Category: Live

One of my closest friends approached me the other day and asked if we could have a talk. My friend and her husband had been married for just over 8 years, and to all that casually observed them, they seemed to have it all; a nice car, nice house, fashionable furniture and decor, perfectly-behaved pets, and time for each other despite their high-profile careers. To some, they could be the perfect couple, yet inwardly, I found out, things were quite different. Things seemed to be on the brink of disaster. And so in asking to have a talk with me she was putting a call out for help.

One of the hardest things about saving your marriage is facing up to your friends and yourself that you have a marital problem. It is much easier to put on a brave public face and show the world that you and your husband are the picture of domestic bliss, while behind closed doors things are all at war.

Perhaps that is what it is like when you decide to save your marriage. There are fears about what others will say:

• He or she is a jerk
• You are better off without them
• You can’t forgive them for what they did
• It will never be the same
• It has gone too far to save
• You are a failure

Public perceptions are perhaps the hardest to overcome. On a subconscious level, we picture our own relationships as that level above others, immune to the petty squabbles and arguments that plague other couples on a regular basis. If we are having problems, they are only bumps in the road to what is otherwise a very pleasant journey. It is easy to identify and even discuss the deficiencies in other people’s relationships, perhaps in an effort to convince yourself that your relationship by comparison is so much better.

So confronting your marriage problem can bring forth issues both in your marriage as well as in others perceptions of your marriage. To admit you have problems in your marriage is to admit that your life is not a fairytale. In addition to this is the fundamental age-old question:

Who is to blame?

One of the hardest hurdles to overcome when saving your marriage is justifying your wish to save your marriage to your family and friends, as well as suffer the humiliation of admitting that your marriage is in crisis. Some of your friends will nurture and support you, and others will sympathize with you and feel sorry for you. Others still will judge you, and it is perhaps this group that you fear the most. Despite your fears, your love for your partner and your need to do what feels right will need to outweigh your fear of how others will judge you.

How do you overcome the humiliation of having a troubled marriage? You have two choices:

You can walk away, or you can stay and try and make it work.

Walking away is the easy option, but in some extreme cases it does become necessary. The harder option is to stay with your partner and commit to making changes and fixing the problems and heal your marriage.

Sometimes the choice to end your marriage is not yours, and you suffer the further humiliation of having to negotiate and bargain with your partner for time to communicate feelings and offer explanations, justify actions and pray for absolution. This is a harrowing experience for even the strongest of us.

Perhaps a thought is to remember why your friends are your friends, and to accept their offers for help when you need it. In the midst of your marriage chaos, the support and love of your friends can be a very humbling experience.

I told my friend that I would offer to help her wherever I could. Friends are angels without wings. At a time when you most need it, the simple act of swallowing your pride and asking for help can bring strength and comfort from those friends,neighbors and family members who have your greatest interest at heart.

I get a lot of submissions, but one in particular stuck in my mind this week and really got me thinking. A woman emailed me who had been married for twelve years and had recently found out about her husband’s affair. The affair had been going on for a number of years, and the exposure of the affair came as quite a shock.

But then the most unusual thing happened…

Instead of the husband pleading forgiveness or wanting to do whatever it takes to heal the marriage, he suggested that he shift out in the expectation that a temporary separation would help them establish what to do. In fact, it went one step further and he recommended that they cease communication for a while until he figures out if he wants to come back home.

What this illustrated to me was that this woman had given up the power in her relationship and was letting her husband decide whether or not their marriage should be saved. He had also maintained contact with the woman that he had been having the affair with.

I get annoyed when I read of situations like this happening. The one who had the affair was in complete control of what would happen from here, initiated the temporary separation, cut off all contact with his wife, maintained contact with his mistress, and left his wife dangling while he decided what he wanted to do.

This is totally unacceptable in my mind, and indicates not only a complete lack of remorse or conscience, but is also one of the most selfish actions someone could do in this situation.

