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Save Marriage When Spouse Wants Out

Desire Versus Decide
 150 150 Lee H. Baucom, Ph.D.
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Saving your marriage? Don't focus on desire. Decide.“I just don’t feel it,” two people told me this week.  One didn’t feel like following the plan to save their marriage.  The other didn’t feel it for the spouse.  One wanted to save the marriage.  The other didn’t.  Both were motivated by desire (or lack of desire).

Here’s the problem:  desire is fickle.  To say the least.  Even in a strong marriage, desire for each other can ebb and flow.  And even the best of us struggle with the desire to do things:  exercise, eat well, clean the house, go to work, etc., etc., etc.

Which is the problem with letting “desire” be the measurement of taking action.

Is there another way?

Glad you asked!  Yes there is.

It’s a word I particularly like.  Decide.

“Desire” is based in an emotional state.  “Decide” is a rational choice.  It supercedes an emotional state. And it generally is the only reliable way we make progress in any area of life.  If I wait for desire, the chances over time of desire showing up — they just keep going down.  If I decide to act, I take back full responsibility for my actions.

Has desire been your motivation and measurement (or lack of motivation and measurement)?  If so, let’s discuss the alternative.

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How Limiting Beliefs Limit Your Marriage
 150 150 Lee H. Baucom, Ph.D.
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Are limiting beliefs limiting your marriage? Yep. Listen to the podcast to learn more.It almost seems redundant, doesn’t it?  If you have limited beliefs, they could limit something — say, for example, your marriage.

I say IF you have limited beliefs.

Full disclosure:  We ALL have limited beliefs that are limiting us.  We ALL have blind spots, assumptions, even untrue beliefs.  We just don’t notice them.  And we pay a price for that.

Especially since we usually fail to notice or address these limiting beliefs.

Do you think your limiting beliefs MIGHT be limiting your life and your marriage?

I’m betting that is the case, since it is true for all of us.

Here’s the good news:  you can change your limiting beliefs.  Once you know what they are.  And decide to change them

Listen below for this week’s podcast.

(Here is the resource that has a whole section on changing limiting beliefs — I wrote it.  FIND IT RIGHT HERE.)

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“I Won’t If My Spouse Won’t” — And You Are Stuck
 150 150 Lee H. Baucom, Ph.D.
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"I won't if my spouse won't" and other ways to be stuck.A few days ago, that was what he said on the phone, “I won’t work on my marriage if my spouse won’t.” Now note:  he had contacted me — I help people save their marriage.

“Huh?” I uttered.

“Look,” he said, “if you think I am going to start working on my marriage by myself, that ain’t gonna happen.  Why don’t you convince my spouse to work on the marriage?”

“First,” I replied, “I am not in the market of trying to get someone to do something, neither you nor your wife.  Second, if you are always waiting for your spouse to do something before you do, you are probably very stuck.  Could I suggest something?”

“Probably not, but go ahead and try,” he said.

“Okay,” I pushed on, “what if you were to start working on things?  What if you were to just start moving in the direction of your marriage, seeing if you could improve the connection?  Is it possible that you could START the process, and your spouse could JOIN the process?”

“Maybe….”

Good enough for me.

You see, this is one of those stuck points of marriage.  If one spouse is refusing to do something until the other does something — and the spouse is doing the same thing — the marriage is frozen in place.  Stuck.

Someone has to shift.  Someone has to blink.  Someone has to be willing to change something in order for something to change.

Let’s talk about this stuck point — and how to get beyond it — in this week’s podcast (below).

(I mention a resource in the podcast.  FIND IT RIGHT HERE.)

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