Hey Julia Woods
Join me, Julia Woods, a couples coach and wife of over 3 decades, as I share some of my client's stories and my own so that you can be encouraged, inspired, and gain new results in your marriage.
Hey Julia Woods
What Led To Our Affair.
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In this podcast, we dive into one of the most difficult moments of our marriage: when my husband, Jeff, confessed to an affair. We discuss the red flags we missed, the impact of generational patterns, and early exposure to pornography, which all led to our affair. We lay out how we rebuilt our relationship through personal growth and accountability. Join us as we share our journey and offer insights for anyone looking to strengthen their marriage.
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Welcome to hey, julia Woods podcast. I'm your host, julia Woods, founder of Beautiful Outcome, a coaching company focused on helping couples learn to see and understand each other, even in the most difficult conversations. On my podcast, I will share with you the real and raw of the messiness and amazingness of marriage. I'll share with you aspects of my relationship and the couples I coach in a way that you can see yourself and find the tools that you need to build the marriage you long for. Welcome to today's episode.
Speaker 1:I have my favorite guest with me and we are going to talk about what led us to the affair as we look back on what happened, so 13 years ago, my husband shared with me that there was another woman, and his confession that night and in the weeks to come rocked my world, and a thought that I kept thinking was how did we get here?
Speaker 1:I was in shock because I had not seen this coming. Was in shock because I had not seen this coming. We learned in time that we had created quite a hidden relationship, that we did not realize how much we were hidden from the reality of what was going on in each other's world, and so today we want to share with you the signs that we were blinded to that were informing us that the affair was coming. We actually can see from the very beginning signs that we were headed towards an affair that we didn't even recognize were a sign and we were blinded to sign and we were blinded to. So we hope that by sharing this with you, that it helps open your eyes in your marriage to what you might be blinded to, so that you can start addressing these signs before they get to the devastation of a of an affair. Right? So, like my coach says that, uh, my coach, dan Takini, says that.
Speaker 1:You know, we all have shit in our lives that we don't want to look at and it shows up first as a shit hors d'oeuvre and if we don't choose to eat it at that point and look honestly and do the hard work, then it comes back around in a shit dinner and if we don't address it, then it comes back into a you know shit buffet and then a smorgasbord. And so it hit Jeff and I. We got to, we finally chose to wake up and start eating the shit that we needed to deal with for a long time as a buffet and it was not fun. And our hope is that if there are things in your marriage that you need to look at that you can, by hearing this, you can, you can work on it, you can address it when it's small, uh, before it gets so big that it creates the devastation. So, and if you're listening and you've already reached this level of betrayal in your marriage, we hope that what we share today gives you some direction and help in healing your past and the suffering that this is creating for you, so that you don't repeat it and that you do have the ability to actually heal and recover.
Speaker 1:So what we share with you today is what we currently are aware of, and there's five things that we have recognized that were significant signs that the affair we were heading towards an affair. So the first one began before we were ever born, and that is that there was a generational um reoccurrence as far as back as Jeff and I are aware of in our family history. On both sides there was infidelity and there was betrayal of some sort in the area of sexual interactions in the parents of each generation. So, um, I'm going to start with what I what that. First of all, let me welcome Jeff, my husband. Thank you for being here. So anything you want to say about what I said, before we jump into the five things that we're noticing, no, you're good.
Speaker 1:Great. So when we look at generational, I knew that there was a long line of it, both on my side and on Jeff's side, and I didn't question it. I just pridefully arrog grandparents. And you know, on Jeff's side there's no way that they have what we have. Their love must just not have been strong enough or as strong as what we're experiencing.
Speaker 1:But the truth is I didn't ask questions. I didn't ask questions of them and ask them like, hey, like, can we talk about this? And and what did you learn and what do you see that you wished you would have known when you first got married and when you were dating? And I didn't want to know those things. And that's the first sign.
