Living in between

Practicing gratitude

Gratitude is a brain exercise that allows us to shift our perspective of the world. It forces us to look for the positive since our brain is wired to focus on the negative. Gratitude helps us create bridges to shorten the distance of our differences. It brings more compassion and acceptance in our lives.

Embracing biculturalism through Inner Self-Discovery

One of the most important things you can do to find strength in duality is to learn to listen to your own voice. This can be difficult, especially if you're used to hearing your inner critic telling you all kind of lies just to keep you safe. We create a narrative that allows us to stay safe in our world. But it's important to remember that your inner critic is not always right. In fact, it's often just your fear talking, it is mean and diminishing. Our inner voice is more gentle, maybe not sweet, but will always tell you what you need, even if it is not what you want. Learning to distinguish your inner voice from your inner critic, can help you prevent unnecessary arguments, learning more about yourself and allow you to expand your world to embrace your and your partner's culture.

The Inflexibility of our thoughts

We are finishing the triad of things that could harm your relationship with the inflexibility of our thoughts, which creates a vicious circle of resentment, frustration, shame and regret. When being in a bicultural relationship, it is critical to stay opened minded, because the way we grew up, our community, our family, our culture, religion, social and financial status, have shaped the way we think. And if our partner was raised in a completely different culture, our way of thinking will be different. Trying to be right is a survival trait a lot of us have learned to use based on our experiences. But when you are past the point of survival, being flexible, open minded to explore together with your partner your differences, can be the difference between having a struggling relationship, or even a decent relationship and having a fulfilling realtionship.

Fighting against the silence struggle

Cultural shock#2 that could be hurting your bicultural relations is the "silence Struggle". How many of us stay quiet because we want to maintain the peace, because that is what we are supposed to do according to society. In a relationship, we have expectations both for our partners and for us. They are both cemented in the way we were raised. How we are taught to think and behave, this is exactly how we will expect our partner to behave and how we will come behave ourselves, because we don't want to dissapoint. But looking to not disappoint other, we end up disappointing ourselves for not speaking up, for doing things that are not important to us, but we have become used to. The silence struggle prevents us from speaking up our mind and going with the flow to keep harmony in the house, at the cost of our own personality. Eventually this silence will cost us a lot, we start delegating decision of everyday living because we have lost that ability to go after our goals and our dreams. What are things that you hate doing, but you do anyway because you are supposed to do?

How unmet expectation are shaking your realtionship

We all have expectations, it is normal as we live in a society which starts programming us since early childhood. We are expected to behave in a certain matter, but what happens when you get together with someone from a different culture, who grew up following a different norm. Which expectations are completely different than yours? Are your expectations reasonable when you take your partners cultural differences into consideration, and if they are, have you communicated them? communication is key in any relationship, but in a bicultural relations, where expectations are completely different, it is critical talking about them. Making sure unmet expectations don't turn into resentment and frustration that can ruin then relationship