Emotional energy, just when you need it
by Mira on April 2nd, 2009When is the last time you ran out of gas? I don’t mean your car. I mean you. I’m talking about a time when you just ran out of fuel, coughed, sputtered, gasped, and slowly drifted to a stop. It might have been a job, a volunteer commitment or a hobby that sparked this feeling. You’d given and given and given and suddenly you had nothing left to give.
This lapse in emotional energy can happen to us in our relationships, too. And it doesn’t always take much to bring it on — maybe just a period when you’re busy, irritated, distant, and disappointed with each other. Suddenly, cough, gasp, sputter, and the emotional energy you’ve had for your relationships has gone. Uh oh. Where do you go for gas when a relationship has run out of fuel and is just stuck there at the side of the road?
You don’t have to go anywhere. All the emotional energy you need is already there. You just have to know how to tap into it. Here’s how to start. In a romantic relationship, ask each other the Magic Question: “What is one thing we can do to make each other feel loved? You tell me one thing I can do to make you feel loved. And I’ll tell you one thing you can do to make me feel loved.”
Now here’s why this is magic. The things that make us feel loved usually don’t cost much to do but they have a big impact. I’ve heard couples say things like, “If you just gave me a smile and hug when you came home from work, that would make me feel loved.” It costs a little, but you get a lot.
We can do something similar in all of our relationships. It’s very powerful and healing to simply say, “You know, I’ve noticed that things are a little distant and strained between us. Is there anything I can do to help with that?” And if there’s one specific thing you need from the other person, you can mention that, too. Just make sure you frame it as “… because I want our relationship to be better.”
Lack of emotional energy is a big issue these days. It’s not just in our relationships. Many of us are running on empty — and for good reason. We’re working harder and for longer hours, too. We have a lot of fears to contend with — everything from terrorism to unemployment. We’re under a lot of pressure, too: to be skinny and exercise and look young. There’s just an awful lot on our plates. We put out a lot and often don’t get a lot back. Now it’s tax time, and that just makes things worse.
This hurts us. It hurts our relationships, too, because when our emotional energy is low, our relationships are the first to suffer, because we take them for granted.
How do you build up your emotional energy? Well, first, let me give a more-detailed definition of what emotional energy is. As I say in my book about it, emotional energy is “a special energy that’s all about feeling young and deeply connected to the fun and hope of life … an aliveness of the mind, a happiness of the heart, and a spirit filled with hope.” To get more emotional energy for yourself, as a start, you could ask yourself what gives you emotional energy — a question most of us don’t ask — and then make sure you put more of that in your life.
Here are some ways to get a quick hit of emotional energy:
- Get some rest. If you increase your physical energy, you won’t have to rely as much on emotional energy to do all the work.
- Think of all the little things that make you happy and do them.
- Think about all the things you expect of yourself and that other people expect of you, and then say to heck with some of those expectations.
- Get some solitude, even if just for an hour or two.
- Ask yourself, “What’s one small thing I can do to make my life better right now?” — and do it.
Want more help? The BEST book on the subject is my The Emotional Energy Factor. Click here to check it out. I know you’ll find help in it. And by the way, when it came out it was a finalist for the Books for a Better Life Award in the psychology category. That’s the self-help-book equivalent of being an Academy Award nominee!
Back to your relationship. What would make you feel more loved? Let us all know. Your ideas might give other people ideas. After all, the more ways we know how to make each other feel loved, the more emotional energy we’ll have, and the better our relationships will be. Love will never run out of gas again.
Love,
Mira
