There are so many relationship patterns
that can play out on a subconscious level.
And even if they're subconscious,
they can spell the end of a relationship.
We're going to talk about one of these patterns today.
What we're gonna talk about is one of the most common patterns
nonetheless, one of the very most destructive.
We all want to know that we're loved,
but the big question to ask ourselves is:
How do we know that we're loved?
I'm not kidding you when I say
that that is one of the most important questions
you can ask yourself relative to a relationship.
Nobody can feel loved by a fair-weather friend.
This is somebody who vanishes the second that things get difficult,
the second they get inconvenient,
the second that they get painful.
But there's serious danger
in defining whether you're loved or not,
by swinging to the opposite extreme.
The "Suffer So I Can Feel Loved" Relationship Dynamic
A shocking amount of people
either consciously or subconsciously
or both,
believe that the way to know that they're loved or not
is whether somebody stays committed to them no matter what.
This essentially means,
that somebody stays committed
and connected,
regardless of how much pain they're in,
even if that pain is being caused
by they themselves.
This kind of thinking
opens the door very wide
for rationalized subconscious abuse.
The definition of an unsafe relationship
is a relationship with someone
who cannot take you as a part of themselves
and therefore cannot take your best interest as a part
of their own best interests.
This is a state of disconnection.
In a state of disconnection,
a person can't really see you,
they can't really feel you,
they can't really listen to you,
they can't really come to understand you.
This means that they actually don't know what your best interests are.
They become unattuned.
Most people in the modern world
believe that to love something
is to have intense positive feeling towards that thing.
But in fact, that's more of a byproduct
or can be, I should say, more of a byproduct of love.
To love is quite simple.
It is to consciously choose to take something as part of yourself.
If you take something as a part of you,
you do not perceive yourself to be separate from that thing
and so you can perceive it fully.
And you seriously take its best interest into account.
To understand more about this, watch my video titled:
How to Create a Safe Relationship
If you take something as a part of you,
you can't hurt that thing without hurting yourself.
The reality is that the vast majority of people
did not have adult caregivers in their childhood
who actually did this with them.
They expected, in fact, that person,
(the child)
to sacrifice their own best interests
for their sake.
A better way of saying this
is that they expected their children to be in pain
in one way or another, for them.
The child's boundaries,
which includes thoughts, feelings, preferences, aversions,
needs and desires were not considered.
The caregivers did what was best for themselves
and the kids had to go along with it.
In fact, these kids are praised for doing so.
They begin to form a link between self-sacrifice
and endurism and love.
And we all know that this may have suited the caregivers in the short term.
However what they're doing is setting these children up for an adult life
where they do this to other people
and this is consistently done by other people in their lives to them.
This pattern actually becomes very dangerous.
Because they will find themselves on either side
of the following pattern:
One person does something to make the other person feel unloved.
It doesn't have to be something extreme,
it could be something small and unconscious
like looking at someone else.
This creates insecurity in the other person.
They disconnect in order to preserve themselves.
But to reestablish security in the relationship
they begin to test the love of the other person.
Because their subconscious way
of knowing if someone loves them,
is if that person remains connected and committed
even when they're in extreme pain.
They subconsciously begin to put the other person in pain.
The ways they go about doing this
range all the way from overt physical mental and emotional abuse,
to beginning to make decisions
that are not in the best interests of the other person,
to no longer recognizing their limits,
to creating situations that seem totally beyond their control,
but that cause the other person distress.
Basically, what they want to do,
or subconsciously start doing
is to create any type of a situation where the other person is in pain.
And how that person responds to the situation,
despite being in pain,
is an indication of how much that person is committed,
wants to be connected
or really wants them.
Now people who find themselves on the opposite side of this pattern
are going to immediately revert to their original pattern
of proving their love or their connection
or their commitment to the other person,
by slipping into a pattern of a endurism.
They prove their love
by staying committed and connected no matter what.
Their "I'll suffered to be with you" mentality
is now what establishes the security in the relationship.
I want you to think about that one for a minute.
In fact, I want you to think about it so much.
I'm gonna spell it out across the screen.
The holding pattern inherent in this relationship pattern
is that for one or both people in the relationship,
the security in the relationship
and the knowing of how much your partner or friend loves you,
is defined by how much they will suffer to be with you
or suffer for your best interests.
It goes without saying
that when this is the pattern in the relationship,
the acknowledgement or respect
for a person's limits within that relationship
goes straight out the window.
Well, obviously it's tempting to think that when you're part of this pattern,
there's love inherent in the pattern,
but there actually isn't.
