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

“Connection is the energy that exists between people when they feel seen, heard, and valued.”

–Brené Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection​

I remember my brother jokingly asking if I was wearing a clip-on tie at my wedding.

I’d been wearing ties five days a week for a decade, and frankly, my tie collection was the stuff of legend. So it wasn’t the “forty-year-old man giving me a noogie” energy that rubbed me wrong but feeling so abruptly unknown by my own kin.

Not to throw him under the bus for one silly comment, but it reminded me (at a less than ideal moment) of how unsafe and disconnected I felt in my childhood – how being seen was actually a bad thing in most cases because it made me a target.

Just the other day after yoga we were sitting on our mats chatting. A few of us began talking at the same time, but they ceded the floor so I could complete my thought, and it was literally JARRING to my nervous system when I noticed that people were listening intently to my words.

I think Brené is saying when people really see you – listen, notice, understand, relate, remember, ask, and clearly WANT to hear you – that feels like connection. And when they don’t… it don’t.

She’s not wrong.

But what she doesn’t mention here is how developmental trauma and attachment injuries can make benign human interaction feel like Russian Roulette or a reoccurring nightmare (which can make dating difficult, bee tee dubs).

As always, there’s an outside job and an inside job:

1. Do you spend time with good people who see, hear, and value you?
2. Have you investigated the internal scar tissue that makes that difficult?

I help people do both of those things. Full time. Most of you don’t need my help. But summa y’all do.

I’m ONE email away.

Sincerely,

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

If an amazing friend forwarded you this email, you can subscribe here.
If YOU are an amazing friend, go on and forward this thang.

​​​​​