Well Being Program 5: Loving Better

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Well being
is something that we all desire. But staying healthy
and feeling good can be quite a challenge, especially
with the stresses that pervade every aspect of our
lives today. Everyone is aware that regular
exercise and eating healthily are two essential
steps to well being.

In


this series, you'll learn about a third step, relaxation.
Not just sitting around but
some specific activities that trigger your body's
relaxation response.

You'll learn about the


importance of deep relaxation for reducing the harmful
effects of stress. Along with a series
of easy to do relaxation skills.

And through


our weekly questionnaire, you'll gain an
awareness of how stress maybe affecting you.

So get a


paper and pencil ready and join us as we take the
next step to well being.

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Deepak: Come


on over here and sit down on my lap.
Want some juice?

Child: Yeah.


Deepak: OK, let's put that here. Here is a bottle


of juice.

Our


well being hinges on our ability to communicate with
others, especially our family.
But how much is our capacity for communication
and emotional security strained by the stresses
of contemporary life?

In this program we'll see what part stress


plays in relationships. This week's questionnaire
will help you recognize if stress is affecting your
ability to feel as close to others as you'd like.

We'll


also discover what you can do to help deepen
those relationships.

Eli Bay,


Director of the Relaxation Response Institute in
Toronto is a pioneer in the teaching of relaxation
skills for stress management.

Eli: Building long lasting happy relationships is really one of the


major challenges of our time. Social changes have altered
the very definition of the family. Family that once
consisted of two parents, two or more children, perhaps a
grand-parent are no longer typical.

Over the last couple of decades the rise of the working


woman as really re-shaped and re-defined
the family. These are profound social shift that
have happened and as we've seen, change is one of the
major triggers of the body stress reaction.

When


we are under stress, we become emotional aroused.
Emotional states tie us to our own personal positions
and we are much less able to understand an other's
point of view. We become more defensive, less able to think
clearly.

Stress makes us say, think and do things that intensifies


conflict. Now in contrast,
relaxation helps to bring about a state of emotional
balance.

Now of course it's not the only resource that we


can draw upon, but related from a balanced perspective can
significantly reduce both conflicts and concerns.

Dr. Posen: Stress is actually one of the


biggest disruptors of family relationships
that I'm aware of for the simple
reason that when people are experiencing
stress, they are very often hard to get along with. They are
irritable, they are impatient, they get short-tempered.
Sometimes they can quiet and withdraw.
Sometimes they start yelling and blaming people
for things. Sometimes
they are so aware of their stress and want to
talk about it, that they end up pushing people
away by talking about how upset they
are.

But certainly the way


the behaviours that people get into when
people are experiencing distress, very often antagonize other people
or push them away and
get in the way of communication. People
start to feel insulted or
uncomfortable and
then other things grow from that.

Alex: In my practice, I see a lot of


families. I see many married couples. People consult
me for a variety of marriage and family and sexual
difficulties. One of the most common symptoms
of stress in families is irritability and
fighting and
conflict.

But they have little to do with actual content --


people fight and they know in their heart of hearts that it is a
minor issue that they've fought over.
They can know that it is repetitive.
They can know, "Why am I doing this?"

You know that experience


that you are heading into a fight and you know that it is
going to get worse and you don't know why in the world that you are doing it.

Often times those have nothing to do


with the nature of the actual relationship that you are fighting
in, and only to do with coping with the stress that
is going on inside of you. And the solution to
that may not be to learn how to fight
better, or to learn how to communicate better. The solution
to that may be learning how to relax better.

Sheila: There are a lot of things that I would get angry


at my husband for. And it wasn't even him who was the cause, it was just me. I was
the one who was stressed and I needed to find a cause.

And


so I would blame him. I would yell at
my children a lot. They did nothing
wrong. It's just that they happened to be the
victim of my stress.

Alex: The more


I know about myself, the more I can intentionally
direct my own efforts towards my own well
being in the management of my stress levels, and indeed
of relaxation.

