happiness – Page 6 – Erin Theodorou, M.Ed, LPC, ACS, NCC

Why Good Relationships are Key to a Happy Life

October 19, 2018March 6, 2021 by Erin Theodorou, posted in counseling, psychology, self-help

Good relationships are the cornerstone of mental health and well-being. They are a vital part of being able to withstand the vicissitudes of life. If I were to think of the hardest times of my life, my friends and family’s support made all the difference. Their support, love, and comfort=priceless. The people in my life who I know are with me through thick and thin…truly one of life’s greatest blessings. Reflect on your own hardships and the most trying moments of your life. Who were the people who stood by your side and helped you make it through? Who had your back no matter what? What relationships have endured the test of time? The fact is it is easy to be there for someone when times are good. It is when times are bad when we see the true colors of everyone in our lives. Sadly, it is during tough times when the people we may have thought cared about us may reveal they do not care as much as we had previously assumed. The pain of this truth can be tremendous.

As painful as this may be, it makes you all the more appreciative of all the supportive, loving people in your life. You recognize the value these relationships are to your well-being. That is what this post is about–the importance of nurturing good, healthy relationships. And the responsibility you having in doing so. It is all too easy to neglect our relationships. Life happens–marriage, kids, careers, running a household. Listen, I get it! You are busy. You can only juggle so much! But if you were to think of the happiest moments in your life–the majority of them most likely entailed being surrounded by ALL the people you love most. Weddings, parties, baptisms, graduations, housewarmings, anniversaries, birthdays, holidays, vacations. Happy memories are usually the times we spent with the ones we love and cherish the most. In our fast-paced, always on the go world, it has become all too easy to forget that a happy life runs parallel with loving, supportive relationships. We are social animals. We are designed to be connected to others. As an extremely individualistic society, we often think what will bring us long-lasting happiness are results of our individual pursuits. Our career success, our financial success, our individual goals. But our communal goals are shown to bring more long-term happiness. We are all in this together, let’s not forget. Our relationships are a source of much of our joy in life. Our families, our circle of friends, the colleagues we are close with. Research shows close, supportive relationships bring more happiness than fame or money. These are the people we laugh with, cry with, share with, vent with, help with. Our close relationships bring much of the happiness we experience on our journey through life. Yet at the same time—-what is it that cause of the most unhappiness in our lives? Our relationships.

Much of the state of our relationships are a reflection on us. Our actions, our thoughts, our behavior. OR our inaction, negative thoughts, negative behavior. We are a large part of our relationship problems. The problem is–many people do not want to take ownership of this fact. It is much easier to blame the other person than look at how we contribute to problems in our relationships. Many of us don’t want to do our part. Let’s be honest. We put care and effort into the things we value. If you value a certain relationship, you will put in the effort to maintain it, protect it, and keep it. If you were to reflect on your relationships that you have lost throughout your life, at a certain point, if you were honest…you stopped putting in the effort. You stopped caring. Maybe with good reason–you outgrew the other person OR this was a relationship with a person who had not treated you right but you had tolerated for far too long. Part of life is loss and this includes losing relationships that no longer serve us. Or maybe it was the reverse situation. The other person showed you they didn’t care. They didn’t put in effort. They didn’t value you or the relationship. They forced your hand into walking away.

If you were to reflect on the relationships you lost along the way, can you pinpoint a time when you felt the cons outweighed the pros of maintaining it? I think if we are honest with ourselves we can. Or can you pinpoint a moment when you realized the other person didn’t care to maintain the relationship? Any relationship in my life that has survived the test of time I have put effort into maintaining. The other person has put the effort in as well. It takes two. Relationships with family members, friends, my partner. I value these relationships and I do what I can to support the individual and the relationship as a whole. If you want to be mentally healthy research says having meaningful relationships will help you to fight off feelings of anxiety, depression, and anger. Having people to share your concerns, hopes, fears, and challenges with help you stay connected and stable. Close relationships fight off feelings of loneliness. Loneliness is a silent killer. Social isolation is shown to lead to depression. Being connected is a fundamental human NEED. We all need to feel a sense of love and belonging. The reality is if you want the benefits of supportive relationships you need to CHOOSE to put effort into being a supportive, healthy person. You get what you give. It very much takes a choice to invest in the relationships in our life. The truth is our relationships are very much a choice. Our behavior is a choice. Our relationships are a reflection of our choices. William Glasser, the father of choice theory, says virtually all our behavior is a choice. He posits that most mental health issues, including depression, arise from problems in one’s relationships.

