Here is the trade off: perhaps you need to experience emotional closeness and security with a special person, because it makes you feel complete and thus you tend to be open with this partner. Intimacy and trust and openness go together.

The best situation is when you are clearly comfortable with giving and receiving emotional intimacy. Previous experiences have been positive and you crave more of a good thing…no fear or anticipation of negative consequences because of being open. You can afford to express your need for intimacy and enjoy receiving it.

There is a natural expectation of openness, in which you tend to believe your partner returns your feelings and devotion and being generally comfortable with surrendering yourself to a partner. In this frame of heart, you probably would experience surprise and concern if you found that there were serious secrets between you and your partner.

Does it matter if your partner’s feelings are equally as strong as yours? Probably to a certain degree…but you know that men and women are experiencing intimacy in a different way, and it can not be compared. Still, for you it is a given that you are willing to take the risks associated with being vulnerable on many levels, because this is the ideal form of connection with a loved one, and the only one that nurtures your needs.

However, it is important for you that the person nears you values and needs a degree of proximity similar to yours. When you did find this person, the the real game of being near begins!

Sometimes you wonder how to test the other person’s level of needed intimacy, because to be unsure that both desire and need the same compromise to be near is really damaging. Fights, disputes and heated arguments sometimes cover up a hidden question: “do you care about this as much as I do?”

A person who ignores your wishes for proximity, or makes fun of them, is too scared of being near. Previous experiences have told this person that if you get too near, terrible things can happen, basically that one person will tend to dominate the other, making a psychological and emotional dependent…

On the other side, you need to know if the other person considers that he has the moral duty to share almost everything with you, as not to develop walls in your relationship that will separate the couple in the future. If this person reserves his right to hold back what is “incorrect, or improper” to share, then inevitably you will see different degrees of commitment and trust. Even the idea that is best not to argue or dispute so as not to “upset” you, covers a lethal attitude wherein you will be kept apart from aspects of his life he deems out of the marriage limits.

Again, is this a kind of experience that you want, when you need trust and intimacy? It is worth to explore carefully, respectfully but deeply, what are the reciprocal needs for intimacy…any person who experiences your needs as too demanding, and plans to hold back, will be a constant source of frustration and loneliness. Now, you know what to look for!

Neil Warner

I’m the “relationship guru,” and my main focus is to increase the quality of love-based relationship experiences. In this ground-breaking guide I offer useful strategies on healing a difficult angry relationship with love and compassion. You don’t have to stay in an unhealthy relationship one more minute. Let us share our tools with you today, by getting the ebook: “The Art of Living with a Passive Aggressive Husband”.

Technorati Tags: appreciation, conflict, confrontation, Emotional Abuse, emotions, love, Passive Aggresive Behavior, Relationships

Assertion is the art of saying what you need or believe in a way that other people can hear you clearly.

This ability is essential for effective problem-solving. The alternatives to assertion are

1.- submission, like in letting other people’s needs come always before yours, even being just or unjust. This will happen if you accept disrespectful treatment from a loved one for some time, while you grow a deep resentment;

2.- aggression – forcing your needs on another person without their agreement.

Both are lose-lose options, meaning that both sides, even the “winning one” will get less from the relationship. They are building anger, hurt and resentment instead of respect and love.

This is the way to assert yourself:

a) Get a clear idea of exactly the behavior irritating you. If he/she is not speaking to you in front of your friends, that is clearly a hostile behavior that needs addressing. What is the behavior that you want, instead of this? Acceptance, care, attention? Be clear on what you want.

b) Be clear and firm on your personal rights as a dignified person; and firmly believe that your rights, needs, and dignity are just as valid and important as anyone else’s, regardless of age, power, role, or gender.

c) You need to define the behavioral change that you need from this person or to set limits with someone whose behavior is unacceptable or hurtful to you.

HOW DO YOU DO ASSERTION?

1.- Begin describing the negative behavior in clear words:

“When you make jokes about my cooking in front of my friends, as you did last night at Alice’s party…”

2.- State the impact on you:

“I feel ignored and rejected.”

3.- Declare that you want a change:
“and I need you to (agree to make a specific behavior change):

“Remember that we are each other’s support system and we don’t criticize the other in public”

Your purpose is not to blame, but to deliver information about the impact of their behavior to the offending party. Messages centered on the “I” pro noun, delivered calmly, with steady, non-apologetic eye contact – have a better chance of being received as information, and not criticism.

