commitment resistance Archives - Baggage Reclaim with Natalie Lue

Without integrity in our relationships, we can’t be emotionally available

August 14, 2018 By NATALIE 17 Comments Reading Time: 5 Minutes

When I talk to people about their biggest struggles with relationships, an all too common complaint is struggling to deal with someone who is not willing to go the distance with intimacy and commitment. Each time they feel as if they’re making progress, this person gradually or even very sharply rolls things back to what I call their ‘status quo’ in my book Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl.

Imagine relationships on a scale of 0-10. The type of person who struggles with progression, balance, intimacy, commitment, and consistency – the landmarks of healthy relationships – wants to keep the relationship at 5. It’s like Goldilocks and The Three Bears: not too cold, not too hot, just right. “Just right” being right for their comfort zone not necessarily for their growth or that of the relationship.

**As a result, someone who is afraid of intimacy and commitment will always manage the relationship back to their comfort zone.**

Temperature ‘too high’ and not fitting with the perception of their self-worth? Cue lowering the temperature through sabotage and passive-aggressive behaviour. Things get ‘too good’ and ‘intimate’, they’ll undermine things in such a way that it gets back on their terms. Like when you meet their friends or go on an amazing holiday, and they pick or fight or disappear afterwards…

Told them to jog on? Cue them suddenly blowing hot and you feeling as if you’re approaching 8 or beyond. You think the fantasy is finally going to come true. And then gradually the relationship slides back down to 5. Like when you end it with someone who refused to commit or who mistreated you. Next thing, you’re experiencing an onslaught of effort and big declarations about the future. And then poof, you’re back to square one again.

The frustration in these situations unreal but also is the clue to our own liberation.

One of the single most significant changes that we can make to our relationship experiences as well as our self-esteem is to be more emotionally honest and to maintain our integrity.

When we’re in an unavailable relationship, we gradually lose our integrity. If we were truly being honest with ourselves (and them), we wouldn’t stick around in the relationship for as long as we have. Being someone whose actions and words match would matter too much to give it up. We wouldn’t say, “I need this and this and this” and then stick around when it’s clearly not there on the basis that we can see so much ‘potential’. We wouldn’t say that we’re “done” if certain things don’t happen and then stay anyway because we’re too afraid to honour ourselves.

How can we expect someone to be honest with us when they’re not even honest with themselves?

Be Careful What You Wish For (Or Raise Your Standards By Wishing For More)

March 2, 2018 By NATALIE Reading Time: 4 Minutes

An acquaintance realised that she was getting what she wished for when she found herself dumped and alone on her birthday. Her then-boyfriend was typically twitchy about committing to having breakfast with her the following day and could be damn-near hostile about hanging out with her friends and family, tending to bail on events or cause drama afterwards. It shouldn’t have been a surprise that no matter how fabulous she was, he wasn’t going to be chomping at the bit to settle down, never mind make her feel special on her birthday. It wasn’t his inclination or his typical pattern of behaviour.

How the hell did this happen?, she wondered. From her perspective, she was the doting, patient, loving girlfriend who saw beyond his ‘quirky’ ways to his potential. She couldn’t understand what she was doing wrong and why each boyfriend had an allergy to commitment.

And then she realised something: each boyfriend had been what she wanted at that time.

This guy was muscly, tick, very good looking, tick, gave her butterflies, tick, ‘spontaneous’, tick (she never knew when he was going to show up or when he was going to pull a Houdini, plus he tended to expect her to drop everything), great in bed, tick, and had a good job, tick. This was what she found attractive and she went out with variations of the same guy in different packages, always trying to meet their needs in the hope that they would meet hers.

As usual, she had got what she was looking for, it’s just that she didn’t like what else it came with.

She hadn’t realised that her type is also moody, ambivalent, prone to selfishness, passive aggressive and reluctant to take responsibility.

Begin With The End In Mind

January 19, 2018 By NATALIE Reading Time: 5 Minutes

When we’re doing or tolerating something that isn’t a reflection of who we really are, we often mistakenly believe that it must be because it’s what we want. This is why, for example, so many people remain in unfulfilling relationships with commitment resistant, emotionally unavailable partners – they resign themselves to the situation because it’s seen as proof positive that they either don’t want it or that they’re not going to get it. What they didn’t do was begin with the end in mind.

