#114: What Does It Mean to be in a Healthy Relationship?

AKA How to Practice Stepping Out of the Drama Triangle

I don’t think I’ve ever been in a healthy relationship until now. What do I mean by “healthy relationship?” I wasn’t even sure, so I asked ChatGPT. This is what it said:
A healthy relationship is one where both people feel emotionally safe, respected, and free to grow - both together and as individuals. It’s built on open communication, mutual responsibility, shared values, and a balance of giving and receiving. At its core, a healthy relationship is a conscious partnership that supports spiritual and personal evolution.

The idea of a healthy relationship like this is new to me. So I think I am learning, right now in real-time, what it actually means to build something conscious and safe. I’m also realizing that both partners are equally responsible for that. I’m responsible for communicating my boundaries as much as my partner is responsible for communicating theirs to me (in a healthy, nonviolent way).

One thing I’ve noticed, is how often we don’t have safe, neutral spaces outside the relationship to talk about what’s happening inside it. I know when I was married when I was in my early twenties, there are things that happened that I never told anyone about. In hindsight it seems so obvious that some of the things that happened were not ok (but I needed to set a boundary for him of what I needed from him.) But I never had any external support to reflect, become aware of the dynamics, communicate in a nonviolent way, and make changes. That’s why therapy, coaching, women’s circles, and spiritual mentorship can be so powerful. Without these outlets, we get tunnel vision. We lose perspective. We might start thinking the problem is us, or that the pain we’re in is normal.

The truth is, most of us unconsciously reenact relationship patterns that we learned in our childhood until we become aware of them. These dynamics don’t just disappear - they loop, triggering us over and over again. And unless we become aware of them, we keep playing out the same stories, and we bring the exact same dynamics to every single relationship we’re in.

One of the frameworks that’s helped me understand these patterns is the Drama Triangle.