As we continue in our conversation with the author Andy Parnham we come to the subject of healthy relationships. How do they work and how do we restore them when they go wrong? We know from our own experience that relationships are important, but the research of the psychiatrist Robert Waldinger goes as far as to say it is the number one strongest predictor of good health.
Do come and join Andy Parnham and I as we look at:
The following 5 principles for healthy relationships:
1. Prioritising people over things
2. Becoming the kind of person other people want to be with.
3. Finding someone you can trust you can share yourself with.
4. Being willing to let go and not to be simply grasping of relationships.
5. Finding a place and a people to belong to.
We unpack Andy’s conclusion of the reaseach:
”It appears that the capacity to relate to other people is hard-wired into our brains and that such relating is at the heart of human flourishing. Relationships are primarily a function of the right brain, with its emphasis on implicit, unconscious, non-verbal processes. Emotions are essential to the development and nurture of all healthy relationships.” (P.127)
”Anyone who has achieved lasting happiness and contentment has acquired the capacity to spend time both alone and with others without a sense of insecurity and inadequacy.” (P. 133)
How we can only relate to others in a healthy manner when we have learnt to live in our own skin in a healthy way. Psychologists refer to this as differentiation. Someone who has successfully differentiated themself is able to:
1. Be clear about who you are (‘define’ yourself) and yet stay in touch with others.
2. Take responsibility for yourself, yet…. Be responsive to others.
3. Maintain your integrity and wellbeing without….. Intruding on that of others.
4. Allow the enhancement of another person’s integrity and wellbeing without ……. Feeling abandonment,inferior or less of a self.
5. Have an ‘I’ and enter a relationship with another ‘I’ without losing yourself and diminishing the other person’s self.
The importance and power of learning to forgive.
You may also find of interest:
Podcast #025: Is there a difficult person in your life?
Podcast #026: The search for happiness
What is the ONE essential ingredient for life-long health and happiness?
Podcast #044: Lasting Happiness
Podcast #045: Do you want to be happy?
Podcast #046: The problem of longing and wanting more
After listening to our conversation what questions, comments and reflections on relationships do you have?
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
