chapter 11

Try these questions;
Why am I unhappy?

Try changing ‘unhappy’ for the word that expresses your bad feelings or the feeling you’d like to change. You need to be as specific as possible to get closer to your deepest feelings.

Then:
What is it about X,  that makes me unhappy?

This is still about narrowing down the causes of your unhappiness, take time, write as many causes, variables and ideas as you can.

And then ask yourself, Why am I unhappy about these?

When you have clearly identified what is bothering you, change the Why into, For what reason?  As in for what reason do these make me unhappy..?

This is when you may encounter your past, the events, beliefs and systems handed to you, the ideas, notions and odd ideas that make you, you.

There may be an ‘Aha’ moment here, there might not be, depending upon who and how you are.

However this ‘Aha’ may arrive with;

What would it mean if I wasn’t unhappy about that?

Or

What might happen if I weren’t unhappy about that?

These questions question you, because until now you may never have thought through the values of keeping yourself unhappy.

Supposing until now, being unhappy stopped you from doing something? Supposing being unhappy was a better feeling, course of action or thought process than feeling, thinking, doing X?

If you can get to this point, you have choice within your grasp and can ask yourself, Why would it have to mean that?

Maybe its that you believe that if you were to be happy, that would in some way be bad for you. So, you don’t want to feel happy and that’s why you have the feelings you do…Somewhere along the way you decided to do these feelings rather than feel happy. I wonder what choices you might make now?

Responsibility as Empowerment

Nobody or anything can ‘make you feel’

You are responsible for any feeling or behaviour you have because these are your chosen responses to anything and everything that happens to or around you. These are your unconscious responses based on how you built your internal map of reality.

I’m not saying you are to blame for every feeling or behaviour you have because taking responsibility for yourself isn’t about blame but about personal power. If anything outside of you causes you to feel or behave, you become the victim of circumstance, twisting in the breeze… Instead, if you can accept that all feeling or behaviour is within you, within your power to change or at the very least that your unconscious process/internal map are the cause, you can take power and do something and become happier. Blame doesn’t help, you can’t blame anybody for doing the best they can with what they’ve got and that’s you. Right now you are doing the best with what you’ve got, unfortunately what you’ve got isn’t making you happy because you think that things outside of you make you feel or behave in certain ways, but I want to challenge that.

‘Things’ may stimulate you, but you have choices on how to respond and you can change these responses consciously until they become unconscious patterns of behaviour. (See change principles)

To be able to choose how to feel at any time and to choose your behaviour you will need to let go of attachment and begin moving away from, ‘X happens so I have to or must feel Y.’

Begin instead to think before you react to stimuli, to events, people and the behaviours around you. If somebody is scared, must you be angry back or scared? These choices limit you, your thinking and life. Can you choose to accept that the person is angry and wait for them to explain or explore why, before you get emotionally involved?

Supposing their anger is nothing to do with you, or your friend’s tears are about something you could change, but if you do change it, then you will be doing something you don’t agree with or like?

To begin, learn to see the hows and whys of your responses, then you can decide whether these give you what you want, if they don’t, do something else.

Your journal will give you clues when you begin to read it (and yourself) through fresh eyes. Meditation can help, being in a therapy or self-help group that gives positive feedback, but most important of all is to listen, watch and observe yourself, be your own witness. Honestly assess your feelings, behaviours, thoughts and the results in your life of these until you recognise your patterns, it’ll be worth it!

Rationalisations

Rationalisations are the explanations, excuses and justifications that we use to ignore our real issues. We do this by generalising our experience to avoid situations by making them appear fixed rather than within our power to change. This denies our self-responsibility or doing something to change the situation.

Do these phrases sound familiar?

I’m angry, Nobody loves me, It’s impossible to talk to my boss, my wife, my husband, her him, them… I know they hate me, I can’t cry, be happy, be angry, That went badly, I can’t relax.

