SPIKE,

WHEN POSTS HURT YOU OR ANGER YOU, THOSE ARE THE POSTS THAT ARE THE MOST IMPORTANT TO PAY ATTENTION TO. WHY? BECAUSE THOSE ARE THE POSTS THAT HIT CLOSEST TO THE REAL TRUTH OF THE MATTER

AND

WILL HELP YOU GET BACK TO HEART OF THE PROBLEM IN YOUR MARRIAGE.


I do have a book recommendation for you Spike:

"Leadership and Self-Deception: Getting out of the box" by The Arbinger Institute.


You will recognize yourself as the main character. After you get past being really angry at me, read the book again with an open mind

and NOT

a "let's pretend to read it with an open mind".


Schoolbus

I heart SB.

Where's the 'LIKE' icon?? Like for FaceBook? I 'LIKE' SB!

Thanks, MB and PM and Pep!

I wish spike would come back....seems he's a bit shy of late.

He's busy with the list of his wife's character blemishes.
Can't neglect his priority, yanno?

I still get creeped out, every time I read that.

Maybe he should have kept a journal of his own behavior.

Shocking suggestion !

Sometimes when people act like "nut jobs", other people do resort to keeping journals in order to sort things out. That's one way to keep yourself organized, because you really can get sucked into believing that you are the one who is crazy.

I had to do this as a child - I lived in a crazy-making home, and when I wrote things down and was able to look at them later it helped me realize that I really DID NOT have a skewed view of things, and that my recall of events was clear. At times I was shocked at what I was able to forget - given the events of my life at the time, you might think I would have remembered every tiny detail. I didn't. Things happened that were detailed, and the journals brought me back to my personal reactions to those events, and the details of the events when I re-read them a few weeks later, or months/years later. It helped me to keep perspective, because the very people who were "nut jobs" in my world were quite effective at telling me that "I" was crazy, "I" needed help, and that "I" was not able to see the truth.

These people were the very people who lived by the rule of truth that William James practiced. The truth is whatever worked for them and their needs at the time, was the truth for that moment. The truth was a malleable and flexible and perspective-based ideal, meant only to be used for a purpose and a means to an end.

Spike has this to overcome in himself. He views the truth in this way. The issue is also that his journals serve a purpose not to help him see the truth of his life, or to help him overcome a crazy-making sitation

but rather

to serve to condemn his wife.


There is likely a very skewed perspective in those journals, one in which Spike paints himself as completely innocent and with a near halo over his head in all interactions with his wife. He likely takes no blame for his own part in the downfall of the marriage.


Which is really too bad. Because the TRUTH of this entire situation is this:


IF SPIKE'S WIFE IS, AND HAS BEEN, AS CRAZY AND EVIL HAS HE PORTRAYS HER TO BE, HE SHOULD HAVE EITHER

LEFT HER

OR

PURSUED PROFESSIONAL INTERVENTION FOR HER either with or without her permission,


LONG BEFORE NOW.

LONG BEFORE AN AFFAIR.


So, she is either a complete nut job, and Spike chose to ignore this fact and not help the poor woman with her mental illness

or

she is completely evil and Spike chose to remain in a marriage with a terribly evil person.


Either choice is not good.


Now, there is the fact that the reaction is an affair, a request for approval to divorce or to continue the affair and protect the OW from exposure, or something in the middle of these...not sure what Spike wants at this point, as he is evasive on his wishes.


At any rate, I'm pretty sure his wife's story would include some measure of blame for Spike.


Pretty sure of that.


And I'm pretty darn sure that 100% of the blame for the affair

belongs to


Spike.



SB

You rock SB.

ITA. Something is very amiss here.