The Founder's Laptop
by Rick Reynolds
Relapsing: Behavior vs. Belief
About ten years ago I had a client who I deemed “the king of relapse”. Week after week he’d faithfully come to his session, and week after week he would tell me how he’d screwed up. About eight weeks into the process I finally asked, “Do you really believe this behavior’s not optional?” “Absolutely,” he replied. “Then I’m confused. I’ve always believed behaviors are a far better indicator of a person’s belief system than words and looking at your behaviors, I’d have to say that your actions don’t match what you say you believe. Looking at your behaviors, it seems you’ve got to believe there are times when the behavior is acceptable. What do your actions really say about your belief system?” “Well,” he said, “it seems my behaviors say that I believe it’s okay as long as I’m really miserable and need an escape. I believe it’s okay if I avoid getting caught (doing the behavior) and that it’s okay if I’ve worked really hard to avoid the behavior.”
“Do you really want to stop?” I asked.
It wasn’t until he truthfully answered that question that Joe began to change. It’s one thing to wish you wouldn’t act a certain way, it’s another to draw a line in the sand and decide it’s “not optional”. Joe began by identifying the behaviors that he felt were inconsistent with how he wanted to be. Then, he identified the behaviors he believed were healthy and consistent with his beliefs and nature. Finally, he made a list of behaviors he just wasn’t sure were good or bad, but wasn’t willing to give up. That exercise eliminated many of his excuses and set a course of action.
Life has a way of creating difficult situations. At any given moment something can trigger intense pain, harsh disappointments, rogue desires and at that moment we’re compelled to respond. In those moments I know how I want to act, but there are plenty of times I’ve failed to act that way. There have been many things I’ve wanted to change, but did I really make the old behavior “not optional”, or was I just hoping good intentions would make the change occur? Change may be what I want, but as the saying goes, “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”.
Infidelity has a way of bringing out the worst in the best of us and the best in the worst of us. We’ve got to accept whom we really are and be intentional about how we want to live. It’s true for both the hurt and unfaithful mate. And if we don’t take the time to think, consider, and answer those questions in the cool of the moment, there’s a strong likelihood that we’ll be like a chip of wood on stormy waters tossed to and fro by the emotional upheaval created by life’s circumstances.
Sex Addicts Anonymous has an interesting exercise called the “Three Circles”.
How do you want to respond to life’s difficulties? Do you want to be true to your committed way of life, or do you want to act in ways that are counter to your nature? These are decisions you need to make in a state of calm, not in a moment of passion. If you love your life, then it’s pragmatically smart to avoid behaviors that will damage your relationship. If you’re hurting or frustrated and life’s not going the way you like, it won’t be long until the allure of acting in ways counter to your nature may soon outweigh your desire to respond in love. The only problem is, acting contrary to your nature not only hurts others, it also hurts you.
Infidelity creates a pain like no other and each time that pain is triggered, you are faced with a two choice dilemma. Do you let the pain drag you to behaviors that you don’t intend, or do you choose a path that brings life for yourself and for others?
To make that decision you must first determine how you don’t want to be. The “Three Circles” exercise from Sex Addicts Anonymous provides a great tool to decide how you want to respond and how you don’t want to respond. As the old saying goes, “People never plan to fail, they just fail to plan.” Don’t let life’s tragedies lead you to behaviors and actions that you never intended.
Let me encourage you to take a moment and consider: What are your standards?
The “Inner circle”:
These are response patterns you know are counter to who you are and how you want to be. They are bottom line behaviors that you want to make “not optional”. These might include acting out sexually, drinking, shopping, physical violence, or verbal abuse. Determine what are the behaviors in your life that you want to make “not optional”.
The “Outer circle”:
These are behaviors that you believe are healthy and life giving. This is the way you’d like to be remembered. Making a conscious effort to maximize these behaviors can bring life to others and to self.
The “Middle circle”:
These are questionable ways of responding to the pain of life, and you’re not sure if they’re good or bad. They may seem appropriate and justified in the pain of the moment, but you’re just not sure.
My friend, Mike, always says this: “My mate’s never my problem, my mate just reveals the problem in me.” Nothing could be truer. If you want to discover your own defects of character, all that’s needed is letting your mate deeply wound you and you’ll experience all the ways your soul has yet to be conformed to love. In those moments we’re all tempted to act in ways contrary to love.
If you haven’t predetermined how you want to respond, you’ll be forever a victim of your emotions and there’s a good chance that your responses may well take you places you don’t want to go.
Now, please don’t hear me saying that your feelings or your intuitions are invalid. Feelings are a real and meaningful part of our existence, even the really strong ones. But, intense emotions also create a demand for action, and that response, if we fail to plan, may take us places we don’t want to go.
For all of us it’s important to be true to ourselves and think through who we really are and how we really want to be. I’d encourage you to take a moment and fill out the three circles. You’ll find it can help you stay the course.
