How to Form Healthy Intimate Relationships

How to Form Healthy Intimate
Relationships

Ryan Buchmann MA, MFT
Pastoral Counselor
Marriage & Family Therapy Intern

• Former St. Brigid staff pastoral
counselor from 2004-2006.
• Graduate USD with MA in Pastoral
Care & Counseling (2005).
• Graduate Alliant Int’l University with
MA in Marriage & Family Therapy
(2007).
• Currently working as a mental health
counselor in a local agency and
private practice. Ryan Buchmann MA, MFT
Pastoral Counselor

Pastoral Counselor

“Intimacy is
 The recursive experience…
 …of open self-confrontation
(vulnerability)…
 …of core aspects of the self…
 …in the presence of a partner.”
--David Schnarch
Author of Passionate Marriage

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• Balancing (autonomy)
and (relationship)
creates a constant tension.
• A person over-oriented toward
individuality becomes self-absorbed
and set in their ways.
• A person over-oriented toward
togethernessbecomes dependent on
others for a sense of self.
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• The ability to validate one’s own
experience/existence…
• …in the face of pressure from the
other/partner…
• …without cutting off…
• …is called self-validated intimacy.

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A healthy relationship is formed when
• two people who each have a healthy
sense of their identity…
• …come together willing to regularly
and openly confront their authentic
self…
• …in the presence of their partner.

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• Primary Relationships
 Significant Other
 Close family members (e.g. children)
 “Closest and Best” Friends
 God
• Secondary Relationships
 Everyone else
 Other friends, boss, extended family, family
friends, friends of significant other, the person
you met at the bus stop, etc.

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• It has a high priority in your life.
 The relationship is “primary” for both of
you.
 Both are willing to be completely open
and vulnerable with each other—
comprehensive trust.
 Boundaries diminish as you become
closer.

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• It has a high priority in your life.
 Concerted effort to spend time
together.
 No fear of judgment.
 Each one strives to help the other be or
become their most authentic self.
 The relationship is an end, not a means.

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• Growing in closeness not a priority.
• Vulnerability not required.
 Safety and security is not that
necessary.
• Time together is nice, but not a
necessity.
• The relationship sometimes serves a
specific purpose.
 Relationship is a means, not an Buchmann MA, MFT
Ryan end.
Pastoral Counselor

vul·ner·a·ble adj.
[Late Latin vulnerbilis, wounding, from Latinvulner re, to
wound, fromvulnus, vulner-, wound.]
 Susceptible to physical or emotional
injury.
 Susceptible to attack.
 the state of being exposed.
Source: The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

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When a person feels “exposed,” what
is the emotion associated with the
experience?
 Joy
 Sadness
 Anger
 Fear
 Shame

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 If my vulnerability causes me to feel
ashamed of myself, I will likely not let
myself be vulnerable again.
 How can I create a space where my
partner will not feel ashamed when
vulnerable?

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What causes one to feel shame?

Judgment!

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“Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind”

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(Uh, what’s “intimacy?”)

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• State of voluntarily being
exposed.
• Open self-confrontation.
• Involves a risk (judgment,
disagreement, rejection,
separation).
• Most often feels uncomfortable.

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• Key elements:
 Vulnerability
 Communication
 Openness to confronting the
deepest self in the presence of
your partner….
 In the absence of judgment.
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Based on the book by Matthew Kelly

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Clichés

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• Casual interactions
• Reveal little about each person
• Rely on fleeting and superficial
exchanges.
• The style of communication is not a
“conversation,” rather it is a
transaction.
 Relationships are NOT made up of
transactions.
Pastoral Counselor

• Common “cliché” terms
 Good
 Nice
 Interesting
 Fine
 Okay
 Whatever!
 Translation: “I disagree with what you’re
saying, and I don’t want to discuss it now.”

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• Advantages
 Establishes connection with others.
 Enables us to conduct daily affairs.
 Great conversation starters.
• Disadvantages
 Can become shallow and superficial.
 Can be used to keep others at an
emotional distance.

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• The best way to move a relationship
beyond the level of clichés?

Carefree
timelessness!

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Facts

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• Focus is on communicating facts
about our lives and our world.
• The facts are mundane, self-evident,
and conflict-avoidant.

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• Advantages
 Ignites our love for learning and getting
to know another person.
 Reawakens our natural yearning for
knowledge.
• Disadvantages
 Continued use of facts when revealing
our selves to others leaves the
relationship superficial and stale.

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beyond the level of facts?

Practice non-
judgment & express
appreciation!
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Opinions

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• Advantages
 Initiates a forward step toward
authenticity (self-expression).
 Opens an opportunity for genuine
agreement, not just conformity.
 Enables the possibility for acceptance
even if the other is not entirely right.

