Understand your relationship patterns

Imagine that we create our reality and everything we see, hear and feel in the outside world. We’re attracting people and experiences that respond to the signals from our thoughts, beliefs and feelings. We’re constantly sending out information to the universe, and the universe reflects this back to us. In this way, we’re creating our relationships and choosing the people who match us at the time.

Except that the information we send out is based on experiences from all past relationships, including those with our parents. Consider all the negativity and pain you have been through, then understand that it is all being projected out into the universe along with your deepest desires. We aren’t conscious of the information we’re sending out, until we realise the same types of situation keep coming into our space. How annoying!

We continue attracting the same guys or girls who dump on us in the same way, and cause us the same pain. We pull in the same experiences over and over to remind us of our pain, and we beat ourselves up yet again.

Whether we realise it or not (most don’t) we are inviting in these people who reject us and cause us pain. I know this might be hard to hear but it’s the truth. And the faster we become open to understanding what’s really going on, the faster we can move through it and heal ourselves.

We have to look inside ourselves to find the answers. With a bit of thought and emotional honesty we can discover why and how we’re creating these negative experiences in our outside world. We can then become more aware, and change our relationship and life experiences. Fast.

If you had a difficult childhood or have been badly hurt in previous relationships, your self-esteem can be damaged and you may find yourself continually anxious with a new partner, and constantly needing reassurance that they won’t leave you. But the more anxious you get, the more they back away, so it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

One way to break these old patterns is to become more aware of them, and be mindful when you choose your next partner. Try to unlock whatever it was in your past that has made you behave the way you do in relationships now. Can you see the connections? Understanding is the first step towards bringing awareness to your pattern, and being able to change it next time: choosing a person who gives you what you need to thrive, and being able to give them what they need too.

Extracted from Self Care for the Soul, available now