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marriage

Design Your Life

The Marriage Ref on Review

03/10/2010

I recently watched The Marriage Ref which premiered earlier this month on NBC. According to Wikipedia.com, the premise of the show involves real life couples who have been having an on-going fight for a long time. A video clip is shown to the three-member celebrity panel, showing both sides of the argument. The panel then discuss the merits of each side of the argument and vote on who they think is right.

MarriageRef01

While this show is one of the funniest I’ve seen in a long time and aims to do the right thing – give both sides a voice and listen to each argument – it doesn’t necessarily translate into creating change or fostering the proper habits for the couple. It starts to play off of what I call “Smart Heart Skills and Dialogue,” but they were not able to define and enact these skills. The Smart Heart Skills were validated but undone by the actors doing cheerleading into each other being right and wrong. Smart heart skills are not about being right and wrong as opposed to “walking in the others shoes” and making the person feel safe.

When I instruct couples to use Smart Heart Dialogue, it’s as a way to move beyond the anger and blame that typically is placed when an argument or disagreement comes to a stalemate. It can be used for smaller, more inconsequential arguments as well as larger conflicts, even when faced with infidelity.

Utilizing this type of dialogue is important in learning to fight fair as a couple. Fighting and disagreeing are not bad things, in themselves. Learn how to fight fair. It’s a misperception that fighting is bad; a relationship without passion enough to launch arguments likely won’t last for the long haul. However, arguing in the wrong way can also drive a relationship into the ground. I encourage having a weekly ten minute “Smart heart”-to-heart with a figurative emotional “bullet proof vest” to protect from hurt, anger and defensiveness, as you listen and echo back what you heard.

This type of discussion can open up the doors to putting the emotionality of a certain topic aside – whether it be finances, life decisions, career changes, fidelity, or a host of other things – and allow the couple to be honest with each other in a safe, loving space. Of course, this doesn’t mean that each person has a right to be angry and hurtful – quite the opposite. This exercise is designed to take the heated emotion out of a discussion so that the couple can share their feelings without a threat of emotion or anger getting thrown in the mix.

lovesm

These types of habits can be the glue that helps to create passion in a relationship, even during and spite of disagreements and conflict. This may start out as basically as telling your partner you HAVEN’T been communicating these feelings and asking them to be patient with you while you learn how to go through this process. It may involve treating eachother with more respect, and being more mindful of the problems at hand during heated arguments.

Events Coming Up

April 4th at 9pm EST
Discovery Health Channel “Unfaithful” featuring Dr. Bonnie and her patients on adultery/cybersex.

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Design Your Life

Carpe Diem: Seize the Day

03/09/2010

There was a time in my life when wake-up calls would have to be pretty dramatic for me even to notice. I was so reluctant to come out of my little status quo cocoon, and it would take quite a crisis for me to wake up and see what was important. But in each of those instants where I would suddenly wake up, I’d see exactly what was important, how precious life is… only to crawl back in my cocoon again.

Nonetheless, those intermittent moments of being awake in time built up to help me change my life, and these days I use them as markers on my path, to remind me why I’m here and which direction I’m heading. If I wake up one morning feeling a little stiff or tired, instead of sitting around and moaning about how I’m getting older, I can go for a brisk walk and know that this is my body’s way of reminding me that exercise is important. If I don’t get something that I had asked for, I know that it’s either on its way, or something better is. I don’t sit and wonder whether I don’t deserve the things I want, or whether I’m just not good enough. Not holding back from loving someone was the hardest wake-up call of all, as I learned it when my father suddenly died at age 63. I had tried to punish him for not meeting my expectations of love, and I was waiting for him to come to the realization that I was right.

There are still still times when I’m aware that the path is never-ending, that one always has to practice vigilance in order to stay awake and be present. As I sit at my desk, I suddenly hear fire trucks in the distance, and I silently send out blessings to the rescue team and the people they are being sent out to rescue. Then I take a look at the collection of objects on my desk, and it’s fitting that the alarm of the sirens should make me take notice. Here are all the things that represent what I love, put there specifically so I will have a constant reminder, and yet sometimes I can lose focus until the sirens bring me back again. My pocket astrologer, a Buddha figurine, notes from friends and family, photos of everyone I love most, a small angel sculpture, and of course a few chocolates are all things I still see right through sometimes. But at least these days, the sirens are needed less and less, as my vigilance has supplemented my desire to be awake and present. For this I’m very grateful.

