Relationship Healing

Using the NLP technique, Perceptual Positions, I guide you through a self-reflection meditation that should provide you with new insight and understanding of a strained relationship that matters to you. Sometimes, this alone is helpful in healing and may or may not spur you to action in changing how you relate to the person.

My advice is to do it on a day you feel emotionally OK and a time that is NOT before bedtime as it may stir up emotions and make it difficult to fall asleep.

Transcript

Hi and welcome to this meditation.

This self-reflection meditation is for you if you are looking to understand a particular relationship in your life that is not in a state you thought it would be or would like it to be.

At the very least,

I hope it will give you a new point of view on that relationship,

A new understanding and through it perhaps more empathy for yourself or the other.

At best,

You will take more responsibility in how you create and maintain the important relationships in your life.

Responsibility usually gives us freedom and ownership.

Freedom from victimhood and ownership over how we choose to feel and move on.

To support us in this exploration today,

I will be using an exercise called Perceptual Positions from Neurolinguistic Programming and it is a useful tool for reflection on interpersonal matters and lately it's been a time of reflection on my side.

I have come to notice that most of the reflections have to do with how I relate to significant people in my life and quite naturally I don't relate to all the people in my life the way I would like to.

Sometimes the source of my sorrows and sadness,

Anger and grief is not in the relationships but in how I choose to relate to meaningful people in my life.

This may sound confusing but I am using this language consciously since most of us tend to use the word relationship often as if it was something outside of us,

Something passive that thrives,

Stagnates or fades on its own,

When really it is the conscious or unconscious actions or lack thereof that result in how we relate to each other.

So we always have a choice.

This process may be cognitively and emotionally draining so I suggest you do it when you have an okay day,

A day you feel at ease and ideally not before sleep.

If now is not that time or day feel free to return to the meditation when it is.

Trust me on this.

This is important because the results of any self-reflection are often molded by our mood and since the goal is to help you gain a new and helpful insight it is important that you feel relaxed and be in a neutral or positive mindset.

So let's begin.

As with all my meditations we start by making sure you make the time to be comfortable in any position you may like.

A position in which you are pain-free.

You can breathe easily and naturally and can stay alert for the next 15 minutes.

Depending on your energy levels it may be lying down or sitting down,

Supported with props like pillows or blankets or without.

Make the time for yourself to prepare.

Feel free to pause the meditation until you're ready.

Slowly bring your attention to your breath.

Observe and feel as the air comes into your nostrils.

Observe and feel as it goes out of your nostrils.

Observe and feel which nostril,

If any,

Can you feel the breath streaming in and out,

In and out,

Without the need to change anything.

Simply feel your breath.

Focus on your breath.

If it helps you relax you may take a deep inhale through the nose and full complete exhale through the mouth,

Sighing the breath out,

Letting all the air out.

In this way take conscious three or five inhales and exhales,

Letting the shoulders,

The back of the head,

The face relax.

Slowly come back to your natural breath.

Easy,

Effortless,

Natural.

In this state of relaxation and easiness,

Sitting or lying,

With your eyes closed,

Choose one particular relationship in your life you'd like to gain more understanding.

It can be with your parents,

Kids,

Siblings,

Friends,

Partners or colleagues.

Settle on one that is meaningful to you,

Where there is some sort of strain,

Some sort of discomfort.

Now that you have settled on one,

Picture a situation or a scene in the past in which you feel the relationship went in an unexpected way,

Or completely broke,

A way you didn't desire or like,

A way that stirred up emotions in you,

In the other person or both.

This could be something very recent,

Maybe the most recent encounter with that person,

Or something from a long time ago.

Remember,

These emotions may have been expressed or repressed,

But they were felt.

It is precisely because of the emotional states that arose in this situation that make this particular situation memorable,

And this particular relationship worth exploring.

As you go down the library of memories,

Settle on that one emotional situation between you and the other person.

Good.

Now that you have that situation in mind,

You can now with ease,

With distance,

And with the benefit of time in certain cases,

Begin exploring that situation in depth.

With your eyes closed,

Relaxed,

And at ease,

Imagine that you are in a movie theater,

Your favorite movie theater.

You sit down by yourself,

Observing a movie screen in front of you.

You can imagine you are now feeling comfortable in this theater,

Having anything with you that you need to continue to feel at ease.

Feel at ease.

Slowly the doors of the theater close,

And the movie is about to start.

With the power of your mind,

You can now imagine the first scenes of the situation in which you and the person you are with relate to each other.

They may be talking with or over each other,

Watching them on the screen.

Notice how the scene unfolds,

The scene between the two of you developing based on how people in the scene choose to relate to each other in this moment,

As you watch from afar,

From the comfort of your mind's theater.

