Love and Relationships

“I Can See Clearly Now”

/ Anne Dennish / Leave a comment

 

 

Every so often I take a look at all the people in my life; the ones I trust and that I’m closest to. I take a good look and ask myself if I’m my true self with them or the self they need me to be. I ask myself if they bring out the best in me or I simply bring out the best in them. And I ask myself, am I a matter of convenience to them when they need my attention and love or are they there for me as well?

Those questions have been in my mind lately and I believe sometimes we have to look at the big picture because we find at that moment that we’re not living the life we need for our Highest Good. We’re in control of our happiness and in order to be all that we want to be and have the life we want we also have to see who we allow in it, because they have an impact on it.

I have a close knit group of people in my life and I’m always cautious when someone I don’t know well comes into it, whether it’s through a social circle or worse yet, through social media. I don’t take every friend request that comes my way, especially when I don’t know them or I know could cause a problem with my relationship.

So yesterday my eyes were suddenly open and seeing things differently, and I wondered why. Yet I knew why: the Universe wanted me to see and so that I could think about it and decide what I would do with what I saw and felt.

Communication between two people is key; trust is earned and maintained; and love is felt by actions, not simply words.

So as I rode in silence I heard the following questions:

  • Am I as much of a priority to someone as they are to me?
  • Do I care for someone more than they care for me?
  • Does my life revolve around all the people in it rather than it being on me?
  • Do they focus on me as much as I focus on them?
  • Do I support them more than they support me?
  • Does every conversation revolve around “them” and end when it begins to revolve around “me?”
  • Do they accept my feelings about something even though they don’t understand why I feel that way?
  • If they do something that hurts me do they do it again or do they love and respect me enough not to do it again, even if it doesn’t make sense to them.
  • Are they starting to find faults in me rather than positive things?
  • Do they put as much effort into me as they do to social media?

So many things to think about and I knew in my heart that I had the answers. And let me say that these questions pertain to all of your relationships, whether it’s a friendship, your family, or a relationship between two people.

And I ask to ask myself: Do they look different in my eyes now?

Now what do I do? What do you do if you find yourself in this position?

You take a leap of faith in who you are; you need to believe that you deserve to be treated as you treat them; and you need to communicate your feelings to them with love, kindness and respect.

And if you do these things and the response is not what you had hoped, then you’ll know the answers to your questions were right.

And that you need to turn the page in your book of life and move onto the next chapter…

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

 

 

“Life And Your Water Bottle”

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water bottles

I was talking to a friend the other day about her life and all the changes she wants to make, when suddenly I found myself saying to her: life is like a water bottle, if it’s filled to the top with all the negative people and situations in your life then there’s no room to fill it with the water of the positive.

She loved the analogy and I thought about it further. It’s always a good thing to be able to visualize things in a way that you can see it and understand, and my “water bottle” analogy is just that.

Imagine that we’re given one water bottle in our life, and that bottle represents our life. It’s filled with water, which is all the people and situations in our life. At the time those things may be purposeful in our life and best for our Highest Good, yet as time and life marches on, it changes. Suddenly you’re left wanting more, wanting something different or wanting to let go of certain people and situations.

But you can’t seem to do it, and that is the human nature of being afraid of change or of the unknown. We know what we need to leave behind yet we wonder what will happen if we let go. Will our life be worse or will it be better? Should we leave someone not knowing if someone better is waiting for us?

It’s a leap of faith in your Higher Power and in yourself.

I explained to her that at this time in her life her water bottle is filled with negativity, both with her job and personal life. I told her that unless she started emptying that water bottle of the negative she wouldn’t be able to fill it with anything new or more positive. She couldn’t replace the negative water until she poured it out and replaced it with the positive.

After all, you can’t put more water into a full bottle until you dump some water out.

And that is my analogy on letting go and moving forward.

Sometimes you have to visualize your life in a way that you can actually picture it, and the water bottle is simply one way to look at it.

Is your water bottle filled with all that is for your Highest Good or do you need to dump some of the water out so that the “good” water can be poured in?

It’s the same no matter how you look at it. When you keep the wrong people in your life or are in a situation that is not good for you then there’s no room for what’s in your best interest to come in.

I’ve been taught by my spiritual teachers throughout the years that you have to let go of that which no longer serves your Highest Good in order for something better to come in. Holding on to negativity in any way, shape or form will prevent anything better and more positive to come in.