When you expose an affair in a marriage, amidst the feelings of shock and betrayal is the need to determine a course of action as a couple. Despite the fact that one is the betrayor and one is the betrayee, you are both invested emotionally in this relationship and the outcome, whether it is healing or a separation, is something that has to be determined as a couple.

I recommended that the woman in question should maintain contact with her husband despite his wishes not to, and to establish clear boundaries for each other during the separation. A timeframe also needs to be set in which both parties can sit down and establish if progress is being made. Failure to do this is simply delaying the inevitable. I urged her to take back the power or walk away.

Giving all the power to either party can lead to problems, because one person inevitably ends up outside the marriage-saving process and misses their opportunity to process their feelings and heal.

While you may not feel like it, when it comes to saving your marriage, teamwork is better than doing it alone. If you feel the power in your marriage crisis is being taken away from you, it’s time to take it back.

Last week I went shopping. It was one of those Saturday morning excursions, where after a leisurely breakfast and a look through the local paper, it seemed appropriate to get out and about and see what is on offer.

The change of season heralds a change of outdoor temperatures, so for me when I awake in the morning, it’s cold and crisp. I had been looking at buying some new shoes for a couple of weeks, and while reading the newspaper I noticed an outlet store offering shoes on sale. Unable to resist, I dragged my partner down there and spent some time inhaling the heady scent of polished leather and admiring all of the beautiful shoes. I came upon a pair of burnished brown cowboy boots, and immediately I froze…

I had to have them. Secretly I had always wanted a pair, but I always worried about what people would think.

• I would look stupid
• I would look too tall
• People will stare
• I would look too gay

But I finally came to the realization that I don’t really care. Sure, I care about what people think, but my love for cowboy boots outweighed my fears of what others would say. Walking out of the shop, my partner chuckled and said to me “You’re so quirky, but I really love that about you. You are just who you are.”

That really made me wonder. Maybe my partner could never have the courage to wear cowboy boots, but he loved me for the fact that I could. You really begin to love your partner when they can do things that surprise you and you love them for it. They can be an individual and you love them for it. They can be quite unlike the person you are, and yet you still love them.

Many people hold the belief that you should only marry someone like yourself, someone you have lots in common with, so that you can maximize your chances of having a happy marriage. Part of me thinks this is true, as I see a lot of couples who do marry people like themselves and have very happy marriages.

But equally I see people who marry their opposites and have happy marriages too. How do they make their marriages work?

They make their marriages work by keying into each other’s particular needs. Sometimes it takes an opposite to bring forth a side of you that you wouldn’t otherwise have the strength to show. Perhaps they round out your character and allow each of you to develop your strengths to become better people. Perhaps they allow you to develop a different view of the world which offers you a form of enlightenment.

The difference could be what makes your marriage interesting. You always have the opportunity to marvel at learning something new.

The key here is to not be scared of your differences. Love your partner for what makes them different from you. Love them for what makes them different from others. It might be what made you fall in love with them the first time… and it may be what makes you want to fall in love with them again.

One of the most common complaints I get from members is complaints about why “Men have to act like men” or why “women are just so damn frustrating”. When I read these comments I chuckle, and wonder how much each partner knows about the way each of you are socially conditioned.

I need to draw your attention to the work of David Deida, and in particular his book “The Way of the Superior Man”

http://www.bluetruth.org/flex/way_of_the_superior_man/112/1
 
In this book Deida explores the idea of masculine and feminine energy and offers readers an insight into answering questions about discovering your life’s true purpose, and what women really want, and why men act the way they do.

Society conditions men to be strong, competitive and independent, and this conditioning also applies to dominance in sex and relationships. A man is conditioned to win, achieve and show strength without emotion when it comes to relationships, while with sex, men are encouraged to want it, get it as much as they can, and to even expect it.

Women, on the other hand, are conditioned by society to be the nurturer and caregiver in the relationship. This isn’t a sexist ideal, this is simply the way society has conditioned its role expectations when it comes to relationships.

