Welcome to Marriage Builders, P32...
When I don't know what to do, that's usually a signal to me that I have more than one conflicting belief going on inside...and it sounds like you've been looking along those lines, too, in trying to solve your relationship problems.
Am I correct in my perception that you are living together, and have been for awhile? Have you read Dr. Harley's take on why living together before marriage increases risk of failure of the marriage?
Before I explain how these conflicting beliefs will cause conflict in your relationship, I'll let you tell me if I'm correct or not about the living together.
After finding MB and understanding Disrespectful Judgments (DJs) which really took awhile for me...I am not going to assume.
Which is what I see you doing that's robbing your love bank and hers, btw. Might want to take another look at that LB.
SD's cannot get your ENs met. Ever. When your GF acts from love...it's her choice. Period. You cannot demand or blackmail her into doing it. She still chooses. You can certainly choose to believe you can do that (and again, rob more of your love bank, drain it even and point the finger at her)...won't be real.
We don't negotiate "I'll do this if you do that"...that's not POJA, and it certainly is saying, "I will only act from my choice to love you IF you do/say this and this". That's like telling yourself everyday you are only as lovable as your last act of love...that you're only as desirable as your last good deed...and places a loving relationship as solely you only acting from love based on the other's acts of love.
Sets you up for a catch-22 there...which means you prohibit yourself from acting from love even when you wanted to...in reality, we only act from love from our own choice.
Just as she can't make you love her (it's a choice), you can't make her act lovingly towards you. And when you withhold and stop acting from love (because she isn't keeping up her end), then you will stop feeling love for her.
That's how it works.
Understanding her ENs, knowing what she does that busts your loving feelings, is as essential as holding yourself to the Policy of Joint Agreement. When you're married.
And being committed to The Marriage, when you are married, are vows you take to yourself...vowing what you will do...not with the if/then statement attached, basing your upholding it on whether she does or doesn't.
Just you. About you.
Defining her as thoughtless is a travesty...even not married. Judging her actions as love busters, is not. There's a keen difference. However, agreeing, if you are, to play house is an act from fantasy, not reality, so your DJs are going to sound realisitic and reasonable when they aren't.
As long as you believe other people make you feel, think, believe, act, perceive or view...when that's solely you, about you...you're going to have major issues in all your relationships.
It's an extension of the same issue when you base your actions on other people's possible responses (giving to get has an inherent flip side called tit for tat). Don't torture yourself that way, 'k? Not only does it harm your relationships, harms yourself. Says self is ony worthy, valuable, significant and whole if someone else thinks so. So you spend your life earning love and punishment, as you seemed to do as a child, and continually feel unfulfilled, unloved, broken, unworthy and insignificant.
I know because I lived this way for decades. You're searching to understand already...don't sentence yourself to what I put myself through, 'k? Strive first to understand (doesn't mean approve)THEN be understood. Doing affirms self, establishes respect and is grounded in reality.
To do it in reverse causes incredible pain, frustration, fear and anger. It's living backwards...living in DJs...and they are the silent killers of connection.
I look forward to your answer to my question.
LA
