Do you have difficulty making your own decisions?

Ever feel unappreciated or taken for granted?

What about feeling guilty for considering doing what’s best for you at the expense of someone you love?

If so, you might just find yourself a little or a lot stuck in your life.

Why is that?

Second-guessing your life choices, being taken for granted and feeling guilty stem from not trusting and expressing your inner voice.

Is the passion between you and your partner a thing of the past?

If your love life isn’t meeting your needs for happiness it can definitely be improved.

Physical intimacy is an important part of a healthy relationship. When this aspect of your connection is working well it effortlessly improves every other area of your relationship.

Has your partner all but given up on your relationship?

Does it seem like you’re the only one still struggling to fight the good fight for your love?

If you’re experiencing something like this it’s not the time invest in your union. It is however a sure sign that you’re losing yourself. Perhaps you lost yourself years ago. If anything, it’s time to surrender your relationship and start fighting for you.

If your relationship is out of balance, chances are other areas of your life are too.

Being able to sustain a lifetime of love goes hand in hand with successfully balancing your entire life. The people with the most fulfilling relationships give equal attention to their health, hobbies, spirituality, friendships, family and career. No wonder life gets stressful at times, there’s a lot to take care of! Fortunately, it’s all interwoven and balance in one area carries over to another.

Along with building your relationship communication skills, so much of what you communicate comes through in your energy. Essentially, I’m referring to your level of confidence, self-acceptance and happiness. These feelings actually stem from the relationship you have with yourself and how satisfied you are with your life outside of your partner.

The easiest way to achieve balance and increase your energy is to slow down and do less instead of more. A peaceful, calm lifestyle that’s relatively stress-free is the answer. But what about all of the things you have to do? Herein lies the challenge. If you truly want a happy relationship and a balanced life then the things in your life that do not contribute to this will need to be restructured to benefit you and in some cases replaced with activities that promote harmony.

Start small, change just one aspect of your life this week that will allow you slow down and rejuvenate. Some ideas are to: say no more – you don’t have to do everything, spend time in nature, laugh more, do something creative, meditate, do yoga, sing, play the guitar, go fishing, play golf, get a massage, put your feet up and have a cup of tea or watch a movie. In time, find a way to do something relaxing, creative and fun every day.

Giving equal attention to all of the important aspects of your life is easier to achieve when you’re no longer feeling overwhelmed. With clarity comes the ability to put what’s important to you in its rightful place. This includes your relationship of course! When you’re in the flow instead of swimming against the tide, your energy becomes much more attractive.

It’s so much easier to connect with your partner and be loving, affectionate and cooperative when you’ve taken the time to center yourself first.

To create a strong relationship you need to be courageous enough to have your own point of view and express it with kindness and respect. In all of your interactions, being yourself needs to be balanced with communicating the importance of your relationship. In every moment you are either bringing your relationship closer together or further apart.

Expressing yourself authentically while honoring your relationship includes speaking about what you need in a calm, rational voice. It’s your tone of voice and your intent that communicates how important your partner is to you. On the other hand, what you say should be genuine so that it reflects the honesty of the moment. You will assist your partner in hearing you when you focus on what you want instead of expressing judgment. This is an interdependent stance, the middle ground between independence which is too distant and dependence, which is too close for love to grow.

By expressing your true thoughts and feelings in an empowered way you focus on the changes you’d like. For example, instead of saying “I’m really angry at you because you’re always on my case about this,” you can say “I’m feeling pretty angry. I’d like us to get along.” Speaking this way allows your partner to listen to you instead of becoming defensive. You are simpl expressing yourself and your desire instead of making your partner wrong. This is the complete opposite of stifling your voice and walking on eggshells.