Carrying on from what I had discussed earlier about men being socially conditioned to be strong, independent and competitive and women being the nurturer and caregiver, masculine and feminine energy within relationships further complicate the issue.

For a man, masculine energy is to know where you are and what you want to be, and what needs to be done to reach your goals. According to David Deida, author of The Way of The Superior Man, you need to discover your goal and the way to achieving it by any means necessary. He explores the idea of the masculine gift being the ability to guide your partner out of their moods into the openness of loving.

In very practical terms, you need to know what your partner needs to do with their life so that they can relax. Perhaps it is exercise, meditation, change of career, dancing more, or spending more time with friends. All of these things are practical solutions, and this ability to guide your partner and be their wake up call. This is what your relationship is all about.
In comparison to the masculine energy, the feminine energy is necessary to connect the thoughts, goals and projects of masculinity and introduce touch, loving energy, tenderness and the ability to show affection.

However, when I talk about the idea of masculine and feminine energy, the great thing about this is that both men and women within a relationship have the ability to switch and change roles throughout their day and throughout their relationships. It is possible for a woman to embrace her masculine competitive energy in the workplace and switch roles to nurturer at the end of the day. In fact, women are much more able to fluidly switch from energy to energy as their roles dictate.

So what does this mean for you?

Well it means you should read David Deida’s work and understand a little more behind this concept. Your ability to change roles as needed within your relationship will determine to some extent how dynamic your relationship can be and it may go a long way towards understanding how complex men and women are, especially within a relationship or marriage context.

Last weekend I celebrated my anniversary. Looking back on the time I have spent with my partner, I realize how far we have come and how much we have grown in our understanding and love for one another.

It was a sobering thought.

While thinking of how far I had come in our relationship, I am still aware that the growth process in our relationship will never end, and that like the tree, will continue to thicken and grow as each season passes. While I feel really pleased with how far we have grown, I am aware that there are areas in my life that I have reluctantly held close to my chest, and managed to retain, partly as a form of security, and partly because they are deeply entrenched behaviors that are familiar to me.

I love my partner so much, but at the same time, I can be a selfish person. I can focus so intently on how things affect me, that it is difficult to actively listen, or put myself in his shoes. I can focus on so many of the silly things going on around my life that I overlook the core. Sometimes I can’t see the forest for the trees.

It has been like that quite a bit lately, and I guess I have let little stresses in my life become something bigger than they need to be. I have an obsession for cleaning. I really do. I have dark carpet in my home, and the smallest piece of fluff or dirt can be spotted by my obsessive-cleaning radar the moment I enter a room. So I vacuum the house every day. I clean benches and floors, I dust side tables and fluff around with curtains. It seems when I’m stressed everything needs to be perfect, and this in itself stresses me out. Then I get snappy, mostly angry at myself, but this comes across as hostility to my partner. Then that makes me unhappy.

It’s a vicious cycle.

In the midst of wanting everything to be perfect, I make myself miserable. So I need to stop and take a look at the bigger picture.

• I have a great man.
• I have a great job.
• I have a great home.
• I have great friends.
• I have a great relationship.
• I really do have a great life.

Sometimes the greatest pleasure can be derived from the simplest things. Light some candles the next time you make dinner. Buy a cake of chocolate and go to bed early with your partner. Make them a cup of coffee or tea. Buy their favorite packet of biscuits. Go for a walk together in the evening.

Perhaps the greatest lesson of all is to appreciate each moment you have together and realize that your attitude and effort is what makes each special moment a reality. Things may not be my idealized version of perfect, but I am very lucky with what I do have. I am a lot better off than a lot of people. I have a lot to be grateful for, if I only take the time to see it. Rather than focusing on how it can be better, focus on how great it is already.

For my anniversary I got a really cool bunch of flowers from a flower design gallery. I got my partner a bracelet. And the next morning when we got up and had breakfast, we went out shopping at one of our local markets. Simple, but satisfying.

