OK I know that my posts have been a little weird, but that comes from being in limbo more than anything.

This is where I am at.

T and I have lived together for 2 years. HNHN, Love Busters I know nothing about until a few days ago.

T and I have mutual friend who has been trying to help us work things out. Call mutual friend last night, wondering if there would be any hope of T and I working through this at this point, or if I should just move on with my life, learn all I can from this point forward from MB, and at some point down the road, I would be ready and able for a new relationship.

All of a sudden friend tells me that she "T" wouldn probably not like for me to know this, but that T is staying with friend for the weekend. Next thing I know T is on the phone with me. We talked for a brief minute, and she asked if I wanted to talk to her through online messaging. Of course I agreed, because It would give me a chance to think before I responded to anything. I knew this was a great idea!

So we talked online for a few, ane the kist of the conversation was in a situation the other day, where i made a demand, it set her off. I could her anger or something in her voice on the phone and I asked her what that was about. She said she was angry because she loved me. Then she said she was angry because she loved me, and that things are the way they are right now.

I explained my reasoning to her, for making the demand, and then explained that I thought about things from her perspective. And that I when I did, I could see how damaging the demand was. And how if I thought about things from her viewpoint to begin with, then I would have never made the demand.

I explained to her, that I had found help for my troubles. Not in any detail, I didnt want her to think I was pushing MB on her, or did I want her to think that I was trying to fix her. I will leave whatever decisions about herself to her.

I did talk to her a little bit about where I see I lacked in her need for affection, and for conversation, and that even thoughI wasn't intentionally trying to, I was ignorant to the depth of her needs. I feel this to be an honest statement, and I believe that because up until MB happened into my life, I really didn't know much of the stuff I am learning here.

T said, that she has things she wants to talk to me about in time, and I understand that to mean that she is in no rush, and things will be revealed to me from her, only as she sees changes. I do believe that for a time, I almost have to set aside my own needs, which isnt hard to do, because being apart she cant meet them anyway, so there is no loss, and concentrate on hers, rebuild trust in me that I will be able to follow through on words I have spoken in the past and again now. The difference now is before I had no map. Now I do, and I know where I am going. I am trusting in MB for that.


Now comes the points I am needing to make. First If I am off base in any thing I am writing please let me know so I can make corrections. Second, even though T and I arent married, our relationship has always been like a marriage, and that is the goal, so I dont believe we are far off from the MB plan. (I have read about living together, and I understand the problems discussed, renter/owner etc). This being the case, I am looking at things with T, and our relationship, as if we are trying to reconcile a marriage.

Since this is a brand new beginning literally for us, I am at the point that I described above. She said she wanted to call me today, and i am scared to death. I sent our friend an email this morning, and told her that I thought it best if T and I limit our contact for right now so I have time to learn, practice, and grow.

I have no real idea what to do, or where to go from here. I don't know what to talk about with T or what would be helpful to moving forward. I am begging for help here please.

Thank you for taking time to read this, and for your offer's.

BUMP FOR LA

LovingMan,

Bring this over to the Emotional Needs section and fill everyone in on your situation and you will get tons of advice regarding your direction.

All I will say for now is that you seem to have had one of those A-ha moments that can really make a difference in your life. I commend your ability to have an open mind to the shortcomings you brought to your M and commend your drive to do something about yourself. Again, this is no small feat you have discovered. So feel good you are on the right path. Stick with the MB ways as I believe they provide a decent chance of restoring Ms.

PS: LA is known to post in the EN section as well.

Thanks, I called on LA because I have read where LA is hardcore, and tells like it is, which is something I need.

Anyhow, thanks for the heads up. And for the record, I try to limit my counsel to a select few, so as to not give myself too many choices. I would rather stick with what works!

Thank you for the encouragement, I need all the help I can get.

Solid counsel? That scares me. LOL

Hardcore? Whoa.

Okay.

You're read about Disrespectful Judgments...DJs...best place to start in changing your beliefs...which you have one that says, love is mindreading and assumptions. It isn't respectful love...it is the earliest kind we know...when we're children, and a gesture or a facial expression communicates because we can't. Adult love respects...does not assume or mindread...because adults know they are two separate individuals, equal...each with their own thoughts, feelings and beliefs...and a lot of harm comes from not mind that respect.

Here's your DJ: "I didnt want her to think I was pushing MB on her, or did I want her to think that I was trying to fix her." You shared you're getting help. That's honest. Choose your intent, make it respectful...you were manipulative here by withholding information for the purpose to control her response. Know this and learn from it. You can't push or fix people. Not in God's design. They choose to react or act...to consider or not...no control on your part. To live purely, with conscious intent...to share because you are an open and honest person is the best premise...not manipulative. This is the only way to combat the belief that you cause others their own feelings...and that they cause you, yours.