I’m reminded of a Zen story, one where all the masters gathered together to discuss where the Key of Life should be hidden. One master was adamant that the top of a mountain would be a great hiding place, but the others disagreed. Another master suggested that maybe the bottom of the sea would be better, but again he was met with unanimous dissent. Discussion went back and forth for quite some time, and finally, just when it seemed like all the good ideas had been used up and rejected, one master stood up. “I’ve got it!” he exclaimed. “Let’s hide the key in the one place that humans never search: inside themselves.” Everyone agreed that was the best place to place the key, and there it remains to this day.

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Ask Miseducated Design Your Life

Ask Miseducated: Who is more sexually evolved?

03/08/2010

Have a question you’re just dying to know the answer to? Want to discuss something extensively in email with us? Please send us an email and we’ll forward it to the appropriate Miseducated writer.

Reader

I’m very curious to hear why there is such a strong border at the point where one drops ones drawers. Why do you consider that to be the place where there is no turning back? If you look at aboriginal societies, and even at other naked societies like those of primates, obviously there are no drawers there to drop, and yet they manage to have quite evolved sexual societies, and they raise children who also grow up to understand sexuality in an intelligent way. So why is it so different for us?

Maryanne

This question of the line of demarcation is an important one, and to understand why dropping drawers is such an important boundary, we have to compare our culture to the ones of naked societies. Ted Bundy once said that he believed that violence against women would continue for as long as pornography exists in our society. There is a dehumanizing element in our media that makes us think of each other as objects, or worse, as predators and prey. This may explain why aboriginal and primate societies are more sexually evolved than we are – they are not exposed to these victimizing elements.

Unfortunately, we are not at the point yet where we can have a naked, peaceful, safe society, and there are no government warnings or instruction manuals for how to avoid the pain and suffering that people go through in relationships. In our current societal context, I can see a direct corollary between that suffering and the dropping of drawers. When people do not stop to consider the consequences, that’s when the suffering takes root. If we can find a way to resist this impulse a little longer, to pause and think about the responsibilities and consequences of sex, we will have a greater chance of creating healthy and lasting relationships.

Since we aren’t provided with a manual instructing us on the best ways to handle ourselves in this sexually complicated society of ours, I wrote Hindsight, What You Need to Know Before You Drop Your Drawers as a response to the need for people to have another way to react when they find themselves at that all-important line of demarcation. If we could just build our self-discipline to delay our gratification, we would find that there is freedom in that discipline, a way to make choices for ourselves that we cannot experience when we simply react to our initial impulses. If we can strengthen our muscles of self-discipline on a global scale, over time, there is the hop that we can evolve into a society that understands and values the things which are naturally sacred, rather than just stampeding over the line of no return.

But there’s another aspect to consider, as well, and that is the very fact that we are able to consider. That we have the capability to stop and think about our actions before we commit to them, is one of the chief differences between us and primates. We have the ability not only to delay dropping our drawers, but to decide not to drop them at all, if we don’t feel it’s best for us. But there is certainly a lot we can learn from the naked cultures of aboriginals and primates. If we can find good relationship models in those societies, who cares if they are not like us? If observing and learning from other people or even animals can help us determine the best time to drop our drawers, I can’t see that there is any harm in that!

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Design Your Life

Single for Valentine’s Day

02/12/2010

“Where can you go to meet people if you’re single?” the reporter asked. He was writing a column about Valentine’s Day, and I had agreed to help him out.

“It depends on what you’re looking for,” I replied. “The right place for you to go may not be the right place for anyone else. I mean, I couldn’t recommend a restaurant for you until I know what kind of food you like! There’s no point in telling you to go to my favorite seafood restaurant if you hate fish.” This is the problem with the singles community: many people think that there’s one magic place out there to meet the right people, and that the same solution should work for everyone.

Sure, that approach is fine if you’re not terribly picky about whom you end up with, but most of us probably want something a little more specific. In that case, you have to take the time to identify what that specific thing is, what you want and what would make you happy. Once you are clear about your own feelings and desires, then it’s time to go out and find people who share those same values. Ask yourself, where would those sorts of people hang out? Those are the places that you need to go. If you surround yourself with like-minded people and let your true self shine through, a lot of great things will start happening.