Dump out your water bottle if your life isn’t the way you want it and fill it with all the good that the Universe has just waiting for you.

After all, I believe that once we rid ourselves of negativity, whether it’s people or situations, the world opens up with more positivity than we can imagine.

I know this for sure…

And it’s a good thing…

I promise.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

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“What Do Men And Women Want From Each Other?”

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My love and I were talking yesterday and came to one conclusion: men have a simple way of looking at things and handling them, while women? Well, not so much! So I decided to write an article about it which will also be a part of a book I’m writing.

This is where I need your help. I need to know what you want from the man/woman in your relationship or if you’re single, what is it you’re looking for in a partner. It’s similar to “what a girl wants and what a man needs.”

I look forward to seeing all your responses! Thanks for your help! Who knows, your responses could help another couple better understand one another!

(Please know that I am not excluding same sex couples; my intent was more on the differences between men and women in a relationship.)

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

men and women

“Turning Off The World”

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turn off the world

It’s been a rough week for me, one filled with a mix of emotions, disappointments, hurt and feeling mentally and physically exhausted, yet I was able to get through the last week knowing that on Saturday morning my love and I were finally getting away for the night…a much needed 24 hours away, just us two. I’ve been wanting to do this for two months and we were there, at last.

It’s so important to reconnect with the one you love every so often, or as often as you can. Life is always happening, work calls, responsibilities, career changes and the list goes on. It keeps us busy and we lose focus on what’s important: each other and the care of the relationship.

And that’s what was happening to us.

So I had suggested a night away. It took two months to do it, but I booked a beautiful hotel with all the amenities we could want, which meant that we could check in and never have to leave until we checked out the next day.

My only request was that we turned off the phones, no texting, no messages, no emails, no television and definitely NO Facebook. In other words, I wanted to turn the world off.

And he agreed.

And we did it.

And it was a beautiful 24 hours of no distractions of any kind and our full attention was on each other. It worked out so well that when we got home the next day I suggested that we keep it going until Monday morning, the day that I knew the real world had to come back into our life.

I realized an important thing in that 24 four hour period: that we all need to turn off and shut out the real world at times, and sometimes that time is as often as possible.

During those hours we had to focus on each other, because that’s all we had in that hotel room, and in the grand scheme of relationships, isn’t that all we have in the end…”each other?” Isn’t the relationship between two people important enough that we should never lose sight of? Shouldn’t the relationship be tended to as we do our garden…we care for it, feed it what it needs, and cut out the weeds?

Relationships need to be tended to and cared for just like a garden. When they feel fragile they need to be solidified. When they seem weak they need to be strengthened. And when they feel lost both people need to find each other…together.

It’s really a pretty simple concept, yet in the busy world, often times overlooked.

And I’m not that girl. I pay attention to the smallest and largest of detail and I’m protective of our relationship.

So these 24 hours were not just desperately needed, but absolutely necessary.

We had dinner together, sat for hours on the balcony under the moon and the stars sipping Sangria and just being alone together with no distractions of the outside world or anyone in it. There were no long conversations, a rare thing for me, but in my mind I wanted to leave my troubles behind and just “be” on this balcony with him.

I realized that it was the first time in more months than I could count that we were truly alone with no distractions, and as the hours passed we seemed to find each other again, over and over.

And it was comforting.

So here I am on Monday morning opening my life up back to the world. It already feels in the enddifferent yet I know this to be true: you can run but you can’t hide, and this is “life.”

The lesson I learned in this is that the real world always exists, but it’s important to turn it off as often as you can and forget about the distractions.

In the end there is nothing more important than the love you share together as a couple and never allowing the outside world to distract you from what’s truly important and what truly matters: each other. After all, “love is what lifts you up when life tries to bring you down.”

I can promise you that it’s worth it in the end; after all, it’s not the distractions that are important, it’s the relationship between you and the one you love.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

 

“Write Your Life”

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“Life is always changing, it’s time to turn the page; so the story continues and it’s mine to create. It’s all an adventure, my life is a song; I know where I’ve been, not where I’m going but I’m dancing along.”  ~Anne Dennish~

My life has been a series of ups and downs, adventures and restlessness, good times and bad, yet through it all I’ve accepted that it was meant to be that way. All those moments happened to teach me a lesson. They happened because I wasn’t living my life as I should and there’s times that the Universe steps in and whacks us with a two by four to “wake us up.” It stops us dead in our tracks to feel the pain and understand why it hurts. After all, we feel what we allow.

