7 Steps of Relationship Breakdown, From Love to Enemy

Posted on January 9, 2012 by Jacque

We start our relationships full of love and desire for our partner and all too often this love disintegrates into a place of animosity with our partner becoming the enemy.  There are many factors that cause us to move from loving our partner to treating them like the enemy.

Science First: Brain Chemicals

Have you been bitten by the love bug?  When we first fall in love our brain produces a cocktail of chemicals that helps us get to the attachment stage of our relationships and marriage.  These chemicals cause thoughts of our partners to pop into our heads and to only see the good in them. Unfortunately the production of these chemicals declines over time and we return to our normal state. This is not your partner’s fault!

Only the Good

In the early stages we see all the wonderful possibilities of our partners. Then as time passes we start to see their shortfalls, the behaviours that aren’t so attractive. We criticize these behaviours and try to get them to change. The more we criticize the more conflict occurs, the more we try to force change the more animosity arises. Before you know it we look at our partner as the enemy only seeing the negative behaviours. We no longer seeing the things we originally loved about then.

When you first got together what attracted you to your partner?

The Person Who Helps Us Heal

Harvel Hendrix and many others in the counseling field believe that the person we attract as a partner has similar attributes as our early childhood caregivers, both good and bad.  The attributes of our caregivers contribute to our emotional conditioning and marriage becomes the container in which we can do our healing. Our partner is often a perfect mirror reflecting back what needs to be healed in us.  Because we don’t know how to heal we often see our partner as the enemy rather than our coach!

  • What would you like to change about your partner?
  • How does this apply to you?
  • Who could help you with the healing?

Getting our Needs Met

In the early stages of relationship we are often willing to do whatever we can for our partner. We take care of their unmet needs for love and recognition.  If one person is doing more of the giving, eventually they start to ask the question “what am I getting out of this?”  They withdraw the services they were providing in the name of love and become more demanding.  When this occurs neither partner is getting their needs met and both people are often feeling unloved and dissatisfied.

  • What do you need your partner to do for you to feel happy?
  • What is one thing you could do for your partner to make them happy?

Unmet Expectations

When we come together with a partner we have an image or an idea of what the relationship could become. We fall in love with this idea or vision as much as we fall in love with the person.  This creates an expectation or a story about what our relationship could or should be.  When it doesn’t match our vision, we feel disappointed and another story about our worst fears or concerns begins to take shape.  Most of us blame the other person for not living up to our expectations and make them wrong.

  • What unmet expectation do you have about your relationship?
  • How could you let go of this expectation to re-engage in your relationship?

Lack of Effort and Investment

Early in a relationship we put our best foot forward in all kinds of ways.  We dress up and look our best, show up on time or call when we are late, keep our house clean and the dishes done.  As time wears on, our best efforts disappear and we return to normal or even worse. We no longer pay attention to what our clothes look like, the house is messy and needs cleaning, there are dirty dishes in the sink; the list goes on.  We stop making an effort to impress our partner and be our best; we stop investing in the relationship.

What is one thing that you could do to invest in your relationship?

Mismatched Sexual Desires

Sexual activity is generally fundamental for longevity of relationships. There are some exceptions where both partners have mutually agreed that sexual relationships are not desired.  These however are often the exception not the norm.  Sex either becomes a weapon that couples use to hurt each other or it declines into relative obscurity.  If sexual activity is desired there is always someone outside the relationship who will appreciate what is not appreciated at home.  Lack of fidelity is the ultimate step into the camp of the enemy.

The demise of the feelings of love have many causes; it may be quick within a few years of getting married or it may be a gradual slipping into the abyss of disappointment and blame as our partners prove to be someone different than who we wanted. Essentially it’s up to us to make the choices to keep our relationships thriving once the ‘in love’ brain chemicals subside.

 

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Custody: Dead Beat Dads or Loving Fathers During Divorce

Posted on December 14, 2011 by Jacque

In the emotional turmoil of divorce there is often a struggle for child custody and my bias without even thinking about it was that women would get primary custody of the children and fathers would play the secondary role as care giver.