“But how can single people cope with being alone on Valentine’s Day?” he wondered.

“There’s no coping necessary if you think of Valentine’s Day as a celebration,” I said. “Just like any other aspect of life, you can choose to be positive or negative. If there’s no one pampering you, do it yourself! Get out there and have the things you want, buy yourself flowers, get spa treatments, or whatever makes you happy. Life will turn around and treat you exactly how you treat yourself, so this is a perfect chance to give yourself some love and attention. If you are true to this intention and stick with it, you’ll attract the right people sooner than you realize.”

He asked again about the best places to find romance, so I tried repeating my point in a different way. “The place you need to find romance is inside yourself. There is nothing out in other places except a reflection of what’s within you. So the focus needs to be inward, taking care of yourself and what you want, and then focusing on putting that message out into the world. If you go out knowing exactly who you are and what you’re looking for, you will end up at the right places to find those things and people.”

The reason people keep finding the same disappointment again and again is because they keep looking in random places and settling for things they don’t really want. So if you want to do this right, find your real self first, focus on what makes you truly happy, and go out concentrating on doing what you love.

In short: it’s about what’s within you, not about what’s out there. Focus in the right direction and you’ll start having the things you want reflected back to you!

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Escapeland

The Parmahansa Ballerina

02/02/2010

At the last moment, I turned right instead of driving straight. “I think we should have some really clean food instead,” I said as I headed down the road to one of our other favorite places. Within a few minutes, we were already there.

The manager greeted us warmly and loudly. You know that comedy show, “Cheers”? Kind of like that, but instead of this place being packed with beer-bellied Republicans, it catered more to the very far Left. Very far.

As we placed our orders, my husband looked at the women on the couch next to ours. “Oh, what a cute dog,” he said. The woman was wearing an almost see-through long skirt, and a knitted hat. “He assists with healing,” she said.

She must have seen the perplexed look on my face, and she began to explain. “He works with cancer patients sometimes, or whatever is needed,” she said. “He takes on the energy of the person he is healing. I named him Buddha,” she added as an afterthought. My husband chuckled and replied, “yes, of course,” half-joking.

I asked the woman about her work. “I’m actually a nun,” she said. “Well, not really – a Swami in the Tibetan lineage, from a specific area in the Himalayas. Soon I’ll be a Parmahansa, and then a Llama after that. Well, maybe. I haven’t decided.”

“Wow, that’s amazing!” I replied. I had no idea it was so “easy” to become a Llama, as it were.

The nun changed subjects somewhat. “I think there may be a big earthquake coming, and my mother is freaking out about that. It’s true, I did predict 9/11 months before it happened,” she said. I kept dreaming about plane crashes. My friends dismissed me as nuts.” She looked vindicated in a way.

At that moment, a friend we knew from our dance class walked in the restaurant. She was in from New York, and we thought we’d missed the chance to say goodbye before she went back. I suddenly remembered my “moment of insight” when I decided to come here rather than the other restaurant, and at the same time I knew this was why the nun’s story interested me so much – life is so much richer when it is lived in the world of possibility rather than the world of the acceptable or “normal”.

While my friend and I chatted, the nun just sat and watched us, eating her food. After my friend left, I told the nun a little about our dance classes.

Her face lit up. “Oh, I dance everyday,” she replied. “I used to be a ballet dancer, you see.” Ha, a Parmahansa ballerina! What a curious mental image that produced.

I asked her about her hair, because I know that many monks and nuns shave as their religion requires. She took of her hat, and she was completely bald underneath. “It’s not required of me anymore, now that I’m a Swami,” she said, “but it’s easier to keep like this anyway!” Hair or not, she still looked nice, which made me wonder something else.

“What about having a boyfriend?” I asked.

“Sure,” she replied, “it’s okay as long as you’re a Parmahansa and he is a priest in the same order. When you teach, your boyfriend must also be a teacher,” she explained. That made sense to me.

As we finished our food and asked for the check, our nun started on a new topic. “I grew up on a cattle farm…” she began, and all at once the absurdity of it all hit me. Here she was, a Parmahansa ballerina, predicting 9/11 but not the big earthquake, with a mother who is paranoid and who raised her on a cattle farm, whose dog heals the sick, and who wears sheer skirts in freezing cold weather.

