Loving Relationships with Lori Carpenos

Author, therapist and coach Lori Carpenos has seen that what affects our relationships the most is our state of mind. When the couples she works with see that ‘working on’ their relationship is not the answer to a loving relationship, that’s when everything changes.Lori Carpenos opened a private individual, couples and family counseling practice, in 1994, to pass along something she had stumbled upon in 1985, when she was privileged to meet the late Sydney Banks. As a result, her life changed in ways she could never have imagined at that time.She maintains a private practice in West Hartford, CT as a therapist, life coach, business consultant, facilitator, and writer.You can find Lori Carpenos at 3PrinciplesTherapy.com.You can listen above, on your favorite podcast app, or watch on YouTube. Notes, links, resources and a full transcript are below.Show Notes* Starting out as an art teacher * Resonating with Sydney Banks’ exploration of innate mental health * On recognizing that ‘working’ on a relationship only makes things harder * How we all fall back into love when our minds are quiet * Getting on the wrong bus with our thinking but knowing we can choose a different ride * How we all always have all the love we need within us * How arguments originate from our state of mind * On being single and our relationship to thought about that * How we are all in relationship with our thinkingTranscript of Interview with Lori CarpenosAlexandra: Lori Carpenos, welcome to Unbroken.Lori: Oh, thank you, Alexandra. It’s nice to be with you.Alexandra: It’s great to have you here. I’m so happy to meet you.Tell us a bit about your background and how you came to find the Three Principles.Lori: Well, they actually found me. It was quite by happenstance. I’d never heard of Sydney Banks, never heard of the three principles. I was an art teacher in Massachusetts, and I got a master’s in expressive arts therapy. I had this idea I wanted to do art therapy. And the place for that was California.So I was 25 years old, and I decided to quit my tenured art teacher job. Much to the dismay of my parents. They tried to stop me. But I felt called in retrospect, when I realized it was not to be an art therapist, because I’m driving across the country. Because California was known as the land of New Thought and new things. And art therapy was supposedly really big.I get halfway across. And I’m listening to a program, NPR, where they’re talking about a bill that had just passed in California, eliminating art, music, all the extra curricular activities in hospitals, schools, and I couldn’t believe it. It was like I was hearing something that was not true. And I’m thinking well, I’m halfway there. I already quit my job. I don’t have a job back on the east coast. So what do I do?I decided to keep going. I didn’t have a job. I knew one person in Northern California where I was headed to. No job, a cocktail waitress with my master’s degree my pocket. And one thing led to another. Well it’s a long story not to get into. But the crux of the matter was, I got into a relationship with a boyfriend, who had gotten the degree from California trans personal psychology, and he was heading to Florida, to the Advanced Human Studies Institute, which you probably heard was the first training place in, in, in the world, actually, at that time. So I thought, well I’ll go with him, of course, I’ll go with him, I’ll be closer to my family, then.I went out to California and this is now three years later.