Putting up with or doing something that’s at odds with our needs, expectations, desires, feelings and opinions, reflects a lack of clarity and commitment on our side that we’re very possibly unaware of.

It’s not unusual to focus on being a good person, to work hard, to try to be as loving, understanding, accommodating as possible. We assume that being and doing these things will influence and control receiving the desired outcome. This leads to us inadvertently blocking our own success.

If we’re overinvesting in someone and a situation that lacks love, care, trust and respect, no matter how much we do, no matter how much we suffer, it’s not going to yield the relationship we want.

We might think that we’ve begun with the end in mind but we don’t if we’re misappropriating our energies. We’re not going to feel the way that we truly want to feel. The way we’re living will block our own growth and intimacy.

If the woodcutter chops logs every day and wants to up their production levels, do they work more hours or do they get a better chopping implement?

We don’t have to try harder, suffer even more or even give up altogether if the way in which we’ve been going about getting what we want hasn’t yielding the desired results. It’s nothing to do with us being not ‘good enough’ and everything to do with us being mistaken in what we think it takes to create, forge and sustain mutually fulfilling loving relationships.

If we mistakenly believe that love conquers all and that we can in essence, hitch our wagon to anyone and that with enough effort, the rest will take care of itself, and we then keep repeating this mentality in our efforts, we’re essentially walking into the same relationship pothole again and again, and again.

We have to figure out what we want (where we want to go) and how we want to feel. We can then point us in the right direction and also steer ourselves away from anything or anyone that isn’t in alignment with that.

If you’re serious about being in a serious relationship, accept no substitutes.

The second habit in The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People is: begin with the end in mind.

No, that doesn’t mean that you should start a relationship with the breakup forecasted. What it does mean is that you need to get clear on what you want. You need to decide where you’re aiming.

If you want to be in a serious relationship that’s mutually fulfilling, you need to commit to your cause. If you don’t, what you do when you date and proceed to relationships won’t have a purpose.

So many people tell me that they want a committed relationship with love, care, trust and respect. They want to be themselves. So, what are many of these people doing?

Dating anyone who shows an interest even if they’re not feeling it or the person has the boundary issues
Flailing around in casual relationships where they’d originally hoped that their involvement would lead to something more serious
Chasing after an ex or even bouncing around with a number of exes
Staying in the wrong relationship because they’re afraid to leave, start over and be on their own
Pretending to be something they’re not, using dating to audition to be whatever they think a date wants

These are just a few examples.

Why aren’t we committing to what we want?

Because it’s a commitment.

If we don’t admit that we need/want something, we don’t have to be vulnerable. We don’t have to expose ourselves to disappointment.

Dating and relationships are an experiment. They put all of our ideas, beliefs and assumptions about who we are, what we need and how we think relationships work to the test. Staying in our uncomfortable comfort zone hurts but we figure it can’t get much worse (until it does).

We don’t have to challenge the misunderstandings, judgements and yes, very painful and negative beliefs that we’re carrying around.

We’re also prone to distraction and often have a ‘some crumbs is better than no crumbs mentality’ so even though we’re in an incompatible relationship where our emotional needs aren’t being met, we’ll stay. We gratify the temporary and so we’ll lap up the attention, affection, acknowledgement, sex or whatever it is. It’s kidding ourselves that we’re getting the best of both worlds while sacrificing our emotional needs and true desires. In avoiding disappointment, we end up experiencing even more of it.

Very often though, we feel as if we have made a commitment to what we want. What we’re unaware of though is the unconscious intentions and fears that scupper our efforts.

If we want commitment in a loving relationship but secretly fear that we’re unworthy, that we’re going to be trapped [like a parent], that we’ll lose ourselves, our career or something else that spells too many sacrifices, or that we’re going to wind up with or like one or both of our parents, we’ll cater to the fear not what we want.

Acknowledge your desires. Begin with the end in mind.

Beginning with the end in mind isn’t a guarantee of what you want (especially if you’re controlling a ‘plan’). It’s guaranteed though that you won’t get what you want if you don’t define it. Without living a life that’s conducive to that end or consciously directing you there, you can’t even get close.

If you’re treating and regarding you with love, care, trust and respect, what you say yes and no to is very different to that of someone who doesn’t know, like and trust themselves.

