Blog – Page 41

Collapsed, Rigid or Healthy Boundaries

January 13, 2014 by @candesscampbell

“No” is a complete sentence.” ― Anne Lamott

Entering into the New Year, we find ourselves playing more, exercising and getting fit, eating better, spending time with old friends, and meeting new friends. Often though with amazing technology we also connect through our phones and computers, using social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and dating sites.

In my mental health counseling office, recently a client shared with me she saw her boyfriend change his relationship status on Facebook from single to being in relationship with another woman. A different client shared she couldn’t create a separate email from her husband because he checked her phone everyday to see who she texted and emailed.

A woman I know met a man on line and fell in love. They talked on the phone and Skyped for months and then he had a crisis and needed some financial support. She sent him money and didn’t hear from him again.

These situations lead me to reflect on the impact technology has on boundaries. It appears there is an intimacy created online that is not grounded in reality. Take this opportunity to assess your own boundaries.

Do you have rigid, collapsed or healthy boundaries?

Are you more likely to allow others to cross your boundaries or do you cross others boundaries?

Do you find you get too close to people physically and you see them back away?

Do you find yourself alone in a corner in a group and not reaching out to others?

Note that the way you set your boundaries changes over time. You also may behave differently depending on the situation and how you feel at the time. This is a general guideline you can use.

Collapsed Boundaries can be identified by:

Sharing too much personal information too soon.
Saying yes when you want to say no for fear of rejection.
Doing anything to avoid conflict.
Having a high tolerance for abuse.

Rigid Boundaries can be identified by:

Saying no to a request if it will involve close interaction.
Staying so busy you don’t take time for intimate relationships.
Being unable to identify you own feelings, wants or needs.
Making little self-disclosure and holding people at a distance.

Healthy Boundaries can be identified by:

Having the ability to say yes and to say no.
Being able to hear no from others and seek other resources to get your needs met.
You reveal information about yourself gradually and self-disclose appropriately.
You have relationships with shared responsibility for the relationship without blaming.

Check out the detailed Boundary Self-Assessment.

Listen to What you Say

January 12, 2014 by @candesscampbell

Although I love social media, when using it, we often make connections that are more about quantity than quality. Hopefully, the relationships you create can meet your emotional needs as well as your other needs.

When you are actually in the presence of someone you can deepen the communication. Deepening relationships is important to emotional health. What happens is, when you let people get to know you, you begin to know yourself. When you hear yourself share, you hear yourself share!

When I taught my Intuitive Mastery Class yesterday, I heard myself say, “I don’t let many people work in my energy field. Not all healers are the same.” We were talking about Reiki and other forms of energy healing. As I thought about it later, I realized that I sounded judgmental and I decided to look at whether I was being judgmental, protective of my students, or both. What I could have said was, “when you study to become an energy healer or a Reiki practitioner, it is important you do the emotional work and learn to keep your energy field clean. Also, when receiving energy work, discern whether or not the energy healer is the best fit for you.” These statements would have been more positive. Listening to myself when teaching assisted me in taking inventory of my attitude and speaking in a clear, loving manner.

Another incidence was in conversation with a dear friend of mine. She asked me if I realized I said, “do you know what I mean?” over and over. I began listening for this and had a difficult time hearing it. When we Skyped for an hour one day, she pointed it out to me. I said it so many times it was nauseating! I began to listen to myself and hopefully have learned not to keep asking, “Do you know what I mean!”

Listen to yourself and share with me on my Facebook blog posts!

5 Love Languages to better Communication

January 11, 2014 by @candesscampbell

Gary Chapman in his book The Five Love Languages teaches us to understand what makes us feel loved and what makes our loved ones feel loved. The five languages are 1) Words of Affirmation 2) Quality Time 3) Gifts 4) Acts of Service and 5) Physical Touch.

Have you ever had a friend who continually is asking for validation? A current or past love who is always touching you as you walk by, rubbing your shoulders, cuddling when you watch a movie? Someone who shops and is buying themselves gifts all the time? These may be clues to their love language.

If your mother’s love language is quality time, getting her a gift certificate for massage would not excite her the way taking her to an off-Broadway play would.

If you have a friend whose love language is Acts of Service, making her a book of coupons for services such as babysitting or yard work may be more important to her than getting her a new scarf.

If your loved one’s first love language is physical touch, you may want to plan a quiet evening alone and give each other foot rubs with a sensual essential oil.

You can take an online test at http://fivelovelanguages.com/ to find out your own love language. Let your family and friends know what your love language is and in doing this you may be able to explore theirs as well.

