Relationship Counseling for Individuals
You can’t seem to find your people, yet you know how important a social life is. Time with others drains you, rather than filling you. Sometimes you are the only one putting in the effort. Other times, you are bothered by values differences. You are wondering… “Is it me?”
Making friends as an adult or finding that special someone seems like it is getting harder. With relational counseling, you can learn to build relationships that give more back.
Understanding Relationships
WWhy Do Good Relationships/Friendships Feel So Hard to Find?
Whether looking for friendship or that special someone, we are wired for connection. Yet we weren’t taught how to build it. You’ve likely become great at building a career, managing family logistics, solving problems, or achieving goals. But you struggle to find people who are emotionally mature - people who can repair conflict, take ownership of mistakes, remain curious during disagreement, and invest in the relationship so both of you can grow. New relationships feel comfortable or even familiar at first, but quickly shift to disappointing patterns.
Many people begin to wonder if they are simply bad at relationships. Others conclude that there just aren't many healthy people left to connect with. The truth is often more complicated than either of those explanations.
Many people begin to wonder if they are simply bad at relationships. Others conclude that there just aren't many healthy people left to connect with. The truth is often more complicated than either of those explanations.
The encouraging news is that healthy relationships are not something we simply stumble into. They are something we learn to recognize, cultivate, and protect.
Therapy Approach
What Relational Therapy Looks Like with Christin
The goal isn't to help you become someone who needs people less. It's to help you become someone who can build relationships that ask less of you and give more back.
Together, we'll begin by understanding the relational patterns that have shaped your life. Rather than judging them, we'll ask why they developed and how they have served you. As those patterns become clearer, you'll begin making more intentional choices about the relationships you build and the way you show up within them.
Many people are surprised to discover that healthy relationships often feel different than they expected. Over time, you'll become better able to recognize qualities such as:
- Emotional Maturity
- Reciprocity
- Accountability
- Conflict Curiosity & Repair
- Respect
- Consistency
At the same time, you'll become better at recognizing when unhealthy dynamics are masquerading as connection, such as:
- Intensity
- Chemistry Alone
- Rescuing
- People Pleasing
- Constatnt Pursuit
- Conflict Avoidance
This isn't about becoming suspicious of people. It's about becoming more confident in recognizing the kinds of relationships that allow both people to flourish.
You don't have to wait to accidentally meet perfect people. You can become someone who recognizes, cultivates, and protects healthy connection.
FAQs
Questions About Relational Counseling
You may be a social butterfly, who naturally brings people together. You might be the fun one, the extrovert, or enjoy being in the crowd. This adds so much to your life, but you might still feel lonely. That is because a healthy relational life is not about the quantity of people in your life - though large friend/family groups can be very good things. A solid relational life also includes quality connection. With relationship counseling, we can work on building relational depth and quality connections so that you can enjoy a complete relational experience.
You may find that early on, relationships feel comfortable. You experience hope that finally you have found a friend or special someone who gets you. Then over time, you see unhealthy patterns develop. You may allow the first or second to slide by, but eventually, you are back in a relationship where you are drained and feel like you have lost yourself.
Did you know that you started learning about relationships when you were in the womb? Those skills, which were learned and developed all through childhood and your teen years, became the lens through which you identify and navigate connection. Think of it like riding the relationship bicycle. You use the skills instinctively. But most of us learned to over rely on a limited set of skills, or even to utilize skills that are not good for us. Therefore, certain relational patterns in other people feel comfortable, because we have been leveraging the same relational skill set our entire lives. Through relational therapy, we can examine these patterns, understand the story beneath them, and find the relational path forward that is uniquely you.
Feeling disconnected from others could stem from different things. You may naturally have a personality type that is more withdrawn or needs to warm up before achieving levels of vulnerability. You could have experienced relational hurt - even without realizing it - and therefore your nervous system keeps you in hypervigilance or protection mode. Whatever the case, relationship counseling can be the place for examining patterns, understanding their impact, and finding ways forward that work for you.
