No man is an island, entire of itself.
Out of the overwhelming love and joy of the Trinity, humans were created from connection, for connection. This drive was gifted to us with the intent of joy and wonder. It is also an area of life that can be fraught with frustration and deep hurt. How can something with such a wonderful intent cause so much wreckage? Well. Human nature seems to be the actual answer to that. But if we intend to pursue a healthy life on all fronts, one thing is true: the quality of our relationships determines the quality of our lives (Perel).
John Donne’s famous quote highlights the interconnectedness of all humanity and how misguided it is to consider your life and choices as isolated from the broader context of the whole. This idea is central to a model of therapy known as Reconciliation Focused Counseling, which posits that our individual well-being rests on three primary relational domains: our relationship with God, our relationship with ourselves, and our relationship with others. The higher the degree of connection in these three types of relationships, the healthier a life an individual will enjoy.
I want to show you what connection in each of these relationship areas looks like and provide a way to assess your own degree of connection in each area. Let’s look at what a strong connection looks like in each type of relationship.
Connection to God:
When assessing the strength of our connection to God, we can start with things we easily observe. How much time do you spend in prayer with God? Do you attend church and read the bible? Do you give to KLOVE? (Joke!)
But, connection with God also goes deeper than these easily observable traits. Do you feel like you have the right to talk to God? Are you angry or frustrated with Him over something? Do you feel like you have to earn the right to be heard by God or accepted by Him through your obedience? Do you sense disappointment from Him?
The list could go on, but the main idea here is: do you enjoy God and look to involve Him in your life? Resting in the love of God is the picture of a rich connection with God. Everybody has room for improvement in this area, but some of us have more trouble than others when it comes to resting in God’s love for us.
Symptoms of not connecting well with God will look a little different for everyone. A person could be under-connected or, believe it or not, over-connected to God. Have you ever met someone who, rather than sit with you in your difficult emotions or experience, slapped some Christian-sounding platitudes on the wound and implored you to move on? This is, in fact, an unhealthy connection with God because it does not leave space for our authentic and God-given emotional responses to life’s difficulties.
Being under-connected to God can sometimes look like not thinking about involving Him in your life, generally forgetting about Him for a while, not nurturing your connection to Him, or simply focusing more on your circumstances than on God’s presence in them. When “unstable connection” feels like more than just the alert on your Facetime call, it could be simply from busyness, hurt feelings, or maybe it feels like problems have been too heavy for too long, and you don’t believe that God cares anymore or has your best in mind.
Aside from relational friction with God, some people simply don’t connect with God at all and aren’t sure what the point would be to do so. To this end, I would say that all of the happiness research of recent years indicates that connecting with something bigger than yourself is imperative to health and happiness. It could be helpful to consider how incorporating God into your life could be a rich source of strength, balance, meaning, and love. Ask yourself, “How can I strengthen my relationship with God?”
Connection to Self:
A healthy relationship with oneself involves mental, emotional, and physical caregiving. Are you aware of your thoughts? Do you talk to yourself in a way that you’d talk to someone you love? Are you checking in with your body and seeing where you hold your stress and tension, providing an opportunity for it to be released? Do you know how you feel about the things that are going on in your life? Do you set healthy boundaries for yourself to get your batteries recharged in a way that suits you? When was the last time you took a nap? When was the last time you went on a shame spiral for a mistake?
A healthy connection with the self requires awareness, flexibility, and self-acceptance. (And, of course, humor never hurts.) People who experience a strong connection with themselves will know what they are feeling and why they are feeling that way. They don’t stuff emotions down or ignore them. Instead, they check in with themselves and make room to honor their human responses. Essentially working with instead of against the grain of how they are wired. They give themselves permission to be human and enjoy the freedom that brings. In the Christian world, it is sometimes taught that connection to self is somehow less spiritual than focusing on others. The Apostle Paul said that we should,
Look not only to our own interests but also to the interests of others. Philippians 2:4
Not only…but also. It’s not okay to be only focused on yourself. It’s also not okay to focus only on others. Health is somewhere in the middle.
Like connection to God, you can be over or under connected with self. Under-connection with self looks like not checking in with yourself and being unaware of your thoughts and feelings. It can also look like symptoms of depression and generally not taking care of yourself enough in a physical, social or spiritual sense. The motto for under connection with self might sound like, “Just keep your head down and trudge through life.”
On the other hand, over-connection with self often looks like anxiety for some or self-centeredness for others. Constant “what ifs,” catastrophizing, emphasizing your shortcomings and other people’s strengths…all of these are manifestations of over-connection with self. When we routinely consider ourselves first and never what’s best for others, this is also too much connection with self. As in most things, health is somewhere in the middle.
Connection to Others:
Strong relationships with others are marked by deep, meaningful connections with trusted individuals. This means having a few people that you can count on, who know you well, and who you make an effort to support in their lives as well. You feel both known and loved, and you feel like you know and love a few others as well. The importance isn’t placed on the number of people whom you know and who know you but on the quality of connection.
Too many of us go through life without letting anyone know what’s really going on with us: the good, the bad, and the ugly. And what a shame because friendship is one of God’s greatest blessings! Learning how to cultivate genuine and reciprocal relationships is a skill, and like all skills-based things, it can be learned with a trusted guide (like your favorite therapist).
Symptoms of not connecting well with others can again fall into the categories of under- or over-connection. If you’re under-connected with others, you have very limited social support that probably involves surface-level communication with those whom you come into contact with regularly. You may have conversations with people in your life, but you don’t feel like anyone really knows what goes on internally for you.
Over-connection with others is also problematic because you can make an idol out of a relationship(s) in your life. Another name for this is codependency. The lines are blurred between where you stop and where another begins. You may feel taken advantage of or like you don’t really understand how boundaries and relationships really work.
Conclusions
So, how does this apply to you? Maybe as you read, you already sensed some feedback regarding which type of relationships are strengths for you. Also, which relationships need strengthening the most. Be responsible with that feedback and begin to make a plan to increase the quality of connection in that area of your life.
All of the above are within Jesus’s own words in Mark 12:30-31 and several other places throughout scripture.
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.
Love for God, love for neighbor, love for self.
Questions for Consideration:
- Do you have an area of under or over-connection in your life?
- Do you need some help removing roadblocks to a particular relationship?
- Does looking at your life through the three relational domains help bring any clarity?
Are you looking for ways to best strengthen one of the relationships discussed here? That’s what I love to do! Please feel free to contact me with questions like this or anything else.