How will you know if you’re fulfilled if you don’t know where you want to end up? If you’ve never put your line in the sand or have never really put some definition behind who you are and where you want to go (your core values):

How will you know when you’ve had enough, that something isn’t right, or that you’ve veered off track?
How will you know what to say/show yes and no to?
How will you know what to do in the day-to-day to further your aims?
How will you know when you’ve, as such, reached your goal?

Many of us struggle with feeling time-poor, overwhelmed and yes, super busy. Without clarity about our priorities and healthy boundaries, things that don’t matter a great deal overshadow them.

Acknowledging what you want also helps you to recognise what you’re afraid of.

This is good – now you know what to address. Now you know what to be mindful of. Acknowledging where you’ve paid attention to these fears wakes you up to the realisation that catering to them isn’t leading you to anywhere but pain.

It is often quite scary to commit to what you want but in truth, not anywhere near as scary as not even trying. You have to take a leap of faith. Commitment means that you have to decide without knowing exactly how you’ll get there or when things are going to happen. You commit without knowing exactly how things will turn out. It’s taking a step, any step, however imperfect it might be and keep trying to move in that direction.

Your thoughts?

Podcast Ep. 97: Focus On You – Want A Relationship? Be Prepared To Say No To The Distractions

September 29, 2017 By NATALIE Reading Time: 3 Minutes

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In this week’s episode of The Baggage Reclaim Sessions, I’m delving into what has fast become one of my favourite topics–being discerning. In order for us to become more of who we really are, to become available for the relationships and opportunities that we want, and to yes, clear some of the baggage from the past that we’re carrying around, we have to exercise good judgment and that means reducing distractions and being discerning by becoming more mindful about what we say yes to.

I cover:

>> How getting distracted at, for example, work, by people who ask us, “Got a minute?” or “Can I pick your brain?’ is like when we date people who we know are not suitable for us or who we’re not even interested in.

>> Why, yes, we often know that we need to reduce distractions in order to focus but that deep down we may be afraid of focusing because we’re afraid of committing, and basically of putting our stake in the sand and saying, This is who I am, this is what I’m about, and this is what I want/need.

>> How we’re secretly afraid of our purpose and potential–scared of being seen. We might have secret fears like… What if I’m great? What if it’s hard? What if I screw up? What if I discover something about myself? What if I discover that everything I’ve been telling myself is not true?

>> Why our uncomfortable comfort zone seems to be the safer option because we know it, we think that we’ve got the pain thing figured out and that it couldn’t get much worse, and we’d basically take this over the great unknown where there’s plenty of uncertainty…but also our freedom.

>> How I noticed this pattern amongst everyone I’ve encountered that’s struggling with relationships or some other form of painful problem and it’s that they’re avoiding something and have a or even a few outstanding big decisions.

>> The two questions I explore with clients that give a great deal of insight into what the distraction is a cover for: What was going on in the weeks and months proceeding this situation? It’s often a loss but it can also be the potential of something good. Do you have any outstanding big decisions to be made? Often there’s delay showing up around, for example, a move they need to make logistically or at work, whether to have a family, or even just whether they’re actually going to quit the unavailable relationship track and get on to the committed, mutually fulfilling track.

>> Why unavailable relationships are really just another form of procrastination

>> How commitment is not about knowing all the steps and ins and outs between where you are now and where you want to go–it’s about taking a step, however imperfect it might be, and taking more steps.

>> How we are inadvertently uncommitting ourselves with our distractions and choices.

Links mentioned

>> Episode 96 about my social media diet

>> We’ve got to stop procrastinating in unavailable relationships

>> My Break The Cycle course is open for enrollment

Next stop

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The Pop-Up Relationship: The Temporary Romance That Expires & Never Develops

March 15, 2017 By NATALIE Reading Time: 4 Minutes

Have you ever spent time with somebody who gives amazing date and yet, afterwards it’s crickets? I did that on and off for four years. Honestly, if you’d met us on dates, wearing the face off each other and barely able to keep our hands to ourselves, laughing and putting the world to rights, you’d be forgiven for thinking that we were madly in love. Sadly, as I mentioned in Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl, we’d have The Best Date Ever TM™ and then he’d go dark until next time.

I recently chatted with Margie who has been ‘seeing’ (I use that word loosely) a guy for two years where they have The Best Date / Weekend Ever ™ every 4-6 weeks or so. She thinks they have an amazing connection but is very concerned about how she’s on a permanent date with this guy when she technically wants to be in a serious relationship and settle down and have a family. The funny thing is though, is all they have is these dates/weekends. That’s it. There’s no actual relationship in between. They exchange texts here and there but after 2 years, even that’s on the wane.

