Intimacy is healing.
“Intimacy is healing.” Dean Ornish, M.D.
How, in this increasingly tumultuous world, can we build and sustain stable and loving intimate relationships that nurture everyone?
I recently spoke at length with a friend whose story lights up this question. Let’s call her Anne. Let’s call her husband Andy.
Andy was in his late forties when he passed. He was recovering from heart surgery when something suddenly went very wrong.
I have the gift of connecting with those who have passed. I had several conversations with Andy soon after he’d moved on. He told me how much he wished he’d done it differently, how much he wished he’d allowed himself to more fully open his heart to Anne and their young daughter. He knew his wife had wanted to experience a more loving connection with him. He told me he’d finally learned the lesson he wouldn’t allow himself to embrace when he was in his body; intimacy is healing. He asked me to tell Anne about our conversation.
Anne told me Andy had confessed the same thing to her several times during the final hours of his life. I had chills of confirmation as she said this to me. It was so important to Andy that Anne understood how sorry he was that he made sure I passed along the same message he’d given her.
Anne loves Andy dearly. She understands he did his very best while she wishes they could have had the marriage filled with intimacy that had been her dream.
What is intimacy? Intimacy is choosing to be transparent with others while creating a safe space for them to be transparent with us.
Intimacy can take different forms. Intimacy can mean being in a relationship that feels like everyone has found their way home. Intimacy can mean a relationship rich with loving touch and sexual fulfillment. Intimacy can mean different things to different people. When two people feel safe enough to form and sustain an intimate relationship, the magic of healing intimacy follows.
True intimacy requires us to be vulnerable. The fear of intimacy and the fear of vulnerability are closely linked. We like the idea of love and closeness until we come right up against revealing something we’d rather keep to ourselves. Maybe we’re afraid of rejection. Maybe we’re afraid of acceptance. Maybe we’re allowing our memory of how it felt to be rejected because we were authentically ourselves with others who weren’t willing to be authentically themselves to keep us from risking once more. Maybe we’re allowing our fear of doing something we’ve never done before to stop us from building intimate connections.
Do we choose to more fully show ourselves to another, do we choose to more fully be there for another, or do we add another couple of bricks to our wall to keep ourselves from truly connecting?
We live in a world in which we’ve often forgotten how to be intimate with each other. We forget the importance of creating, one day at a time, the safest possible space for each other. We forget the importance of listening deeply to each other. We forget the importance of asking our loved ones how we can give them what they need.
What might our world be like if all our relationships were intimate relationships?
My friends Scott and Shannon Peck have given themselves the beautiful life mission of teaching love skills to the world. If you’re in a love relationship that’s not feeling as intimate as you would like it to feel, you might want to read their latest book, Soul Mate Love: Inside Secrets From An Authentic Soul Mate Couple. They are transparent about their lives, and I look forward to reading their book.
What’s a good first step in developing relationships that grow intimacy instead of distance?
Perhaps you remember Scott and Shannon’s guesting on my radio show. They discussed how they treat each person they meet as a potential soul mate. They ask people, “What’s the most significant thing going on in your life right now?” I do that, too. When I meet someone who appears to be open and I ask the question in a soft and loving voice, the results can often be gorgeous. If you feel called to try doing this with strangers who appear to be open, I hope you experience what I have experienced.
I have found it’s easier to grow intimacy with beloveds when we practice growing intimacy with strangers. Not only do we get more practice in all our human relationships, we learn not to take rejection so personally. There are times when we reach out to our beloveds who would rather not be intimate back in that moment. How can we learn to graciously allow our beloveds to have their own space without taking their rejections personally? Practicing intimacy with strangers without being attached to specific outcomes is wonderful training.
Andy was a workaholic. Working long hours and being exhausted when he came home meant he didn’t have the energy to relate to his beloveds.
So many of us choose things to do that keeps us away from love. We choose to use mood-altering substances to keep us out of our hearts. We choose to pursue other romantic relationships while we’re in committed relationships because it’s easier to start something new than it is to work on what we already have. We choose all sorts of distractions that ultimately keep us from finding the intimacy that heals us all.
Anne and Andy both came into their marriage with significant health issues. Anne’s brain was recovering from head injuries she’d received in a near-fatal car accident. Andy had had a heart attack when he was in his early thirties.
You may know of some leading wellness advocates who link intimacy with health. My friend and radio guest Dean Shrock, Ph.D., author of Why Love Heals, describes how many of his cancer patients told him they lived longer and experienced better quality of life when they felt his love and compassion for them. Dean Ornish, M.D., has been a leading contemporary advocate of bringing more intimacy into the lives of heart patients. He found his cardiac patients do better when they feel loved and supported.
I hope you will visit my website and read the inspiring story of how I feel devoting my life to loving my dog after her diagnosis of terminal cancer created natural healing miracles for us both: www.TransformingThroughLove.com
Where might Anne’s still-healing brain be today if her marriage had given her the intimacy she’d craved? Might Andy be alive today if he’d more fully opened his heart to his wife and daughter?
I can tell you story after story about how creating a loving safe space helped my Mom, my dog, and me function way above what might have been expected for others in similar situations. Love can indeed be that powerful.
The question about Anne and Andy will never be answered. Andy has moved on.
We, on the other hand, are still here.
How many lives might you transform, including your own, if you make the choice to celebrate and welcome intimacy?
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