The passive aggressive behavior needs someone to provide the offending person with a steady feedback on the impact of their behaviors…..which should extinguish them, if there is a willingness to change.

Want to hear more? We have good information and support for you!

Technorati Tags: aggression, anger, appreciation, Cold Shoulder, confrontation, Emotional Abuse, feelings, fight, Healthy Marriage, healthy relationships, hidden anger, Passive Aggresive Behavior, Self-Esteem

Passive aggressive behavior does not happen in a vacuum; it requires an adequate partner to play the game with. This interaction is created between two people-one person who resists proximity and responsibility and the other one who accepts too much frustration to feel a minimum of “love,” “acceptance,” or “company.” Do you want to know more?

Neil Warner

I’m the “relationship guru,” and my main focus is to increase the quality of love-based relationship experiences. In this ground-breaking guide I offer useful strategies on healing a difficult angry relationship with love and compassion. You don’t have to stay in an unhealthy relationship one more minute. Let us share our tools with you today.

Technorati Tags: frustration, Healthy Marriage, hidden anger, Passive Aggresive Behavior, passive aggressive

Are some conversations with your hubby leaving you feeling emotionally drained, dejected, and utterly confused?  Do you received the message “I love you” while at the same time he/she is sabotaging your best efforts to do positive things for the couple?  

This is maddening, and you need to know what is going on….because being in this confusion can damage your confidence and self-esteem.

Constant, stubborn passive aggressive behavior can take its toll on you, slowly altering your personality, until you barely recognize your own self.

You feel isolated, perhaps you might cry or yell more often than before, and perhaps you could feel completely out of control.  

What are the main aspects of passive aggressive behavior?

- Unexpected, unprovoked anger attacks, not related to the issue being discussed

- Isolating or rejecting you without an obvious reason

- Stopping you from expressing your feelings or ignoring them

- Preventing you from getting your family or friends’ support

- Showing sensitivity and caring one minute; hostile and resentful the next.

  In order to understand what is going on, what you need to look for is not the occasional response that blocks cooperation while saying that it is forthcoming, but look for the passive-aggressive behavior which is ingrained and the habitual way of dealing with the world, you included.

Every time you suggest something, and you can do this exercise only to test his answer, watch how he never will say: wonderful, let’s do it! Instead, he will edge and haw, give evasive comments and change the conversation….or asks from you about something not related, (like the weather or the time) only to throw you off.  

More: if you push and ask about the meaning of his communicative behavior, what you will get is a maddening mixture of evasiveness and contrition, agreeableness and resistance, connection and aloofness.

If all of this fails, he will show himself being severely depressed, which leaves you in the same place!  

The classic description of passive aggressive behavior includes a “stubborn malcontent, someone who passively resists fulfilling routine tasks, complains of being misunderstood and underappreciated, unreasonably scorns authority and voices exaggerated complaints of personal misfortune.”

Sometimes you can even perceive him as doing a very sly, covert sabotaging of all your plans to move ahead, progress and develop new experiences for both, so scared this person is of change and your role in any change happening to him/her.

Do you plan to enroll his help losing weight? Then he will invite you to dine out, at a good pizza place!  If you push a lot, then you will be served with aggressive outbursts, coming like “out of nowhere,” but destined to protect his personality from any adult challenge needing his response.  

Do you need to know more? If you think passive aggressive behavior is the cause of your unhappy situation there are steps you can take to resolve it. 

Perhaps you need to get a copy of my ebook,  which will give you strategies to respond to Passive Aggressive tactics! If you are ready to break free of the chains of passive aggressive emotional bondage, if you are tired of feeling humiliated and alone, if you are ready to take control of your emotional well-being once and for all, then this e-book is for you.

Neil Warner

I’m the “relationship guru,” and my main focus is to increase the quality of love-based relationship experiences. In this ground-breaking guide I offer useful strategies on healing a difficult angry relationship with love and compassion. You don’t have to stay in an unhealthy relationship one more minute. Let us share our tools with you today.

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/marriage-articles/recognize-passive-aggressive-before-it-destroys-your-sanity-467359.html 

Technorati Tags: Anger Attacks, Cold Shoulder, loneliness, love, Passive Aggresive Behavior, passive aggression, passive aggressive, rejection, Resistance, Sabotage, Silence, Unhappiness