These beg the questions; Angry about what? With who? Who doesn’t love you? (And, er, why not?) Because? How do you know they hate you? Badly? Compared with what? Is that can’t or won’t cry, be happy or be angry? What would happen if you did?

If you find yourself doing these, or others, maybe meditate or think on them and talk with another person about what responsibility to yourself you may be avoiding. To deny our power in these situations only makes us into smaller people. Sure you may find it difficult to talk to somebody you find difficult and potentially your fear tells you the situation can only get worse, however, if you don’t attempt to talk with them, the situation already is worse, for you.

I’m not saying go out and face all of your fears everyday and at every moment. More that if you find yourself using the same rationalisations over and over, that there’s something else happening with you, that maybe you’ve developed a block in an area of your life and its time to do something about it.

How often do these happen in your relationships?

Withdrawal and avoidance, this is the unwillingness to get into or stay with discussions.
The danger is when this becomes a relationship habit. Not listening to each other’s hopes, dreams and fears on a regular basis can lead to a lack of intimacy. It is impossible to feel connected to someone when you feel they aren’t there for you. This is when one partner is unwilling to discuss certain issues and they either avoid discussions altogether or withdraw verbally or physically. Leaving the
other to tiptoe around them because they are afraid of anger, withdrawal and more avoidance. When discussions are put on hold so is the relationship. For a relationship to grow you must be able to talk about anything and everything, you need to make honesty, expressing your feelings and sharing a priority because sharing the good times as well as the bad strengthens your relationship. And you want this to happen, right?
Withdrawal can be getting up, leaving the room, tuning out, turning off, shutting out or down during argument. Avoidance is reluctance to participate in discussions, the emphasis being on preventing conversation, not being available, being overly involved in hobbies, working or generally being out of the house. I remember overhearing a conversation between laughing and joking windsurfers, “I’m so tired that I won’t be able to ‘give her one’ when I get home.”

I remember getting it, getting the point like a flash of clarity, that windsurfing, a solitary activity, gave him the opportunity to present his avoidance of her as tiredness. That tiredness allowed him to continue his isolation.

Invalidation is where a partner directly or indirectly puts down, the thoughts, ideas, feelings, dreams or character of the other. When one partner puts the other down or constantly second-guesses them, intentional or not, they are chipping away at their self-esteem, because as you invalidate you are telling them they don’t matter. Intentionally or unintentionally this works to lower the self-esteem of the other. Invalidation takes many forms e.g. one says to the other that their feelings are unnecessary, inappropriate or unwanted. Such invalidation hurts because it leads to covering up who you are and what you think, it becoming too risky to do otherwise. Covering up who you are leads you to deny who you are and this will lead to resentment to the other or depression for you. If your thoughts, feelings or dreams are regarded as less worthy than your significant others are, this destroys you, for these make you who you are. Covering up who they are and what they think is to protect their self-esteem. This example demonstrates a one-sided relationship where one holds power over the over and is a recipe for disaster.

Negative interpretations occur when one believes the motives of the other are more negative than they actually are. If the actions of one continue to be interpreted negatively and unfairly we have a tendency toward confirmation bias. Meaning, that we look for evidence that confirms what we think about people or situations and disregard any positives, such partners discount the positive and accentuate the negative, this can lead to negative expectations being acted out.

Escalation occurs when we respond negatively to each other, continuing until conditions worsen. After living with someone for a while we learn what buttons to push to make our partner feel bad about themselves.  Before you do this ask yourself how you would feel if someone spoke to you in this way and stop the insults, putdowns and your body language to convey mockery and disbelief. Avoid these non-verbal beatings (because that is what they are) and you will be building a healthier, happier relationship.
Beware of using verbal and physical weapons, if intimate knowledge is used as a weapon, it threatens future tender moments. If physical force is used then any safety inside the relationship is over, this doesn’t mean that plates can’t get thrown, only that they can’t get thrown at or near the other person…If You are a plate chucker; tell the other person, remind them that their safety is important!

