A Positive Relational Moment is a remembered experience of connection—when you felt seen, safe, or moved. Bringing it to mind can both create safety and spark energy—almost like plugging back into that moment.

The moment can be small: a welcome, a shared joke, someone understanding what you were trying to say. Remembering their voice, an expression, or what happened between you may help you feel accompanied again. There is room for sadness here, too. Being met with care during grief can become a memory that supports us later.

The idea that connection can sustain us beyond an immediate encounter has roots in early RCT. In What Do We Mean by Relationships? (1986), Jean Baker Miller described growth-fostering interactions as building resources we can draw on during difficulty. Experiences with others become part of what we carry into later relationships. This provides a foundation for understanding remembered connection, although Miller was not naming the Positive Relational Moment practice in that passage.

Amy Banks gives the practice an explicit name in Wired to Connect (2016), written with Leigh Ann Hirschman and previously published as Four Ways to Click. She describes a PRM as a remembered time of safety and happiness with another person. Within her account of relational neuroscience, bringing that experience to mind can help us feel calmer and more energized. She returns to PRMs when discussing acceptance and the vitality of connection, inviting readers to gather memories they can revisit.

Harriet L. Schwartz offers a related perspective in Connected Teaching (2019). She describes how the presence of a trusted teacher or colleague can remain part of our internal conversation when we are working alone. Her account helps explain how support developed between people can continue to matter in their absence. It extends our understanding of remembered connection into learning without claiming to redefine Banks's practice.

BCC's Relational Visualizations draw on Banks's PRM work alongside John Makransky's work on compassion. They invite people to revisit connection at their own pace and include an option for times when a positive relational memory is hard to find. BCC's glossary wording emphasizes being seen, safe, or moved, making room for the many ways a moment of connection may stay with us.

A PRM may bring some of the benefits described in the Five Good Things. When it also challenges an old expectation about relationships, it may offer a Discrepant Relational Image. This page centers the remembered connection and what becomes available when we return to it.

Choose a small moment of connection that feels welcome to revisit. Let one detail come back: someone's words, a shared laugh, or the way they made room for you. You can remember through words or a sense of what happened; a vivid picture is optional.

Spend a little time with that moment. Notice whether anything shifts in your sense of being accompanied, your steadiness, or your energy. If the memory feels supportive, you might choose a word or small reminder to help you find it again.

If nothing comes to mind, or remembering becomes painful, you can pause. BCC offers clients and group members Relational Visualizations, including a guided option for times when a positive relational memory is unavailable. Let what you notice guide whether you stay with the practice, seek company, or leave it for another day.