Transcription

Hello, my name Sevin Phillips. I’m a licensed marriage and family therapist and I’m here to talk about conversations starters. Who hasn’t felt nervous when meeting new people? Which one of us hasn’t put our proverbial foot in our mouth and has fallen flat on our face when we tried to talk to somebody new?

My suggestion is to always be yourself and be genuine. Anytime we try to start a conversation with something we don’t care about or make some statement that has nothing to do with who we really are, people can tell. People are intuitive. We know when someone is using small talk or they really don’t care about what they’re saying. Why should you care? No wonder it feels awkward. It doesn’t work.
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Los Angeles, Beverly Hills – Relationship Counseling Center – Couples Counseling Therapy

Video Transcription

Hello, my name is Sevin Philips. I’m a licensed marriage and family therapist and I’m here to talk about conflict avoidance.

Some of us, in relationships, are uncomfortable with having conflict, with upsetting our partner, with having to deal with the fallout of sharing stuff that’s just difficult to talk about. So we learn to hold it in and not say it.

In the short-term, we win out, right? There’s no conflict.

But, in the long-term, and what most people don’t know is the curse of it is that it causes a lot more damage to the relationship by not expressing your needs. By not going through the conflict earlier on, you have much more conflict later on.

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East Bay, Berkeley Relationship Counseling Center (Couples Counseling Therapy)

Sevin Philips, MFT- Fear of intimacy at it’s heart is about fear of abandonment, rejection or betrayal. Origins from childhood or adult hurt. Solution is in the practice of open-heartedness and self-protection. Taking risks with intimacy should be based on a slow progression of trust building.

Video Transcription – Couples Counseling Therapy

Hello, my name is Sevin Phllips. I’m going to talk about the fear of intimacy. Now many of us have been hurt in a relationship, so being in a relationship can be scary business, which can be completely normal.

For some of us, though, we’ve been hurt to such an extent that we could even be in a healthy marriage and we end up pushing people away at some point and time, whether it’s six months, a year, or every two years.

And deep down inside, the root of this is oftentimes fear of betrayal, fear of abandonment or fear of rejection. And somewhere along the line, we have been hurt. Maybe when we were children, there was a divorce or a parent abandoned us at some level. As adults, we’ve been betrayed; we’ve been hurt – and sometimes to such an extent that it makes it very difficult for us to have our hearts opened to another person.

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Los Angeles, Beverly Hills – Relationship Counseling Center – Couples Counseling Therapy

Video Transcription Advice

Hello, this is Sevin Philips. I’m here to talk about our stories. Our stories that we have about who other people are, or for instance, how people feel about us.

The reason why I say stories is because we see a behavior or we believe something to be true based on some sort of truth that we actually experience. What we do is we extrapolate that oftentimes and make that into a larger story. A story that someone doesn’t like us, they’re angry or upset, or someone is unhappy in their lives. It can leave us in a difficult spot, because over time, people do change.

Sometimes when we believe something is true about somebody, we treat them differently – sometimes not in a good way. So I want you to use your gut. I want you to use your intuition and gauge the world and protect yourself in situations or in relationships.

But what I want you to do is question those long-lasting, or even short-lasting, stories that you have about who people are or about how they feel about your or something else.

Oftentimes, it’s not true. So if you could as the question, perhaps even ask the person, “Hey, I noticed you seem to be angry with me. Are you angry with me?” When people do this, it’s such a lovely surprise, because oftentimes, it’s like, “Oh, no, I wasn’t.” And it’s such a relief, because who knows how long you would’ve held onto that for and how painful that might’ve been.

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North Bay, Mill Valley – Relationship Counseling Center – Couples Therapy

Video Transcription

Hello, this is Sevin Philips and I’m here to talk about appreciation. More importantly, what happens in a long-term relationship whether it’s romantic, or it’s our parents, or it’s our siblings or a long-term friend is that we begin to take each other for granted. It’s very normal and natural to do this.

We help each other out. We support each other. We’re there for one another and we begin to just assume that that’s the way things are. We assume that we know that the other person appreciates the efforts.

But what gets lost over time is that we stop actually physically, verbally appreciating one another and it’s such an amazing element of a marriage.

So what I’m asking you guys to do is to bring that back into your relationships. The ones that you haven’t appreciated in a while – friendships, maybe it’s your husband, wife or partner, or your mom and your dad. Whoever it might be. Make a list of the things that in your life they do for you – even the small things. In fact, specifically the small things.

