Tag Archives: relationship

Who Shoud Be Your Best Friend?

Dear reader,

I hope you have a person in your life, your significant other whom you call a friend, perhaps even a best friend. You might even have more than one and that’s fantastic, though also one isn’t too bad.

We are social beings, that goes also for those exceptions who like spending time being alone. Alone doesn’t equal lonely; i.e. with other words, we need others to feel accepted, secure, belonging, to care for them and to be cared for. But there is one catch: human beings are not very reliable and trustworthy, we can never be certain what’s going on in other person’s head and there is no such thing as “forever and ever”, “I promise and I won’t break my promise” or “I will never hurt you”.

Others don’t always behave perfectly. And nor do we. In the end many people die alone. More than half of the marriages end up in a divorce. Best friends forever become worst enemies. Siblings hate each other. And so forth. Yet still we don’t give up and we do look for connection with and to others. Other’s opinion matters. We define ourselves according to social norms, patterns, beliefs and attitudes. We all do it, even though some would not admit and would claim they are unique and don’t care about what others think (I suppose only those who don’t even bother to say anything about this matter really don’t think about it :)).

I’m noticing my inner dialogue and the words I use to talk to myself are sometimes so rude that I wouldn’t even say it out loud to the most toxic person who would actually deserve it. I’m my worst assessor, criticising every single aspect, even the ones that are actually quite fine. With others I can tolerate a lot and can accept mistakes. With me no ways. I accept failure and small steps and even encourage it, but when it comes to me, my demands and standards are literally unreachable. I reward and compliment others constantly, myself rarely. To make it short: I’m my own worst enemy.

Giving I’m an intelligent person, there must be some rationale behind it. And there is: by being your own worst judge, this guarantees you that nobody will criticise you more than you would. Nobody can hurt you more than you can. And that gives you a sense of security and control. Not insane at all.

With just one small missing gap: your inner voice becomes the words you use. Your words then become your thoughts. Your thoughts your actions. And your actions your behaviour. Long term criticism and focusing on what’s missing and what’s not good enough will make these aspects bigger, until there is nothing left but these gaps. You talk yourself into the problems, that can become your narrative and your life story. What a pity to miss all the beautiful aspects and working ones!

So I’m learning to change my inner voice. I still do agree that I should not obey the Pareto principle and not give just 80% if I am capable of giving 100%. But I don’t have to demonstrate more than others. I don’t have to impress. I don’t have to make others like me. I have to make myself like me.

Your relationship with yourself is the only relationship that will last for a lifetime. You will always be there for you, whether you like it or not. Make sure your company is welcoming and supportive. The world is cruel. And beautiful. And the only one that will completely understand what’s going on with you, is you. You are the only expert of your life. So why not being your best friend, your confidant, your nest to rest? Why not trusting your intuition? Why not letting yourself take the leading role of your life? Others surely have lots of plans for you. But it’s your life. And it’s ending one minute at the time, they say.

Sure you have and make mistakes. Who doesn’t? As long as you are alive, you’ll make mistakes. And others will too. And they are your mistakes, your chances to learn. Learning is good. Embrace it. If it’s hard, it means it’s worth it. And it also means you can do it. Your inner self is offering you a hand. Take it and hug yourself. You deserve to be happy. You deserve to be yourself. Including every aspect of yours that you are not proud of, including that lazy, fat, broken, damaged, grumpy thing you might have. You won’t make it go away by hating it. Try accepting it as an integral part of you. Your most honest and truthful friend is standing right next to you. It’s always been there for you, yet you didn’t see him or her. 

Your best friend in life is you. And it’s about time you get acquainted with them :). I must say it feels strange, but I’m kinda liking it. And surprise – others like it too!

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Picture borrowed from the web. Relax. Nobody’s perfect. Also you don’t have to be – you are already good enough.

Sugar Daddy – going out with someone who is double your age

Dear reader,

if you have a partner in your life that you love and loves you back, you have everything you need. Regardless the gender, type of love, race, status or age.