Comments
perfect
This is easy enough even for us A.D.D.ers
Thanks Rick
Lonny
how do you want to be
I've been stuck on that same yo-yo for 3 years. Its emotionally and physically damaging. I know I have to choose a pain and move forward. I know intellectually my wife and family is the right choice. But I am so emotionally attached to the other woman. Its sraining me day by day
The HARM of making choices by feelings ...and justifications
As a woman damaged by discovering my husbands secret life involving a woman who crossed a restaurant years ago when my husband had been promoted , transferred to another city and apart for a few months while we prepared to follow with our three small children ...I can tell you CHOOSE LIFE...the other way is DEATH and very difficult ..He was in a weak point ...I was still recovring from a C section and he was miles away , lonely , high on his new status...and the young woman was willing to be in adultery with him even though he swore he would never leave me. He continued in this for 15 years...even giving her two children just to KEEP her in his life. ALL the while I was homeschooling and given all the work to show and sell our homes as he pursued his career , moving us despite all the interruption to our lives and their schooling. I never suspected since his job was very demanding of his time [ or so I thought] He was very good at his continuing to hide this from everyone ...She moved and followed us even though we moved about every two to three years. He paid for her house, new car and continues to pay twice the lawful child support ..>THIS is the very damaging issue that continues to be sore in our household ..He has given her over one million dollars despite our economic down turn and ALL without my knowledge as I made many sacrifices and lived very modestly.
He broke it off with her ...but now for 2 and a half years it has been very painful . There has been no contact but he continues to pay for her expenses and private schooling ...plus a hefty life insurance policy ..This has had a huge impact upon our children ..and it is very painful in that we have never really gotten the type of network of friends and support due to moving and now I am having trouble getting into any real friendships with other women or even couples.
We have begun attending a church ....but my ministry days were interrupted when the ministry began to fall apart due to leadership inproprieties...my husband 's mother died when our first child was born and he began to question our marriage ...what love is and rejected the Lord and our marriage in all areas that were pertinent ...He would not share with me once he began to work in an office...He directed his whole life to those he worked with ...and withdrew from me pretty much in most ways that were what marriage IS ..
With every pregnancy I found out he was unfaithful in some way ..but none of them went as far as with this woman who is 17 years my junior ...We have been married 29 years during which I THOUGHT he was the perfect man but just was 'sacrificing ' time with us for his building what was FOR us in his work. He was there for "important' events in most of our lives..and would call from work daily ...
This woman was told from the beginning he was married and knew us as she was hired later on to work with him so they could be together...She agreed to be in tihs ..and then also wanted children but researched being a single mother ...just as long as he provided the money ..
Trouble is all around this situation ...the LORD is faithful but the pain for all of us is profound ...Yes we DO have to decide WHAT is going to be our legacy ..>NOW this man who HAD IT ALL by everyone 's definition has to face all of the inequities of WHO and WHAT he has been .
My question is 'WHO is a better person for having done this? " " What good has she done in this life that she can look upon as her greatest legacy ?" When I first found out he told me that she was 'just like me' and that she was a 'good ' person ..HOW decieved does one have to be?
I will not elaborate upon MY life and attributes ...for I have a LORD in heaven who will recite my true contribution to the following of His will or not ...but I urge you to consider that THOSE in your life ...both your family AND the OW are the beneficiaries of your choices ...either for the betterment of their lives or the painful legacy that you will have to live with ...
My husband is sorrowful because he cannot change what HE has done to all of the lives that HE decided HE 'could do ' and just because you CAN doesn't mean you SHOULD ..>Solomon was trying 'after the fact' to convey that all his wisdom USED the WRONG way to get what HE felt he wanted for HIS OWN pleasure and reasoning ...was FATAL in many ways ...as was HIS father David who used HIS position and power to get MORE than he should have ...and the disasterous effects upon the lives of ALL his decendents was known to the whole world ..>Thus GOD demonstated that even a man devoted to the LORD who starts to live by felt needs is going to suffer LOSS ...After his infidelity and murder of Uriah he was not called 'a man after God's own heart " any longer ..HE did repent but the consequences of his sin still 'came up ' as what we sow we reap in his world ...sin has those consequences BOUND in them ...contained ..and adultery has consequences that are suffered that are different than that of other sins...because it involves the BODY and IS FOR the LUSTS of the FLESH ..and touches many aspects of the temple of GOD which temple we are !
Fearful thing to contemplate ...a good idea to seek the LORD to examine yourself in HIS WORD and to see how far you think it is WORTH it in terms of eternity to get that 'feeling ' you crave ...when it is the flesh that you HAVE been provided for in marriage with the wife of your youth FOR YOUR OWN BENEFIT .
GOD's FIRST law of marriage was to LEAVE and then CLEAVE ...the secret to the fulfillment ..and the husband was given this command and to DO as CHRIST DID ...to love his wife as CHRist LOVED the church and GAVE himself FOR HER ...AND CHRIST went FIRST ....the HUSBAND is to be the INITIATOR ...and the wife WILL RESPOND ..it is the DESIGN of the man to do so and the DESIGN of the woman ...she is a responder...
