Notes From a Relationship Coach
​(Big ideas in a small email)

“Love liberates. It doesn’t bind.”

–Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings​

Love requires enough safety and freedom for two entire humans to live, grow, explore, frolic, fall down, get up, and still feel lovable. There must be space for two completely different sets of perspectives, feelings, struggles, experiences, and preferences.

A relationship is not a one-seater that you need to cram yourselves into via sacrifice, compliance, performance, and self-abandonment. You don’t need to like all the same things or agree on everything.

But you DO need to let your partner be themselves.

If you can’t appreciate, accept, or allow someone to be who they are: 1) That’s probably gonna suck for both of ya’s, and 2) Maybe it’s just not a good match?

A lotta folks are drawn into romantic partnership based on physical attraction, proximity, familiarity, convenience, loneliness, or unmet needs. Then they lock down a committed relationship and gradually encounter some gross incompatibilities and misalignments that quietly fuel resentment and irresolvable conflict.

I do not believe any old two people can make a relationship work if only they have good boundaries and communication skills (or whatever pop psychology is selling these days). Nawww… there are minimum requirements, without which your partner will annoy the crap out of you.

And no amount of love will fix that.

…

Last year I taught a course called What F’s Up Relationships? and spent some time discussing the importance of compatibility and what that entails. Here’s a free download I put together on the topic:

​Compatibility Inventory​

Hope that makes your life more wonderful,

*This email contains Amazon affiliate links to the books mentioned.

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