And when pain and heartache happen it’s because we allowed the behaviors that led up to that moment happen. We allowed someone to cross our boundaries and treat us in a way we shouldn’t be treated.

We lost sight of ourselves and in the process of caring for everyone else we forgot to care for ourself. We forgot to love ourself first, to respect ourself, to take care of ourself, and when other’s see that we’ve forgotten that, they cross our boundaries.

We have to draw a line in the sand that shouldn’t be crossed, yet maybe we should be drawing a line in the cement.

Broken hearts and pain don’t happen overnight. Sure, we feel blindsided when it happens yet when it does you begin to look at the behaviors that led up to it and suddenly you’re not so surprised or shocked that someone hurt you. You let them disrespect you long before they hurt you; you let them love you less than you loved yourself because their ego was larger than their heart; and you began to blame yourself and made excuses for them.

Losing sight of yourself and seeing only them strengthens their ego and robs you of your self-esteem.

But there’s hope in the heartache and purpose in the pain.

The hope is that the broken heart will mend stronger and the purpose in the pain is to teach you a lesson about yourself. It’s to bring the focus back onto “you.”

Life is always changing and the change is up to you. Your life is your story and you are the author. You create what you want.

Write your story well and if you need to make some edits along the way be sure they’re for your Highest Good.

It’s your story…

It’s your life…

Make it spectacular!

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

“Can You Follow Your Heart?”

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It’s safe to stay in your comfort zone and take the road you know, yet I find that the road less traveled to be more exciting and filled with adventure and endless possibilities! The choice is always yours!

Follow you heart…it will lead you to amazing places!

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

road known

Photo by Anne Dennish – copyright 2017

“The Wrong And The Right”

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“The wrong person wants something FROM you;
the right person wants everything FOR you.”

~Anne Dennish~

It doesn’t matter if it’s a budding romance, a committed relationship, a marriage or a friendship, being with the “right” person is key to its’ success and happiness.

We all have a choice of who we surround ourselves with, so please, my friends, choose wisely. Don’t allow the “wrong” people to drain you of your energy and self-esteem. Surround yourself with the light of the “right” person; the one who see’s you and all that you are and all that you can be; the one who supports your dreams and ideas; the one who wants only the best for you.

Choose the people who want all the best for you.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

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“Relationships Are Like The Ocean”

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the sea

Every relationship we’re in is like the ocean; some days rough, some days angry, some days gentle and smooth. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a friendship, marriage, life partner or even a job. What matters is that we have to understand that these relationships are similar to the waves in the ocean, and we must choose to weather the storm or jump ship.

My love always says that every wave carries a story, and I believe every relationship does as well. We are ALL a story that’s always changing, just like the ocean. Yet as humans, when the seas get rough we’re ready to get out of the water and back onto the safety of the shore. And why is this? Why do we feel the need to leave a relationship when it gets rough?

Yes, there are some relationships that aren’t meant to last, and when we learn the lesson from it it’s best to wish it love and light and then drop it. And no, that doesn’t mean we jumped ship, it means we’ve moved onto another part of the ocean.

Then there are the relationships worth weathering the storm; the ones’ with a sharedstorm history or a love like we’ve never known before. These are the ones that you have to grab a life preserver and hang on until the sea get’s calm. With each “angry” wave there’s a lesson and a story, and when we understand it and learn from it, the “gentle” waves begin, and the relationship strengthens.

And that’s why I believe that our relationships in life are like the ocean: always changing, always different, yet always constantly in motion.

Yes, I’m a true Jersey girl, and the ocean has always been my place of peace and serenity. Every wave I sit and watch carries a story and message I need to hear, and I can tell you it has never disappointed me yet.

Close your eyes and listen to the voice of the sea; hear the stories and messages it needs to tell you. And when you open your eyes, the world will look and feel different, because YOU do.

Life isn’t meant to be “smooth sailing” all the time; it’s those rough seas that allow us to see who we truly are and just how strong we are, and when you can do that, you’ll know which relationships are worth “weathering the storm.”

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

“A Broken Heart”

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“A broken heart is proof that it still works.” ~Anne Dennish~

Ah, the broken heart…we’ve all had one at one time or another in our life, and it’s never easy to get through.

