The Purpose of Relationships - Part II

Something really awesome happened to me while I was in California. Actually, many really awesome things happened but one special thing happened on April 18. And the first person I wanted to call was my partner. And in that moment I realized that THIS was the purpose of relationship. Thank you Tony Robbins, the purpose of a relationship is to magnify the human experience. Tony compares this to watching a baseball game. Yes, watching a baseball game by yourself is awesome, but it is a completely different experience when you are at the game with 250,000 other people jumping up and down and celebrating. On April 18 I celebrated by myself and did a little dance on the beach but it wasn't the same. 

I also want to celebrate HIS success. I want to feel like I’m walking into a baseball stadium when the two of us are in a room together, I want to feel as if fireworks go off when we look across the room, or when we make love, or when we celebrate. Because LIFE should be that amazing, fireworks should be going off every day! You never know what could happen, so every single day is precious and you MUST live it fully. I don’t believe we were designed nor destined to be alone. There is so much to be GAINED through having someone to share your life with, and sometimes many people choose to focus on what they imagine to be a loss.

Every single day is a new day. Every moment can be a new one in a relationship. You never have to project the past onto the present, whether it is something that happened in childhood or something that happened 2 minutes ago. 

"Can you see the possibilities a relationship offers? Explore the possibilities. Be yourself. Find a person who matches with you. Take the risk, but be honest. If it works, keep going. Let go of the past and begin every day at a higher level of love. This will keep the fire alive and make your love grow even more." - Don Miguel Ruiz

 

We are WHOLE and we are perfect exactly as we are and we are ENOUGH. I give up on saying oh boyfriends SHOULD do this or that, that’s bullshit. EVERY relationship is different and what works for one couple, might not work for another.  Some people are monogamous, some are not. Some people spend every day together, some do not. I want to CELEBRATE the magnificence of LIFE and all of the great moments I EXPECT to have. I also expect the sad times, or a difficult time, or a challenging thing to happen and then partners must “step up” for each other in those moments.

In all its simplicity for me today, I just want someone to celebrate with. Someone who reminds me who I am, holds the space and allows for me to discover myself over and over again. I want to celebrate my partner, encourage, empower, and inspire them to continue to create and enjoy their life. I am committed to love flowing out of me, giving love, being love. That when something really great happens in your life, they are the person you want to share it with. And when things that aren’t so great happen, they are there by your side.

There are sooo many quotes about love, but the one that really stood out for me was “true love is the soul’s recognition of its counterpoint in another.” All the WONDERFUL qualities you see in your partner are all things that lie within you, and same goes for all the things you DON”T like or are frustrated by! YUP you got those too. So the recognition of yourself in another. If you CONSISTENTLY celebrate your partner, celebrate their success and their life, you will celebrate your own. The best partners are the ones that fuel our capacity to love ourselves, which then INCREASES our capacity to love each other.

YOU are the one you have been waiting for

This is Part I of my reflection on self discovery and the purpose of relationships.

I am returning back to Boston after one of the most amazing, inspiring, self-reflective weeks of my entire life. I was in San Diego, California where I experienced one magical moment after another, one new idea or self discovery after another and while there were many themes that came up this week that I will write about later, the one that continued to come up over and over again was more discovery of myself. The idea that YOU are the one you have been waiting for.

I had a really amazing week in San Diego as I rediscovered myself and my passion, surrounding myself with people who fueled me, who contributed to my energy as I was committed to giving it. I felt so alive, so in my heart, so confident.

 

So long as you SEEK love, and many desperately seek this, you will NOT find what you are looking for. Because in this seeking, the attitude may be that UNTIL I find a man/woman, I am not good enough or UNLESS I have a partner, I can't confirm that I am loveable.You are most certainly allowed to want a relationship, I want one! But you can’t want one in order to confirm/solve/eliminate two of the biggest fears of human beings: 1. I am not enough and 2. I will not be loved. NO ONE will ever be responsible for confirming these things for you except YOU. I actually believe the people who are longing for a relationship the most are actually longing for a deeper connection to themselves FIRST. YOU are the one you have been waiting for.

By virtue of being exactly who you are, YOU ARE ENOUGH. YOU ARE LOVED. In fact, you were BORN worthy-your worth is intertwined with your very being. Spend as much time investing in YOURSELF as you do on dating websites and longing for love. Change your mindset and EXPECT LOVE. GIVE LOVE. BE LOVE. 

My weakest points, my most insecure points in any relationship I have been in, are when I have needed my partner to satisfy some NEED or fill some void within myself and then when that person (place or thing) didn’t meet that need, I became devastated or heartbroken or super angry or I reacted by needing more because of course, I didn't feel enough or loved!

There is a story in the book Mastery of Love by Don Miguel Ruiz (which you all should read) which essentially discusses this same idea around happiness - two people fall in love and things are great because they allow the other to be free, they have no expectations or judgments or NEED from the other, they just share in their joy and celebration of life. BUT one day the man decides to give his wife a star containing his happiness. When he places the star in her hands it shatters and the relationship ends abruptly because as soon as you place your happiness in someone else's hands, you give them the power to take it away. YOU hold within yourself the ability to be happy, with or without a partner. Stop giving your happiness to someone else and please stop letting OTHERS determine whether you are enough or loveable. 

