I’ve noticed over the years as I’ve gone through my own divorces and watched friends go through theirs that sometimes it seems almost as if there is a conveyor belt that once begun takes you inexorably to divorce. As I’ve thought about it and continued to observe it seems to me that there are three sources for this conveyor belt effect: Self Talk, Social Pressure and Inertia. I’d like to discuss the first one in today’s post and then cover the other two in subsequent posts.
By Self Talk I am referring to the on-going, internal conversation that we are all constantly having with ourselves. When we are considering what to have for dinner, thinking about how to handle a situation at work or mulling over where to go for vacation we are partaking in self talk. Of course most of the time this internal dialogue we hold with ourselves is very productive and plays a vital part in solving problems in our day to day life. It is also normal to think about problem areas in our relationships. If our friend says something insensitive or the kids act up we tend to replay that incident in our mind as we search for the best response. The problem comes when the focus of replaying isn’t to find resolution but to rehearse to ourselves the problem its self. Let’s say that our wife or girlfriend tends to chew with her mouth open at meals; if you are like me this is very irritating. So it would be absolutely normal for me to replay that situation over in my mind as I look for the best way to address the problem with her. But if I just replay the problem and start telling myself how rude she is, how inconsiderate, how boorish . . . if I start telling myself over and over all the ways that this habit can impact me personally then all that will increase is my anger and impatience with the whole matter. I will begin to see myself as the martyr and victim (a very emotionally gratifying role to play at times). As a result not only will I tend to do a poor job of addressing the problem I will also begin to resent my significant other far out of context to the offence.
As resentment grows so does the temptation to find and focus on other faults they may have. Pretty soon you find yourself absolutely miserable in a relationship with someone who you used to love to be around; they haven’t really changed, only your perception of them has. This is where we get on the conveyor belt towards divorce. Because once our perception of the other person changes and our habit of negative self talk really takes hold we grow more and more resentful, more and more dissatisfied and we begin to treat them worse and worse. Naturally they put up their defenses and this is only further ammo for more negative self talk. It becomes a vicious cycle with an ever diminishing chance to turn things around.
About the only way to get things turned around is to recognize what you are doing and start consciously and purposefully interrupting your own negative self talk and start balancing positives against the negatives. Find and remind yourself of your lady’s good character traits and the reasons why you were attracted to her in the first place. Not to say you shouldn’t recognize the problems, that is neither realistic nor healthy but you just can’t focus on them to the exclusion of all else.
Anyone else have any other thoughts, comments or questions? I will take a look at the Social Pressure aspect of the divorce conveyor belt in my next post, until then – be well!
Bill