It is now an established pattern that they can have a date or a weekend and that he will disappear, and that she will be right there when he is looking for entertainment again in the future.

In theory, walking away seems easy, after all, why would she want to keep seeing somebody who, in the space of 2 years has spent the same amount of time with her that someone else would do in the space of a few months?

Margie focusing on the feelings that she experiences on the dates has blinded her to what she feels afterwards. It is a rollercoaster and she harbours a fantasy that one day he’s going to come to her and say, ‘Baby, thank you for your patience over this last two years. I’ve decided you’re the one and I want to be with you every day and live happily ever after. Let me knock you up this minute’— not.gonna.happen.

When a relationship pops up for a short period of time and then disappears again, it’s a pop-up relationship or even pop-up romance.

There’s a Big Difference Between Interest and Commitment

January 16, 2017 By NATALIE Reading Time: 4 Minutes

One of the mistakes I used to make was assuming that if a guy expressed interest in me that he was:

1) Not in a relationship already
2) Over his ex
3) Interested in a relationship with me
4) We had a lot in common (I know, I know!)

From there, my next assumption was that if we were hanging out, sleeping together, plus I was playing armchair therapist, and, in my eyes, we were for all intents and purposes acting like boyfriend and girlfriend even if it wasn’t labelled as such, we were doing so because he was interested in it developing into a relationship.

I was so hung up on whether he was ‘interested’ that I failed to pay attention to what his interest pertained to. I’d feel rejected when they’d utter such guff like, ‘You’re a great girl and any guy would be lucky to have you… but I’m not over my ex /not ready for a relationship/not ready to be cut from the umbilical cord yet’, but the truth is, they were interested in me within certain contexts but separate to that, they weren’t interested in a relationship. I used to make that a me-problem, as if how interesting I was could make a man spontaneously combust into being relationship-minded even if he had issues that meant he wasn’t. It was also foolhardy of me to make assumptions about where a person’s interests lay when I could show up and let the person unfold.

Anyone can be interested in you just like anyone can browse or pick up something and play about with it for a bit, but there’s a big difference between interest and commitment.

As humans, we’re interested in a lot of things but our personal priorities shift some of those interests into the commitment category.

If, for instance, we have an interest in how online businesses work, fishing, and how to make paper rosettes to name but a few of our interests, but part of our plan is to run our own business one day, we’re likely to develop the interest in online business if we’re serious about it.

We might, for instance, be very interested in fishing and do what so many of us do when the urge to know everything about something overtakes us, and order up all sorts of equipment, books, and maybe even a cool outfit to go with it, but never have the fishing rod touch the water or only fish sporadically.

That doesn’t mean that the person isn’t interested in fishing but what separates someone who is interested in something from someone who is invested in something, is the actions.

Similarly, every time they see a paper rosette, they might think, I’d really love to be able to make those, but without actions, it’s not a priority or even a developed interest.

Podcast Ep. 60: “I should have more self-discipline”, Gifting stress, Intense With The One After You

November 18, 2016 By NATALIE Reading Time: 2 Minutes

It’s time for another episode of The Baggage Reclaim Sessions.

In episode 60, I cover:

“I should have more self-discipline”: I explain why we need to stop criticising us for having to cut something out in order to avoid temptation and move forward. I talk about food, deleting the likes of Facebook and Instagram, and having to go No Contact. | Link mentioned: It’s Just The One Chocolate Bar. It’s Just The One Values and Boundaries Bust. Or is it?

Why doesn’t our gifting feel so giving?: I talk about overspending, passive-aggressive gifts, gifting even when the person has asked us not to, ill-judged gifts and feeling as if we’re being upstaged by a show-off. | Links mentioned: Episode 15 about giving | Episode 2: What’s the baggage behind it? | Unsent Letter Guide

Intense with the one after you: I explain why we shouldn’t be too quick to assume that our commitment-avoiding ex is committing to the one after us. | Extra links:

Listener Question: Steve wants to know whether he’s right to feel rejected about his girlfriend not sleeping in his arms for the entire night.

What I Learned This Week: When we’ve been rehashing something, it’s good to make a conscious decision to talk about something else.

You can listen to this podcast below. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe either on Soundcloud or on iTunes. If you’re new to podcasts, find out more about what they are and how to subscribe with this handy guide.