I remember when I was younger, I had this belief that I’m not interested in romance. That I would never marry. I cherished freedom way too much and couldn’t picture being attached to someone and look at them 24 hours/day till the end of my life or for the whole eternity.

I didn’t understand what love is, obviously.

Now I’m married to a man who is 29 years older than me. It’s quite a daring thing and also it has certain stereotypes attached to it. Some of them might include:

  • the older partner has a middle age crisis, is tired of the current partner and is looking for “fresh meat”
  • the younger partner needs a sponsor, so called sugar daddy/mommy
  • it’s all about the money and sex
  • it’s not going to last
  • the younger partner will eventually have other plans
  • the older partner won’t be able to keep up with the speed and aspirations of the younger one
  • they won’t have common friends
  • they won’t have a family together
  • they don’t have a future together
  • the younger partner messed up the older one’s head through sex
  • the older parter is the boss
  • the younger partner is stupid
  • having another go when you’re older than 50 makes no sense
  • etc.

I can firmly confirm that none of the above stereotypes is true in our case (and we’ve been together for over 7 years now). However they might contain some seeds of the truth.

Every relationship requires work. But this work is something you love to do, when you appreciate and enjoy your partner. It doesn’t have to be hard work, but it’s definitely work. Like a workout – if you like to do it, then it’s not hard work. If you don’t like to do it, every move and exercise is hard and annoying. My husband says his biggest regret in life was not being patient and confident enough to have waited for me, so he settled for less. And if I knew what kind of person he really was, I would accept his proposal and dive into this relationship much earlier.

In the “un-ordinary” relationships some salient traits take more attention and consciousness than they would in ordinary relationships. This doesn’t mean the relationship is any different than the other. During our time of being together, we noticed that sometimes other people had more problems with our relationship than did we. And in most of the cases, these were the people who had messy relationships themselves (you know: if I can’t do it properly, I will teach others how to do it). However we were very lucky: my friends were very happy for me when we got together and his friends were thrilled for him that he found someone to fit. Actually, I was quite surprised by their reactions, because they didn’t even bother to look at the age difference, but were genuinely happy for both of us, by seeing us happy together. They noticed the difference how we’ve been before and how we’ve become after us.

Neither of us rationally wanted this relationship. We tried to stay apart and persuaded us it wouldn’t work. As he fell in love with me, I kept telling him it will pass and didn’t believe when he told me something like this has never happened to him before. But then instead of getting out, I fell in love too. Though we tried hard to forget and even break this relationship (I even went out of the country), we couldn’t stay apart. Of course we had issues after getting together. We had to adjust, had to do the “fine tuning”. We survived and came out better. We now both agree that together we’ve become a better version of ourselves than we were before we’ve met each other. Being brought up in a society that functions through the stereotypes, of course we were both scared and full of doubts. I was scared he’s gonna change his mind, he was scared I would leave him for a younger fellow. We both didn’t trust the other, not because we wouldn’t trust per se or because we would have some contrary evidence, but because we were imbued with stereotypes, social expectations and biased in our beliefs. To confess that there was no need for a backup plan or to drive in lower gear. It took quite a while and courage to let go of all this clutter and truly confess that what we have is amazing, stable and we can finally relax, because we found the other soulmate. Once you find one, you don’t have to live your life in another way that pleases your partner, you don’t have to change who you are and you don’t have to look for a way out and find some comfort in others, because there is no need to do so. Then you actually want to be loyal, fidelity is not a problem, you want to make the other person happy and you give up some of your habits voluntarily, even before anyone asks for it. Yes, sometimes also good things happen to you and you don’t have to double or tripple check whether what you have is truly a diamond or a fake.

Sometimes people are curious and ask me what it’s like being in such a relationship with an older man. Some friends ask me for experience and advice when they find themselves in a similar situation and are not sure whether their relationship has a future or not. I’m always very grateful for their questions, so I share my experience and it is actually not that difficult and not at all different from any other relationship challenges. Do you care for that person? Can you picture your life without them? What makes it worthwhile being together with that person, what good qualities of yours does this person awake in you? Are you happy giving in this relationship (not only taking)? Do you love yourself enough so that you can be in the relationship with someone else? Are you happy when you see the other person being happy? Do you have dreams about your partner, happy dreams? If your partner had an accident or gets ill, what would you really do (not what society implies you to do)?

