Happy Thanksgiving to all of you in the U.S.A.
You’re being bombarded by posts about gratitude and appreciation and how very important it is.
Today, I’m unapologetically adding my voice to the chorus.
Both science and woo-woo Masters such as Abraham, an entity channeled through the mortal human, Esther Hicks, point to the many benefits of gratitude and appreciation.
Now I get it. Appreciation is my final key to discovering the fullness of who I am, and to uplifting the fullness of who I am.
– Abraham-Hicks
Study after study demonstrates how simply writing a few things down for which you’re grateful has a quantifiable effect on your happiness.
Why not try it out?
Because it’s too good to be true?
If you are like me and a lot of people I know, you’ve been conditioned that you have to work hard for your success in all areas of your life.
Sometimes, maybe, you might even make things harder for yourself.
And so you resist doing simple and easy things that could create huge shifts in your life, your business and your relationship.
Like noticing and appreciating everything that’s going well.
Let’s talk appreciation and love.
Your partner needs your appreciation. You need to feel appreciated too.
This need does not make you codependent. Codependency is a word that gets thrown around a bit too often anyway, after all, the science behind love, physics and all things woo-woo shows how interconnected and interdependent we all are anyway.
The negative stuff tends to weigh heavier than the positive stuff in our relationships.
(This is true for all areas of our lives, typically.)
Dr. John Gottman found that we need at least five times as much positive interactions in our relationships than negative interactions to have some kind of happy balance. This is because we automatically give more weight to the negative stuff in our relationships (and our businesses as well).
It’s important that we start to pay attention to what’s going right.
When you consciously attend to the positive, you will get more of it.
So do some mental work and start to look at your relationship differently.
Change your perspective a little bit, and when you add expression and action to the mix, you may notice a big shift.
If for whatever reason you resist doing this, ask yourself, what’s stopping you?
A fear of vulnerability? A fear of intimacy?
Sometimes we stay in stuck places because the familiar can be comfortable.
If you’re feeling any discomfort with the idea of sending your partner “rampages of appreciation”, in the words of Abraham, that’s even more of a reason to. Start now.
If you feel unappreciated by your partner…
Know that this whole appreciation thing doesn’t come naturally or easily to many.
This is especially true for those who have never been shown appreciation by their parents or others in their lives growing up.
When I work with a couple, it’s often revealed that one partner feels one way — truly amazed, impressed and appreciative of their partner — but just assumes the other knows. Rarely is that the case unless it’s expressed.
There is a strong possibility that your quiet, seemingly unappreciative partner thinks the world of you, possibly taking it for granted that you know that.
What can you do about it?
Shower on the appreciation anyway. Then, ask your partner how he feels about you, not in a mean, demanding or critical way, but from a true place of vulnerability. Let him know how much it would mean to you to feel appreciated, and how you sometimes question whether he does.
Yes, you’re taking a risk.
Yes, you’re pushing out of your comfort zone.
But you need to know.
We all need to feel appreciated.
And if he really doesn’t appreciate you, what are you doing with him?
Get some extra help if you need to, because once the appreciation starts flowing a bit more openly, you’ll be happier and stronger because of it.
Cheers to thriving in business & love,
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