So why would a professional counselor, with a PhD, treat his wife and family in a way contrary to all of his education and training? Ironically, in need of the kind of help you would expect his training to provide? Part of the answer is spiritual, since we are all guilty of being prideful.
"For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father." (https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/mosiah/3.19?lang=eng#p18)
It is something more than that though, this kind of behavior goes much deeper and it has to do with brain chemistry.
Depression messes with your brain. You get to the point where you literally aren't thinking clearly. Descriptions of what it's like trying to function with depression are similar to descriptions for symptoms of Alzheimer's Disease and Dimentia.
Addiction also messes with your brain. Pornography impairs your thinking and reasoning ability. The addicted brain causes changes in behavior.
If you suffer from addiction, use caution when learning more about the harmful effects because reading about it can be a trigger.
"The study of the doctrines of the gospel will improve behavior quicker than a study of behavior will improve behavior. Preoccupation with unworthy behavior can lead to unworthy behavior. That is why we stress so forcefully the study of the doctrines of the gospel."
(https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1986/10/little-children?lang=eng)
You can download a free copy of the addiction recovery 12 step guidebook both as a PDF or MP3.
(https://addictionrecovery.lds.org/home?lang=eng)
You can also get a free copy by going to one of the 12 step meetings.
(https://addictionrecovery.lds.org/?lang=eng)
Whether or not you have addictions, the program is designed for self-improvement in overcoming character flaws and weakness. Unless you are already perfect, you can benefit from the program.
"And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them."
(https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/ether/12.27?lang=eng#p26)
One of the best ways to augment your recovery, as you work through the 12 steps and then repeat (once you hit step 12 - you start again back on step 1, each time you go through the steps you will gain something new, you will also gain valuable insights from others by going to the meetings, use caution when sharing advice - what works for you might not work for someone else and could cause them to get discouraged when your advice doesn't work for them), is to read daily in the Book of Mormon. There is great power in consistent daily study.
"It is not just that the Book of Mormon teaches us truth, though it indeed does that. It is not just that the Book of Mormon bears testimony of Christ, though it indeed does that, too. But there is something more. There is a power in the book which will begin to flow into your lives the moment you begin a serious study of the book. You will find greater power to resist temptation. You will find the power to avoid deception. You will find the power to stay on the strait and narrow path. The scriptures are called “the words of life” (D&C 84:85), and nowhere is that more true than it is of the Book of Mormon. When you begin to hunger and thirst after those words, you will find life in greater and greater abundance."
(https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1986/10/the-book-of-mormon-keystone-of-our-religion?lang=eng)
Friday, October 12, 2018
Thursday, October 11, 2018
Why do victims get blamed for causing someone else to be rotten?
In my years of college I have taken courses in psychology, child development, human development, marriage and family relations as well as courses relating to special education. In addition, I have listened to talk tapes and seminars, attended community offered classes, and read and studied book after book after book from public and university libraries. I have studied enough on my own that, had I pursued it through college, I could have earned a PhD many times over. Much is available now online but most of my learning was done pre-internet. Information was available back then but you had to be motivated to seek it out. I was super motivated leading up to and after my divorce. At first I was trying to save my marriage and then I was on a mission for over a decade to "fix" myself so that, if any part of the divorce was in any way my fault, I would be able to prevent it from happening in the future. I went to years of professional counseling with that goal in mind. I did want to eventually get remarried but I also wanted to never go through something like that again.
Years ago, there was a call-in radio program on at night called Loveline. Those were the days when the show was hosted by Dr. Drew and Adam Carolla. I worked late enough that I could listen to it on the drive home. It was fascinating and often disturbing to listen to teenagers talk about behavior and relationship problems and ask medical questions about sex. The phone calls were often unavoidably graphic in nature due to the content of the subject matter discussed. People often were caught in repetitive patterns of behavior. They were "acting out" the pain of past traumas. People seem to be subconsciously driven to recreate unhealthy and destructive situations going from one failed relationship to the next. Dysfunction and abuse have a way of getting passed on to others. I had no idea how common it was for people's lives to be so messed up.
