It’s the hero’s journey where our hero leaves the comfort of the ordinary world and wrestles with an adventure, this one of the heart. He faces tests, meets friends and mentors who train him to achieve love. Like any adventure, the hero is bruised and suffers along the way. It’s these wounds that become the scarred reminders of the lessons learned. And after making it though the ordeals of deep loss, our hero—shedding the old version of himself—has been transformed by the experience. When he returns to the ordinary world, there is something now inwardly different about him. He has new knowledge to share. 

Every relationship has taught me something and I've chosen not to waste my pain but grow instead. Partners have taught and challenged me. I have learned from mentors and had relationship guidance on my journeys. To all those who sharpened me, it is my honor to do the same by sharing here.

Because relationships are growth and movement toward expansion. Everything is connected and we are all looking for connection. There is an instinctual survival drive to connect with others, to belong, to love and to be loved. 

Connections are everywhere. Partners share a kiss with each other. The sun shines to open the flower. The wind catches the sail, the boat glides. We may have the drive to connect and yet that drive doesn't ensure everything will just happen naturally.

Very early, we learn about what relationships look like from our parents. We see their interaction, encode it unconsciously and later play out that conditioning, often unaware of what or why we are doing or how it might affect those around us. Our actions and reactions are conditioned for the kind of connection we got from our parents. Let’s face it, sometimes that interaction was unhealthy. Parents aren’t to blame. We know as adults we have bad days and how that looks. And If we create disconnection with those whom we love—and we’re conscious of it—that we address and repair it. As children, however, those emotional interactions become the sub-routine running in the background until we consciously clean the past and create future relating the way we want it to look for us.