Relationships are full of emotions. Our feelings can range in any given moment from one end of the spectrum to the other. They are affected not only by the circumstance that triggered them but also by factors such as how much sleep we’ve had, how much stress we’re under, whether we’ve eaten, hormone levels, grief, and illness. Healthy relationships depend on our ability to communicate our needs, wishes, and thoughts, and also on out ability to discuss issues of concern and resolve problems. Our emotions affect our ability to communicate, and our ability to communicate can certainly impact our emotions.
To talk about these issues, a good place to start is with a discussion of integrity agreements. Integrity agreements are unspoken (for the most part) agreements that we humans have with each other that say, “I will not harm you, emotionally or physically.” With our spouses, the agreement is spoken out loud and made public. It is implicit in the parent/child relationship. It is even assumed to exist among strangers. Our society operates on the expectation that we can trust each other not to harm one another physically or emotionally.

Unfortunately, people break the integrity agreement with each other in little ways all the time---by failing to do what we say we will do, failing to be on time, being dishonest, and being judgmental… When someone we know and love breaks an integrity agreement with us, big or small, immense emotions can erupt, including anger, betrayal, abandonment, hurt, fear, and insecurity. When this happens it is important that we take a look at how we are feeling, examine our part in the situation, discuss the situation with the other person, and to come to a renewed agreement with each other---before resentment builds up and irreparable damage is done. All this requires the ability to communicate I the middle of a stream of emotions. Few of us are well trained in these skills, and most of us have seldom seen anything modeled during conflict beyond the expression (or the suppression) of anger, which seldom helps resolving the problem.

If you are the one who broke an integrity agreement and your goal is to have a loving relationship, you will need to take responsibility for what you have done and accept the consequences, which may include having to endure your partner’s pain. When you don’t acknowledge what you did that inflicted pain, or don’t take responsibility for your actions, but rather defend your ego, you block the ability to resolve the problem by honoring ego instead of truth, love, and compassion. The two of you may both need to work through the full range of emotions in order to find your way back to love and understanding, reset your intentions, and make a new agreement.

When you feel guilty, you also need to clear up the integrity agreement that you broke with yourself, achieve a sense of forgiveness for yourself, and restore self-love. Otherwise, your guilt and distrust of yourself will contaminate your actions in the future.

Remember, ego is what blocks love and compassion. When we are able to transcend issues of the ego and focus instead on the bigger picture of why we are here and what it is really important, we are able to clean up broken integrity agreements, even years after the fact, and begin to handle them immediately instead of holding on to the hurt they inflict.

This is obviously easier said than done, but mending any agreements that we have broken is an incredibly freeing thing to do. Even years later, a phone call or email saying, “I realize that I hurt you, and I apologize. I was wrong,” is very powerful. Sometimes the “wrong” we have committed is simply to have held on to a grudge for a long time, maybe even years, after someone violated an agreement with us. We may at first justify our lack of compassion and forgiveness by thinking that the other person is the one who broke the agreement. When we contemplate it further, however, sometimes we are able to see that the other person made amends and tried to make it right, and that we held on to anger and hurt without looking at the whole truth, owning our responsibility, and moving back to love.

Broken integrity agreements evoke a lot of emotions for both people involved. When we become aware of our feelings—particularly the emotions that don’t feel good, like anger, hurt, fear, jealously, frustration, anxiety—and stop to inquire by looking deeper into them, we can use them to guide is back to love.

When we feel anger or a variation of anger—frustration, irritations, annoyment, or resentment—it is really like a flag on top of a mountain of other emotions. It doesn’t exist all by itself. Several other emotions are also afflicting us.

Directly under anger is hurt. When we are mad at someone, we also feel hurt in some way by them or the situation. Our feelings are hurt that he or she didn’t consider us; we are sad that he or she didn’t trust us.

Underneath hurt is fear. We are afraid of losing the relationship, afraid of what others will think of us, afraid that we will continue to be hurt, afraid that we will never be able to trust again, afraid that we are made to look foolish, and on and on. We are afraid of losing control or losing approval. Our need for control is embedded in anger, and our need for approval in hurt. Both are hiding in our fears.

