend (without riding in on the white horse, and trying to solve the problem!)
• supporting your partner in their ambitions and goals, e.g. encouraging a partner to undertake further education/new job, and helping sort through the impediments to that becoming possible (application process, resume, interview training, childcare)
• choosing to do things for the sake of your relationship .  Things like putting aside minor altercations based on the rule of “will this really matter in one week or 12 months time?”
• finding ways to talk about and heal the relationship after arguments
• sitting together and recalling the funny and/or significant times you’ve shared or maybe sharing those with your growing kids.  (We find our adult kids and partners “get” the importance of these memories.)
• looking over family happy snaps together
• making sure you capture memory-makers on camera, video, audio, or in writing!
• writing (and keeping) love letters to each other that some day (after you’re dead!) will become heirlooms and special mementoes of your love

For me, cherishing requires some degree of being public so that the person we are cherishing gets the message!

Just like there is no point in hoping that our partner “knows I love her” without actually saying and showing it, so too does cherishing need some kind of obvious demonstration.

A wedding is a public declaration of your vows and love and any of these hints have some hint of public declaration.  The sign is saying, I’m proud of the love we share and the life we live together.

So what is it that you do to demonstrate “cherishing”?  My examples were just off the top of my head. We’d all love to see some better examples. Have you got any?

Here at Calm Space. In many similarly inspiring places across the net. Your local bookshop has a big section. Even your daily paper sometimes goes there.

We’re all hunting for healing for our “21st century angst”.

The search is on for satisfaction for the soul, motivation for the days ahead, increased self-awareness, acceptance and belonging, shared values, and peace and harmony.

In my humble opinion, there’s a lot of needless searching going on. Or perhaps I should say some of that searching is needless.

Don’t get me wrong! I’m not suggesting self-development is useless, stupid or even unnecessary. In fact I’m a strong devotee of those searches. And they’re searches I encourage others to begin.

But I do claim a rider to my searching.

You see I believe that it’s within our relationship that we can find much of the support we need to explore, consider, and take action on our endless search to relieve our angst!

In a true and committed relationship lies the sacred space of possibility, a crucible of self-development. And the possibilities are different for both of us. But there’s room in the sacred space for all that possibility. Maybe the focus will swap from one to the other, and back again, over our lives together. Sometimes both our possibilities will be cooking in that crucible, and boy will be busy!

In a loving relationship, I want the very best for my partner. And I want a partner who wants the very best for me.

I want him to create dreams, find paths, and achieve successes, which only he can recognise as success. And I want to share that path with him. I want to be along for the crazy ride. I know that even when I’m scared for him, I also have to allow him the space to make the discoveries that mistakes provide. I want the best for him.

And in giving him that gift, he delights in giving me the same.

I don’t want to be dragged along as an unwilling passenger and be treated/act like unconsidered baggage.

I want to be a partner in all senses of the word.

Sharing the dreams, and believing in them because I can see the possibility, that a partner’s self-doubt can sometimes question. I want to nurture the dreams with dreams of my own, or by providing the wall off which all the best ideas bounce!

I need to be a partner on the path too. I realise that sometimes I’ll be walking on the rocky, unmade part, beside his path. Or maybe I’ll be practically running behind him, trying to keep up with him. Or maybe there’ll be times when I’m the shoulder on which he leans so heavily I fear we’ll both fall over. But I’m there because the path is made intriguing enough to keep me there, purely because it’s his path. And vice versa.

And when a destination is reached and an achievement met, I want to hold him in my arms and will him to find more courage, and more energy, and more satisfaction, and more motivation, and more self-awareness and understanding. I want to see his chest swell with acceptance and belonging as much as with pride at our achievement. And I want to lie entwined with him at night, safe and filled with well-earned peace and silent harmony from our labours.

And when it’s my dream we’ve been chasing, my path on which I’ve struggled and felt his arms surround me, my vision of success that comes to pass, I know that again it’s our sacred space that has brought me the victory.

But hey! Not all days in my relationship are like that. Most of the days just feel plain bloody ordinary. Meals, work, family, exercise, time-out, business, calm, blunders, tears of joy and sorrow.

So I go searching outwards like everyone else. To The Calm Space, on the net, in my books, in conversation. Searching for answers to my angst.