Solomon found this out with the Queen of Shebah ..as he operated this aspect of the DESIGN ...he LISTENED to her ..and ANSWERED all her questions and SHE RESPONDED by GIVING to HIM!
This is also part of the command of the husband to live with his wife according to KNOWLEDGE and to protect her emotions by warming her and faithfully attending to her ...
This brings about security and value to HER and SHE WILL respond ...HUSBANDS GO FIRST ..be sure of it ..Christ went first and the church has been drawn to him through is sacrificial love.
The woman marries and is drawn or DESIRES her husband ..>NOT to usurp him ...but the curse of the law at the time of the FALL was that the MAN would seek to RULE over others...and his wife in particular...AS Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the LAW of sin and death ...a husband in Christ should seek to overturn this urge to RULE and dominate ...to live independently while off loading all of the responsibilities on to his WIFE that GOD commanded the husband and father to take on ...the MAN will GROW up unto all that GOD has designed for him THROUGH the maturing process that MARRIAGE IS ..
I have been studying ...to learn HOW to respond to this difficult situation that my husband's refusal to prepare himself to handle in a godly manner years ago because he would not heed my heart to place godly boundaries in his way of relating to his women in his office. THEY responded to his CHARM and "care' that caused me to observe their responses that he did not want to acknowledge as a threat to our marriage...my heart ..
A man who will not acknowledge the aspects of wisdom his WIFE is equipped to bring to him for the protection of the marriage is foolish and immature and selfish . It is NOT ungodly for a wife to be careful for her marriage..it is NOT inappropriate jealousy but proper warning system GOD has designed as she is more sensitive emotionally ..>Men do not often recognize the difference in HOW their attention to women effects them ...especially in this day and time when many girls have not been affirmed by fathers...."I have regarded my families losses ..MY husbands insistance upon extending his adolesent "need for fun ' and actually extending his childhood ...STOLE my children's rightful childhood from them ..and NOW that childhood that his feminist adulteress has caused children she wanted to have for the "experience ' and now she is raising them to believe the Bible is myth!
The fruit of this ungodly union is GOING to come forth ...SHe is comfortably living upon our finances that are based upon DEBT so she can continue to live in the way she is comfortable ...He is sorrowful but feel the weight of responsibility for "THEM " while putting our family second in terms of not heeding the god given command to put his wife as the first priority after his relationship with GOD ...The present view that he is effected by his HUMANISTIC SOCIALISM or the redistribution of wealth ...SEE the doctrines of radical feminism ...The woman did not care for him , us or even the life of the children she demanded from him ..along with the money she has been receiving ...
We are determined to be married ....our lives are good except for this life long situation that will go on into the lives of our children no doubt at some point in their future even though he SAYS he doubt they will have to deal with those other children ...OUR children are now mature but not older and THEY are very concerned about this terrible situation their father ...who says HE decide he could have children with her because he knew OUR children KNEW he loved them!
Talk about the insanity that infidelity causes ...THIS is ONE messed up accomodation for the CARNAL LUSTS of two people blinded to anything but what THEY DECIDED was the life all of us should have !
It is very difficult to deal with but each day is one that we DEAL with it....I try to think of the woman whose face and hands were chewed off by that chimpanzee ...how TERRIBLE a thing to deal with ..and how radical a thing to have to think of to make me stop mourning my own pain in all of this...THANKFULNESS is what has to be done ...to consider the LORD ..and remember this WORLD is NOT HIS kingdom ...His kingdom is WITHIN us ..through his WORD ...which is His spirit...as Jesus told us ...eat that word and be thankful ...this life is really SHORT ...and eternity is LONG ......
Stop before you do something worse that you will find is just not worth it ...the veil of darkness that you are under will drop on day and you will find it very difficult to find repentance as Esau did ...though he searched for it with many tears....STOP and THINK!
This is a very sad story. I
This is a very sad story. I can't begin to imagine how difficult this is going to be for you to live with. I agree that those two made the decision for the kind of life that you and your children will have and they made that decision without consulting you. They are cowards and the least these adulterers could do is be honest about their choices and let you in on what they are doing so that you can choose whether or not you want to live in an open marriage, subject yourself to disease, make personal and finacial sacrifices for someone who is stealing your life, and live a life long struggle of dealing with betrayal. I am so sorry that you have to live with this and try to figure out what is best for you and your children. He is more than lucky that you still consider letting him be in your life. It might be nice to let him go live with someone who is a liar and a back stabber and is totally self centered and then he can see just what he sacrificed you and your children's life for. She will never be tolerant like you. He will probably get from her just what he deserves. My hope for you is peace in life. I'm not sure you can find it with him, but I certainly admire you for trying. I understand what it's like to love one of these people and also what it's like to try to figure out what is best for your children. I just wish that these people would not create a family if they want to have multiple sex partners. Adulterers, Just tell us! That's all we ask.