Lindsey: Hi, welcome to The Life Coach Hotline. This is Lindsey Mango, your life coach. How can I help you?
Speaker: Okay, hi Lindsey. So I’ve been feeling that a story that keeps coming up for me is like just for once I want my relationship to be easy. And yeah, that’s my story.
Lindsey: Love it. Okay, perfect. Tell me more about that. What type of relationship is it? Is it just all your relationships or your romantic relationship?
Speaker: It’s for my romantic relationship, yes.
Lindsey: Okay.
Speaker: I’ve been with this guy for about four years now and I really love him. We have gone through really hard challenges together, like really tough ones, but it feels like the struggle never ends, you know? One after the other or there’s a curveball, you know?
Lindsey: Okay, so what about it feels hard? You’ve already kind of said that there’s different struggles or challenges that show up. What about it all feels hard?
Speaker: What about it really feels hard is I think there’s a part of me that doesn’t want this relationship. It’s weird, but part of me keeps saying that I’m not with the right person.
Lindsey: Okay, so part of you doesn’t know if you want this relationship or if this is the relationship for you.
Speaker: Yes.
Lindsey: And that’s what makes it feel particularly hard?
Speaker: Yeah, like am I really with the right person? Is this going to work out or am I just wasting both of our time?
Lindsey: What makes you think that?
Speaker: So for a while now I’ve been having certain needs that I’ve had, you know, that I keep telling myself that they’re not that important. But I know they are. And I’m great at manifestation, right? And when I keep working through each of these needs step by step, I ultimately do realize that they do get met, but only when I pay focus on it. When I consciously, actively manifest to get my needs met. It doesn’t happen effortlessly. Does that make sense?
Lindsey: It doesn’t happen flawlessly, is that what you said?
Speaker: Yeah, like I have to actively visualize. I have to actively communicate my needs time and time again, or maybe communication happens and yeah, that’s it.
Lindsey: Okay, so let me ask you this. Why does that feel hard or what about that feels hard or bad?
Speaker: Because a part of me feels like this relationship should be easy, you know? I mean, I know relationships are hard, but they’re not supposed to be this hard, right? There shouldn’t be a curveball after a curveball. It should be easy. It should feel good all the time, you know?
Lindsey: Well, I think there’s a couple important things to point out here. I think one, you said, “I know relationships are hard” and I want to argue like, what if that’s not true? And on the flip side, you’re also saying it should be easy, which might be confusing but I’m not sure that’s helpful either. Because think about it, when you think relationships are supposed to be hard, how does that feel to you? And how does that show up?
Speaker: When I keep believing the story that relationships are hard, I’m naturally attracting more hardships, more communication battles. And that definitely feels way icky, like a vibration I don’t want to be in, definitely.
Lindsey: Yes. And then on the flip side, when you think they should be easy, how does that show up? What does that look like?
Speaker: It negates because it’s not always easy. Like we do have beautiful moments, like we do have beautiful weeks together, but it comes back to not being easy. So it feels like, why am I not able to keep it easy all the time?
Lindsey: Right. So you kind of swing, right? Like it’s supposed to be easy – And tell me if I’m wrong, when you say hardships are coming, is it in the relationship or in life hardships come and then that’s what makes it hard? Is it just hard things in life happen to one of you or both of you and that is something that causes difficulty? Or is it actually something in the relationship that is happening?
Speaker: In the relationship.
Lindsey: Got it. Okay, perfect. So I was just kind of showing you how when you think it should be easy, then anything that’s, you know, whatever, life or difficult conversations come up, your brain is like, “This is wrong.” Right?
Speaker: Yeah.
Lindsey: It’s not supposed to be this way, which causes resistance, I would guess. But you tell me, how does that feel to you?
Speaker: Yeah, I think you mentioned this point, that both of these statements are not helping. I don’t know another statement or another reframe that would help.
Lindsey: Yes. Okay, thank you. Pregnancy brain, I was like backtracking. Okay, so then I think there’s a couple of pieces here. I think that one, you’re absolutely right when you say that what you focus on expands. And the human mind is wired to focus typically on lack, typically on what’s missing, typically on what could be better.
And so I don’t think it’s “wrong” that it takes you active work to spend time bringing your focus to what is working, to the way your needs are being met and all of that. I think, what if that’s not a problem? And I also think there’s a conversation of, is your standard being met?
Speaker: That’s a really good question about the standard.
Lindsey: Because the truth is, you could – And I want you to think on that and answer it in just a second. But the reality with coaching and the power of it is that we can change our thoughts about anything, which is amazing.
And it can also be a little tricky, I think, sometimes because sometimes we just keep signing up for the same circumstance, like the same person or the same things or the same jobs that we don’t love, kind of telling ourselves, well, I can just change how I feel about it. When in reality, they just aren’t meeting the standard. And do you want to spend your life having to coach yourself and do thought work and do all this stuff to shift your ability to see that? Or do you just want someone to meet your standard?