Speaker 1:I had a long history on my side of the family of women saying to me both my mother and my grandmother, in many different words, said you know, men can't be trusted. This is who men are, this is just what men do. And I didn't question that. I didn't question whether I believed that about men or whether that was true, whether women in other families, in families where they didn't have a history of infidelity, is that what the women in their families believed. Those were important things to notice and they were signs that, if I didn't look at what the women in my life believed and what I believed, that I was destined to repeat the past. What would you say, hon, in regards to the generational aspect of what you now see was there.
Speaker 2:I would. I mean first and foremost. Just, I think it was a level of arrogance that I had. Obviously, I didn't ask my father questions. I knew about my father's affair my parents got divorced through it and I was young. I didn't ask any questions of him and, looking back, there was just a fear and I make up, there's just a fear in asking him questions. My dad's not, first of all, not a very talkative person. That's very private but I didn't ask him questions. I became very arrogant to the fact and when we got married, my arrogance was I believe it wouldn't happen to us, believe it wouldn't happen to us. You know it wouldn't happen to you and I, based on what my folks had gone through and, um, but yeah, there was just a lot of questions. I didn't. I didn't wasn't what. I didn't even ask. I didn't want to ask the questions. I think as well as more of that, even why do you think that was?
Speaker 2:um, I think there's this pain, was pain there? Um, you know, I mean, as we get very vulnerable, there was a situation that happened that I actually answered the phone and I remember a gentleman threatening my father um, this is probably when I was, I don't know, seven years of age, six years of age, maybe even younger, and that was like scary for me and so I just kind of wanted to compartmentalize it and hide it, like you know, like it never happened and my folks know about that situation. Um, my grandmother at the time, who was primary, my primary care provider, because both my parents worked um took the phone and and gave the guy an earful at the moment. Um, and that and that moment. But yet, you know, I don't know if you know, being such a young kid, I don't know what my fight flight, fright reaction was. I really don't know. It was like why was someone mad at my dad?
Speaker 2:You know I had no clue that there was anything going on. I had no clue that there was anything going on, but I remember, that has stuck with me, and so I think asking the questions was more out of fear than anything else.
Speaker 1:And this is what, when I was describing earlier the shit hors d'oeuvre like, it's that pain, right, the pain. There was pain in thinking about asking our parents and our grandparents questions and if they would have even been willing to enter the pain with us. But there's a lot that we didn't choose to investigate, but that was because it was painful. It was painful to ask those questions, but that's the shit hors d'oeuvre, right, it's the suffering we don't want to face, the suffering we don't want to be with that. If we don't deal with the suffering, the suffering, even though it feels really big, it's smaller than what it's going to be if we wait and later it's going to grow even bigger. So the second thing that we recognize was a sign that we ignored or was informing us that we were heading towards a fair was. There was a lot of conversations that we didn't have before and during our marriage. So we talked about the ones that we didn't have with the people that in our past, um, but these are conversations that we didn't have with each other. So, um, early on in our well, we were dating, I think, and you let me know that you had been introduced to pornography at a young age and I remember asking you I think I didn't think much about it, it just was like I felt empathy for you, like, oh, I'm so sorry that you know you weren't protected from seeing that and at that time I didn't even really get what pornography was, but I was just like I was listening, just from like hearing what you were saying in the moment, but I wasn't listening. For wait a minute, what future might that create for us? What future might that create for us? And so you said, you know, at one point we had another conversation about it and I said is that something that I actually think you prefaced it right when you told me.
Speaker 1:I now look back and I recognize you were rationalizing it in the moment because you said that's not something I deal with now. And I can now see it was a rationalization because it was a quick defense, right, and then I just accepted that I that sounded good to me. I'm like, oh good, you know he doesn't deal with it anymore, so there's no reason for me to ask anymore. So that was a significant place where I look back and I recognize I didn't have the willingness to get in the uncomfortable with you and ask a lot more questions like what did you specifically see, and has there been a moment you know that you were tempted, and what would you do in the future if you were tempted again? Those weren't the questions I was willing to ask, because I heard what I wanted to hear. I heard great, this is not a problem anymore. And I naively, blindly, went forward.
