In relationships, there are a few things that have to be tended to, one of which is emotional integrity. Put simply, emotional integrity is the ability to face our emotions, and be open, honest, and transparent about them with our partner.
Without emotional integrity, relationships suffer. Think of it, when one partner buries their emotions and never explains how they feel to their partner, eventually those emotions are going to come up and wreak havoc in the relationship. A good way to put it is emotional authenticity.
The more we hide our true emotions, the harder relationship communication is. And when we are inauthentic to ourselves, we are also being inauthentic to our partner. In turn, we build a wall between ourselves and our partners.
Here are 6 signs of a lack of emotional integrity in a relationship:
1. You hide mistakes from your partner.
When you make mistakes, you hide them from your partner. Whether these are little blunders or major ones, you don’t like sharing them and prefer not to be that vulnerable with them.
2. You refuse to open up about your weaknesses with your partner.
When you are going through a difficult time, you try to downplay the situation with your partner. You may be dealing with financial difficulties or emotional ones, but regardless, you keep them to yourself.
3. You never know where you stand with your partner.
On any given day, you are unable to tell where you stand with your partner. You find that they seem unpredictable and vice versa. There is no emotional transparency.
4. You avoid sharing things you feel might upset your partner.
You tend to hide things about yourself that could upset your partner. If they do something that upsets you, or something happens that you feel like they might not appreciate, you just omit it altogether.
5. You have a hard time labeling your emotions.
Part of the reason you have such a hard time sharing your emotions is that you are unsure of what they mean to even you. When your partner asks you a difficult question, you often brush it off until you can figure out what you want, or agree to things, even when you don’t agree with them to save face.
6. To avoid conflict with your partner, you avoid hard topics.
When speaking with your partner, you often avoid hot topics to avoid conflict. When questions arise that you might have something to say that could upset your partner, you avoid talking about it altogether.
7. You tell your partner little white lies regularly.
When your partner asks you questions, even simple ones, you find yourself telling them little white lies to appease them. Even when it comes to questions about how you feel about something or what you want, you end up just trying to push the question off for later.