Really just writing freely here today about something that I think is really important and helps us look at wellness in another way.
Our task as humans and your task in love is to do this: Integrate.
We’re all ONE, right? We’re in one super hologram?
The Universe is a giant mirror of what’s inside of us.
If that’s true (and even if it’s not), our task is INTEGRATION.
Dr. Dan Siegel talks about this a lot, in fact, he’s the one that got it into my brain 5 years or so back when I was listening to his awesome audio called “The Neurobiology of We.”
At the time, I was driving up from a training on working with couples in NJ to see Buddy Valestro The Cake Boss in Poughkeepsie, NY, no lie. It was my sister-in-law’s birthday present and she even got to high five him. And I remember driving up past Marist College, listening to Dan Siegel thinking, “this makes so much sense.”
When we are functioning optimally, we are INTEGRATED, in a micro way, and in a macro way.
Not only are the right and left hemispheres of our brain working together, but from top to bottom our brain is in harmony with itself. Our body is in synch, as are our emotions and spirit.
Broaden out a bit more and we include others in our lives as well.
Your partner.
Ideally, you guys are operating as a team, in harmony. Integration.
But when a negative cycle takes over your relationship, it’s usually because YOU are not fully integrated with yourself, and show your partner only a partial version of your experience.
Your partner then misinterprets whatever peek at your experience they see as the full experience that you’re having, and misses the boat. So for example, you might be terrified about the state of the relationship because it’s so important to you, but your partner just sees you as an impossible to please raging monster.
When you can integrate and show up more fully and more vulnerably with the whole picture, your partner is more likely going to be able to integrate with THAT and together you’ll forge a deeper connection.
Take something like trauma?
Then we see dysregulation and dis-integration up the wazoo.
Your left and right hemispheres get out of synch and emotions can be extraordinarily overwhelming. The answer? Integration.
One of the most severe results of trauma is something called Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID, formerly known as Multiple Personality Disorder). This is when literally someone’s personality is shattered into a bunch of different alternate personalities as a way of coping with whatever traumatic event(s) they were dealt.
Dissociation is a total normal response to trauma. It can result, however, in a dis-integrated personality.
If you stop to think about it for a minute, we all have different personalities with different people.
I’m certainly not going to speak with a client exactly the same way I might speak with my husband. If I’m speaking somewhere professionally, I am definitely presenting myself differently than I would at my family’s Christmas party.
Does this make me inauthentic?
No, but different situations call for different sides from all of us.
The difference with someone who has DID is that these separate sides are actually totally separate identities, and they often do not have memory for each other. (And to all you skeptics, DID is real).
This disorder can understandably be extremely disruptive in someone’s life.
The goal? As with anything, integration.
Like Michael Jackson advises, start with the Man In The Mirror. It’s really all we can do. Do whatever you can to get in touch with your full experience, and express that.
In your business, with your partner, with your clients and with your loved ones.
You’ll be a shining example for all of us.
Cheers to thriving in business & love,
Disclaimer: links in this post may be affiliate links, and I may receive compensation if you choose to purchase through my links. I will never share a link that I don’t truly believe will help you.
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