Connections

Day 153

“The best way to call upon your better selves, is for me to show you my best self.”

– Rajni Kurichh

As I reflected on how nice it was to reconnect with a friend last weekend, I thought maybe I should write a post about how we can improve our relationships with others and deepen our connections through our thinking.

I’ve been trying to write this post for two days. I don’t know why it was so hard. All I wanted to say was that the people in our lives are important, and that the connections we have with others can make a difference in our sense of belonging, and even our sense of self.

There, I said it. It only took as little time as it takes to type that paragraph, and it wasn’t hard, but it took two days of stumbling to find the words before I was able to write those few sentences. I have to wonder why. I know I don’t normally write about relationships – the main focus of my blog, and my thinking for that matter, is that we create our reality with our thoughts and beliefs, so naturally my writing is mostly centered around our relationship with ourselves – how we feel, think, and view the world around us, and how we can change anything by thinking differently.

Implicit in this way of thinking is that we can nurture, mend and flourish in our relationships with others when we put our best foot forward with our thinking – when we think the best of others, and expect the best of others, they will show up they way we see them in our minds. I think that’s what it means to be your best self. When you see the good in everything, you can’t possibly be focused on the negative.

I think that first paragraph was hard for me to get out because I couldn’t reconcile how to talk about relationships with others without talking about how our thinking shapes those relationships and for some reason, I thought I had to talk about external ways to improve your relationships and connections with others.

Now, I realize that there’s no conflict, and in fact, all of our relationships – with ourselves, with others, with God, with the Universe, with whomever and whatever, have everything to do with our thinking. It all starts with you.

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Blog Beats: That’s What Friends Are For by Dionne Warwick, Elton John, Gladys Knight, Stevie Wonder

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I’m no expert on relationships, but here’s what I know:

• Your happiness can only come from within. If you’re looking to your spouse, or children, friends, colleagues or anyone else to make you happy, you’re going to be waiting a very long time.

Happiness is a choice. You can decide to be happy despite your circumstances, and when you are, you attract more reasons to be happy.

• People show up the way you expect them to. If you don’t like the way someone treats you, take responsibility for your thoughts and beliefs about the person, or your relationship with them and clear any limiting beliefs you have. You can’t control or change what other people think or believe, so if the behavior continues after you are certain you have let go of your “negative” beliefs, then you’ve done all you can. And even then, if the relationship doesn’t improve, keep believing and seeing the person the way you want them to behave with you, eventually, your vision will become your reality.

• Love is king. If you don’t know how to begin mending a relationship, start with loving yourself. If you don’t love yourself, you can’t let go of whatever you think the problem with the relationship is because the conflict is a mirror reflection of what’s going on inside. Once you do that, you will be able to easily let the other person know how much they mean to you. Love can transform any situation and heal wounds.

“Love is the great miracle cure. Loving ourselves works miracles in our lives.”

– Louise L. Hay

• Forgive. Holding on to past hurts is more detrimental to manifesting abundance and joy in ALL areas of your life than anything else. If you think that holding a grudge against a colleague doesn’t affect how your family vacation goes, think again. If you’re holding on to negativity, you will attract more of the same in all areas of your life.

• Pause before you react. Sometimes we aren’t able to see the other person’s point of view when we are in an emotional state. Take a minute to calm down and try to see if you’re holding on to a belief that matches your experience, and then try to find another way of looking at the situation. Chances are you’re holding on to a belief that you’re not consciously aware of.

• Laugh. Laughter lightens every situation and elevates the spirit. This might be the most important factor in creating and maintaining healthy relationships, and in feeling joyful. Find the humor in life.

“Laughter gives us distance. It allows us to step back from an event, deal with it and then move on.”

– Bob Newhart

The first relationship that you must take care of is the one with yourself, like the safety guidelines on the airplane, you have to put your own oxygen mask on before assisting others. When you let go of limiting beliefs, it frees you up to see the good in those around you, and deepen the connections you have with your loved ones, which in turn reinforces your positive feelings about yourself and your place in your world.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!