It’s likely that you have communicated important matters to your partner with kindness and respect and didn’t achieve positive results. You partner might have responded to you in anger or by withdrawing. A typical response would then be for you to eventually back down to end the fight or stop the silence. In maintaining your perspective balanced with kindness and respect, don’t allow your partner’s anger or silence (fight or flight response) to reinstate the status quo. Instead, remain calm and consistent in your message and disengage from any heated conversation. There are no victims; only volunteers. Don’t give your power away by giving in, as this doesn’t serve either one of you.

Over time, when you are consistent, anger or silence shifts into cooperation. This is because your partner’s need for connection is strong. Anger and silence (fear) is a negative form of connection. Although it may take some time, if you no longer engage it will naturally dissipate. All behavior is purposeful. By speaking in a way that communicates the importance of your relationship, your partner will eventually realize that the only available avenue for connection with you is through kindness and respect (love).

We are constantly changing. You may have heard that the past is the best predictor of the future. The past only has power if you allow it to. It can only influence the present and future if you refuse to let it go. Ideally, you want to learn lessons from the past and leave the experience and the pain behind. When you become aware of what you need to do differently so that it cannot happen again, the past loses all of its power.

What you’ll need to do differently is either communicate or behave in a manner that leaves you feeling empowered regardless of what your partner does. As long as you do this with kindness and respect it will always strengthen your connection. When you change your responses in a way that ensures you are self-protective the past is no longer a threat to your happiness and you will naturally release it.

To sustain relationship happiness, it helps to know that change is not only possible, but is in fact inevitable. Believing this opens you up to have thoughts that help you to create what you desire instead of being held hostage to feelings such as hopelessness and despair. Looking to negative experiences from your past creates doubt and anxiety. It’s this confused state that creates the perception that nothing is changing and slows down your creative energy, so that change is more painstaking than it needs to be. Without clarity of mind you actually block changes from happening without frustration and delay.

Positive change and harmony occur when you allow yourself to stay present. The moment is where all of your power for change lies. By focusing on the present you are free to shift your perception, patterns of behavior and communication without being influenced by negative memories of the past or any predictions you may create for the future.

Becoming aware that you influence your relationship and your life by your state of mind is essential. This takes place by knowing how to stay in the present and choose thoughts that are in alignment with the life that you desire. Regardless of what is going on, insist on choosing thoughts that will benefit you.

Feminine Grace is the natural, core energy in the majority of women. Once you discover how to use it effectively, you’ll be able to magnetize your partner to you in a way that sustains his desire and devotion for a lifetime.

By following your intuition, becoming more relaxed, communicating assertively and making yourself a priority you are automatically following your heart. Following your heart is important because this is where feminine grace resides.

Tapping into your feminine grace allows you to transform the connection you have with your partner so that it’s close and intimate, even if he’s cold and distant right now. This graceful strength and state of mind empowers you to feel good about yourself and focus on the positive aspects of your life and relationship with gratitude and compassion.

At times, you might be too exhausted and resentful to feel gratitude and compassion and that’s okay. When this is the case the antidote is always self-care. When you’re frustrated the only way to fill yourself up is to engage in activities that will support you in feeling relaxed and creative.

Once you’re feeling balanced, you’ll be able to offer appreciation, trust and respect to your partner. This is the way a man desires to be shown love first and foremost. Essentially, this is unconditional love and it’s complimentary to the way you want to be loved. And how’s that? Being desired, cherished and his number one priority, of course!

If you’ve been feeling taken for granted, unloved and uncertain about the future of your relationship, you owe it to yourself to discover the power of your feminine grace within you. Along with empowering yourself, you’ll be able to adopt a lifestyle that reduces your stress, increases your energy and allows you to get your needs met.

By following your heart, you will begin to communicate and behave differently. You’ll start to see the positive influence this has on your partner, even if you haven’t been close and connected in ages. Changes will occur in your relationship as soon as you change your energy to become softer, more alive and inviting. You don’t have to work so hard! In fact, being a superwoman and having to take care of everything is the opposite of feminine grace, which is the balance of being strong, yet soft. 