Deepak: Eli, we've seen that


stress is a problem in relationships. What can we
do about that?

Eli: First of all I think it's important to acknowledge that you


can only take responsibility for your own part in any relationship.
And it's also important to appreciate that we all have certain
behaviour patterns that we've developed from our
families, that we've learned from our parents and our immediate family, that may not necessarily
work for us, in fact might work very much against us.

That's why I think you see such high


divorce rates. Researchers believe that something
like 85% of all families are
dysfunctional, they don't work well. And we
learn these dysfunctional patterns that we carry through our lives with.

One some of these patterns I think become obvious as we go through the


next questionnaire that looks at wellness and
relationships.

Deepak: So it's time for paper and pencil?


Eli: Yes. But don't worry if you don't have a paper and pencil handy. Just


examine each point as it comes up and think about it in terms of your
own relationships.

To do this test,


choose a close relationship, perhaps a
family member, and use that person throughout the whole
test.

To score each question,


you rate it on a scale of 1 - 4.
1 is for false, 4 if its true. And 2 and 3 for those things that
occur in between.

As an example, let's look at the


first question. Your relationship
helps you to feel good about yourself, true
or false? If this is a true statement,
give yourself a 4. If its false, give yourself a 1.
And if it isn't all true, give it a 3.
And if it isn't all false, give it a 2.

So just take a moment, think about it, mark


yourself on that -- true or false?

Next


question, you feel you are a person of worth, on an
equal plane with the person in this relationship.
You feel good about yourself, you feel that there is
a quality in the relationship -- true or false?

You don't feel in


competition with this person. Again, look at your
relationship. Is your relationship a competitive one or is there
equality and balance in this.

These last few


questions deal with self esteem -- how you feel about
yourself. All the research indicates that when you feel good
about yourself, your relationships tend to
improve and it enhances overall well being.

The


next group of questions. The one you care about
really cares about you. True or
false?

Think about your relationship


and rate it on a scale of 1 - 4.

You feel your love is


appreciated and returned.

You are never jealous over the other's outside activities.


These three


questions deal with overall level of
trust. And it's obvious that the higher your trust levels, the more
secure you are going to feel in your relationship and the lower your stress levels.

Next group of


questions -- you don't feel the person in this relationship tries to
control your life. Think
about it.

You rarely


feel a sense of powerlessness in your relationship.

You can rely on this relationship


for support in times of crisis. True or false.

These three questions sort of


give an overview of the amount of support that you
receive in your relationship. And as an aside
to that, in a study that was done a few years ago,
they fed hundreds of rabbits a very high
Cholesterol producing diet. And
after the study period where the
animals were to have eaten this horrible
diet, they were to be autopsied and they were
analyzed to see how much plaque and build-up in the
arteries.

And all of the rabbits complied with their


hypothesis, they had all had very high plaque build-up except for one
group of rabbits. And they had almost no Cholesterol
build-up even though they ate the same diet.

And when they analyzed to see what was the difference


between these rabbits, they found that the only difference was that
these rabbits were fed by a different graduate
student from the other rabbits in the study. And the difference
was with this graduate student, that instead
of just putting food in their cages, she
would take out each
rabbit one by one, stroke them, talk
nicely to them, and then put the rabbit back in the cage and
feed it.

These rabbits, the ones that were stroked,


did not develop high Cholesterol. Of course the
researchers were astounded at first and they thought there was
obviously some mistake, so they tried it again. And they got exactly the
same results. And they still didn't accept that something like just being
stroked in that way could affect something physical
like Cholesterol.

They tried it a third time, and it was


actually replicated. And it's very much similar
to a study that was
done, one in Israel that I'm aware of, where they
found that men who felt that their wives did not
support them had much higher coronary heart
disease rates than the men who did feel that they had their wife's
support.

So it's really interesting to see


how much support you get could actually get a significant
effect on your overall well being.

