Three Ways We Block Connection and Intimacy

We are all susceptible to blind spots. Happily, I am the kind of person who likes to share mine, so you can have a good laugh, feel like you aren’t alone, and be more willing to look at your own human foibles. I am told this is my secret sauce. Yay for imperfection. We are rockin’ it out together!

This week I was reflecting with Nevada Sidewalk Talk Chapter Leader, Michael Tedesco (thanks Michael). We were both challenging each other and empathizing with each other on different aspects of leadership we both struggle with so that we could support one another in growing.  It is so nice when folks can just be bold with you. The leaders crew here are some of my favorite because there is an earnestness to keep on growing through self-reflection, self-responsibility, and dialogue. 

Being an earnest human who wants to look at their flaws takes one large sense of humor.  
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Doing flaws well also takes the ability to take an inventory without shame. I like to make lists of my mistakes and then think through what I can change and what I am just going to have to say “Um that is me and probably will be a flaw I go to the dirt with” so people can feel empowered to choose if I am their cup of tea and I don’t spin my wheels trying to please everyone. 

Here is my list of mess ups around connection from the last few weeks. Have a laugh and then make your own. It is really good practice.
 
1. Believing that people, life, and the world should be a certain way. 
When someone uses a tone of voice we don’t like, doesn’t call us back, or is unfair we may want to “should” all over the situation. They should NOT have done x, y, and z. In the podcast with Dr. Christian Conte, he talked about cartoon world and real world.

The more we deny the hard truth of the real world the less likely we are to respond in any sort of connective fashion.
 
I am not saying not to set limits. Actually, the opposite. But, I notice I have no problem setting a limit when I don’t expect every person to just follow my own inner set of standards. If I get caught up in a “They should have x, y, z” I may be too damn righteous to bother dialoguing.  You see how this works?  
 
By assuming, I cut off dialogue. Not great for connection and intimacy. 
 
 
2. Be clear and up front about what you need in the moment. You might wonder, “But Traci, isn’t that selfish?  How does that have to do with connection?”
 
I will throw it back to you with a question. Have you ever not been clear with someone that they should ‘please take your shoes off before coming into my house’ only to later find mud tracks all over your white carpet? 
 
How did you feel about that person when they didn’t notice they had left a trail of mud in your house? More connected? More intimate? I didn’t think so.  
 
Ok, maybe it is a bad metaphor but usually, when we aren’t clear about what we need, we are not protecting our connections with others, we are jeopardizing them. See how that works?
 
I had a tech job that I liked but I got so pissed because I was in a new territory that wasn’t making any money. I tried to quit but in a lengthy dialogue with the CEO he confronted me.  He said “Traci, you have a right to be paid what you are worth.  Rather than getting mad, you could shared what you needed to be financially whole. I support you demanding a raise.” 
 
I left his office with a massive life lesson and a 20% - YES TWENTY- percent raise. 
 
3. Not setting limits and not receiving limits.
First, I must attribute my use of the word limits to Michael Tedesco. For ages, the word boundaries, for whatever reason, conjures images of walls – static, unchanging, rigid, and cold.  Limits, however, feels flexible and contextual. 
 
Here is the rub. After the person from above has walked on your carpet with muddy shoes, if you still do not ask them to take off their shoes, again you jeopardize intimacy and connection with them and, frankly, with yourself. Only bad feelings can emerge. 
 
And I get it. We don’t set limits because some folks react to them and we want to avoid their reaction. But their reaction lets you know you have been heard, as Randi Buckley often says (she is the boundaries master and will be coming on the podcast soon). 

Reacting to limits and even judging folks as unreasonable for setting limits is so disruptive to connection.
 
Magic wand wish? This whole “You are unreasonable for needing what you need and having the limits that you have” is the one thing I would swap for “We all get to have needs and limits and communicating them IS connection".   
 
Ask yourself…
Am I good at setting limits in clear, kind ways? 
Am I good at receiving limits in clear, kind ways? 
​What assumptions do I make about the other person in that whole giving and receiving limits process?
 
My hope is we can all do better at this connection stuff. That our hearts can stretch wide with love in these hard spaces and keep trying.