Stuff My Dad Never Told Me -

Just Let It Go……..

BN Staff: Ran across this story, and it simply resonated. How many times have we been told we can catch more with honey than vinegar? Or all the management strategies that encourage leaders to accentuate the positive skills of the staff rather than trying to mold each member into a duplicate of themselves. This writer believes we can better our relationships by letting go of the caustic issues and focusing on the alluring, complementary characteristics and actions of your spouse. We must agree life gets easier when we aren’t stressing over the issues.

Marriage Fitness with Mort Fertel

Put Your Problems Aside

If you’re reading about how to save your marriage, you’re probably expecting to learn problem-solving strategies, communication techniques, and insights about gender differences. Do I have a SURPRISE for you!

The key to renewing your marriage is NONE of those things.

How do I know this? Because I experienced it!

Unlike other relationship experts who approach the topic from a clinical perspective, for me saving and restoring marriages is also very personal. I’ve been where you are now. I’d like to share with you my story.

My wife and I started out deeply in love. I remember staying up all night talking, surprising each other with thoughtful gifts, and speaking to each other in code words. You know the feeling of really being connected? That was us.

But then something happened that destroys most marriages. We had a son who died when he was one week old. And then we had twin daughters, who also died as newborns.

Understandably, my wife became depressed. I coped by immersing myself in work. We ran from each other emotionally.

Your situation probably was not so tragic, but something happened. What was it? How did you lose each other? Maybe you can’t put your finger on it, but something is definitely not right. That’s common too.

For us, after losing 3 children, everything felt different. Instead of talking all night, it was a chore to talk for a few minutes. Instead of using our code words, we used curse words. Our relationship consisted of screaming matches and silent treatments.

Somewhere deep in our hearts though, like you we knew we didn’t want to lose each other. So we made a commitment to work on our marriage. Sometimes I tried and my wife didn’t. Sometimes my wife tried and I didn’t. We went through different stages of “trying.”

What did we try?

We tried the obligatory, “Honey, let me repeat what you said to make sure I understood you correctly.” We applied conflict resolution strategies. My wife learned about Mars and I learned about Venus. We even went to therapy to wrestle with our problems. But guess what? Nothing changed. Nothing worked.

All the advice (books, counselors, whatever) asked us to confront our problems. But that just made us feel worse. And fight more.

As long as the “right” way wasn’t working, why not be dysfunctional? So we tried to convince each other of our way. You’ve tried that too, right? Obviously, that doesn’t work.

Then we had a breakthrough.

We decided to SET ASIDE OUR PROBLEMS. We didn’t talk about them at all. We didn’t bring them up even once. Instead, we put our energy into trying to connect. We used certain relationship techniques that transformed our marriage. Not only did we resolve our differences; we fell in love again! And we did it not by dealing with our problems (as serious as they were), but by establishing new relationship habits that brought positive energy to our marriage.

This is the solution to most marital situations! Believe it or not, the secret is to STEP AWAY FROM YOUR PROBLEMS and spend your time and energy doing specific relationship building activities.

It’s counter-intuitive, but if you do this, most of your problems will dissipate, the threat of divorce will go away, and the other people invading your marriage will become irrelevant. Before you deal with your problems, you first have to build good will with your spouse. And this is doable even in the most difficult marital situations. If your marriage is stressed, do NOT tackle your problems. Stop talking about the affair, the attention you’re not getting, or whatever. If your timing is off, trying to solve your problems will damage your marriage and make it LESS LIKELY that you’ll ever find resolution.

It’s not about conflict-resolution or communication skills because these are NOT the key to saving a marriage. The key is NOT to fix what’s wrong. The key is to make new things right.

And there are, in fact, specific things you can do, with or without your spouse, to make things right in your marriage. Temporarily put aside the problems and issues that are weighing you down and make it possible for you to establish a new momentum in your marriage. It works for any marriage even if only one spouse does participates. And the best news is that you don’t have to dig into your past, dredge up your problems, or practice communication techniques. This is not marriage counseling; it’s Marriage Fitness.

Sexless Marriage?

elp! I’m In A Sexless Marriage

Comment: Very interesting article. More importantly, we have heard this story more frequently from men as they get older and have been fortunate enough to have been engaged in longer term relationships. The author references Newsweek estimates of 15 to 20 percent of couples are in a sexless marriage. The Back Nine (TBN) Team Members believe the percentage is much greater. The challenge to keep her interested in a physical relationship is far greater than most men would like to admit. Enjoy the article and feel free to share your experiences and tactics used to keep her emotional connection charged and her sandbox clean.
Posted In Intimacy, Sexless Marriage / Bruce Muzik / WWW.LoveatFirstFight.com

Newsweek magazine estimates that 15 to 20 percent of couples are in a sexless marriage or relationship. If you are currently in a sexless marriage, I understand how sad or resigned you may feel.

