bodymindspiritworks   LLC

Building on strengths, dealing with shadow

Here are 12 keys to an effective, healthy relationship, drawn from a number of cross-discipline sources. The first six are "relational characteristics," describing the quality of the relationship itself. The second six are "functional characteristics," having more to do with particular relationship skills that can be learned.

Relational characteristics

1. Equality, mutuality, respect
   Discover what each partner is called to do; find a hurt and heal it, find an hope and help make it so. Share tasks together. Respect each other's privacy. Insist on an equal "balance of power" in the relationship. "Mutuality" means that roles and expectations are flexible rather than rigidly defined: they can and they do change as need requires. "Equality" means not only that there is a balance of power in the relationship, but also that both partners are mature and their psychological/emotional "centers of gravity" are pretty much in the same place. Some aspects of respect include faithfulness, acceptance, honor. In a healthy relationship, partners have a broad base of shared values along with the ability to accept differences when they are not critical to the relationship or to either partner.
   
   
2. Genuine affection
   When partners feel and express genuine affection for one another, they are intimately open to each other and available to each other, body, mind and spirit. It's difficult to maintain a relationship when one partners does not particularly like the other no matter how many of the other "keys" are present.
   
   
3. Attention
   Plan for daily skin time and eye contact. Eat together. Be in each other's presence for a reasonable amount of time each day. Important factors here are privacy - intention - quantity. Share unstructured time where the focus is on each other and not on something "out there." A full calendar, no privacy together, or many distractions, all communicate "there is no space for you."

   Try this: give your partner your undivided attention a minimum of fifteen hours each week, using the time to meet his or her most important emotional needs. Once you have identified each other's most important emotional needs, your next step is to learn to meet them in ways that feel like love to your partner.

   Common emotional needs: affection conversation recreational companionship honesty and openness sexual fulfillment physical attractiveness financial support support and help with tasks family commitment admiration

   Pay attention to your partner.
   Do a daily check-in and share your day.
   Enjoy the simple pleasure of each others company and do things the easy way.

4. Honesty/Trust
   Reveal to your partner as much information about yourself as you know;
   your thoughts, feelings, habits, likes, dislikes, personal history, daily activities,
   and plans for the future. Bend over backwards to give all the information,
   not just the information that will lead to judgement in one particular direction. Period.

   This policy chunks down into four parts:
   

   Emotional honesty:
   Reveal your emotional reactions, both positive and negative, to the events of your life, particularly to your partner's behavior.
   
   
   Historical honesty:
   Reveal information about your personal history, particularly events that demonstrate personal weakness or failure.
   
   
   Current honesty:
   Reveal information about the events of your day. Provide your partner with a calendar of your activities,
             with special emphasis on those that may affect your partner.
   
   
   Future honesty:
   Reveal your thoughts and plans regarding future activities and objectives.

5. Integrity/wholeness
   Bring all of who you are, and all of who you are becoming, into the relationship. This includes being emotionally and physically accessibility, both partners. Each partner is generously available to the other. Love is something to be given freely and whole-heartedly.
   
   
6. Transcendence
   Expect and find the magic and miracle in your relationship! Is there joy, delight, playfulness in being together? Is making love fun? Is each partner able to become/ to be more of who they really are in the context of the relationship? Can the two together become much more than either could ever have done on their own? Is there a sense of sacramental living and working in the relationship? Does the relationship feel like "home?" Is there a sense of "being in love" with each other?.
   
   

Functional characteristics

1. Safety
   This is so basic it should be mandatory. Includes physical, emotional and spiritual safety. Safety at the least means absence of withholding, coercion, "emotional blackmail," or any kind of abuse (physical, emotional, spiritual). Safety acknowledges that neither partner's "yes" really means yes unless their "no" really means no.
   
   
2. Effective communication/interpersonal skills
   Discuss the inevitable problems and concerns of your relationship in ways that are helpful and allow each partner space to experience their own thoughts and feelings. Good communication skills include "active listening," using "I-messages" to communicate personal thoughts and feelings without projecting or blaming the other.
   
   
3. Effective Decision Making Process
   The Policy of Joint Agreement: Never do anything without an enthusiastic agreement and mutual consent between you and your partner.

   Both partners' interests are considered simultaneously. One does not suffer for the benefit of the other. "Enthusiastic, unanimous agreement" will help partners remember to consult with each other to make sure they are not being the cause of each other's unhappiness. It makes negotiation unnecessary. Good negotiation skills are critical when the going gets difficult.

4. Several excellent recreational activities
   Too many activities exhaust a relationship. Too few make the relationship feel like too much work. Choose a few activities which both partners enjoy. Include friends. Make plans for activities that fit within the context of the relationship.
   