Slowly,

Change your position and imagine you can float out of the chair,

Out of your body,

And enter the screen,

This theater screen.

As you enter the scene,

Enter your body,

Yourself,

In that very moment in the scene.

See what you see through your eyes,

Hear what you hear with your ears.

Notice any smells or tastes as you observe the situation through your eyes,

Present with the person you are with in this situation.

As you do so,

Reflect in your mind,

How are you behaving?

What are you concretely doing in this situation?

Notice,

How are you feeling in this situation?

Really become aware,

Recognize and name the emotions you are feeling.

Good.

What do you believe about the situation?

Which of your underlying beliefs have you brought to this encounter?

Maybe that you are right,

That you don't deserve this,

That this person is a bad person.

Just recognize which of your beliefs are present in this situation.

Now that we have explored what you've done,

How you felt,

And what you believe about the situation,

Notice what is important to you in this situation.

What values of yours are you eager to assert or protect?

Keeping your eyes closed,

Gently and slowly imagine you can float out of the screen,

Out of your past self.

Good.

Take a moment,

Take a few,

Connecting to the present moment,

Connecting to your breath.

Breathing in and out.

If there is any movement that may feel natural and needed at this moment,

Feel free to take it.

Slowly coming back to the composition you were in,

With your eyes closed.

Slowly start imagining you're back in the theater,

And this time as you prepare to rewind those scenes,

Imagine you can again float out of your body,

Out of the seat,

And into the screen.

Entering the screen,

And this time entering the body of the person you are in this situation with,

Only for a short while.

Visually put yourself in their shoes.

Imagine you are this person.

Seeing through their eyes,

Hearing through their ears,

Smelling,

Tasting,

Or touching what they may be smelling,

Tasting,

Or touching in this moment.

From the position of the other person now,

Reflect.

How are you behaving?

What are you concretely doing in this situation?

How are you feeling in this situation?

Become fully aware,

Recognize,

And name the emotions you are feeling as this other person.

What do you believe about the situation?

Which of your underlying beliefs have you brought to this encounter?

Maybe that you're not being heard?

That you've never truly cared?

Just recognize which of your beliefs are present in this situation from the perspective of this other person.

Lastly and importantly,

What is important to you in this situation?

What values of yours are you eager to assert or protect?

Reflect.

Keeping your eyes closed,

Slowly imagine you can float out of the screen,

Out of this person's body,

And take a few breaths,

Connecting back to the present moment,

Connecting to your breath in this moment,

Breathing in and out,

In and out,

Continuing to feel at ease one last time.

Imagine you're back in the theater,

And this time,

As you prepare to rewind those scenes one last time,

Imagine you can float out of your body,

Out of the chair,

And into the screen.

Entering the screen,

Entering the body of a fly on the wall,

Someone who has nothing at stake in this situation.

If only for a short while,

Imagine that you are a fly on the wall in this situation,

Seeing through the fly's eyes,

Hearing what it's hearing in this moment,

As this fly on the wall observes from a distance,

And reflect.

How are these people behaving?

What are they concretely doing in this situation?

How are they feeling in this situation?

From a distance,

What emotions do you recognize?

What emotions are they expressing?

What do they believe about the situation?

Which of their beliefs do they appear to be using?

Recognize which of their beliefs are present in this situation.

Lastly and importantly,

What is important to each of them in this situation as you look through the fly's eyes,

As you observe both of them at the same time?

What values of theirs are they eager to assert or protect?

Keeping your eyes closed,

Imagine you can float out of the screen.

Good.

Well done for taking some space,

Some distance,

Some perspective,

And take a few breaths.

Connect to the present moment.

Connect to the breath in this moment.

Before you begin the process of opening your eyes and coming back to your day,

Notice what is there for you to learn from this exercise.

Notice how has your perspective changed after doing this visualization,

This self-reflection meditation.

What shift,

Large or small,

Has occurred in you?

With this embodied learning,

You may gently flutter your eyes open.

Sometimes a gentle shake or stretch of the body may be helpful in returning to waking consciousness.

And remember,

It is not of vital importance for you to do or change anything in your relationship with this person in this very moment.

What matters is that you have cultivated mental flexibility and built empathy.

And if it feels right,

You may choose to do something.

Thank you for taking the time to journey into self-discovery,

And I hope this was helpful for you.

Reviews

Thank you 🙏 I feel like this is a practice I can come back to many times for clarity.

This is a very helpful meditation! Thank you! It helped me see both points of view even if I don’t want to. It has given me more clarity, even if I didn’t want to face the reality that it has given. Grateful for this insight!