Has the love that was once there gone out of your marriage? Discover the one underlying cause and what you can do to regain the love you had at the beginning of your relationship.
Has the love that was once there gone out of your marriage? Discover the one underlying cause and what you can do to regain the love you had at the beginning of your relationship.
Hi everyone. Dr. Margaret Paul here, and welcome to the Inner Bonding Podcast. Most people have at one time or another fallen in love, and so often, with the many 1000s of people I’ve worked with, they believe that this time their love will last. Yet, as we all know, their love often fades, and they don’t really know why.
There are many articles on what causes love to fade and what destroys relationships, and they list many causes, yet I haven’t found any that understand the one underlying cause behind all the various causes that are listed.
For example, we hear that one of the major reasons for relationship failure is a lack of good communication. And of course this is true. A lack of good communication causes many problems in relationships, such as emotional distance, distrust, feeling manipulated or gaslighted, a lack of sexuality, blaming each other, each person feeling like a victim of the other person, fears and doubts, conflicts with no way to reach resolution, and each partner feeling unseen, unappreciated, and unsupported.
But what leads to all these problems? There is an underlying issue, and if you’ve been hearing my podcasts or practicing Inner Bonding, you likely know what it is.
The underlying cause of communication issues and all these resulting problems is about intention. In Inner Bonding, there are only two intentions to choose from, and all of these issues result from an intent to control each other, rather than from an intent to learn about loving yourself and each other.
Think about conflicts you’ve had with a partner, or family members, friends, or colleagues. Imagine what would happen if you were open to learning about your false beliefs that may have led to your part of the conflict, and your partner was also open to learning about their part of the conflict. If both of you are open to learning about yourselves and each other, and you are using the conflict to learn and evolve in your ability to love, rather than to win an argument or get your partner to change with some form of controlling behavior, the conflict would not only get resolved in a way that feels good to both of you, but both of you will have learned and grown in your ability to love yourself and each other.
Whether conflicts are over finances, child raising, chores, politics, religion, addictions, sexuality, unreliability, or dishonesty, the inability to talk about and resolve these conflicts in ways where both people feel like winners. come from the intention to control your feelings and others, avoid responsibility for your feelings, and protect against pain. Even deeply painful issues such as infidelity can be learned from and resolved when both people are open to learning about themselves and each other. And it’s not likely that issues such as infidelity would even be an issue if both people were not trying to control in both overt and covert ways – such as anger, blame, compliance, resistance, or withdrawal.
When each person is intent on learning about their own dysfunctional patterns coming from their old programmed false beliefs, which we all bring into our relationships from our early programming in our families, then the relationship grows and deepens in love. But love rapidly fades in the face of all forms of controlling behavior.
Experts on marriage failure point to lack of communication, emotional distance, growing in different directions, financial issues, lack of common interests, infidelity, substance addiction, fighting, lack of support and respect for each other, lack of appreciation, and life stressors such as work and health issues, as the cause of relationship failure. But, as I said, these issues are the result of the one underlying cause of the intent to control. These issues can actually lead to learning, healing, growth, emotional closeness, and loving sexuality when dealt with, with an intention to learn.
Commitment to learning about yourself and your partner is what leads to love deepening over time. When you are open to learning about your own false beliefs and your resulting fears and forms of self-abandonment, as well as your unrealistic expectations regarding your partner, and your partner is also open to learning, your relationship will thrive. When you are both open to learning about what it means to love yourselves and take responsibility for your feelings, then both of you are open to sharing love, and the love grows and grows deeper.
The intent to learn about loving yourself and each other is the vital ingredient necessary to grow and sustain your love. Without this, no matter how much you felt in love at the beginning of the relationship, it’s likely that your love will fade as your dysfunctional controlling behaviors take over.
I’ve counseled individuals and couples for 56 years, and it still thrills me when a couple, especially a couple with children, choose to work on their troubled marriage instead of leaving it. When two people really want to save their marriage, they generally can. Even if one person wants to work on the marriage and the other doesn't, but the other is committed to staying in the marriage, great change and healing can occur. Sometimes it takes just one person to change a troubled system, but when both are devoted to doing their inner work, miracles can happen very quickly.
Such is the case with Robert and Karen, married 14 years with two children.
As I hope you know by now, the essential problem in troubled relationships is that each person is trying to control the other in different ways, and neither person is taking loving care of himself or herself. Each person is making the other responsible for their feelings of worth and safety, and neither is taking responsibility for their own happiness, worth, and safety. This is codependency.
