Skipping the Beginning
Recently, I had the opportunity to speak with a group of women who are in the midst of a coaching program that I completed last year. The goal of the program is to grow your relationship skills and resolve the barriers that have kept you from creating a great relationship. As a graduate of the program, the women had a lot of questions for me and most of the questions centered around how I am showing up in relationships now differently than I had in the past. In the conversation though, I had a realization about myself that I hadn’t quite been able to articulate previously.
For years, I said that I wanted to jump straight to the 6th month of a relationship. I wanted to wake up one day at a space where we had toothbrushes at each other’s houses, we had a pattern to how we spent time together, we’d settled on the idea that we were each other’s person and we were just living life swimmingly. As I talked through this, I realized that this was one of my versions of an intimacy bypass. Like being emotionally slutty, this was a way for me to skip over the fear and vulnerability needed to build a relationship. My desire to jump straight to 6 months meant that I didn’t understand the importance of building a solid foundation. It takes time, energy, and presence to build that foundation. Without a foundation, you’re living in a house of cards.
As I articulated this, I reflected back on my previous relationships and I could clearly see the pattern of not building that foundation. When I would spend my time and energy future planning versus being present in the relationship, I would miss issues as they developed. When I would spend my time and energy future planning versus being present in the relationship, I wouldn’t co-create a relationship. When I would spend my time and energy future planning versus being present in the relationship, I would MISS THE GOOD STUFF! I would miss the space of getting to know someone, the times of revealing myself to someone and soaking in my partner, the joy that comes from new relationship energy and the giddy delight of choosing to love another person.
How have you handled the beginnings of relationships? What have you been willing to sink into and what have you tried to bypass?
