Letting go, finally

[JGuy]

Rd, I appreciate that you are hanging in there with me. In this most recent response I found you were much less harsh. Thank you for trying to get your point across more gently.

I don't think most people would take I'm calling you stupid when I actually posted , I don't think your stupid. But Jguy did Lets just take that example. I post one thing and you read another Who is at fault there, seriously , who ? I didn't infer anything , I actually posted " I don't think your stupid " but Jguy read between the lines and found I was calling you stupid

You're right, in that particular case you didn't directly call me stupid. But the way that sentence read to me, it sounded like you were implying it indirectly. The full sentence was "You don't strike me as stupid but I do wonder if you can't get past your own opinion of yourself enough to see how you come accross". If I read it wrong, then I apologize for the misunderstanding.

My surprise at your asking W is that this person lies to you on a regular basis and you have proved this. Why ask her In her Wayward state anything she says could have an alternative agenda.

That's a fair point. I do take everything she says with a grain of salt, but I don't see the harm in collecting clues from her. I found something that led to a helpful realization, so I'm happy about that.

Jguy. We could go back and forth with this and unless you accept that you have issues why would we ?

I do accept that I have issues, I just don't agree with your definition of what my issues are. The empathy issue is pretty deep and daunting, and I think that learning to self-validate may be one of the first steps I need to take.

You take things as hurtful and I see them as one adult attempting to explain to another Your 39 and I'm 50 , do we have to pick our words because we are afraid to hurt each other's feelings ? I'm very sensitive but im also an adult and have to accept that the world isn't sugar coated and fair all of the time

I appreciate that this blunt style of communication works for you. I'm not saying it's wrong, I'm just saying that it hasn't worked well for me. Trust me, I've got little JGuy here nodding his head. But this last post of yours was much better. I still get the sense that our personalities might be very different and so we have an uphill battle to understand each other, but nobody's to blame for that.

You never post on anyone' else's threads , why , lack of empathy as you posted a while back ? But then we are back to the Shaman getting you completely wrong but you didn't think they did

I do post on others threads, recently trumpet's. Not as often as I'd like, but I've been busy. The thing about my issue with empathy is that apparently, when I can't empathize with myself, I can't empathize with others. So it makes sense that I could try to start with self-validation and see where it takes me.

Jguy. Step back from any hurt or feelings that I'm not on your side , just for a minute Your 'M has failed because your W cheated on you and does not find you attractive ( she may say she never did but obviously that's rubbish ) How much of the M breakdown is Jguys fault , seriously , how much ???

I really don't know, I have some issues but I don't know to what extent her loss of attraction to me had to do with that. So, I've got nothing to lose by working on my issues and seeing what happens. However, independently of that, I also observe the severity of my W's issues and I question whether it's really realistic that she'll ever deal with them. Ultimately I see it as both her fault and mine. Not either or. Both of us should work on our issues regardless of what the other person does.

Do you come accross as controlling in the M ? W said you do push for agreement to a point , COULD this be seen as controlling ? To you it isn't BUT could W see it this way. I see it this way but you don't

Yes, Rd. That's exactly what I realized yesterday when I spoke with my W. I'm not controlling, but it may appear that way to some people when really I'm just seeking validation. So, that's how I got to realizing that if I work on self-validation, it might just do the trick.

You use words like Hero and when you removed the key logger , you said you did it to keep your integrity , you put it on without integrity but somehow when you removed it you had integrity. Please don't misunderstand , I think you needed to put it on to comfirm your suspicions and I saw no lack of integrity at all but you seems to think by removing it you showed integrity , I'm not sure why

It wasn't about showing integrity to anyone else that I removed the keylogger, it was for myself. I felt horrible about snooping, invading someone else's privacy, and I had to lie and keep a secret from her in order to do it. It just made me feel sick and I couldn't do it anymore.

I'm going to stress this again , I'm in your side and I think your W is way out of order with her choices BUT unless you accept your faults and issues ( that we all have in our Ms ) then how can you hope to have a healthy R ???

So if we take the "controlling" issue as an example, I can't accept that I'm controlling because I really don't see that I ever want to control anyone. My intention is to be validated. But I do recognize how seeking validation may be misinterpreted as controlling. So I'm making the leap by accepting that my issue has to do with needing validation from others.

we are asking you follow the books and we are asking you to stop chasing instant answers because you are racing down cheeseless tunnels and focusing on the completely wrong areas

I'm pretty convinced right now that seeking validation from others is the cheeseless tunnel!

Validation is nice but not always possible because sometimes we are wrong

Our definition of validation might be different here. When I say validation, I'm talking about accepting one's internal experience, which can never be wrong. You may not agree with the content of the thoughts or feelings, but validating is not the same thing as agreeing.