The catalyst to bringing him closer and having him look at you as though you’re the most beautiful woman in the world is you making yourself your highest priority. By sustaining this approach to your life, you become secure in his love for you because you’ll receive daily reinforcement that he is attentive and committed.

The Bruins 4-0 win over the Canucks presents the perfect opportunity to highlight some relationship success essentials.

Due to your particular connection to Vancouver and the 7th game, you may feel a twinge of guilt by association (due to the riots that broke out). It’s normal to feel some shame when someone you feel connected to in some way does something you consider to be humiliating. This is often the case when your partner does something that you find inappropriate.

Everyone feels humiliated, angry, frustrated or guilty at times. Although it’s normal, it is also very unhelpful to have these emotions. In terms of life and relationships feeling this way is something you want to steer clear of at all costs. These negative feelings decrease your energy, zap your mood, dull your ability to think clearly and create distance in your relationship.

A decrease in your energy and mood, whether it’s due to humiliation you feel about something your partner did (while out at social event among friends or colleagues, for example) or shame or anger with people you’re associated with broadly (the minority of fellow Canuck fans, say) is something that you control based on the meaning you give to the situation and the ensuing thoughts you have about it.

Upon reading the headlines and seeing pictures of fires breaking out in cars, my initial thought was “Oh s&%!, how embarrassing — I can’t believe this!” It’s not your initial thought that counts though. It’s what you do with your thoughts that matters most.

Your power lies in gaining awareness of your thoughts and changing them, if necessary, and realizing that what you or anyone else does says nothing about you, unless you insist that it does — and even then, it’s all in your mind.

Don’t overidentify with beliefs, behaviors or personality traits — they can and do change from moment to moment. Changing your thoughts allows you to create thought forms and ideas that energize you and brighten your mood. This is how feeling good becomes consistent along with having the life and relationship you desire.

Being attached to being right (judgmental) includes statements like the following (from twitter): “Canucks fans are schmucks”, while choosing to be happy is includes expressions like: TheEllenShow Ellen DeGeneres. “Congratulations to the @VanCanucks on an amazing season and series. You’ll get ‘em next year.”

Ultimately, in your relationship and everywhere in your life, you’re responsible for your thoughts, emotions and behaviors. This is great news because it allows you to empower yourself and influence positive changes! What you focus on gains power so finding the positive, even when the negative seems to significantly outweigh it is an invaluable skill.

How about choosing to love by association instead of feeling guilt by association? One transcends and transmutes negative energy and the other breeds more negative energy. When seen in this light, it becomes an obvious, albeit challenging choice.

When someone does something that you consider to be wrong, decide how you want to feel. If you intend to be happy and get along, then you’ll want to hold a thought that’s in alignment with this positive frame of mind, regardless of what you’re faced with.

To do your part, whether it’s in your relationship or in the world, choose to influence the positive in your life and the lives of everyone around you by remaining centered and peaceful. Know that ’meaning’ is something that you create, regardless of what anyone else thinks. This is your relationship and your life. There’s no way you can please everyone, but you can choose to please yourself.

Taking care of your own needs is central to loving your partner and others unconditionally. What you focus on expands exponentially. So, make your thoughts count and realize that meaning is less about reality and more about what you choose to believe.

And how about the photo of the couple kissing on the streets of Vancouver with the riot police in the background (courtesy of Getty Images)? Lol. Keeping in mind what we’ve been discussing about the power of your thoughts… what do you think about that?

Are you aware of the role you play in whether or not you’re happy?

Yes, things happen that you have little or no control over, but what you always control is your response. And this is where all of your power lies.

You may be familiar with Maya Angelou’s quote “I’ve learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way he/she handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights.”

It’s a great reminder that when life challenges you, how you choose to handle it is always within your control. Do you make the most out of the cards you’re dealt or do you focus on the negative? If you’re like most people, you probably do a bit of both.

Focusing on the positive takes practice, but it’s so worth it. Being open to finding the good in any given situation brings more good into your life, because whatever you focus on expands.