One person in this relationship
has to stop taking their own best interest as a part of themselves.
They have to essentially self-sacrifice,
which is the exact opposite of self love.
Therefore, for one person to engage in this pattern,
they have to stop loving themselves.
To understand more about this pattern,
it may help you to watch my video titled:
ENDURISM (The Flipside of Escapism)
The other person has to disconnect from the other
in order to do and say things
and make decisions that put that other person in pain.
Now this by definition,
means that they have to
stop taking the other person's best interests
as a part of their own best interests.
They have to make it okay for the other person to be in pain,
for them to selfishly feel loved.
By definition this means that they are no longer loving the other person
and this seems like a rather ironic twist, doesn't it?
That in order for us, if we're in this pattern,
to feel that the other person really loves us
or to have their love for us proven,
we ourselves have to stop loving.
In a relationship if you have this pattern,
you may notice yourself flip-flopping
between either one of these positions within one relationship.
You also might find
that in one relationship you're in one role
and in another relationship you're in the opposite one.
So you can understand this dynamic,
I'm gonna give you one example;
I want you to first imagine a couple.
This time we're going to use a man and a woman
and they're having a lot of financial trouble.
The woman in the relationship loses her tolerance for it
and makes the comment:
"Why couldn't I have just married a millionaire?"
This makes the man feel unloved
and immediately doubt the security of the relationship.
Instead of really putting his energy towards financial well-being,
he begins to test her love
by subconsciously putting minimal effort towards improving
their financial situation.
And plays video games or goes to the bar,
when could be looking for ways to improve their situation instead.
Their financial situation stays bad or gets worse.
She suffers.
But he feels more loved as months go by and years go by
and she is still choosing to be in the relationship with him
despite their poverty
and the suffering it causes her.
He feels even more loved
when she suffers even more
by putting all her time and energy into improving the financial situation
for the both of them.
And she looks at her willingness to suffer that much with him
instead of getting another more affluent partner
as a measure and gesture of her love for him.
Her willingness to suffer and stay connected and committed "any way"
becomes their barometer for the security of the relationship
and the amount she loves him.
If this is a pattern in your relationships
what it means is that your wires are incredibly crossed.
Crossed to such a degree that your definition of love is in fact,
the exact opposite of actual love.
To love something implies
an intolerance for something's suffering.
This is why in a relationship
it is so incredibly important to acknowledge
and do something about incompatibility.
Now here's where I'm gonna throw you another curveball.
If this is your pattern,
you will feel the very most loved
in incompatible relationships.
The reason is if you have this relationship pattern,
incompatible relationships and the indescribable pain they can cause,
will be the relationships in which you feel the most loved
and think you love the other person the most.
But this layer goes even deeper.
You will end up in a state of shame,
like all people do,
in incompatible relationships.
You're gonna end up feeling
like all people do in incompatible relationships
as if something is really bad and wrong about you because of your boundaries.
Including thoughts, feelings, unique preferences, desires, everything.
However,
when you and the other person hit this level
of shame being the baseline of your relationship,
the fact that they stay with you
no matter how bad you are
and the fact that you stay with them
no matter how bad they are,
becomes your new barometer
for how much you are loved and how much you love them.
To understand more about this, watch my video titled:
Incompatibility (A Harsh Reality in Relationships)
If you notice this pattern inside yourself,
this doesn't make you bad,
it doesn't make you wrong.
In fact, this pattern is incredibly understandable.
It makes perfect sense why it exists,
it makes perfect sense why this would make you feel loved
or make you feel like you love someone else.
But here's the reality:
It is impossible to create a feel-good relationship
with the security in the relationship
and the knowing of how much a person loves you,
being based on how much they will suffer to be with you
or suffer for your best interests.
It is also impossible to build a good relationship with yourself,
when your definition
of how much you love someone else,
is whether you are going to stay committed to them
and connected to them,
no matter how much you suffer
or they make you suffer.
Now here's where I'm going to throw you my last curveball;
Doing this even though you have been wired
by your experience to think it's loving,
isn't actually loving towards them.
What is in another person's best interest,
is for them to be with someone who really
appreciates and enjoys them
and sees them as a source of pleasure.
Not to be with someone whose truth is:
"It hurts me to be with you or do this for you."
The security in a relationship
and the measure of whether somebody loves you
should actually be based upon
their commitment to your well-being.
Their commitment to you not suffering.
Let this be your way of loving someone else
and let this be your way of loving yourself.
Have a good week