My advice does not change, and if you can see AS posted the same thing I did. Many posters have posted the same thing. I highly doubt we aren't all wrong and seeing things unclearly.
Often I will open a window and type a response while doing other things at work, so it can take me an hour or more to finally finish and send my response due to interruptions. Sometimes someone else has posted something in the meantime, as was the case this time with Ginger and 25. I did not see their posts until after I had sent mine. Which is to say, I wasn't repeating what they said, we were saying pretty much the same things separately. Why? Because you ain't the first cowboy we've watched in this rodeo Here's the best advice I can offer you right now- just stop everything you're doing and wipe the slate clean. Quit thinking you've got it all figured out. Forget strategies. Empty your mind. Take a couple of days to do that. Then....
How SURE are you about things that are going to happen?
How much do you rely on the past, and the present, to predict the future? Especially about the "negative" things?
How would you see the situation you're in from an outsider's point of view? What if you were a third-party looking at the events that are going on in your life? How might you see things differently?
If you were to read your story on the board like it was someone else's thread, what would you post to yourself? What advice would you give to you? How well would you take that advice?!
If there was no past history to taint your views of the possibilities of things that could happen in the future, what might things look like?
If you were to put aside the "fact" that everything your partner is doing is meant to hurt you, what other possible explanations for some of their individual behaviors might you be able to come up with?
What areas of your relationship might it be helpful to "take off your blinders", and see things from a different perspective?
What does that dot that the teacher drew on the blackboard represent to you?!
What would your answer be to the "miracle question"? Your answer to how things COULD be, instead of the way that they are?
If you were to start things over from scratch, with a clean slate, what would your relationship be like? What would YOU be doing to help lead it into the right direction?
Now, empty your minds, and let's begin!!
Originally Posted By: Ginger1
A wise person once said " listen to understand, not to respond"
Here's the best advice I can offer you right now- just stop everything you're doing and wipe the slate clean. Quit thinking you've got it all figured out. Forget strategies. Empty your mind. Take a couple of days to do that. Then.... 