Please know that I'm not attacking you...this isn't something everyone knows...it isn't out there nearly enough. Also, I am not saying you phrased your words wrong here...you were honest. This is a belief which needs to be changed, not words...many think I'm asking them to not say what they think in that way...just speak more respectfully...and no, I'm asking you to believe differently.

"T said, that she has things she wants to talk to me about in time, and I understand that to mean that she is in no rush, and things will be revealed to me from her, only as she sees changes." Probe and clarify...no assumptions of what she means. Listen and repeat her words, verbatim, for now...so you understand her and do not assume.

"I do believe that for a time, I almost have to set aside my own needs," I can be offbase, but I would advise you looking at your needs, writing them out, seeing where she is meeting some of them, even at a distance, and in your head with thoughts and memories, also. Find out how deep your needs are, where you might fill partly or entirely some of them, and get to know your own power.

"which isnt hard to do, because being apart she cant meet them anyway, so there is no loss, and concentrate on hers, rebuild trust in me" Yes, your changes will change the relationship as a by-product...but you cannot rebuild trust...you do your part for you, and the choice remains in her to trust. Please do not set yourself up for resentment if she does not trust or believe you when and how much you want her to...this is you not creating resentment in you. Faith in yourself...whether she chooses to trust and believe or not. You'll know. That's very important.

"that I will be able to follow through on words I have spoken in the past and again now. The difference now is before I had no map. Now I do, and I know where I am going. I am trusting in MB for that." Which books have you gotten for your guides?

Now, you got through your bout with doubt...in you. Listen and repeat...fully understand what she says, acknowledge it...put her words into a hopper on your head...you have been reactive before...defensive...felt immediate response emotions...now that you know what she believes is hers...for you to comprehend, not own, then put her words into that hopper and carefully allow them into your brain with the knowledge they are hers...not yours. No emotional reactiveness occurs if you do this well. Deep breaths, calm yourself...let's Self know you're there for you...respect, respect, respect. Later, when you both can communicate and be safe for one another and yourselves, you will listen and repeat with your filter...and still later, listen and respond. You're breaking a pattern here, takes time.

Describe how you used to feel in R conversations with her...attacked, defensive, justifying, right or wrong, misheard, misunderstood...words twisted or lied to? Go through and identify your routine emotionally responses so that you can effectively use that hopper. And know that a lot of it came from assumptions and mindreading. You're normal. You're not alone or defective. Breaking this pattern will change your life and affect everyone in it...thriving personally is the big step to thriving in marriage.

You can do this. Call yourself on your expectations...the fear of her response, the expectation of rejection, all these play a part in the DJs and your awareness of them helps you see your emotions come from you, on the inside, not from her, on the outside.

Since this is like a new beginning, have you considered not living together? That this separation is like giving you both that fresh start where you make choices from your personal code, not your immediate desires?

Sorry about the delay in response...but I found ya over here.

<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

LA

Thank you so much for the insight, and the response.

In the last week this is what has happened.

I have been looking at where I have failed in the past relationships of mine. Really looking at my ownership in things. I have had to come to some truths, and vocalize them when I really didn't want to. I have found that I have acted, and made decisions based on fear of acceptance, not wanting to hurt anothers feelings because they were not exactly what I am interested in. I have experienced first hand, what it means when I have put demands on others, because demands were placed on me. I have experienced giving to others with no thought of return. And I have pushed an issue of mine off on T.

She came to work with me last friday, and after two episodes, where she left and took off walking home, and then me chasing her down and bringing her back, that next morning, after a couple hours conversation, I broke down, and found an intuitive honesty about myself, and let her know that the previous days episode where I was telling her that in her past relationships, she had failed, was nothing more than me trying to tell her, that as I work through things, I have a need to not feel as if I am all alone in what I am working on. Then the light goes off, and I realize that my problems are not hers, and I can only concern myself with my own.

She was very receptive to what I had to say, and my honesty about it. She found a new place for me, and a new admiration. I am not sure I understand, but she was very receptive to my efforts.

During the weekend, we read the first chapter of HNHN together, watched the first hour dvd of the HNHN for P seminar, and she took the EN questionaire with her to work on this week. She and I discussed the MB, and she says she likes what it has to offer, and she likes the help I am receiving from here. She sees a difference. Although I have no idea what she sees, I am not going to question it.

Further, we are starting Premarital counseling 3rd of June, with our preacher, and we are saving for a MB weekend. In the meanwhile, she has found some help of her own during our time apart, and I have mine obviously.

