Overcoming Temptation in Relationships

I was listening to a friend recently talk about temptation. You know that feeling of being tempted that takes hold of you and you just can’t put on the brakes and whatever it is that you are temporarily obsessed by seems like you just have to have it no matter what? Yeah, that’s temptation.

Being seduced by an idea, a substance, food, music, or person people is probably the most human experience we can all have. We all wake up on some days and crave something. Maybe it’s coffee or tea or soda or a donut. We start with an idea. We get tempted with a thought. The thought becomes a craving and then it is a must have it.

There are a lot of things we learn from our parents. Mostly we learn how the world treats us. If as a child, you were scolded, you might learn that the world is harsh. If you were yelled at you might become angry. And if your parents just expected things silently, but you knew you had to comply, you might become quiet too and harsh on yourself.

Psychologists often examine how people grew up to get clues about how we operate as an adult. And as a therapist I know this is always a fruitful search, and it proves helpful when I work with people addressing their issues while in counseling.

All of us at some time in our lives have received something good from someone who really knows us. Look back on your experiences in your life, especially the ones that formed you into who you are now. See if you can find those special people who you felt understood you. These are the ones who really know us.

All humans want to be accepted for who they are. But most of us have many experiences where people did not fully accept us, in fact many of us were formed by people who had strong opinions that clashed with ours. If you got in trouble a lot, this happened to you.

I hear couples talk a lot about connection. In fact, feeling disconnected is probably one of the biggest difficulties couples face. Often one of the partners will say something like, “I just don’t feel connected to him.” But it could be a man saying this too. Feeling connected is something we all feel inside our body, and it is different for every one of us.

Some of us live inside our feelings and literally feel everything that happens to us. That’s me. I am a right-brain-dominant person, which means that I experience the world through my feelings. Imagine how frustrated I felt when I coupled with a person who is left-brain-dominant. That means he interacts with the world through his thinking mind. He thinks first. I feel first. We are different.

Monthly Archives: February 2017

Overcoming Temptation in Relationships

What We Learn from Our Parents

To Those Who Know Us

I Feel Disconnected in My Relationship, What Do I Do?