The Human Magnet Syndrome (Book Excerpt)

This book was inspired by my own journey to overcome the forces that invisibly influenced my own dysfunctional relationship choices.  The concepts and ideas that define this book were inspired by my attempts to discover why, as a former therapist once told me, my “relationship picker” was so badly broken.   Since I never intended to be unhappy in my relationships, and greatly suffered as a result of them, I needed to identify and isolate the reasons behind my dysfunctional relationship patterns in order to change them once and for all.

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Through a great deal of challenging and difficult personal work, I eventually figured out why I habitually gravitated toward harmful romantic partners.  I realized that my adult relationship patterns were distinctly impacted by the manner in which my narcissistic father and codependent mother had raised me[2].  Through this work, I connected this same developmental process to all children who were brought up by a narcissistic or Emotional Manipulator parent.  I also learned that adult relationship patterns, healthy or dysfunctional, are always impacted by the type of parenting a child receives during the first five or six years of life, their formative years.  With these insights, I was better able to provide psychotherapy that would facilitate fundamental personality change.  I have helped my codependent clientele reconcile and heal their childhood trauma that I refer to as “the original condition.”  The original condition is the trauma and/or damaging circumstance that is foundationally responsible for dysfunctional adult relationship patterns.

More from YourTango: The Human Magnet Syndrome (Book Excerpt)

Since the dawn of the first Stone Age kiss, men and women have been magnetically and irresistibly drawn together into romantic relationships, not so much by what they see, feel and think, but more by invisible forces.  When individuals with healthy emotional backgrounds meet, the irresistible “love force” creates a sustainable, reciprocal and stable relationship.  Codependents and emotional manipulators are similarly enveloped in a seductive dreamlike state; however, it will later unfold into a painful “seesaw” of love, pain, hope and disappointment.  The soul mate of the codependent’s dreams will become the emotional manipulator of their nightmares.

The reader will come to understand why the human desire to be understood and to love and to be loved compels us to find a romantic companion.  A human “love drive” motivates us to seek a companion who we hope will understand our struggles, validate our pain, affirm our dreams and, most of all, co-create an explosion of emotional and sexual excitement.  We can’t help it; we are naturally inclined to look for someone who will spark our deepest desires and who will join with us on a rollercoaster ride of sexual and emotional excitement and romance.