We are not going to live together until we are married, and have tenatively set a date of Oct 8 2006. We both believe that this is progressive, and non ending, and we are taking things as they come. However, something right is going on here, because in spite of the sometimes difficulties, we are both feeling better, and relaxed about things, and both rely heavily on prayer, and God.

I am not sure where I am at with things other than to keep doing, reading, and experienceing, and not taking myself too seriously.

LA, please decipher these words for me, and point out anything I may or may not be missing. Please. I truly appreciate your help, and my skin is much thicker than some. Besides, I am asking for the help. No point in asking for it, if I don't follow through on it.

Decipher these words for me...

Hmmm...I got....

Nuttin'.

<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

See, what I read was your pattern...the episodes, which led to the epiphany, which got to the respect...which is the way I got there, too. Staying there, in that perspective, holding that light (and we all know how difficult it is to hold pure light without a source), was the part I didn't expect.

Expect it.

Separate and equal...respecting her choice...she wants to get out and walk home, respect it. Breaking the patterns of I pull, you pull; I push, you push back...those are what makes all the difference.

Not alone, is what I hear as your largest fear. Not unique, separate, responsible or free. I hear you. Scary stuff. Very. Vulnerable. Brave. Human.

How did you feel about not living together again until married? About the counseling? Describe your feelings...get to know them...even if you've only got two right now to go on...fear and love. Practice this exposure of you to you...of course, I'm asking for it on a public forum...no fear there!

Are you getting past the first ownership which looks like failure, and seeing your reactive patterns...that you didn't fail relationships...you didn't learn from them. Tell me the core root to why that took place...what belief was in play which was so strong to keep you in this pattern...even up until last weekend...

I began reading "Conversations with God" by Walsch today...and I believe even more deeply that in our intimacy with one another...learning respectful radical honesty, we become closer to God. Takes us knowing and owning our selves first...before we are known...keep that in your top shirt pocket, over your heart.

You can take yourself seriously--I do. You can be dramatic, rageful, weepy or scornful, too. You can take yourself in all manners and ways...now that you know your choices, where they can lead, because you have a new horizon.

I believe in you.

LA

Ready for a loop?

"My first feeling is relief that the fussing has come to an end, or at is at least manageable now in a sense." Stay aware of that relief...and find out more where it comes from. Some could be relief from intimacy...that in each other's faces...which living together creates the illusion of...and we all know how we can be an inch apart in our person, and miles apart in our minds.

Find out if your Conflict Avoider (CA) is relieved...which can contain your judgment of you failing in front of someone...

And as for the suspicion she's measuring progress...look inside and find out if you're using a yard stick on yourself and seeing it in her hand; or if she tends to hold one; or a part way condition of each.

You make sense...her as a distraction...your focus slips over there, where it is safe and in front of you instead of on you. Yes. However...she is there whether she is there or not. You know this.

Lots to find out in yourself...because you shared your feelings...we get to know our beliefs through our feelings...and see ourselves, truely.

Find out what intrusive feels like...how your belief someone can intrude on you triggers emotions...and what those emotions are...

Do not judge your feelings good or bad...just feel them. They are yours. If you fear I will misunderstand your intent, I am taking it as pure intent...that you are respecting and cherishing your life right now, this moment, all of it...and I am not judging you good or bad, right or wrong...less than or above.

You fear counseling can become something like a battleground...a place of more pain instead of healing? Think this through more...without her thoughts...just yours...where this idea/expectation comes from...

As for counseling being about solutions and not more problems...I found out that 90% of marital conflict were not solvable...ACK! No, wait...they weren't problems to be solved; they were thoughts, feelings and beliefs to be understood. Took down to size what is conflict and what just feels like conflict.

That help?

Fear triggers apprehension, negative projecting, strong urge to protect, defend...know fear...it isn't powerful...it is a tiny child. Hold it, hug and reassure it...act brave, anyway.

The less you judge, the less you will feel judged...and the less you will fear.

Conversely, the more you will love and feel loved...pretty cool how humans work.

When you feel that incompleteness, recognize that as a perspective, not a fact. You are whole. Complete. So is she. That's why we're all equal...not seeing yourself as whole, or others, has been what you've stumbled over time and time again. It is how we respect...choosing that perspective and fighting our habitual one.

When you remove judgment...out go the words failure, success, good, bad...and in comes the element of being. You are. You are. Period.

Would it make sense that your relationships do not last if who you are depends on who you are with? If getting a solid relationship with your self, one of love and acceptance...without judgment...means that you can love and accept others, do you think then that love lasts?

Know what you fear...share it here...do not act from fear.

Know what you love...share it here...choose to act from love.

Where loving acts come from...time to do those for yourself. I think you already have started...stay aware. Do not measure your progress (that is judging)...celebrate it.

LA