Member-only story
What Keeps You From Being Open in a Relationship?
Relationships are built on trust and vulnerability, so if something is holding you back from being open, you need to get to the bottom of it.
Intimacy in a relationship comes from trusting and being trusted by your partner. Trust comes from a variety of things, one of which is being vulnerable and letting your partner in. But for some people, this openness isn’t easy.
There are lots of reasons you might struggle to be open with your partner. Sometimes you might even have more than one reason. But if you want to build a solid relationship that will last, you need to be able to identify the reason and address it so you can create that close connection.
Here are a few of the most common reasons people hold back from being open with their partner and how you can move past them.
Feeling judged
Being open is about being vulnerable. It’s about sharing things that are very personal, sometimes embarrassing, and might even give your partner the ability to hurt you. So it makes sense that you might feel as if you’re being judged by your partner for what you share — and that it might make you think twice about sharing something.