But the joy is in bringing that knowledge, or even its possibility, back into the treasure trove and sacred space of us (SweetP and me).

When I sat down to write this article I had no idea it would end as a treatise on relationships.

But filled as I am at the moment with the New Year’s possibilities and a sense of growing belief that something big is coming, I think I’ve just staked out my space in the world of relationship experts. I’ve just declared my ideals, my raison d’etre, my reason for being!

This is what I stand for!

I think you Calm Space readers have just shared a special moment with me as we build our relationship. Thank you for empowering me. Thank you for sharing this sacred space with me.

I’m off to share a happy dance with Sweet P!

When your Myers-Briggs personality type is identified as ESFJ, then one of your values is Social Tradition.  So ceremonies and rituals become a useful and successful strategy.

When you choose to work in a coaching/counselling arena, then ceremonies and rituals become a technique you encourage clients to use to mark significant shifts and changes in their lives.

Do you get the message?

The Old Pink Apple Tart here is pretty familiar with ceremonies and in fact I tend to relish the opportunity to introduce a ritual to many things in my life (even if it’s a one-person ceremony.)  The only trouble is that with that kind of history and embedded thinking, change can be harder to embrace.  I need to hear good reasons for changing my patterns of behaviour, or introducing a new ceremony.

When I look back at Christmases Past, the one that stands out in memory was the first PC Christmas (post-children) we had in OUR home.  It was just a few weeks after #3 was born and I thought it would be good for me and bubs and the pre-schoolers to stay home all day.  To get this idealistic dream, I had to have my family for lunch and SweetP’s for dinner!  (What WAS I thinking?  I can’t remember WHY I couldn’t join them together.  Maybe bloody-mindedness and obsession with tradition?)

By my judgment, the ONLY way to conduct Christmas was to have simple stocking fillers from Santa appearing in the pillow case in the early morning, and then “proper” presents coming from Mum and Dad under the tree.  Those presents didn’t get touched till the Present Distribution Ritual once everybody (the adults) had gathered, had a drink and some nibblies, and was ready!  It didn’t matter how many times kids asked “Can we open our presents?” the answer was No.  It was good for them to learn to wait!

The presents had a ritual all their own, as well.  It was best if one person handed them out.  And it was better if that person was an adult who could keep an eye on harmony by avoiding one person having five presents piled in front of them and another none.  (After all gifts just got plonked under the tree so random was part of the whole scene.  Yes I know I have just described a less-than-random scene.  I NEVER said this story had logic as part of its make-up.)

SweetP’s family on the other hand had a method that I believed was haphazard and chaotic (and therefore totally unacceptable).  As you walked in the door (still with bowls of food, children, and presents in your arms), other family would approach you with a kiss and present.  For me, who valued some semblance of organisation, this chaotic mayhem was HELL.  I had no idea who’d given what to the kids, after all I was busy putting down a half-sleepy toddler, moving food into the kitchen, and fielding presents left, right and centre, all while desperate for a breath, a cuppa, a drink, or all three!  The kids tore things apart wildly and with great glee, egged on by grandparents and uncles.  Why wouldn’t they?  There was noise everywhere and I just felt totally overwhelmed and out of control.  (Not a comfy place for Pink Apple Tart even way back then!)

So THIS Christmas I was going to get my own way!  (Yes!  I can see the issues here.)

I carefully prepared the in-laws (especially MIL who was just as bloody-minded as I was) and battled their disapproval and arguments against my methods.  They reluctantly agreed.

The end to the story?  By the time I’d had my family for lunch, battling heat and a breast-fed baby who was unhappy cos his stressed-out Mummy had allowed her milk supply to dwindle for lack of fluids and attention to self-care, I just wanted to run away, crawl into bed, or otherwise avoid my MIL.  The delightful present-giving ritual I’d insisted on, had an air of awkwardness and resistance from the participants, and NO pleasure for any of us!  The kids just wanted their pressies.

The point?

One outcome of the whole event was a significant rise in my loathing of the whole of Christmas.

Any shift in my habits was delayed by the death of my MIL, and the abandonment of any Christmas traditions within SweetP’s family.

