They say love makes the world go around. At the core of our being, we all desire to love and be loved in return. Everybody needs love in order to feel fulfilled and happy.
If you have been reading my blog series on the stages of a relationship, you have learned that once you get past the initial meeting and attraction stage, you enter into the relational stage, where, ideally, you’ll spend at least three to six months building a friendship before you decide to enter into a romantic agreement with your person.
From here the relationship moves into the emergence stage, where you’ll spend the first six months to a year of the relationship flushing through your old concepts, patterns, and beliefs about relationships. Your past pains and fears emerge to the surface so you can face them, understand them, overcome them, and finally – let them go.
After this, the relationship enters the metamorphosis stage, where the relationship evolves from its youthful state to a much more mature one. You each become more involved in the relationship and establish a more meaningful connection with your person; and there is a clear commitment and dedication to the long-term success of the relationship.
Does that sound like a lot of work?
Well, it is. As you know relationships require effort. They require intentional and conscious work from both individuals; each doing their part to foster and nurture its growth. And that’s not all. There’s a fifth stage to discuss.
The deepening stage is when the relationship grows and expands by several degrees into something more real and more intense – love. In this stage the relationship strengthens and becomes more profound. But this doesn’t happen all by itself. It takes great effort and care from both of you to get there.
By the time you reach this fifth stage you have both invested in and surrendered to this process. You have both been fully present and aware of how you are showing up in the relationship; and you are each taking ownership of how your actions, both positive and negative, impact the relationship. You have both been committed to making healthy adjustments to help your relationship evolve.
Let’s be real!
I want to be clear that this process isn’t free of disagreements or challenging conversations. In fact, you will have to step into some conflict with one another. But this is an integral part of the process. It’s how you manage these conflicts that makes a difference.
When done respectfully and constructively conflict is good for the relationship. Conflict that respects boundaries and allows both individuals to express themselves helps create a stronger bond. When you allow the arguments to happen and to come through the other side of them, it increases trust. So, knowing that you can have conflict and still be okay makes arguments less threatening.
The key to this is understanding that there are two unique human beings in the relationship. Humans are emotional creatures by nature and emotions are integral to the human experience. As such, you’re each allowed to have emotional responses within the relationship. And whether those responses are directly related to the relationship or not, it is important to allow and respect each other’s process.
What this process is truly asking of you is to commit to your own healing and growth. It is asking you to deepen your relationship with yourself and to love yourself fully. Because when you do, the better equipped you will be to love and treat others around you, specifically those closest to you. And that is exactly what your romantic partner is there to help you do. They’re helping you become aware of how and when you are not loving yourself. They are shining a light on your blind spots so you can, little by little, make improvements on yourself that will help you become a more loving person; first with yourself and then with those around you.
This entire process looks different for everyone, and some relationships will need to spend more time in certain stages than others. The intricacies that happen within each stage will be unique to your couple dynamic and that is what will make it special. It is a beautiful process, but it is challenging. If you surrender to it, you will evolve into the best version of yourself.
To sum it up, I’ll leave you with this quote:
“Life is the school, love is the lesson, and relationships are the assignments designed to further us into learning to live in a deeper state of love.”
― Kate McGahan
Blessings,
LifeCoachAngel