Despite book learning and education, we tend to behave in similar ways to what we observed and experienced growing up. We often become our parents. We don't pause and think before we act; many of our relationship behaviors are automatic. It may seem ironic that a professional counselor with actual credentials in marriage and family relations would behave in a way contrary to their education but this is something which also happens. Not being able to see the forest for the trees is very common. Sometimes denial is more than not wanting to admit something, sometimes it is actually not knowing.
Fortunately, I have parents who were good examples. I also realize that some things are beyond our control. We should take responsibility for ourselves and our own behavior but we should not try to take responsibility for another person's choices. Due to agency, sometimes people choose to do what they do and there is nothing we can do to stop them. We are only responsible for ourselves. We can and should take ownership of our own choices and behavior but not for someone else's.
If you do the very best that you possibly can, to be a devoted and loving husband and father, but your wife still chooses to be unfaithful - that is not your fault. You are responsible for you. I thought that it was somehow my fault. I am now convinced that cheaters cheat. It is what they do. What she did really had nothing to do with me and everything to do with her. It would not have mattered if she was married to me or to someone else, I was just the poor unlucky one that happened to be married to a cheater. I also believe that people can change but only if they are willing.
I blamed myself for her choices but she also told me it was my fault. If it was somehow my fault then she did nothing wrong. That is why she has never apologized or admitted that what she did was wrong. She has never taken ownership of what she did. She is the one that is still bitter even though she is the one that cheated. She is still angry at me for her own choices because she says she never would have cheated if she had been happy. Somehow I should have known she was unhappy without needing to be told. Here's the problem though. She was already unhappy before I knew her. She was already that way before we ever met. How can something be my fault if it happened long before I was even in the picture? Was it my responsibility to make her happy after we got married (even when she never was honest with me about being unhappy until it was too late)? Was her happiness my responsibility or hers? Who is in charge of whom? Because she has not accepted what she did, she has not been able to move on. She is stuck and unable to move forward. She has never been honest with herself about what she did. She is still angry and bitter.
Ironically, she is angry at me for what she did even though I should be the one who is angry because she cheated. Instead, she is the one that is angry. She does not seem to be able to get past it. Once she moved away, I was reminded of this every time I tried to see my children. She still tries to keep me from being part of their lives. She does not encourage or support their relationship with their father. She wants them to only be hers and not mine. She does not want to share. She does not want me to be their father. She does not understand and does not want to understand. She is still stuck in the unhappy place she was before I met her and angry at me because I did not fix it. She is still unhappy.
If someone tries to make you responsible for their happiness, that is not only unfair, it is something beyond your control. You are not their personal savior. The only way to gain the kind of healing needed to be truly happy is through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. Repentance, or in other words - our willingness, is needed for that to happen. Because she will not admit she did anything wrong, she is not able to repent. She is not able to receive the kind of healing only the Lord Jesus can provide because she is not willing to let it happen. Grace is something we can receive but we also have to choose to allow it.
A powerful example of this can be found in the story of Enos:
"And I will tell you of the wrestle which I had before God, before I received a remission of my sins. Behold, I went to hunt beasts in the forests; and the words which I had often heard my father speak concerning eternal life, and the joy of the saints, sunk deep into my heart. And my soul hungered; and I kneeled down before my Maker, and I cried unto him in mighty prayer and supplication for mine own soul; and all the day long did I cry unto him; yea, and when the night came I did still raise my voice high that it reached the heavens. And there came a voice unto me, saying: Enos, thy sins are forgiven thee, and thou shalt be blessed. And I, Enos, knew that God could not lie; wherefore, my guilt was swept away. And I said: Lord, how is it done? And he said unto me: Because of thy faith in Christ, whom thou hast never before heard nor seen. And many years pass away before he shall manifest himself in the flesh; wherefore, go to, thy faith hath made thee whole.
(https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/enos/1.2-8?lang=eng#p1)
We can be healed completely and made whole once we decide to accept God's grace. Accepting God's grace, however, requires us to be honest.
Years ago, there was a call-in radio program on at night called Loveline. Those were the days when the show was hosted by Dr. Drew and Adam Carolla. I worked late enough that I could listen to it on the drive home. It was fascinating and often disturbing to listen to teenagers talk about behavior and relationship problems and ask medical questions about sex. The phone calls were often unavoidably graphic in nature due to the content of the subject matter discussed. People often were caught in repetitive patterns of behavior. They were "acting out" the pain of past traumas. People seem to be subconsciously driven to recreate unhealthy and destructive situations going from one failed relationship to the next. Dysfunction and abuse have a way of getting passed on to others. I had no idea how common it was for people's lives to be so messed up.
