When it comes to relationships, one can find lots of “how to” information on the Internet. Having “steps” are fine, the issue is, being able to take the action to implement them. For years, I struggled with not feeling authentic within my relationships, not feeling like I was understood or supported, that I didn’t “belong” or much too often dealing with contention and strife — just too much judgment and self-centeredness going on, on both sides of the fence. By the way, since we “take our self with our self” wherever we go, this can apply to business and personal relationships. A major piece to the missing puzzle for great relationships is understanding the power of perception and the role of how we see our self in relationship to others and the world in general. Science is showing how we are “making up” the meaning to our life and relationships as we go, which makes sense considering we interpret the world according to how we “see” it. We don’t see the world objectively; we see it subjectively based on the way we are conditioned by our environment, those around us, and I’ll add our life purpose and lesson. Our brain is the filter between the seen and unseen, spiritual/energy world. Our consciousness and how we relate to others must go through our own filters which is why loving ourselves is so important. If we reject our self and act without compassion to self, we distort how we relate to others. Just use some practical “common sense” here — if you feel insecure, self-conscious and compare yourself to others, you will likely walk into a room full people more concerned with how you look and act than if you were comfortable with who you are — it just makes sense. Yet, people often seem to get offended and assume the worse, like you have to be a selfish, narcissistic maniac just to talk about “loving self”. Since we are constantly projecting our views onto the screen of life, what this tells me is the person who is offended by talking about “self-love” likely is dealing with self-rejection in some form. Otherwise “love and accept yourself” would not be such an upsetting concept. It would just be another voice in the landscape in life, for example. So, in a nutshell, a major block to great relationships is not having a great relationship to our self. Another common way we sabotage relationships if we are unaware is to stereotype to feel “safe”. Stereotyping will severely limit healthy relationship and networking potential. Stereotyping can be about group behaviors or how we see ourselves, such as “men are masculine, women are feminine”, when in reality, masculine and feminine are qualities, not genders. For example, the left-brain is “masculine” and the right-brain is “feminine” in its characteristics and both men and women have both sides. The question is, just how capable we are in using them as we need to uniquely call upon the quality in moment-to-moment situations. Then a third way that we block great relationships is to go into them trying “to get”. As we heal our misperceptions that block our true personal power, we naturally flow and glow with more confidence and abundant attitudes. We will naturally seek to give and the flow of this is to naturally receive. As we take the pressure off of others to meet our expectations, we will paradoxically find our expectations being fulfilled more often than not — this is the flow of giving and receiving. If we find ourselves around “takers” who don’t give back, when we feel secure in ourselves we are more likely to release these people from our lives and let them be so that we can find new relationships that support us in our growth in a way that is mutually beneficial instead of dysfunctional. We teach others how to treat us. So in summary, these 3 well-kept secrets to great relationships are: 1. Love and accept yourself and you will be healthier to love others. 2. Open your mind and stop stereotyping others and placing these types of limits on yourself as well. 3. Intend to give from a healthy, unattached/less needy heart and open your heart to receive without “needing” others fit into the box of what you want them to be (This will likely require learning how to “retrain your brain”). Since all other human interactions unfold from the “home base” of our self, and many if not most people refuse to deal with their own inner dramas, these very dramas get played out in our relationships with others (It’s called “projection”). This goes back to “mindset with skill set” once again if you want to be able to apply those “steps” that you learn in relationship seminars; there is no avoiding it. We attract who we are in general, what we need to learn and grow through and life is full of lots of ways to grow. The key to navigating with wisdom and finesse is to learning how to quiet your mind, get present to your thoughts and feelings by learning how to manage the power of your own brain wisely and learn how to release the perceptions that are creating so much relationship havoc. Any thoughts to share?