By Donna Eden and Dr. David Feinstein
Donna Eden and Dr. David Feinstein recently gave us some valuable relationship advice around what they call The Energies of Love, also the title of their co-authored book.
Check out these 10 tips for couples from The Energies of Love:
1. Hug often. Hugs get your positive energies to intermingle and meld. Relaxing even into a six-second full-body embrace increases serotonin levels, leaving you feeling closer and, if you were having a disagreement, less irritable. Even couples in strong relationships tend to touch less over time. Initiate hugs even if your partner doesn’t, particularly at times of parting or reuniting.
2. Give your partner a “spinal flush.” Reflex points that impact every one of your body’s major energy pathways are situated along the spine. Have your partner lie face down and massage the points along both sides of the spine (but not directly on the spine), using your thumbs or middle fingers and using your body weight so strong pressure is being applied. While most people can tolerate and will enjoy considerable pressure on these points, check to be sure you are not using more than your partner wishes. Progressing from the bottom of the neck all the way down to the bottom of the sacrum, go down the notches along the vertebrae and deeply massage each point. Stay on each for at least 5 seconds, moving the skin too and fro or in a circular motion with strong pressure. You can stop when you reach the sacrum or repeat the downward flush once or twice more. When completed, sweep the energies down your partners body with either one long swipe or several brush strokes. Use the palms of your hands to sweep the energy from the shoulders all the way down the legs and off the feet. Repeat the sweep two or three times.
3. Support the production of oxytocin. Energy techniques can influence your hormone levels! We know that sex produces oxytocin, but so can this simple one-minute technique. It begins by breathing in slowly and deeply as you draw your hands up from your pubic bone until you get to the center of your chest. Before you exhale, move your hands up and out toward your sides as if you were tracing a heart above and around your breasts. Slowly exhale as you bring your hands back toward your pubic bone, completing the tracing of a large heart over your torso. Repeat a few times. Finish by drawing your hands up the center of your chest and holding them over your heart for two breaths. You are stimulating your “radiant circuits” and triggering the production of oxytocin.
4. Stretch! When you begin to feel stale or tense, stretch so the energies within you can move more freely. Stand and imagine an invisible rope hanging down from over your head. Reach up toward it and pull it down with one hand, then the other, alternating hands for at least a minute. Feel the stretch in your arms and all the way down the sides of your body.
5. Hook-up! If you are feeling disconnected from yourself or your partner, get the energies flowing between your own head and your body by doing the “hook-up.” Place the middle finger of one hand on your third eye (between your eyebrows above the bridge of your nose) and the middle finger of your other hand in your navel. Gently press both fingers inward, pull them upward, and hold there for at least three deep full breaths.
6. Scan for what you appreciate about your partner and state it. Often! Simply staying alert for what you like about your partner and gratefully acknowledging even the simplest qualities stimulates the biochemistry of love and raises the energies between you.
7. Use a gentle opening for tough topics. The way you bring up a delicate topic will have an immediate impact on your partner’s biochemistry and thus the energy that is activated in each of you and between you. Tracking the amount of accusation, blame, criticism, and negative voice tone and facial expressions in the early phase of a conversation has allowed psychologists to predict the outcome of a conversation with 96 percent accuracy! Be aware of your partner’s sensitivities and find a kind and gentle opening for introducing a tough issue.
8. Keep your energies moving in a criss-cross pattern. When you are under stress, your energies tend to lose the natural cross-over configuration that supports your best thinking. A simple way to get the energies to cross over from the right side of your body to the left and from the left to the right is called the Crossover Shoulder Pull. Place either hand on its opposite shoulder and press in hard behind the shoulder with your fingers. Drag your hand over your shoulder, maintaining the pressure. Continue, with less pressure now, to your opposite hip. Repeat two or three times. Shift to the other side.
9. Balance your energies rather than battling your partner. If tension begins to rise between you and either of you calls for a cease fire, you both should — by ironclad pre-agreement — STOP the argument, mid-sentence if necessary. Then, immediately, set about shifting the energies within yourself. A simple technique to begin to do this is to place both hands over the center of your chest, close our eyes, and take three deep breaths. When you are both a bit more centered, do a shared energy exercise, such as the spinal flush, before returning to the discussion. You will come back with energetic bridges repaired.
10. Get curious about your partner’s Stress Response Style. Rather than judging your partner or going into your own defense mode, give your partner the benefit of the doubt. That alone shifts the energies. Get curious about how the behaviors and feelings you are witnessing make sense. This opens a soft space within you so judgment is replaced with compassion and understanding.
Donna Eden is a pioneer in the field of Energy Medicine who has served in both traditional and alternative health care settings. She is recognized for her innate ability to accurately determine the causes of physical and psychological problems based on the state of the body’s energies, and to devise highly effective treatments.
David Feinstein, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist who has served on the faculties of The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and Antioch College. Author of eight books and more than 80 professional articles, he has been a pioneer in the areas of Energy Psychology and Energy Medicine.
Together, Feinstein and Eden have co-authored The Energies of Love, Energy Medicine, Energy Medicine for Women, and The Promise of Energy Psychology.
CONNECT WITH THE AUTHORS:
http://www.innersource.net/innersource/
http://www.theinnersourcestore.com/the-energies-of-love-book/