My bias is based on societal conditioning that the mother is the primary care giver and children are best with the mother.  Societal conditioning is so deeply entrenched sometimes we don’t even realize it is there. This is much like the fairy tale that when we get married we will live happily ever after, given the 50% divorce rate this obviously isn’t true.    My thinking on the dynamics of fathers in child custody was challenged when I read the article Fathers: Equal in Marriage but Not in Divorce .

Gender Roles

Three major changes have occurred with regard to the role of men and parenting as outlined in the above article:

  1. Fathers take a more active part in their children’s lives than what they did 30 years ago. Marriages are becoming more equal when it comes to raising children.
  2. Many women have pursued executive careers and the husband has been the stay at home Dad. Plus difficult and changing economic trends have kept more men at home, “in 2010 approximately 154,000 men were stay at home Dad’s.”  Brookings reports the median full time employment rate for men has decreased by “14% since 1970, and their inflation adjusted median net earnings have decreased by $13,000 compared to women’s median earnings which have increased by $20,000.”  The result is more men are working part time and many Dad’s are consultants working from home; hence more men are becoming primary care givers for their children as more women become primary income earners.
  3. The number of single fathers has “grown by 27% to 1.8 million in the United States over the past decade.”

These trends suggest that we need to change our mental images about the role of men as primary care givers for their children. Plus we should expect to see more fathers taking their daughter’s to the swimming pool for lessons and other activities.  When we enter into divorce we also need to expect that men will want to play a primary role in being a caregiver to their children.

Divorce and Child Custody

I know for some women this strikes fear in their heart that they will loose full time contact with their children when they get divorced.  This fear however is likely what men have been feeling for years.  If we can achieve an amicable divorce and agreement for child custody then no one has to loose contact with their children.

To do this we need to come to terms with the idea that the family dynamics will be different than the mental model that we may have envisioned would happen if we were to split up.  Second we need to accept that men can do just as good of a job raising children as women.  Third we need to resolve the fear of loosing our children when we get divorced. This fear often creates major conflict in child custody proceedings.

Resolving Fear

This fear often comes from a negative story that our mind makes up about the future. First we can ask ourselves the following questions to overcome this fear:  What causes me to have this fear?  What is another story I could write that would have a more desirable outcome?  What do I need to do to bring this more desirable story to life?

Second we can resolve the emotional energy of fear that fuels these stories.  By feeling into the physical sensation of fear in our body we can dissolve the emotional energy of fear leaving us in a more centered and grounded position from which to make decisions and negotiate a divorce.

By changing our preconceived ideas about the role of fathers after divorce and resolving the fear of mothers loosing their children we could possible achieve better outcomes in child custody hearings.

 

 

 

 

 

Perhaps the time has come for us to change our perceptions f Dad’s, not

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Turning Blame into Forgiveness

Posted on November 28, 2011 by Jacque

It is so easy to blame others for what is not happening in our lives; when we have unmet expectations. When we blame others we become a victim of the circumstances that we find ourselves in.

When I returned to Belize I found myself in the situation of supporting two members of my boyfriend’s family. Unfortunate circumstances had befallen the family and these two fellows found themselves out of work in the slow season.

When I looked inside of myself I could not allow them to starve, so I made the decision to help them out with a place to live and food.  My expectation was that they would look for work and they assured me that they would be able to find a job.  One week dragged into the next and before long they became a drain on my financial resources.

I noticed I was feeling frustrated with the situation and I started to blame them for the drag on my finances.  I started to blame them for my situation.  I was being a victim!

I took three steps to stop being a victim and blaming them for the circumstances that I found myself in. I needed to take responsibility for myself and be true to me.  I took the following actions:

Boundaries

I established a boundary with myself, no more rescuing.  I chose to stop giving my boyfriend money to support them.  I needed to allow his family to be responsible for themselves and let the universe take care of whatever was going to happen. When we take responsibility for others we take their power away from them and turn them into victims.

