Executive Marriage Coach – I Thought My Marriage Was OK

“I thought my marriage was OK”. This was the lament of a young man who came in with his wife to see me for coaching. A couple of months ago his wife informed him that she has been unhappy in their marriage for about five years and now is thinking about leaving. How could they have such drastically different perspectives on their marriage?

The simple answer is really bad communication. In reality, things are never quite so simple. The problems in this relationship stem from multiple issues, including how they have dealt with past experiences, differences in how they think, how they are motivated, and how they deal with emotions. They also have not learned how to understand and meet one another’s basic needs.

I remember feeling lost and confused in my marriage at different points in time. It is not easy to work through tough times. However, the rewards of pushing through and hanging in there can be great. For example, my wife and I recently had a great visit with our daughter and her husband and our wonderful granddaughter. Seeing the next generation living healthy and happy lives is sweet indeed. These are the good times.

For the young couple in my office there is hope. They have finally started to confront their problems and really talk to each other. Even though telling the truth hurts, it is a necessary part of recovery. If you are in a hard place in your marriage right now please don’t give up before you do everything you can to work it out. Imagine yourself happily married for 40 years and reaping the rewards of enduring love. Hold unto that thought and make it happen.

Here are a few tips:
1. Decide to be happy and make marriage your priority
2. Share your honest thoughts and feelings with your partner. Not “you make my life miserable”, but “this is what is going on with me right now”.
3. Find out what is most important to your partner today. If you listen to the feedback openly you will hear the themes. What is the underlying need, fear, or pain that is being communicated?
4. Once you know what is most important, sincerely try to respect and meet the need or concern with love as consistently as possible.

Give not in order to receive but to become capable of giving more. Love generates love.

p.s. I have been working hard on ways to help you “re-imagine marriage”. Stay tuned.

Executive Marriage Coach – How to Stretch your Love Capacity

Why won’t you meet my needs? A client recalled this lament from his wife, which in essence was the accusation: “you have the ability to meet my needs, you’re not doing it, and furthermore you’re not doing it on purpose”.   Upon further exploration it became clear that in spite of this man’s efforts to meet his wife’s needs he could not satisfy her demands.  She had taken on the role of victim and projected blame onto him.  He, in turn, felt helpless and stuck and projected blame back onto her for being impossible to please.

This situation illustrates a common struggle in marriage relationships.  The real problem is a misguided assumption that one’s spouse is responsible for and capable of meeting our core needs and fulfilling us.  That is not possible any more than any other external source can validate us, fulfill us, and make us whole.  Wholeness is a journey that happens from the inside out and is both an emotional and spiritual process.  We must own that responsibility for ourselves and open ourselves to love from within, from our spiritual source.  Then we can effectively give and receive love in our external relationships.

This client came to see that once he got clear about the issue of responsibility there were several commitments he was able to make to his wife.  These are commitments to support her in her journey towards finding wholeness at her own pace, to be engaged and present in the relationship, to create a loving space for her to learn, and to not blame his wife for what she needs.  Paradoxically letting go of the expectation of meeting another’s needs allows us to be instrumental in helping our partner get those needs satisfied.  This may not result in what you hope for from your partner but it is worth doing anyway because in the process of keeping these commitments you will be stretched and increase your capacity to be a loving human being.

Executive Marriage Coach – Do the Inner Work First

Be careful of things that promise easy and simply solutions to complex problems. The Law of Attraction is one such solution that is often misleading.  If it’s so easy, why are so many still stuck?

One of my new clients told me how she uses dreams and visualizations in the hope of creating her ideal life.  She described how she imagines herself already having all the things she wants and feels the joy and excitement of those dreams.  This is exactly what books on law of attraction say you are supposed to do. Yet, she continues to attract the same dead end relationships and is stuck in a low-paying job.

The reason this client is not attracting what she wants in her life is that her dreams are not congruent with who she is at this point. Since childhood she has used fantasy to escape from reality, which by the way was painful and dysfunctional.  So for her, visualizing and dreaming became a means of compensating and denying her real thoughts, feelings, and circumstances.

Her skills at visualization will be helpful to her down the road but she needs to set it aside right now and deal with reality.  She has to honestly confront her core beliefs, assumptions, and self-image and learn to understand herself in a new light.  She needs to allow herself to heal the unspoken grief she carries inside.  Then she will be able to see herself with more compassion, work on forgiveness, and be able to love and accept herself for who she really is.  As she grows forward into higher emotional well-being she will then begin to attract what she desires, as her self-image, attitudes, behaviors, and beliefs align.

This may sound like too much work and pain but it is the road less traveled, which leads to true prosperity. Don’t be discouraged by the journey.  This is critical to the health of your relationships and your sense of well-being. Find a good coach or therapist who understands how to guide you through the inner work and keep moving forward.  You are worth the effort.

Executive Marriage Coach – And a Man Shall Leave his Mother…

There are many developmental issues that influence your ability to be a healthy partner in your marriage.  One issue that everyone has to work through is separating from one’s family of origin.  Separating is not about leaving your family behind, not caring about them, or rejecting anyone.  I’m talking about the emotional and psychological work of knowing yourself as an adult with your own identity, which includes defining your own values, beliefs, and world view.  Until you do this work, you will continue to play  the role you played in childhood and be unable to fully engage as a mature partner in your marriage.

Why does it matter?  If you are still playing out unconscious roles it is most likely leading to conflict in your marriage. Do you end up fighting about the same issues over and over?  Are you particularly sensitive about certain issues, especially related to your family, and not sure why?  If so you most likely think your spouse is the problem.  However, you won’t be able to resolve the conflict until you are willing to look in the mirror and work through your own development issues.

How?  Begin by being an honest observer of yourself and your family system.  If you can watch interactions in your  family without getting wrapped up in them you start to see yourself and them differently.  When you stay in contact with your family and consciously choose to respond in new ways you are redefining your relationships. For example, if you typically get angry at your mom, try being more patient and seeing her from a different perspective.  If you  typically are passive around your father, try out more assertive responses.  Over time you will gain confidence in yourself and be able to be less defensive with your spouse as well. Then you may find he or she is less defensive also and you can learn to help each other work through the things that get in the way of connecting in deeper ways.

Please let me know if you have specific questions, comments, or examples about this.  I value your feedback.

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