Speaker: Yeah, I think that does make sense, if this meets my standard. I would say that I’ve just recently, so I’m great at manifestation, I’m all into the spiritual, but I never really considered applying it to my relationships. But recently, like maybe just a month ago, I’ve started to do that. Focusing on the good part, focusing on how to get my needs met and all of these things. And it is working out great.
However, I just have this fear of, oh my God, what if I get back to the track of not feeling good about the relationship? What if it gets hard again? So currently I think I’m doing good. Currently I’m actively working on it and it has been feeling good and I want it to continue to be that way. About my standards, in some way it does.
Lindsey: Okay.
Speaker: But my desires, I would say not as of now. Like I do feel like there are certain things. So we’re not living together at this point, we are just two people who have been navigating long distance relationships here and there. And we’re not married, obviously, so we don’t live together. So maybe certain challenges come through that. And I wouldn’t say that my needs are stupid, but I feel like my needs might be better met when we are physically together most of the time.
Lindsey: What needs do you feel aren’t being met?
Speaker: So there’s this one part in our relationship which is, this is something personal, which I’ve been navigating a hard time with my family recently. And I just get anxious at night. Like I’m on guard for some reason at night. And I feel really anxious at this point of time. And I feel like I want my guy to be there for me in that period of time when we have naturally discussed that it’s not really possible because he has a night shift and he cannot attend to me or he cannot be available to me at nights.
And I just end up feeling really alone sometimes in that time. And I feel like if my own partner cannot be there for me, if I end up alone ultimately, then what’s the sense? But we have discussed this. And he has said that currently we are not living together, so this might shift in maybe a year or two when we do get married because then I will have him with me. He can hold my hand through nights when I’m anxious, when I’m feeling low and we can talk it out then.
Because in the mornings, I’m chirpy, I do not want to discuss the hard stuff in the morning. I do not want to rant about how anxious I felt the night before. It’s just those moments that I need somebody to be there.
Lindsey: And what do you make it mean that he’s not there? Because circumstantially, you said he has a night shift. He can’t physically be there, which sounds like it’s what you want, right?
Speaker: Not physically, but even maybe through phone calls, maybe through texts. So yeah.
Lindsey: Yeah. Okay. Well, what do you make it mean if he’s not?
Speaker: Then it just means that ultimately what happens is I would put on a good movie, soothe myself, do some inner affirmation work, you know, child healing work. I would call up another friend. It makes me feel like if I can do this alone, then why do I even need a partner? Like why do I need him?
Lindsey: That’s a great –
Speaker: If I can do this alone, why do I need him?
Lindsey: That’s a great point. You can do it all alone.
Speaker: Yeah.
Lindsey: So the question isn’t why do you need him? It’s why do you want him? It sounds to me like you have an association with needing him to fulfill these things. And I’m not saying it’s not okay to want him to be there for those things, all of that, right? But like, you’re like, okay, if I don’t need him to soothe me, to help me through this, then what’s the point of even having him?
Speaker: A partner, yeah.
Lindsey: Yeah. And I’m like, that’s a great question because I believe that as humans, we do have the ability to give ourselves what we need. So why would someone have a partner if they can fulfill and have their own back and soothe themselves and manage their anxiety and all of that on their own? Why would we have partnerships?
Speaker: Wow. Yeah, that makes sense. I’m linking my needs being met to if I really need him in general, if I even need a partner, if I can fulfill my own needs. Yeah, that makes sense. So your question is not on need, but your question is, why do we then want him?
Lindsey: Yeah, why would you want him or a partner if you don’t need him?
Speaker: Wow. It feels like there’s so much emphasis that I’ve put on needs that in my brain, it feels like relationships are all about meeting your needs, about completing maybe.
Lindsey: Yes. Yes, and I think there’s a difference between working on allowing yourself to need people, like there’s a whole different ball game. But what I’m saying is I think we’ve been taught as a society often that we’re looking for someone to complete us. And I think it’s actually pretty disempowering.
And I will tell you, I’ve had situations, not in my current relationship, this was before I was in growth work, but like where it always felt like what you’re talking about because I was always looking for someone else to fulfill my need. And people can’t read your mind. Your partner can’t read your mind. Nobody can really fulfill a need that you’re not fulfilling within yourself. It’s like a black hole.
No matter how much they try or do, if that feels like it’s lacking in you, it will always feel like it’s lacking no matter what the people around you do.
Speaker: It’s not like it has never occurred to me. But it still feels like, yes, partnerships are about two individual beings being complete and fulfilling each other. But then what’s the point of having a partner then?
Lindsey: I’ll tell you from my own experience, if that would be helpful.
Speaker: Yes.
Lindsey: For me, it’s because I want him there. I want him in my life because he adds to what already exists, not makes up for something that’s lacking. He brings me joy on top of the joy I already feel I can create.