It doesn’t always have to make sense.

It doesn’t have to cost a lot of money.

It doesn’t have to be perfect. 

But sometimes the little things, and your attitude, are what make your relationship great.

It’s snowing here today.

I would have never expected it, as it was blowing a balmy north-west wind last night when I went to bed, and it was unseasonably warm. However, this morning after opening the window, I realized why my dog was scratching at the door, wanting to be let in. Poor little thing was freezing, tho he did have a woolly coat on. After thawing the dog out, my first thought went to those close to me who would have to brave the snow and the treacherous conditions outside today. I even got out of bed early to make my partner a cup of tea while he was in the shower, something I almost never do during weekday mornings.

Something inside me went into auto-pilot, and it became very clear what was important to me. Where I live, we get snowfalls only once a year, and I have never known it to snow so early in the season, today down to sea level. I called my sister and my mother to check in with them and reassure them that I am available if they need my help for anything. While it was quite likely that they can cope with things without my assistance, I felt better for offering it, and they felt better for the thought that went into the call.

It made me wonder about how couples interact in times of crisis, and how something as simple as a fall of snow can bring such nurturing and selfless feelings to the forefront of your mind. It may be something other than a snowfall, such as a loved one injuring themselves, a birth in the family, or another event that brings forth feelings of togetherness and concern for those we love.

What is important in these times in your life is how you remove all of the inconsequential issues from the periphery of your life and focus on what is important. Like the passengers on the United Airlines flights on 9/11 when they knew it was going to crash. The first thing many of them did was call their loved ones. The partners of the passengers that died had the comfort that they were in their partners thoughts the moment they died.

I don’t know. Maybe I am taking all of this too far, but if you were aboard a plane about to crash, would your first thought be about being right in that argument you had with your husband or wife that morning? Or would it be about how much they mean to you and how much you love them?

So thinking about your marital crisis, how important is it to make your point and be right, and how important is it to just let it go and focus on what is really important? In times when your support is really  needed, how willing are you to drop all of your issues and help your partner?

While the issues might seem important to you at the time, when you are in the midst of an argument you need to consider how important the issues are going to be tomorrow, or in a week, or in a month. This should give you a clear indication how much emotional energy you invest into your marital conflicts. Weather the storm, and have faith in the fact that clearer weather is on the horizon.

It’s snowing again. I need to put another log on the fire.

When you say the words “..in sickness and in health..”, you never quite imagine that you are going to have to remember those words and live them out in perpetuity. This is none more so correct than when depression rears its ugly head in marriage.

What is it about depression that elicits such fear or stigma?

• Is it the stigma of having a mental illness?
• Is it fear about the reasons someone might be depressed?
• Or is it fear of the unknown?
• Equally, is it fear of not knowing what to do or how to cope with a depressed partner?

The first thing that needs to be pointed out is that depression is a lot more common than first thought, and that all of us experience levels of depression at stages in our lives. The difference between those that need extra help pulling them out of depression and those that don’t, is the level of depression that each of us face, and the personal coping mechanisms that we develop to deal with it.

One of the reasons depression largely goes undiagnosed is the stigma that is attached to having depression, and this can be seen or portrayed by society as a form of weakness. This is particularly hard for men to deal with, as the expectation is often that the male in the relationship is the rock that holds everything together. An image that springs to mind is that of the Marlboro man in therapy. The image just doesn’t seem right. Picturing the Marlboro man talking about emotions and needing help goes against the tough, strong, macho image that he is so famous for.

Yet the stigma doesn’t extend to other health problems. An example of this is erectile dysfunction. After the advertisments for prescription medication such as Viagra and Cialis, men are approaching their doctors for treatment more than ever before. Perhaps there is a lesson to take from this.

