Yes, I do. And I don't think anything I have said is at all incompatible with what Dr. Harley has said at all. He largely focuses on behaviors, which is the right thing to do because focusing on thoughts and feelings is too frought (that is the essence of behavior therapy vs. traditional therapy). I'll listen to that show.

I have heard him say that things like, "we are all wired to have affairs," etc. That circumstances matter, etc. And I AGREE with that. But that doesn't mean that people's sense of entitlement to what they are doing is not real. He has also said repeatedly that some people are more pre-disposed to affairs. I agree with that too. Some people have a stronger sense of entitlement to get their needs met in anyway they can. Some people have a stronger sense of entitlement to be heard through anger or disrespect and therefore use those tactics. Both are wrong in terms of thinking (even it it largely unconscious) and both take some exercise of will to stop (character) even if you don't feel like it.

Character is doing what is right even when it hurts, is hard, etc. It takes an extraordinary amount of character to end an affair the right way for example. I forget the name of the couple in SSA that he gave as an example--but that guy, even after starting to have those strong feelings actually stopped. Almost every person in Plan B exercises it as well. It is extraordinarily difficult to go into Plan B if you are in love with your spouse. I felt like I was dying.

And I am not saying that people who end affairs the wrong way--dying a natural death--don't exercise character later. I have seen former waywards on this board exercise it.

In both cases, in terms of recovery, emotions follow actions. That's why focusing on action is the right thing.

Now, I'll let this die (for reals this time), because we largely agree on the treatment. It's like saying we both agree with AA, while disagreeing about how alcoholics become alcoholics.

This is so true. Piglet, I was raised old way type person as in even was never alone with husband before marriage, and if I went out with him, I went "chaperoned". Married, I had instances were some men flirted and I felt attracted and I was dry and looked away as I saw smiling back as wrong. Nevertheless, FB appeared and I added every single person that sent friend request and responded to every single message, even from a guy, out of ignorance, not lack of character. I added my ex boyfriend out of ignorance and replied one message, then another, then I realized I was having an affair, no excuse... I chose it, and I have the consequences. It is called guilt. As a betrayed you know the pain of being betrayed by another but you have no idea the pain when you realize you lost your identity and you know you chose everything and I am thankful for this program for letting me stand up again.
I spent nearly a year and a half begging forgiveness after I had ended contact and hadnt chatted for already 4-5 years had no personal email no facebook for 4 years hearing DAILY I was immoral, an adulterous, thinking I deserved to hear that when I had been affair free 4 years. I wish with all my heart I had had higher boundaries in FB and I didn't not because of my character but but out of ignorance. And by the way, I think women that feel attracted to a man wont usually have an affair because they can sense a possible affair. It is not feeling attracted that starts it for women, its talking back and keep on talking back as friends, when your brain starts justifying. It is a brain wiring defense mechanism. You got yourself in the situation and your brain will defend you. No excuses, I know. I do believe its poor boundaries and not lack of character and I am thankful for this program, because I was a real mess out of guilt and now I have my life back and my marriage back.

a quote from the article: >>Up until then, Lyle Mitchell said, their marriage seemed �excellent.�

�We never fight,� he said. �We�re together, I�ll bet you, 95 percent of the time. We work together, we never leave the house unless we're together.�<<

So...it sounds like they could have used some UA time. Undivided Attention, focusing on each other. Not just being together out on errands or what-not.

This is a pretty big one:


And so is this one:

These are not compatible with what Dr. Harley teaches.

I'd be very curious to see what Dr. Harley would say about this, but since this is the Other Topics forum I'm going to chime in and say I think this is mostly a debate of semantics.

We all agree that a lack of boundaries is a prerequisite for an affair, what we're really arguing about is whether a lack of boundaries is a character issue/moral failing.

PW, the analogy you reference about betrayed spouses was originally posted by indiegirl on another thread a while back (I thought it was pretty brilliant, actually) but on slightly different terms. Her point was that unmet emotional needs do not cause affairs, they only make people vulnerable to them, and that boundaries were the real issue. I thought it was a very concise way of summing up the MB viewpoint on affairs and ENs.

I personally agree with PW about OS boundaries being a moral issue because that is how I was raised (by my father specifically, who's biological father was a serial cheater), but certainly I can see that most people do not view them that way and I don't know what good it would do to beat anyone over the head with my views on the topic. Saying that OS friendships are simply a bad idea I think works well enough. Discussions about pre-marital co-habitation here generally work the same way...not everyone agrees it is morally wrong, but we can all look at Dr. Harley's analysis on the topic and see it is certainly a poor idea.

