Every time your fear is invited up, and you recognize it and smile at it, your anxiety will lose some of its strength. The past experiences have the potential to show up as fears in your current relationships — but you can learn how to face them. For example, for some of us, the fear of being close to others makes emotional intimacy challenging. Such anxieties often centred on vulnerability, inadequacy, or fears related to taking on relationships.
Relationship Fears
Relationship fears may stem from several places and need different levels of attention and care. Experts suggest that most relationship fears are associated with a perceived threat in a previous relationship and a desire to avoid repeating the same negative experience. The more evidence a person has that the threat is unavoidable, the more fear there tends to be. To make your relationship stress or anxiety free, consult getdiazepam. Familiar sources of relationship fear may arise from:
- Unaddressed or insufficiently addressed prior trauma
- Unaddressed or insufficiently addressed childhood attachment issues
- Dishonesty
- Disrespect
- Mixed messages within the current relationship
Relationship fears may develop in your primitive brain, the unconscious and impulsive part of the brain linked with survival instincts. When the primitive brain gets fearful about a relationship, it may lead to anxiety, depression, and frustration. Some relationship worries are natural, while others are more robust and hinder your relationship’s success. It’s okay to be fearful. However, the way that we act out this fear may cause harm to a relationship. The root causes of relationship fears may include the following:
- Premature commitment
- Difficulty bearing the ambiguity of a new relationship
- A need for excessive reassurance
These root causes often lead to larger, more complex fears that need addressing. The most common worries within relationships may be:
- Intimacy
- Inadequacy
- Abandonment
- Rejection
How to Maintain a Healthy Relationship Despite Fears and Anxiety
Top up the emotional resources
You’re possibly super sensitive to the needs of others and give openly and plentifully to your relationship. Sometimes though, anxiety can waste those resources from the relationship just as speedily as you invest them. This is completely okay – plenty of good comes with loving you to make up for this – but it may mean you must keep ensuring those resources are outdone up whenever you can, heap your partner with attention, gratitude, affection, touch, and conversation around them.
Let your partner see you as support
Your partner might feel reluctant to ”burden” you with worries, mainly if those worries don’t seem as big as the ones you’re going through. People with anxiety have so much forte – it’s intolerable to live without it – so make sure your partner identifies that it doesn’t matter how they vary in size, small or big their struggles are; you can be supportive sometimes too. The tendency may be for partners of anxious people to dismiss their worries, but this might mean that they do themselves out of the opportunity to feel nurtured by you, which would be a massive loss for both of you. Be deliberate in being the rock sometimes. Ask, hold, and touch. There’s nothing more remedial than the warmth of the person you love.
Allow your partner to know your thoughts.
Anxious thoughts are highly personal, but let your partner in on them. It’s an essential part of intimacy. You often think about what you must do to feel safe, what feels bad for you and what could go wrong. You will also have a considerable capacity to think of other people – anxious people do – but make sure you let your partner in on the thoughts that arrest you. Keeping things too much to you can widen the distance between two people.
Asking for reassurance is okay – but just not too much
Anxiety has a way of sneaking into everything. When left unchecked, it can make you doubt the things that don’t deserve to be questioned – such as your relationship. It’s totally okay and very normal to ask your partner for reassurance. Too much, though, and it might be felt as neediness. Neediness is the foe of desire and, over time, can increase the spark. Make sure your partner has the opportunity to love you spontaneously, without prompting – it’s lovely for them and even healthier for you.
Be vulnerable
Anxiety can affect relationships in diverse ways. In some people, it might strengthen the need for continuous assurance. In others, it can reason them to hold back, to reduce their weakness to potential heartache. Openness – being open to another – is beautiful and the spirit of successful, healthy relationships. The problem with defending yourself too much is that it can invite the rejection you’re trying to guard against. Part of intimacy is allowing someone in closer than you let the rest of the world.
Avoid avoidance
Another way to deal with fear is to face it. Avoiding our fears prevents us from moving forward—it makes us anxious. But be gentle with yourself and do what feels safe to you! If you are getting more panicky, take a break and find something pleasant or comforting to notice or do. If it feels safe later, you can explore your fear again, taking breaks as required. If you find it challenging to address chronic fears or anxiety alone, note that therapists can be invaluable in helping you work through avoiding strategies.
Conclusion
Fear and anxiety don’t have to be the enemies of your life journey. By concerted efforts to recognize our emotions and learn how to respond instead of react when faced with fear and anxiety, we can use these emotions as tools for growth and opportunity. Developing compassionate self-awareness, being mindful of the present moment, and engaging in supportive activities such as yoga or meditation can all help us cultivate healthier relationships with our anxieties and fears to embark on our paths courageously. It is important to remember that facing your fears does not eliminate them. Instead, it opens you up to their value by recognizing how they can provide insight into what’s important to you. Through this transformative process of cultivating enough emotional intelligence towards fear, we can unlock the potential of fear to move our lives forward.