Search Results for: lisa firestone/feed/2009/11/fear-of-intimacy

How to Fall Back in Love with Your Partner

…oving feeling. Staying in touch with your desire and sexuality and sharing intimacy in a personal way can be a powerful way to feel closer to your partner. Find healthy ways to vent. It’s okay to be angry or frustrated. Your partner is not perfect. You may be doing a lot to develop yourself, and they may be at a standstill. However, neither silently sitting on your anger or building a case and blowing up are the best strategies to get relief and f…

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Why We Should Talk About Sex

…ng sexual relationship. Many people find it difficult to combine emotional intimacy and deep loving feelings with passionate sexuality. One reason this can occur, albeit mostly unconsciously, is that old issues from their past begin to surface. People may even start to experience “critical inner voices” about their sexuality that hold familiar themes from their past. For example, if you were hurt or rejected by the people who cared for you, you ma…

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Keeping the Romance Alive in a Long Distance Relationship

…tic with Technology: Text messaging and emails are a great way to maintain intimacy between you and your partner, even though you are apart. Simply sending a text that says “I love you” or “I miss you” can make your loved one feel special. You can even get inspired and type up a poem or a short story about the two of you and send it to them. Emailing a love letter about your feelings can put a smile on their face, especially if they are having a b…

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Working with High-Conflict Couples

…tanding of and ability to assist individuals in developing and maintaining intimacy in their relationships. Participants will learn how to help couples challenge self-protective behaviors that interfere with closeness and intimacy. Learning Objectives: 1. Recognize how methods or defenses formed to deal with pain & anxiety in childhood later come to limit people as adults in their ability to develop and sustain attachments. 2. Summarize the concep…

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It’s Not You It’s Me: The Truth Behind The Excuse

…ople come up to me after my presentations to thank me and tell me that the fears of intimacy and defensive traits I have been outlining perfectly describe their partner. These people are essentially saying, “Yes, I know defenses are hurting my intimate relationship, but it’s not my defenses, it’s theirs.” In my professional experience, it is all too easy for people to identify issues in their partners and increasingly difficult for them to pinpoin…

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5 Things to Do Today to Save Your Relationship

…ssing, and you’ll be surprised to see the depths of desire and feelings of intimacy that arise. 3. Slow down – We hear these two words all the time, but we rarely live by them. For most of us slowing down means plopping on the couch or zoning out to the TV the minute our chaotic to-do list is done. No matter how hectic our schedule, there are ways to take pause within our own minds and reconnect with ourselves throughout the day. Mindfulness provi…

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Keep Love Strong This Valentine’s Day and Beyond

…ways we push them away. Inviting open communication and being receptive to feedback can help us overcome the real obstacles in our relationships. Instead of making excuses or counterattacking when our partner gives us feedback, we should look for the kernel of truth in what they’re saying. Don’t pick apart what they are saying. Instead find what you think applies and be compassionate to how they feel. In this same manner, you should seek to be dir…

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How To Be Loving in the Time of Twitter

…important to carve out time in which we can closely relate to our partner. Intimacy itself triggers a range of complex, and not always pleasant, emotions, such as jealousy and anxiety. Along with the natural toll of stress and schedules, the issues that arise between one’s self and one’s partner can make it easier to go to Facebook than go face-to-face with the emotions that being close can trigger. When the going gets tough, many of us unconsciou…

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It’s not you, it’s me: The truth behind the excuse

…ople come up to me after my presentations to thank me and tell me that the fears of intimacy and defensive traits I have been outlining perfectly describe their partner. These people are essentially saying, “Yes, I know defenses are hurting my intimate relationship, but it’s not my defenses, it’s theirs.” In my professional experience, it is all too easy for people to identify issues in their partners and increasingly difficult for them to pinpoin…

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Relationship Advice

Selling Out: Compromising Integrity in Intimate Relationships

…ve their power from unresolved past experiences that have left exaggerated fears of loss. They can run the gamut from urgent to mild. The problem is the high price you have paid. There are some universal fears that can drive even well-meaning and confident people to stray into that negative realm. For example, many people are more willing to sacrifice their integrity when they anticipate unbearable emotional loss. But many partners who are not fac…

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