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Fidelity
Why So Much Infidelity?
By Margaret Paul, Ph.D.
Megan contacted me for counseling because she had just found out
that her husband, Jim, was having an affair. Although she was
feeling hurt and angry, she didn’t feel justified in getting too
hurt and angry because she had also been having an affair.
Megan told me that she and Jim still loved each
other and they didn’t want to break up their family, but her
discovery of his affair took her out of denial.
She had been able to
rationalize her affair to herself, but she couldn’t rationalize
Jim’s. She had to acknowledge that something was really wrong. She
was worried that this meant the end of their relationship.
I assured Megan that the affairs were not the
problem but a symptom of the problem. It did not need to mean the
end of the relationship. She and Jim could decide to learn about the
deeper problems in their relationship and eventually create a much
more satisfying relationship.
As a counselor, I hear this story over and over.
Why is there so much infidelity?
Megan and Jim entered their marriage, as most
people do, with the expectation that the other person would make
them happy. They entered feeling some emptiness, unworthiness and
insecurity, hoping their partner would fill them, validate them and
complete them. Yet as time went on, neither felt happy, secure,
filled or complete.
They began to look elsewhere. Perhaps someone
else – someone more attentive and more emotionally available, or
sexier, or more playful would fill the emptiness, validate their
worth, and make them happy.
The problem lies in how most people in our society
view what makes them happy. Any TV commercial will illuminate the
underlying problem:
- Get this car – it will make you happy.
- Get this house – it will make you happy.
- Wear these clothes. Then you will look good and
get approval and that will make you happy.
- Go on this diet – then you will look good, find
your beloved and then you will be happy.
- Take this pill – then you will be happy.
- Go on this vacation – that will make you happy.
- Get this toy, this appliance, this new gadget –
then you will be happy.
But Megan had the house, the car, the husband, the
children, the money, the job, the antidepressants – and she still
wasn’t happy. So, she went looking for another person to make her
happy.
The problem is that as long as Megan and Jim
believe that something external will make them happy, they will be
unhappy, and they will keep looking for another person, better sex,
a bigger house, and so on to make them happy.
Infidelity generally comes from the same inner
emptiness as does alcohol and drug abuse, food addiction, gambling,
spending, shopping, and so on. In the case of infidelity, the
addiction is to attention, approval or sex – using another person to
fill the inner emptiness and take away the inner aloneness.
Rather
than end the relationship, taking their emptiness and aloneness with
them into their next relationship, Megan and Jim have the
opportunity to do some inner healing work.
Megan and Jim decided that it was worth trying to
save their marriage. They came to one of our Inner Bonding Couples
Intensives and learned about all the ways they were making the other
person responsible for their well-being and happiness.
They learned
the powerful Inner Bonding process for taking responsibility for
their own feelings and for connecting with an ever-present source of
love and wisdom to help them learn to love themselves. They
discovered that they had no love to share with each other until they
learned how to fill themselves with love and to be loving to
themselves. They learned:
- To stay focused inward, on their own feelings
and behavior, rather than have their eyes on the other’s plate.
- That their intention is the most powerful thing
they have, and that they are either in the intent to protect against
pain or the intent to learn in any given moment. They discovered
that the intent to learn about themselves and each other creates
intimacy while the intent to protect against being hurt creates
distance.
- To explore their own fears and beliefs rather
than keep trying to get the other to change.
- How to connect with their personal source of
inner/spiritual guidance to help them know the loving action toward
themselves and with each other and they learned to take loving
action for themselves rather than try to get the other to take care
of them.
By being willing to do their inner work and learn
how to take emotional responsibility for themselves, Megan and Jim
were able to create a much more intimate and fulfilling
relationship.
The affairs, rather than ending their relationship,
led to creating a whole new and satisfying relationship. At this
point, neither Megan nor Jim has any desire to have an affair.
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is the best-selling author
and co-author of eight books, including "Do I Have To Give Up Me To
Be Loved By You?" She is the co-creator of a powerful healing
process called Inner Bonding. Learn Inner Bonding now! Visit her web
site for a FREE Inner Bonding course:
http://www.innerbonding.com
or
mailto:margaret@innerbonding.com. Phone sessions available. |