Resolve my Fears

One of the reasons why we rescue others is because our ego writes a negative story about the future. The story I was writing was that if I didn’t help, then they would be homeless and starve.  The truth is that this story comes from my own fear of being homeless and starving.  Rescuing is an emotional reaction to my own feelings of fear.

I used the Emotional Hot Button Removal Techniques to feel into the fear I had around being poor. Plus the frustration that I was feeling due to my unmet expectation that they would find work and support themselves.

Forgiveness

The cool thing about all of this is that what is occurring with the people around us is simply a reflection of ourselves.  I was blaming them for not working and bringing in enough money.  In some way I needed to forgive myself for not earning enough money.

There are two ways that forgiveness occurs, one is to consciously choose to forgive ourselves and the second is to resolve the emotional energy that holds us back. Rather than blame someone else we can tell ourselves “I forgive myself for …..”  In my case not having enough money.

In a call with my coach we were talking about goals and I was telling him that setting numeric goals, like I will earn $200,000 per year, have never been reached.  I could feel a lump come up in my throat.  I sensed I was carrying around some deep sadness about money and not reaching goals.  This sadness started in my past long before I was self-employed.  I used the Emotional Hot Button Removal Techniques to release this energy and set myself free from this old emotional energy that was holding me back.

When we take a close look at ourselves we can see what needs to be resolved in us and we can turn blame into forgiveness which will bring us a greater sense of freedom and enjoyment in our lives.  Where can you turn blame into forgiveness in your life?

 

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3 Ways to use Divorce to Practice Spirituality

Posted on November 21, 2011 by Jacque

“More fundamental than religion is our basic human spirituality. We have a basic human disposition towards love, kindness and affection, irrespective of whether we have a religious framework or not. When we nurture this most basic human resource – when we set about cultivating those basic inner values which we all appreciate in others, then we start to live spiritually.” Dalai Lama

Going through divorce gave me a great opportunity to practice being more spiritual.

Love

One of the best ways to get through the emotional trauma of divorce is to practice loving ourselves and loving others even when their behaviours may not be loveable. It is very easy to get caught in the trap of being angry at our ex, but the only one this really hurts is us.  The energy of anger is in our body and what we really want to cultivate in our body is the energy of love. The more I learned to treat myself with love the better I felt.

Kindness

My partner Milo was unhappy and he decided he wanted to leave our relationship after 18 years.  I was absolutely devastated and I couldn’t imagine how I could live without him. I had to ask myself; “was this a good enough reason to not treat him with kindness?” My answer was NO.  He was making a decision as to what he thought was best for himself and what would bring him happiness.

To be kind to myself I needed to let go of my emotional ties to Milo, to do anything else would only create suffering within myself.  We are unkind to ourselves when we continue to insist being attached to someone who no longer wants to be with us.

Affection

Going through my divorce I reached out to a lot of friends who expressed their affection for me.  I was very hurt and at the same time I was very grateful for the support that I received.  It made me so much more aware of how important it is to show my affection for others. Even if showing affection is in small ways like going for a walk or making time for a phone conversation when I am busy.

What is one thing you could do to practice more love, kindness an affection in your life?

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Living in Paradise

Posted on November 10, 2011 by Jacque

We all go through transitions in our life.  Starting a new career, getting married, getting divorced, or retiring from our main career.  At each of these junctures we have choices to make.  We can either be moving more towards our magical life or we can feel like we are stuck in a life that we have to live in. The choice is really ours and it takes courage to choose something different than what we have become comfortable with.

Many people would love to live someplace other than where they live; we would all love to live in “paradise.”  In my Living in Paradise blog series I am going share with you what it is like to have an alternative life style and live in paradise.  In my blog www.workeasy4lifebalance.com I will share what it is like to work virtually from an international location.

In November of 2009 I moved to Belize to immerse myself in a book writing project, Divine Divorce.  I lived there for six months renting accommodations from two different Belizean landlords.  I have now moved back to Belize and I am renting accommodations in a condo complex where predominately Americans and Canadians live.I look forward to sharing with you my adventures of living in Belize, a third world country.

