Couples

I've been absent from the blog for several weeks while writing a book, and then another book.

I'll talk more about how perfect this book manifestation has been in my life, but for now, I have a subject that intrigues me that I'd like to share with you.

Kim Kardashian!

No, I'm not really kidding, because I always look at people through the lens of Law of Attraction, and this a great example to share, along with an excerpt from my counseling study guide about couples.

Here's an excerpt from the book  (meant for counselors)

Couples come to therapy because they believe the dynamic of their relationship is making them unhappy. 

Often they believe they need a third party to convince their partner that he/she needs to change.

They are struggling in some stressful situation and looking to each other for comfort, but neither is able to give it, so they blame each other.

The first step in establishing a paradigm shift in the couple is to say to each of them, “You are not responsible for your partner’s happiness.”  And

“Your partner is not responsible for your happiness.”

And as in all situations, the circumstance is not making you unhappy, your thoughts are making you unhappy.

When you ask someone else to behave in a way that will make you feel better, or when you say I cannot feel better until this problem is solved, that is the definition of conditional love.  You are saying, “I cannot love (be happy, be who I really am: a loving, whole, inspired, inspiring person) unless this condition changes.”

What if each partner was responsible for his/her own happiness?  If they truly assert their own power to make themselves happy, each partner would be with a happy person.  How would that partnership feel? 

What does it feel like to be in the presence of a happy person?  It feels joyous.  It feels fun and funny and spontaneous.  It feels real and free and powerful and tremendously loving.

What does it mean to make yourself happy within a relationship?

The word “selfish” comes up (from people who don’t know what it really means).

What does ‘selfish’ mean?  It means being fully your self.  Life is only experienced through self.

What are the wishes of each person within the relationship?  They were drawn together because they will mutually benefit each other and are a match in many ways.

Do they desire the same type of relationship?  Do they both desire monogamy?  Do they each desire children or not?  Do they desire a domestic life or an adventurous life? 

Let’s discuss the concept of seeking others’ approval.

Our society teaches a sort of value-by-approval system.  Early on, parents approve of behaviors and exhibit love and approval when we behave in a certain way, ie, when we do something that makes the parent feel good. It feels good to get their approval.  It feels bad to lose it. Conditional love.

We are then taught a grading system in school, which rates our behavior and our ability to perform according to our age and in comparison to others.  It feels good to get an A it feels bad to get a D.

We’re taught to compete and compare with one another for approval.

We’re taught that we can’t win the mate we want unless we look good enough or make enough money or have that ‘thing’ that gives us the upper hand over others.

We’re told we can’t compete in the job market unless we work hard and outperform others.  And people who make more money are respected more and have more power than people who make less. 

This societal training replaces our own natural inner sense of well-being and goodness and perfection with that of a fickle, transitory, endless, false seeking of others’ approval.

This is contrary to what we were born knowing; We were born as a perfect, whole, worthy expression of (source energy) God.  The idea of ‘earning’ value and love and well-being is a complete fallacy and illusion.

Within a couple, if you think you need to hold the approval of your mate in order to feel good you will be repeatedly disappointed with him and/or with yourself.

Think of the implications; you feel good when someone is gazing upon you with love.

You feel loved and deserving of that love.  This is especially apparent when you are ‘falling in love.’

What happens when his gaze is focused on work or other people in his life?  Or what happens when he is in a bad mood while focused upon you?

Are you no longer loved?  Are you no longer deserving of love?  Is he no longer holding up his end of the bargain? What’s wrong with him?

What’s wrong with you that he’s no longer focusing on you with adoration?

He cannot feel love while feeling frustrated or overwhelmed or guilty or powerless…  It has nothing to do with you!

The very idea of feeling good being reliant upon others’ behavior is doomed to heartache.  It’s a powerless, unnatural, painful state of being.

Freedom is the most important, most natural state for any individual.  Freedom is a sense of self-empowerment.

Let’s look at the perception of lack of freedom with in a relationship.  When someone feels trapped they seek freedom because they know freedom is their natural state of being.  A ‘trapped’ person confuses physical freedom with emotional freedom.

