Emotional Intimacy: Key to Health and Happiness
By Doug Austin, MD
A thread that runs through successful lives is the ability to establish and maintain emotional intimacy. Such relationships are based in honesty, trust, and unconditional love and respect. Emotionally intimate partners feel safe to reveal their true selves without fear of being judged. Physical intimacy isn’t a required ingredient.
The nucleus for emotional intimacy is the bond between parents and children. Successful emotional intimacy can also involve marriage, longterm committed relationships, and deep, platonic friendships.
Studies show that strong social support, including emotional intimacy, improves long-term health by helping people adjust to life’s difficulties, decreasing emotional and psychological stress, and decreasing development and progression of disease.
Emotional intimacy often begins with romantic interests. Through physical attraction, we relax our defenses, allowing more full knowledge of one another. When the sexual ‘charge’ decreases, conflict may develop as previous perceptions of ourselves and our partners conflict with current reality. However, once physical passion is tempered, true intimacy can grow. Mutual goals can be developed, and the ground rules in the relationship are solidified. Once this foundation is established, successful relationships will flourish, for the individuals as well as for the couple. The ability to look deeper in one’s self to understand personal drives and motivation often evolves during this stage of developing emotional intimacy. Success spawns success, and provides enhanced self esteem and confidence for both partners.
Perhaps we should not measure success by financial portfolios, academic degrees, or professional titles. Instead, I suggest we come to understand that a better benchmark of a fulfilling life is the depth of our relationships and the number of lives we touch in a meaningful way.
A thread that runs through successful lives is the ability to establish and maintain emotional intimacy. Such relationships are based in honesty, trust, and unconditional love and respect. Emotionally intimate partners feel safe to reveal their true selves without fear of being judged. Physical intimacy isn’t a required ingredient.
The nucleus for emotional intimacy is the bond between parents and children. Successful emotional intimacy can also involve marriage, longterm committed relationships, and deep, platonic friendships.
Studies show that strong social support, including emotional intimacy, improves long-term health by helping people adjust to life’s difficulties, decreasing emotional and psychological stress, and decreasing development and progression of disease.
Emotional intimacy often begins with romantic interests. Through physical attraction, we relax our defenses, allowing more full knowledge of one another. When the sexual ‘charge’ decreases, conflict may develop as previous perceptions of ourselves and our partners conflict with current reality. However, once physical passion is tempered, true intimacy can grow. Mutual goals can be developed, and the ground rules in the relationship are solidified. Once this foundation is established, successful relationships will flourish, for the individuals as well as for the couple. The ability to look deeper in one’s self to understand personal drives and motivation often evolves during this stage of developing emotional intimacy. Success spawns success, and provides enhanced self esteem and confidence for both partners.
Perhaps we should not measure success by financial portfolios, academic degrees, or professional titles. Instead, I suggest we come to understand that a better benchmark of a fulfilling life is the depth of our relationships and the number of lives we touch in a meaningful way.