Speaker: Mm-hmm. I’d say if I completely eradicated the story of needing, I would want a partner who would believe in me so much that I never had to prove someone. A partnership would mean for me, what I would want is somebody to believe in me so much that I just don’t go about proving to other people, because my entire life –
So in case you’re aware about human design, we as projectors, I’m a projector, we have been conditioned to prove ourselves a lot. In my career, in my life, with everything I feel like I’ve just tried to prove other people until I got aware of this fact. And now I try my best to not do that. But I want this one person, my partner, to just believe in me so much that it just becomes easy for me to believe in myself. I’d say that I wouldn’t have to prove to other people. This person would just –
Lindsey: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, if that makes sense.
Lindsey: But here’s what I’ll tell you, is that it starts with you. Because the same thing, if you already feel not good enough or like you have to prove something to them, two things happen. Your brain looks for evidence of that, right, to support whatever your beliefs are. And then you might attract people who also – Like the way you show up, right? It’s like in some ways needing to prove or lacking that belief. The way you show up is from kind of like a deficit. So you attract somebody who believes or kind of matches that vibration.
I’ll give you an example. This is something I had to deeply work on, like 100% in my relationships. And what would happen was because I felt the need to prove, I would kind of skew who I was to try to fit who I thought they wanted me to be. Kind of like you’re saying, dishonoring the desires I had, not being this way or that way because I thought that’s what they wanted.
And then literally, I was creating the result where I had to kind of flex who I was to be loved.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Lindsey: Rather than with my husband now, I still had work to do, but I worked on believing that I just got to be fully myself and there was nothing to prove. And now I’m in a marriage where I literally feel so free because he truly does know the real me and loves the real me because I allowed him to first.
Speaker: I think this might be coming from a point, I hope I don’t end up crying. What’s making sense to me right now from your story is that if I fully believed in myself, I would only attract the partnerships that would believe in me, right?
Lindsey: Yeah.
Speaker: So maybe there’s a part of me that doesn’t believe in myself that’s attracting the partner that does not believe in me. Or maybe I’m seeing it as him not believing in me when the reality is that he does, but I keep seeing it as him not believing in me.
Lindsey: Yes.
Speaker: And I keep feeding the belief that he does not time and time again.
Lindsey: Yes. Great awareness. Yes.
Speaker: Wow. Okay. Wow, this is tough.
Lindsey: Yeah, how does it feel to see that?
Speaker: It brings me a fear of what if I fully believed in myself 110% and then I started to attract the evidence that he does too. And what if he does not? And then I would have to end it because he does not believe in me and he does not match. So this is something that is coming up for me right now as we’re having this conversation.
Lindsey: Yeah, that’s really scary.
Speaker: Yeah, it is.
Lindsey: I know I really feared that when I first realized this too.
Speaker: Yeah. But the first step would be, in this situation, to first believe in myself so much and then see whether this partnership keeps hanging on or stays or it falls away would be something that is not in my control, at least for now, because I don’t know what that reality would really look like.
Lindsey: Yeah, like this is what’s going to make it easy. This will either make this relationship beautiful and easy and what you’re talking about.
I also think it’s important to address saying something is easy doesn’t mean there aren’t hardships, but how you feel about those are different, rather than like what you’re saying, this push pull, this always being hard, whatever, right? It’s very different. But yeah, that will give you either what you’re asking for in this relationship or in the relationship that you really want.
Speaker: I really did not believe that I would reach this conclusion about the believing part because I’ve been trying to uncover because I’m a coach myself, right? I’ve been trying to do the inner work and try to figure out what the fuck is this all about because we have had so much trauma. And I couldn’t connect the dots until this just hit me about why would I really want it is related to believing. Oh my God, I love this. Thank you.
Lindsey: Yes. Yay! Oh, I love to hear that. That’s so good. I was like, man, you’re really aware, so it makes sense that you’re a coach. You speak the language for sure.
Speaker: Yeah.
Lindsey: Well, that is amazing. Well, I am so excited to hear how this goes. This is going to be huge.
Speaker: Definitely. Definitely, because I feel like relationships are a very important part of your life. And if this keeps taking away or if I keep feeding the story of not being easy, I won’t be able to pour my energy purely into other things like my coaching that I’m doing currently, you know?
Lindsey: Yeah.
Speaker: Because it takes away the belief, you know, it makes me feel like an imposter sometimes that while I’m really not great at my relationships, how would I be a good coach because I’m not able to navigate this shit, you know?
Lindsey: Yes.
Speaker: But yeah. Well, thank you.
Lindsey: You are welcome. Well, that is amazing. Thank you so much and I will talk to you soon.
If you want to call in to The Life Coach Hotline, go to https://lindseymango coaching.com/lifecoachhotline. Talk to you soon. Bye.