Is living some place other than what we have come to think of as “home” any different?  Are there less challenges than living at home?  Or is it just different?  Is what we crave in our life variety or is it something else? What is “paradise” anyhow?

I will answer these questions and many more that I haven’t even thought of yet.  My challenge for you is to look at your life; what would make it feel a little more like living in paradise?

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Casting out Demons and Lightening Up

Posted on October 28, 2011 by Laurie

This time of year always seems like en-darken-ment to me.  As the days get shorter, the weather gloomier, it feels like an emotionally down season.  Unresolved material gets stirred up from the past like the ghosts and skeletons of Halloween. 

Perhaps there’s some wisdom in the Indian celebration of light – Diwali  which celebrates the casting out of demons and lighting lanterns.  What if we took that approach to casting out old emotional demons and celebrating a new lightness of being?

Or, for those of you following the planetary ascension progression of triple date portals this month, 11:11:11  is an invitation to set intention for en-lighten ment.  As the world becomes darker each day we can choose to raise our inner frequency, to shine our inner radiance and light up the world around us.  

There will always be darkness and light. Where do you want to put your focus? It’s all about intent.  There may be more darkness in some areas of our lives than others.  Like sweeping the proverbial dirt under the rug, we may choose to keep ourselves in the dark about the very things we want to change.  Working with people as a healer and a coach it’s interesting to notice how we would rather hang on to our pain, or negative stories than change or let them go. 

What is it that keeps us from letting go of old ways of being? Usually the biggest barrier is being afraid to look inside.  We continue along blithely accepting we are the way we are, unwilling to look under the surface for fear of what we may find out.  We imagine what’s going on inside will be even worse than what we’re currently experiencing. Like the ghosts and goblins we imagined under our bed as kids; it could be scary, emotionally overwhelming or traumatic to look inside.    

We are deeply conditioned to avoid pain and trauma.  The irony is that quite often our fear of facing what we don’t want to feel is more painful than experiencing the energy of the actual event. When we allow ourselves to feel the energy of an emotion and move through and beyond the emotional experience, it’s quite painless. We can move energy with virtually no emotional trauma, unlike traditional counselling therapies where releasing can be very traumatic; lots of crying, major catharsis, etc.  Recipients may feel much better afterward, but often are emotionally drained by the process and often only a small amount of emotional energy has been released.   

On a more subtle level, we may be deeply identified with our own behavioural patterns.  We are so used to being a certain way it feels normal.  For example we may have been depressed for so long we don’t know what is feels like not to be.  Or we may have felt anxious or overly stressed to the point that we can no longer recollect what calm feels like. We start to accept these states as being “normal.”  We may become adept in our avoidance; choosing to focus on the parts that are working and ignoring the parts that aren’t. Or we may have become a victim, knowing that life could be or should be better and being disappointed by what is not happening.   It may seem like we have our nose up against a brick wall – not knowing which way to turn, or how to look over the wall.  We feel stuck and struggle in a life that feels like a never ending Halloween horror show.

Another reason we resist looking inside is most of us have had the experience of wanting to hide some part of ourselves from others.  We talk about the skeletons in our closet or our demons.  We feel that these parts of ourselves are suspect, we feel like we are not good enough. We fear what will happen if we expose those parts of ourselves; that we will be judged, ostracized or shut out in some way. We may feel a sense of being punished, hurt or that love will be withheld.

So we try to keep them hidden, but they jump out regardless.  Others see them whether we want them to or not, they show up in our everyday behaviour. Others see when we lack confidence, even though they may not say anything to us.

What would happen if we had the courage to step away from the story of who we are and let go of the image we attempt to hold up?

It is only by exposing our demons to the light and accepting them that we can truly let them go.  With acceptance we can move to resolution and completion by fully feeling our present and past emotional experiences.  Then there is nothing left to hide.

