Forgive & be Forgiven

Did your spouse hurt you? Have you made mistakes that hurt your spouse?

Except in the case of physical abuse, you can “move on” from anything. In fact, your marriage can end up even BETTER!

I know…you’re probably thinking, “Better? How could it be better than before we screwed up?”

It CAN be better, ...

Moving from Pain to Peace

When it comes to your emotions, there’s a big difference between being in pain and true suffering. What’s the difference? And how does this relate to your marriage?

So what’s the difference between pain and suffering?

Pain has a purpose.

Suffering is true torture because it has no meaning.

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Cognitive Distortions

The Ten Forms of Self Defeating Thoughts

1. All or nothing - thinking

You see things in black and white categories If a situation falls short of perfect, you see it as a total failure. When a young woman on a diet ate a spoonful of ice cream, she told herself, 'I've blown my diet completely.' This thought upset her so much that she gobbled down an entire qu...

What is a co-dependent 

Welllll …there isn’t a guidebook for setting boundaries. Each of us has our own guide inside ourselves. If we continue to work at recovery from being co- dependant , our boundaries will develop. They will get healthy and sensitive. Our selves will tell us what we need to know, and we’ll love ourselves enough to listen.

Beyond Codependency

What do we need to do to take care of ourselves?

STONEWALLING

What is it and do you do it ??

The second behavior that predicts divorce with over 90% accuracy, according to John Gottman's research and the experience of most couples' counselors, is stonewalling. Different from an occasional timeout to calm down or collect your thoughts, stonewalling is absolute refusal to consider your partner’s perspective. If you listen at all, you do it dismissively or contemptuously.

The common songs of the stonewaller are:

&...

 The terms anxiety and stress are often used interchangeably, and it is true that they are related conditions with many of the same symptoms. Feelings of stress--even chronic stress--are not the same thing as an anxiety disorder, although they can contribute to developing one. Anxiety and stress are categorized by separate feelings.

The stress we experience in our day-to-day lives is associated with fr...

Every encounter with the external world presents a conflict with a person’s cherished inner world. Disappointment is the gap between expectations and reality. There are two ways to be happy.  Improve your reality and lower your expectations. How would you go about doing that? What would you start with? 

Attitudinal Healing 

"Attitudinal Healing is based on the principle that it is not other people or situations that cause us distress. Rather, it is our own thoughts and attitudes that are responsible for our distress, and the actions we take as a result of those thoughts and attitudes can hurt us. Healing results when we concentrate on changing our own attitudes rather than trying to change the attitudes ...

ARE YOU NEGOTIATING YOUR BOUNDARIES??

Boundaries are a measure of self-esteem. They set the limits for acceptable behavior from those around you, determining whether they feel able to put you down, make fun, or take advantage of your good nature.

The ‘Five Things’ Method

▪ List five things you’d like people to stop doing around you, for example, criticizing absent colleagues

WHAT'S WRONG WITH ASSUMPTIONS ??

Wrong assumptions can separate just about any two individuals.

An assumption can seem to grow out of nothing.

Ever think about that water cooler talk? We see people talking at the office water cooler, and our brain automatically starts creating a story about what we assume is being discussed. Our sel...