Interpretation of MWD and DR regarding infidelity

[Denver_2010]

thanks denver for your replies.

i'm not being hard on star sky, i hope. i think that it is more a case of, well if he is so adamant about how to do this, then why can't i ask questions before i take his advice?

No problem. Just paying it forward as they say.

Eh, Starsky is tough. He can take it.

I got hit hard and often for having expectations, hope and belief that ultimately I would reconcile my M. But it was the only way that I was able to sustain for as long as I did. And I believe in positive imagery as a means to accomplishing one's goals. So yes, I do believe that you have to have faith and hope in order to keep going.

This ^^^^ to me is the elephant in the room on this bb.
the constant 2 x 4's from everyone to everyone about not having expectations, not having hope etc.

in my honest opinion, it is downright impossible to go through this for as long as we have to without having some belief that it is possible.

I believe that everyone here has good intentions. I became very good friends with a handful of members who began their journey right around the same time that I did. The BITS. Each one of them responded differently to different posters who give advice. One BIT might get offended by the hard line approach, while another might be completely fine with it. One might not get much out of the hand holding approach, while the other might find that extremely comforting. My point? It is a matter of personality IMO. For me? I have a thick skin and trust myself and my instincts a lot. True, I was weak when I first came here because I had just been hit as hard as I ever had in my life. But after a while, my confidence came back.

Some posters got on my nerves at times. But mostly it was when they were telling me things that I didn't want to hear. In hindsight, I can see that many times, they were right. I didn't want to see it at the time, but they were.

The bottom line is that I believe that newbies can learn a tremendous amount from those who have been through this. And sometimes those lessons come in the form of a 2x4. They are just telling you their opinion based upon their experience.

I will concede that I never bought into the idea that this is about working on us and not about saving our M. I eventually learned that it IS about both though. I never bought into not having hope or expectations. Without hope, what is the point?

i like what you said about the visual imagery and also what i quoted from you above - it is frankly some reassurance that i am in an okay place. i have beaten myself up way too much for having those and tried to force myself to being detached. (i don't believe i am alone in this)

I get this Zig, but I do believe that detachment is a big part of being successful here. I struggled with it a lot though. But I can tell you that my most significant progress was done when I was detached from my W and what she was doing.

frankly i think that it slows down our growth as well as slows down the process towards that real final detachment that comes on its own eventually.

I disagree with this. I believe that the healing process is assisted when we are detached. When we focus in on being detached. Listen, this is probably the hardest thing that we are told to do. However, we have control over our emotions, our actions, and thoughts. In fact, that is the only thing that we control. If we allow ourselves to do it, we can detach from our WAS's and their craziness. When we are detached, we learn that there is a happy life outside of the mess that our M has become.

I do prefer the term 'lovingly detach' though. In other words, you remove yourself from what your S is doing and the choices she/he is making, but you continue to love them from a distance. You offer a beacon of light for them to find their way home.

what do you think the effect would be that when newcomers came on the board they were allowed to acknowledge for themselves that where they were was an okay place to be - and the "pressure" of detaching and letting go would eventually come on it's own in it's own time.

i do see the value of urging them to get there as fast as they can, and i think that that is necessary, but there is an element missing here sometimes for many - that most crucial element involved in moving forward is truly accepting where you are at.

Yes, but again, the people giving newbies advice are just telling them what they know from experience. Man do I wish that I had been able to see, understand, and implement some of the advice that I had gotten when I first came here. I could have avoided wasting SO much time being obsessed and miserable. Not that I could have made myself happy during that time, but if I could have seen what a long haul it was going to be early on, I could have hunkered down and weathered the storm without AS much misery.

i started acknowledging very gently to myself, that yes, zig, of course you are not detached, of course this hurts, of course this is painful, of course you don't know how long you can stay the course

There is nothing wrong with being kind and understanding to yourself. In fact, I encourage it.