Creative Sacred Living Magazine August 2014 | Page 76

You have a lot of personal and professional relationships in life. Some relationships are loving, satisfying, uplifting, supportive and enrich your life experience. Other relationships are tense, adversarial, problematic, strained, and exhausting. You don't like, or avoid, spending time with the people who drain your life energy. The funny thing is that all of your relationships, good and bad, are a reflection of you!

"Each relationship you have with another person reflects the relationship you have with yourself." - Alice Deville.

You have a lot of personal and professional relationships in your life. Some relationships are loving, satisfying, uplifting, supportive and enrich your life experience. You love spending time with these people. They motivate and inspire you. Other relationships are tense, adversarial, problematic, strained, and exhausting. You don't feel good around, and may even avoid, people who drain the life energy right out of you. The funny thing is that all of your relationships, good and bad, are a reflection of you!

How can that be?

It's very simple, really. You love the good relationships that you have because these people reflect what you like about yourself. They're kind, giving, nice, loyal, fun to be with, and all of the other attributes that you enjoy when you're involved in a good relationship. You dislike the people you have difficulty with because they reflect the parts of you that you don't like. You see something in these people, however tiny or large, that you don't like about yourself. If they're needy, they remind you of the times when you have been needy. If they're rude, they're a reminder of the pain you caused others by your own rudeness. If they're annoying they bring out the annoyer in you. If they are liars, they remind you of the time you lied, how that felt and the damage that lie may have caused you or others.

Pay particular attention to the people who bother you, get under your skin, for no apparent reason. These people reflect something within you that you have been unwilling to see.

I'll give you an example.

Several years ago I had a business associate, Naomi, who irritated the heck out of me. Naomi was a nice enough person, never hurt me, but every time I saw her my skin crawled. If she said, "Hi. How are you?" I wanted to run in the other direction. Any time she called with a business related question or invitation I couldn't get off the phone fast enough. Naomi frequently invited me to networking events and I always found some excuse to decline. For some unexplained reason I just didn't want to be around this woman.

Relationships: A Mirrored Reflection of You

(c) 2009 Valery Satterwhite