Leave a comment or post on Facebook, and please, if you enjoy it, subscribe and/or leave a review on iTunes (how-to guide here)–it really helps in growing the show. If you know someone who would enjoy it, please help spread the word. It all helps. Listener questions can be emailed to podcast AT baggagereclaim DOT com. If there’s a topic you’d love me to talk about, let me know!

Advice Wednesday: What If Grieving Takes Too Long After The End of My Engagement & My Bereavement & Then I Miss Out?

November 2, 2016 By NATALIE Reading Time: 6 Minutes

Shelley asks: Four months before we were due to get married last January, my ex cancelled the wedding. He simultaneously pushed for us to get married and start trying for a baby straight away, while being very critical, looking for problems, and demanding certainty that it would all work out. I recognised that his actions didn’t match his words and that he wanted certainty before he would commit, showing that he didn’t know what commitment truly involves. We broke up and I feel that for whatever reason (I’m beyond caring), he faked a future with me.

Remembering that his problems are about him, I was taking time to heal and rebuild my confidence. I still had a way to go but felt I was on the right path. Then in January, my dad died suddenly and it threw me. I do OK with self-care including grief support groups but it’s not linear. My body tells me I’m stressed (bad skin, flaking nails, some mild hair loss) even if I think I’m doing OK on a day to day level.

I keep thinking I must be fully over the ex before getting into something new, but how do I know when I’m over it enough? We’re not in contact, nor do I want him back, but I’m still angry.

At 35, I really want kids and fear that I’m getting too old and that I’ll miss out while trying to get over my recent experiences. I fear that my distrust is going to put up a wall or send me into another unhealthy relationship. This is what kept me with the fiancé through 3 months of flip-flapping after we got engaged. That and I had committed and it took me that long to realise that the problem was he hadn’t.

I tell myself there is no race, but really there is. There will be a time when I can’t have kids and it is approaching. How do I calm that, focus on myself and make sure I’ve put myself back together enough that I can confidently go forward into the world of dating? How will I know when I’m ready? At the moment the thought of making another mistake is terrifying, which I know isn’t realistic. But I don’t want to go through more pain on top of all this.

*******************

Life is a teacher and it loves to do it with ironic reflections.

The things that we dislike and that frustrate us in others, are things that we ourselves are guilty of in some guise.

Your ex-fiancé rushed, pushed and pressured you. He wanted everything yesterday and he wanted guarantees about the future. He simulated commitment by proposing and wanting to dive straight into trying for a baby, but the actions, mentality and attitude for commitment weren’t there. He had competing fears and beliefs undermining it.

Here’s the thing: You are now rushing, pushing and pressuring you. You also want it yesterday and on some level you want guarantees. You say you don’t want to go through more pain but there will be pain ahead, more so if you keep trying to avoid it.

And while you’re right that part of the problem was that he hadn’t committed, the other part was that you were trying to see through a commitment that was driven in part by your fear that this was the last chance saloon and also fearing trusting your judgement and revising your decision. As I explain in Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl, yes of course we look more committed when the person we’re committed to is flip-flapping but committing to someone who is uncommitted no matter which way you slice it, is procrastination.

The Vicious Cycle of Undervaluing Yourself

September 19, 2016 By NATALIE Reading Time: 5 Minutes

While chatting with a friend who is only a few months in business and having her doubts about continuing because of how she feels about valuing her work she said, “I don’t feel worthy of charging the proper rate yet”. As a result, she’s been charging much less to get ‘experience’ so that she can build up to feeling worthy, only to feel stressed out, devalued and demotivated because she’s undervaluing her work and sometimes clients are too.

Charging what we’re worth in business (or ensuring that we’re not underpaid) isn’t at all dissimilar to treating and regarding ourselves as worthwhile and valuable people.
Instead of undervaluing our skills, talents, experience, and the transformation that we can for instance, help a client achieve, we undervalue our needs, expectations, desires, feelings and opinions.

We settle for crumbs hoping that in the process of doing so, the other party will feel inclined to reward our efforts with a loaf.

Instead though, we grow increasingly resentful, disillusioned and hurt when they don’t.

When we know that we are undervaluing ourselves in some way and so as a result, someone else is getting to undervalue us as part of that interaction or process, all it does is reinforce our unworthiness because we perceive their actions or lack of them as an indicator of our worth, creating a vicious cycle that just might begin to convince us that this is as good as it gets (it isn’t).

