When ONE relationship drives you nuts! How to get over it.

Every once in awhile, you will run into someone who gets under your skin. Maybe you are too intrigued for comfort, or consistently angry about how they treat you. If you find yourself focusing on a particular person and emotionally reacting to him or her more than you would like, it’s time to look inside yourself, and see what unmet need the person is triggering.

We all have needs, and we are driven to get them met. Unfortunately, we tend to “push down” many of our needs, because they make us feel vulnerable. Sometimes we are embarrassed of having them, and often we don’t feel like we have control over getting them met. But conscious or not, we will continue to work to get our needs met, and when the subconscious parts of our brain take over, the result is usually less-effective behavior, the kind you exhibit when you are panicking or reacting to something.

In many cases, especially with relationship needs, we begin to focus on one person and decide that they are the only person who can meet our needs. Unfortunately, this practice creates scarcity, and almost guarantees that the need will remain unmet. Even if the "focused on" person tries, they can never give enough. This sets into motion a dynamic where the person with the need is often angry and resentful, and the other person feels drained by the relationship and pulls away. This happens a lot in love relationships, but also in friendships, and in the workplace. At work it’s especially common in boss / employee relationships where the employee is focusing on the boss.

It is important to understand that all needs reside within you, and it is your responsibility to get them met – even relationship needs. This is why we have the saying “you must love yourself before you can truly love another”. If you don’t love yourself, then your relationship with someone else is only about getting love from them, which comes across as manipulating them so that you feel loved by them, instead of truly loving them by allowing them to be themselves.

Relationship needs are satisfied in the energy that is created through connection with others. But you aren’t limited to or dependent on how others treat you. You have a relationship with yourself, and you may have a spiritual relationship with a higher being. If there were no other people on the planet, you would instinctively be driven to create special relationships with animals and plants. Potential for relationship is everywhere, and it’s bi-directional. You don’t just get it – you co-create it. That’s why giving so often feels like receiving, and people are often driven to give what they most need from others. It’s a strategy that sometimes works, and works even better if you are aware of your true motive for giving.

To “let go” of the person you are focusing on, you need to do two things:

1. Identify the need you are trying to get met from that particular person.
2. Get that need met outside the relationship, in as many other ways as possible.

Initially, it will seem like there’s no other place to get the need met, or that the other places don’t matter, but this what I call “panic mode”, where your brain stops the creative thinking process and has fallen into the adrenaline driven action process. To create abundance from scarcity, you get your brain working on how to get the need met outside of the relationship you are focusing on, and the way to do that is ask yourself questions. Here are some you can start with:

1. What is the specific feeling I get when this need is met?
2. What are all the situations where I get a similar feeling?
3. How can I co-create something similar (although perhaps not as good) in my other relationships?
4. What can I do in my relationship with myself to get this need met?

Even though some people aren’t as interesting as other people, there are usually enough of the base components available in everyone you meet, so that you can co-create a little bit of what you need in various different people, which is usually the healthiest and most empowering way to get your core relationship needs met.

At a deeper level, you may have to listen hard to the negative voices in your head. Usually, the biggest culprit in unmet relationship needs is that “voice” that hangs out in your head and talks to you all day. If it’s critical and unloving, it tends to suck more out of you than anyone outside of you. Sometimes the best way to get a relationship need met is to be a better friend to yourself.

The basic needs model is simple – but the process is always easier said than done. If you find that the concept I’m writing about makes sense, but you can’t seem to move yourself out of the emotional trap, it might be useful to get some coaching.

I now have an on-line needs assessment available that takes about 20 – 40 minutes to fill out. If you’d like to take a needs assessment, send an e-mail to nahid@aspyrre.com requesting one, and I’d be happy to get you set up.

Copyright © 2007, Nahid Casazza and Aspyrre.