We got up to leave, and she invited us to come to the temple to see her. “I teach classes there, you should stop by!” she said. We hugged our new friend and then made our way to the car.

As we rode toward home, we speculated what it would be like to create an entire new teaching lineage. Maybe you could begin as a Llama, and then as time went on you would lose rank, let your hair grow, get a boyfriend, and then… eventually you get to enlightenment and completely release from the self! California is amazing!

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Design Your Life

Addictive Relationships: Are You in One?

01/25/2010

The Greeks had no shortage of words for love. Eros indicated passionate, romantic love, full of desire and longing. Philia was the kind of love that came with friendship and loyalty. Storge, thelema, and agape also meant love, but all in different ways. In English, however, we tend to lump it all together – although we have plenty of words to describe the different elements of love (affection, devotion, infatuation, passion, and so forth), as far as actual love is concerned, we only have that one word to express it.

We also have another word that can sometimes be related: addiction. Addiction is being so gripped by a habit or practice as to be enslaved by it. This progresses to such an extent that its sensation causes actual trauma, a psychological wound so deep that the damage is both significant and lasting. The etymological root of addiction is addictio – to surrender to or to give something over. Addictive love has this enslavement and surrender about it, and when this is not addressed, it can lead to some very dark and dangerous things.

I think spiritual leader and author Thomas Moore said it best: most addiction and addictive behavior is based on us misinterpreting or distorting our soul’s longing. I have noticed over the years that when we are not in touch with our true selves, we are much more likely to fall prey to those potentially destructive behaviors we learned in our youth to help quench the longings we perceive. When those longings fall into the “object love” category, this can often set us up for entering into addictive relationships.

But it’s not that repetition in itself is bad. On the contrary, it’s repetitive behaviors that are responsible for many of our successes. The trick is to spot when our patterns are unhealthy and destructive, and to examine those more deeply. Each time we can catch it, we have a perfect opportunity for deep self-inquiry.

Keeping drama to a minimum can seem boring, sure. If you are attracted to the drama and fun of bad boys, it can be difficult to see that the novelty is only temporary. If you suspect you might bo one of the hundreds of thousands of people who are trapped in the cycle of relationship addiction, here are some questions that might help clarify things:

Do you have feelings of restlessness or agitation when you don’t know where this person is?

Do you bend over backwards to be agreeable, accommodating, or sexier in order to retain this person’s interest?

Are you having increasing feelings of being unfulfilled in this relationship as time goes on?

Do you ever feel that your attraction seems bigger than you?

Do you feel overwhelming relief or a kind of high when this person calls or contacts you?

Do you feel some excitement or a sense of the forbidden with this person?

Do you find yourself rationalizing or making excuses for their behavior?

Do you find that your own usual behavior changes when you are around this person?

Does it seem that deep down, you do not share any of the same values or behaviors?

Do you keep finding reasons to stay even though you already know you are in the grip of an unhealthy addiction?

Have some of your other relationships with friends and family been damaged because of your relationship?

Do you know deep inside that this is not the person you really want to be with, but somehow you still don’t manage to leave?

It can be difficult to see your own addictive relationship, but having the courage to look is a wonderful first step forward. If you are in an uncertain situation right now, I would say this: start raising your self-awareness. A journal can help greatly with this. If you do find that your relationship has crossed the line from dependent into addictive, or is in danger of doing so, you are not alone by any means. There are plenty of helpful groups out there who can assist you with getting back in the love game in a healthy way, with more productive behavioral patterns. For assistance, contact your local chapter of Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous.

Maryanne’s teaching another emotional and physical self-defense workshop in Santa Rosa, CA along with karate black belts. More info on http://askmaryannelive.com. Can’t get to Maryanne in person? Her new DVD series, launched this week gives you personal, expert relationship advice from the comfort of your own home. Discover: Six critical tools for your relationship tool belt, which of your relationship patterns are destroying your chances for having a great relationship, why having sex too soon can be a deal breaker ~ and more! Click here.

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Design Your Life

Boys, Guys and Men. Which is He?

01/21/2010

Will your partner make a good Dad?

