One of the questions I often get asked is, “how do I navigate it when my partner, who I love, and want the best for, is irritating me?”
Relationship challenges are consistently one of the top three challenges high-performers come to me with for help.
The truth is if you do not feel fulfilled in your relationship(s), it can have a significant impact on other areas of your life, including your inner happiness.
Odds are you have experienced this for yourself.
Think back to when you and your partner (or if you are not currently with someone, insert somebody who you love), weren’t on the same page or when they were irritating you.
This feeling of frustration can become distracting and take you out of your heart and away from showing up how you want to in the relationship.
So what do you do when this happens?
Whether it’s your partner, spouse, co-worker, family member, etc., one of the number one tools that I would recommend using the next time you feel frustrated with someone is The Extreme Freedom Process©, created by Lise Janelle.
Here’s how it works:
I recommend writing down the following questions and your answers as you go through this process. This isn’t something that you will be sharing with someone else (unless you choose to), so I invite you to be as honest as you can with yourself for each question.
The Extreme Freedom Exercise:
Step 1: Ask yourself, what is their problem, and why is this frustrating you?
For instance, perhaps your partner is frustrating because they aren’t communicating with you.
You can even dig a little further and ask what about them not communicating with me is bugging me?
Step 2: What is the advice you would give them?
If only they would listen to you in an ideal world, “all” would be solved. What’s your advice to them?
For example, what advice would you give them about not communicating?
Step 3: Where in your life are you doing the same as they are in question one?
For example, ask yourself where in your life, are you not communicating?
The key is to humble yourself.
It may not be in the exact same way, but just know that you, too, are doing the same thing. Keep searching until you discover what it is.
Think of all the eight areas of your life (career, finances, social, spiritual, family, environment, physical, mental).
Perhaps you aren’t communicating with yourself?
Step 4: Based on the advice you gave them, what’s the advice you would give yourself?
The key is for you to get into action on the advice you would give yourself because the real reason your partner (or the other person) is irritating you is that you aren’t doing what you’re supposed to be doing.
You have a block or resistance around it, that is creating an emotional charge.
By YOU taking action and working on your number four (the advice you would give yourself), that’s when the magic happens, and most likely, one of two things will occur.
Either by you doing your inner work here and getting into action, you will naturally shift the other person, and they’ll stop doing whatever was bugging you, or they’ll continue to do it, but it will not upset you anymore because the charge is gone.
It’s essential to pay attention to your answer to #4 because that’s a clue to where you have a block or limiting belief holding you back.
When I am working with my clients, I have them complete this exercise and send me their answer to number four so that I can help them dissolve the block around it so that it’s no longer pushing their buttons, and they’re able to move forward with their action steps more effortlessly.
Just know that you will be both supported and challenged in your relationship. By understanding this, it will help you to have more appreciation for yourself and your partner:)
If you are interested in learning more about Love and Relationships, I invite you to visit my website and check-out my upcoming Love Mastery Workshop. Click here for more information.