Who knows what will happen in the future. Probably no relationship is meant to last forever, Disney fairy tales are a huge lie and cause damage. So if you are lucky, you might find someone with whom you create a bind that makes each of you fulfilled. I don’t know whether we have only one soulmate in life. But I do know that it is very rare to find even one. Of course at the beginning of each relationship you might feel this is the one and you found it. But only time will show whether if it is really the one, once you put the pink glasses off. And in most cases, one year is not a long enough period.

I’m happy with and in my relationship and proud of my partner. Age doesn’t matter, I can confirm this. It does have a certain influence, but it doesn’t really matter. Stereotypes are important to consider and to be able to defend your relationship if they are not true and you have mean people around. But don’t worry about it too much – these people have their own problems, this is probably why they are overwhelmed with your relationship. Other people don’t matter. Your partner matters. And you matter. And those who are happy for you matter.

Good luck nourishing your un-ordinary, diverse, crazy, wild, daring, special relationships. And don’t forget to enjoy the ride!

Biba

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When you find someone that is your kind of crazy, you become a rich person.

What’s in it for me? (what to expect in a SF session?)

This is said to be one of the most important sentences for an individual when engaging someone in collaboration, a dialogue or a new relationship (either personal or professional). Although I do not completely agree with this, as I still believe that some things just do not have selfish or self-centred aims, it looks like a suitable starting point for this post. So dear reader,

If you are interested in Brief Therapy or Coaching with me, here’s what to expect in a Solution Focused session.

I believe, you have a good reason to come. You want some kind of a change. However you don’t have to know it in detail, a wish or a thought will do. Many people don’t know exactly what or why, they just know or sense they want to see some changes or something different. As mentioned in previous posts, any kind of issues or challenges might be addressed within this approach. So whatever is on your mind that you want to discuss, change, resolve, observe, think about or share, you are welcome. What we will do is that we will think through it in a solution focused way, us both being on the same site. Although I’m about to be a future licensed therapist, I’m not acting as an expert, but rather as a facilitator even though I have knowledge and expertise. This means that our relationship is based upon not-knowing. I don’t know what the best is for you so I will not tell you what you could or should do. You and only you are the expert of your life.

There are two simple rules in our conversation: I’m 100 percent responsible for asking questions that produce useful answers. And you take 100 percent credit for each useful answer. It is that simple to understand, however not so easy to perform (this is why I’m in the learning process, because if this were to be easy, no one would have to learn and practise it!).

Prior to the session you already might notice some differences. This is often the case, as a therapeutic or coaching process already starts when considering booking a session. We might talk about this. Prior to the session you might be interested in issues concerning privacy and other professional settings. I’m committed to EBTA Code of ethics (http://blog.ebta.nu/the-solution-focused-modell) and am subject to supervision in order to constantly improve myself as a therapist trainee. Therefore I’ll ask you for your permission to record the session for my supervisors. You may decline, of course. However my supervisors are not interested in content, but in my work (what my focus was on and what kind of questions I used, hence what I could do better and what I did well).

Usually the session lasts approximately one hour. About the following sessions, I rely on you to know when to stop meeting. As it is brief therapy, it is not meant to be a long term process, but I can’t tell at the moment the average number of sessions, because I don’t have enough sessions behind me to gather a proper sample from which reliable conclusions would be possible.

The effects may be immediate or shortly after the session. You’ll see it for yourself. At the end of a session I might give you some appreciative feedback about what I’ve noticed during the session. There will be no advice or goals, therefore you cannot “fail” or disappoint anyone (not yourself nor me, as there is no “homework”). I trust you will find your way and I’ll help you discover it.

How does that sound?

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This photo was taken somewhere above France, as I was flying home from Barcelona conference and had first thought about this post.