Maintaining Close and Intimate Relationships

Your soul is your relationship with other people. What you say and do

does not die. Tom Wolfe

Prototypes of love

• Love for our first caregivers- a child’s love for a parent (essential for building trust)

• Love for those who depend on us- parent’s love for a child

• Passionate desire for sexual, physical, & emotional closeness with another- romantic love

Signs of love

• Mutual gazing• Cuddling• Kissing• Skin-to-skin contact• Touching body parts considered

private• Oxytocin released at climax as

well as nursing- enhances bonding

The universal need for love

Core virtue of humanity- the capacity to tend & befriend others

• Capacity to love and be loved- valuing close relations with others, reciprocity

• Kindness- generosity, nurturance, care, compassion, altruistic love

• Social intelligence- emotional intelligence, knowing how to fit into different social situations

Secure attachment- prototype for future relationships

• Attachment- emotional link that bonds people over time

• Healthy secure attachment is fostered by responsive, speedy interactions as parents respond to babies’ signals

• Maladaptive parental behaviors can result in insecure attachment patterns

Infancy experiences set us up for later relational patterns

Problems related to poor attachment

• Problems for a child relating to adults

• Poorer coping styles

• Problems coping with parents’ absence

• Later relationship problems

• Emotional disorders

• Conduct disorders

Secure attachments predicts:

• More positive internal model of self & others

• Self perceptions as competent, appealing, loveable

• Concepts of caregivers as accessible, responsive, consistent- they see the world as safe and others as reliable

• self-reinforcing• Better emotional regulation, curiosity, willingness

to ask for help from others

• Comfortable with others, lack of anxiety re: abandonment/ rejection

• Better general coping with life stresses, better adjusted

Love energizes self development

Developing true intimacy means taking risks

• Only through exposing one’s vulnerability can one be open to trusting another & recognizing his/her trustworthiness

• Sex without emotional intimacy becomes goal-driven performance

• Couples don’t always agree on what is satisfying sexually, however

• Resolution of conflict can be managed with:• Neutrality- respecting the good intentions of the other,

taking personal responsibility for one’s own needs

• Mutuality- working toward a mutual cause- satisfaction for both parties, as partners try to please and be pleased

• Key is full & honest communication

Healthy relationships require balance of closeness & separation

Aspects of the healthy relationship

• Honest and open communication builds trust• Don’t assume your partner should be able to read your

mind, or you can read his/her mind

• Partners need to be aware of old relationship garbage & strive not to impose it on new partners

• Both partners should remain individuals with separate interests, goals

• Sexual commitment involves sexual responsibility on both parties• Protection against unwanted pregnancy, STDs

How can you optimize your relationships?

• Minding relationships• Mutual knowing of the other as well as acceptance can produce synchrony

of thought, feeling occurs• Maintaining a sense of being unique & appreciated in the relationship

• Creating a culture of appreciation• Magic ratio of successful marriages: 5:1 • 5 positive interactions for every 1 negative• Without positive expectations of the partner, contempt breaks down the

relationship• Expressing gratitude for small acts creates a culture of gratitude• Trying to avoid the 4 Horsemen: criticism, contempt, defensiveness,

stonewalling• Capitalizing on positive events

• Telling the partner about good things in one’s life & allowing him/her to celebrate with you

• Active/constructive responses amplify the pleasure of a happy event\• Some people are negative, projecting their own negativity on you- in

which case they are not safe people to share good fortune with