The


next group of questions. You enjoy being with the
person you have this relationship with, 1 - 4.

You can depend on this


person.

You


offer praise and support more often than
criticism -- true or
false.

And these questions really deal with how


positive is your experience of your relationship?
Is it an energizing experience for you, or do you
feel drained by your relationship. Is it
life affirming or is it deadening?

Deepak: Eli, I


have a question with this group. I enjoy
being with the person I'm thinking of most of the time,
but there are times that I'd rather be elsewhere.

Eli: Well no


relationship is 100%. And also just when you are scoring
this, just appreciate that each time you do it, you are probably
going to get a different score. If you did it right
after an argument, you get one score. If you
did it right after a very positive intimate moment,
you get another score. So just appreciate that this is just a
spot light on your relationship right now.

Next group of


questions. You have no difficulty revealing your intimate
thoughts and feelings to the person in this relationship.
Is this true or false?

You are your intimate partner are


sexually compatible. If this is not
applicable, score zero.

You


engage in outside interests together, 1 - 4.

In one of Woody Allen's films,


Woody and his partner Diane Keaton, go to a therapist
who asks them how often they have sexual relations.
And Woody responds by saying hardly ever. And Diane Keaton,
his partner, responds by saying all the time.

Now this is a classic example of intimate feelings that


just aren't shared. And really how close are
you to your partner? Are you able to share your
intimate feelings? It seems that the ability to share
intimate feelings is really quite crucial to success
in relationships. And many of us are
locked into patterns of withholding feelings,
with resisting, of blocking intimacy.

So just


think about your relationship. And
we are looking here at subtle issues here as well.
If you gave yourself a 4, ask yourself,
is there really no room for improvement here?

Next group of questions. You and the other person


in this relationship are able to communicate effectively -- true
or false?

You and the


other person are able to apologize when you have
hurt each other. Take a
moment, think about it.

You and the other person


are able to forgive when there have been hurtful
communications.

And these questions of


course deal with communications. And effective communications
are really the foundation for successful relationships.
Many of us aren't even aware when we are communicating
well. We are often locked into
old patterns, old dysfunctional behaviour
patterns that are just so much a part of the landscape that we don't
even realize it. We often may for example speak at the
other person rather than speaking to the other person.

It's


sometimes helpful to ask the other person to
rate you on these particular questions. Because you may
be quite surprised to find that they disagree
with your own evaluation of how well you communicate.

And of


course, forgiveness is really a key in
relationships -- the ability
to let go of the past, to be
in the present. And of course, that's where communication
happens.

The next group of questions.


Your relationship is able to deal constructively with
conflicts so that both people feel satisfied.

You and other


person seldom become impatient or
lose your tempers.

You never feel like


hitting the one you are
in a relationship with.

Now these questions deal with


conflict and conflict resolution. And of course every relationship
has conflict, it can't be avoided. What can be avoided
though is the non-resolution of the conflict. What happens when
people don't resolve their conflicts
is that at least one of the partners, and maybe
both, tend to have a frustration that builds and
builds and builds, sometimes manifesting in
violent words and sometimes even violent action which of course
is not a helpful way to deal with the problem. It's not constructive and may even
cause more problems.

The next


group of questions. You are willing to make reasonable
compromises to maintain your relationship.
Think about that, rate it on a scale
of 1 - 4.

You are confident


that you can do something about problems that may arise --
true or false.

If


there were problems in your relationship, you'd be willing to
seek professional help -- true or false.

And these last group of questions


really relate to your willingness and commitment
to making your relationship work. If you aren't optimistic, if you
aren't prepared to make reasonable compromises. If you aren't
confident that you can do something, or you aren't willing to do
something about your relationship, then that's obviously going to
raise some very important issues for you.

Deepak: I got a lot of high scores on this test, plenty of 4's, but a


few 2's and 1's as well.