Speaker 2:And I think too, when we say at a young age, I we well me, I mean I literally was at a young age. I we well me, I was what I mean. I literally was at a young age you were talking, like you know maybe my earliest recollection of that is maybe five or six years old um, finding magazines, um, not even having a clue of what it was like, not even having an idea of, like naivety. I thought men and women all looked alike, you know, in terms of our bodies, and I had no idea of the anatomy of a female or so forth. And it was just really.
Speaker 2:And I think we also have got more data today and understanding of what type of effect that could have on an individual at a young age and the dopamine that comes from it.
Speaker 2:And you know, obviously, the shame cycle that goes along with it.
Speaker 2:And I've just come to, you know, realization that it took me a very long time to admit that there was an addiction there, that there was a problem, and, and realizing that it was something for me, that was just part of my story.
Speaker 2:I didn't need to live in shame.
Speaker 2:I had, you know, feel like I had freedom from it and continue to keep, you know, doing that work internally, like of what goes on for me and you know, because I think, even like today, we can watch something on television, and TV has come a long way in what they're willing to show, and so it's like, even if the soft porn that you might see on Netflix shows, even To me there's a little bit of a what's the word.
Speaker 2:To me there's a little bit of a what's the word, I can sit there with you in that moment and feel at peace with you, whereas before, because of the acknowledgement, because of the being up front and knowing, but I think there's just a real sense of, I think I don't want to say accepting, but I get that's part of my past and I can continue to keep pressing in and begin to understand what caused it and what's producing for me internally, that I see that as an escape, you know. So I yeah, it's just, but like when we talk about and I just even feel for parents nowadays with the amount of what that's out there and how easy it is to come across it- yeah, we didn't have electronic devices when we got married 33 years ago in our hand.
Speaker 1:So, um, so yeah, those were conversations that I recognize. They were signs telling me that, okay, there's affairs in the generations past, there is pornography that you know he's been exposed to, but we didn't do research, we didn't ask questions. Another thing that I recognize was a sign for me is what would happen when I would be. We would maybe be walking behind you know a woman and I would see the way he was looking, or a woman would pass and I would watch him, watch her. I would almost lose my mind and I would make it all about me and like how could you do this to me? How could you even, you know, want to look at this woman and you shouldn't do that. You're not supposed to do that and you know, you got to promise me you're not going to do that again and blah, blah, blah, and I would shame and I would judge. And it was very revealing of my relationship with myself in that I couldn't, I didn't have the space to be able to ask questions and understand what was going on for him and understand the differences between men and women. It was completely about my identity and if he was looking at her, it must be because I'm not attractive or I'm not as attractive as that woman. So that was revealing a lot that I didn't want to see about my relationship with myself. That needed to be addressed and if I didn't address it, it was just going to keep growing and I was going to keep.
Speaker 1:It was going to keep getting worse as well, as I didn't choose to have the conversations with him about what was going on for him, and you know we didn't get the support from mentors we didn't really even surround ourselves with mentors that we would be able to have these kinds of conversations with. That need to be able to be had Every couple. If you don't want an affair heading your way, you need to have mentors in your life that you can talk to about the things you don't know and the things that you're wondering about, the things that are creating stress, the fights that you're having. Who in your life do you go to that you're able to bring what's hidden into the light, and we're going to talk more about that in a few minutes. But what are the conversations, jeff, that you recognize we didn't have before or during our marriage that were a sign that we were on the road towards betrayal?
Speaker 2:Well, I think for one, it was really divulging more of my childhood, and even to this day we still have those conversations of what goes on for me in my childhood. Not that my childhood was, I don't want to say my childhood was pathetic or awful, it wasn't. I mean, there are definitely parts of it that are not that way. Not having a very close relationship growing up with my dad probably produced some of that, and you know, growing up with a mom, I was an only child and so therefore, there was just a very enmeshed relationship with my mother based on I was her little, you know, shining light. I was her little, you know shining light, and so the the level of affirmation was unhealthy on that respect, and so there was just never really conversations that you and I had about my childhood or about your childhood either.