My first marriage turned into a sexless marriage.

In the beginning, we’d dive into bed, hands passionately reaching for each other, excited to feel the warmth and closeness of each other’s naked body and loving touch. Within a year of being married, we were wearing pajamas and I was lying awake feeling like my wife may as well have been my sister and then falling asleep on my side of the bed feeling lonely inside.

At the time, I didn’t have the tools or understanding of relationship dynamics to do anything about our sexless marriage and eventually it led to me cheating on my wife (something I’m not proud to admit). Because our sexless marriage was the primary reason for our divorce, I never wanted to be in another sexless relationship and vowed to learn how to create and sustain sexual passion and chemistry. If anyone understands the importance of learning to create sexual chemistry instead of coping with a sexless marriage, I do.

The Real Reason Why You Have A Sexless Marriage…

When I coach a couple in a sexless marriage, they almost always say that they still love each other. Then, they say things like:

• “We work hard. We’re too tired for sex…”
• “We have no time for sex because of the kids…”
• “My partner is not as attractive as they used to be…”
• “Isn’t it normal for sexual passion to fade?”
• “I’m depressed…”

My job as a relationship coach is to dig deeper beneath the surface of their self-diagnosis and help them discover the REAL reason they are not having sex. More often than not, their sexual attraction dies for TWO reasons only:

1. Sexual Polarity has been lost
2. Emotional Intimacy has been lost

I hear you thinking, “But Bruce, my situation is different! My partner and I are experiencing (work related anxiety) or (clinical depression) or (a porn addiction) or (an affair) or (insert reason of your choice)…”
Sure, all these things are associated with lack of motivation to initiate sex, but I assert none of these cause a sexless marriage.
Let’s take a look at the real causes:

Sexual Polarity – The secret most people never know about sexual attraction

Sexual attraction is created by the the difference in sexual polarity between the two of you. To put that in plain English, just like a magnet has two poles (positive and negative), you have two sexual poles: masculine and feminine sexual energy. Your masculine energy is that part of you which strives for greater freedom and tries to achieve it through financial, creative, or political challenges. Words that describe it are: empty, present, purposeful. Your feminine energy is that part of you which yearns for deeper love and tries to find it in intimate relationship, family, or friends. Words that describe it are: full, bright, flowing, changing. If the masculine is the land, then the feminine is the ocean.

…and like a magnet’s opposite poles are attracted to each other, so sexual opposites attract each other (i.e. masculine energy is attracted to feminine energy).

Sexual Attraction is created by you expressing the opposite sexual energy to your partner.

The greater the difference between these two energies, the greater the sexual attraction between you. Sexual polarity can easily get lost when the two of you get caught up in your daily lives and forget to (or don’t know how to) consciously create polarity.
Here’s how to do it:

If you’re a feminine woman wanting to create sexual attraction with your man, you’ll need to temporarily let go of your internal masculine energy (so that your partner can hold that energy) and polarize yourself into your feminine sexual energy. For example, when my partner comes home from a hard day in the office running her web design business, she is still carrying a lot of masculine energy in her body and being. So, she may choose to take a long sensual bubble bath or she may go for a walk in nature to get back in touch with her feminine energy.

On the other hand, my work with couples requires that I access my feminine energy (empathy, compassion), so when I get home I may choose to do something aggressive like kitesurfing or weight lifting to get me back in touch with my masculine energy. This way, my partner and I stay sexually polarized and can consciously create our sexual attraction and turn on. I understand if you’re thinking that this sounds a little conceptual and woo-woo. This topic would require an entire book to do justice to, but for now take comfort in knowing that it is possible quickly learn practical relationship tools for consciously creating sexual polarity between you and your partner.

Emotional Intimacy – The key to feeling safe and sexy

The second most common reason couples lose their sexual attraction for each other is because they stop being emotionally intimate with each other. I loosely define Emotional Intimacy as “the experience of being intimately connected with your partner such that sharing your most tender, vulnerable emotions feels safe.” Remember the time when you cried on someone’s shoulder and they gently cradled you telling you that it would all be OK? That’s emotional intimacy.

You remember the time you shared your deepest, scariest secret with another, trusting that they would hold it as sacred and they just listened without judgement? That’s emotional intimacy? Sexual attraction naturally grows inside emotionally safe and intimate relationships…
…and because Emotional intimacy is directly linked to you experiencing safety in your relationship, when you stop sharing tender, vulnerable feelings honestly with each other, you don’t feel turned on. Over time this feeling becomes “the way it is” and before you know it, you’re in a sexless marriage.