Another outcome was: enough evidence, though only with significant hindsight, to persuade me that change was needed and that tradiitons could not be transplanted from one group to another.  By the time I could unravel where my loathing of Christmas could come from, I had reached a point of being prepared to accept ANY changes to Christmas traditions.

Now I am happy to cast aside traditions with ease.  So when my son (father of my new granddaughter) suggested it was time to stop sharing Christmas with my extended family and instead develop a new ceremony where we become the observing (and indulgent) grandparents, I was happy to agree.  It was easy.  I’d already let go of so much from working to achieve Christmas calm!

So this year is the time we say goodbye to our extended family joining us on Christmas Day.

Instead I am handing over the baton to my son.  I know he still values family.  I trust that he will create new rituals and will ask my opinions.  I can let go.

The relief is enormous!

So what about you? Do you have any over-tight addictions to Christmas/Holiday rituals?

Is there some sign that is quietly calling to you (or YELLING at you) that it’s time to let go?

Why not have a think about it over this Christmas?

Believe me, the world won’t end.

I mentioned a word that many of you believe should never be used in the same sentence as “calm”.  (Was that “oxymoron” I heard you muttering?)

Just take a few deep breaths.  You’ll come good in a moment. I promise.

Firstly I must tell you, I know about your attempts at denial!  I know many of you are currently digging, desperately scraping away at a hole.  The hole where you want to keep your head buried, while you pretend that Christmas and the Holiday Season isn’t hanging over your head like a French Revolutionary’s guillotine!

But it’s ok!  This Relationship Space is presented by a special Christmas Angel.  No, not a  guest author.  It’s just your average old Pink Apple / Relationship Advisor who’s put on her other hat.  Or should that be – changed into her fairy costume?  (ok, not a good visual, so we’ll leave THAT alone.)

Since 2004, your editor, Karen Wallace, and I have been authors of a little seasonal extravaganza that helps the frazzled and fractious become Calm.  It’s called The Christmas Calm Manual and we cover many aspects of Christmas Coping and Calmery. So let’s make sure everyone knows as much as possible about Christmas calm.

Unfortunately, Christmas is a time of difficult relationships.  And I’m not just talking about the increased incidence of domestic violence either. Or of the increased incidence of suicidal risk.

If we put aside those dramatic/extreme examples, I bet you can instantly recall a Christmas you experienced, or know about, where the “Happy” season created conflict and not calm.

There’s the classic conflicts between couples about who Christmas time should be spent with, how Christmas gifts for the children should be managed, and more significantly where all the money in the bank account/budget has gone.

I’m not even talking about conflict in couple relationships either.

Other conflicts are those extended family ones, where competing needs cause flare-ups of deep-seated family rifts or sibling rivalries.  Even if we come from one family and presumably a similar cultural background, our different attitudes to customs, culture, and in particular our attitude to change will cause conflicts.

When we overlay that on top of end-of-year deadlines, children exhausted after the long school year (at least here in Australia), climate-changed excesses of heat and cold, extra traffic, extra shopping and extra cooking and cleaning – what we get is something far from calm and renewal.

Whether you’re a single woman, a single mum, an only child, or a woman well-entrenched in a big extended family, the effects on you as a person are still difficult to cope with.

You see if Christmas and the holiday season sends you into a place where you keep banging into feelings of stress, of frustration, of resentment, of guilt, of exhaustion, of anger, of fear as well as the occasional moments of satisfaction then why do you keep doing things the same way every year?

I hate to suggest this to such a nice, normally intelligent person, but are you mad, or are you just a masochist?

Why would you keep doing the same old thing getting those same outcomes, of stress, resentment, guilt etc  and not stop and wonder what else you could do?

Ok! It doesn’t matter what’s happened before, this year is your chance to deliver a joy-filled Christmas to yourself and to those you love, without losing your Christmas Calm.

So like any problem let’s start by looking at the situation as it stands.  Sit for a moment here and now and look deep into your heart and admit to yourself which parts of Christmas give you most pain and distress.  Is it the bah-humbug relative, the critical mother, the drunken uncle, the bitchy sister?  Is it all those shopping centre car parks stretching in front of you?  Is it the endless, unassisted cleaning or the unfair sharing of tasks?  Is it preparing a meal beyond your abilities or inappropriate for the climate?  Is it the fights over excessive spending or overdrawn credit cards?