Speaker 1:You know, I wouldn't find out about the abuse that you experienced until after the affair happened. I was clueless, I had no idea.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, we just kept that. It's easy for you know to suppress that. You know, forget that. You know to live the lie or to live the internal lie and to be able to live with it. And you know for years, because it's just something that you kind of believe the lie at some point you know, and so it was just a part of me that was just wasn't there. Swear to god, it's never going to come out. You know it's not. No one's going to know about this and um, and when we started having those conversations, the level of freedom was miraculous in a lot of ways. And again, this is never to say that we've arrived. We are still continuing to work through childhood trauma, both of our accounts, and just getting clarity and understanding, like why is that? Just getting clarity and understanding, like why is that? Um, and yeah, I think every, every man and who's listening probably kind of sunk back in their chair a second when you were discussing, you know, looking at an attractive woman, because I inherently believe that it's natural for a man to look at another woman.
Speaker 2:Um, I remember, uh, a conversation a long time ago, hearing I believe it was a doctor. He was talking about how it's natural for the man to do that. What's unnatural is a man to kind of put himself into a position where it's lustful thinking or imagining those things. And so what was happening for me when I saw an attractive woman, wasn't that it was just an admiration, it was more of like. When I saw an attractive woman wasn't that it was just an admiration, it was more of like she's just an attractive woman, and I don't know if women think like that at all. Maybe they do.
Speaker 2:I sense that there is a changing of the guard in some respects, because studies are showing that women are becoming more addicted to pornography than even men in today's society. So I think there's something changing in the mind in that regards. But for me it was yeah, I think there's moments me what I'd have to look at a corner of my eye to make sure you weren't, you know, like looking at me if I saw an attractive girl and so forth, and I, you know like, well, what was that all about? Like I'm not hiding something, but yet there was just this fear of like you know, dealing with your anger or wrath instead of just actually. I think today you and I could have a very civil conversation about it and that's obviously growth and it's obviously we have doing the work and I've continued to keep doing the work in that regard. But, yeah, that's really a lot of. It was just we kind of built a life around fear.
Speaker 1:We did, we built, yeah, which is one of the things that we recognized, um as well. But before we proceed in the episode, I just want to share something with you that can if this is where you're at like, if you're listening and you're like, wow, we've done all these things If you recognizing there is, you know, generational things that you haven't looked at or conversations that you didn't have that, uh, before marriage or even in your marriage, I want to invite you to consider joining marriage growth community. This resource will give you the tools that I used and continue to use to grow, um, my ability to be in these conversations, and it is something that's available to you. That's going to give you the tools, the support and the coaching that you need to begin to learn to have these kinds of conversations in healthy ways. So, right underneath this episode in the show notes, you can find the link for that.
Speaker 1:So the third sign that we recognized that was pointing to the road that we were on right, like you're, you're on the road and there's signs point is showing you which road you're on. Well, these signs are the signs that we recognize were telling us we were on the road that was leading to an affair, and that third one for us was a lack of personal growth, and I was not focused on personal growth whatsoever. I kept asking Jeff, can we read marriage books, can we go to marriage events? But I was really in the back of my mind. I was wanting to read those books or go to those things so that he would start changing, that, he would start growing. Because, sadly, I had a lot of arrogance, and I still do, but I had a lot of arrogance, and my arrogance told me that I was because I um, we both recognize that. You know, in our minds he saw himself as the bad boy and I saw myself as the good girl, and that was a part of what attracted us to each other.
Speaker 1:And so, in my good girl racket, I thought I was better. I thought, because I hadn't done some of the things that he had done before we got married, that I was better and so it allowed me to, in my mind, see myself as above and that he was the one that needed to grow up to where I was. And the truth was that was so incorrect. The moment we now know that, the moment you see yourself above or beneath someone else, you have some things that need to be addressed. And a lot of the things that needed to be addressed in me is I had no idea how to process my emotions. I had come into the marriage with a lot of unmet needs, and that produced in me a strong neediness to where. No matter how much love or affection or romance that he offered, it was never enough for me. I needed my need was quite sin sin satious what's that word? Something like that.