Such madness reinforces relationships rather than destroys them…

 

Hidden Issues and Expectations. Look for these as they can let you know if there are hidden issues in your relationship. Unrealistic expectations can be expecting to change another by fixing their flaws, instead learn to be flexible for intimacy and love is about compromise and not about making another into who you want them to be. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Changing someone’s problem behaviour, drug or alcohol abuse, domestic violence or criminal behaviour won’t work either, do be supportive if they are making efforts to change but you cannot do this for them. You cannot change someone else but you can compromise. If you find yourself in an abusive relationship, I urge you to walk away to preserve your dignity, health and self-respect. Should your partner then make efforts to change their abusive behaviour you can then maybe think about resuming your relationship.

Another unrealistic relationship expectation is thinking the other person will solve your problems. Expecting another to fix your life is as unfair to them as is living your life through them. You alone are responsible for your life, self-esteem and happiness.

Scorekeeping, the keeping track of who does what. Policing any relationship is about who controls and who determines who does what or what is acceptable. The ‘police person’ or persons here are fighting for control but doing so without having a clear fight.

Wheel Spinning is talking about the same problem over and over, the argument that starts with you thinking, ‘Here we go again.’ It is possible to have an argument that can’t be resolved, if you have one of these say so. I have a fight about tissues about once a year, my wife stands at one end of the kitchen and I moan about them; they get everywhere; in the sofa, under the bed, in my toolbox, anywhere and everywhere…and she listens until I’m done. Then we move on and I’m not allowed to whine, until next time I signal my need to moan about them again. The issue of tissues never goes away but it can’t be resolved-not with women in the house…however a wheel spinning that gets nobody nowhere and is about something deeply felt will destroy relationships, if you can’t bothered to resolve an argument; what else are you not resolving?

Avoidance, when you are avoiding certain topics or levels of intimacy. Like my overheard windsurf conversation above, this can be done in so many ways, unlike wheel spinning though in that conversations don’t take place. Issues that are hidden can only then fester producing sadness and resentment to destroy your relationship. At extreme forms this can be a couple who leave notes for each other instead of talking. I wonder, is this what you signed up for?

Trivial fights, the trivial issues that get blown up out of all proportion. Control being something that can’t be fought over and won with an honourable win-win, so smaller skirmishes get blown up in the hope that control can be gained in this way. Instead by discussing issues openly you will come to validate each other which draws you closer together.

Many hidden issues like these come from deeply held expectations that are built up from lifetime experience. These expectations built in the past operate in the present and stem mainly from our family of origin, previous relationships and the culture we live in. If you have no clear understanding of your partners and your own of these past driven expectations then conflict gets caused by such unexpressed expectations. Unmet expectations will lead to disappointment and frustration in your relationship. A good pointer to unexpressed expectations is disappointment, if a discussion turns to argument and disappointment, take a moment out and check your expectations with each other, express these, be clear and reasonable about what you expect. If you’re not clear about what it is you want, how can you get it? If your perspectives aren’t shared you’re probably working toward different goals and that’s why you fight…

Expectations get formed in our lives by what we see and hear and these aren’t necessarily the same thing. If we are raised by hearing X will be done but instead Z happens, we learn X = Z. If your partner is raised hearing X and X does happen, you have an immediate conflict of understanding. These can be major or minor things but both cause fights, pain and misunderstanding.

My minor misunderstanding was I wanted to cook for ‘A’. I’m a pretty good cook but felt anxious about cooking for her because I liked her, wanted to impress (I was young…) so, I spent an afternoon getting all the right ingredients, preparing and cooking. At the appointed hour she didn’t turn up. She was an hour late, she then came in, immediately sat down and told me she wasn’t hungry. Instead she’d bumped into an old friend and they’d gone to some fast food place for coffee and cake. I was so angry I couldn’t speak. We sat for a while and instead of eating we talked and after I’d calmed down we talked about my expectation of this great meal and she told me she was totally unaware of my expectations of her.

