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HOW COULD EVERYTHING CHANGE SO DRAMATICALLY

I came across this quote today and wanted to share it with you. You may find that it relates to your marital situation. 

 

“The difficultly with marriage is that we fall in love with a personality, but we must live with a character.”

-         Peter Devries

 

Hi. My name is Mort Fertel, author of Marriage Fitness.

 

We can only appreciate the profundity of this statement if we understand what is meant by CHARACTER.

 

“Personality” is easy to understand. Your “personality” is how people experience you. It’s your public persona.

 

But what is “character?” And why is “character” so crucial in your marriage?

 

Character is who you are when no one is watching.

 

Let me say that again so you can read it slowly and really digest it this time.

 

Character is who you are when no one is watching.

 

You see, when you and your spouse met, you met each other’s PERSONALITIES. You showed your spouse and you were shown by your spouse your public personas. I’m not saying you tricked each other. It’s just your personality…how you display yourself to others.

 

But marriage lasts too long in too close quarters for anyone to sustain a public persona. Personalities eventually give way to an INNER SELF that gets revealed for the first time. And there you each stand, naked as if no one is watching. But someone is watching. And that’s when you meet for the first time…again!

 

You and your spouse don’t meet the person who charmed each other’s friends, bought gifts for each other’s parents, and always smiled from ear to ear. No, this time it’s a meeting of your CHARACTERS.

 

In many cases, it’s not only that you’re meeting each other for the first time, but it’s that you’re meeting YOURSELVES for the first time.

 

Most people wouldn’t be caught dead treating anyone the way they treat their spouse. Most people don’t recognize their own behavior. “I’m just not myself with him/her.” Well then who is that person? That’s YOU…it’s your character. (And your spouse meets their character.)

 

The reason so many people fail at marriage and an attempt at marriage renewal is NOT that they don’t like their spouse. It’s that they don’t like THEMSELVES. And while everyone else in their life is like a mirror reflecting their personality; their spouse is a mirror reflecting their character. And most people don’t like what they see.

 

Many people would rather choose to be with someone else than remain with their spouse and have to continue to be with themselves. (Did you get that?)

 

Balthasar Gracian wrote in his 17th century manual on success, The Art of Worldly Wisdom, as follows: “You are as much a real person as you are deep. As with the depths of a diamond, the interior is twice as important as the surface. There are people who are all facade, like a house left unfinished when the funds run out. They have the entrance of a palace but the inner rooms of a cottage.”

 

Marriage renewal and individual character development go hand-in-hand.

 

Many people who apply the Marriage Fitness system of relationship renewal tell me that it not only restored their marriage, but it was a personal fixing for them too. If you’d like to explore that risk-free, then subscribe to my FREE breakthrough report "7 Secrets to a Stronger Marriage" and get a FREE marriage assessment too. To subscribe, CLICK HERE. It’s FREE.

 

Warm regards,

Mort Fertel

Author of Marriage Fitness

Marriage Coach

 
Open Letter to the Wayward Spouse
This is a letter to the wayward spouse that explains the 'need to know'.:
"I know you are feeling the pain of guilt and confusion. I understand that you wish all this never happened and that you wish it would just go away. I can even believe that you truly love me and that your indiscretion hurts you emotionally much the same way it hurts me. I understand your apprehension to me discovering little by little, everything that led up to your indiscretion, everything that happened during that weekend, and everything that happened afterwards.

I understand. No one wants to have a mistake or misjudgment thrown in his or her face repeatedly. No one wants to be forced to "look" at the thing that caused all their pain over and over again. I can actually see, that through your eyes, you are viewing this whole thing as something that just needs to go away, something that is over, that she doesn't mean anything to you, so why is it such a big issue? I can understand you wondering why I torture myself with this continuously, and thinking, doesn't she know by now that I love her? I can see how you can feel this way and how frustrating it must be. But for the remainder of this letter I'm going to ask you to view my reality through my eyes.
"You were there. There is no detail left out from your point of view. Like a puzzle, you have all the pieces and you are able to reconstruct them and be able to understand the whole picture, the whole message, or the whole meaning. You know exactly what that picture is and what it means to you and if it can effect your life and whether or not it continues to stir your feelings. You have the pieces, the tools, and the knowledge. You can move through your life with 100% of the picture you compiled. If you have any doubts, then at least you're carrying all the information in your mind and you can use it to derive conclusions or answers to your doubts or question. You carry all the "STUFF" to figure out OUR reality. There isn't really any information, or pieces to the puzzle that you don't have.

