107: Dealing with Difficult Relationships
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[00:00:00] Hello my friends, and welcome to another episode of Radiant You. In the last week, I've had three different people reach out to me asking about how to navigate some difficult family relationships. So I figured that we might as well jump in and explore some of the ways that maybe you might be stuck and help you navigate those relationships too. Because we all have them, right?
[00:00:24] That family member that's really hard to be around. It could be an opinionated in law that keeps criticizing you, or maybe it's a child who just feels like they're always disrespectful, or it could be a triggering former spouse that comes to a function and you just don't feel so resistant to having them there. Whoever it is in your life that may be one of those sore spots keep them in mind as we're talking through how you can spend time with them without getting in that place of negativity and anger and feeling like you're just starting to boil.
[00:01:00] Because you know, we all have these moments where no matter how many boundaries you set, no matter how clearly you communicate, they just don't listen.
[00:01:11] And I hear you, my friend, because I've been there and you and I know it feels very unsupportive. and sometimes you might feel like you're being attacked or just worn out by the constant nag of this relationship. You might even feel flabbergasted at ridiculous it is sometimes.
[00:01:30] And in the end, you end up trying to avoid them or control them which leaves you feeling disempowered and disconnected in those moments when you want to connect with the people around you.
[00:01:43] But it doesn't have to be that way, my friend!
[00:01:45] So we're going to talk today about three empowering tools that will help you navigate difficult relationships with more peace and with more ease.
[00:01:54] *Tool number one: understanding why you are boiling.*
[00:01:59] Now I say boiling because oftentimes these relationships leave us in this place where we just feel that energy building and bubbling up inside of us. It usually is associated with feelings of anger or frustration.
[00:02:14] And one of the things you need to understand about anger is that anger is actually a secondary emotion. This means that it's the product of a different emotion first. Underneath anger, there's an emotion that happened before it escalated to that boiling point. These are emotions like rejection, loneliness, sadness, disappointment, defensiveness, even fear. These lead into anger and come out in ways that push people away from us. Whether those relationships were healthy or not healthy in the beginning, it still disconnects you from yourself when you don't recognize your boiling point.
[00:03:02] Simple self awareness here can make all the difference to help you cool down and be more present so you can make a choice about what to do next.
[00:03:11] *Here are some simple ways that can help you cool down:*
[00:03:15] Naming and understanding those underlying emotions. Mindful breathing; going out in nature, moving your body because motion changes emotion; listening to calming music; or simply counting to 10 or 20 or however high you need to, to re-engage your brain so you're not in that automatic reactive boiling response.
[00:03:39] So that's empowering tool number one, understanding why you boil and doing something about it.
[00:03:45] *Tool number two: practicing emotional maturity. *
[00:03:50] Let's define that really quickly. Emotional immaturity is just what it sounds like. You're immature in your ability to manage and be responsible for your emotions. If you think about any child in their progression, they're immature because they don't quite know how to handle things yet. As they get older and they're more mature, they're more responsible. They're more capable of navigating difficult things. We give them more capacity to learn and grow, right?
[00:04:17] So emotional maturity is the same way. When you're not emotionally mature, like a child, you're looking for things to make you feel better. A child cries expecting someone else to soothe them because they don't know how to soothe themselves. They also don't have self-awareness to see where they might be part of the problem or how they might be able to do something to get out of the problem.
[00:04:44] When you learn and grow emotionally, you shift from that dependency on others and feeling stuck to recognizing that you are responsible to help yourself emotionally. No one else has to change for you to be okay. You own your emotions and your thoughts because that's what's creating your emotions is the thoughts that you're thinking in the first place.
[00:05:08] Emotional maturity also means that you have a practice of responding to emotions. You get curious instead of just reactive when you feel emotion. You create a safe place to feel. And you know that safety can only come from within you, not from anyone around you.
[00:05:29] *Here's a quick example of how you would show up with and without emotional maturity.*
[00:05:33] Let's say you're going to an event and you're dreading it because this triggering family member is going to be there and you start having thoughts like, "This is going to be miserable! Can't they just see how ridiculous they're being? I can't believe they would show up like that. If they would just change that behavior, everything would be better!"
[00:05:54] You ever had thoughts like that before about a family member? I know that I definitely have! And we are human in those moments and it's okay. But recognize that when we think like that, we start feeling judgy and feel slighted by the other person and we end up shifting into a powerless place where we feel like it's happening to us.
[00:06:16] And how do you show up when you have those feelings? If you're like any of my clients, it usually shows up like resisting negative emotion, focusing on the other person and wishing they would change, expecting them to step up and reacting negatively, maybe passive aggressively towards them, or trying to set unhealthy boundaries where you're trying to control them and force them to do it in a way that then you can feel better.
[00:06:41] But these are all very disempowering behaviors. And the result of that is that you actually make your experience miserable for yourself.