Speaker 1:You know it was like. You know it was like, and I was a very fearful person and I had no idea how fearful I was. I just like to control everything. The fear was leading me to a lot of anxiety as to what he was doing and was he going to show up for me and was he going to keep loving me? And it brought me to control and I couldn't see how controlling I was. I'm still learning today how controlling I am and I came by it.
Speaker 1:Naturally it's part of that generational thing the women in my history that drive us to codependent relationships and to want to control things that are out of our control because we're afraid to. I can speak for myself. I, for myself, recognize that I go to control when I'm afraid to eat that shit hors d'oeuvre and face the sadness, face the loneliness, face the things I don't want to face, and uh. So those were a lot of the things that I recognize I was not choosing to grow and I can now look back and see how obvious it was I needed to control or how obvious it was that I needed to face those things when I look back at the arguments that we had and how much I would lose my your shit, I would lose my shit.
Speaker 1:I don't think I've ever said that word so many times on a podcast episode, but it's coming up a lot. I mean I would lose it and I was just like, oh well, if he hadn't done this I wouldn't have gotten that furious, or I wouldn't have gotten that furious or, you know, I wouldn't have slammed the door that hard if he hadn't said such a hurtful thing to me. I kept giving all the power, my power, to him, as though he was the problem. And that's the first sign that you're not choosing. Personal growth is when you're blaming someone else for what you're choosing, and that was rampant in my life and that will lead. That's a sign that you're on the path to betrayal in the future.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think the lack of personal growth can also just show up in a number of ways and I think there is a gift in it for me, even currently, as we sit here, of seeing where that lack is at. You know, like they're never having the feeling that, oh my gosh, we have arrived, we're human, we're gonna mess, mess up and so forth. And for me, you know, during that season it was I became very distracted, just distracted, with a growing business, distracted with having four children Although the parenting aspect of that I really am at fault, as I look at my life and things I would have done differently, because I really gave that all to you, like you were the one that was doing the parenting and I was just there for moral support or if I needed, you know something. I would just like throw things under the rug and then it would just get ugly and blow up, you know. So I really lacked growth in that season.
Speaker 2:So I really lacked growth in that season, even though I might have looked confident on the outside with how I looked physically or how I dressed, internally there was a lot of low self-esteem, not feeling like I feel, like most men have this. We're not good enough. I'm not good enough. I felt like I'm not good enough, and so there was always this looking for validation outside of myself versus just actually being good with myself and realizing that there was growth in this area. And a lot of times it was easier for me to turn to women.
Speaker 2:Going back to that mother wound, it was just I found that I could find I could be enabled or be taken care of through a woman, whether it was even you abusing that with you, or my mother, or my grandmother for that matter. I mean, there has just been countless women in my life that have just went above and beyond taking care of me, and so that never gave me the opportunity to work on my manhood as much as I would have liked to have done, and I would recognize that I could numb, just find an escape to numb and just cover up that lack of self-esteem, the lack of just what's the word? More being proud of myself, like not. You know you and I have always talked about am I going to bed with my head on the pillow, with gratitude, and I, how I showed up that day and how am I showing up? And there was just so many days where that wasn't the case and I wasn't willing to share that with you because of embarrassment or shame the shame cycle that we dealt with.
Speaker 1:Yeah, which leads us to the fourth sign, is that the hiding right. We were hidden from ourselves and therefore we were hidden from each other. And you know, like I said, when he I would notice him flirting or looking at another woman, I would absolutely blow up. And what I recognized later is I was training him how, what he was going to get from me If he chose to be honest, like if he was flirting with another woman, if he did, um, look at another woman woman.
Speaker 2:What's that baby?
Speaker 1:some alarm. It must be for airbnb. I mean, uh, for you instagram. Yeah, it's just instagram. I don't. I thought I had to have the video launched, but it's josie.
