You have finally succeeded in surviving the gauntlet of “I love you” and “You love me,” and are now half of a couple.  Good for you!  Now all you have to do is to glide down the sunny slope of “living happily ever after.”

Right?

As Sprite, the veteran of many relationships, would say, “Haha.”

After the courtship and the honeymoon, which may last a few weeks or several years, the going may get tough.  And when the going gets tough, as they say, the tough get going.  By “get going” I do not mean the tough resolve their mutual challenges.  They often “get going” by hiding, by keeping secrets of the heart.  At best this causes a relationship to deteriorate.  At worst it causes a relationship to collapse.  At the very worst keeping emotional secrets consigns a relationship into the zombie zone.

As time passes we each have a growing investment in keeping the relationship going, even if it has sputtered for years.  We accept a life of futile familiarity.  We fear the unknown and refuse to change the situation by either speaking honestly with our partner about our feelings, or by simply getting out.  As Thoreau put it, “The mass of men [and women] lead lives of quiet desperation.”

This is exactly what happened to Marcia and John (names changed to protect us all), who married at age eighteen, the day after they graduated from high school.  I talked with Marcia at our twentieth high school reunion.

Marcia married John with high hopes for happiness. “But he just didn’t turn out to be the right person for me.  He works all the time. He pays no attention to either me or our children.”

“Have you talked to him about it?”

“Of course.  In the beginning.  But nothing changed, so I gradually gave up.  And now both children are in their teens, and I guess . . .” There were tears in her eyes.  I never learned what Marcia guessed, because John appeared, drink in hand, and asked me what had happened since high school.

Ten years later, at our thirtieth high school reunion, Marcia and John were still together.  This time Marcia said, “Our children have both graduated from college now.” Then she hesitated.  “But our oldest is still living at home.  And he and his dad both treat me just like I was some kind of maid service.”

Marcia, drink in hand, smiled weakly.  It seemed I was talking to a woman who was resigned to her fate.

How can you avoid becoming Marcia?  Or stop being the Marcia you have become?  In your heart of hearts you already know the answer.  You know what to do.  You are just scared to do it.  You need to speak up, to have the courage to let your partner know how you feel.  You have absolutely nothing of value to lose except, as I said above, futile familiarity.

With open communication you will give yourself the opportunity to resurrect and resume the relationship you once enjoyed.  Or you may leave the zombie zone to find something better.  By allowing yourself to lead a life of noisy desperation you will give both yourself and your partner a fresh opportunity to return to that dream each of you once enjoyed, to live happily, and outspokenly, ever after.

Alan

Do you believe that anything on the following list scares you?

1. Standing on a high ledge.
2. Buying a house.
3. Balancing your checkbook.
4. Making an emotional commitment.
5. Speaking before a large group of people.

If you said yes to any of these you fall into a nearly universal trap. Most people believe that when they are scared of something, the scare comes from outside of themselves.  It is perfectly normal to say, “[Whatever it is] scares me.”  If everyone talks about scare that way, then it must be true.

Right?

Wrong.

If the scare comes from outside of you, from a high ledge for example, then everyone in the world would be scared of a high ledge.  If the scare comes from public speaking, then why isn’t everyone afraid of it?  And, sadly, if you believe that scare comes from making an emotional commitment, then you’re doomed.  If you continue to believe that your fear originates from outside yourself you can no more change that fear than you can change the orbit of the moon.

I’m afraid to ride in a hot air balloon. But when I say “riding in a hot air balloon scares me” I automatically think of myself as helpless.  It is more accurate, and I think more helpful, for me to say, “When I think of riding in a hot air balloon I scare myself.”  I have to remember that my fear is not universal.  It doesn’t come from “out there.”  The scare comes from inside me.  Many people ride in hot air balloons and feel no fear at all.

My fear comes from my imagining that I might fall. The scare is not in the hot air balloon.  The scare originates from and remains within me.

If I asked a behavioral therapist to help me overcome my fear, she would ask me to imagine myself riding in a hot air balloon high in the sky, enjoying the breeze and the beauty of the morning sunrise. She would help me change my negative association into a positive image.

I used to be terrified speaking to large groups of people.  But to succeed in my profession I was expected to speak in public.  Though I continued to scare myself for about ten years, my actual experiences were positive.  I was never booed.  I never lost a friend in the audience.  In fact, I began to receive compliments on my speeches (which, at first, I didn’t believe).  Finally I was able to take the label of “fear” which I had stuck into my own head, and replace it with the label of “excitement.”  After all, when I’m excited my body feels pretty much the same as it does when I scare myself.

But maybe you would rather scare yourself. It’s comfortable to not take responsibility.  Maybe by now you simply accept your fears as an inevitable part of you.  You might even believe that if you were no longer afraid to balance your checkbook, or afraid to make an emotional commitment, you would lose an important and familiar part of yourself.

But remember that your fear always comes from inside of you, and you don’t have to hang onto it.  You can send yourself a new message, which starts with, “I scare myself when . . . “

In a few weeks I’ll be in Cappadocia, Turkey.  I’m planning to ride in a hot air balloon to view the unusual rock formations.  Will I scare myself?

I’ll let you know.

Alan