Imagine boosting yourself up to look over the wall and finding paradise rather than the boogie man. What would it take to look over the wall that is standing between you and paradise?

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Finding Forgiveness

Posted on September 9, 2011 by Jacque

When we think about forgiveness it’s usually associated with thoughts about people who have wronged us in some way.  We feel hurt or offended and hold on to the memory and the charged emotions attached to the event.  We think in terms of the person who has caused this; it is their fault.  It ties into judgement and blame and we feel that if we forgive them it makes what they did OK.  You may hear yourself say, “I can forgive, but not forget.”

This is not truly forgiveness.  We are still holding a charged memory of what was done.  We hold on to it as a reminder of what happened and make the other person responsible for what they did.  It’s as if we want to hang on to it so we can show them in the future how they have hurt us.

When we look at forgiveness from an energetic perspective: For – giving – is for giving that energy back.  We no longer need to carry this energy within us.  When we hold on to it we keep ourselves in a disempowered place, being a victim to circumstance.  We are caught in judgement of the other.

Rather than feeling like a victim and staying caught in judgement, it is useful to consider what role we have played in this drama.  What part of it can we take responsibility for?  It takes both people for the scenario to unfold and we are both playing a role.  Both Victim and Persecutor are playing their role. What part have you played?

When we identify the role we have played we can let go of the need to blame the other and forgive them and ourselves. In Self forgiveness we can forgive ourselves for the choices we have made thus far, and for the roles we have fallen into.  You may want to ask yourself if you have been playing something out based on your conditioning.

In relationships especially with a significant other, the roles usually stem back to our parental relationships.  We attract into our life someone who plays the role of the parent that we had issues with, or in some way sets up a replay of the dynamics we experienced growing up.

In my case, I had a ‘poor me’ feeling in relation to my father and his assertive, aggressive behaviour – and I took on that role

What I needed to forgive myself for was being like my father who believed the way to survive was to be assertive and aggressive.  If things didn’t go our way we got angry.  I did this to keep myself safe, and to survive and be successful.  Survival and success were intertwined. I thought that in order to be successful I needed to be dominant and push hard and push my ideas forward.  Just like my father.

When I came in contact with resistance, I became frustrated, or angry.  In the workplace my frustration turned to being highly judgemental toward the people around me.  I became disillusioned thinking they were wrong and made myself right.  In business relationships, I was considered a difficult person to work with:  smart but difficult. In personal, marital relationship I chose a man I dominated – who let me run the show.  If I hadn’t chosen someone who let me run the show we would have had nothing but conflict in our relationship.

Today, I’ve realized that I want to forgive myself for being a hard, driving, demanding person who didn’t have much empathy for others. This is so at odds now with the person I have become. In letting go of my charged emotional baggage, I have developed empathy for others. Empathy has become a natural thing in my life and I wouldn’t choose to treat people the way I did.

There are two ways to forgive.  One is to intellectually forgive ourselves for who we were and choose who we want to be now.  The other way recognizes the significant emotional charge we’ve been hanging on to: repressed emotions from childhood and all the way through.  We can forgive ourselves in a deep and lasting way by letting go of the emotional energy we’ve held in our bodies.  Simply resolving and being complete with the energy makes forgiveness easy and permanent.

It’s been said that harbouring resentment and not forgiving is like drinking poison and expecting someone else to die.  It festers inside us. When we forgive, we let it go.  It’s a relief, a cathartic event.

Posted in Dealing with Emotions | 3 Comments

Do you Treat Yourself Preciously?

Posted on August 25, 2011 by Jacque

When I finished the first writing of my book and delivered the final chapter to my editor, it occurred to me that I should celebrate.   Normally I would pooh pooh this as no big deal and deny that this was an important milestone in my life, just like I did when I got a whole in one in golf, and then I found out that there were lots of pro golfers who have never had a hole in one.  Instead of denying myself a celebration, I called a former client and friend to celebrate.  My friend only had 2 hours to spend with me before he had to be somewhere else. At 5pm he left.  What was I going to do now, I was alone?

