3 Ways to Have Healthier, More Fulfilling Relationships
- Brainz Magazine
- Dec 18, 2025
- 9 min read
Updated: Dec 19, 2025
Lisa Tibando had devoted decades to the healing arts, specializing in guiding others through empowered self-care and personalized transformation by blending ancient wisdom and modern science. Her practice blends deep spiritual insight with a highly educated foundation in anatomy and physiology, reflecting an unwavering commitment to holistic health.
As a collective, we have come to normalize stress in our lives. Life is so full of constant stimulation and distraction, pulling us in so many different directions, that we have forgotten about being. "Be-ing" a human being, that knows how to just "be". Relaxed and at peace. Instead, we have normalized ourselves into human "do-ings." Constantly on the do do do. Tending to this, tending to that. To that email, to that text, to that next distraction from our inner world. This constant attention outward neglects the inner world that desperately needs us to "pay" attention.
If we don't have a healthy relationship with ourselves, how could we possibly have one with another person, place, or thing? We cannot give what we do not have. So, we need to ask ourselves, “Where am I investing my wealth of attention?” Are we “paying” our attention to externals, or are we “paying” attention to our most important relationship of all, ourselves? Let's spend our attention wisely and make good investments that serve.
We live in a world of relationships. We relate to our peers, we have a relationship with our jobs, with our finances, with our pets, and with our partners. We even have a relationship to the weather and to nature.
Ask yourself, “How do I relate to this or that?” and you will find your relationship to that thing. Ask yourself, “Do I relate with love, kindness, acceptance, and understanding?” If the answer is “no”, then we must look at where that “relating to” came from. It came from within. Only what is inside is what can come out. If stress and tension are inside, then guess how we relate to the world of people, places, and things around us, with tension and stress.
Unattended daily stress results in tension in our bodies, in our tissues. A tension that builds up very quickly these days. Tension/Stress causes disease: dis-ease. A headache, poor digestion, body pain, anxiety, auto-immune, and even cancer (to name a few), all start with stress on the body-mind complex. Stress creates tension, and tension needs attention.
Our bodies and minds are often neglected in favour of external life demands. We must carve out time in our daily lives to give the body and mind the attention they need to cultivate a healthy relationship with ourselves. It's very similar to the laundry, the dirty clothes that need to get washed. When we don't tend to the laundry we accumulate, it builds up very quickly. If we put off doing the laundry week after week, when we go to do it, it's now a huge job, a huge mess that feels overwhelming.
The same is true internally. We often let a mess of stress build up and feel overwhelmed. A mess in our inner worlds, the relationship with ourselves. By not paying attention to simple self-care on a regular basis, we miss investing in our most important relationship of all, ourselves.
The outside world grabs our attention in so many subtle ways. For example, our cell phones, these devices that ding, buzz, bling, ring, and are "on" constantly. So, we adapt to also being "on" constantly. “On” and invested in the external world, the material world, that contains so many requirements of the human Do-ing. Hence, we lose sight of the human Be-ing. If we are not balancing the scale of being and doing on a daily basis, stress builds up in our lives, just like the laundry. “I will get to it tomorrow”, we say. “I will do it later”, we tell ourselves. This kind of coping is just that, “coping” with it instead of “dealing” with it.
The most intimate, longest, and important relationship we will have in our entire lives is with ourselves. When we don't deal with the little stresses that arise every day, just by living our lives in this day and age, then a bunch of dirty laundry piles up, and just one extra outfit will make the load too big for the washing machine. An overload of laundry, an overload of stress.
So, “How do I change and start a new investment plan that serves me?” you ask. Well, here are 3 simple things you can do daily to start investing in something that will pay off today, tomorrow, and years from now. A wealth that you can withdraw from as long as you make deposits daily.
1. Remember, you are the one who knows you best, you know how to meet your needs better than anyone else
We all have an inner voice. When we are taught how to use that inner voice to serve us instead of letting it be the monkey-mind that swings chaotically from thought branch to thought branch, we come to realize we can choose our thoughts and use them to meet our needs.
Have you ever had the thought: “they should”, “they need to”, “they better or else”? This kind of thinking disempowers us and puts our fate in the power of others, where there is zero control. Remember, “you know you best”.
If you notice the thought, “I need them to do or say this for me to be okay,” try replacing they with me. If you need to hear “I love you,” say it to yourself. If you need care or action, explore how "you" can provide it.
We need others, and we are not meant to do life alone. At the same time, many of the needs we expect others to meet can be met internally through compassion, presence, and self-care. When we tend to ourselves with love and understanding, we naturally bring that fullness into our relationships.
Nurturing our inner world, which is equivalent to nurturing our inner child, can only be done fully and efficiently by our inner selves. The problem lives in the inner world, and so does the solution. Getting help and guidance from our community support systems is vital, but the most loyal, faithful, committed, unconditional-love relationship that can never leave us is with the self, within the self.
We can investigate within, pay attention to the needs of the inner self with our own love, understanding, and compassion. Then, when we relate to others (people, places, and things), we pour out of us what has been established within.
