Couples therapy – part 1 - Life as he knew it
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Couples therapy – part 1 - Life as he knew it
Their marriage was great for the first fifteen years
He lived like most of the stereotyped males – invested in sport, trying to be successful in business and generally focused on providing and winning.
He was happily married - at least for the first fifteen years.
In 1994 when he and his wife returned to Australia after a four year stint in Europe, something in their lives started to gradually change – and he didn’t perceive that change until a few years later when it was nearly too late.
It was not clear at the time, but with hindsight, his wife may have been going through mild depression that year.
She was having difficulty settling back into Australia, although to many looking from the outside it would have appeared to be an idyllic lifestyle. So, she started to explore herself. She pondered life’s purpose, behaviours, relationships, love and many other philosophical questions – and she became a course junkie! She attended lectures, training courses, retreats and workshops about mind, body and soul type matters whenever she could.
She started training as a Somatic Therapist. She went away for weekends with fellow students. Through all of this she really challenged the status quo of her life and then tried to change their marriage to become more meaningful, more fulfilling and more harmonious.
The months tripped by, and as he returned home from his many overseas business trips he was fronted with a whole new set of rules in their relationship - Rules that he did not understand.
His childhood education and his boarding school experience had not presented these circumstances to him before. Everything was under review. He was uncomfortable with these changes. He resisted.
Back then, he did not do feelings in a big way.
If everyone appeared OK, then all was OK.
But it was not so.
- His wife was pointing out the shallowness of their lives and of the communities they mixed in.
- She was exposing the generally accepted nutrition based on profits of major global conglomerates rather than on sound principles of health and well-being.
- She asked to avoid the meaningless grog laced parties and gala functions that they seemingly too often attended.
She was questioning all the “norms” of the society they lived in.
"We lost our ability to go into relationships for love, we instead go for comfort, money, kids and companionship.</b>"
Serge Benhayon Esoteric Teachings and Revelations, p 689
By 1998 their relationship had morphed into mediocrity at best, yet everything probably appeared well to their friends and kids as they both masked the reality of a marriage moving more to convenience than love.
That year his wife (always the pathfinder) suggested they attend a retreat in Bali. Reluctantly he went there and surprised himself as he tentatively and then more boldly embraced re-birthing, meditation, yoga and things he could not possibly relate to his male friends! Maybe most surprising of all was that he really enjoyed it! Ten days without grog was possibly the longest he had been since conscripted military service (back in 1979). His toe was in the water for his first experience of another way of being.
To be continued...life after experiencing ‘another way of being’
To be continued...life after experiencing ‘another way of being’
Filed under
Marriage, Couples therapy, Love, Counseling, Relationship problems