[00:06:52] *It's not the other person who's coming to the activity that's making it miserable. Emotional maturity means you recognize you are in charge of your experience. *
[00:07:02] So, what would that look like in this same situation with emotional maturity? First you would be aware that that's a triggering person for you and you'd make a plan to care for yourself. Anytime we make a plan beforehand, we use the higher part of our brain that makes it easier for us not to be reactive in the moment. And when you take time to plan purposefully, you can decide what success looks like for you without them having to show up any certain way.
[00:07:33] *Because if success depends on their actions, then you're setting yourself up for disappointment.*
[00:07:39] One way you can do this is to know what it means to have clear boundaries internally and externally.
[00:07:46] It would look like mentally bringing an empowering thought that you can practice when you start feeling yourself being triggered, managing any negative thoughts that come up, recognizing it's not helpful for you to practice those.
[00:07:59] It also means creating a safe place to feel any emotion that does come up in the moment where you're not resisting it or reacting to it. You're holding clean emotional space, not dirty emotional space.
[00:08:14] And if it ends up being a hard experience where you do it imperfectly and it's a little bit messy, you know who to turn to for support afterwards, who actually does have space for you. Not this person who has consistently shown you that they're not a safe place to do that for you.
[00:08:32] Can you see the difference between emotional immaturity of blaming the other person and letting them be in charge of your experience versus owning your responsibility that you get to decide how you want to show up?
[00:08:48] *No matter how they show up, you are in charge of you. And it comes from inside you, not from anything around you.*
[00:08:58] Now, I know that this can be a little bit hard and overwhelming sometimes to try and practice this, especially if it's someone who is a very intense personality.
[00:09:07] *That brings me to tool number three: bring the spirit with you. *
[00:09:13] Sometimes you have just exercised that patience and that emotional maturity so many times that it feels like you don't have anything else to give.
[00:09:22] I have been there before. There was a specific relationship I had spent months, and months, and months trying to heal and move forward on, and it just had no traction. And there was a moment where I knew she was going to be at an activity and I prayed so hard that I would have peace and love in my heart to be able to give to her.
[00:09:41] But I didn't have it to give from me. And in that moment, God very clearly told me that I didn't have to hold it. That He could give me His love for her and just let it go through me instead of come from me.
[00:09:58] And it's one of the most tangible, empowering moments of my life with God was walking into that room, seeing this woman who I felt so hurt by and drained by over the last year and actually felt God's love flowing through me for her. I felt like I didn't need her to show up any certain way. I had God's love with me and that was enough.
[00:10:22] Practicing these empowering tools in difficult relationships really can be life changing. One of the three people I mentioned who reached out about difficult family relationships gave me permission to share some of her story with you and how empowering applying these tools has been in her life these last few weeks.
[00:10:39] You see, this client has been divorced for years to a man she was married to for a very long time. Well, her daughter is now married to someone who reminds her of that past relationship.
[00:10:50] And she was going to an event where her daughter and her son in law were both going to be there, and she was feeling really triggered not only by the memory of her past relationship, but the sorrow she would feel as she watched her daughter go through similar patterns. And as she started telling me about that emotion, you could just feel the energy boiling up that she just feels trapped and frustrated and reactive.
[00:11:15] She told me that often at family functions like this, she would hide in the corner and just sit and feel sorry for her daughter wishing things would change and thinking about the triggering past memories from her former spouse.
[00:11:28] So, first we acknowledged that that's where she had been, but that she didn't have to be there anymore. Together, we made a clear plan of what it would look like for her to show up for herself in emotional maturity, where he didn't have to change and her daughter didn't have to change for her to own her own feelings.
[00:11:48] Well, soon after we had another call and she was elated to tell me that she not only felt empowered at that experience, she enjoyed herself! And stayed longer than she had even planned taking time to be present with the people she did want to connect with who were there.
[00:12:08] *It was so empowering for her to understand why she was boiling, exercise, emotional maturity, and have the Spirit with her to guide her through that experience.*
[00:12:20] And she was able to shift relationship patterns that had been entrenched for years.
[00:12:27] You can do this in your difficult relationships too, my friend! And as you do, it will clean up the negativity in your relationships, renew your power to navigate tough situations, and if there are children involved, you can give them an example (just as this woman did to her daughter) of how to own your own experience and find peace, no matter what people are doing around you. And all of this together will give you more space to feel the Spirit and have it constantly guiding you.
[00:13:07] You don't just have to endure difficult relationships, my friend. You can thrive in them. And when you do, you will feel so much lighter and have space to shine even brighter.
[00:13:22] Keep shining. My friend, we need your light in this world. And no one, no one can change that but you.
[00:13:32] Have a blessed day.
[00:13:33] You are radiant and God wants you to remember that truth. But sometimes you forget. Don't worry, I've got you. I've created some free resources that will help you live lighter and shine brighter. Check out my show notes for the links.
[00:13:54] However, God guides your next steps, know that you are not alone on this journey I can't wait to see how you discover a more radiant you.