2. Give back to the body that serves us daily, 5mins is good, 30mins is great
Every relationship works best in reciprocity, in giving and receiving. Our bodies do so much for us 24/7. Our guts digest our food, our hands brush our teeth, our legs walk us to the kitchen, our feet hold us steady to stand, our necks help us turn to look this way and that way. A thousand little micro things are happening in our physical system every second as we go about our day. All these little things help us and serve us to live our daily lives, every second, every day.
How much time do you spend giving back, paying attention, to show reciprocity to this body that does so much for you? If we expect to have a good quality relationship with the world around us, let it begin with the most important relationship of all, ourselves.
Does it not seem obvious that we should give back in reciprocity to the body that is so committed to serving and helping us? What have you done recently to give back to your body?
Did you stretch for 10 minutes? Did you meditate for even 5 minutes? Did you take 5 minutes to deep breathe life-giving oxygen to every cell of your body? (Stretching, breath-work, and meditations from 5 minutes to 30 minutes, all found on my Lisa Tibando RMT YouTube channel with self-love teachings).
These small but powerful actions to show attention to the body, which is accumulating tension/stress daily, make a huge difference and add up to create a wealth of health and happiness. A happy, fulfilling relationship with the self that then extends outwards to the way we relate to our life that comes with people, places, and things.
Giving back just 5 to 15 minutes of quality attention to ourselves at the end of every day is appreciated by the mind-body complex. Keeping this regular practice going week after week, month after month, creates a bank account of deposits, so that when life gets complicated and challenging, we have funds to draw from to deal with challenges in healthy, non-destructive ways.
When we self-care frequently, we relate and respond better to life's circumstances with love, compassion, and understanding, as opposed to reacting from a build-up of stress/tension that’s too big a mess for the washing machine of life's relationships, our body-minds.
3. Remember, “what you put in it is what will come out of it”
If you put dirt in the bucket, dirt is what will come out. If you put garbage in the can, garbage is what comes out.
Ask yourself, “What am I putting in my mind-body on a regular basis in regards to food, ideas, conversations, media, scenery, etc.” When we watch a scary movie before bed, chances are we will have disturbing dreams. When we eat a bunch of junk food, chances are that within hours, we will feel less than great. When we listen to angry music, chances are we will soon find ourselves irritated.
Ever notice that after a good, connected, nourishing visit with good friends, you feel better? Ever notice that after watching a great podcast on positive ideas, you feel a new sense of hope? Ever notice that when you eat really healthy for a few days, you want to engage in more healthy activities? This is because “what you put in is what comes out”.
When we honour our mind-body as a processing unit (one that processes thoughts, ideas, food, conversations, interactions, and experiences in general), then we can make healthier choices that serve the mind-body and choose good, loving things to let into it so that good, loving things come out of it.
When we remember that we are in a relationship to this mind-body, the most important relationship we will ever have, we make choices that serve instead of sabotage. When we learn to consistently, to the best of our ability, do this on a day-to-day basis, we set a standard for how we relate. First to ourselves and then as a by-product to the world we interact with (relate to) in a relationship.
We first must cultivate that healthy give and take with ourselves. We invest in nurturing a good, quality relationship with ourselves, and then we can have healthier relationships in our lives. Pay attention is what the mind-body requires. Pay attention to how this feels, how this serves, how this helps. When we can become more aware of the impact that “what we put in is what comes out”, we can empower ourselves to set standards of what a good, healthy relationship is for us and then have that in the relationships of our lives.
Start simple with these 3 suggestions for healthier, more fulfilling relationships
We can start simple, with these 3 daily practices, to keep up on the internal stress laundry that needs to get done. Better to deal with it in smaller loads, so that the machine can handle it efficiently, than to overload the system and have it break down. We can prioritize this most important relationship, with the self, and pay attention to the daily tensions.
Remember, you can meet many of the needs internally with yourself that you thought had to come externally. Simple talking to ourselves (our inner dialogue) with compassion, understanding, and love.
If we prioritize ourselves, it's very reasonable to find just 5 to 10 minutes to give back to our bodies in reciprocity at the end of every day with self-care practices like stretching, breath-work, or meditation. When we know what goes in is what will be squeezed out under pressure/stress, then we can be more mindful of what we are putting in our body-mind complex in regards to all experiences, from conversations to food to media. It all matters. A little goes a long way with committed, regular daily self-love.
Begin today and invest for the future to come.
Read more from Lisa Tibando
Lisa Tibando, Business Owner, RMT, Bioenergetics Facilitator
Lisa Tibando is a leader in self-awareness, self-care, and self-love. After overcoming a history of multiple childhood and adolescent traumas, she embarked on a profound healing journey that transformed her life, mentally, physically, and emotionally. Today, Lisa is dedicated to guiding others through their own healing, drawing from both personal experience and decades of study. Her deep compassion and intuitive understanding create a safe, empowering space for individuals to reconnect with themselves and embrace the transformative power of self-healing.