To be perfectly honest, I also don't see what good it does for the BS to sit in moral judgement of the WS, whether you recover or divorce. If you're trying to recover, that is a DJ, so that doesn't work. If you divorce, I don't really know what the point of it is. Maybe I'm a bit thick skinned (or thick witted, take your pick), but judging my ex one way or the other doesn't help me with any of the problems I have as a divorced BS. It can hamper my progress towards eliminating lovebusting habits by tempting me to blameshift them onto the WS, it can make me less attractive to a new partner by making me bitter, and it can sour my attitude by triggering me about the A. I'd rather just leave their moral standing between them and God and worry about my own problems.

I don't have a lot of the problems someone with children would so maybe I'm being callous saying that, but I don't get it. The WS is off in the their own little world (caring not a whit about the BS) and once you either Plan B or divorce, I don't see how judging their character is helpful.

Well Ax, you've gone straight to the point with good wise wording, all true but as a FWW the concept of poor boundary vs character IS the concept that got me up and forward. That one concept IS important in recovery from guilt. The reason Piglets post got to me as a FWW is because I am still shaky over the messy past past year me and my husband, I had been hearing daily prior to posting in MB how bad of a person I was, and my husband felt morally superior to me for a long long long time. I thought I deserved that and I learned here all these concepts and I now have high expectations out of my marriage.
I think it is less than a month that I am actually starting to recover (from guilt) after more than 5 years after my affair had ended and starting to have high bar standards expectations set on my husband and the concept got to me as I still havent recovered my identity.
BS deal with recovery from pain from betrayal someone else did. FWW/FWH deal with recovery from guilt they brought up by their poor choices and recovery of their identity.
Dr. Harley's concepts have a basis out of experience and saying it IS because of character is not one of Dr Harley's concepts, period.

Pos affair my character hasn't changed, my boundaries have. I now don't have any male friends on my recent one month new FB.

Maybe some people that had affairs had character issues, but some didn't. They had poor choices over poor boundaries.

And my husband got involved emotionally with his ex out of entitlement and anger and I don't at all think he had poor character, because I don't and can't know how his brain was processing all after my betrayal and what circustances that were 4 years post my affair had ended enabled it. glad this is all over for us.

One of the issues here is what people think character is. It is not the same thing as morality. I keep mentioning and everyone keeps glossing over the fact that Character is "doing something that is right when it is hard to do", not "having good morals." I have no doubt in my mind that my husband thought cheating was wrong before he did it. I have no doubt in my mind that his boundaries were shaky mostly because of ignorance. However, he felt entitled to OSS friendships and even in the early stages of this when she had just started working with him, he defended his "right" to have a friendship with her (she started incessantly texting right away). There were also other signs like feeling entitled to not work until he got his dream job or to open credit cards without telling me. I think those actions demonstrated poor character (entitlement).

I mentioned the couple in SSA that ended the affair the right way. That guy was demonstrating good character when he did that even though he messed up in the first place. That guy did display better character than Sue--I'll make a judgement on that, because objectively it's true. I would say that any spouse who even after getting very involved in an affair, ends it even if it is painful, demonstrates good character. That doesn't mean that Sue didn't and could change her character later (ie giving up her entitlement), but she didn't display it at the time. That doesn't necessarily mean the marriage is not recoverable, I know--which is one of the reasons Dr. Harley doesn't focus on it.

And since character is simply "doing what is right when it is hard," I don't need to sit around condemning my soon to be ex or bitterness at all. He simply has not displayed good character by not ending his affair or trying to do anything at all to save his marriage. One doesn't need to editorialize on what he did to be "bitter" about it.

If ones spouse does continually condemns them after making the changes necessary to save the marriage (and the betrayed spouse wants to continue the marriage), then that's just as bad. It shows poor character by holding on to a sense of entitlement to anger. If you choose recovery, set the standard and the former wayward meets the standard it is abusive to use the affair to make one feel like he/she is a bad person.

Again, I don't think character is immutable or can change over time. Every time we choose to do right, consider others, etc we are demonstrating good character. apples said many posts ago, if you change your actions you change your character. That's true.

So really, last post. If using the words "actions" or "behavior" makes everyone feel better, then I won't argue this point anymore.

I have only briefly skim-read this thread.

My opinion is this: I think this kind of analyzing isn't really helpful and actually could be distracting and dangerous to a BS who is here with a WS in the throes of an affair, trying to decide whether to expose and break up the affair and whether they want to pursue a recovery.

This kind of speculation is going to lead some to decide whether their spouse has a character flaw that will make recovery impossible and some maybe will decide it's not worth it without trying.

I think that's why Dr Harley does not approach looking at a WS this way. Even if a WS has a personality or character flaw or is a serial cheat with major entitlement and dishonesty issues, if you change the conditions under which an affair/SSL can exist, recovery is still possible. That's all a BS needs to know.