Episode 98: Loving Your Relationships

Our relationships are one of the most important aspects of our earth life experience. But for most of us, if we don’t currently have the relationships we want, it feels somewhat out of our control. But that is only because we don’t understand that our relationships are created entirely by the way we think.

I spent years struggling in my relationships. This all changed when I found coaching and learned three important things: our pain is always caused by our thinking and not other people’s behavior, it’s no one else’s job to make us happy, and love is not supposed to be easy. These ideas changed all my relationships and allowed me to love in ways I was never able to before.

In this episode, I interview my husband to get his perspective on how our relationship and our family life changed when I changed the way I thought about the people I love and the way I thought about myself. Coaching changed the way I experience my relationships and the amount of love I feel in my life—and it can do the same for you!

Our capacity to manage relationships is a wonderful yet incredibly challenging aspect of our human experience. The way we relate to our spouses, children, and ourselves may seem separate, but they’re interconnected by one common factor: our brain. And our brain can often come up with all kinds of thoughts that contribute to our relationships in ways we don’t want.

In this podcast episode, I welcome a special guest - my husband David. We provide two perspectives on our relationship and speak from the heart about the challenges we’ve faced in our marriage. We agree that our relationship has grown and deepened significantly as a result of thinking new thoughts, and I want to show you that your life can be transformed in the same way.

A lot of us feel that we have to change the other person for our relationships to improve, but this isn’t the answer. Today, I’m also sharing 3 fundamental principles will improve any relationship you have.

1. The only thing that causes our pain is our thinking.

We aren’t ever mad or frustrated or hurt  because of what the people in our life do….we are made or frustrated or hurt because of what we think about what they do.  This means they don’t have to change for you to feel better. 

2. No one else has the power to make you feel happy.

No one else has the power to make you feel anything. And so often we give the people we love the job of managing our emotional life….whether its by the things they say or the things they do or the ways they behave and show up. But it is never their job. Managing our emotional lives is always our job because we are the only ones that can do it.

3. We think love should be easy and it's not and it’s not supposed to be.

We think that if the relationship is "right" it should be easy, but we are 100% wrong about that. Relationships are made up of real humans. They are 50% amazing and 50% not. But this is the whole point. We can to learn to love. And that means our curriculum will include plenty of moments where it’s hard to love. We aren’t supposed to be perfect at loving.This is the work we came to do and it is work worth doing.

Mentioned on the podcast:

My group coaching program: Made for More

Sign up for a free coaching consultation

To read or download a written transcript of the entire episode, simply click the link below.