Speaker 1:Let let's go back to hiding right. That leads us into the fourth sign that we recognize is how much we built a hidden life. We didn't want to be with that, uncomfortable, suffering the pain in ourself of looking at the things that we didn't want to see in ourselves, and so we created a life of hiding hiding from ourselves, hiding from each other, and like an example of that is like earlier when I said I would absolutely lose my mind when I caught noticed him flirting with another woman or looking at another woman, and my reaction was teaching him like this is the version of me you're going to get if you choose to be honest with me, or if something that I, you're doing, something I don't like. Here's how I'm going to react to you and in that I was training him. Don't be honest with me. You're going to get the crazy woman if you're honest with me, woman, if you're honest with me.
Speaker 1:And what I did very early on in our marriage was set up a system, train him. I don't want you to be honest with me because I can't handle it, because I lose myself when you tell me things I don't want to hear and that is huge, like if when you're not on the road to an affair. You're able to talk about anything and everything, no matter how uncomfortable it is. You don't shy away from the uncomfortable conversations. You move towards them because you want to see what's hidden, because you know that what's hidden is going to hurt you down the road, because it's growing in the darkness. Down the road, because it's growing in the darkness, but we built a life that was hidden, where we just learned to say what each other wanted to hear, because it was easier than getting the crazy person that got triggered when suffering actually was what showed up in the moment.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the hiding for me was around. Just there was a point where um, pornography kind of came back into the picture later, while we were married and you know this, those conversations I was having internally of you know we were coming off our first child, and just the interest level was not there and, um, on my part, on your part, I I yeah, how we do anything is how we do everything.
Speaker 1:So, as much as I had given him all of my attention because I was I was empty inside. I was just like begging for love. I had given him all of the love and then the moment our first child came in, then that quickly switched and, like my attention and focus went to her.
Speaker 2:Yeah, also, I remember I don't want to call it bad advice it was a teaching that we were receiving about how, for a female, no matter what, just give him sex, sex.
Speaker 1:You know, that was kind of what we were believing at the time and that's such a bad philosophy, um, and it created a lot of like I don't know, sympathetic sex yeah that was enjoyed a husband, a wife's job is to meet her husband's needs whenever he has them, was the teaching that we got, and so that's what we were trying to, that's what I was trying to abide by, and it made very empty, meaningless sex yeah, unenjoyable, unenjoyable unfulfilled, exactly, and we do not stand by that teaching, just to be clear.
Speaker 2:But it was just that was there for us and you know for me to be clear, but it was just that was there for us and you know, for me it was more of like I'm going to be the hero and just take care of my own needs. You know that like that way, I don't put the pressure on her If I think that she has to have sex, which again is a very poor, it's just, it's hiding, because there was never a conversation around that. You know was never a conversation around that. Um, you know, the pornography was there because I was. I didn't want to put that pressure on you that you had to perform or you had to be physically, sexually aroused or so forth, and so it was just a.
Speaker 1:It was a shit show, absolute shit show in terms of what, the what season was like yeah, and we weren't really talking about it, like obviously we were hidden from each other. So you were having all this inner dialogue going on with you, you were, you know, going to other sources to get your needs met with pornography, and I had no clue, no idea.
Speaker 1:And I was internally resenting you because I was trying to do what I was supposed to do as a wife and so we just really didn't talk about it and we, you know, we loved sitting by each other, we loved being with each other, but we began fighting a lot, and what we didn't know is all this hidden stuff inside of us was driving this anger and resentment and frustration and beginning to see each other as right. You either see the best in each other or you see the worst in each other. And all of these things were driving us to see the worst in each other and fear that we were each out to get the other one. And I mean, how can you, how can you partner with each other, how can you experience true intimacy when you're thinking the worst of each other?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and we really couldn't even I don't feel like we could turn to people in that season either Um, cause it was kind of taboo in a lot of ways.
Speaker 1:Well, but that's the story we told ourselves.
