relationship stages tagged posts

September 5, 2024,  Family, Life, Love, Relationship, Relationship Tips  No comments

The ultimate goal for every relationship is “happily ever after.” When you are at this stage, you just know in your heart that it is exactly where you should be. It really is about forever and knowing in your heart that it will never be any other way.

This stage is about being independent of and interdependent with your partner at the same time. It is where the two of you, your separate “me’s,” exist side by side and the “we” becomes the concrete that binds you. It is the place where the two of you have the capacity to achieve even more together than separately.

A study done with sled dogs symbolizes the unbelievable power of couples in this stage of their relationship...

May 8, 2024,  Family, Fundamental Human Needs, Life, Love, Relationship, Relationship Tips  No comments

The third relationship stage is about discovering not only who you can be as a couple, but who you can be as an individual within it.

When you can resist the pull back to the stage of exclusive attachment, you can reestablish your own identity, which must exist independently of your relationship if it is to be a healthy one.

Where, Exactly, Do I Begin and End?

Therefore, this stage is about you moving from an undifferentiated “we” back to an individual “me.”

In this stage, the “we” part of you continues to be reassessed, while the balance continues to tip more and more in favor of each partner’s further exploration of their separateness within the relationship...

March 29, 2024,  Family, Life, Love, Relationship, Relationship Tips  No comments

The second relationship stage that normal, healthy couples pass through is one of rediscovering their differences and managing the uneasiness that comes with it. Despite what you believed in Stage 1, there really are differences between you. These deserve to be recognized and celebrated.

Eventually, as each of you begins to reemerge from the couple bubble that first encapsulated you, differences between you begin to surface and expose themselves more clearly.

Parts of you or your partner that may have been quiet or unrecognized begin to emerge. The three D’s—disenchantment, disillusionment, and disappointment, arise as you now become more aware of each other’s imperfections—maybe even for the first time.

And as the Honeymoon concludes and replaced with some disillusion...

February 27, 2024,  Counselling, Family, Life, Love, Relationship, Relationship Tips  No comments

The first stage of a relationship is a time of exclusive attachment. It creates such a strong connection that it seems that the couple cannot survive separately. The honey bee has the same attachment to a flower where both the bee and the flower benefit. For the bee it’s pollen to make honey and for the flower it’s a way of being pollinated by another as the bee hops from flower to flower.

Now you’re not a honey bee but the relationship between two people when they first meet can be similar in that they become so close that all their attention is focused on each other, often to the exclusion of everyone, and everything else.

The first time in your life when you should have experienced this was in your relationship with your mother when you were first born...

January 30, 2024,  Counselling, Fundamental Human Needs, Life, Love, Relationship, Relationship Tips  No comments

This is why rebound relationships generally do not work. When a relationship ends, you need time to grieve. Even if you were the one who decided to separate, you still need time to heal and to learn your lessons. The lessons are not just about relationships, either, but about yourself. You don’t want to duplicate the mistakes you made that shattered the previous relationship.

I also repeatedly hear stories of couples separating because one partner or the other has “found someone else.” That the new relationship could possibly work out is a fantasy. First, the new relationship is created within a context where one of the former partners (and most often, the new third party as well) is still in a relationship...

March 13, 2019,  Counselling, Exercise, Life, Love, Relationship, Relationship Tips  No comments

I use the acronym TOUCH to remember the five ways of funding my love bank.

T is for Time

Relationships aren’t part-time arrangements. And, if your relationship is fed on left-over time (the time you have after everything else has been done), your love bank will very quickly be depleted.

Your relationship must take priority over everything else (other than yourself). You come first, your partner comes second. Your family is third, your work is next, and finally there are your extended family and other friendships beyond that.

This is not to say that you can’t work because you must always be with your family. It just means that you must always keep your family’s needs in mind if you are doing something of lower priority (like working)...

March 22, 2017,  Family, Fundamental Human Needs, Games People Play, Relationship, Script  No comments

Tamara and Alex’s Games

Things need to be clear in order to be understood. By clear I mean the background story and the connection to the current issues to it need to be understood to fully comprehend what the current issues are about before responding.

Usually issues come up when something far distant in the past which has nothing to do with current issue impacts on the resolution and/or even the understanding. Consequently, what you might think about a situation will often be the exact opposite of what I think about it.

Understanding and being clear about each other’s past helps build the future of the relationship better and can prevent issues from occurring.

Each relationship has its stages and it’s important to recognize the stage and its needs.

In fact, to be in a happy relati...

January 25, 2016,  Events  No comments

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If you would like to attend the seminar please ring 02 99978518 or email admin@northernbeachescounselling.com.au with the words: “Yes I would like to attend the seminar”.

Some excerpts from my workshops.

July 23, 2015,  Family, Games People Play, Relationship  No comments

Adam and Emily had been in a relationship for two years and were contemplating marriage. The issue however was that they could never agree on anything and even less so when the conversation turned to how they might fulfill their marriage vows.

Adam was an only child growing up and was used to having most things he wanted without having to share with siblings. He was fun loving and ambitious and well-liked by his mates and work colleagues. Emily was the youngest of five children and so was used to speaking loudly to have her voice heard at all.

Adam and Emily met at a work function where they immediately “hit it off” and became great friends. It wasn’t long before they decided that because they were spending so much time at each other’s place they might as well move in together...

July 8, 2015,  Family, Relationship  No comments

I will try to focus your thoughts on the word “balance“. What does it mean to you?

We can all agree that the balance can be a financial, emotional, behavioural and even professional one. But which one of these characteristics has the strongest influence over the person’s feeling of happiness?

To the greatest extent the burden of the meaning of “balance” falls most significantly on your relationship with your partner. Most of the people in my office say that if they feel balanced in their relationship at home then they achieve unprecedented heights at work.

Why is it that way?

It is because every human being needs a centre to balance their social hardships...