Robert was trying to control Karen with his anger and withdrawal. When she wasn't attentive enough to him, such as not wanting to listen to him complain about work, or when she didn't feel like making love with him, he would invariably get angry and sullen. He hoped that by punishing her, she would give him what he wanted - what he felt that he needed in order to be okay.
Karen was trying to control Robert with her caretaking. She would listen to him go on and on complaining about work, way past the point of boredom. She would give in to him and make love when she wasn’t turned on, in the hope that he would love her and not be angry with her or have an affair or leave her for another woman. But Karen had reached a place of deep resentment. She was almost ready to leave rather than go on losing herself in the relationship. When she finally decided to be honest with Robert, he was more than willing to come into counseling with her.
When Robert and Karen started sessions with me, they both had the false belief that:
"I am responsible for making you happy and you are responsible for making me happy. This is why we are together - to make each other happy. Why else be together? When you are not happy, it is my fault, and when I am not happy, it is your fault." Again, this is called codependency.
It had never occurred to Robert or Karen that they were each responsible for their own happiness and wellbeing. It had never occurred to them that they were together to share their love rather than to get love. It was a totally new concept to them that they each had an inner child, their feeling soul self - and that they were each responsible for their own inner child – their own feelings. Each of them had been handing their inner child over to the other person, essentially saying, "Here. This child, my feeling self, is your responsibility." This is what creates codependency.
The problem with this is that just as an actual child will feel abandoned if you keep trying to give him or her to someone else to care for, your inner child feels abandoned the moment you make another person responsible for your feelings. Then you think that your abandonment feelings are coming from the other person not loving you, when they are really coming from you not loving you!
I worked with Robert and Karen, teaching them Inner Bonding. Within a few sessions and committed practice on their own false beliefs and resulting controlling behavior, Robert and Karen were sharing their love rather than trying to get love. They were moving beyond codependency.
Because they were both devoted to becoming aware of all the ways they were trying to control each other, and they were both devoted to learning to love themselves and share their love, the fun, joy, love, and passion were coming back in their relationship!
Are you in a long-term relationship where you are either fighting some or much of the time or feeling distant, disconnected, and without passion? Or do you find yourselves going along fine until a conflict arises, and then you can't seem to find way to resolve it? Do you either try to win by getting angry and defensive, or give in to avoid the other's anger and defensiveness? Do you find yourself shut down, numbed out, or resistant some of the time or much of the time? Do you and your partner love each other, but resentment is building because of all the unresolved conflicts and communication problems?
Relationship issues occur when the dual fears of loss of the other – of being rejected, and loss of self – of being engulfed and controlled, have been triggered.
Most people have learned protective ways of trying to have control over getting the love you want and avoiding the pain you believe you can't handle. As soon as one of these fears is triggered, you might automatically go into your learned ways of protecting against pain and trying to control the other person into being the way you want them to be. When you get angry, give in, withdraw or resist, this protective, controlling behavior often activates your partner's protective controlling behavior. The interactions that follow may be filled with anger, blame, judgment, defensiveness, explaining, denying, withdrawal, and resistance. Love does not flourish in the face of these difficult controlling interactions.
Here is where the practice of the Six Steps of Inner Bonding can gradually heal the relationship.
A simplified version of The Six Steps are:
Step 1 - Willingness to feel your painful feelings and take responsibility for them
Step 2 - Choose the intent to learn
Step 3 - Dialogue with the feelings
Step 4 - Dialogue with your Higher Power
Step 5 - Take loving action
Step 6 - Evaluate the action.
In Step One, you choose to be willing to feel your painful feelings and take responsibility for them, rather than turn to protective, controlling, addictive behavior.
You cannot change your automatic reactive controlling behaviors until you become aware of the feelings of fear and anxiety that trigger them.
What do you feel in your body when someone gets angry, blaming, or judgmental toward you?
What do you feel in your body when someone shuts down, withdraws, or becomes resistant toward you?
Take a moment to tune into your body and see what it feels like when your fears of rejection or engulfment become triggered. What happens in your stomach, your throat, your shoulders and neck, your face, your heart, your arms and legs? Does your body fill with adrenaline and go into the fight, flight, freeze, or fawn reaction?
You cannot begin to react differently when your fears of rejection or engulfment are triggered until you know that fear is being activated. You will unconsciously continue to respond with your learned protective controlling behavior until you become conscious of what you are protecting against.