Commit to discovering yourself over and over every day, affirming that you are enough, you are loveable and you have everything you need. Your future partner will be drawn to this and you will ATTRACT someone who is this filled up too. 

I believe the MOST amazing partners will be the ones that continuously help you discover yourself, so they would support you, challenge you, celebrate you, REMIND you who you are. They will not be someone who runs away, or someone who puts you down/criticizes you, or when you are most insecure and vulnerable they can’t handle it. The partner that can hold the space for you, lets you have your moment (because we WILL have them!) and then look at you and say “I’m going to remind you what you already know. EVERYTHING you need, EVERYTHING you are seeking lies within you.” And love you back into the place to love yourself (this really goes back to my first blog post LOVE>FEAR). Every unsuccessful relationship I have experienced is when I needed my partner to satisfy most, if not EVERY need in my life. I honestly don’t think partners are supposed to satisfy any need (and maybe that’s naïve, because you certainly have to be selective and honest about whether someone is right for you or if they are what you want). 

Do you know what you want? I want the one who makes my heart sing, the one who is aligned with the way I am, the one who loves me just as I am. Once you accept yourself just the way you are, the next step is to accept your partner. If one of you has a bad moment or an emotional crisis, your agreement is to allow each other to be what you are. The right person for you is the one you love just as they are, the one you don't have to change at all.

When YOU fill yourself up you will be that much more capable of giving to your partner and when you are FULL you will be more able to determine what and who it is that you want. Who will CONTRIBUTE to your life, add to your greatness. Fill you with energy rather than deplete it. Who you want to celebrate with. 

YOU ARE ENOUGH. YOU ARE LOVED. AND YOU ARE FREAKING FANTASTIC.

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life

“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.”

 – Melody Beattie

Gratitude: The quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness

Today's theme was gratitude and I hope that remains the theme every day. For you and for me.

Tonight I watched the sunset over the ocean in Del Mar, California. The picture is the one I took today. I spoke out loud with my friend the things that I was grateful for. We played a game where we went back and forth and I could have gone on for hours. What am I NOT grateful for? My list went something like this: I am grateful to be sober. I am grateful to have choices. I am grateful for two arms and two legs that allow me to move about freely, to work out, to run, hop, jump, skip, and walk. I am grateful for my family, I am grateful for my amazing friends and all the friends I have yet to meet. I am grateful for my job. I am grateful that I wake up every morning and I love who I am. I am grateful for my life in Boston. I am grateful for the sun. I am grateful for yoga. I am grateful for a safe place to go home to, for a roof over my head and food in my stomach and clean water to drink. I am grateful for YOU. I am grateful to love, to give love and receive love...

My life is unbelievable today. Not because of the “things” I have, not because of money in the bank and not because of anything I have achieved. My life is unbelievable because I wake up every day without shame, or regret, or dread. I wake up every day happy to be who I am, excited to be living my life! I aim to be of service to others, to be a light in the world and I know today that my purpose is to give back what has been freely given to me. 

My life has not been easy, and it's not meant to be. Where is the growth in "easy?" There is none. Life is meant to be messy and difficult and challenging because it is in these moments that you grow. For as much messiness and difficulty, there is just as much, if not MORE, love, joy, happiness, and excitement. Every single one of my experiences has led me to become the woman that I am today. I believe today that everything that has happened to me up until this point is because God wanted me to grow, become strong and then be able to share it. To inspire, empower, encourage and motivate others to courageously create the life of their dreams. Because I am living mine.

"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life, it turns what we have into enough and MORE.” The FULLNESS of life! What is life about to you? What does it mean to you? If you are not grateful for what you have, it doesn't matter what MORE you get, it will never be enough! I never stopped to enjoy the things I had been creating or achieving, when I was drinking; I never paused and thanked the spirit of the universe for all that had been given to me.

So much of my life I focused on all the things I DIDN’T have, or instead of celebrating the success of others in my life I just got angry or jealous about how that wasn’t happening to me. 3 years ago gratitude was NEVER a part of my vocabulary. And now today, when I become fearful, or insecure, I can change my focus and recognize all the gifts that I have in my life, how blessed I am, how honored I am to be in the lives of my friends and that I am going to be able to coach and spend the rest of my life dedicated to being of service. That I want EVERYONE to succeed, everyone to be living their dream, everyone to wake up fulfilled and living a life of purpose. 

When I focus on what I do have, when I focus on where it is that I am going, the world looks a lot different. You can change your focus in an instant, in a SECOND. So pause, reflect, and recognize all of the gifts in your life. Be grateful for everything that you do have, everything that is to come, I am grateful for possibilities and I am grateful for YOU, for your participation, your creativity, your magnificence, your spirit, your contribution to the world by just being exactly who you are. May you find the light within you today and always. YOU are the one you have been waiting for. 

In love and service,

Catherine
Your Second Chance Coach
Second Chance Coaching