Bearing in mind that it’s probably a little of a lot of those, think about where you’d like to focus most of your efforts.  What one or two changes could you make that would help you to remain the kind of person you want to be when you show up at Christmas?  What kind of person is it that you want to be?  How do you look?  How do you behave? How do you cope?  Who do you turn to for support and assistance?

Who or what might get in the way of making things better for you this year?  How are you going to deal with that?  What plan could you develop to manage the issue and find at least a compromise that meets your needs as well as other’s?

Part of the problems that cause conflict at Christmas, lie in our attitude to change.

Why do we continue to slavishly follow traditions that no longer fit our lifestyle, our budgets, or our relationships?  Because we’re a bit scared of what bringing in changes might do?  So instead of making choices that allow you to remain not only calm but loving nurturing and caring (all feelings that fit the Christmas season very well), you continue to get stressed, bite people’s heads off, and send them running AWAY from you just when you need help most and want them running to you with offers of assistance!

You do know you have permission to make change, don’t you?  Well if you didn’t, you do now!

So you’ve now got a good idea of what changes need to happen.  Whose help do you need to enlist to achieve these changes?  When can you sit down with enough time together to draw up a plan for how it’s going to be and how you’re going to manage it?

How are you feeling right now?  Is knowing that it can be different, that there’s an end in sight to your stress, changing your feelings and attitudes?

Guess what – you’re on the path!

Christmas Calm, here I come!

As someone who judges she falls into the ugly segment of society, I can get a bit defensive about the shallowness of people focusing on skin-deep beauty.  If that’s all people are going to do, then no-one will ever take any notice of me!

(Well of course it’s all about me!  Don’t you have times when it’s all about you?)

Being overweight in a world where thin is all important doesn’t help either!  Every message reinforces that I don’t fit the world’s definition of beauty, and so by default am unacceptable.

Hopelessness or Hope?

But there is one place that is safe for me to believe that I have a certain beauty to offer and that is in my marriage.

At first I thought my darling boy (aka SweetP) was just deluded by love/lust and couldn’t see what was in front of his eyes.

After the relationship had passed that early romantic “love is blind” phase and settled into a more ponderous “normality”, I assumed he was just plain lying to shut me up and “make me feel better”!  I assumed that’s what he thought he “should” do.  While on one hand I appreciated the effort, I actually wished he’d be more real and honest.

And so it went on.

Years down the track when we at last started having conversations with shared and growing intimacy, I discovered that I’d been doing the poor guy a disservice all these years!

He actually honestly believes I am beautiful.

The Eye of the Beholder

He believes I am beautiful because beauty to him is a mix of the visible and invisible, the physical and the mental, the behaviours and the qualities.

35 years later, he’s still entranced by a glimpse of a voluptuous curve of breast as much as he’s entranced by a capacity to understand the workings of my own and other’s complex human brains.

He’ll trace the lines around my eyes and remember the many laughs that have embedded those creases into the structure of my face.

He’s as stunned by a talent for engaging others and making them feel special, as he is by his private view into the woman behind the mask with all her vulnerabilities and so much love to share.

So these days while I might loathe looking in the mirror, I love to lie in his arms and can safely believe him when he tells me I am beautiful in his eyes.

That’s loving someone with all their flaws not just despite them.

So What About You?

When you’re told you’re beautiful by someone you love, what weird little conversation does that voice in your head have with you?

Do you believe your partner is beautiful?  What beauty are you talking about?

Have you ever told your lover what beauty you see in them?

Have you ever told a friend what beauty you can see in them?

Just a few days ago, a friend of mine did that.

This was part of what she told me:

you are a wonderful person

you have a heart as big as the earth!

you have so MUCH to give

you are the most inspirational, amazing woman

when you just get out of your own way!

Yes there was a bit of a kick-arse quality to the conversation! But for me the beauty of the gift she gave me was her honesty.

Just like with SweetP’s comments, I actually believed her. After many very real and honest conversations, I now KNOW how authentic she is, and have every reason to believe that she sees in me a beauty that I can’t.

Those are blessings and gifts beyond measure. No need for flowers, no need for jewels (though SweetP I do still like visiting the jeweller!) All I need is someone who can see the real me and appreciate it!

That’s beauty in all its many guises.