"Now let's enter my reality. Let's both agree that this affects our lives equally. The outcome no matter what it is will affect us both. Our future and our present circumstances are every bit as important to me as it is to you. So, why then is it okay for me to be left in the dark? Do I not deserve to know as much about the night that nearly destroyed our relationship as you do? Just like you, I am also able to discern the meaning of certain particulars and innuendoes of that night and just like you, I deserve to be given the opportunity to understand what nearly brought our relationship down. To assume that I can move forward and accept everything at face value is unrealistic and unless we stop thinking unrealistically I doubt our lives well ever "feel" complete. You have given me a puzzle. It is a 1000 piece puzzle and 400 random pieces are missing. You expect me to assemble the puzzle without the benefit of looking at the picture on the box. You expect me to be able to discern what I am looking at and to appreciate it in the same context as you. You want me to be as comfortable with what I see in the picture as you are. When I ask if there was a tree in such and such area of the picture you tell me don't worry about it, it's not important. When I ask whether there were any animals in my puzzle you say don't worry about it, it's not important. When I ask if there was a lake in that big empty spot in my puzzle you say, what's the difference, it's not important.

Then later when I'm expected to "understand" the picture in my puzzle you fail to understand my disorientation and confusion. You expect me to feel the same way about the picture as you do but deny me the same view as you. When I express this problem you feel compelled to admonish me for not understanding it, for not seeing it the way you see it. You wonder why I can't just accept whatever you chose to describe to me about the picture and then be able to feel the same way you feel about it.

"So, you want me to be okay with everything. You think you deserve to know and I deserve to wonder. You may honestly feel that the whole picture, everything that happened is insignificant because in your heart you know it was a mistake and wish it never happened. But how can I know that? Faith? Because you told me so? Would you have faith if the tables were turned? Don't you understand that I want to believe you completely? But how can I? I can never know what is truly in your mind and heart. I can only observe your actions, and what information I have acquired and slowly, over time rebuild my faith in your feelings. I truly wish it were easier.

"So, there it is, as best as I can put it. That is why I ask questions. That is where my need to know is derived from. And that is why it is unfair for you to think that we can effectively move forward and unfair for you to accuse me of dwelling on the past. My need to know stems from my desire to hold our world together. It doesn't come from jealousy, it doesn't come from spitefulness, and it doesn't come from a desire to make you suffer. It comes from the fact that I love you. Why else would I put myself through this? Wouldn't it be easier for me to walk away? Wouldn't it be easier to consider our relationship a bad mistake in my life and to move on to better horizons? Of course it would, but I can't and the reason I can't is because I love you and that reason in itself makes all the difference in the world."
 
Your Marriage Made Him/Her Do It??
Your Marriage Made Him/Her Do It?

by Dr. Robert Huizenga, The Infidelity Coach

Infidelity has different faces...and different signs and patterns.

Yes, infidelity is complex. You probably know that or perhaps feel the overwhelm and confusion.

Most I work with find tremendous relief, a sense of control, confidence and power once they pinpoint the situational signs of infidelity.

Understanding IS the beginning of healing.

But, to accelerate breaking free you need to dig into and nail down the signs and patterns of infidelity.

Did you know there are 7 different kinds of affairs? Well, there may be more, but after a couple decades of clinical work and research, I've identified 7.

And, if you look carefully, you will find that each form of infidelity carries different signs and markers. Know those specific signs of infidelity and you can save yourself much grief.

Read more...
 
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