Healthy Relationships Require Both Participants to Show-Up Emotionally!

"… Just talk, I’m listening, Just talk. I know your tastes in food and wine, but never really what’s on your mind. What’s going on inside your head? I hear you say what you can or can’t. I’m never sure what it is you want. There’s always something left unsaid."
Morten Harket, Listening

 Being emotionally unavailable in a relationship is a major problem. It’s a form of abandonment. If we are emotionally unavailable to others it’s a sign that we have abandoned ourselves. We don’t believe we are worthy of voicing who we are, what we like, what we need, what we think or what we want. In all of these essential areas we remain silent and in being so, we stifle relationships and keep them from growing. The other person feels left out of our inner-world and thus abandoned by us.

Over time, the more the other person tries to break through our wall of emotional unavailability, the further we distance ourselves from them for fear that they will find out we really aren’t good enough for them. We think we are protecting ourselves from rejection, but in fact we are setting ourselves up to be abandoned by the other person. Sooner or later, he/she is going to be tired of feeling left out. Our emotional deep-freeze is going to lead them to believe that we really aren’t interested in them. And when they are finally tired of something always being left unsaid, they will bow-out of the relationship.

Being emotionally unavailable always blows up in our faces. We may think we are controlling the relationship to our favor by refusing to reveal too much about ourselves. We may think that the less the other person knows about us, the less likely they will be to leave us. But the opposite is true. The other person can’t grow to like or love us more, if we won’t allow them to know anything essential about who we are inside. Surface level conversation is OK between acquaintances, but it becomes a red flag when two people become more than associates.

If the other person is aware of human behavioral patterns, being emotionally unavailable will be a major red flag for them. It will make it obvious to them that we don’t feel very good about ourselves. They will see through our need to hide who we are, and it’s rare that any healthy person finds that need to be attractive.

This is why it’s to our advantage to let the walls down. Being vulnerable might feel uncomfortable at first, but it helps us to know if we are on the right track with a particular person. No relationship can flourish on pretending. Relationships flourish on the truth. If we are truthful with the other person about who we are, what we need, what we like, what we think and what we want one of two things may happen: 1) The other person will either like what we have to say about ourselves and the relationship will grow; or 2) The other person will realize that we aren’t really a good fit for them and the relationship will end.

Both results are to our benefit. In the first result, as we both honestly share our inner-worlds, we grow together into a healthy relationship that brings added happiness into our lives. In the second result, we learn early-on in the relationship that we probably aren’t compatible, and so we can end the relationship without having wasted a lot of time on an attraction that wasn’t good for either of us. We can then begin to look for someone who is the right fit for us. So, as you can see, in both situations, we actually win when we allow ourselves to open up and be emotionally available.

If we know we aren’t allowing ourselves to be vulnerable in a relationship, we need to work on opening up and taking the risk of showing who we are to the other person. And if we feel left-out of a relationship because the other person isn’t willing to be vulnerable before us, then we need to challenge him/her to open up to us. We need to let him/her know we’re willing to listen objectively and that we want to know where we stand in the relationship. Remember the truth will always set you free to live life to the fullest.

Morten Harket is the lead singer for the Norwegian rock group A-Ha. “Listening” is from his new solo album Out of My Hands.