You may find you score high on a few love languages. Let your loved ones know this and how they would express this to you. My highest score is Acts of Service, although Quality Time and Physical Touch are close behind. When I think of this I remember a boyfriend who built a fence around my yard and how loved I felt. More recently friends wrote reviews for my book and it was the greatest expression of love they could have given me. The photo is of my dear friend David Sandoval, M.D., an immunologist, who wrote an incredible review that is now on the back of my book 12 Weeks to Self-Healing: Transforming Pain through Energy Medicine.

Being the Pole – A Relationship Tool

January 10, 2014 by @candesscampbell

Relationships are fluid and changing all the time. Communication is often a challenge and keeping up with the shifting can be disconcerting. In this video I teach you to “Be the Pole.” It is a great way to stay stable when you have a partner that is either reactive or changing their minds continually. Enjoy!

Getting through your Thick Skull!

January 9, 2014 by @candesscampbell

“I think it was when I ran into Kerouac and Burroughs – when I was 17 – that I realized I was talking through an empty skull… I wasn’t thinking my own thoughts or saying my own thoughts.”

– Allen Ginsberg

“I can’t get it through your thick skull,” a character on a TV show says. What does it mean? Being a writer, I often listen for sayings and I wonder where they came from.

Have you ever talked with someone and you shared with her as clearly as you can, and when she responded, what she said had nothing to do with what you said?

Communication can be difficult when your head is full of your own thoughts. You are stuck in your own perspective and you can’t seem to find room for how anyone else sees the world.

What happens for all of us is we tend to defend ourselves by taking a stand on something. We see it our way, and close down our minds to other possibilities. In part, this can be a survival tool; to not become so sensitive to all that is happening around, and to just focus on our task. In relationship though, this can be frustrating and derisive. Have you ever heard two people sharing with each other and you could see both sides, but they could not see the others point at all?

I remember an old 1970’s TV episode of All in the Family, with Archie and Edith Bunker. In this episode, they were discussing politics. Archie was irate when he found out Edith had voted for the opposing candidate from Archie’s. All he could see was his vote didn’t count. She had cancelled it out. They went round and round and he could not understand her vote had nothing to do with his. He would never understand this of course.

We all have this tendency to “have a thick skull” at times. Being a reader, I love seeing the world from other people’s perspective, especially other cultures. How I am in close relationship, well, that may be a different story.

The goal of course is to try to see situations from the other person’s perspective. This can be done in the privacy of your own mind. You don’t have to give up your position. Once you do practice seeing the other point of view though, it becomes easier. You don’t have to agree with the opposing view, but being open to hearing it and understanding why one would see it that way helps strengthen relationship.

Since I mentioned liking to read books that take on a different perspective, I’ll share three of my favorites. Enjoy!

Poisonwood

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

Stones from the River by Ursula Hegi

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese

Listen before it’s Too Late!

January 8, 2014 by @candesscampbell

“Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.”

― Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

It is an enlightening view, sitting in my chair in my office as a mental health counselor. I am honored to sit with clients as they share about their lives and their relationships. In this process, I see themes unfold.

We have ended the year and are into the New Year. As I look ahead at new beginnings, it reminds me of one of the most common themes. When working with couples, I notice that, for most, by the time they enter my office, it’s too late.

Too often one of them attempted continually to communicate with the other, without being heard. Sadly, I watch their last attempt to keep the marriage together. The partner, let’s say the man, who has not really heard, but has listened as if she was nagging or on a rampage over something, finally understands. It is too late now for him to realize that what she was saying was important. So important, that the marriage is now over. I see him groveling and trying to make sense of it all. In the safety of another person (me) she says, “I’m sorry, but it is just too late.”

Many of us have ended relationships before the New Year. I remember myself, many years ago, sitting outside Nordstroms, having coffee with my lover on December 29^th. I said, “I am sorry, but it’s over.” This was difficult to say and it was painful. I had felt though, that what I said over and over, didn’t matter and I was “pushing the river,” in order to create a change for us. It didn’t work. Once I was honest and ended the relationship; although painful, it was also exhilarating.

When I am with clients and they are suffering over a relationship, I often ask, “when did you first know this was not the right situation for you?” More than I would like to hear, they say, “in the beginning.” If not, they knew years before they decided to make a change.

Whether it be a love relationship, a work relationship or a family situation, “when you begin to lose your voice, your self-esteem, your sense of personal power; it is time to make some kind of a shift.”