How many times do we refuse to ask for help from our life partners — or not tell them how we feel about something — because “they should already know.”
How many times have you heard yourself or someone else say: “If he (or she) really loved me, they would already know how I feel about this problem.”
Sorry to break the bad news: This is simply not true. Perhaps in a perfect world we might find ourselves in love with a mind reader, but in reality there is much about us that no one knows or understands.
Relationships are journeys into unchartered territory needing ongoing discovery and exploration.
It takes a lifetime to begin to know someone. And even then how much do we really know? (On the positive side, there’s so much to discover about one another!)
The child within us desperately wants to be known. Remember how kids are often saying, “Look at me — see me!”
As children, our security and survival were dependent on our primary caregivers’ abilities to to read our cues and watch our signs. Our parents could see on our faces if we were tired or hurt, angry or scared.
As the years go by, however, we learn to hide so many of our feelings for fear of being hurt. That “open child” part of us becomes concealed once we’re adults, sadly.
Now when we feel fear it does not show so readily on our faces. If we are hurt we often we suck up the hurt and withdraw, without communicating as openly as we would have as a child. We no longer wear feelings on our sleeves.
What is important to know is that our partners and spouses are not deliberately ignoring our feelings — sometimes it is simply too difficult to read even the closest love ones if they are not communicating.
When they are unresponsive to our hurt, anger and fears, it does not mean that we are not important to them or we are unlovable.
Here’s a solution:
It’s essential in a healthy loving relationship to understand that expressing and communicating is a cornerstone of intimacy. While we’d like to go back and be the child whose attentive parents notice every nuance and understand every cry, we no longer live in that space.
We conceal ourselves more than we know.
So take a risk. Express yourself in words; ask for what you want. Chances are your partner or spouse will be all too happy to be there for you.
None of us is a mind reader. Communication is the key.