I explained to my friend that what she’s saying about charging the ‘proper rate’ for her work is just like when people say stuff like, “I don’t feel I’m worthy of a loving partner and relationship because I feel like that’s for someone who is more ______ or less _______ than me.”

Really what we’re saying in these situations is, “What if I charge what I’m worth and then they wonder who the hell I think I am or they expect more of me [and I don’t live up to their expectations]?”

And, “What if I’m my true self and I step up for the type of partner and relationship that version of me desires and deserves but then they don’t want to be that partner in the relationship or they reject me and think I’m uppity? What if I stop accepting crumbs and then I’m left with no one to date?”

In the business situation, the person isn’t buying the experience—they’re buying a transformation, what we can do for them or their business.

In the relationship situation, it’s coming down to the difference between dating and creating, forging and sustaining relationships.

Obviously we need to date/go out with some people to move it towards a relationship but if we’re serious about being in a serious relationship, we have to move on from dating.

If in this situation, you were looking to date and nothing else, then your objective is met because you would be, if you kept accepting less than what you need and deserve, be dating but not really progressing. Even if things appear to progress, you might have, for example, a several-years-long relationship under your belt but for all intents and purposes, still be ‘dating’ because it hasn’t really evolved in terms of intimacy, connection, progression, balance and consistency. And believe me—I hear from a lot of people who are in their 30s, 40s and beyond who are with partners for multiple years but ’stuck’ due to the relationship not really having emotionally evolved from that first year or so and in some instances, it’s regressed.

Fearing that the population of single men/women will effectively vanish off the face of the earth the moment that you have boundaries and standards is fear of stepping out of that self-critical comfort zone talking. Really, what happened? You had some boundaries and standards and it wiped out the single population like a plague?

In order to move beyond dating but also the loop-the-loop of unavailable relationships that sometimes make us feel like we’re in our own Groundhog Day with same person different package, we cannot accept imitations.

We can’t simulate intimacy, commitment etc while also feeling unworthy because we’ll be hitching our wagon to something and someone where it’s all gonna feel a bit ‘off’ because we’ve come into things from a place of feeling as if we can’t be who we truly are or show up for what we want because we don’t believe that we deserve it or that we’ll get it.

What type of partner will we choose on that basis? It’s not as if we can claim that we’re having a deeply intimate relationship when we’re driven by our sense of unworthiness, because we have a wall up when we’re coming from this place plus we will be and do things in order to ‘get’ love and the relationship we want, and it won’t necessarily be because it’s who we are and what we want to do but because we think it’s expected of us and we’re afraid of what might happen if we don’t.

And incidentally, in the case of my friend, she can charge a lower rate as long as the value’s clear to both her and clients. She can for example, let them know the full rate but explain that as she’s in the process of establishing her practice that she has beta fees and will do a full-rate job but wants honest feedback as she tweaks the offering etc.

You’re not going to feel like a valuable and worthwhile person by doing things that actively devalue you.

Undervaluing ourselves is always going to sour the interaction. The energy just won’t be right. Raising our self-worth by entering into our relationships from a place of equality rather than it being about superiority and inferiority, will filter out people who aren’t interested in a mutually fulfilling relationship, but this is no bad thing. It clears the decks for people and experiences that nourish and raise us up instead of dragging us down.

Note as well: People can value themselves enough to not accept less than love, care, trust and respect in their relationships while still having baggage to sort out. It’s called being human.

Someone who doesn’t know how to love you or how to be a partner in a relationship is only going to hurt.

You might think that it will be ‘easier’ or that it will feel so much more valuable when you convince and convert them; you might think that you’ll get your training wheels with this type of partner and then feel more confident to try out a ‘real’ partner, but while you’re settling for less and getting busted up in the process, they’re also settling for less then being a truly available loving partner. They will learn more from you valuing you even if that means you opting out than they will from you not doing so and accepting far less than what you need and deserve in the hopes they’ll spontaneously combust into the person you want. It’s also safe to say that if you don’t get on board with valuing you, you will push away what doesn’t chime with those feelings of unworthiness.

If you value you by not accepting less than the basics (care, trust, respect and then love), you will not go wrong.

Your thoughts?