Speaker 1:There's plenty of people who, in our generation, worked through these things far sooner than we did. And so that leads us to the fifth one, which is the unresolved conflict which I alluded to just a few minutes ago, in that there was so much bitterness and resentment and it was just easier to avoid the conversation because we were getting exhausted by fighting and we were like, okay, we can lay here next to each other and cuddle and watch this movie tonight and pretend like everything's okay, or I can bring up something that's bothering me and I'm just gonna point the finger at him and make him the problem and he's going to get mad and he's going to shut down and I'm going to wind up storming out the door. And the pattern in the cycle of our fights were so consistent that it was like why even step on that merry-go-round, because we know where it's going to go. And so it was just easier for me to be like, well, I've got to, you know, I've got some work to do on the computer tonight, or I've got to, you know, work these extra long hours, and or the kids really need me to help them with the project.
Speaker 1:And we just set up a system in our life to where it was. We didn't make time for conversations. We didn't go on when we knew that when, if we were to go on a date, it was going to turn into a fight. So it was easier just to be busy and get busy with the kids and work and say we just don't have time to go on dates. But the truth was we were getting closer and closer to the devastation of betrayal the more we let conversations go unresolved and the more bitterness and resentment we grew.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and take everything. For me was taking everything personal In conversations, going to shame, going to I'm not needed, I'm not wanted. Woe is me, a mindset of shame. And wherever you're at, there you are. And so the future that was coming towards me was this that, you know, if I keep saying to myself, well, I'm not wanted, I'm not needed, then that's the future I'm going to produce. I'm not going to be reliable, I'm not going to be depend upon, I'm not going to show up as a man in the relationship or as a father, a husband, and now, at this stage in life, you know we're grandparents.
Speaker 2:So is this really? I think it's a Viktor Frankl that says that when we are no longer able to change the situation, we are now forced to change ourselves. Feel that that's the road, um, that I look at, because I've, you know, I've tried to change a situation and it doesn't work. You know, it's the behavior modification that you, you talk about a lot and that doesn't work. It's more of the internal work and changing yourselves, because for me it's, it's and it's continuing. I'm not saying that I have got it figured out or that I'm even really continuing to do the work. The work is constantly the work that I need to do is always there in front of me to see and to how I'm going to show up in it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a moment by moment choice. And so if you're listening today and you're like, oh wow, I see that we have done some of those things, I just encourage you to recognize that. Look at the future coming towards you. If nothing changes, what is the future coming towards you? And whether it's an affair, whether it's betrayal of some point sort, whether it is the betrayal of, you know, just living as roommates and emotionally divorced, mentally divorced, spiritually divorced. You may never physically divorce, but is that the future that you want? Never physically divorced, but is that the future that you want?
Speaker 1:And it doesn't take much to get on the other road, to get on the road to a marriage that is thriving, to get on the road to a marriage that is what you long for. The entry onto that road is taking personal responsibility for yourself, looking at yourself and what you're contributing to, what you don't want. When you're losing it in fights or you're responding in ways that you're like man, that's not really who I want to be. Well, that's the shit hors d'oeuvre that you get to decide if you want to eat, and it's powerful when you choose to start eating things when they're small. Eat the pain when it's small, because that's much more manageable than waiting until you get to the point where we were, where we said how in the world did we get here? Well, we can now see how we got here, and we're hopeful that, by sharing this with you, you can see what you might not have been able to see in your marriage, and so I just wanna thank you for joining us.
Speaker 1:We are here and if you have questions, please don't hesitate to ask. That's going to do it for this episode of hey, julia Woods. Now I have a quick favor to ask of you. If you've ever gotten any value from this podcast and you haven't already, please leave us a five-star rating and a quick review in the app that you're using to listen right now. It just takes a couple seconds, but it really goes a long way in helping us to share even more valuable marriage growth tips and interviews here.
Speaker 1:This episode shares the power of what can happen when a spouse takes responsibility for who they are, being one conversation at a time, and if you want the marriage that you long for, click that first link in the show notes and this will take you straight to the resource that's going to solve that for you. I can't wait to connect with you inside my membership, where you can get the support you need to grow the marriage you long for. 24 seven All right, that's going to do it for the show. My name is Julia Woods. I'll talk to you next time.