Transforming Your Relationships Sheldon Z. Kramer, Ph.D. Beginning Steps Being in a relationship is the most challenging task you will attempt in your life. It takes a lot of work, perseverance, commitment, and openness. In the debut article of this column, I will show you basic ideas to begin your relationship journey. Look at Yourself. To change relationships you need to return to a state of balance. The first step is taking responsibility for changing your own reactions, rather than focusing on your partner's weaknesses. You can't change your partner without changing yourself first. Your partner may have many difficulties that turn you off. All relationships have problems. However, to change your relationship, you need to be completely honest with yourself about your OWN relational triggers. For example, if someone is critical and blaming, and your response is to be critical back, the exchange could spiral off into an argument. Stop! Look at yourself here. Not at your partner. Are YOU overly critical? Is being critical your main style of reacting to criticism? This could be the your beginning step toward self exploration and change. If the answer is yes, to change your own reactivity, it is helpful to cultivate emotional qualities that counterbalance your tendency to be critical. Make a list of emotional qualities to counterbalance your tendency to be critical in response to someone's criticism of you. To get you started, here are some possibilities: receptivity openness tolerance patience If one of these qualities fits for you, a beginning step is to practicing it. If your partner becomes critical, and you find yourself beginning to react, STOP. Here are the steps: Take some deep breaths. This will help calm your nervous system. In your mind, say the quality you are trying to embrace (tolerance) over and over again. Practice being tolerant by getting an image in your mind's eye of someone you know or admire who is tolerant. Make sure your facial and bodily reactions match the picture in your head. Say something that expresses tolerance. For example, "I hear you", "I'm listening" or "I want to understand what you're saying." Working on yourself has the ability to transform not only yourself, but your partner too. In fact, don't be surprised if your close intimate acts nicer toward you as you begin to balance yourself. ---------- Transforming Your Relationships Sheldon Z. Kramer, Ph.D. This is the second article in a series about relationships. You may want to read the first article, Transforming Your Relationships as well. Relaxing Yourself One of the main keys to transforming relationships is to learn how to be more attentive to your close intimate. If you are in a fast, quick-paced lifestyle, you need to learn how to slow down and provide full attention to your partner. Many times people who are close to you may get angry with you, not so much at what you say but how you act. Many arguments can start because your partner may think you are inattentive. Many times you can be already formulating your verbal responses to your partner, before he or she is finished stating what is wanted from you. You need to learn to achieve gentle attentiveness, and openness before your relationship can transform. One major way to prepare yourself to receive your close intimate is to slow down your mind-body. The best way of achieving quick results is by using relaxation techniques. It's been scientifically proven to be a major technique for quickly slowing down the nervous system. This can decrease your stress as well as rapidly change the quality of your relationships. It would be helpful to audiotape the following exercises. They are ways to practically relax and prepare to receive your partner. Here are the steps: Focus on breathing through your nose. Allow the air of the in-breath and out-breath to flow through your nostrils. Feel the subtle sensations beneath the nose as you breathe. Let your mind rest on this one point. If you find yourself being distracted, blow a little harder through your nose and, once again, focus on the inhale and exhale of your breath and your nostrils. Focus your attention to the top of your head. Feel the sensations on top of your head; experience them without judgment, maintaining an observing position. Gradually, move your attention to your forehead and the back of your head. Just observe the sensations. Slowly move your attention to your cheeks, nose, and mouth. Bring your attention to your neck. Experience the sensations around your neck. Focus now on your upper back and chest. Experience the sensations in these areas of your body. Move your attention to your heart area, in the middle of your back, and chest. Slowly bring your attention to your stomach and lower back. Experience the sensations emerging there. Move your attention to your rear and genital area. Bring your attention through the upper parts of your legs, slowly; keep focusing on your breathing while you are doing this exercise. Move your attention down through your legs and, eventually to your feet. Slowly bring your attention upward from the bottom of your feet. After you have achieved moving your attention from your head down to your feet, the next step is to sweep your attention upward from the bottom of your feet back to the top of your head, as follows: Slowly begin to bring your attention upward from the bottom of your feet and up through your ankles. Move your attention up through your legs, genitals, pelvis, lower back, and stomach. Continue to focus, slowly bringing your attention up to the middle of your body through your chest and back. Continue to focus on the inhale and exhale of your breath. As you are breathing deeply through your neck, focus on your mouth, nose, and cheeks. Move your attention slowly up through your forehead and back to the top of your head. Sweep your attention up and down through your body. As you continue to focus on your in-breath and out-breath of your nostrils, and as you sweep your inner body, listen to the following words: Breath is what nurtures the body. When you're tight, you're only partly nurtured so the rest of you is hungry. The more tight you get, the more you feel others should feed you. Therefore, allow your body to be relaxed while breathing. You may become aware of how you react physically to your partner. Experience how your body feels. This is a major step for you to learn how to control yourself. After listening to this exercise, continue to focus on your breathing and engage in one last step: Get a mental picture of your partner. Experience yourself, while your eyes are closed, looking at him/her with full attention, openness, and receptivity. Allow yourself to be able to receive your partner in this relaxed state of mind. This exercise is very powerful. It should be practiced, at least once a day, preferably in the morning. Doing this more than once a day, in the morning, afternoon, and evening, will create benefits more rapidly. You will find yourself not only relaxed in your work place, but you will see yourself being able to become more receptive and open to your partner. If you find yourself getting too reactive, you can always come back to your breath with your full attention focused on your partner. When you are working with achieving this receptiveness with your intimate, always remember to make eye contact. In our next column of transforming relationships, I will talk more about how to consciously utilize eye contact to further transform your relationship journey. Author Sheldon Z. Kramer, Ph.D. is a licensed Clinical Psychologist, Assistant Clinical Instructor of Psychiatry at UCSD Medical School, and Director of the Institute for Transformations. He is author of Transforming The Inner and Outer Family: Humanistic and Spiritual Approaches To Mind/Body Systems Therapy Copyright c 1996 by Pioneer Development Resources, Inc. All rights reserved