Instead, she had her own, that old friends are important and that though I was cooking for her, for us there would be another day. There wasn’t. (Not that we split then, I’m not that petty, more that our life experiences were so far apart that we became more incompatible, not less.)

Hidden issues like this don’t occur unless unexpressed expectations get crossed, neither of us were in the wrong, we just expected different understandings from each other and had yet to express these in our new relationship. Within relationships the only way to know that you’re accepted is to feel that you’re being heard. Though, if you’ve yet to begin talking as we had, use these misunderstandings to begin.

The best way to handle such hidden issues is to learn to recognise when they are in operation and begin immediately to talk constructively about them. If you then suspect hidden agenda, take time out of your discussions to discover what these may be. Do this by making another time to discuss any hidden issues. This may then take some heat out of any argument. Doing this shows care and shows your partner that you want to resolve issues and not just make them go away. Aim for problem discussion rather than problem solution because the deeper the issue, the less likely it is that problem solving will be the answer. More importantly you need to hear and understand, get heard and understood each other’s feelings, concerns and fears.  Discussions of this kind reveal hidden issues, these can then help resolve any hidden agendas. If you can listen for understanding, trying to see their point of view and looking with their eyes at their experiences you are entering their world and beginning to explore their expectations, in this way intimacy is created.

Power gets created because our true desire in relationships is to know we’re really accepted by the other. Dealing with issues in this way takes skill and effort, if you can work as a team to discover, explore and handle them, asking your self and partner, what can we do to work through these issues?

This prevents damage by your learning to give life events and issues the time and skill they need.

In any potential relationship, without the base of truth, trust cannot occur. Without the development of trust, respect will never be born. Without a level of respect for each other, functional relationships of love and commitment cannot grow. Intimacy only occurs when we become willing to share ourselves completely with another. It is the gift we give and get when we fully engage in a balanced, loving relationship.

To ensure a happy married life, you need to find a compatible life partner, in common with someone who shares similar views, attitudes, habits, dreams, aspirations etc. Before you seek your one true love that you will share the rest of your life with you need to ask yourself the important questions; Do you like who you are? Are you happy with your self-image? Are you able to be honest with another about these?
 

Truth is of prime importance for building trust in relationships. Respect is earned from trust and love earned from such respect. You will put honesty, respect and love at stake in your relationship by concealing truth or by being fearful of consequences of not revealing your truth. Being true to yourself and to others by being able to communicate your emotions frankly is the only way to create of trust, respect and love in your relationships.

There are no easy roads or shortcuts in relationships, though every relationship is unique. Good relationships have similar themes, working together, talking together, being based on honesty, respect and love. Getting into a relationship might seem easy, but sustaining it for a lifetime requires constant working on.

It takes two to form a relationship and if one habitually acts on their emotional impulses by jumping in and out of relationship, without devoting sufficient time or by putting blame on their partner, this reflects their inability to understand the ways or means to successful and long-lasting relationships. If this is your partner, be patient, be kind and most of all, be empathetic and understanding. If this is you, then I guess this is why you are now reading this, to learn to grow and to be more of who you truly are.

If you are committed to creating a happy and lifelong relationship, agree to begin doing this today. Let go of judgements or prejudices about the past and instead of focusing on your difficulties, become willing to talk about expectations and later to work on solutions. Take time to let go of the need to control the consequences of decisions you take, live from moment to moment, one day at a time because the joy of living can only be experienced in the present moment.

Express your feelings and give appreciation’s to your partner, don’t let a day pass by without saying or showing in some way how much your relationship and they mean to you. Never take a moment for granted, show how grateful you are for all the good times you’ve had and how wonderful the future will be with them. Share your dreams of the future with them, this demonstrates that you see the future with them in it. 