We have all learned many ways of avoiding feeling and being conscious of our feelings. All addictive behavior - substance abuse, process addictions, reactive behavior toward others, and judgmental thoughts toward ourselves and others - are ways of avoiding feeling the deep loneliness and heartache, as well as feeling our helplessness over the other person's behavior and feelings, that is at the core of all addictive behaviors. When your partner behaves in some controlling rejecting or engulfing way toward you, this deep loneliness, heartache, and helplessness is activated. But these are such difficult feelings to feel that most of us will turn to our learned addictive behaviors to avoid them. We will either try to have control over the other person by getting angry, judgmental, or giving in, or we will try to control the pain of the loneliness, heartache, and helplessness with substance and process addictions.
The only way out of this is to be willing to feel the very challenging feelings of loneliness and heartache, and of helplessness over others, and learn to manage these feelings as a compassionate loving adult rather than avoid them. If you were to learn to accept and manage these feelings, rather than turn to your learned protective controlling behaviors, you would begin to change the dysfunctional relationship system that may be eroding your love.
Inner Bonding is a process for moving out of your automatic reactive behavior and into kindness and compassion toward yourself and your partner.
In Step Two of Inner Bonding, you consciously open to learning about your thoughts, beliefs, and behavior that are causing your pain. You let go of believing that it is your partner who is causing your wounded painful feelings of fear, anxiety, anger, hurt, rejection, abandonment, numbness, guilt, shame, aloneness, or depression, and you want to take responsibility for these feelings, as well as for lovingly managing the deeper painful feelings of life - the loneliness, heartache and heartbreak, and helplessness over the other person. In Step Two, you learn how to open to your higher, wiser self so that you can compassionately embrace your painful feelings and learn what they are telling about what you may be doing to cause them.
For example, Joan feels angry, alone, rejected, and abandoned because Justin spends a lot of time at work. Joan has been nagging Justin, judging him for his long hours and blaming him for her feelings. The result of this is that Justin is now even busier. He is in resistance to Joan, due to not wanting to be controlled by her.
Joan is using her anger and blame to avoid feeling her pain. She is addicted to having her eyes on Justin and making him responsible for her feelings. When he spends time with her, she feels happy and worthy, and when he doesn't, she feels anxious and insecure. She is anxiously attached.
If Joan were to practice Inner Bonding, she would start with Step One - welcoming and compassionately embracing her anger, aloneness, fear, and resentment. She would be with these feelings just as a loving parent would be with a hurting child - with deep kindness and compassion toward herself. She would make a conscious decision that she wants responsibility for being the cause of her wounded painful feelings.
Then, instead of going into her usual protective, controlling behavior of blaming Justin for her feelings with her anger, nagging, and complaining, she would move to Step Two, opening her heart to learning about what she might be telling herself and how she might be treating herself that is actually causing much of her pain. She would open to her higher, wiser self to help her stay open to learning. She would choose to be curious about her own beliefs and behavior, rather than judgmental toward Justin or herself.
When Joan moves into Step Two, she is moving out of being a victim and into personal responsibility.
This shift in her intention will immediately begin to change the interactions between Joan and Justin. When Joan shifts her intention from trying to control Justin with her anger, blame, and complaints, to learning about herself, her energy will completely shift. Justin will actually feel this energy shift, even if he is not in the same room as Joan. Energy is not local. We all unconsciously pick up when others are angry with us and when they are accepting and loving.
This intention shift is the vital key for healing a troubled relationship, because, as I’ve said, it’s the intention to control that’s the major underlying cause of relationship problems.
As long as your eyes are on your partner and you are trying to get your partner to change to make you feel better, you will continue to have a dysfunctional relationship. At those times when you are willing to feel your feelings and take responsibility for how you may be causing them, and you open to learning about your own fears and false beliefs, you will likely notice that your relationship quickly improves.
The shift out of trying to control your partner and into learning about loving yourself is one of the most major shifts you can make in your relationship and in your life.
In Step 3 of Inner Bonding, Joan investigates her beliefs and behavior that are causing her pain. From a place within of compassion and curiosity, Joan dialogues with her feelings of anger, aloneness, fear, and resentment. Imagining that she is a loving parent speaking with a hurting child, Joan asks her inner child questions:
Loving Adult Joan: Little Joanie, what am I thinking or doing or not doing that is causing you so much pain?
Inner Child Joanie: You keep telling me that Justin doesn't love me anymore. You are scaring me so much. Whenever Justin works a lot, you tell me that he is working because he doesn't love me anymore - that if he loved me, he would spend more time with me. You just keep telling me that there must be something wrong with me because Justin works a lot.
