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Don't let it end if you don't have to.
By Katherine Agranovich — Written on Sep 06, 2019
When things are bad in your marriage or relationship and you’re one step away from calling it quits — don’t. Not just yet.
Because you have the power and the ability to save your marriage or fix your broken relationship and enjoy it, just like you once did. The secret lies in learning how to communicate — not only with your spouse but also with yourself.
Remember how good your relationship was? So what happened? Where did those feelings of lightness and happiness go?
They still exist within you, but they’re covered by the perceptions you’ve formed during the years with your partner, which is perfectly normal. However, in order for you to save your marriage and be free from these old feelings about your partner, you’ve got to let these perceptions go.
So what exactly are these perceptions? They’re your mental opinions — charged by emotional triggers — about what your partner is doing or not doing, and they're fully responsible for your emotional discord.
Yesterday, while I was meeting with an old friend in a cozy coffee shop to catch up on life’s happenings, I could not help overhearing two ladies at a nearby table talking about their husbands.
Clearly, they were not happy in their marriages, and everything their husbands did was driving them up the wall. It’s like they were wearing murky glasses of perception through which all they could see was their husbands’ imperfections.
But as I listened in, I could recognize the deeper pain — the real reason for their upset.
Their husbands’ inconsiderate behavior made them feel insignificant, unworthy, helpless and out of control — the way most children feel. So whatever was happening in their marriages triggered them into feeling the way they’d felt when they were little girls.
Psychologists believe that emotional patterns formed in your childhood carry into adulthood, manifesting in real-life circumstances unless they are challenged and reframed.
Only then can you witness an improvement in your life. It’s as if life is just a gigantic mirror reflecting all those old, self-limiting opinions formed in the mind of an irrational child back at you.
And the last thing we want is for the mindset of your inner, immature child to run your adult life — especially your marriage.
Now, should these women in the coffee shop divorce their husbands or quarrel with them, forcing them to change? Or should they address their own emotional triggers first before jumping into any kind of strong action?
I would recommend the second approach because, as a hypnotherapist, what I’ve noticed is that every time we feel emotional discord in our relationship, one of our core beliefs is triggered and you feel unworthy or not good enough.
So if you want to save your marriage or relationship, you have to come to one powerful realization: Your partner’s behaviors, attitudes, and actions do not define your personal sense of worthiness or human "enoughness."
That state is innate and unconditional — it's your spiritual backbone, which is unshakable.
Maybe back then, during childhood, you weren't in control of your mental perceptions, but now you’re in complete control over the opinions you form and this is crucial because the opinions you form today will determine your future actions and life experiences.
So here are 4 things you must reframe or let go of in order to save your marriage:
1. Let go of the idea that something is wrong.
There is no such thing as a perfect relationship. It’s normal for things to go bad; breakdowns are inevitable.
However, it’s unnecessary for you to get stuck in your upset and create a murky lens of perception through which you view your partner.
Instead, ask yourself: Why am I getting so upset? What does this say about me?
Usually, the answer will be that one of those false core beliefs formed in childhood got triggered. Reassure yourself by recognizing that it’s just not true.
When you feel soothed, that changes the dynamics of the conversation and your partner feels soothed, too. From this new place of calm, it’s easier to communicate your needs and preferences to your partner, who may now be surprisingly open to hearing your concerns.
Remember: When you let go of your triggers and accept your worthiness, your mind is calm, and you always communicate more clearly.
2. Let go of blaming your partner for being a messed-up human.
Expecting another person to perform perfectly to satisfy your needs every single time you feel vulnerable is not a feasible expectation.
Just like you, your partner is a flawed human being and inevitably they'll do things (big or small) that annoy and upset you.
But when you accept yourself and your partner as imperfect, you can communicate your needs because you're no longer letting your inner child — the one feeling upset — speak through you.
When that happens, then it’s easier to give your partner the benefit of the doubt.
3. Let go of taking their actions, moods, and attitudes personally.
Since you can never rely on another person to fully satisfy your needs, you might as well gain independence for your happiness, regardless of where your partner is emotionally.
If you don't take their attitudes personally, you can also become their strength when they're down, offering words of encouragement or simply listening without judgment.
4. Let go of the old patterns of behavior controlling you.
Do not repeat your parents’ marriage — unless it was a happy one — and don’t blame them for your own marriage difficulties, if it was a disruptive one.
Your parents were imperfect humans, doing the best they could. Often times however, you may get caught in adopting their marital traits and repeating them with your spouse or partner.
Once you realize you're not your parents, you can learn to keep away from negative patterns and dynamics in your relationship.
You’re an adult now, and you don’t have to follow the patterns set by your parents. Talk to each other about your parents’ marriage — what you liked and what you didn’t like — and how you’d like yours to be different.
This may be an ongoing process, but stick with it. Once you’re free of your parents’ patterns, you can make decisions together about what kind of marriage you want to create and experience.
So there you have it. It takes courage to look within and take responsibility for your own negativity; it’s much easier to point fingers and blame your partner, but that’s not who you are.
You and your spouse deserve happiness in your relationship.
Try these techniques for 30 days and repeat the process if you need more time. Remember, it takes time to establish new habits and to create new dynamics in your relationship. Things can only change for the better when your mentality shifts!
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Katherine Agranovich, Ph.D., is a medical hypnotherapist, holistic consultant, and author of Tales of My Large, Loud, Spiritual Family. As the founder of the Achieve Health Center, she helps men and women attain mental-emotional alignment and close the gap between where they are and where they want to be.