   
5. Supportive environment
   The condition of a living space communicates what the persons in the relationship think of themselves. Is there enough room for shared activity as well as privacy for each partner? Is the home kept well? Is it cluttered or orderly? Does the living environment reflect the qualities of peace, assurance, gratitude, love as well as the personalities and tastes of each partner?
   
   
6. Shared Responsibility
   Share tasks together, all the big and little things that keep a relationship and a household together and running smoothly. Each partner carries their part of the load but both together take responsibility for it all. Responsibilities can be flexible and can change as time and circumstances change. In a healthy relationship, who is responsible for what is talked about and decided by both partners, and not simply assumed by either.
   
   

When all six of the "relational characteristics" are in place, the level of health and satisfaction in a given relationship is likely to be high. Note that the presence of the "relational" characteristics serves only to increase the level of satisfaction and delight in a relationship, they will not "zero out" or counterbalance dissatisfaction or dysfunction caused by the absence of "functional characteristics."

To be healthy, a relationship will also have at least four out of the six "functional characteristics" well in place. Absence of more than two of these characteristics may be a source of dissatisfaction. Note that the presence of these characteristics serves only to reduce the levels of dissatisfaction in a relationship, their presence does little to actually increase levels of satisfaction and delight.

These 12 keys assume a basic level of emotional and psychological health with each partner. When one or both partners carry significant emotional or psychological wounds (shadow), or behave in ways that indicate the need for significant emotional growth or psycho-emotional healing (psychotherapy), the brokenness will be "acted out" and sometimes even carried by the relationship, and it will be difficult or impossible for that relationship to be healthy. When there are unspoken, tacit dependencies and unhealthy (for one partner or both) emotional agreements in a relationship, too much remains hidden for the relationship to be healthy and fulfilling. Dealing with the "shadow" aspects of persons and relationships is critically important. Simply put, "shadow" is everything we lie about to ourselves, anything about ourselves that we have disowned and now may see, or project, onto others.

Shadow elements can be minor or serious and are present in every person and every relationship to some degree, and the matter of degree is important. Neither the relational characteristics nor the functional characteristics can get at the shadow, and their presence in a relationship can, in fact, actually mask shadow elements even further because the relationship has the appearance of health. Serious shadow elements can bring down a relationship that seems to have everything else going for it.

Within a reasonable range, a healthy relationship can become the crucible in which each partner has the safety, the support, and the love enough to confront each other in compassionate ways so that shadow elements can be owned and re-integrated. Each partner becomes healthier, and the relationship itself becomes healthier and more fulfilling.

Beyond that reasonable range, however, shadow elements can devastate relationships and the persons in them. The extent to which both partners continue to own and integrate shadow aspects of themselves is the extent to which the relationship can be healthy. When one or both partners continue to stay in denial about their own shadow, or bring serious shadow elements into the relationship, (personality disorders, addictions of any kind, post-traumatic stress disorders, sociopathic behaviors or other psychiatric disorders), there is too much for any relationship to bear and inappropriate to expect as much.

In a healthy relationship, both partners can thrive and grow and become more of who they are, and the relationship itself grows and deepens as well. There is greater capacity for trust and intimacy, a greater sense of safety, and a greater likelihood for healthy transcendent experiences that bring joy and delight. There are always the issues of everyday life, of course, but they are dealt with in an effective way even when it may be embarrassing to admit having made mistakes. Each person is capable of owning their part in the difficulty, owning their own feelings and tendencies, admitting when they are wrong, and forgiving the other when it is clear that a mistake was made and it's time to get on with life and be wiser for it. Patterns of behavior tend to be constructive ones.

In an unhealthy relationship, one partner can be relatively "OK" only at the expense of the other person or the relationship. Or the relationship can be "OK" only at the expense of one or both of the partners. All three cannot be "OK" at the same time because it takes the energy of two to prop up the third. Put simply, when significant shadow is present in one or both partners or in the relationship, there is no safety; honesty and trust do not have a chance; and openness and intimacy are simply too dangerous because there is a monster in the closet. More often than not, one partner begins to absorb and accommodate the dysfunction of the other, and the relationship becomes a place of having to walk on eggshells. One or both partners are incapable of admitting they are wrong about something, incapable of empathy with the other person's experience, incapable of sincere apology, and incapable of any real change of behavior because the shadow elements driving the behavior are all still present. There may still be transcendent moments in the relationship, but they tend only to intensify the energy of the disowned shadow elements. Patterns of behavior tend t be destructive ones: selfish demands, denial, disrespectful judgments, angry outbursts, annoying habits, independent behavior inconsiderate of the other, dishonesty, emotional blackmail. With these destructive patterns present, it is extremely difficult for a relationship to be a source of joy, renewal and fulfillment.

© Thomas D'Alessio
Draft in progress
January 2008