Post in brief: A Valentine’s day getaway can be a happiness cure for conscious couples. This post addresses opposite personality traits and the need for external validation vs. a liberated you — passionate, self-fulfilled, and engaged. Read on if you desire a loving Valentine’s day getaway.
Couples Argue Once A Day While on Holiday
Bickering is relatively common while on holiday. As many as 40% of couples argue every day while on vacation, according to Holiday Auto. The study of 2,000 couples also states, “one in ten couples break-up after a vacation.” I also witnessed this as a travel professional. In speaking with hundreds of travelers, the majority weren’t all that happy with their partners. Another reason I’ve developed Unpack Your Personality: Your Soul’s Journey to Self.
What is the Happiness Cure for Conscious Couples?
If you want to enjoy a truly loving getaway with your partner, it begins with you ⏤ falling in love with you. If you depend on external sources, a beautiful location, fine dining, and other niceties to bring you, love, this is a falsehood. Counting on external things to bring you happiness is a form of codependency. Similarly, if you seek external validation from a partner to make you happy, it’s also a form of codependency. Another person can’t fill you with peace, joy, passion, and happiness; this is an inside job; self-validation.
Why the Fairytale Love Fantasy Must Die and Why it Won’t
The fairytale fantasy is what many of us dream of. Does it exist? No. But I believe love stories do. The key to it all is not expecting love to come from the physical world. Again, that’s codependency. The happiest couples don’t live in a fairytale fantasy world. They’re first and foremost comfortable with themselves. They’re independent of one another while sharing a love story all their own. I know this as I’ve spoken with hundreds of travelers. Some couples shared their stories of loving romantic getaways while others seem to fight nonstop.
What Happy Couples Seem to Have in Common
What the happy couples seemed to have in common is a love of self. They were okay with their partner exploring and doing their own thing. These separate experiences gave them new insights to share over a romantic dinner. They focused on finding their inner source of pleasure, fun, freedom, and happiness, while not harping on one another’s differences.
Passionate couples were more of an anomaly than a majority. Many couples I spoke with were very focused on what they didn’t like about their partners. I define negative thought patterns that arise on vacations as travel triggers. A travel trigger is your soul gently awakening you to a pattern, belief, or habit that needs to go or change.
When you focus on aspects of your partner that frustrate you, guess what, you’re going to get more of that behavior. Hey, the Universe is only bringing you what you focus on.
“There is no value in focusing on unwanted things (causing an activation of the vibration within you) that the Law of Attraction will respond to, and therefore creating in your reality something you do not want.’
Abraham Hicks, The Amazing Power of Deliberate Intent.
Unconscious Couples Behavior
Has this situation, or a similar travel trigger ever happened to you? Your partner has been in line for 40 minutes only to be told the play sold-out ten minutes ago. He/she returns to you upset and sullen. You’re fuming because you said a million times buy tickets ahead of time.
- Who’s at fault?
- Do you embrace feelings of anger?
- What do you choose in the moment?
My advice, go within and choose the best thought you can muster in the situation. It could be enjoying a walk and or getting an ice-cream discussing why you’re frustrated with the lack of planning.
Maybe you need to rethink why you’re angry. Typically it’s an opposite personality trigger showing up. Let’s say you’re an excellent planner, but if you know your partner isn’t a planner, then why not get the tickets yourself. I know, I hear you sighing, and saying, “I do everything why can’t he/she do the one thing I ask.” I ask, why do you do everything? Are you not asking for help? I have to believe your partner is capable of a lot more than you give him/her credit for. What I do know is dwelling on missing the play doesn’t’ get you a ticket; it only stirs more negative feelings.
Unpack Your Personality
Often we are attracted to people who are different from us in the way we deal with the outer world, extroversion, and introversion. Many in the world of typology and psychologists alike believe we look to others to strengthen our weakest traits. We often pair with a person who has a similar dominate function:
- Sensor or intuitive
- Feeler or thinker
For example, an individual whose dominant function is introverted sensing seems to be naturally drawn towards partners with a dominant function of extraverted sensing. Or an extroverted feeling type will pair with an introverted feeling type.
Why Sharing the Same Dominant Function Matters
Research on personality typing and conscious coupling shows successful relationships share the same dominant function. Of course, this doesn’t mean people with different preferences cannot have successful relationships. It means that people frequently settle down with individuals who share similar values and personality functions.
Knowing this, it shouldn’t be a surprise that you may quarrel with your partner on a trip. You pack your things and your personality type right along with your flipflops and sunnies. We aren’t different people on vacation. Why a vacation can help? It’s because we, as humans, are ready to embrace new perceptions. We’re more open-minded than we are in our daily lives. In essence, we drop our masks in readiness for a unique experience. Does this help you understand why you might argue on vacation? It’s the opposite trait that ignites quarrels. I’ve spoken in detail about traveling with an extrovert or an introvert here.
Conscious Couples
OK, so you have an idea of why your partner drives you crazy — if you know your guy/gal is an introvert;
- Needs alone time,
- Wary of new experiences,
- The inner world is the “real world,”
- Subdued in thoughts, words, and mannerisms,
- Will think before they speak
Or an extrovert
- Is energized by engaging with the world,
- Open to new experiences,
- The outer world is their “real world,”
- Typically expressive, and animated,
- They need to live life to understand it.
If your travel mate has an opposite trait, stop focusing on their behaviors and instead pay attention to your thoughts. If you’re feeling hurt because your partner needs alone time, and you see this as them not loving you, this is an untruth. It’s what they need to power up and feel good. If you continue to dwell on the feelings of being unloved, you’ll turn that thought into a reality. The reality might be a fight, you withdrawing or directing these feelings outward. Your partner will probably be thinking, what did I do? This situation is a perfect example of how outer responses affect our emotions and self-worth. Can you see how easy it is to believe one thing when, in reality, it’s not even real?
A point to remember. If your better half needs time alone, be grateful for knowing this and take this time to do something that fills your soul with joy. A recipe for happy couples.
Valentine’s Day Getaway a Happiness Cure for Conscious Couples
Of course, I’ve just touched upon a few ideas to make this Valentine’s day getaway a happiness cure for conscious couples. I hope you see yourself and your lover in a different light. As we head into February, the month of love, why not include vacation plans that aren’t only center around the physical pleasures, champagne, and strawberries, flowers, chocolates… Make time to “see” your partner’s greatest strengths and appreciate them instead of the negatives?
If a travel trigger – aka a negative situation arises, while on vacation don’t ignore it. Communicate with your partner about what you’re feeling and your expectations. Partners aren’t mind readers. When you identify a travel trigger (your soul’s gentle way of telling you it’s time to change), it usually leads to self-awareness for both of you. So much better than fighting!
Stay tuned
I am now developing a free quiz and 16 guidebooks that act as tools, helping you to unpack your personality using travel vs. a classroom or a masterclass. These e-guidebooks will take a deep dive into your exclusive travel personality, aka your genuine self. Do you desire a new vacation paradigm to gently transform, awaken, and inspire something new in you? A person that returns home feeling happier and more in touch with their authentic self. If you answered YES, then you are in the right place.
If you want to learn more, check out my interview on Speaking of Travel part of the iHeart radio network with Marilyn Ball ⏤give it a listen here.
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