Eli: You have to appreciate that this is a


subjective assessment of the overall well being of your
relationship.

The higher you


score, the happier you are likely to be in your relationship.
And obviously the more you travel away from the
ideal, the more frustration, the more
anxiety, the more stress that you are going to feel in your
relationship.

But it's really important to be aware that we are getting


stress coming at us from many sources in our culture.
What we are doing in this program is spot lighting one particular
aspect of stress. But it's just one. And it's important
to appreciate that the
cumulative effect of stress tends to have
really negative effects on our overall well being. And with
regard to this particular program, it has a very powerful
negative effect on our relationships.

Deepak: So what can we do about this?

Eli: I think first of all we have to


become aware of the specific areas where our relationships are not
working well. And it's also important to be able to
break out of the old patterns, the old
cycles, the old dysfunctional
systems that we have incorporated into our
lives.

And certainly one of the most effective ways to break out of the


old patterns and to build up our own
self concept and our own self esteem, which is fundamental
to make any relationship work, it's important to
break out of the stress. And the way that we can do that is by
focusing on turning on the body's relaxation
response, which is the body's anti-stress mechanism.

Deepak: What exercises can we do that will help our


relationship?

Eli: Well there are many kinds of exercises.


One of them that I'd like to share right now involves getting in touch
with the feeling of being relaxed.

Back in the 1920s in


Europe, Dr. Johan Shultz became aware
that when people were relaxed, they tended
to feel heavy and they tended to feel warm.

So Dr. Shultz developed an exercise


that he calls autogenic relaxation, that
by suggesting to yourself that you are going to
feel heavy and that you are going to
feel warm, that you can actually induce a state of relaxation
in your own body, mind and emotions.

Would


you like to try?

Deepak: I would love to.

Eli: OK. Get


comfortable. Sit up straight and cross your legs and arms.
Relax your shoulders. Get comfortable in the chair and close your eyes.

And for those of you at home, you'll get much


more out of this program by actually doing the exercise with us
rather than by just watching. So follow along with us.

So just close your eyes and just


put your concentration into your right hand.
And just imagine your
right hand is becoming heavy,
and just by thinking, let all the muscles relax
and just enjoy a feeling of happiness.
Imagine if you will
that your right hand is a balloon filled with wet
sand or water. And
just by being aware and focusing in this way
on your hand, just be aware of a feeling of
warmth -- a gentle warmth
in your hand which is actually as a result of increased
blood circulation.

So just let your right hand


become heavy and warm. And let that
heavy, loose, warm sensation move all the way up your
arm so that your whole
right arm is loose and heavy and warm.

And just repeat to yourself silently,


"My right arm is heavy
and warm." And repeat that several
times, "Heavy and warm, heavy and warm."

And


just allow your right arm to become ever more heavy, ever
more warm. All the muscles relaxing.

And just imagine that feeling


of warmth.
Sense it.
And just let that loose, heavy,
warm sensation out. Be generalized to your whole body.
Just imagine your whole
body is just feeling pleasantly heavy, very warm.
Put your concentration now onto your forehead.
And just let all the muscles
in your forehead relax and just imagine a
feeling of warmth as if perhaps the
sun were shining on your forehead. Let all the
muscles loosen. And just imagine a
sensation of warmth, a pleasant penetrating warmth in your
forehead that just seems to raise the
temperature -- imagine. Don't try to make it warm, imagine
it warm. Imagine the warmth. Imagine the warmth
as it moves down into your eye lids. That all of the
muscles in your eye lids
relax. That your eye lids become warm as if the sun was shining
on them. Let them become
comfortably heavy as if there were weights attached.

So it's a loose, heavy feeling.


Good, let that loose, heavy feeling move down into your
cheeks and into your jaw. Let
all of the muscles relax. Let your lips just part
slightly. And just be aware
that by focusing on your cheeks and jaw in this
way, the muscles relax and you can just feel
a very pleasant warm sensation in your
mouth, in your jaw, in your laps and
your tongue, as if the sun were shining.

