9 Tips for Next-Level Relationships

A sentence I say a lot is, “Freedom comes when we can choose to respond as opposed to react to people and situations in life.” The key word there is choose. Feeling there’s a choice about something = whatever it is feels less scary.

Having the ability to choose how we respond to our partners (most of the time — hey, we are all human) is what creates next-level relationships. It opens up the possibility for growth, healing, deeper union and ultimately, love to flow.

There are three things to consider when in partnership: A) You, B) Them, and C) The relationship — the space between you both. It’s like a garden, it can either grow weeds or flowers. The key is maintenance and that comes in the form of honing our self-awareness and ability to communicate about ourselves and our needs from a knowledgeable, constructive, non-reactive place.

Here is a selection of tools I’ve picked up along the way of my twelve-year, so far, personal freedom journey that I wish someone had told me about sooner. Using them is NOT easy but it IS exponentially rewarding towards the level of depth, connection, safety and love that opens up to you in life. Being aware of these things and using them (the tricky part) is what’ll take your relationship to the next level.

Get to know her menstrual cycle. If you date women, ask about her cycle. In fact, even if you don’t it’s useful to know anyway. Take note of how she is at certain times of the month with a sense of curiosity. The language of winter (bleed), spring, summer (ovulation), and autumn is useful here because the feeling of each season gives a starting point for you in empathising with how she might feel as the different hormones are released during the stages of her cycle.
Find out your love language. There are five: Words of affirmation, Quality time, Physical touch, Acts of service and Receiving gifts. We are often two main ones. Google “Love languages” and take a test then you’ll know the “language” you speak and hear regarding giving and receiving love.
Research your Erotic Blueprint (https://missjaiya.com/). Again, there are five and mostly we align to two of them more than the others: Shapeshifter, Energetic, Sensual, Sexual, and Kink. Think of them as the ways you can most easily accept the feeling of the energy of eros (erotic love).
Unearth your Attachment Style. They are, in short, created by how our parents and/or caregivers showed us affection multiplied by how we were shown/taught to deal with our emotions as children. There’s more to them than that but it gives the gist. The main ones are: Anxious, Avoidant and Disorganised. We can fluctuate between them depending on the situation but we tend to have a goto one. E.g. I consider myself an ex-avoidant because when relationships start to get deeper my body used to go numb and I’d push people away. Now I talk about if numbness comes up, hence EX-avoidant. Doing that calms my nervous system and people tend to become closer as a result.
List out your Life Shaping moments. Humans can only remember things when an emotion happened at the time e.g. you can’t remember going to the supermarket two months ago but if you met the love of your life or got punched in the face then, you would. Write out what you can remember from your life so far. I’m not saying the list is THE answer but it’ll give you a starting point for the reason (the traumas) for some of your reactions that have been triggered in the present. Your partner’s too of course. Treat Trigger points (as they are often called) with deep care and compassion because they can be very sensitive and raw.
Get to know his cycle. Men who practise non-release sex can have multiple energetic orgasms and there’s a cycle to that too. The same language as a women’s can be used. For a man, winter is immediately after ejaculation, spring is recharging, summer is almost full of sexual energy (when we are really horny it’s because we are almost full of energy NOT too full), and autumn is when we are full of sexual energy. In time, this is a game-changer with a man’s need for sex. Eventually, the need quietens. With that love-making and/or f_cking both become deeper and more mind-blowing acts.
Sandpit sessions. With all these self-awareness tools it’s important to create a container to relate in. A sandpit is a safe place to play. Try having one monthly with your partner to discuss C) the relationship and specifically how it’s working for you. Ask what you both feel you could Drop, Add, Keep or Improve (DAKI) within it. Write out your thoughts in secret then discuss them openly and without pointing the finger.
The Metaphorical table. Whenever you speak, verbally or via text, pretend there’s a table in front of you. Say how you feel honestly and when you speak imagine you’re placing your words on the table, then stop talking. Allow the other person the time and space to take the words off the table. How they choose to receive them is up to them. Their reaction isn’t your responsibility, it’s theirs (it’ll be heavily influenced by their understanding of their Triggers).

These 8 tools can be used to craft the three stages of any communication: relationship, possibility, and action. Mainly the first part because if the relationship, i.e. trust between two people, gets broken there’s no chance of getting to possibility and definitely no chance of taking action. But to create real deep trust in the first place we need to be able to discuss who we are, what makes us tick, what we need and our boundaries openly.

The final tool, or what might feel like a tax at times, helps with that. No 9. is understanding the art of vulnerability. It’s perhaps the most important because without being able to hold ourselves in the feeling of vulnerability non of the rest of the tools can come into play and the real us stays below the surface no matter how aware of ourselves we are. Understanding the 8 things above though will give you more confidence to express your authentic self and rebel through the feeling of vulnerability — that’s where the art lies. This, in turn, creates a virtuous circle with an unavoidable leap of faith at the start. Vulnerability is one small step for you but will be one giant leap for your relationship (and life!). Try it and see…

All the best,

Adam

PS. It’s wise to view the answers you’ll get from investigating the above with a soft gaze. It’s great to define ourselves initially as it provides a sense of safety and somewhere to start. It’s also great for our growth to not be too rigid with those definitions as it provides a sense of curiosity, adventure and openness to change.

Adam Slawson is a Personal Freedom and Relationship coach and founder of Plight Club clothing. For more tools on tips to become better at expressing your emotions download his free e-guide here and/or visit his website here.

Living consciously and by choice instead of by habit is fantastic but it’s not easy. It takes practise. It’s called “doing the work” for a reason. If you’re ready to step out of the waiting room of life, he’ll save you a lot of time on your journey to freedom by supporting you through the insecurity of change. Book a free discovery call here.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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