I have worked with Monique on redefining my relationship with food. This post is definitely one of those that you should print out and highlight. Lots of nuggets.

-K

by Monique Halley

From personal experience I know a lot of us deal with self-judgment, engage in unhealthy relationships and allow life to beat us up. Most of how we relate to  self, others, and life{s.o.l} is based on what we witnessed growing up, how we were told to be, our cultural beliefs, societal norms and the messaging we hear and see in the media. Since we naturally want to belong, we rarely stop and examine if this way of relating makes sense for us or serves us.

Have you ever thought that things may not work for you because you are trying to uphold a way of being and living that’s not in alignment with your current circumstances, values, goals, and beliefs?

After a huge disagreement I had with my mother about parenting I realized that I have the right to redefine things in my life.  There are certain situations where it makes sense to give new meaning to the way I do things, because the way my mother did things back then, it’s not always a good fit for the way I need to do things now.

When was the last time you reflected how you are relating to yourself, others and life itself; especially when things are not the way you really want them to be?

I naturally have a spirit of questioning, which the buddhist calls “ Kalama Sutta”. I’m a truth seeker and the best way to get to the truth, is to ask questions. Later on, I’m going to challenge to take on this same spirit of questioning to learn your truth of how you want to relate to {s.o.l}.

“When you have arrived at the question, the answer is already near”.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

When you are going through redefining process, these questions may come up:

How do I talk to myself when I make mistakes? Am I truly happy with me? What really gives me joy? why am I so scared to make changes? when shits happens in life am I playing the victim? what’s working for me? am I truly  living according to my faith? How am I showing up when I engage with my partner? am I being present as much as I can, or am I just going through life?  etc… One question may lead to another, so make sure to have a journal during this redefining process.

I know theses are all deep questions but it’s worth the time to re-examine and gain clarity on them; simple because these are long-term relationships that you have to sustain. Why not make sure you are creating authentic, happy & enjoyable experiences in each area?

“No matter where you go, there you are.” The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai

At the end of the day you are the common factor in all areas of your life. My hope is that you develop a healthy, self-accepting & loving relationship with yourself first. Your relationship with others and life with benefit from how you relate to self.

Here’s an example of how I’ve re-evaluated my relationship in regards to others:

Growing up, my mother was in survival mode, raising all of her children.  When it came to being affectionate, caring about our feelings and what we desired to do in life was not of concern to her. I totally get it, she wasn’t taught to parent that way and she wasn’t privy to the impact it would have on me as an adult, so all is forgiven.  From that awareness, I was very clear on how I wanted to relate to my son as a parent because I knew differently.  Subconsciously I did behave in similar ways my mom did early on as a parent. Eventually my guilty conscience set in and I redefined how I want to be a mother, so I adopted the conscious parenting approach. I’m very concerned about my sons emotional well-being, he has space to express himself, we talked about what makes him happy, what makes me happy and we have developed a beautiful relationship. We are not foolproof from parent-child challenges but I give myself permission to re-examine what we need to do to make things work.

I want to charge you with this exercise:

re-evaluate your relationships to & with {s.o.l} and determine what practices and way of being are not serving you.

• Figure out your questions, then ask yourself… why am I relating to  ______ this way?
• Then redefine how you really want to experience those relationships by giving new meaning to them.

Things to keep in mind:

• As you go through this process, pay attention to what themes or patterns are consistently showing up in each area.
• If your intentions with how you truly want to live are not in alignment with how you are living, this is where the change or transformation needs takes place.
• Think about how you engage with yourself: emotionally, physically, spiritually, how are you relating in all relationships (family, friendship, romantic, professional) and life; are you learning lessons from life challenges, how are you coping with stress etc…

I still have more work to do myself; so let’s do this together.

Let’s start a dialogue around this topic;  leave a comment and let me know what relationships you have to redefine and give new meaning to.

A must share:

I saw this inspiring program on PBS yesterday around the topic of women “redefining” their roles in Hollywood, on & off-screen; you should check it out.

Here’s the link: http://video.pbs.org/video/2365340582/

My goal is to always help women examine what’s not working in their relationships, so they can create better experiences. Clarity, redefining & reclaiming is a big part of the process, so I’ve created a tool to support the work; a relationship impact worksheet. Sign-up here and get immediate access to the worksheet. http://bit.ly/relationshipclaritycoachingsignup

[info_box type=”alert_box”]My goal is to always help women examine what’s not working in their relationships, so they can create better experiences. Clarity, redefining & reclaiming is a big part of the process, so I’ve created a tool to support the work; a relationship impact worksheet. Sign-up here and get immediate access to the worksheet. http://bit.ly/relationshipclaritycoachingsignup[/info_box]