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• Disadvantages
 People often cannot get past this level
unless they have the other completely
“figured out.”
 Arguments often flare up because each
wants the other to believe in the same
way they do (a.k.a. conformity).

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• Opinions are the first step toward
becoming vulnerable with another
person.
• The biggest risk of sharing an opinion
is disagreement.
• The key to this level is acceptance,
not understanding (“figured out”).

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• Acceptance
 The ability to respect each other’s opinions
and unconditionally accept the other,
despite the differences of opinion.
 Being a benevolent witness of someone’s
journey through life, rather than a
manipulative or dictatorial force in it.
 Allows a person to be themselves, not
pushed into someone you want them to be.

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• Understanding
 A condition of acceptance (“I can’t figure
her out” or “He doesn’t make sense to
me.”)
 A need for predictability, to know how
he/she will react in a situation.

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• What is it about me that mandates
that I completely understand this
person with respect to this issue?
• What experiences have influenced
and formed my opinions?
• Is my position the absolute truth?
• Is this the hill I want to die on?
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beyond the level of opinions?

Find common ground.
Accept one another.

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“Tough Love – Episode 1”

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Hopes and Dreams

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• Our hopes, dreams, and goals are a
derivative of our authenticity.
• Inform us of a person’s values.
• The person with whom we will form a
primary relationship will be the one
who will help us fulfill our dreams.

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The Kicker:

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• Know what drives those closest to
you.
• Dreams provide a vision of where one
wants to be in life.
• Dreams change constantly. Stay in
touch with your and your partner’s
dreams.
• Write your dreams down!
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Best way to move a relationship
beyond the level of hopes and
dreams?

Delayed
Gratification

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Don’t let yourself get overwhelmed
when someone reveals all their hopes
and dreams to you at once!

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“My Cousin Vinny”

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Feelings

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• Emotional reactions to the world
around us.
• The big question:

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• Removing the mask of “having it all
together,” making yourself
vulnerable, and telling your
significant other how you really feel.
• The failure to release stored up
emotions is the core of
psychopathology.

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• How do I create an environment that
enables a person to openly express
how they feel?

Unconditional
acceptance

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• Quote of the day:
“Confident that they will not be judged or
criticized but rather accepted for who they are
and where they are on their journey, most
people will open the doors of their hearts.”
Matthew Kelly
“Seven Levels of intimacy”

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• Learn to listen to the other person.
• Make the person feel as if nothing
else existed, except the two of you.
• Ask the question “Why is this person
saying this to me?”
 Until you know why, remain silent and
listen.

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• “Our journey toward intimacy means
trying to understand why people have
certain feelings and why they react to
certain people and situations as they
do.”
• “We will likely discover these truths
about the people we love

.”
Matthew Kelly
Pastoral Counselor

“About Last Night…”

What are the emotions NOT expressed?
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Faults, Fears, and Failures

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• In Level 5, we make ourselves
vulnerable. In Level 6, we expose
ourselves.
 Emotional nakedness
• True advancement in this level is
when you can honestly and humbly
admit to your significant other “I need
help.”
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• Also heard at this level:
 “I am afraid.”
 “I messed up.”
 Ownership of one’s faults, failings, or
mistakes.

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• The twisted paradox of vulnerability:

By owning your faults, fears, and
failures, people will accept you
even more.

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• People will own their faults, fears, and
failures only in a place of
unconditional acceptance.
• What are you doing to foster an
environment of unconditional
acceptance?

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• The “magic” formula: How to create
an environment of unconditional
acceptance:

You must first accept yourself
unconditionally.

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• How do I accept myself unconditionally?
 Know your “dark” or “shadow” side
 If a person behaves in a way that does not make
sense, it is likely the shadow in action.
 Ask your closest friends “What is the gold
you see in me?”
 Then ask your family members “What are the
shadows you see in me?”

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“Elizabethtown”

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Legitimate Needs

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• A dynamic collaboration to fulfill the
needs of your significant other.
• Providing needs, not wants.
• At this level, we build a lifestyle that
helps each other be our authentic
selves.
• It’s about revealing MY needs, not
getting my partner to reveal theirs.
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• Ask yourself: Is this a need or is this a
want? How does this need enable me
to be my authentic self?
• Relationships are not about getting
what you want. Relationships are about
helping each other become your
authentic self.

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• Love
 Not a feeling, but an action.
 Learning to know our partner’s
legitimate needs and attempting to
proactively fulfill them.
 “You should KNOW that about me!”

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• The biggest error of romantic
relationships:

Passing judgment and failing
to accept the other
unconditionally.

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• Vulnerability
• Absence of Judgment
• Unconditional Acceptance

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• Identified primary & secondary
relationships.
• Defined and explained vulnerability
• Listed the 7 levels of intimacy
• Described how to move from one
level to the next.
• Saw lots of cool movie clips.

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How to Form Healthy Intimate Relationships

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