You have amazing sex. You’re physically compatible. Each time you’re, well, intimate, you’re reminded of how great you are together. But is that all there is? What if you’re not alone? What if – even if you took precautions – you end up pregnant? Great sex doesn’t mean the man in your life will be a great father.

Sure, nine months later there COULD perhaps be a ring, maybe some wedding bells, who knows. Don’t you think it makes sense to find out which kind of man you are about to invest you and your child’s future in? The kind of man that thinks having sex is an awesome responsibility and believes they are as responsible as you are, no matter what happens?

Time to find out if you’ve got yourself a boy, a guy or a man.

BOYZ!

Boy meets girl. ~ Boy wonders what she looks like naked.
Girl says hello. ~ Boy thinks, She wants me!
Girl says, “Call me.” ~ Boy suspects he could get laid.
Girl says yes to date. ~ Boy brings prophylactic.
Girl agrees to kiss. ~ Boy initiates second base.
Girl agrees to touch. ~ Boy negotiates sex.
And so on, until when Girl wants commitment. ~ Boy wants to meet another girl.

This scenario is likely an adolescent encounter, one in which neither boy nor girl has realized their own worth. But we also see this pattern repeated into adulthood by guyz and gals. Then looks something like this:

GUYZ!

Guy meets gal. ~ Guy wonders what gal looks like naked.
Gal smiles. ~ Guy knows she wants him.
Gal says “I’ll call you.” ~ Guy gives her his office voicemail JIC she’s a whacker.
Gal initiates meeting. ~ Guy picks Tuesday night for early drinks, JIC.
Gal imagines what their children will look like. ~ Guy hopes she doesn’t talk too much.
Gal negotiates sex. ~ Guy rehearses story for optimal quick departure.
Gal calls for days. ~ Guy thinks, I knew she was a whacker.
Gal is convinced all men are pigs. ~ Guy wonders if she wants to have sex again.

In that scenario the man/boy has not yet developed, psychologically or emotionally, much beyond puberty. This unilateral relationship phenomenon is punctuated by his awareness of this fact and his unwillingness to tell you so.

MEN!

Man meets a woman. ~ Man wonders what she wants in life.
Woman responds warmly. ~ Man wonders if she is as open and capable as she seems.
Man extends invitation. ~ Woman accepts enthusiastically.
Woman tells man what she wants in life. ~ Man notices they want the same things.
Woman sees man’s actions are consistent with words. ~ Man develops respect.
Man opens his heart. ~ Woman drops her drawers.
Woman speaks her mind. ~ Man tells the truth.
Man and woman wake up and see what they can do to enhance each other’s lives!

Wanting sex is natural; wanting to touch, to be close, to be held—natural. You become aware that we are on this planet together, on a path of growth. In the meantime, we all need be reminded, now and again, of the difference between boyz and men. Particularly when it comes to creating what we want in a relationship…with children or not!

The definitions of boyz, guyz, and men come from Chapter Six of Maryanne’s latest book, Hindsight: What You Need to Know Before You Drop Your Drawers. If you’d like some time-tested, practical tools for your Relationship Tool Belt, you can buy the book at maryannelive.com and learn how to turn your dream relationship into reality! To see Maryanne talking about navigating relationships in shadows that are larger than life, click here:

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Design Your Life

Shame, Shame, Shame… on Who?

01/06/2010

We have plenty of excuses for Tiger Woods’ sexual mis-steps: “Powerful men have a higher sex drive,” says one expert; “Men are just wired that way,” says another. “If women don’t want their men to stray, they need to turn up the passion in the bedroom.” And I say – Pleeeeze!

Tiger Woods hits the front pages, and instead of fans cheering they’re reeling from his admission of foul play. Gasp! “Powerful men have a higher sex drive,” says one expert; “Men are just wired that way,” says another. “If women don’t want their men to stray, they need to turn up the passion in the bedroom.” And I say – Pleeeeze! We all know that men do not have a corner on the hormone market; the secret’s out and the facts are in, so enough with this foolishness—at least come up with something original.

Instead of acquiescing to what’s PC and getting on the oh-so-boring, poor, poor, sex-depraved male bandwagon, how about I direct your attention over here, to what I’m calling SI: Spiritual Incontinence. Defined: a sudden swift departure from one’s internal compass, brought about by the unconscious wound of separation. SI, I believe, is a malady that most of us who live in the western world not only suffer from but, ironically, subscribe to. We know what the high road is, and choose to submit to our lower nature, to hell with the consequences. And yes, I said choose.

