Human beings - the flagship social creatures are built with emotions and behavioural patterns that we gather during the course of our lives. All of us have – what we can simply call a Routine. It’s what we do every day – out of habit. As we traverse life, we come across various experiences which may consciously or subconsciously shape us – this comprises positive and negative influences.
For example, if a child grows up in a home where the parents constantly fight, they’ll grow up to be introverts who would keep silent to avoid conflict. Often they won’t realize the reason behind their behaviour and just accept it as how they are. Similarly, we form a lot of habits. Now not all habits are bad – as a child when our mothers tell us to recollect toys after playing helps us to learn organization skills as adults.
Sometimes the bad habits we develop as a child are usually a form of coping mechanism that we develop to protect ourselves. Ideally, these habits are supposed to go away as the threat goes away but sometimes, they stay with us and become a part of our routine – changing into maladaptive behavioural practices which are tough to let go of.
Have you ever felt as if you’ve constantly fallen for the wrong man/woman? Have you felt that you have a certain habit that is evident in every relationship you get into? Does the same things bother you in different relationships? – Take a minute to think about it before you read ahead.
When it comes to relationships, our relationships as adults are greatly influenced by the bonds we shared with our parents and care givers as a child. Our behavior is thus a manifestation of our past experiences, dating back to childhood. Often, children who saw domestic violence in their home turn out to be adults who becomes abusers or may develop Stockholm Syndrome wherein they develop positive feelings towards getting abused as a coping mechanism and stop seeing abuse as a harm/ something which they need t break through from.
Another channel of learning such patterns is through dating in adolescence and early adulthood. As kids, our minds are pretty naïve and we often find ourselves changing to ‘better fit’ the desires of our loved ones. It could be as simple as getting a haircut or something as grave as disconnecting with our families. Sometimes, even when those partners leave, the emotional damage that they’ve done – stays. You become this changed person, farther from your true self and your beliefs. These type of chronic patterns may be evident in any form of relationship like parent-child, teacher-student, husband-wife, friends, siblings etc.
All of this can de damaging to your personal wellbeing – leaving you feeling detached, lost and hopeless – since you start taking the blame on yourself without realizing the cause of it. To help you, we’ve listed some signs that’ll help you recognize these patterns in your relationships, and correct time in time.
· You/Your partner repeat habits from old relationships which hampers with you building a safe and secure relationship
For instance, imagine you had a relationship in the past where your partner used to check your phone. On confrontation, they used to make you believe that it’s all in good faith and over a period of time it stopped annoying you and you imbibed that habit. Now in your current relationship, you still continue to check your partner’s phone because your brain has learnt that it’s not a bad habit but such behavior might be negatively impacting your current relationships.
· You/Your partner has a time limit – your relation usually lasts 2, 4 or 6 months
Do you feel as if you’re trying too hard to make a relationship work and yet nobody is ‘perfect enough’ for you? Have you ever felt that even after you giving it your all every single time, people still leave you – without understanding you?
Well maybe it’s a good time now to think if maybe you are the problem – now this might sound offensive and unhelpful but often we’re so used to our habits and we can never see what’s wrong with them. Sometimes we give people we love what ‘we need’ without thinking what they might need. In love, it is always important to listen to your partner and their needs.
· You/Your partner have the same argument in different relationships
Each of us has our own triggers – which may make us argue with people, dislike them, feel frustrated/angry or just make us feel trapped in ‘toxic relationships.’ However, sometimes these triggers arise from deep rooted trauma/ issues and until you’ll communicate it with your loved ones, it’s like an elephant in the room which remains unaddressed and create rifts & differences in relationships.
· You/Your partner are reluctant to make sacrifices
Being in a relationship inevitably requires making sacrifices by both the partners. It’s difficult if you want to live your bachelor life and be in a committed long-term relationship at the same time. Relationships require many sacrifices, even if they are small ones which might not have a huge impact. However, some sacrifices are bigger- like for example, being in a monogamous relationship might be usual for some but can be a huge sacrifice for others. It’s thus important to make sensible agreements with each other that are in line with each other's wishes, comfort and needs, even if they conflict with your own. If you have agreed to let each other know when you will be late, you cannot just stay out without letting the other know. If you used to go out partying every weekend, but the other person doesn't like parties at all, find a middle ground. It may not always feel good to have to give up some of your independence. But just affirm yourself that these small things mean nothing in front of the beautiful life you and your partner might have together.
· You/Your partner bottle up your emotions and don’t share with each other
A relationship is more than just going for dates, surprising one another, posting selfies together! True love/ companionship is when the both of you understand each other, support each other and can be your true self with each other as well. Every human – be it you, me or absolutely anyone has amazing qualities but we also have flaws – and as partners it’s our duty to accept each other’s flaws and that requires a person to leave their masks behind and show their true selves to each other. A simple exercise to practice this in your relationship is to be there for each other no matter what – make the other person feel heard, seen, acknowledged and loved. A prerequisite for that to happen is to share your emotions. We humans often bottle up our emotions because we fear what the other person might think/feel, we fear being judged/ being questioned. Of course not everyone will understand you in the first go, maybe you might have some conflict also – but until you don’t trust each other and open up – a healthy and stable relationship shall remain a dream.
I’ll share a story – Imagine two people, Rohit and Anjana who have been married for 20 years, and love each other dearly. Rohit has a pattern of feeling great anxiety and fear when he feels like he’s letting Anjana down. And if they’re in a circumstance where she is feeling disappointed, she’ll express her hurt and he goes into total fear and anxiety response. Then in response to that, he tries desperate attempts to please her, and to make amends, and promises the world to her - but all of them are things that he can’t actually do. So it’s this negative setup that he’s promising things that he can’t actually fulfill, and then basically she doesn’t know what to trust. Such vicious cycles are common with relationship and hurt you and your partner both.
It is common to see such patterns in the relationships around us. The good thing though is that these patterns once identified can be corrected – it might take sometime but with the right approach you can revisit the causing factors and move past them. Often, the person might find it difficult to identify, troubleshoot and reclaim the lost stance by themselves in such situations it is always advisable to consult a mental health professional. With the help of a professional you can learn to ‘unlearn’ the maladaptive behavior that you’ve learnt over the years. Through unlearning, one can start their journey towards Individuation, a term coined by Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung. Individuation is the process of finding one’s true self that is underneath the layers of one’s social identity and believes by incorporating their conscious and unconscious mind. The process of unlearning allows one to adapt to change easily. Unlearning makes one believe in endless possibilities that life has to offer as compared to those taught to him/her by society.