Do something to appreciate that person. It could be a gesture. It could be a verbal acknowledgement of just how they’re really great and important in your life.

This is the practice that I ask you guys to do and it’s just one of those things that we need to do when we’re in long-term marriages, because it’s just so natural because of the stresses of life, having children, having busy lives, work lives that people that are closest to us, we often tend to take for granted.

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A perfectionist thinks that anything less then perfect is unacceptable.  Most of us are just plain hard on ourselves for not achieving what we think we should.  The problem is perfection is not obtainable or sustainable, thus you are never satisfied.  Our self criticism can come from a number of places. From a difficult, strict upbringing, or we can be driven to perfection in order to make people respect or love us more.  No matter what the motivation, the resulting painful element is not feeling like we are good enough.  We miss the gentleness and our inherent value as human beings.

Healing the inner perfectionist

• Understanding perfect is boring and uninteresting
• It is the scrapper and underdog that is most admired
• Make it a practice of being the best person you can be, without expectation of an outcome. (See and admit shortcomings, and get back up when you fall off your practice)

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Genuineness
1. If we don’t have to be anything other then what we are in every moment then we relax, we no longer need to be prepared, braced to change something that isn’t true
2. We give others permission to do the same

3. We get all that energy we used to create some artificial persona back, we relax and feel right with the world

Video Transcription

Hello, this is Sevin Philips. I’m here to talk about being genuine in your life.

Kind of like a spaghetti western with Clint Eastwood, it’s bringing the good, bad and the ugly into all your relationships. I’m having fun with that, but it’s kind of true. We’re not perfect beings. We’re all striving to be the best we can be in our lives.

We want people to like and love us. We want it so bad that sometimes we’ll act like we think they want somebody to act. We’ll try to be smarter. At work, we’ll try to be that success-driven person that we may not honestly feel all the time.

So what happens is if that were different people, we’re acting differently within all these different places. At some level, we have to keep track of that in ourselves, and it takes so much energy to be someone we’re not that it’s an incredible relief just to be yourself.

You might know this in your life if you have somebody in your life that you could really just relax with. It’s one of the best things ever.

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Personal Freedom- “Being the fullest expression of ourselves”
Problem- Living a life unlived.
Major roadblocks to living a big life.
• Fear of being seen as egocentric, self-centered or selfish
• Playing small for others (fear of making others feel bad)
• Negative beliefs (childhood, family or difficult experiences)
• Fear of finding out if our negative beliefs are actually true
Is there room for more meaning in your life?

Relationship advice by, Sevin Philips, MFT

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Personal freedom:
Each one of us has a unique expression; we all can express ourselves in smaller ways and yet be just as beautiful.
Don’t believe me- find out for yourself, your own experience is your best teacher.
Suggestions:
• Explore how you stop yourself (ie. Negative stories)
• Give yourself permission to find out
• Be curious, you don’t have to know in order to explore
Process is organic- outcome may not be what you expected.
• Find supportive people
• Empty-handed leap into the unknown
• Being scared is a normal part of the process
• If you fall down, it isn’t failure

Relationship advice by Sevin Philips, MFT

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Asking yourself what you want to do in every little moment is not as simple as it sounds. Fear of hurting someone, causing uncomfortable conflict, or not having your needs met are all ways in which we stop ourselves from asking what we truly want.

Socialization has taught us that asking for what we want is selfish and bad. This is an old story often used to stifle our ability to live freely. We are beings who desire and have needs. The question “What do I want?” is about taking care of ourselves in every moment and, in the process, respecting ourselves and others.

I believe that deep down we are all aching for the truth from one another. Think about the times a friend or family member has asked you for something and you were aware that you didn’t want to do it. If you do it anyway, you may experience resistance or resentment, which becomes apparent to both sides. Both people lose. If you don’t say no, and just give an excuse for your absence, you may experience sadness around the inauthenticity in your relationship. Just saying no, although initially disappointing for some, is what both people want. Taking care of yourself by being honest builds trust in a relationship. Taking care of yourself gives permission to the other person to do the same with you. Hence, when we actually are available to each other, it is a gift.

If this practice feels too scary at first, just start by asking yourself the question. Be curious about the ways you stop yourself from asking for what you want. Asking this question will start the process of coming back to yourself. There is enough in this world for you. There is enough for all of us to be happy and fulfilled.

Article by: Sevin Philips, MFT