Negative, hurtful or sarcastic remarks are abusive and slow the growth of relationships. If you are angry, say so. If you are hurt or want to wound, say so. Doing this helps rather than hinders because you are being heard and demonstrates your willingness to be open about your feelings rather than attacking. You can always agree to disagree on issues, life is too short to waste it on arguments with no purpose. By learning to agree to disagree, this can dissolve your differences and creates respect instead for their opinions. For you to be right, must your partner be necessarily wrong?
 

To forgive and to gain forgiveness is the greatest of all human virtues. When you finally learn to say, “I admit I made a mistake” or “I am sorry”, you get to finally hear you are OK similarly. When you say, “It’s okay, I forgive you”, you are not only showing your partner how sensitive, compassionate or understanding you are, but you also allow them the freedom to communicate their feelings openly without the fear of being misunderstood or unforgiven. By giving forgiveness, you allow your partner to become your confidante and best friend, by asking for forgiveness you are asking for this too.

Unconditional love is easy to talk about but hard to practice. It holds the key to happy relationships and is the bedrock of all relationships. To accept another person unconditionally as they are, rather than trying to change them to your expectations is what is meant by unconditional acceptance.  Positive communication builds relationships while criticism destroys them. Criticism is making judgements, finding faults or being disapproving. All criticism is unwelcome, try instead “I didn’t like that (X) can you do (Y) instead?” You then have the basis for conversation rather than argument.

Choose your words, since words can and do hurt ourselves as well as others. How we say things in our intimate relationship matters. Use “I” or “we” instead of “you” which helps in removing blame and invites open communication when given in a non-threatening way.

Example: You never listen to me

Instead: I’d like to spend some time to talk with you.

You never do anything around the house

I’d like to share some housework as I feel overworked?

You never tell me you love me.

I love you and I feel good when I hear you say I love you. I’d love to hear you say it more often.

You never show me affection.

I hope you feel as affectionate toward me as I do to you.

oo0oo

Love, Sex and Lasting Relationships; Sex as the superglue of marriage (or not…)

The definition of a successful marriage used here is one that has maintained a high level of affection right from the start, where both partners behave as lovers and stay that way. You can’t enjoy what you have if you think something better is out there. Instead make love by finding ways to appreciate and enjoy the relationship you’ve got.

To recognise your ideal partner you must know yourself first.

A union between people who have resolved most of their own issues first creates

balanced, strong and positive partnerships, where partners feel safe due to the honesty and support they have because intimidation, manipulation or abuse do not exist within it. This is done by their working together to create a boundaried, healthy, passionate and harmonious life.

Such partners accept who you are, want to bring out the best in you, challenge you and be your best friend. They will not require you to change. However, you will still have difficult times even when married to your ideal lover, as life will always throw up challenges…

To achieve this you will need to give up your need to fix your partner when you see that they are hurting or in need. If you get caught in the need to fix things or them, your boundaries will weaken in the trying to fix them to the exclusion of taking care of yourself.

It’s a hard lesson that you cannot control how your relationships should be and can only accept how they actually are. Giving up the fantasy of an idealised partner may not be easy but I promise you, when you do it, it’ll be a lot easier than attempting to turn your less than ideal partner into an idealised one!  This is about the boundaries between you, accepting that if change is difficult in yourself it will be difficult for the person you are with and you accepted them for whom they were when you met them.

Bringing order to your life means recognising that you cannot have healthy relationships unless you establish and maintain your boundaries by learning to let go of or be consumed in relationships that are about the need to be needed. Such relationships are not healthy because they are ‘I’m OK because I help you, you’re not OK because you need help.’

I’m not saying here that we can’t help one another, but if your relationship develops this way of being, it will consume your relationship. It will Lead to anger, hate and resentment because one partner is doing all the healing or helping work and it is not then a marriage of equals…and that’s what you want, right?  A relationship with somebody who can be as fiercely loving, gentle and caring as you.

