Conscious communication is a way of talking and listening that is focused on growing strong, mutually enriching relationships.

Since most relationship problems are rooted in communications that are either avoided, forced or misinterpreted, the purpose is to provide an emotional experience that allows each person to feel safe enough to grow a quality relationship in which key emotional needs (not wants…) are expressed, mutually valued – and met through natural giving.

(To give naturally, by the way, is to give from a place of overall love or joy, as opposed to fear or guilt or shame.)

When you express your self in ways that stretch you, particularly in moments where you may not “feel” like doing so, you exercise your ability to stretch and courageously develop the capacity to authentically love your self and another.

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Ah women, what makes them happy with their partner, and what turns them on sexually,
can be baffling to men.

But not because men and women are from different planets. As a recent study showed, in truth, both are from the same planet Earth; they share more in common, at least intellectually, mentally and emotionally, than they are different.

And the differences? Well, let’s just say, “Vive la difference!”

Myths that baffle men and women?

You wouldn’t know how much men and women have in common from what science and other writings have proclaimed for centuries, and in more recent decades, media and entertainment industries (and especially pornography) have reinforced and embellished mythical portrayals of women as potentially dangerous to men, akin to unruly children who must be dominated, not trusted or spoiled (“for their own good”).

Myths of romanticized dominance (eroticized, for men) still prevail. It’s not unusual for male partners to think its their job, on the one hand, to fix or set their partners straight, tell them what to do or think, scold or punish if she doesn’t follow his advice, and then blame her for making him feel inadequate for not allowing him to do his job.

While it may feel he has failed, the real problem largely lies in a set of strategies men are conditioned from boyhood to use in order to deliberately block emotional intimacy. 

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Despite misconceptions, as discussed in Part 1, expressing anger is a choice between actions that are defensive in nature and thus increase distance between us, and actions that are effective in increasing our understanding of one another, and keeping communication lines open.

Just as the uses and benefits of lemons are more numerous and significant than most can imagine, so are the possibilities of anger, when expressed effectively, to clarify, spark and produce a deepening of our connections with self and other, and emotional intimacy.

Truth be told, the ability to handle (listen to, feel and express, etc.) anger effectively is essential in building strong, mutually enriching and mature relationships. And, because our brain is a relationship organ, our  personal wellbeing is all about how we “do” relationships. In the words of top selling author and personal success expert Brian Tracy notes, “relationships are the hallmark of the mature person.”

To learn how to regulate and express anger effectively, however, like any thing else, it’s essential to better understand our anger, its potential benefits as a healthy emotion, its risks and potentially damaging impact.

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Anger is like a lemon. It’s easy to overreact to its reputed punch (no pun intended), and quickly develop a distaste for it, dismissing its potential and unique value to your health.

Also like anger, lemons are balancing agents. They cleanse and set the pH in your body in balance. At the same time, they were never intended by nature to be digested as a main course.

The health benefits of lemons are many, in other words, if  you know when and how much to use in proportion to other ingredients, and so on.

Similarly, anger is an emotion that activates, as an agent that helps you regulate and reset the balance of seemingly opposing inner strivings — to stay connected to your self and life around you – yet never meant to be overused as an emotion to hide or to hide behind.

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Believe it or not, the author and creator of your life story is you.

And, it’s not a question of “if” you write (and continually rewrite) your story.

It’s rather about who  – or what part of you – is doing most of the writing.

More specifically, will the primary author be your authentic wise-self or your wounded ego-self?

Does it matter? Yes! The former is mostly a conscious process you fully participate in, and the latter is mostly directed by your subconscious mind.

Though both seek to realize a sense of happiness within yourself and life, they each tell the story of your life and experiences quite differently. That’s because … each views the world from a totally different lens!

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Safe to say, the inability to handle emotional distress is widespread enough to consider it a national pandemic.

The pandemic is connected to anxious ways we have learned to avoid, deny or strongly react to emotions that are uncomfortable or painful.

We learn these desperate ways of dealing with painful emotions in childhood and carry them into our relationships in adulthood. Whether our primary response to distress is a strategy that activates overwhelm, angry outbursts or emotional shutdown, all of these cause reactivity in us that unnecessarily activates our body’s survival system.

This pandemic is related to cultural mores that overall relegate painful emotions as signs of weaknesses, inferiority or defect that need to be fixed, ignored or even eliminated.

To complicate matters, some of these teachings consist of gender taboos; some emotions are considered unmanly for men to express, and other emotions too manly for women.

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It’s that time of year again to start anew, to re-energize your life and to access your brain’s capacity for possibility thinking and energizing the momentum you need for success and happiness in the coming year.

It’s a good time to stretch out of old comfort zones, contemplate changes in your personal life or at work, and replace a problematic habit or two with enriching ones. The sky is the limit.

Let’s be honest, however.

When you think about the upcoming year, New Year’s resolutions and making changes, all in one breath, do you get a weary déjà vu feeling? Or maybe a “been there, done that” moment?

Sound familiar?

If New Year’s resolutions haven’t worked for you in the past, and they don’t for most, it’s likely that the real problem is not you, rather the approach or thinking patterns you are using.

So, first, start fresh, pause for a moment, close your eyes, smile and take a few long, deep breaths.

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The holidays are when our hope for good will and joy, love and meaningful connections is kindled. Perhaps because of this they can also be times of stress and emotional ups and downs when hopes are dashed. Like it or not, we are relationship beings after all. From the cradle to the grave according to researcher John Bowlby, nothing concerns our brains and bodies more.

The bottom line is this: Most all human behaviors are motivated by our inner hardwired emotional strivings to meaningfully connect with others and life, to matter. As real as inner drives for physical sustenance, we’re wired with core emotional drives, or needs, to love and be loved, to be recognized and valued, to find purpose — and contribute one’s love in life, and feel our love matters.

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We looked at differences between “real” questions and rhetorical-why“s in Part 1, and, in Part 2, how rhetorical-why-loops can (seriously) trip up our brains.

Here we look at questions that can reboot our brains, as needed, especially when it comes to getting out of fear-inducing, toxic thinking patterns spawned by rhetorical-why loops, and back to normal optimal functioning.

In a breakthrough study published in the academic journal Science, researchers found newly formed memories associated with fear can be “erased” by disrupting the “reconsolidation” process that affects the memory content.

Using an MR-scanner, by repeatedly exposing subjects to the same memory without the fear previously associated with it, all traces of fear was dissipated from the part of the brain (the amygdala in the temporal lobe) that stores fearful memories.

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