beliefs tagged posts

A Rose By Any Other Name

A Rose By Any Other Name

I would like to say something about the title of my book Love, Lies, and the Games Couples Play. Put simply, love, and all that it embodies for us, is what each of us seeks in life above all else. It is the main reason we enter into relationships in the first place because it gives us a place to belong and to feel connected to others.

The “lies” in the title refers to the mistaken attitudes and beliefs that we hold about ourselves and about others. These are most likely based on someone else’s thinking which in the first instance were probably our parent’s. And as these beliefs were presented to us at a time when we were not able to make well-considered decisions for ourselves, they are not necessarily reflective of our current subjective truth.

Those beliefs, and the w...

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Sex and the Stress Factor

Sex and the Stress Factor

Many couples use the state of their sex life as a barometer for what is going on in the rest of their relationship. I also suggest that the converse works as well: what is going on in your relationship and in each of your personal lives can also affect your sex life.

Libido levels rise and fall with circumstances. Maybe one person is too stressed to make sex good for their partner, let alone for him or herself. Work pressures can distract couples from giving positive sexual attention to each other.

An episode of ill health can affect your sex life. It could be something that directly affects the sex organs like prostate cancer, or just stress, or your diet. Maybe you need to exercise more or you feel overweight. You might need more sleep, or even just more fun.

You should monitor all of t...

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Transactional Analysis Ego States Theory

Ego states of a personMany years ago, people believed that a healthy relationship looked like this: two complementary halves making a whole. Now we understand that a relationship that looks like this is far from complementary and where generally one person in the couple dominates the other.

People need first to be whole within themselves in order to be happy with another person.

If we look at this issue from a Transactional Analysis perspective, according to that theory, we all have a mixture of personalities; we don’t just have one way of being. Instead, in different places with different people, we can actually relate quite differently as well. Berne described these different personality styles as “ego states...

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The Language of Love

The Language of Love

Please speak my language

In general, if you aren’t showed love the exact way you imagined love looks, it doesn’t at all mean that you aren’t loved. It has nothing to do with lack of love, but with the fact that we all of us have been scripted not only to value ourselves and others in particular ways, but also in the way we prefer to be shown love. We tend to create a picture of how we see love and this turns into the language of love that we speak with our partner.

Although you experience the expression of love from another in many ways they broadly group together according to the five senses. In the early stage of falling in love our senses become extra sensitive when we’re close to someone...

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Is The Life You Have Good Enough?

Is The Life You Have Good Enough?

Limiting Feelings, Limiting Beliefs and Limiting Behaviours

There are various ways to relieve yourself from a script and a game your mind is used to playing. Many of these are therapeutic which includes many different techniques and practices. In the USA there are about 450 registered associations that offer different help for limiting beliefs, behaviours, and feelings. These three combine to create the scripts we live our lives by.

“Limiting” here means something that holds you back, restricting you from living a truly happy life. It refers to an old way of being that is no longer useful in your life. Feelings, beliefs, and behaviours based on negative past experiences can all be limiting if held onto.

In therapy, you get an opportunity to review those limitations and make changes so tha...

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What Games Do Couples Play? (Part 7)

Lyn and James Game

Some people realize they are having problems at an early stage in their relationship while others they only realize there have been problems when their relationship is about to break down.

As with every other couple, with Lyn and James, the problems appearing are connected with both their childhoods.  Lyn had grown up in a family with three older brothers and a mother who was struggling to manage as she and her husband had separated some years before.

Lyn’s mother was anxious and depressed and on medication and her father was only occasionally available to take care of the children.

As she was still young at the time, Lyn knew very little of what happened to separate her parents...

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What Games Do Couples Play? (Part 4)

What Games Do Couples Play Part 4

How and Why Games Began

It seems that Tamara and Alex’s game began when had their first child. However, in truth, the root of the issues presenting themselves has a longer history and it starts with Alex’s early life.

As often happens, when the first child is being born, the father can feel replaced and ignored. This certainly happened to Alex. But added to the background of his relationship with Tamara, or the lack of it, was his relationship with his father and the feeling of rejection he experienced then that consequently escalated now.

Back then, when he was a child, he wasn’t aware consciously of the missing figure of his father because he had everything he wanted.

The gulf between Tamara and Alex grew even wider when Alex went to work for the science and technology company whe...

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What Games Do Couples Play? (Part 3)

What Games Do Couples Play?

Tamara and Alex’s Games

Things need to be clear in order to be understood. By clear I mean the background story and the connection to the current issues to it need to be understood to fully comprehend what the current issues are about before responding.

Usually issues come up when something far distant in the past which has nothing to do with current issue impacts on the resolution and/or even the understanding. Consequently, what you might think about a situation will often be the exact opposite of what I think about it.

Understanding and being clear about each other’s past helps build the future of the relationship better and can prevent issues from occurring.

Each relationship has its stages and it’s important to recognize the stage and its needs.

In fact, to be in a happy relati...

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What Games Do Couples Play? (Part 2)

What Games Do Couples Play Part 2

Beth and Roger’s Games – What Obstructed Their Relationship Progress?

There are few things that obstructed Beth and Roger‘s relationship. Surely the first thing to mention is the miscommunications between them. Having in mind their childhood experiences and the way they have developed certain patterns in their way of relating to each other, it is obvious that their effective communication skills are limited.

By “skills” I mean the ability to say what you really want to say and to give yourself time to understand what the other person is saying.

I also mean the ability to listen not in order to answer, but in order to understand.

It also means being honest with each other in those communications.

Situations like this and the resulting crisis in the relationship are most often a sig...

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What Games Do our Couples Play? (Part 1)

Beth and Roger’s Games

Beth and Roger’s Games

The story of Beth and Roger may look superficial or like nothing is really happening and affecting their relationship, but if the situation is analysed and looked at more closely, a lot of underwater details appear and give some clues to something happening at a subconscious level not evident when looking at it consciously.

The problem occurs when one of their children doesn’t want to attend the other child’s birthday party. Beth gets upset and expects Roger to take care of her feelings and to console her, but he is unable to do it.

Questions immediately appear and some of them are: what is so distressing about this situation and why so and even more so what roles are both playing and why?

The truth is, as bystanders to the situation it seems that Beth and R...

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