Now Joan moves into Step 4 - Dialoguing with her higher guidance. Joan imagines her personal concept of spirit - God, Goddess, her own higher older wiser self, an inner mentor or teacher, or a spiritual guide.
Joan asks her guidance: What is the truth about the belief that if Justin works late, he doesn't love me?
Joan relaxes and opens, moving out of her thinking mind and allowing the information to come through her from her guidance. Our guidance is always here for us, and we can access the information when we are open to learning about the truth and about loving actions toward ourselves, and we are eating clean, non-processed food to keep the frequency of our body high enough to access our guidance. It takes some time, but eventually Joan receives the following information:
Higher Guidance: Sometimes Justin works late because he has a lot of work to do, and it has nothing to do with you. Sometimes he works late because he is afraid of your blaming and nagging. He loves you, but he doesn't always feel loved by you, and his way of dealing with feeling unloved by you is to stay away.
One way we know what is true from our guidance and what is a lie from our wounded self is how it makes us feel.
When Joan tells herself that Justin doesn't love her, she feels alone and afraid. When she tells herself the truth from her guidance, she feels clear and peaceful.
Joan asks her guidance: What are the loving actions toward myself? What actions would be in my highest good?
Higher Guidance: Instead of focusing on what Justin is doing and how much time he is spending with you, focus on what would be fun for you to do when he is late. His being late gives you a chance to catch up with your friends, to read, and to do the creative things you enjoy doing. You can also take the dance class you have wanted to take. You will feel much better when you just take care of yourself instead of making Justin responsible for you. He will want to spend more time with you when he sees you happy than when you are always unhappy and complaining.
Now Joan moves into Step 5 - taking the loving action.
She stops nagging Justin and starts taking care of herself. Instead of always waiting for Justin to come home, she makes plans to have dinner with a few of her girlfriends. When she comes back from dinner, she is happy to see Justin and he is happy to see her. He is especially happy to see that she is happy rather than angry with him.
Joan signs up for a dance class and gets back into practicing the piano. On those evenings when she has nothing planned, she gets into reading her mystery novels, which she loves. She stops telling herself that Justin doesn't love her when he works a lot.
As Joan takes these loving actions on her own behalf, she moves into Step 6 of Inner Bonding - tuning in to how she is feeling. She notices that she is no longer feeling anxious, alone, and resentful. Instead, she is feeling happy and peaceful - regardless of whether or not Justin is there.
Much to Joan's surprise, she finds that Justin is no longer working such long hours.
She sees that what her guidance told her is true - that Justin does love her and wants to be with her, but not when she is angry, needy and resentful. By taking care of herself, Joan has completely changed the relationship dynamic between her and Justin - without ever even speaking with Justin about it. By taking care of herself instead of making Justin responsible for her happiness and sense of worth, her fear of rejection is well on the road to being healed. As long as she was rejecting herself by allowing her wounded self to tell her the lie that Justin didn't love her, she would be reactive to Justin not being there. In no longer abandoning herself, she no longer feels abandoned by Justin.
While Justin has not done the inner work to heal his fears of rejection and engulfment - which he may or may not do - his fears have lessened due to Joan's loving behavior toward herself and toward him. Because his fears are no longer getting triggered by Joan, he wants to spend more time with her.
In order for his fears to be healed, he would need to learn how to take loving care of himself in the face of another's anger and criticism. If he learned and practiced Inner Bonding, he could learn how to do this, but Joan has no control over whether or not he chooses to do his inner work. As long as Joan continues to take loving care of herself, she can create her own happiness within her marriage, and not be invested in whether or not Justin opens to learning about himself.
If Justin had continued to work long hours and showed no interest in having a closer relationship with Joan, then at some point Joan might have decided to leave the relationship. But most people leave far too soon. The time to leave is after doing the inner work necessary to develop a strong inner adult capable of taking loving care of yourself. If, after doing this for a good period of time, your partner is still angry, distant, and unavailable, you might consider leaving.
Often, it takes just one partner to change a dysfunctional relationship system. Before deciding that your marriage can never be what you want it to be, try practicing Inner Bonding. You might be amazed at the results!
I invite you to join me for my bi-monthly masterclass and receive my live help, which you can learn about at https://innerbondinghub.com/membership.
And, I invite you to heal your relationships with my 30-Day online video relationship course: Wildly, Deeply, Joyously in Love.
And you can learn so much about loving yourself, creating loving relationships, and healing from my newest book, “Lonely No More: The Astonishing Power of Inner Bonding” and from our website at https://www.innerbonding.com.
I’m sending you my love and my blessings.