The TWO most common reasons I find that clients stop initiating sex are:

Hurt:
You feel like your partner has wronged or betrayed you and you are carrying hurt or resentment. Unless you actively work to heal your hurt with your partner and work through your feelings of betrayal and resentment, emotional intimacy will be lost, your TRUST bank account will go overdrawn, and your sex life will suffer a terrible blow.

Withholds:
One of you is withholding a communication from the other. This secret may be something you’ve said, done felt or thought and you’re not telling your partner about it. Withholds will destroy your relationship faster than anything I know of. They act like a virus, infecting our relationship with lies and forcing us to present ourselves as something that we are not. Withholds are the biggest, most dangerous threat to emotional intimacy and to your ability to feel ALIVE in your relationship and left unchecked will quietly suck the life out of your relationship and sex life.

How losing Sexual Polarity and Emotional Intimacy created my sexless marriage

When my first wife and I met, we knew nothing of sexual polarity, so when the romance stage of our relationship ended and we entered the Power Struggle stage, the first thing casualty was our sexual polarity and attraction. Because we had never learned how to fight in a way that creates deeper intimacy, we survived our conflicts by repressing out real feelings.

Before long our sexual polarity had disappeared and we felt more like brother and sister than lovers. I remember cuddling my first wife at night thinking to myself how much I loved her, but feeling zero desire to initiate sex, not knowing why. No matter what I tried, I couldn’t seem to trick my mind and body into wanting to express my love sexually with her.

That’s because Sexual Attraction is NOT a choice – it’s an automatic and totally unconscious reaction.

A few years later, while travelling on business, I met a woman I felt huge sexual attraction for. We had a one night stand and before long, one night stands became the way I felt desired and affirmed as a man. My wife had made it really clear that if I ever cheated on her, she would leave, so I withheld my cheating from her in order to not lose her – the woman I loved. My withhold killed our emotional intimacy. I was lying to my wife and hated myself for doing so.

Eventually, I owned up to her and we got divorced. A week later, she met the man of her dreams and 18 months later, I met someone and fell in love again. Had my ex-wife and I known how to create sexual polarity and sustain emotional intimacy, I suspect we’d have a very different story to tell.

Ignorance is bliss?

The bad news is that until you address the root cause of your sexless marriage or sexless relationship, it’s not going to magically become a passionate one filled with excitement, love and orgasmic bliss. What is more likely to happen is that you’ll get used to it and begin justifying why not having “to-die-for sex” regularly is OK and normal. If you’re doing this already, get support from a professional. Don’t wait. Alternatively, you’ll tolerate a sexless marriage until one of you can’t anymore and leaves of has an affair. You don’t have to tolerate a sexless marriage. You can have a fulfilling sex life, no matter how bad it currently seems.

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AND THEN IT IS WINTER

ou know, time has a way of moving quickly and catching you unaware of the passing years.

It seems just yesterday that I was young, just married and embarking on my new life with my mate. Yet in a way, it seems like eons ago, and I wonder where all the years went. I know that I lived them all. I have glimpses of how it was back then and of all my hopes and dreams. But, here it is – the ‘ back nine’ of my life and it catches me by surprise.

How did I get here so fast?

Where did the years go and where did my youth go?

I remember vividly seeing older people through the years and thinking that those older people were years away from me and that ‘I was only on the first hole’ and the ‘back nine’ was so far off that I could not fathom it or imagine fully what it would be like. But, here it is . . . my friends are retired and getting grey. They move slower and I see an older person now. Some are in better and some worse shape than me, but I see the great change.

Not like the ones that I remember who were young and vibrant . . . but like me, their age is beginning to show and we are now those older folks that we used to see and never thought we’d become. Each day now, I find that just getting a shower is a real target for the day!

And taking a nap is not a treat anymore . . . it’s mandatory! Cause if I don’t on my own free will, I just fall asleep where I sit!And so, now I enter into this new season of my life unprepared for all the aches and pains and the loss of strength and ability to go and do things that I wish I had done but never did!

But, at least I know, that though I’m on the ‘ back nine’ and I’m not sure how long it will last, this I know for sure, that when it’s over on this earth . . . it’s over. A new adventure will begin! Yes, I have regrets. There are things I wish I hadn’t done . . . things I should have done, but indeed, there are many things I’m happy to have done. It’s all in a lifetime.So, if you’re not on the ‘ back nine’ yet . . . let me remind you, that it will be here faster than you think.

