Video Summary:

There's a tendency in relationships, especially close relationships, for us to insist people be how we need them to be rather than how they are. We all have stories, scripts, and fantasies about how various relationships should be.

We have stories about how our significant other relationship should be. And we have expectations about how a relationship with our brother, sister, mother, father, best friend, and boss should be.

A lot of times we're expecting them to be like us and do things like we do in some form or another. We want that relationship to be consistent with how we think it should be. So it fits in our comfort zone. Unfortunately, this can be very limiting. I suggest that we’re cheating ourselves when we do this.

The opposite of this would be letting go of how we need someone to be, or allowing people to be who they are. This is a practice that has a tremendous amount of freedom.

It's only when we can let go of how we need them to be that we really get to see and experience who they actually are. Until then we're ripping ourselves off by putting them in this box of how we need them to be. So all we can experience is not being happy with them because they are not who they should be.

But when we let go of the box we put them in and ask ourselves who this person really is, it becomes pure discovery.  We can see, “Wow, they are very different than I am. It doesn't always make sense to me, but it's kind of cool. What an interesting choice they just made. I would've never done that.”

So you can see how having an inquisitive and curious mind can really helpful in this approach. It’s asking who this person is and what they are saying to me right now in this experience. You can understand their dance and how they see life. You can be fascinated by it and how it’s different and similar to yours.

A place to start is to notice how you need people to be. Notice that you're uncomfortable because the person is the way they are. You can inquire why you need them to be something that they're not. This can take some time and put you through some changes, but it can be very powerful and liberating.