Advice Wednesday: I Wasn’t Sure About My Boyfriend But Now That I Am, He Just Wants To Be Casual

August 31, 2016 By NATALIE Reading Time: 5 Minutes

Lucy asks: I met a sweet, lovely person at work, we fell in love and dated for four months. As I came fresh out of a longer friends with benefits relationship (my partner wasn’t ready to date), I had mixed feelings and sometimes felt rushed. I wanted to take it slowly but didn’t want to disappoint my new boyfriend. Still, I felt some incompatibilities (core values). Eventually I felt sad and confused, and asked for time, but my boyfriend said that would mean breaking up. I thought it through and talked to him honestly and we parted as friends. We saw each other at work. While I was figuring out how I felt, we sometimes hugged etc. Recently, when I realised I didn’t want to go back to my ex (who is now ready to date me), we slept together three times and finally I had the courage to ask him to take me back, but things have changed and he wants to keep his options open now. I understand. He offers friendship, even friends with benefits for a while. I feel like I lost the love of my life, miss him terribly. Should I do No Contact or keep seeing him? We’re no longer workmates.

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An ego trap that can cause us to spend time on people and things that would be better left alone, is wanting what we can’t have. When you were in your friends with benefits ‘arrangement’, you wanted him to be your boyfriend but he didn’t want to date. You then had a bonafide boyfriend for a few months but you had mixed feelings and ultimately didn’t want to be in a relationship with him, and then some time after the breakup where maybe the first ex suddenly thought something like, “Whoa! Wait up a second! Lucy isn’t jumping to my beat and she’s not going to make herself available to me if I tell her I’m not ready to date. Ooh, I don’t like this feeling of being out of control. What can I do? Oooh, I know–I’ll say that I’m ready to date”, and then dangled that at you, you decided that you don’t want him but that you now think that the man who you have some incompatibilities around core values with is “the love of [your] life”. Possibly feeling that this was a sure bet because he’d originally wanted things more than you had, he’s now decided that he doesn’t want to be in a relationship and is now offering you what you had been discontented with with the previous ex.

This situation is a mess and the truth is, not one of you knows what you really want and that ambivalence is playing out through this friends with benefits game of musical chairs.

Lucy, you were not over your ex when you met your now ex c0-worker and boyfriend. He probably offered sweet respite from waiting around for the person you really wanted to step up and want you for more than just sex and ‘friendship’. You talk about falling in love but you also talk of “mixed feelings”, feeling “rushed” and some “incompatibilities (core values)”. These are not small things and it sounds like you downplayed your concerns and being fast forwarded but it eventually felt too much. Even if you hadn’t gone from one involvement to another, it’s likely that you would have still felt uncomfortable because it didn’t feel as if you were going at a mutual pace and there was too much of a temptation to ignore your feelings and downplay your need for time because you were afraid of disappointing him. When you did finally explain how you felt and asked for time, he said that it would mean breaking up, if anything validating those niggling feelings.

Podcast Ep. 40: Relationships Need Purpose & Direction, Handling Narcissists, Disapproving of a Friend’s Partner & Plans

August 12, 2016 By NATALIE Reading Time: 2 Minutes

It’s time for another episode of The Baggage Reclaim Sessions.

In episode 40, I cover:

Is a future allowed?: I talk about why it’s perfectly OK for somebody to not want a relationship but if you do, it needs to have purpose and direction otherwise it has no aim. You need to know that exploring the possibilities and having a future is a possibility.

Handling narcissistic co-workers, family members, and romantic partners: Whether they’re narcissistically inclined or an actual narcissist, the 18 tips that I share will reduce your baggage in this area but also lessen their impact on you. More reads: We Need To Talk About Narcissists | Episode 2: What’s The Baggage Behind It? | Episode 5: Dealing With Tricky Co-Workers | Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD)

Redirecting your energy: The same energy that goes into making you unworthy could be used to make you the opposite.

Listener Question: Sarah’s friend is marrying someone who is 20 years her senior and it’s bringing up feelings of disapproval as well as questions about her own life. What do you do when you disapprove of your friend’s partner, plans and choices?

What I Learned This Week: I’ve been reminded yet again that I really do not need to dim my light for my siblings.

Leave a comment or post on Facebook, and please, if you enjoy it, subscribe. If you know someone who would enjoy it, please help spread the word. It all helps. Listener questions can be emailed to podcast AT baggagereclaim DOT com. If there’s a topic you’d love me to talk about, let me know!

Enjoy!