Real freedom is freedom of thought.  Freedom is feeling free to feel good no matter what.  Freedom is acting upon inspiration not motivation (taking action while feeling good, not taking action in order to feel good.)   Freedom is feeling responsible for one’s own emotions and not another’s.  Freedom is the antithesis of obligation.  Freedom is the ability to love unconditionally.   Freedom is belief in one’s own and in others’ unique, perfect path and the trust in well-being.

If this couple has decided they have desires which are in concert with one another, and that they value each other’s own responsibility for happiness, their partnership will thrive.

How do each of them “assert their own power to make themselves happy”?

1. Focus daily, hourly, moment-to-moment on feeling good by focusing on things to appreciate and by stopping negative thought.

2. When feeling bad, focus on thoughts that feel better.

3. Release your partner’s responsibility for your happiness.

4. Trust and respect your partner’s path and know that their experience is their own and does not have anything to do with your well-being.

5. Trust in your own well-being.

6. Release all impulses to control anything about your partner.

7. Makes lists of things you appreciate about your partner often.

8. Relish those moments when you both come together feeling wonderful.  Remember those moments.  Recall them throughout the day. 

9. Intend to have conversations only when feeling good.  Excuse yourself from any conversation in which you don’t feel good. Say, “I need some time to feel better (or get back to myself or back in the vortex, or back to God, or whatever sounds right to you)

10. Do things for one another out of inspiration, not motivation. (inspiration comes from within, motivation from without)

Never agree to do something for your partner in order to please her (and gain approval for you).  Say, ‘let me think about your request’; make yourself feel good; then consider the request. 

If you want to do it out of love and inspiration, do it.  If you don’t want to do it, lovingly decline.

  

In therapy, sometimes one member of the couple seems more open to suggestion, more willing to change.  Lead him or her in feeling good and the other will likely follow.

Feeling good is contagious.

  

If one or both of them are feeling angry (or vengeful), a one-on-one session is called for.

(refer to the Emotional Scale)

Anger is almost always an indication that the client has been feeling powerless.

The impulse to feel anger or rage or revenge is a natural movement toward feeling better.  Anger has energy, where powerlessness has none.  Anger (rage or revenge blame or even jealously) feels much better than guilt or grief or sadness or victim hood (powerlessness).

Powerlessness feels so bad because it is as far as one can get from his connection to his true self.

The goal when counseling a powerless-feeling person through anger and beyond, (ultimately to appreciation and love and empowerment), is to emphasize that this is a process of energy and thought (and faith and trust) within one’s self, and never one of action.

In couple’s therapy, the likely target for anger is the partner, since this is the issue that is most current. 

The partner need not know of any of the statements made.

If you can get the client to feel angry on purpose, and acknowledge that 1) he feels better, and 2) he felt better under his own power, this is the key to self-empowerment.

It doesn’t matter whether the statements of anger are justifiable or fair.  It only matters that the client feels a sense of relief.

A common scenario on the path toward feeling better: rage- revenge-anger- less anger…  Then blame.  Then disappointment.

These are simply statements made by the client which make him feel better. 

Have him make a statement and gauge how he feels.  If a statement doesn’t produce a feeling of relief, try another.  Once the feeling of relief is reached, have him make a few statements within that better-feeling place to solidify the feeling.

Everyone is different.  On the emotional scale you can see which emotions are better-feeling as you go up the scale.  It’s not possible to jump very far on the scale in one thought.  Have the client work his way up gradually.  The key is a feeling of relief.

After disappointment often comes frustration or impatience.  Statements of pessimism are often an illumination of possibility, if only for a moment.

Contentment is the key to “making peace with what is”.  Statements that reflect contentment acknowledge that things are not so bad and that there are good things about the relationship.  These are encouraging signs, which lead to hope and optimism and eagerness and ultimately, appreciation.

The ideal way to end a session that started with anger is to end with appreciation for the partner.

Feelings of appreciation and love are natural and life-giving and empowering.
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I'll keep following Kim's shows.  Yes, it's hard, but it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make in the name of research.  She may decide that this event was painful enough to warrant a look at the power of her own emotions  But if she doesn't, we'll likely see some more embarrassed/powerless manifestations.