I think in popular psychology this concept has played out to a large extent. Many psychological theories focus on the issues that arise from unhealthy relationships with one’s parents. Oedipus complex. Electra complex. I can say that I have seen as a clinician direct correlation between people who have bad relationships with their parents and their mental health.As a society we jokingly refer to this as having “mommy issues” or “daddy issues” but there is far from a joking matter. Our relationships, especially key ones like the ones we have with our parents, impact our mental health. Our relationships have a profound impact on our lives. This is why people who are often in unhealthy or abusive relationships tend to suffer a whole host of mental health ailments. The people we spend the most time with can build us up or break us down.

It is also why people from dysfunctional families tend to develop anxiety, depression, and other disorders. Our relationships have a direct impact on our mental health. This is why it is so important to be choosy with who you allow into your life. Who we have relationships with is indeed a CHOICE. It is a choice to keep unhappy relationships in our lives.

It is also a choice to manufacture problems in a relationship. There are ways of behaving that we bring into our relationships that can either enable healthy, happy relationships or destroy our relationships.


Seven Caring Habits		Seven Deadly Habits
1 .Supporting		1. Criticizing
2 .Encouraging		2 .Blaming
3. Listening		3. Complaining
4. Accepting		4. Nagging
5. Trusting		5. Threatening
6 .Respecting		6. Punishing
7. Negotiating differences		7 .Bribing, rewarding to control

I ask you to reflect on your behavior in your relationships. Which side of this chart do you find your behavior is more aligned with? When it comes to our relationships, far too many of us are winging it! We are on autopilot without any conscious thought to how we approach the people we love in our lives. In choice theory, the emphasis is placed on the individual. Personal responsibility is at the forefront. We, and we alone, are responsible for our behavior. An underlying assumption of the theory is that we cannot change other people and that the only thing we can control is ourselves. Again, you may be thinking that this sounds obvious – of course, we can’t change other people! But the reality is many of us are always trying! Control. It can become a problem for us if we begin to lose control of ourselves and attempt to exert control over others. As long as we insist on controlling people around us, we will create completely unnecessary suffering in our lives. Often when we are upset, instead of looking at how we are feeling and behaving we look at others. The most unhappy people point the fingers at others for their pain and unhappiness.

Many times, the way people try to remedy relationship problems is by attempting to change others. But what if we instead focused on changing ourselves? Something we can actually be successful at. If we change our behavior, it will certainly impact the response we get from others.

If you want to have happy, healthy, enduring relationships you need to look at YOUR behavior and how you behave in your relationships. Is your behavior driving people towards you or driving people away from you?

If you enjoyed this article and are interested in seeking counseling with me:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/therapists/erin-doyle-theodorou-nutley-nj/243617

Erin Doyle Theodorou, M.Ed, LPC, NCC

THEODOROU THERAPY, LLC

590 Franklin Ave.

Suite 2

Nutley, NJ 07110

973-963-7485

etheodorou@theodoroutherapy.com

Expectations: The Root of All Unhappiness

September 16, 2018March 7, 2021 by Erin Theodorou, posted in counseling, psychology, self-help

expectations 3

All of us of us have expectations.

We hold expectations of ourselves, others, circumstances, and what we want out of life in general. Managing our expectations is key to our happiness. We need to have realistic expectations, of ourselves and others, if not to be met with never-ending hurt and disappointment.

At a basic, simple level we are unhappy when our expectations of reality exceed our experience of reality (Nat Ware).

The further away reality is from our expectations the more miserable you can expect to be.

expectations

I feel there are some common expectations held by unhappy people: that others MUST treat them well, that they should NOT have to deal with difficulty or hardship, and that they MUST do well.

This type of thinking is toxic and a recipe for misery.

Yet what about the specific expectations we hold for ourselves?

When you were a little boy or girl, did you want to grow up to be a baseball player, a super star, or a singer? At some point you probably gave up that dream for something more attainable (unless you are Derek Jeter, Leonardo DiCaprio, or Adele). When our dreams are out of reach, we feel stress, frustration, and anxiety. Many of us abandon our dreams, feeling they are impossible.

Carl Rogers, one of my favorite psychologists, referred to this gap as it relates to our self as incongruence.

Incongruence is when our desires and feelings are not aligned with our actions.

Maybe you always wanted to be a doctor but felt you can never do it and are now a med tech. You can’t bring yourself to go back to school to further your career, even though you always felt you can be more. You WANT to do more. But can’t motivate yourself to do it.

Maybe you want close relationships in your life, yet find you keep people at arm’s length. You can’t bring yourself to apologize to people you may have hurt or put yourself out there to build new relationships with people. Still–you WANT to have intimate relationships but aren’t willing to put yourself out there with people to obtain them.

