Four Ways Your Relationship is Mirroring You back to You

Relationships are relentless in mirroring back to us all that we need to be aware of, heal and transform. The common trap is to make the other person wrong and believe they need to change in some way for the relationship to improve. Truly transformational growth comes when we accept that they are a mirror to us and Life is inviting us to look at all those aspects of ourselves that are being reflected back.

Here are four levels through which this mirroring works:

1. It reflects back what we are giving out, which is an expression of who we are in the moment. If you are holding anger somewhere then it will be mirrored back by your partner. If you are holding love that will be mirrored back. Communication is the response you get, so what are you giving out that is bringing back that response?

Remember that up to 90% of communication is unconscious and non-verbal so you may not be consciously aware of what you are radiating, but the reflection back will be an accurate guide. Look at the nature of what is reflected back, and then ask yourself where that same quality may be hiding within you.

2. It mirrors what you judge and have an emotional charge about. For example, if you have an emotionally charged judgement about selfishness you will get that perfectly mirrored back to you. If you judge people who are over indulgent you will find your partner reflecting that back in some way. They may need to take responsibility for their behaviour but your opportunity is to see your judgement and move beyond it into understanding and acceptance. That includes accepting yourself for having that same quality, while you honestly explore how to integrate and purify it into a redeemed wholeness.

3. Fear will be repeatedly mirrored back to you. We draw to us the very things we fear, so your unresolved fears in the relationship they will get mirrored back. For example, if you have a deep fear of empowering yourself you may experience repeated incidents where you need to empower yourself so you can move forward with the relationship. You are therefore being continually invited to confront your fear of self empowerment.

There are many psychological fears that get played out in relationships and they will all get mirrored back in some way or another. With fear it may be that the situation demands that you deal with the fear, rather than it being directly reflected back by the other person.

4. The other person will mirror back all the qualities and possibilities that you have denied within yourself. If you have compromised your honesty that will be mirrored back, maybe by your partner being very staunch about honesty as a value. If you have denied your own feelings you may have repeated scenarios that require you to get in touch with your true feelings.

The real journey of healing and transformation is about reclaiming and owning all the parts of you that have been denied. Two common issues are authenticity and personal power. So many of us have denied these in an effort to survive our upbringing, and once more your relationship will mirror back exactly what you now need to do to reclaim them

Try this:

Identify a pattern or quality that you find difficult with your partner.

Remember when and how it gets played out.

Become aware of your inner feelings, without blaming them.

Ask yourself if you exhibit the same pattern or quality, maybe in subtle ways that have gone unnoticed.

Explore what your relationship would be like if you could let go of that.

If that is not the mirror, then go through the other 3 ways and see if your judgement, fear or denial is being mirrored back.

Once more explore what it would be like to let go and get beyond that.

See if you can get a vision for how transformed the relationship could be.

Choose one significant thing you could do to bring that about.

Make a powerful unconditioned choice to do it.

Be gentle with yourself but persevere until real change occurs within.