Despite book learning and education, we tend to behave in similar ways to what we observed and experienced growing up. We often become our parents. We don't pause and think before we act; many of our relationship behaviors are automatic. It may seem ironic that a professional counselor with actual credentials in marriage and family relations would behave in a way contrary to their education but this is something which also happens. Not being able to see the forest for the trees is very common. Sometimes denial is more than not wanting to admit something, sometimes it is actually not knowing.
Fortunately, I have parents who were good examples. I also realize that some things are beyond our control. We should take responsibility for ourselves and our own behavior but we should not try to take responsibility for another person's choices. Due to agency, sometimes people choose to do what they do and there is nothing we can do to stop them. We are only responsible for ourselves. We can and should take ownership of our own choices and behavior but not for someone else's.
If you do the very best that you possibly can, to be a devoted and loving husband and father, but your wife still chooses to be unfaithful - that is not your fault. You are responsible for you. I thought that it was somehow my fault. I am now convinced that cheaters cheat. It is what they do. What she did really had nothing to do with me and everything to do with her. It would not have mattered if she was married to me or to someone else, I was just the poor unlucky one that happened to be married to a cheater. I also believe that people can change but only if they are willing.
I blamed myself for her choices but she also told me it was my fault. If it was somehow my fault then she did nothing wrong. That is why she has never apologized or admitted that what she did was wrong. She has never taken ownership of what she did. She is the one that is still bitter even though she is the one that cheated. She is still angry at me for her own choices because she says she never would have cheated if she had been happy. Somehow I should have known she was unhappy without needing to be told. Here's the problem though. She was already unhappy before I knew her. She was already that way before we ever met. How can something be my fault if it happened long before I was even in the picture? Was it my responsibility to make her happy after we got married (even when she never was honest with me about being unhappy until it was too late)? Was her happiness my responsibility or hers? Who is in charge of whom? Because she has not accepted what she did, she has not been able to move on. She is stuck and unable to move forward. She has never been honest with herself about what she did. She is still angry and bitter.
Ironically, she is angry at me for what she did even though I should be the one who is angry because she cheated. Instead, she is the one that is angry. She does not seem to be able to get past it. Once she moved away, I was reminded of this every time I tried to see my children. She still tries to keep me from being part of their lives. She does not encourage or support their relationship with their father. She wants them to only be hers and not mine. She does not want to share. She does not want me to be their father. She does not understand and does not want to understand. She is still stuck in the unhappy place she was before I met her and angry at me because I did not fix it. She is still unhappy.
If someone tries to make you responsible for their happiness, that is not only unfair, it is something beyond your control. You are not their personal savior. The only way to gain the kind of healing needed to be truly happy is through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. Repentance, or in other words - our willingness, is needed for that to happen. Because she will not admit she did anything wrong, she is not able to repent. She is not able to receive the kind of healing only the Lord Jesus can provide because she is not willing to let it happen. Grace is something we can receive but we also have to choose to allow it.
A powerful example of this can be found in the story of Enos:
"And I will tell you of the wrestle which I had before God, before I received a remission of my sins. Behold, I went to hunt beasts in the forests; and the words which I had often heard my father speak concerning eternal life, and the joy of the saints, sunk deep into my heart. And my soul hungered; and I kneeled down before my Maker, and I cried unto him in mighty prayer and supplication for mine own soul; and all the day long did I cry unto him; yea, and when the night came I did still raise my voice high that it reached the heavens. And there came a voice unto me, saying: Enos, thy sins are forgiven thee, and thou shalt be blessed. And I, Enos, knew that God could not lie; wherefore, my guilt was swept away. And I said: Lord, how is it done? And he said unto me: Because of thy faith in Christ, whom thou hast never before heard nor seen. And many years pass away before he shall manifest himself in the flesh; wherefore, go to, thy faith hath made thee whole.
(https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/enos/1.2-8?lang=eng#p1)
We can be healed completely and made whole once we decide to accept God's grace. Accepting God's grace, however, requires us to be honest.
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