Awareness. Raising public awareness of problems such as depression helps break down the fears associated with it, and can help men seek treatment without the associated guilt or shame. Perhaps removing loaded terms such as “therapy” or “counseling” with terms such as “consultations” and “workshops” are a key step to breaking down barriers.

Here are some interesting sites to visit if you want more information on depression and understanding how to treat it:

It never ceases to amaze me.

I had dinner with an old friend from out of town the other night and we got to chatting about how each other’s relationships are going. It seems I’m not the only one with in-law problems. In fact, when sharing this fact with a few of my other friends, I was surprised to learn of the depth of feeling surrounding this topic.

How much do you think your in-laws contribute to your marital difficulties? This is a really interesting question, and the answers I received were quite varied, both in passion and perspective offered as an answer.

My friend from dinner explained that he had a mother that was struggling to come to terms with her son not living near her, and in her role as a mother now that she was not the most important female in her son’s life. The relationship between mother and son had deteriorated to the point that communication was intermittent and sparse, and her son’s homecoming for a week sparked little enthusiasm. Both were reacting to perceived hurt, and this was jeopardizing a relationship at a time when the son was only months away from celebrating his wedding day. This made me sad, as I remember a time when mother and son were very close, and each relied on the other not only as a family member, but as a friend. It made me sad to see the bond start to break over something that in my mind could be easily solved.

My friend will always need his mother, as all people do. But over the course of time, and as children grow up and develop relationships and start new families, the style of parenting has to change. It is a gradual progression from complete dependence, to nurture, to support, to guidance, and finally to letting go and having faith. Problems persist when this cycle is not duly recognized and people try to resist the forces which bring us from one step to the next.

In the case of my friend, he is hurt because he interprets his mother’s guidance and support as interference and a lack of faith in him. His mother interprets his reaction as a lack of love and recognition for her years of effort. Both of them overlook the fact that the roles of both mother and son have changed and that they need to find a new level of mutual love and recognize each other’s changed roles.

As much as mother and son wouldn’t give the other the satisfaction of knowing how hurt they were, the pain was obvious to me and I believe to a number of others around us. It amazes me how we are so hurt by those who are supposed to love us the most.

But in thinking about the relationship between mother and son, I started to think about the situation between my own partner and his mother. Similar to my friend, mother and son had shared a close bond through childhood, and circumstances had led to a breakdown in communication. Our situation was different however, but in many ways I wondered about the similarities. I was now the most important person in my partner’s life, and his mother saw me as a threat. Unwilling to acknowledge this change in priorities and role definition of a mother, we were attacked as a couple, both emotionally and physically in a set of events that will take some time to heal from or forgive.

But in the midst of these strong feelings of hurt and betrayal, I had to recognize something that maybe I didn’t want to: as much as I was hurt by my partner’s mother, she still remained his mother. Nothing would change that.

I’m not yet in a position where I am ready to forgive, but I can see a part of what motivated her to act the way she did. Part of it was a reaction to losing control of someone she cared about. But the biggest part of it was a deep sense of loss, of not being needed in the way she was needed when my partner was a child. It was also an unwillingness to change, and recognize that upon my arrival in her son’s life, a different style of parental caretaking is necessary.

In order to grow, we all need to change. Life is a constantly evolving cycle of changing roles both in our own lives and in other people’s. Sometimes we let these roles evolve and change, and other times we fight the inevitable, and in the process hurt ourselves and the feelings of others. In doing so we may delay the inevitable, or in many cases accelerate the forces of change that have so sharply become necessary in our own lives and in the way we interact with those we love.

Whether or not you get on with your in-laws, you need to examine your reasons for doing so. Do you threaten their belief system or gender role within the family, or do they threaten your belief system or role within your relationship? Do each of you challenge the other’s legitimacy to be the most important person in your partner’s life?

Once you have finished challenging each other, where does this leave your partner?