The man in my life is 2920 miles away as the crow flies, he certainly couldn’t celebrate with me.  I decided to walk to my favorite Japanese restaurant for dinner.  On the way there I passed La Belle Auberge, a 4 star French restaurant in the small community where I live. I stood on the sidewalk and deliberated, Japanese vs La Belle Auberge.

I new the cost would be significantly different and often denied myself the gift.  This was a big milestone, I had made a commitment to write a book and I had never considered myself a writer.  For 17 months I focused on the biggest project of my life, I spent money on an editor and gave up earning money to invest my time, heart and love into this project.  I felt into many hours of emotional pain as I poured my heart out into chapter after chapter.  I had reached the first milestone; I had completed the final chapter.

As I stood on the sidewalk I had to decide if I was worth it. I knew that what I would spend on dinner would feed my loved one for the next two weeks.  For some of you the price of a dinner at a 4 star restaurant is nothing, for others it is a fortune.  This is the decision I was making as I stood on the sidewalk.

I decided I was worth it.  I worth showing myself love. It took lots of  learning, growing and developing to be able to complete my book and I deserved to be treated preciously and celebrate this occasion.  I was entertained by Michael the guitarist and served succulent morsels of food. They severed me a decadent desert and made the coffee exactly the way I wanted it. I felt special. 

I treated myself preciously. After all how can I expect my man to treat me preciously if I am not willing to treat myself preciously.   I was present to every moment of this evening and felt extremely grateful for everything that I have and all those people in my life who love me and who I love.  I tipped the guitarist well and told him that God would give me double in honor of my man who taught me that God gives double when we are generous.

May god give us all love and prosperity and each of us remember to treat ourselves preciously and celebrate the important moments in our lives and feel the love of being grateful.

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Addictions Caused by Emotional Baggage

Posted on August 6, 2011 by Jacque

For many, being affected by addiction is closer to home than we’d like to admit.

  • Do you have concerns about a spouse drinking too much?
  • Has your child become hooked on drugs?
  • Are there people in your work team who are absent, depressed or have accidents way too often?
  • Are you someone who eats and treats yourself every time your mood changes?

Addictions show up in all kinds of different ways and have significant impacts in our work and our families.

Why do people have Addictive Behaviours?

Many develop addictions or addictive behaviours to avoid feeling pain. “At some base level all addicts experience great discomfort with being in their own skin” was a remark I heard years ago in an interview with an addictions psychologist.  A book about healing addictions talked about addictive substances being used as a tool to manage feelings the user felt powerless to handle on their own.

At the outset the behaviour may not be an addiction but rather something you do to just relieve “the pressure.”  It may escalate into a habit and before long the behaviour has become an addiction.  These addictive behaviours range from somewhat healthy behaviours to very unhealthy and costly behaviours.  Addictive behaviours include:

  • Using alcohol, nicotine, marijuana or other drugs
  • Eating disorders, caffeine, chocolate
  • Internet, working too much,
  • Gambling, shopping, Television
  • Excessive sports be that triathlons, marathons, golf or billiards
  • Hobbies taken to the extreme

How do you distinguish between an addiction, a habit or a practice?

  • A practice is something you do because you love, or commit to because of the benefits it brings you. It is something you practice to become better at.   
  • Habits can be good or bad.  It becomes a problem when there is a negative affect on your health and well-being.
  • With addiction there is a compulsive ‘need’ to do it.  Nervous energy builds up and you can’t seem to stop doing it.   There may be feelings of fear at the prospect of not doing it anymore.

If the latter is the case, you may want to seek help.

An idle habit like having a glass of wine at dinner can turn into an addiction when it becomes an every day need and then turns into drinking an entire bottle of wine.  Habits become compulsive behaviour when used to subconsciously suppress emotional pain.  Consciously we may not even know that we are suppressing something.

