Kids Say the Darndest Things

Hi, friends!

I hope your week is going well thus far. If you’re anything like me, you enjoyed the long weekend WAY too much and the Mondayest Tuesday ever was jam-packed with unchecked items on your to-do list. It’s OK – it will all get done at some point (I keep trying to convince myself…).

female CEO, lifestyle therapist, health and wellness advocate

Yesterday I sent my oldest daughter off for her first day of Kindergarten. My husband and I chose a private kinder option, as we both work in the medical field and are not able to work from home. Virtual learning just does not work for our lives. Needless to say, my daughter loved it! She has a group of friends from pre-K and they are all in class together. It fills my heart with such joy to watch her light up when she is with her little buddies. My daughter’s teacher has told me she could make friends with a brick – this is a skill that I hope to continue to foster to bring richness and depth to her life through meaningful relationships.

I consider my daughter an old soul with the kindest heart I have ever known. She is compassionate and insightful, often at just the right moments. We recently lost my grandfather, her great grandfather, which is a devastating loss for our entire family. My daughter has been reflecting on his death with us over the past few days. One of the comments she made to me this weekend really stuck.

“I love you” is the most important thing.

Yes, baby. It is.

Love is What We Need

She makes a good point. Wise beyond her years, she is echoing a sentiment I often use during couples counseling. When we come from a place of love, we are better able to recognize we are fighting FOR the same things. Not against.

I have a rule in couples counseling – no fighting. If a session becomes tense or feels as though we are entering a battle, the session is over. Nothing productive comes from arguing in front of a therapist. A good couples counselor will not choose sides and will not alienate one client from the other by aligning their positions. Rather, a couples counselor helps to keep a couple focused and on task, guiding and supporting the couple as the client versus two separate individuals.

Many of my first few couples counseling sessions are focused on establishing a couple’s WHY. We often spend time reflecting on the roots of what brought them together in the first place – however many years ago that may have been. We don’t spend a lot of time dissecting the journey of what went wrong. I don’t believe that is effective. Rather, we reignite the sparks and initial flames of the relationship.

Setting Goals as a Couple

I think goal setting is important personally and in a relationship. If a couple has not set a course together, how will they even know what they are working towards? Short-term and long-term goals are important to keep us focused, to celebrate small and large wins together, and to know when to pivot if something is not working. Some relationship goals my clients have set include:

Saving a certain amount of money in a defined period of time
Retiring by a defined age to begin traveling together
Helping their children to get through school
Feel safe and secure in their relationship
Become friends with their spouse
Work on fitness to be in the best shape of their lives

Ultimately, goals can be anything, as long as they are mutually agreed upon.

Once these relationship goals are established, we work on effective communication. Forgetting that your partner is coming from a place of love coupled with a breakdown in communication can be disastrous in any relationship. Therefore, I believe in communicating love through the use of validating language, affection, and everyday actions. Add in some clear and concise expression of needs and BAM – communication has improved.

Bringing It All Together…with Love

What does all of this do? Well, coming from a place of love and effective communication helps to break down walls that may have been building between partners. It helps to dismantle the ego, that sometimes intense voice in our heads that takes things personally and causes us to build up walls. It doesn’t really matter why walls formed.

Love equates to forgiveness, letting go of resentment, building empathy, and showing compassion for the human we have chosen to share life with. A romantic partnership of any kind is unlike any other relationship in our lives. It involves an emotional connection and CHOICE. Show up and be the partner you were in the beginning. When LOVE was the CHOICE.

When we come from a place of love, we respond WITH love. And this is the most important thing.

Take care of yourself. And take care of each other.