As a Life Coach and Counsellor I work with many people from a variety of backgrounds, ages and gender and it has become stunningly obvious the fear that everyday people have about what once upon a time was considered an essential ingredient…. the relationship.
I often contrast the perspectives of those seeking help to navigate their lives, pain, success, fear and vulnerabilities and those who don’t and find similarities in perspectives and challenges the difference being an openness to the acceptance of them and a willingness to be available to explore, which of course means death to the teachings of Romantic Comedies!
As a person first who is a trained professional with regard to Human Behaviour and Well being I must say that the challenges people face to overcome the fear associated with a previously unsustainable relationship, I won’t say failed as I believe every experience is successful in it’s ability to teach us something about ourselves and the world we are creating around us, is both painful to witness and heartening because people are seeking deep within themselves a way to connect and build truly healthy relationships with themselves first and then as an external manifestation with another, the pain is in the moving through past hurts, navigating the self defeating beliefs about one’s worthiness and value and even the probability of being loved and vulnerability of loving in return.
The perceptions of what it takes to create a healthy sustainable relationship are as wide and varied as the individuals themselves with one commonality, we require them to feel a fullness that is the human experience as we are fundamentally relational beings and the need for love is part of our hardwiring see other blogs, we are designed to be a part of something greater whether relationship, family or community.
I have developed an idea around the Love Cake and what are the ingredients required and in what measure to create you own special recipe.
A pinch of intellectual stimulation, a dash of physical affection and passion, a large handful of emotional intimacy, a teaspoon of shared interests, separate the work from home and whisk together till light and fluffy or the right consistency depending on the type of cake, pour into a well greased solid container and bake away till in bounces back when lightly touched in the centre!
What you will notice is this cake doesn’t come together by itself, it requires knowledge of yourself to know the right ingredients for you, it requires effort to gather the ingredients and blend them together sometimes testing and measuring to ensure the right consistency, it requires resources to create the right environment to then bake the cake and finally enough resilience to bounce back when lightly touched.
Relationships past and present create opportunity for enhanced growth, satisfaction and well being and like other pursuits that facilitate similar experiences they come with some risk and I wonder what outcome might be possible if the risks were taken consciously (Love Cake) rather than risk taking behaviour (yep they like me so why not!) and how fearless we may become to write the ingredient list down, head out into the world and ask for what you want knowing you may need to shop around and sometimes a more suitable ingredient needs to be sourced before commencing the great bake off.
Vanessa Auditore – Human Behaviour and Well being specialist has a practice in St Leonards NSW and can be contacted at vanessa@successhq.com.au for all enquiries and session bookings.
