In his book, The Truth, Neil Straus says: “Intimacy problems come from a lack of self-love.” For those who’ve read the book, you know that this story has no shortage of intimacy problems – for those who haven’t: it’s well worth the read for a new perspective on what it means to find yourself (a solid dose of Love Vitamins for Self).
Book aside, the common understanding of intimacy is that it’s that feeling between two people in a relationship. In our frameworks, we’ve talked about countless ways to build intimacy between two people: establishing a shared relationship vision, practicing cherish time, and creating a safer space to communicate.
So if a relationship is working -> they have intimacy.
If the relationship isn’t working -> they need to work on their intimacy.
Yeah – I agree, this is a very crude and simplistic way of looking at the concept that Oxford describes as “close familiarity or friendship; closeness.”
But what I’m trying to get at is that at its core – that closeness that we feel with others, that we believe to be the magic binding relationships – actually stems from our relationship with ourselves.
Zach Beach, the founder of the Heart Center Love School, in our Podcast Interview, said: “The best thing that you can do for your partner is work on yourself. The best thing your partner can do for you is work on themselves.”
MIND = BLOWN (hopefully not because this is relatively common sense as well) – but hopefully it does serve as a humble reminder that if things aren’t working in the WE, maybe I can give some extra lovin’ to ME.
LoVita 