Welcome AwakenYou listeners, welcome to another week of upgrading your intimate relationship! It is a new month and that means two things: a new relationship goal to work on and a new Marriage Masterclass! Let’s start with this month’s relationship goal, you can pick any relationship, even the one with yourself, what is it you want to work on and what are you going to do to take steps forward? As always, you can use any of the episodes here in AwakenYou in your marriage because I always share something you can take and implement or you can download my free Abundant Love Mini-Course which is all about re-wiring your brain’s current default way of thinking of your marriage and then you can also turn to my past Marriage Masterclasses. I have done one every month this year and in each one, I share three action steps. Set your goal this week, write it down so you don’t forget what it is, and then write down 1-3 things you will do on a daily basis to start moving forward. Remember that you can also book a 30-minute free coaching session to help you plan your goal or work through obstacles that come up as you do the work of improving how you feel about your marriage.
This week’s topic has been top of my mind because of real work I have been doing this past week in my marriage. Remember, in marriage, just like any area of our life that we want to keep growing and getting better, we have daily work to do so I am right alongside all of you, in the trenches doing the work of expanding and growing this beautiful dynamic that we call marriage and intimate relationship. If you follow me on Instagram or my Facebook Business Page you might have seen the video series I posted where I share a real-life marriage circumstance that I was working through. Of course, I share some of these examples not to broadcast behind the scenes of my marriage in a vain way but to give you real-life examples of the work I teach here.
Types of lies
Today I’m going to talk about a different type of lying that you might not recognize as lying. There are what many of us might call blatant lies to cover something up that they are ashamed of or don’t want to face the consequences that they might have to face if they told the truth. This could be as big as an affair, sharing an intimate lunch with someone besides your partner, an emotional affair or even where you went between work and home that made you late – even if it was to go shopping for something you’ve been longing for.
Then there are the not-so-obvious lies we tell, lies that happen more subconsciously than we’re aware of. The example I shared in my post series was around my husband asking if I minded if he worked the one weekend evening he had off. Just reading that message stirred up all sorts of emotions stemming from a pandora’s box of thoughts, “how rude,” “he has no respect for our time together,” “he prefers working over time with me,” “he’s asking so he can blame me if something goes awry,” “he can’t express his desires for fear of what I’ll think,” the list goes on and on.
I want you to pay attention to the example I am sharing and note if and when something similar might happen to you. It may not be about spending time together, what is your flavor? Trust me, it’s happened once or twice for you, start noticing.
My reactive response would have been a “sure,” loaded with insinuation, I would have been annoyed for a while, maybe stewed over it for a bit, maybe taken it out on him but over time, with much practice, I would see the pain this sort of reaction was having on me and would have turned it around. Turned it around to something enjoyable like, “he’s such a good provider,” “he thinks this is taking care of us.”
Instead, I decided to be truthful. I shared that I was truly looking forward to having an evening on the weekend with him, that I didn’t have any specific plans but that I would initially be disappointed if he chose to work. I also reminded him that this was me being honest, not trying to control him and that he was free to do what he thought best for us.
This felt amazing.
What happens when we lie
Most obviously, we don’t want people to see who we are at our core, we aren’t letting them in to see us. In this example, it took courage to open up and be vulnerable about the truth that I was looking forward to some time with him, it opened me up to be rejected and for him to see me. This is where growth comes in because as we grow we learn that other people can’t reject us, yes, I might be sad for a bit but as I grow more and more in love with myself I learn how to let other people’s reactions to me go.
The lie would have been about putting myself “one up” on him, trying to show that I’m the better person by letting him do what he wants and that his time away meant nothing to me because I’m a strong, independent woman.
I would have stored up those emotions and thoughts as more evidence when something came along that “broke the camel’s back” – toxic emotional waste stored up inside of ME.
What happens when we tell the truth
Yes, there may be some tension with telling the truth, keep following my IG and FB to see the follow-up that will happen after Jeff and I discuss this interaction this weekend. I’m imagining that there is some tension on Jeff’s side but I can’t tell you what that might be. He could be annoyed that I “made him feel guilty for wanting to work”, but remember, no one can make you feel guilty, we do that ourselves with our own thinking. He might feel resentful by thinking I am trying to control him and his actions.
But on my side, there is pure cleansing. I let go of any anger, resentment, blame, and dismissiveness and spoke about what I was really thinking at that moment. I know in my heart and soul that I was speaking my truth without being manipulative because honestly, another night to get out on my own and do something I enjoy with friends would also be lovely!
It’s all about how we feel in our hearts and that is why so much of the work I do is surrounded by emotion work because our emotions tell us which direction to go. My subconscious auto-response felt awful, tight, and reactionary and my well-thought-out response felt light, freeing, and abundant.
Action steps
What I want all of you to do is start paying attention to when you hide your truth. Start asking yourself why you do that and how you could start being more open and honest.
In order to help you with this I want you to go register for this month’s Marriage Masterclass because it is going to help you discover where you are lying and how to start telling the truth. In this month’s class I am going to teach you how to step out of reactivity into love. You will learn how to:
- Start to recognize your go-to patterns when your spouse does something that makes you react as well as your spouse’s go-to patterns
- Understand why you respond the way you do and why it’s so hard to react differently
- Retrain your subconscious mind to understand that you can handle these situations in a whole new, safe way that will feel self-supporting and diffuse the cycle
- See how your change will bring about change in your spouse
In summary, telling the truth helps you become more connected with yourself and it helps you live more aligned with your values while it also builds more connection with your partner because you are opening up and sharing who you are and learning how to deal with the other person’s reactions in a more mature way. This work allows you and your spouse to become more differentiated which is the work of growing more intimately close and secure.
The link to register is in the show notes, you will not regret committing one hour to improve your marriage!
Have an amazing week and keep this month’s goal top of mind! Happy hugging, ciao!
I am a marriage coach who helps women and couples go from feeling powerless to change how they feel about their marriage to feeling powerful and taking ownership of how they feel. My process isn’t about changing your partner; it’s about discovering who you are so that you can AwakenYou in your marriage, and through this process, you will begin to find that your partner will change as well! Schedule your free mini-coaching session today to discover how coaching can help you take your next steps forward toward what you want in your marriage.