But you can get through…if you choose to.

Life is what happens when we’re not paying attention, and what that means is that we’ve recite-1rs96tblost sight of the blessings in our life, and in some way, taken them for granted, always believing that if they’re there in the first place, they’ll never be taken away. And that’s how a broken heart happens: we weren’t paying attention.

Broken hearts are our greatest teachers, yet there’s a few things you have to understand to realize that.

Let’s be honest, broken hearts happen because of “love.” They happen when something suddenly rocks our world, and what we believed to be true suddenly looks very different….but maybe it isn’t different. Maybe it’s the same as it always was; we just didn’t take the time to see it.

We’re all human and we all make mistakes, but if you want to start to heal a broken heart you must throw away the “list of wrongs” and write the “list of rights.” Sure, when you’re heart is broken you feel betrayed, angry, hurt, even confrontational; all valid feelings yet negative emotions only bring negative reactions. So, when the the dust settles from these emotions, and you can put them aside, the real healing begins.

“Forgiving” is the hardest thing in the world to do; “loving” is the easiest. Yet, by forgiving, we release our anger and negativity; it doesn’t excuse someone’s behavior, but it allows us to move forward with clear eyes and an open heart.

My worst broken heart was my greatest teacher; I could sit here and go on and on that he treated me badly, hurt my feelings, disrespected me, and so on and so forth. And I used to wonder why someone could treat me badly, or break my heart; I didn’t feel like I deserved it. But here’s the truth:

I didn’t deserve it; I allowed it.

Hearts are broken from miscommunication, biting our tongue and not standing in our truth. I learned that the hard way; I should have used my voice, stood in my truth, and set clear boundaries of what I would allow and what I wouldn’t.

I know to do that now.

Time-to-change-myBroken hearts happen for many reasons, yet when you can put the hurt and blame aside, that’s when the reality comes in and the healing can start. When you take your own accountability in the brokenness, you heal, you become stronger, and you learn something about yourself…and with that, you’re given the gift of changing yourself.

I can promise you that your broken heart will mend; and it will mend stronger…but you have to do the work and LET IT!

“Broken hearts are the reality of what we lost sight of.” ~Anne Dennish~

Life as we know it can change with a broken heart, but why not let it change for the better? Look at the positive in a hurtful situation; something wasn’t working, the Universe whacked you with a 2×4 to wake you up, and now you’ve been given a chance to learn and change.

I believe that there’s always something good to be found in the storm; it will take time to see, but it’s there. The choice to see it is up to you. And sometimes, just sometimes, maybe it’s the “storm before the calm.”

Life’s an adventure with ups and downs; how you handle it and move forward is your gift of choice…choose wisely!

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

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“It’s A Guy/Girl Thing”

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As my love and I were having our morning coffee together, we began to discuss our “miscommunication” from the night before. It’s funny how two people can be in the same situation, yet both can see it so differently. I guess that’s the difference between men and women: men see it one way, and women see it another.

That’s not to say it happens all the time, because I truly believe that when you’re in balance and in the right relationship, it happens very little. Yet I do believe that when it happens it does so to teach us something about ourselves and each other.

It also teaches us about our relationship.

I tossed and turned all night, thinking about what had transpired. It was such a small and inconsequential thing, yet couple that with being tired, working long hours and too much on your mind, well, you’ve got a recipe for disaster… or at least a minor miscommunication.

Women and men think differently, process things differently and react differently. Yet what I’ve learned over the years is this: If women can learn to accept the differences of a man, and a man can learn compassion for a woman’s differences, then all is right with the relationship. Truth be told, we should all have respect for each others’ differences, whether you’re a man or a woman.

How many times have you said: “It’s a guy thing, or it’s a girl thing?” I’m sure you’ve found yourself thinking it or saying it on several occasions. And you would be right because men and women are different, and that’s a fact.

So what do you do with these differences? You embrace them with love, try and understand them if you can, and be grateful for the lessons you learn from them. It’s these very lessons that teach you more about yourself, and about your relationship.

My love and I don’t always agree on everything, yet the love we share and the life we’re building together are much stronger than the little things that come up every so often. Our similarities far outweigh our differences and once we talk about our differences, there’s always laughter to follow… and our love for one another grows stronger.

Wishing you love and light,

~Anne Dennish~

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