If you can deal with intimacy by ways of maintaining boundaries, you will gain health, happiness and increased energy. After all, you’ll no longer be banging your head against a wall and that’s got to bring happiness, health and more energy…

And I know you can do this, because if you are by any way a thinking adult you’ve recognised that the magic powers you had as a child have gone and you are powerless to control other people, places, things, situations and time.

Below are some ways I’ve found effective in maintaining healthy boundaries.

Creating quality time

Try scheduling a weekend away for the two of you and don’t change this for anything. If you don’t have much money, you don’t have to go anywhere, camp out in your garden or a different bedroom.

1. Eat together at least once a week.
2. Let your children know that you need time alone together.  Close your bedroom door.
3. Walk together.
4. Do the dishes together.
5. When you are together, turn off the radio.
6. Spend 20 minutes a day to talk.
7. Arrange for an evening alone together once a month. 
8. When you travel together, spend the time talking to each other, don’t read or take work with you.

Making decisions

Gather all facts and information, gain input from friends, family and experts, try not to focus on one option by first looking at all options, talking about the pros and cons of each. Make sure any decision made is one you can both live with and that both of you have responsibility for. Remember that you can always revisit the decision later to re-evaluate it. If spirituality is part of your life, pray for guidance as you make your decision. 

How to fight fair

Conflict is not a problem. All long term relationships are about resolving conflict, so you can learn to fight fair by recognising that loving somebody doesn’t mean that at times they won’t piss you off, because they will. Knowing this and knowing that you can vent your feelings without damaging the relationship and better still can strengthen it.

Don’t let things build up until you explode into a big fight about everything and nothing. Know what your issue is and then stick to it. Hold hands while fighting and remember that you love this person, you might be angry with them or feeling hurt by them right now but you still have a history and future together. If your partner doesn’t want to discuss your issue, set a time within 24 hours to have your fight.

If you are so angry about your issue that you can’t talk about it with them within 48 hours, let it go. Write it down if you can’t express it. This is putting marriage first, it doesn’t mean that you can’t learn from the situation, only that right now you might not be able to handle your issue in the best way.

Your fights are your business and only between you two, bringing in others ends that intimacy, your fight is for your relationship and for its continuing.

Bringing up past history, intimate or sexual secrets, name-calling, blaming and shaming is hitting below the belt, this will lose you a fair fight and gain you a row. Rows are harder to forgive. Develop your sense of fairness to know what can be said by each other.

Use I instead of You: “I felt hurt when you did X because that means Y to me,” listen fully while you fight, looking at each other, watching body language and don’t interrupt. You will get time to respond but wishing to give your side will get in the way of hearing what is really being said.

At the end be willing to ask for forgiveness and to ask to be forgiven, being unforgiving causes emotional and physical harm to your marriage.

Better sex

Try to set the mood in advance, (start foreplay in the morning) since being miserable or ignoring your partner during the day will get in the way of creating a positive experience that night…. However, occasional abstinence can be helpful if it creates desire.

Talk about your expectations concerning making love, sharing your sexual desires helps create a healthy and active sex life, as unmet expectations will get in the way. Sexual intimacy is a continuing process, deepening to become a richer experience, no matter how many times you’ve made love together the joy can still be made to be there. If you want to have good sex, let your spouse know you care and are thinking about them before sex, during (!) and afterwards.

These will help you set boundaries as they bring order and ways of being to your partnership. They will help you recognise over and over that you are two distinct individuals who have come together to create a bigger thing than both of you and like all good things in life is worth spending time, thinking and energy on.

How can we make love last?

I believe the answer is in recognising the purpose of marriage, healing and to be healed. The destructive fight or flight conflict in marriage rises out of unconscious needs. When this conflict becomes conscious and understood, it points to what is broken within us and provides opportunity for healing. What makes love last is in understanding the unconscious causes of marital conflict. Marriage becomes a healing, learning thing rather than a relationship based upon the past.