So your facial muscles are


loose and heavy and warm. And
let that loose, heavy, warm sensation move down
to your throat. Imagine if you will that the sun is
shining on your throat. All the muscles relax.

And just allow that


loose, heavy, warm sensation to move down your
neck and into your shoulders. Imagine a penetrating,
comfortable, warm sensation on your neck and
shoulders as if the sun were shining on your neck and shoulders.

Just recall from your memory banks


what it feels like to have the sun shining on your
shoulders. And let that loose, heavy warm
feeling move down your upper arms,
where all the muscles in your upper arms relax. And let
all the muscles in your forearms loosen.
Both right arm and left arm equally heavy, equally
warm.

And


you feel that warmth and heaviness extend all the way down
to the tips of your fingers.

And allow the


sun's warmth to move to your chest. Now to move to your
chest. Let the sun's light and warmth be felt on your chest.
A penetrating warmth. All the muscles relax in your
chest. You can feel a very pleasant
warmth building.
Let that warm sensation move down into your
solar plexus,
and down into your stomach. Let all the muscles
relax, loosen,
unwind.

And imagine if you will the sun


shining on your torso, on your
chest, on your solar plexus, on your stomach. So you feel a
very pleasant warmth.

Imagine that


warmth now, you can feel it along the back of your
neck and down your back and into your
upper back. That all the muscles in your neck and upper back
loosen. Imagine a feeling of
warmth in your upper back. And let that
warm loose feeling move down your
back right into your lower back muscles.

Imagine if you


will that there was the sun shining on your lower
back. That you feel a penetrating warmth.

And let that sensation move down into your buttocks.


Let all the muscles in your buttocks relax,
and your thighs and calves and feet.
Let the muscles loosen.

And imagine a feeling of


warmth as if the sun were
shining on your body, on your lower
body. A penetrating comfortable
warmth. And just by thinking about these body
parts, you can feel an enhanced sensation of
warmth. So that your whole body now
is just feeling loose. All the muscles are relaxed.
You feel a heaviness as if your
body were filled with
sand. As if you were just a balloon filled with sand or water.

So this heavy


feeling. And just repeat to yourself silently,
my entire body is loose, heavy and
warm. My entire body is
loose, heavy and warm.

And repeat that several


times. And just keep repeating it. And as you repeat
it, imagine a feeling of being loose, a feeling of being
heavy, a feeling of being warm.

Now take a deep breathe,


hold it and then let it
go. And
very, very slowly, little bit by
little bit, just slowly open your eyes.

Deepak: This


is a super exercise.
My wife and I had to do this before discussing the results of that test.

Eli: Yes.


And you should also take time out of your busy
day and put yourself into deep states
of relaxation for 20 - 25 minutes, so that you
really have a chance to rest, recuperate, restore and
replenish yourself.

And when you


come out of a relaxed position, out of a relaxed
healing state, you'll find that it
can't help but enhance your relationships and just about
every aspect of your life. And again, I encourage
you to approach it as an experiment to be tested.

And


what is real is what you experience.

Deepak: I can't imagine arguing


with anyone feeling like this.

Eli: Well you see,


our reactive tendencies tend to be reduced.
Normally we tend to react rather than respond.
And with techniques like this, we can
step out of our own defensive postures and be
more open and receptive. We can even listen and
relate better.

You might be surprised to find that as you become more centered and


balanced, that other people will react differently to
you. And relaxation is extremely effective
in helping us to break down unproductive, even
unhealthy emotional and mental patterns that tend to block communication.

And the other issues that


we've explored in this program that we've seen are so important for
well being and relationships.

Deepak: Thanks


very much Eli.

Eli: A pleasure.


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Program Length: 26:50 min

About the Program:
Program 5 Loving Better, focuses on the importance of relaxation for caring and effective communication in all relationships, and especially between intimate partners and family members.