Underneath fear is responsibility, recognition of or remorse over our part in the situation. It is rare to encounter a conflict or circumstance for which we do not have some responsibility or remorse, even if it is simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time. When expressing the whole truth of our feelings, it is very empowering to admit to ourselves (and to let our partners know) what we are sorry for and what we could have done differently. Remember, our feelings are the result of something we thought (our response to an event). So if you are feeling angry, hurt, and fearful, taking responsibility for the thoughts that led you to feel that way are empowering. Again, it is in our response ability that the power to heal and change exists.

When we let go of blame to the extent that we can recognize our responsibility in a situation, we are able to have a sense of understanding and forgiveness. In other words, when we transcend our egos and drop our guards of defense and resistance for a moment, we can feel some compassion for what the other person is experiencing. From a place of understanding, we may see our partner’s perspective and possibly even his or her innocence, or why our partner did what he or she did, or we can see what the misunderstanding was that contributed to the situation. When we take a moment to try to see it from the other person’s side and to take in all the information, we become better able to understand the situation. When we achieve a sense of understanding, we are far better equipped to forgive. “Forgiveness” comes from a root word that means “to give”. When we forgive out of compassion and understanding, we clear the ego blocks and restore the ability to give and receive love. When we take the time to look at the situation from our hearts, with compassion and understanding, instead of from our egos, what really matters and what does not begins to become clear.

Beneath understanding and forgiveness is what we want. We want to be treated fairly, we want a loving relationship, or we may want out. Regardless, when we express our desires, half the battle of achieving them is accomplished.

Underneath what we want is appreciation and love. Regardless of the fact that we’re feeling all these emotions, there are still things we appreciate about the other person. Underneath the mountain of emotions, love still exists. The love is easier to see when we’re dealing with partners or family members than it is with total strangers, but even when we don’t know the person we are angry at, on the soul level we care about him or her as a human being. With our loved ones, however, it is much easier to recognize and express what we love and appreciate about them. The bottom line is love.

We are often unaware of all these underlying emotions that present obstacles to the expression of our love. Consequently, we express to our partner only our anger or hurt—or we inflict pain and hurt on them. As a defense they then express their anger and hurt to us. Often an argument based on protecting both egos ensues, which is a very difficult place from which to reach an agreement (and love). Anger doesn’t cancel out love, but it certainly can block the experience of it. The conflict goes back and forth on the surface of the emotional mountain without getting closer to resolution. Jumping from anger to agreement is a long stretch. When we express our full range of emotions—anger, hurt, fear, responsibility, understanding, forgiveness, want, and love—we can then begin the process of negotiation and agreement. When we take the time to truly self-inquire into all the feelings we are experiencing, we often find the original even we were reacting to isn’t even the real issue that need addressing. When we dive into the total truth, we often reveal the real truth.

When you are angry, if you can’t communicate the total truth of how you are feeling, or at least the very minimum you can’t align with the goal of a loving relationship, agree to wait until you have cooled off to talk about it. Give yourselves time, and then resume your effort to resolve the problem.

Notice that the sentences stems for expressing the total truth of your feelings are all “I” statements, rather then “you” statement. People are far better able to take in what we tell them when we share what is true for us, instead of what we think is true for them. This can be communicated by simply changing the pronoun in our sentences. Doing so also helps to separate the deed from the doer. With “you” statements, we are assessing or attacking the other person’s character traits, rather than focusing on his or her words or actions.

It takes practice—and self observation—to begin speaking in “I” statements. In fact, out everyday language has replaced “I” with “you” even when we really are talking about ourselves. People say things like “You get stuck in a rut and you just don’t know how to get out” or “Sometimes you just feel like everything you do is wrong and it is hopeless. You just want to give up.” In actuality, they are talking about themselves. They really mean, “I get stuck in a rut and I just don’t know how to get out.” Or “sometimes I just feel like everything I do is wrong and it is hopeless, I just want to give up.” Using “you” allows us to distance ourselves from the painful truth, rather than owning it. It is much harder to say, “I feel hopeless”, or “I want to give up”, than it is to say. “You feel hopeless” or “You want to give up”. Using “I” is a more honest and responsible form of communication.