So, whatever you would like to accomplish in your life please do it quickly! Don’t put things off too long! Life goes by quickly. So, do what you can today, as you can never be sure whether you’re on the ‘back nine’ or not! You have no promise that you will see all the seasons of your life . . . so, live for today and say all the things that you want your loved ones to remember, and hope that they appreciate and love you for all the things that you have done for them in all the years past!”Life” is a gift to you. The way you live your life is your gift to those who come after.

Make it a fantastic one.

Why Didn’t My Dad Tell Me that Women are Looking for Security before Sex

ike many people, you may struggle to put yourself in others’ shoes. This isn’t always a big deal, but it can have major repercussions for your love life. Unfortunately, many men are unable to put themselves in women’s minds and end up projecting their own wants and needs onto their wives and girlfriends. Not surprisingly, this often results in one failed relationship after another. In some cases, it can prevent you from finding love in the first place. Even as a middle-aged guy, you may still struggle to understand what women want. So, what is it? The answer may surprise you.

What Men Want

The first thing to do when trying to understand what women want is to think about what men typically want. Chances are that you’re taking those wants, needs and desires and assuming that women think similarly. Here’s a pro tip: They don’t. At the risk of lumping all men into one group, most guys are primarily interested in companionship. Does that mean they place a priority on sex? Sure, that’s often the case, but there’s usually more to it than that. That’s especially true with older men because they’ve usually sown their wild oats years earlier and have settled down quite a bit.

So, men are mostly concerned with finding women who can provide companionship, and that companionship can take many forms. Another thing that many guys look for in female companions is to be cared for, or even mothered. Most men won’t readily admit to this, but they often want women who can help them keep their lives in order. Now, if you were to say this to the average woman, she wouldn’t be too thrilled. Still, it’s often the case, and there’s nothing inherently wrong with that.

What Women Want

What we’ve learned so far is that men mostly want companionship and to be mothered to a certain extent. That tends to become truer the older they get. Don’t women want the same things? Not quite. They want companionship, for sure, but they can just as easily get that from other loved ones and good friends. Sex is on their radars, of course, but it tends to appear fairly low on the list of priorities. While there are certainly women who want guys who will act like fathers to them, most women aren’t looking for father figures.

If women aren’t too worried about companionship and rarely look for fatherly guys, what exactly do they want? It can be summed up with one, simple word: security. Women want to be with guys who can take care of business. Men who have their affairs in order are immensely appealing to most mature women. The word “mature” is an important qualifier here. Younger women are usually less worried about the trappings of success and security because they figure they have plenty of time left. As women get older, though, finding a man who can give them the security they crave becomes more and more important.

Are You Going About Things the Wrong Way?

Like many men, you may feel like you’re competing with other guys who may be better lovers than you. In turn, you may feel the urge to emphasize how great you are in bed and the excitement you can bring to a woman’s life. If you’re doing these kinds of things, chances are that you’re striking out left and right. Women want and enjoy sex, of course, but it’s not like they struggle to find it. Most women can find men to sleep with them without any trouble, and that’s something many guys fail to consider.

If sex is so readily available to most women, it’s not something they are extremely concerned about when looking for serious partners. That’s one of the many reasons that security becomes so crucial. Do you demonstrate your ability to provide security to the women you date? This doesn’t mean you have to go around flashing cash and being flashy. It simply means emphasizing that you have your act together and are stable in the most important ways. For instance, do you own a house and a car? Are you gainfully employed? Do you have disposable income that you can spend on hobbies, travel and other fun things?

Shift Your Mindset to Improve Your Odds of Dating Success

Now that you know how important it is to show women that you can provide security and stability, you may be tempted to run around bragging about your many accomplishments. Don’t do that. Regardless of how successful and secure you are, no one likes braggarts. Boasting about the things you have and the security you can provide will make you seem insecure. The thing to keep in mind is that showing is far better than telling.

How do you show women that you have the security they crave? First, make sure you are presenting the right image. No, you don’t have to look like George Clooney to make this happen. In fact, you don’t have to be conventionally attractive at all. What you need to do is invest in nice, flattering clothes and get a decent haircut. Maintain your personal appearance as impeccably as you can, and splurge on a few really nice pairs of shoes. Keep your home and car neat and tidy, and make a point of showing that you’re a hard, dedicated worker.

Security First, Sex and Fun Second

At this point, you may be feeling pretty let down. After all, dating is still supposed to be fun, right? If you’re supposed to focus on providing security, how are you supposed to have a good time? Like many things, the rewards of playing your cards right from the beginning will come later. As women realize that you are a good provider and reliable person, you will attract more of them. Showing that you’re a stable, secure person is a major aphrodisiac for many women, so you will be able to enjoy plenty of excitement and fun as time goes by. Hang in there for now, and great things are sure to come your way later.

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