The way that you think about your relationships and your life affects the way that you feel about yourself, your life and others. When you are able to think positively about life, you will feel better. Try an experiment for today. Choose one relationship that is troublesome to you … and find a way to look for a positive in that situation or that person.
If your boss is difficult, think of one thing about her/him that is positive such as “He does have a good smile” or “She did say that she likes the way that I handle customers.” If that is not possible, think of a positive thing about the situation such as “I am only at this job 40 hours a week and have many other things in my life that are fulfilling such as my spouse, children, home, etc. … and I can put this all in perspective.”
One woman recently told me that she was surprised by how much better she felt after she changed one habit. She no longer spent time with co-workers who were unhappy with the job and constantly complaining. Instead, she tried to only talk with others about neutral or positive things about the job … or about her life. Her job and the problems did not change but they were no longer so overwhelming for her and she no longer found herself thinking so much about them.
Showing posts with label troubled marriage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label troubled marriage. Show all posts
Monday, December 3, 2007
Friday, November 30, 2007
Are you feeling distance and loneliness from your partner?
One of the surprises for couples is that they have to work at their marriage and the connection that they have to their spouse. In today’s busy society with many distractions … from work and family to recreation and commitments with community, church, friendships, computers, etc. it is very easy to forget … or feel like there is not enough time to nurture the marriage. It is too easy to grow apart and feel distant from each other, and lonely for each other.
This is one of the main reasons that the divorce rate is so high in marriages where there are young children … careers and childcare overtake couple time and the marriage suffers as the adults do not nurture each other and their relationship. When couples grow distant from each other, they each often turn their time and attention, have their needs filled by, other people or other things. The territory then becomes fertile ground for affairs to develop.
John Gottman (Marital Therapy: A Research-Based Approach, John Gottman, PhD) noted that, in follow-up research, those marriages that were able to sustain changes made in counseling, are also ones who had the “Magic 5” hours of connection each week. This includes having 6 second kisses when you begin and end the day and telling each other 1 interesting thing that happened during the day. Finding 40 minutes each day to talk about what happened during the day (catching up with each other’s lives), finding 5 minutes a day … every day … to kiss, hold and touch each other, 5 minutes a day just to talk about what they like, appreciate and admire about each other and one 2-hour date each week.
Thursday, November 29, 2007
What Makes It So Hard To Remain Faithful To Your Spouse?
The causes of infidelity are complicated and can happen in good marriages as well as struggling ones.
Many affairs develop in marriages where couples have drifted apart because they have avoided conflict and resolving problems, are fearful of intimacy or have just not tended to the necessary feeding that a marital relationship requires. They can also occur when one person is depressed, unhappy in the marriage or within a social group where affairs are condoned. Affairs may happen at transition times in marriages, sometimes called “mid-life crises,” which are often opportunities for individuals to take stock of their life and evaluate what is “missing” and then look to others to fill that space.
In healthy marriages, it can take someone by surprise when feelings for another person develop, generally with a co-worker, neighbor or a friend that someone sees regularly and with whom a friendship develops into more as stories, experiences and life events are shared.
Multiple affairs generally indicate some personal problems with the person having affairs. Some are addicted to love, sex or self-affirmation. Often there is a family history of affairs often by the same sex parent and it is a “tradition“ accepted within the family. With some, there is a feeling of entitlement with little regard for the spouse’s feelings.
Emotional affairs may not involve a sexual relationship (intercourse); however they do involve secrecy from the spouse and sharing of intimate details in each other’s lives and can be as destructive, often even more so, than sexual affairs. Women are more likely to have emotional affairs, men are more likely to have sexual affairs.
Internet affairs are becoming more and more common. With today’s technology and easy access to others with similar interests or problems … as well as the opportunity to see “what is out there” in the single world, people can become emotionally open to another in ways that distance them from their spouse and the marriage.
Many affairs develop in marriages where couples have drifted apart because they have avoided conflict and resolving problems, are fearful of intimacy or have just not tended to the necessary feeding that a marital relationship requires. They can also occur when one person is depressed, unhappy in the marriage or within a social group where affairs are condoned. Affairs may happen at transition times in marriages, sometimes called “mid-life crises,” which are often opportunities for individuals to take stock of their life and evaluate what is “missing” and then look to others to fill that space.
In healthy marriages, it can take someone by surprise when feelings for another person develop, generally with a co-worker, neighbor or a friend that someone sees regularly and with whom a friendship develops into more as stories, experiences and life events are shared.
Multiple affairs generally indicate some personal problems with the person having affairs. Some are addicted to love, sex or self-affirmation. Often there is a family history of affairs often by the same sex parent and it is a “tradition“ accepted within the family. With some, there is a feeling of entitlement with little regard for the spouse’s feelings.
Emotional affairs may not involve a sexual relationship (intercourse); however they do involve secrecy from the spouse and sharing of intimate details in each other’s lives and can be as destructive, often even more so, than sexual affairs. Women are more likely to have emotional affairs, men are more likely to have sexual affairs.
Internet affairs are becoming more and more common. With today’s technology and easy access to others with similar interests or problems … as well as the opportunity to see “what is out there” in the single world, people can become emotionally open to another in ways that distance them from their spouse and the marriage.
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