Instead of looking at the circumstances you’re in as the ‘reason’ for your satisfaction or dissatisfaction in life, realize that being happy in life has very little to do with what’s happening and everything to do with your perspective. What happens is not really in your control, and although it may not always seem like it, your perspective and your response is entirely up to you.

An example of a tragic circumstance is losing a child. Almost everyone would agree that this is one of the very worst experiences anyone could endure.

Why is it that two different families can lose a child and handle is so differently? For example, Family A mourns the loss of their child for years on end. There is little happiness in life for them and all of their hopes and dreams remain shattered. They cut themselves off from friends and family because everything is a painful reminder of their loss. Their future is bleak and a dark, grey cloud hangs over their home.  In Family B, the loss was every bit as painful and devastating. Instead of focusing on the loss, they chose instead to focus on life and respond to the tragedy with courage and optimism. They decided that their child’s life would not be in vain. Although they also mourned, they put their energies into continuing to live a good life, they set up a foundation in honor of their child so that they could help others, they continued to realize their dreams and enjoy life as best they could. Sunshine and happiness reigned in this family.

Is it easy to change your perspective? No, it’s not. Just as it isn’t easy to train for a marathon, learn a new language, give birth to a child, pass an important exam or lose those extra pounds. But like everything else, with commitment and perserverence you can definitely achieve it.

So, where do you start?

It helps to understand that your feelings (sad, happy, angry, scared, optimistic) are a result of the thoughts you create. Your thoughts are created based on your worldview or underlying beliefs about life. Because your worldview was completely formed by the time you were 5 years old, it’s safe to say that you (like everyone else) hold some very “faulty” or unhelpful perspectives on life.

If you look at Family A for example, they might hold a worldview that says, when you lose a loved one it’s disrespectful to continue living with joy, OR its disrespectful to be happy when you lose the one you love the most, OR life isn’t worth living when your dreams are stolen from you. Family B might have a worldview that says people live on in spirit when they die and choosing to honor this is important, OR its disrespectful to lose someone you love and not do everything you can to celebrate their life, even in death, OR losing one life is tragic, but to put our lives on hold as a result so that all love is lost, is a sin.

Your worldview or beliefs are the program or operating system that runs your life! So, if you aren’t living the life you desire, the root cause will your programming from your personality, family, culture, societal norms and experiences.

It doesn’t matter so much ‘why’ you hold the beliefs that you do, as much as it does finding out whether your beliefs are helping or hindering you. There are no “right” or “wrong” beliefs, only those that work for you and those that work against you.

In living a passionate, purposeful and balanced life, choosing to focus on the positive no matter what makes all the difference.

Photograph © by www.martin-liebermann.de

There may be times in your life when you feel as though you’re at a crossroads. You may even be feeling like this now.

When life gets confusing and it seems daunting to make a choice to stay put or go in a new direction, it can be helpful to ask yourself certain questions (outlined here) to gain clarity. 

1. What’s happened in your life that’s lead you to this crossroads?
2. What activities help you to feel grounded, balanced and hopeful?
3. When you’re under stress, how do you typically feel/behave?
4. Who are the people in your life that you can count on for support, encouragement and love?
5. What do you enjoy doing for fun, relaxation and entertainment?
6. If you’re in a relationship, what’s it like? Does it meet your needs, values and desires?
7. What role do you play in your family/circle of friends/life (eg. caregiver, fun-loving, scapegoat, overachiever)?
8. If you weren’t at this crossroads, how would your life be different?
9. Who else in your life is affected by your current confusion and uncertainty?
10. Why do you think you’re having this experience at this time in your life?

Writing down your answers to these questions can give you a necessary shift in perception. Frequently, it can bring about deeper reflection and make it easier to know what you need to bring the balance back into your life.

Give yourself time to get your answers. Be patient and trust the flow of life. When things are as they should be in the moment, the future is naturally taken care of as one moment leads to the next in a ripple effect.