It’s one thing to be broke and uneducated and thus make poor choices out of ignorance; it’s another to be out of integrity and behave abominably on purpose. You see, I am not a believer that people do the best they can; nope, I believe that people just do what they do. (And, in many cases, whatever they can get away with.) Unless you are a bona fide junkie, addicted to the rush of break-up and make-up, wake up and smell the truth:

First, being famous, powerful, rich or having a penis, in general, is not a precursor to infidelity or cheating. The difference between being a cheater and having cheated is gaping. If you don’t know the difference, bone up and grow up. There is no longer an excuse for not educating yourself unless you cannot read.

Second, women who choose to be in relationship with men who are cheaters do so because we are either afraid to be abandoned or alone, are financially dependent, are defined by a man wanting or loving us, or simply do not yet honor and respect ourselves. NOT because we love him and want to stand by our man. This is immature love and romanticized attachment. And if your man has moved from having cheated to being a cheater, he doesn’t need help. You do—get some, and some self-respect while you’re at it. You will be thrilled you did in the long run!

kittylove

Third, do you know what one of women’s greatest strengths is? One of our greatest gifts? Our intuition. Use it or lose it. Look, we know! We see the red flags; we just …want what we want. We want handsome, tall, and strong/rich, powerful, and sexy/ hunky, artistic, etc., etc., guys who will sweep us off our feet and we’ll live happily ever after. We like the idea of love, not the reality. And I gotta tell you this; fantasy gets us into more trouble than just about anything. Slap yourself. Pay attention. Do your homework. Very few men turn into cheaters who were not already cheaters of some kind. The writing is on the wall—read it OR pay the price. How much is your peace of mind, your soul, worth? I’ll bet Mr-pro-golfer’s wife is asking herself that right now. Heavy price to pay, I say!

And four and last (for now, anyway). Wanna stay a victim and a blamer, or embrace the path of a skilled relationship warrior goddess? Maybe it’s time to fan your inner flame, turn up the volume of your passionate heart, and say YES to what’s most sacred and NO to what is not. To deny any suitor who has not taken care to bow before the divine, honor women and children, to live by the code inscribed in their deepest core, whose life reflects this on and off the field! How about you…shame on who?

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Ask Miseducated Design Your Life

Ask Miseducated: STDs and Ethics

12/26/2009

It’s always a painful situation when you feel like you have finally met the mate of your dreams, only to find out soon after that you were very, very mistaken. One of my students was recently in this situation, and shared an ethical dilemma that she had encountered as a result. All the names below have been changed.

Dear Maryanne,

When my goddaughter went off to college, I made sure that she had plenty of condoms, and a copy of your book. I’ve encouraged her to make smart choices, but unfortunately I wasn’t smart enough to follow that advice myself. As a result, my heart is broken, and I am paying the price for trusting someone who didn’t deserve that trust.
I met Darren through a friend of mine who assured me that everything about him seemed great. He was also a known philanthropist, and as I spent time with him I felt like he was the kind of person I could trust. As a result, I agreed to spend the night with him, and naturally the subject of condoms came up. But Darren insisted that he had been tested and was healthy, and stupid me throw all sense out the window and believed every word he said. So of course my heart sank when a few days later, after never having had an STD before, I had an outbreak that turned out to be herpes.
The first thing I did was approach Darren about this, but then suddenly he became evasive and wouldn’t speak to me about this so-called clean bill of health he supposedly had This just confirmed what I already knew, even though it was in Hindsight!
But now I have a decision to make. Should I just take myself out of the situation and let others worry about themselves, or should I tell the friend who introduced us not to recommend Darren to anyone else? My therapist thinks I should leave it alone now, but my conscience worries about the other women who could put themselves at risk. I’d be curious to hear your opinion.

Thank you,
Rhonda (full of regret and feeling stupid)

Well Rhonda,

you have experienced firsthand how getting in a sexual relationship too soon can distort the reality of a situation. It takes time to build that level of trust, and you need to allow yourself the opportunity to see whether this person’s appearances of integrity check out. This time buffer, combined with asking the 14 question that are outlined in Hindsight, can greatly increase your chance of spotting trouble before it’s too late.

