In Relationship. Sharing Rules

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

No matter how we strive for individualism, man is a socially dependent being

Initially, the personality is formed in the family, then develops and learns in broader groups of society - school, kindergarten. We are accustomed to considering vital needs related to the body (food, safety). But the need for relationships is equally necessary.

We learn the "rules" of relationships from childhood, using the example of people close to us. Initially, such an experience is acquired unconsciously, and closer to adolescence, we gradually draw conclusions about which behaviors we like and which do not.

A healthy relationship is not a given, it is work on oneself by both partners. For it to be effective, you need to understand why we come into these relationships, and what we bring to them.

No matter how altruistic we are, communicating with other people, we are looking not only for opportunities to give our resource to another person, but also for a way to satisfy our needs. Unfortunately, we are not always aware of these needs, therefore, it is not always possible to satisfy them either. Perhaps this is the root of many problems that arise in a relationship. As soon as you enter into relationships with people consciously, the quality of these relationships will change significantly.

In transactional analysis, one of the key concepts is stroking … This word is called a unit of recognition, attention. Stroking is vital for every person, because they indicate that a person exists. An example of stroking is a simple look, gesture, greeting, or reaction to us from another person. The opposite of stroking is ignoring … And this is a form of emotional abuse.

Stroking can be positive(these are positive signs of attention that carry a positive emotional charge) and negative … It would be logical to assume that when we come into a relationship, we strive for positive stroking. But everything is much more complicated.

Need for recognitionformed throughout life and is determined by the strokes that we received earlier. If a person received more positive ones, he would come to the relationship for them, and if violence prevailed and there was very little positive emotional experience, accordingly, the person would not be able to request it.

As an example, women who have suffered from childhood violence most often unknowingly build relationships with men who are prone to aggression. This is a form of stroking that they are familiar with and that they can easily recognize. Plus, they know exactly how to adapt to such strokes.

Thus, when we come into a relationship, first of all we want recognition. And the recognition that we get or don't get in the end depends on our own awareness and ability to determine the need for recognition and request appropriate stroking. It's enough just to understand what exactly you want from a partner in a relationship in order to receive it. If there is a feeling of dissatisfaction, and there is no understanding of its cause, you risk getting a lot of "wrong" strokes.

The result of this I constantly hear at the reception: "He does not pay attention to me", "She does not care how I feel at all." If you want attention, understand in what form and offer your partner how he could give it to you. And remember to be genuinely interested in your partner, their needs and feelings. Remember that relationship is the responsibility of two.

Another essential human need for a relationship is affiliation … In the best sense of the word. One way or another, it is very important for a person not just to be, but to be a part of something. For example, family, people, team or company of friends. Otherwise, we are talking about isolation, which makes us unadapted.

Affiliation can exist on two levels - mutual responsibility and interdependence … The most emotionally colored level, and therefore the most tangible, is attachment.

Why is it so important? Affection is about trust, security, and contact. In attachment, a sense of security and such an important feeling as "I am not alone" is formed. It is a sense of the presence and empathy of another person, the opposite of loneliness.

There is a very important psychological theory, Bowlby's Attachment Theory, which explains how our early attachment to our parents influences how we form relationships with people. Through attachment, ways of contact and the capacity for intimacy are formed. We learn it from infancy, when we learn to express our needs in ways that are available to an infant. Depending on how the mother reacts (timeliness, adequacy) to the needs of the baby, a certain type of attachment is formed.

Realizing and accepting your natural need for attachment solves several problems at once:

- Formation of intimacy. A quality relationship is impossible without a feeling of security in emotional and physical closeness, and this feeling is possible with the inner permission to feel affection, to reduce the distance;

- Building trust … If we allow ourselves and our partner to form healthy attachments (not codependency), we organize space for two and space for each individually. This is the zone of trust in a relationship;

- Feeling safe … Affection builds trust and intimacy, which in turn gives us a sense of security in contact with the person.

When we come into a relationship with a person, we expect him to bring us closer to these feelings. But if you do not allow yourself to trust, be close, or form a reliable healthy attachment, no one can give it to you.

It is good when we come into a relationship with conscious needs and are able to request their satisfaction from a partner, giving him something in return. But more often it is different. The problem in relationships at various stages arises when we bring into them unconscious and unfulfilled needs from the past. The difference is that these are not the needs of today, and they should not be satisfied by the people who are with you now, but by those from whom you did not receive satisfaction before.

We ourselves are responsible for our life and health. A sense of basic security, i.e. trust in the world and the ability to ask for help are not formed now and not by current circumstances.

It is laid down at a time when we are still dependent and helpless, and our parents instill a sense of basic security in us.

If during that significant period the feeling of basic trust in the world was not laid, we go through life, looking back and not trusting the world, people and ourselves. We seem to be stuck in childhood, afraid to take a step on our own and are looking for support from an adult. It is quite natural that, being in the state of a small child, we are looking for someone who would give us a sense of security.

But this is a very bad motivation for building relationships, because not many people are ready to be second parents to you. And they shouldn't be. If you want to enter a relationship in order to place the responsibility for important decisions about you on another person, you are not looking for a partner, but a mother or father. And the partner, most likely, will not want this responsibility, he will prefer to be on an equal footing with you.

What to doin this case? First of all, you need to understand your own priorities and needs. If you feel like you’re looking for a parent in the other person, you may need to figure out yourself first. You can analyze this for yourself, but it is better to go to a specialist and work through what is called childhood fixations - your unmet needs from the early stages of life. Then you have a chance to build a healthy and fulfilling relationship in which you and your partner will be on an equal footing and at the same time happy, no one will feel hurt, and no one will take unnecessary responsibility.

Duplication of parent-child relationships in married life is a very common cause of divorce. Usually men talk about the fact that a woman takes a childish position and refuses to take on the slightest responsibility for a relationship or life together. It also happens to women when they feel like a mother to their husbands. At some point, both of them can get bored, because the need for a relationship between a man and a woman lies in the other.

The transfer of parent-child relationships into the life of a couple often affects sexual relationships as well. Sexual attraction often disappears, or it does not arise initially. And psychosomatically, this can be reflected in psychogenic infertility.

Another not the best motivation for building relationships is the desire to separate from parents, to leave the family. Separation from parents does not involve mandatory physical care. First of all, this is a decrease in the importance of attachment and the formation of psychological autonomy. No matter the distance between you and your parental family, until you psychologically grow up enough to be able to give yourself care, acceptance and recognition on your own, you will not get independence and freedom. The voices of parents and their attitudes will sound in your head every time you decide to make an independent decision. This is sometimes useful, but for the most part it brings confusion and doubt to your decisions. And the person to whom you run away will sooner or later begin to fulfill the parental function. The reason for this is again the childhood position of vulnerability in which a part of your psyche is fixed.

If being in the parental family brings discomfort and makes you want to run away into marriage, this suggests that there is an unhealthy attachment, symbiosis, or codependency. This is normal during adolescence, but if you're in your late 30s and still don't feel the strength to separate, consider how much you really want that freedom. Most likely, emotionally you are not quite ready for separation and do not have enough confidence in your abilities. This may also indicate that there is a fixation in some early period, where you were not given the right to make an independent decision in an important period for you. Returning to your current age, psychological maturity, and your right to autonomy will solve this problem.

You, like your partner, have the right to play the role of a partner in a relationship, not a parent or child. The other person has the same right to personal space as you do. Even if you have early commits, that doesn't mean you don't have an adult part of your personality that needs a normal, healthy relationship. Listen to this part if you want to build a harmonious relationship, and it is better to understand the consequences of early experience in a psychologist's office.