The Privilege of Relationship
Do you know that we train and certify Integrative Coaches? Well, we do! And it was back in 2001 when I was looking for the “best life coach training program” that all fingers pointed me in the direction of The Ford Institute. It is now my privilege to run that coach training program.
Currently we are in the phase of a year-long training program when the students actually start working one-on-one with clients. Even though I have been an Integrative Coach for 13 years, I still feel humbled and honored to be invited into a client’s life and bear witness to some of their deepest thoughts, truths, experiences, and desires. It is always an awe-inspiring and profound moment for me when our students reach this phase of their training and realize what a privilege it is to have this kind of meaningful connection and hold a person in their highest.
Yet the fact is, every relationship is a sacred relationship — especially our closest relationships. Think of what an honor it is to share a meal with someone’s family, be invited into someone’s home, be included on a thread of a text of a private group of friends, and most of all to have someone open their heart to you. Any time we are being invited to be in relationship with someone it truly is a privilege and a profound responsibility.
Yet at some point during a relationship, many of us stop treating the relationship as if it were sacred and start focusing on the problems instead of the privilege of being in relationship. We begin to judge, compare, criticize, lash out, threaten to leave, run away, gossip, betray confidences, or somehow behave in a disrespectful or dishonoring manner. We end up wounding the people that we love the most and hurting the hearts that we had the privilege to hold. Ultimately, we push away the ones we want to hold the closest.
This is just one of the reasons that doing shadow work is so important! When your shadows get triggered, your insecurities, limiting beliefs, and traumas all show up in full force. You cannot see straight or act responsibly because your shadows wreak havoc on who you are being. You are being guided by your wounds and not your wisdom. Your fear of being betrayed turns you into the betrayer, your shame of being abandoned turns you into the abandoner, and your feelings of not good enough have you act out in some way that affirms that you are not good enough, worthy enough, or deserving enough to be in such an amazing relationship.
If you want to create sacred relationships with others, it starts with yourself. For others to feel safe around you, you need to feel safe within yourself. To understand the privilege of being in relationship with someone else, you need to grasp what a privilege it is to be in relationship with yourself. To attain this perspective of privilege, you need to do your work and look at your issues, wounds, judgments, agendas, righteous positions, and beliefs. You need to embrace all of who you are — your light and dark — to feel deserving enough to have others do the same. This is why we always hear from the students in our training and the people who attend The Shadow Process or The Shadow Experience that their relationships totally shift after the workshop. When you make peace with your shadows you don’t have to project them on to others and sabotage your relationships!!!
Debbie used to say that everyone who comes into your life is there to heal you. They are there to show you some piece of yourself or the shadows that you need to own so that you can be your fullest and most loving self. No matter what has happened in your past, it is never too late to have that one relationship of your dreams and a community of healthy and supportive people around you. This is especially true when you understand that the people in your life are there for a reason — they are there for the evolution of your soul.
So this week I want to invite you to look through the perspective of “the privilege of relationships.” Feel the gratitude for everyone who crosses your path, especially those that trigger your deepest insecurities or wounds, since they are in your life as your greatest teachers. Instead of pushing or running away from these people, welcome them in…they will be the catalyst for your next “aha” moment or evolutionary leap!
And if you feel you want to go deeper in creating a more sacred and safe relationship with yourself and truly understand the privilege of being in relationship with yourself and others on a much deeper level, then come join us in June at The Omega Institute for The Shadow Experience or in Miami or Los Angeles for The Shadow Process.
Transformational Action Steps
(1) Start observing how your agendas, judgments, criticisms, and beliefs (whether said or unsaid) impact the space in your relationships with others.
(2) Take on viewing at least one of your relationships as if it were an amazing privilege to be in a relationship with that person. Notice how you act or interact with that person. How is it different?
(3) Take on being in a sacred relationship with yourself. What will you do differently? How would you treat yourself differently? What would the internal dialogue in your head sound like? Notice how your relationships with others shift as you go deeper into a sacred relationship with yourself.
(4) Join us at The Omega Institute for The Shadow Experience: Breaking Through to Emotional & Spiritual Freedom June 19th to June 21st. Learn more and register here.