Real intimacy does not happen naturally, it is something that has to be learned. The hope for lasting marriages is that we can move away from an unconscious process of power struggles of distanced relationships. Instead we can enter the process of learning to be conscious in our relationships. Real intimacy is obtained by becoming conscious of unmet needs that underlie relationship conflicts, sharing these is sharing the bare bones of our psyche.

Being sexually innocent is often associated with being foolish, backward or ignorant.

So for couples faced with having to work out exactly where their sexual relationship is fear gets in the way, sex gets to be a Donkey…in that everything gets put onto it…so fear of sex becomes fear of each other, leading to distance, loneliness, fear of expressing desires. To stop the donkey, you have to get off it. Admit your fears, the fears of being clumsy, fears of being foolish, fears of being thought odd, stupid or perverted. Sex will only be one of the things you do together, if you can work more on intimacy and acceptance of each other as you are, the sex will get right. I promise.

Its true that life-long committed sex has the potential to be more, thrilling, varied and satisfying than any other sexual arrangement, but first couples need to realise how they turn each other off and on.

I’d suggest taking a sexual inventory for each other, of each other, the things you’ve done, not done, liked, disliked. By now I guess you’ve worked out from the previous exercises here the kinds of things you need to be asking each other…and don’t do it just once, do it after a year, 2 years, 20…you may be surprised how you’ve changed.

Long-term relationships can sometimes be a slow death for a couple’s love life. Over time boredom lives in the bedroom and families, jobs, lack of libido all get in the way of the fun you once had. Before you set up an affair, go into counselling or set off to the divorce courts, why not first try to relight the fire you once had in your life?

There are many reasons why sex in a long-term relationship can suffer.

When they only see each other as parents and there is anger, jealousy or fear of intimacy, couples can become numb to each other and to their sex lives.

To get over these things and see each other as sexual beings learn again how to use each other sexually, go back to your inventory for your sexual menu. Vary what you do, in bed, out of it, your fantasies, keep your adventure alive.

Once your mind is having sexual thoughts, get physical, get to know each other’s bodies again. Take time to explore how your bodies, minds, needs and wants are changing. And get rid of that awful bloody need for perfection, sex isn’t always perfect, nothing is, get over it and learn to love your imperfections, be an artiste and learn to make your mistakes part of the act!

Drifting apart is about being self-satisfied, when couples say they have no complaints with what they say is a normal sex life or that it is appropriate to their age or some national average. Did you start average? What is average? Is average normal?

Or the couples who think it natural for sex to become less important as time moves on or they are too busy or too tired to do it anymore.

Maybe sex has become a job, another duty to get out of the way or about keeping a partner happy because their own chemistry or feeling has gone. Alternatively one or both may only have sexual feelings when fantasising about another and this leads to unsatisfactory love, worst is suggesting you feel you are too old for sex. 

To escape these maybe your sex life might be better if you take time to make your sex life fun again. Though this might make you self-conscious, any effort to improve your love life, even one good time out of ten mediocre sex sessions makes the effort worthwhile. Trust me on this one!

Learning to be easier with sex keeps it happening, making love to the same person becomes a pleasure which can feel safe and be daring both at the same time, if you stop taking each other for granted and begin to find each other again and again.

Summary;

Let your partner know that you love them every day of your life together.

Nurture your marriage by communicating, by being honest emotionally, talking about feelings, opinions and any problems you may have, a big gap in expectation is communication, whether it’s quantity or quality, few people meet others requirements. Instead share your thoughts and you’ll be less frustrated.

Be willing to understand the others perspective. By showing affection and by having sex, which is whatever you as consenting adults find pleasurable. Stimulate the joy and excitement in your partner’s life as passion is created from the feedback we get when we stimulate excitement in our lovers.

By your commitment, the seeing what you do rather than what you say. Have a commitment to continuous renewal of your relationship and to have things in common like your values.

Neil Benbow

(c)neilbenbow