Love - What Is Your Love Story?

Everyone has a 'love story', right?

What I mean by that is that everyone has a set of beliefs about themselves and their relationship to everything else (love, money, luck, life, etc). Some stories look like this:

I cannot earn a lot of money right now because the economy is bad and because my former manager embezzled money from me so I can't trust anyone to work for me and......

But the real story that this person has deep within is:

I am not successful; I will never have what others have; I cannot count on anyone to be loyal to me....

These are her (or his) deeply held and sometimes even unconscious beliefs about her/himself. These beliefs, or this STORY will define how you show up in life! That's why it is so important to know your Love Story.

Your Love Story is the set of deeply held beliefs you hold about yourself in relation to love. These stories are usually formed very early in our lives, before we have the ability to understand the meaning we are giving to those experiences. As a result, they are often unconscious and we may not even know we have them! For example, one client, I'll call her Monica, struggles with intense fears of abandonment and will act in ways that push men away in her relationships. Monica was not really consciously aware of what her Love Story was or how it was formed until we worked together to transform her story.

By doing some guided visualization exercises, Monica was able to connect patterns in her relationships with some early life experiences that created her story that "people who I depend on for love always leave". Once she could identify her story, she was able to shift those old beliefs by using the strengths she had as a adult to 'rewrite' this story and come up with a new one. Her new story became, "I can't control what other people do, but I can make good choices to include loving, giving, healthy people in my life". Once she was able to change the old Love Story and create a new, more powerful one, Monica began to show up differently in her life. And guess what? She got different results!

Here are some other examples of Love Stories:

I am not safe so I have to build walls to keep away danger

I am not wanted or desired so I don't value myself enough

My needs are not important so I focus on taking care of your needs (and mine get neglected and then I become resentful)

Do you recognize any of these stories?

If not, what is yours?