About ten years ago when U-Brew wineries became popular in Canada, I started to brew my own wine.  It didn’t take long before I had a glass of wine every day and on weekends it was three.  After a couple of years my capacity increased to two glasses each night and when I got up to being able to consume a bottle in a night, I knew there was a problem and I needed to reduce my consumption.  It was no coincidence that I had a large pain-body.  To me anything that I am doing to excess and using to zone out is an addiction, and that includes sports.

Beyond the impact on personal well being and the ability to function effectively, addictions are very costly in the workplace, and at home.

Read more about the Impact of Addictions at Home.

What are the impacts of Addictions at Work?

The cost of addictions in the workplace is high. Substance abuse and dependence can be the cause of absenteeism, accidents, injury, death, poor work quality and costly mistakes, reduced morale, productivity loss, staff turnover, co-worker disputes, property damage and theft. “An employee with substance abuse problems can cost between 25 – 50% of their salary through low productivity, sickness and accidents.” It is estimated approximately 6% of workers suffer from additions to drug and alcohol.

Most statistics on addiction are based on alcohol or drug abuse.  These statistics do not take into account the significant health problems that come from eating disorders and food addictions.  It is estimated that stress and depression costs the Canadian economy more than $50 billion a year and are responsible for a significant amount of absenteeism at work.

A study in 2010 by the Center for Addictions and Health states the following:

“The average short-term physical disability leave is about 33 days, and on average employers pay $9,000 for each case. The study found the most common reasons employees take physical disability leave include respiratory illness, muscular skeletal problems, injury and digestive disorders.

Meanwhile, depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder are the mental illnesses that appear most in the Canadian workforce, with each case leading to an average 65-day leave and $18,000 bill.” As reported in the study by the Centre for Addictions and Mental Health.

It is often stress at work and at home that leads people to succumb to an addiction in the first place.  Our substance of choice is used to numb out the emotions provoked by the stressful situations of life.  Two major factors; unresolved emotional conditioning carried from childhood and reactions to the stressful situations play off each other in a dynamic process to provoke emotional reactions.

With a backlog of unresolved emotional baggage from childhood, employees are not able to withstand pressures in the work place, such as:

  • shift work and long work hours
  • poor job design, including boring or extremely demanding work
  • unrealistic deadlines and performance targets, or inadequate resources
  • lack of opportunity to participate in decision making
  • inadequate training and supervisory support
  • bullying, harassment or victimisation at work
  • fear of job loss and uncertainty about the future
  • Family and social problems.

Part of the solution is to support employees in letting go of their “emotional baggage”.  When we do this we are addressing the cause of the problem, rather than the symptom which is addiction.

If you would like to drop your emotional baggage and free yourself from existing or potential addiction, consider our Emotional Hot Button Removal Training.  We have several options to choose from.

 

 

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Addictions and Stress Cause Havoc in Families

Posted on August 5, 2011 by Jacque

When a family member has an addiction other family members often cover for them; making up excuses and taking on their domestic duties.  Embarrassed by the addicted person’s behaviour, family members will down play the impact. Conflict often erupts causing even more pain and stress in the family.

Family Law attorneys report record numbers of divorces related to cybersex and cyber affairs. One survey of nearly 18,000 people found almost 6% of those surveyed met the strict criteria for Compulsive Internet use, with another 4-6 % abusing the Net on a regular basis. The Internet has powerful mood altering capabilities; over 29% of those studied report using the Internet to alter their mood or escape on a regular basis.

A Person with an Addiction Won’t take Action

Many people resist taking action because they think it is too difficult or they don’t really believe they have a problem.  They convince themselves life is good enough and have never imagined what life without suffering could be like. I have met people who know that pain is ruining their life, yet they are terrified of putting attention on the pain to try and resolve it.  People tend to avoid anything that might make them feel bad, even if it will resolve their problems in the long run.

Society promotes the idea that showing emotion is a sign of weakness and no one wants to be weak, especially men. We learn at an early age not to express our feelings and emotions, especially when we are feeling bad.  So we go on and try to numb our discomfort in a wide variety of ways, rather than face it head on.

 

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