The key to healing in your family is in understanding your beliefs and reactions to people and perceived threats. As a partner, it is time to share legitimacy in the wider context of love. The fact that you and your in-laws both love your partner should bring you together. As a parent, it is time to let go and embrace a more holistic and less “hands on” style of parenting. And for all of us, it’s about recognizing the differences. 

The next step is to respond with love.

Things went a little less than perfect for my friend after returning home from dinner the other night. After what had been a nice night out with friends he returned home and had an argument over an impulse purchase of a treat for their cat.

At first glance it seemed like a really silly thing to be arguing over, but underlying this seemingly shallow argument was the symbolism of a much more important issue.

And it is the symbolism of our lives that often leads to passionate arguments and strong clashes in points-of-view. In the case of my friend, the symbolism of their argument was the possibility of raising children and what sort of parenting styles each parent would have. Having a pet is a seemingly innocent thing to do for many people, but for others it is a trial-run for parenthood, and an opportunity to foster and develop caretaking and nurturing skills and identify what sort of parenting style your partner has.

Wow! Who would have thought owning a cat or dog would have such deep implications! But when you think about it, there is symbolism in a lot of things we do, and it is in our symbolism that we attach meaning to the many things we do in our lives. Buying a rose is not simply an act of purchasing a flower. It symbolizes your love for your partner, or a moment in time that you were thinking of them with love.

So what does symolism teach us? It teaches us that some of the things we do in life have meaning. We do them for more than the simple reason of doing. It might add to your sense of purpose or achievement, or it might help you work towards your life plan. For one reason or another, it is important to you.

So the key to understanding those inane squabbles and arguments in your relationship is in understanding the symbolism or greater meaning that underlies your reason for fighting. It might be something that is aligned with your core values or beliefs you hold. It might be something about the person you aspire to be. Whatever it is, if you are able to understand the symbolism of your own life and communicate this to your partner, the act of identifying and sharing this symbolism will start a process in your relationship to deeper understanding.

And with this deeper understanding of your own and your partner’s symbolism comes deeper love. 

It’s one of those strange things. You can get two people to look at a picture and you can get two very different descriptions of what is in them. In fact, it is quite amazing how we let our circumstances and moods influence the way we see the world.

This was particularly true last weekend when I was talking with a friend of mine. She and her husband were married 6 months ago, and it was interesting to hear of her experiences in their short-lived marriage. Of particular interest to me were her repeated references to wanting to work on their marital problems, or more particularly the way they both communicate.

So many people see marriage as the golden apple, and once they have it they assume they will ride off into the sunset and leave the trivialities and problems in their relationship behind. After all, that’s what we are conditioned to believe in the fairytales isn’t it?

But what if Cinderella had abandonment issues from her childhood, or if Robin Hood was a controlling and dominant husband to Maid Marian due to repressed feelings from past relationships? What if Snow White suffered from a diminished sex drive due to her low self-esteem or depression? There is no such thing as happily ever after unless the two of you are committed to it.

Back to my friend however, and her situation. The insecurities that she had from her dysfunctional childhood had led her to have a very negative self-image, and she let her insecurities cloud her judgement of her marriage. She spoke of when her husband would finally get sick of her and decide to end their marriage. Her married life was an endless chapter of crises, and she spent all of her free time examining every word he told her for hidden meanings, perhaps indications that he too was going to leave her in the way her father did.

I was amazed. In  her efforts in focusing on the many negative things that might happen in her relationship, she was failing to focus on the many great things that were currently happening in her relationship. She had a home, her health, and the love and support of a great man. It might not be the type of love she would always want, and at times she might not understand it. But I told her simply to have faith.

That’s it. Have faith.

Have faith in the fact that her husband has his reasons for still being married. Have faith that he will climb into bed beside her every night because he wants to be there. And have faith that he loves you even if he doesn’t speak the love language that you want him to speak.

The glass is not half empty. It is half-full. It is often too easy to focus on what needs doing in your relationship rather than looking at all the good that you already have. So it’s all about attitude.

And a little faith.