April 9, 2008
by Rod Smith
“Our daughter has a great boyfriend. They are being wise. She has concerns about his feelings of insecurity and poor self-image. She is sometimes inclined to break up with him. However, he is very kind and they get on very well. I’ve recommended that she challenge him to get help as a pre-condition to marriage – rather than hoping that they will improve with time. I wonder if it is better rather that she give the relationship, or give him, more of a chance by saying that if he changed they could stay together. She is reluctant to challenge him for fear of doing him permanent damage, making his issues worse, and she wonders where ‘unconditional love’ comes into the question?” (Edited length only)
His “condition” will not improve with time, and it will not improve unless he becomes intimately engaged in a process of self-discovery, quite unrelated to your daughter. She is NOT the key to his emotional salvation. His growth should not be offered as a way to keep the relationship. Together or not, the young man will have to look at his fragile being and come to grips with what he offers the world.
Posted in Difficult Relationships, High maintenance relationships |
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April 7, 2008
by Rod Smith
1. Are clear and “up front” as possible about your expectations when facing new or changing circumstances.
2. Rehearse difficult conversations with a trusted friend before you have to engage in them.
3. Engage at deeper and more meaningful levels of conversation with people in your immediate family.
4. Work hard at ridding your self of debt.
5. Meet regularly with a small group of men and women who share your interests, your passions, and your burdens.
6. Forgive others for real or imagined grievances against you.
7. Creatively imagine ways to enhance and empower those whom you think may not have your best interests at heart.
8. Give handsomely to your house of faith, your former school, and to a charity you respect.
9. Write a brief history of your life, going into detail even over the most difficult issues you have ever faced.
10. Simplify your life by ridding yourself of unnecessary possessions.
11. Resist doing things for people they are fully capable of doing for themselves.
12. Resist expecting others to do for you the things you are fully capable of doing for yourself.
Posted in Boundaries |
1 Comment »
April 3, 2008
by Rod Smith
“I have left my husband for another man and I worked so very hard to start a new life with him. It is not easy at all. I ended up more alone than before and was fueled with anxiety and had to take medication. I lost interest in everything just about because I loved this man so much. He is now drifting away from me and I am alone. My marriage is over and I am about to lose my children because of what I have done. I loved this ‘other’ man much more then he loved me and now I feel the effects. It’s the worst feeling in the world to love some one so much when you cannot fully have them.” (Minimal edits)
Your heart has deceived you and resulted in enormous consequences for you and your family. I repeat: extramarital affairs are seductive – seducing participants from the real issues within the marriage and resulting in a new relationship destined to be flawed. The impulse for an affair (need this be said?) is a strong signal that the marriage, not the third party, requires attention.
Posted in Affairs |
39 Comments »
April 2, 2008
by Rod Smith
I frequently get letters from women who cannot seem to forgive a husband or partner’s unfaithfulness. “Even though it was 10 years ago and I have said I forgive him, it still haunts me,” writes one person. “He expects me to just get over it as if it is no real issue at all,” writes another. “He rolls his eyes at me, he sighs, as if it is my issue – and HE was the one who cheated!”
Infidelity violates sacred trust, and, while most relationships are resilient, and can survive much stress and trauma, infidelity often serves the deathblow to all vibrancy in the marriage (even if a couple stays married for years after the ending of an affair) for it undercuts the very humanity of the partner who has offered her mind, her soul, her spirit and her body in loving and appropriate abandon.
Posted in Affairs |
2 Comments »
April 1, 2008
by Rod Smith
“You write, to a woman asking for help with her son that if she gets her attitude right she might see a shift in her son’s attitude. Just because she has a ‘right attitude’ it doesn’t mean her son will. It seems to me you were a little heavy handed with someone asking for your advice. I am a single mother and two of my three children are boys. My boys are very respectful of women because they have been taught by me to be that way from a very early age. My feelings for their father have nothing to do with it. At the age of 11 it will be difficult to change the attitude of a son but can still be done. Let him know that his attitude and behavior toward women is uncalled for and will not be tolerated. It can be difficult for a woman to raise a son alone especially when the father is not much help but it can be done.” (Edited for clarity)
As I said, attitudes are contagious. It seems your no-nonsense approach has paid off for you and for your children. Congratulations on your success. I am sure your children have thrived, at least partly, as a result of your forthrightness.
Posted in Children, Communication, Parenting/Children |
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