Relational CORE Fitness – What is it?

Relational CORE Fitness is the ability to function wisely in the web of our modern relational lives.

Relational CORE Fitness takes on the role of an antidote to the disconnect, unhappiness, and loneliness that have creeped into our lives. Its development and practice promote healthy relationships and a quality of life.

The concept of Relational CORE Fitness, its content and approach are grounded in my extensive research and life experiences. It draws on knowledge and insight from various relational science domains, represented in three foundational courses:

• Relational Wisdom Insight matters for clarity, love, and mindful relational living.
• Emotional Empowerment Feelings matter in all our relationships, at home and at work.
• Conscious Communication Language matters to connect and reconnect heart to heart.

These foundational courses are designed as stand-alone courses or as an integrated framework.

They serve to build relevant insight and competences needed to be fit for the challenges inherent in all relationships in a world with shifting cultural andrelational dynamics and norms. These three foundational courses resonate with studies that emphasise the need to build and practice human skills in a world more and more dominated by technology, social media, and artificial intelligence. If we are not careful, we will forget how to talk to each other face-to-face, feel our human energy, and welcome each other with open minds and open hearts.

The foundational courses are inviting everyone to

• Strengthen their wisdom to be mindful of the various forms of ever-evolving relationships and their indicators of healthy and unhealthy relational patterns in all our life contexts.
• Remain focused on what matters in life, honouring their own emotions, needs, and values, and those of others, and the health of our individual, relational and community biospheres.
• Practice conscious communication with kindness and compassion, appreciating the importance of mutual respect, compassion, and care as vital ingredients for the quality of our life here on Mother Earth.

In many ways, Relational CORE Fitness is not unlike physical fitness.

Physical fitness looks at healthy food, sufficient sleep, and regular exercise as a way of building and maintaining strength, stamina, and flexibility. It is recognised to foster a healthy body, a sense of aliveness, and human longevity and wellbeing.

Relational CORE Fitness also boosts our human energy,  our strength, endurance, and flexibility, so we can share in the joy of daily life, specifically a rewarding relational life. It is a much-needed relational wellness program that contributes to our overall individual, relational, and collective well-being. 

Relational CORE Fitness helps us build and sustain our mental and emotional fitness, if not fitness for the soul. It gives us a voice and vision to be proactive rather than reactive in how we interact with ourselves and others. It is the soul-motivator to relate to ourselves and others with curiosity, courage,  and commitment to show that we care. It is the unacknowledged missing pillar of holistic wellness and wellbeing in our cultural climate of disconnect and estrangement, romantic and friendship break-ups, isolation and loneliness.

Relational CORE Fitness is about reconnecting with ourselves and the world around us.

The word relationship commonly evokes thoughts of romantic or platonic relationships with others. However, healthy relationships with others start by getting to know ourselves first, connecting with who we are and who we want to be as individuals and as part of relationships. As famous research professor Brené Brown points out in her book Atlas of the Heart  (2021, p.272)

“Our connection to others can only be as deep as our connection with ourselves.”

Relational CORE Fitness is a practice where we learn to maintain a healthy connection with ourselves. However, it steps beyond the individualistic orientation that is common in our commercialised global world of wellness. It refocuses our attention beyond self-actualisation to the need for self-transcendence.

Being connected to our inner core of humanity, we can proudly take on the role of relational champions and rejoice in feeling alive, resilient, and ready to live love and love life in all its often unnoticed beauty.

Relational CORE Fitness allows us to balance individual and relational involvement.

With Relational CORE Fitness, we can

• Acknowledge our shared humanity, replete with vulnerability, imperfection, and emotional conundrums in our personal and professional spheres.
• Question our biases and avoid a cycle of maladaptive thoughts and behavioural patterns that undermine healthy relationships
• Be curious, courageous, and committed to showing that we are willing and able to live by the values we proclaim.
• Act out of love and not out of fear with a valued capacity for empathy, compassion, and kindness.

Relational CORE Fitness elevates our relational consciousness to be responsible and accountable for our contributions to the dynamics of our relationships in our private and public spheres.

At this point, I like to highlight that the Relational CORE Fitness program and content are designed as an educational avenue to re-ignite a sense of meaningful and loving connection in a world of growing isolation and loneliness. It does not take the place of needed or desired therapy.

Relational CORE Fitness is sensitive to our existence in the web of life.

Relational CORE Fitness reflects a sociocultural perspective and the systemic relational-cultural theory. It acknowledges that our sense of well-being does not exist in isolation from the world around us. Our relational lives take place in our world at home, in our relationships with our significant others, our families and friends, and our work environment. They exist in the wider world of socio-political, economic, and ecological developments with ever-evolving opportunities and threats.

Relational CORE Fitness reminds us that it is our life experiences, in the past and the present, that make us who we are and how we react and act in our daily lives; that we co-regulate our emotions constantly in the dynamics of our relational and collective biospheres.

In our throw-away society, and that unfortunately also includes relationships, we benefit from reminding ourselves of our shared humanity. Relational CORE Fitness enables us to pause and remember that none of us is perfect, but rather that we are all ‘perfect imperfects’.

Relational CORE Fitness lends different lenses for us to see the world anew, to step outside our hectic and judgmental cultural existence and look below the surface. How do we communicate with ourselves? How do we communicate with each other? Do we communicate with each other at all?

In the end, no matter who we are or where we live, deep down, we all long to feel welcome and safe, to be heard, seen, and valued, if not indeed loved for who we are.

I look forward to welcoming everyone who also believes that we can do better in our relational lives and the world we live in.