02 – Pessimistic or Positive?

Is your past helping you or is it getting in your way?

You have more control over it than you think. This is what we’re going to be talking about today.

This is “Couples Coaching,” and I’m Natalie Clay.

It’s interesting to me how often childhood comes up when I’m coaching someone. I’ve thought a lot about why that tends to come up so often, and I think it has everything to do with expectations.

So, think for yourself. Can you envision an ideal childhood? Two parents, both loving and supportive, no hurt, no fear, some responsibility taught, but nothing too painful…

In reality, that childhood does not exist. No matter how good things were for us. Every one of us has things that we wouldn’t have chosen.

I think that’s the connection subconsciously that they’re making to marriage, because no matter how good our marriage may be, there is plenty there that we wouldn’t have chosen. But what if we decided to look at everything from our past and decide maybe that happened so that I could learn the lessons I needed to learn in life? Maybe all of that perfectly prepared me for whatever is going to come in the future. We’re not where we are today, in spite of our past, but because of it.

“Maybe this is all happening for me.”

That’s a thought I really like.

“This is happening for me.”

We were in Spokane over New Years, visiting my side of the family. One afternoon, we decided to take our kids down to Riverfront Park, down to the carousel there and there was a little girl there. She was probably 6 or 7. I saw her throw up on the ground and it was really gross. My thought was, “Please take her home because that poor child is sick.” Yes, I did have compassion for the child, I promise. But I’m a bit of a germaphobe too.

When the mom didn’t take her home and I saw the girl get back on the carousel, I watched closely to see what horse she got on because I definitely wanted to make sure that my kids were not going to get on that same horse. It was interesting because when she got off, she left after that ride.

I watched this boy who looked to be a couple of years older than another little girl. The girl and boy run on to the carousel and for whatever reason they both wanted that horse. The boy, being a little older, was faster and he jumped on the horse and this little girl was devastated. She was just bawling because she had to sit on the stationary horse next to it that didn’t go up and down.

It was so interesting to sit from the outside and watch this and think, “Man, there’s no way she could possibly know that she got the better horse because everything in her logical mind tells her that his horse is better.”

They both knew that his horse is better. His goes up then down and hers stays stationary. There’s no way that she would ever have the thought or even considered that maybe she got the better end of the deal there. But who knows? He might go home tomorrow and be sick, and or maybe he won’t. 

It just really made me think about how often this happens in our lives. Where everything makes perfect sense to us that it should be different. When we definitely know what situation would be better for us. Maybe if we got married later in life or we had more money. Or, our spouse didn’t have an affair, or whatever the circumstances may be. It’s so easy to think we know for sure what would be better.

So I like that idea of just thinking we don’t know. It’s very possible that we don’t know. So, that is something I choose to believe as fact now — that for sure all of this is happening for us. Even though when we’re going through hard things, it doesn’t seem like that could be true…every time I think that, it makes me be more of who I want to be.

Thinking things are happening for me, makes me more actively create a better situation. Whereas, when I think it’s just not as good as it should be, that makes me just kind of want to give up.

If you don’t believe me on this, that’s okay. I just want you to consider it.

If you feel like you’re a victim a lot in your life, how does that serve you? Does that serve you in any way, or does it just keep you stuck? Because when we have to change our childhood, or our past, or who we married in order to feel what we want to feel today…we’re kind of out of luck. We can’t change it. 

Anything from your past is now just a fact of your path. It’s not good. It’s not bad. It doesn’t have any effect on you today except for the way you choose to think about it.

Now this is really good news, because this means that the things that happened in your past don’t have to keep causing you pain today. In fact, you can decide that everything you’ve been through in your path is now there to help you create whatever it is you want to create in your future. You’re actually more prepared than you’ve ever been to do whatever you want to do next. 

So, when you think about why you’re married today, I want you to pay attention to what your brain does. Does your brain try and tell you that your marriage is less than ideal? If so, that is not helping you improve your experience. And it’s also just a lie. There is no ideal marriage. The experience you’re having in your marriage is coming from the thoughts you’re having about your spouse and about what you think marriage should be.

If you don’t believe me, write down a list of all the things you think about your spouse and everything you think about your marriage. Look over all of those thoughts and notice how your brain thinks that so many of those thoughts are facts.

What if you decided to take a risk and find reasons to want to be married that were based on love or compassion? Now this takes courage because having hope implies that you could be disappointed in the future. But assuming your marriage will be a disappointment just ensures that it’s a disappointment now.

What if you tried on the idea that maybe you could have a great marriage? Maybe everything you’ve experienced in your marriage so far, and I don’t care how many years that is, how many decades that is…maybe all of it is there for you to learn and grow from?

What if that’s true?

What if it has the ability to make you better and stronger as a couple? Can you look back on everything that’s happened in your marriage and find evidence that you guys have had a common goal? Do you think you could have a common goal today, given the opportunity? Do you think you would both choose to be happy and be in love with one another?

Decide today how you want to consciously think about why you are choosing to be mad. When we are running on autopilot, it’s easy to think we’re just kind of stuck in this situation and maybe we just got kind of a stinker of a marriage that you have to deal with. But I think it is really helpful to know that you’re married today because you are choosing to be married today.

As soon as we start thinking, “Truly, the only reason that I’m married today is because I’m choosing to stay married today,” then that puts the onus on us to also be in charge of the experience that we’re having in our marriage. I think that’s a really good thing.

I don’t say that for you to beat yourself up or think, “C’mon, you’ve just got to think positive. You’ve just got to be more kind and loving and serve more and then your marriage will be great.”

Although I do think those things will help…but as soon as you feel some responsibility for your situation, you feel more motivated to take some responsibility for it.

Think about the reasons that you’re married today. Instead of thinking of your marriage just happening to you, remember that you are choosing to be married. Your marriage isn’t a stinker. Things haven’t gone wrong. What if all of this is happening for you? How might you learn from everything in the past?

Thanks so much for listening today and remember: of all the emotions you can choose to feel, love feels the very best.