Hey Scott! At least your "mental wave" will come closer to me than MJ's idea of Missouri. She never seems to get that I live over on the western side of the state. It's HP that lives near St. Louis.
Being in a better emotional place is not the same as having control over our feelings. Trying to control your feelings, rather than simply accepting them for what they are, is a good path toward compulsion.
I think what I meant to say is that we can change our feelings by changing our thinking patterns, changing the way we "see" things.
Quote:
You seem to be taking a lot of things personally today
Not really sure what you meant by that. I'm just giving my personal take on things and I have been in many people's mental "shoes" in a sense, especially the desire to want to bitch about a spouse and then get validation from people on the board. I remember many times spending too much time complaining on the board about my H and the feelings I was having about him, then to have him come home from work with me in a pissy mood. How does bitching about our S on here really help? I changed my approach and it has been helpful. You can use this board to grow in your M or you can use it to escape. I learned my lesson, maybe other people can too.
Huh? So we have no control over our feelings? We can't change our attitudes and thoughts to put ourselves in a better emotional place? Well I guess cognitive theory is wrong then. And when I said "should" it's quite obvious I meant typical loving traits such as respect, understanding, blah blah. Those are a given in most people's definitions of a loving M.
I also feel we don't have control over our feelings. Take this for example I believe it is you that has this situation LFL and that is housecleaning. Your husband desires a clean house. While you don't. Well, can't you control your feelings to change your attitude so that maybe you will love to start cleaning?
LFL wrote: "So we have no control over our feelings? "
Yup, we don't.
As a therapist, you don't know that?
I'm not going to get into a debate over the semantics of change and control but I think I've already made it clear that I believe you can CHANGE your feelings. The word CONTROL implies suppression or some other negative defense. That is not what I am referring to. But if it makes you FEEL better to be right then ok, your right, I'm wrong.
I suppose I "change" my feelings about and toward my wife a dozen times a day. Sometimes I'm angry. Sometimes, I'm empathetic. Sometimes, I'm happy with her. Sometimes, I'm even - gasp - horny, and I want to jump her bones.
But it's hard to be consistently loving/empathetic/respectful towards someone who treats me the way my wife does from time to time. I'm sure her feelings toward me change often, too.
I thought you would say I was delusional for thinking OSU would make it to the Championship game after that close call with Xavier!!
***Why is it that, after two, three, four years of me doing everything/anything to try to show her how much I love her, that she can so easily deflect my wants/needs?***
Come on HD, look at this question. This is the KEY. What IS the answer? Could it be that you were doing any and everything but what she needed? Don't take that personal; she may not have known what she needed any more that you did.
Early in the relationship, we did have some pretty good sex. She seemed to enjoy it, she initiated it some of the time, and although she seemed pretty conservative in her sexual repertoire (compared to my ex, and to some girlfriends), it didn't seem to be a problem at the time.
So her "feminist" views are not ingrained and innate to her. Something else has been happening. Look back to the above question.
But what is happiness except the simple harmony between a man and the life he leads? ~Albert Camus
