You’re Not Bad For Hurting Your Partner

And they’re not bad for hurting you. Here’s what to do to repair after.

You’re not bad for hurting your partner
They’re not bad for hurting you

Everyone is doing the best they can, with the strategies they have available
Including you

Your current strategies were invented during childhood to cope with a childhood that was:
Sometimes pleasurable
Sometimes painful

Since childhood, these strategies get reused thousands of times
Well grooved in neural pathways

Not your fault
Yet now your responsibility

Part 2/5: Wise and Unwise Strategies

All strategies today are
The wake of a past wave
Echoes of yesterday

Some strategies are still wise
Other strategies are no longer wise

Even wise strategies can cause hurt
Especially when addressing a codependent relationship

Sending aggression (“You’re Bad”) to a strategy 
Is telling the younger child self “you’re bad”
For doing the best they could to cope
Ouch

Witness the strategy with acceptance
What you resist persists

All strategies make sense
In the context they were born into

If you can’t remove the judgment of “bad” or “wrong”
Get curious about your own / your partner's context

Part 3/5: A Healthy Relationship Hurts

Your relationship is not broken because you hurt or got hurt
It seems inevitable to me that every authentic relationship contains hurt

If neither partner hurts each other
They are not authentic
Instead they hurt themselves

If neither partner hurts each other
A relationship becomes bored
And has boring sex

It seems inevitable to me that every partner comes with unwise strategies
Can you accept a partner as they are?
Including their hurtful strategies?
Messy and imperfect?
Like an unfinished painting?
Until you can, no relationship will feel right for you

Part 4/5: What to Do After a Hurt

Accept Yourself
Can you accept yourself when your authentic strategy hurts another?
If you consistently cannot, the byproduct will be boredom, anxiety, codependence, or even depression
What is being de-pressed?
Who you really are

Get Curious 
Learn about the good intent and unmet need behind both the action and the reaction
(Self-preservation included)
Learn about the context that first created each of your strategies
Curiosity removes animosity

Process Your Feelings
Name the Feeling
Open the door for that feeling
(Mad/Sad/Glad/Fear/Shame)
Invite the feeling in for tea
Like a guest who brings wisdom hidden beneath discomfort

To Get Untriggered
If you find it hard to be curious or stay with your feelings
without getting sucked into blame, shame, control or problem-solving
You are triggered
Take a HALT before acting to avoid making matters worse
Then return to process your feelings
And ask: What difficult feeling do I get to avoid by pointing the finger or problem-solving?

Problem-Solve Only After Getting Curious and Processing Feelings
Problem-solving before curiosity is navigating a minefield in the dark
Problem-solving before processing feelings is rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic

Take Accountability
When your impact was different than your intent
If you want to be in relationship with others
“My intent was X, my impact was Y, and I really feel [sad] about that impact. What can I do to repair?”

Enforce Boundaries
To distance away from certain people / behaviors
A pain in the past created their present strategies
They are not bad
But they may not be for you

Part 5/5: Creating a Healthy, Happy, and Hurtful Relationship

Learning that a relationship can withstand rupture
Makes a relationship more secure
Because it contains the lived experience that even mistakes and hurt
Don’t break the relationship

As opposed to a relationship with few ruptures and hurt
Untested and insecure

Next time you are authentic, and it unintentionally hurts your partner
Can you resist entering the world of right and wrong?
Can you bring compassion?
Use a compassion mantra:

“Everyone is doing the best they can, with the strategies they have available to them, including me”

Next time your partner is authentic, and it unintentionally hurts you
Can you resist entering the world of right and wrong?
Can you bring compassion?

“Everyone is doing the best they can, with the strategies they have available to them, including me”

Compassion + Boundaries

Both are necessary for healthy relationships