Nonetheless, it is terrible to have to learn such a harsh lesson in this way, and I certainly feel for what you’re going through. You clearly have been trying your best to use your CORR® relationship techniques, and I’m sorry that in this case things crashed and burned so dramatically. When a friend recommends someone, it’s so easy to perceive that recommendation as some sort of guarantee of trustworthiness. But in the end, it’s up to you to find out whether the person you’re getting involved with has earned that trust.

letterTake some time and effort now to return to your loving center. You can do several things to aid this process. First, cover all your mirrors with paper for three days, and choose to look inward rather that at your outer reflection for validation. Rediscover who you are according to your highest self, and use your inner beauty and wisdom to help your reference point become internal again.

You can also benefit from a period of cleansing your sexual palate, and this will mean a period of dating during which you don’t take the relationship to a sexual level. This will allow you to explore why you were so happy to trust a man you didn’t know that well, and give you some insight into the kind of men you attract, and how you behave around them.

Lastly, a clearing ceremony can be tremendously cathartic and healing. Invite your closest friends to join you, create a sacred space, and fill it with all four elements, your favorite music, and things that remind you of beauty. Make a ritual of writing down all the things you want to heal, as well as the things you want to let go of. This is a very effective way to turn a disaster into an opportunity to love yourself.

Take your time – this process is not a race. When you feel centered again, I think you’ll see more clearly what you want to do. I am available if you need someone to answer some more questions.

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Design Your Life

Can a Bad Relationship Make You Sick?

12/11/2009

There are so many ways in which relationships affect our overall health. Recent studies have shown how coupling can add years to your life, boost your immune system and even help with anxiety and depression. Naturally one might wonder what influence the end of relationship might have on your health and wellness.

Most of us don’t have to think to hard to conjure injurious feelings about a relationship gone bad. And while the pain and grief due to botched relationship vary from one individual to the next, we need to explore our baseline beliefs about everything rather than jump to overly simplistic ideology. “My relationship ended, it felt bad and now I am sick because of it,” is precisely the kind of unexamined thinking and superficial generalization that spins us into imbalance in most cases.

For example, most of us don’t take into account how we arrived to relationship. Did we come healthy and balanced? Did we know who we were, what we wanted, were we purpose-driven and spiritually and emotionally actualized? Did we know how to sleep alone, be alone, fulfill our needs ourselves, and understand that we are responsible at all times for our own reality? Had we taken care to understand the complexity of human emotions and feelings and how to maintain inner peace and harmony BEFORE we met our beloved ~ would they have thrust the blade, turned it and left us for dead? I suspect, should you honestly ask yourself these questions, I think not.

Rather, most of us sidle up to our relationship candidates, seducer or seductress in full force, selling some version of ourselves we find acceptable and hopefully lovable so as to better secure our hostage. The person that will make it all better, soften life’s hardships, ease our fear, anxiety, help lift our depression etc, in exchange for ~ well, whatever we sell it for. How much do we pay to have someone comfort us in the night because we are afraid to be alone, to walk our path alone; to have someone hear us, see us, love us, accept us, celebrate us? We rarely think of this, as we are seduced ourselves into the story of Happily Ever After, hopefully swept into bliss where we can hide or be transformed there, rather than in the suffocating truth of aloneness.

Yes, we are safe from many ailments in relationship for a while, but most of us come to find, “wherever you go, there you are.” Eventually, whether in relationship or not, whatever shadows you have run from/tried to camouflage or hide/temporarily derailed/quelled return. Only, oddly, we look at our partner and think they now are the culprit! The relationship ends and we pick up where we left off. The same anxiety returns, the depression, low self-esteem, loneliness, etc., etc. Our symptoms multiply in the wee hours of the night when we are unable to distract ourselves, until perhaps we manifest an ailment we can point at and say, “Look at this, I am alone, therefore I am ill and out of balance!” Round we go chasing our tail (or tale), not quite seeing that it is alone we must be to know we are never alone ~ it is with ourselves we must know who we are and not. It is in our own presence that we must ultimately embrace the truth; that the wound of separation, when not seen for what it is, keeps us “Chasing Amy” (illusions) and never knowing the freedom, balance or joy that is available in sickness and health, until death do you part.

Video

To see Maryanne talking about the need to “go where you’re frightened,” watch this video:

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