I need Help with my Relationship! Where do I begin?

This is the kind of relationship help question I love to hear because the answer lies in the question.  And that means you are ready to embrace the answer and the difference it can make for you.You begin with yourself.  You may have heard this before, but you cannot change anyone else.  You can only change yourself.  We hear this often, especially from Oprah!  She always reminds people they can only change themselves, not their partners.However, it is your relationship you need help with.  What about your partner, what is his or her responsibility?  What does it mean that you cannot expect to change your partner or spouse, you can only change yourself? It means you look to yourself and the results you get from your relationship.  The best way to do this is to imagine that you are 100% responsible for the results that show up in your relationship.  While it may not seem fair, it is a profoundly powerful place from which to make changes in your relationship.  It is definitely worth your time to give it a try.  Let me explain.Let’s say your spouse has begun to shut you out of his or her life.  You just cannot seem to get through to each other any more.  It is as if a wall has been built between you.  Rather than look to your partner to determine what is wrong with him or her, expecting the other person to fix it; you accept what you see happening in your relationship as the results you are getting.  From there you take responsibility for those results.  You get outside help if you need it.  But you deal with those results.  If you want to change the results, then you get busy being who you need to be to create different results in your relationship.As an example, let’s look at the sports world to see how athletes deal with their results.  Take golfers, for instance.  A professional golfer who isn’t winning tournaments doesn’t go to his coach and say, “I’m not winning.  How can we change the other players so I can win?”  In the world of sports, we would understand such a perspective to be ludicrous.  Rather, the golfer works with his coach to address the results he gets in the game and figures out who he needs to be and what he needs to do in order to improve his game.Just so, the most lasting relationship help you will ever receive will come from you as you take responsibility for your relationship results. Using the example from above, your spouse has shut you out of his or her life.  That is a result.  You ask yourself, “Who do I need to be, in order to be seen, heard, and felt by my beloved again?”  You may need to become someone who sees, hears, and feels the other person.  Is something going on in his or her life that they cannot share with you because you have been emotionally absent?  You can become the kind of spouse who is emotionally present.Perhaps there is another reason your spouse has shut you out.  Is there a lot of anger between you?  Shutting you out may be a passive aggressive way of their handling the anger.  What can you do to address your own anger, becoming a more loving person in the process?Is your spouse depressed?  If this is the case, you may find it challenging to claim responsibility for this result.  The depression, after all, belongs to your spouse and not you.  However, if it shows up in your relationship, it is one of your results.  Take responsibility.  Take a good long look at your spouse, his or her history, your history together, and determine what it is going to take to have your spouse trust you so that you can assist him or her in getting help for the depression.Has your spouse shut you out and has the wall grown between you from simple neglect?  What will it take for you to fall in love again?  How do you need to be and what do you need to do in order to get back to the love, joy, and passion you once knew?From this one example, you can see how when you begin with you and attend to your relationship results, you can be the change that improves your relationship.  Any changes you make will affect your spouse and the relationship.  They cannot remain static when you change.  As you make changes that have to do with you taking responsibility, you create a space in which your spouse can show up with greater strength and potential to do the same.Furthermore, when your relationship requires that you seek outside help from a relationship coach, for instance; when you show up already taking responsibility for your relationship, you will experience speedier improvement than if you sought the help from the status of a victim!Another benefit to taking 100% responsibility for your relationship results is the gratitude you will experience from your spouse or partner.  Taking that level of responsibility requires a level of courage that is admirable.  It can even result in increased intimacy that your spouse will cherish.