Maybe you want to be healthy and in shape yet find yourself overeating and not exercising. You can’t bring yourself to change your diet or will yourself to even exercise for 15 minutes a day. You WANT to be healthy but can’t seem to muster the willpower.

Maybe you want to be financial secure yet find you are not saving enough for the future and are unwilling to live within your means. You repeatedly spend more than you should and procrastinate making a budget. You WANT to get your finances in order but can’t get your spending habits in line.

And the list goes on and on. You are in a state of incongruence when there is a gap between your ideal life and your REAL life.

Incongruence is going to cause psychological pain.

We all want our ideal self and actual experience to be consistent and overlap as much as possible. If you recognize yourself in one of the examples above, you are probably unhappy with the current state of your life.

congruence

Many psychological problems may arise when we are in a state of incongruence.

Expectations are the enemy of happiness.

We can see how our expectations of ourselves can lead to unhappiness, but what about our expectations of others?

Often our expectations of others leads to disappointment and hurt.

We all heard that the secret to happiness is LOWER expectations. Some even would probably say NO expectations is the real key to happiness in your relationships.

This is not to say you shouldn’t have standards. Standards are different from expectations. The two are not interchangeable.

A standard is a principle of how you will conduct yourself and behavior you will accept from others. It is a norm. For instance, a common standard people have is they would not scream or curse in public NOR would they find it acceptable to witness someone else engaging in such a manner. This isn’t an expectation-it is a standard of what is acceptable. Our standards are our values.

An expectation is how we would like people to behave or a situation to turn out. For example, an expectation would be if you expect your boyfriend to text you every day, regardless of how busy he is. Sure, it would be nice, but it is not a standard. It is an expectation of how you are expecting someone to ideally behave. They are more like unspoken rules. Expectations are in large part our ideals.

The reality is no one cares about our expectations except us.

The simplest example of this truism is the golden rule. We think if we treat others well we will be treated in kind. I think we all have experienced otherwise.

The problem with expectations is they are often unspoken. You just expect people in your life to meet your expectations. But people have their own expectations that they live by which may be in conflict with yours.

Often we he hold expectations of others that we ourselves don’t even fulfill. We all have encountered someone with high expectations of others and little to no expectations of themselves. These are the do as I say, not as I do types. Perhaps from time to time this has been you. Human nature can be hypocritical.

Nevertheless, there are going to be a few people in life whose expectations we are driven to fulfill. We try to anticipate expectations for important relationships in our lives. Most of us try to be cognizant of the expectations of our spouse, partner, boss, clients, kids.

But even in the these important relationships expectations are unmet and expectations can gradually slid into a sense of entitlement.

The problem with expectations is it can sour relationships if not managed.

As a society, we are living in a time where many who walk amongst us are profoundly unhappy.

And many of these people are unhappy by their own making: their expectations.

If you want to be happy, you are going to need to keep your expectations in check. Both of yourself and others.

Start to be mindful of the vicious expectation conflict cycle. Be mindful of how you interpret situations and other people. This is where lots of problems start since they are entirely subjective. If you identify a problem, you need to carefully consider your response. Pay mind to what you expectations are of the person AND the situation to determine if they are realistic.

If you hold an expectation of someone and they do not meet it you have a few options. You can end the relationship. You can address it. You can act passive aggressive. Or you can decide it isn’t a big deal and let it go.

All our interactions with people have the opportunity to weaken, strengthen, or remain neutral in our relationship with them. This is why it is so important to examine your underlying expectations. You need to ask yourself if you are being reasonable. It is reasonable to expect to be treated with civility and basic human respect. It is unreasonable to expect people to do as you expect them to do according to your rulebook. We need to be able to catch ourselves when we begin to drift into unrealistic expectations.

If it is an issue with respect or some other type of basic standard, that really isn’t a relationship you should be too concerned about, if a lack of basic respect exists. If it is a more superficial issue, remember people rarely behave exactly the way we want them to.

Remember the magnitude of unhappiness you experience will be proportionate to your thoughts and how you choose to interpret things.

As a therapist, I find many people come to counseling because their expectations of others are not being met. This is causing pain and problems for them. I work with them using CBT (cognitive behavior therapy) which focuses on changing THEIR thoughts and behaviors including their expectations. I gently remind them we can’t change others, we can ONLY change ourselves.

I find it is helpful to work with clients to improve their coping skills, tweak their expectations, and look at what role they are playing in creating unhappiness in their life.

Try taking some time to reflect on your expectations. Of yourself and others. It can be the beginning of a happier, more satisfying life.

expectations 2