Jul 7, 2020
Brian Mayer welcomes you to this 3 part series on renovating your remarriage. In part 1, we discuss how to be more aware of past issues that might be driving our reactions. In part 2, we discuss how our thought processes, distortions, and biases play a role in our connection. In part 3 we will discuss implementing new behaviors to complete the renovation. We hope you are inspired by today’s message. For more information and additional resources please visit our website at http://www.theremarriedlife.com
Today's Goodies
- Getting married again is not easy. In fact I would say it is probably much more difficult to sustain a good marriage the next time around than it was the first time. We often think we have learned from our mistakes and will do better the next time, but that is more often not the case.
- You may be even in another marriage that feels like it is heading in the wrong direction or even getting close to divorce. Again you are not alone and this is an extremely common place to be.
- In this 3 part series, that we are calling Remarriage Rehab we are going to talk through steps to help get your remarriage not only back on track but pushed to a much healthier place than you ever thought it could go.
- Now a couple of thoughts before we jump in today’s session. It was be highly beneficial if both you and your partner listened to these episodes together because you will get to your destination if you both are paddling together. Of course marriages and relationship can change with just one person paddling, but it can be a bit of a slower process.
- Secondly, if you are dealing any kind of emotional, physical, or sexual abuse then your safety of course trumps any of what we are going to talk about in this series. So if that is the case, I want you to address any safety issues first but getting help from the appropriate authorities first.
- All this being said, if your safety is assured then hopefully what we discuss over the next 3 sessions will be simple yet extremely powerful in moving you remarriage to a more healthy place.
- In Remarriage Rehab Part 2, we will talk today about how cognitive distortions can filter the way we view something that is happening and can change our reaction in a more negative way.
- You might be asking what a cognitive distortion is. Well first before we describe what it is, you should know that we all have them to some degree or another because we are humans and imperfect.
- A cognitive distortion is often described as a way of thinking that is often inaccurate and also tends toward being negatively biased. There are lots of cognitive distortions and we will go over a few of the more common ones now.
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- Overgeneralization means that we reach a broad conclusion base on something occurring once or maybe even just a few times. For example, if you and your spouse constantly argue about money, it maybe become so overwhelming that you start thinking you disagree about everything.
- Catastrophizing is assuming the worst when faced with something that is unknown. Often our minds will go down a rabbit trail and eventually down the rabbit hole that a worse case scenario is going to happen.
- Personalization means that you are attributing blame for something entirely toward yourself or you could be blaming someone else. An example, might be something like blaming yourself and how bad of a person you for not cooking dinner one night. When in fact maybe there were all sorts of issues contributing to dinner not being able to be made.
- Labeling is somewhat similar to personalization. It occurs when say we mess something up, and we start to say we are a bad person. Or maybe we get into too many arguments and we start saying our spouse is a jerk for example.
- There are many more cognitive distortions but those are just a few that pop up in relationships.
- So what do we do with these. Let’s talk about 3 practical things you can do to limit the effect on your life.
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- First, you must work to become aware that this is a possibility. A good way to do this is to notice or become aware of your thoughts and how you are processing what you are perceiving.
- Second notice if your mood has shifted negatively. Are you feeling anxiety, anger, or fear for example. If this is the case it may very well be that a cognitive distortion is occurring.
- Finally, can you allow your mind to think about alternative possibilities. The best example for doing this is assigning what you think the motivation is behind why someone is doing something. Often we get the motivation completely incorrect.
- It takes time to recognize when we are mentally in a somewhat distorted place but the more you do it the easier it will be.
- We look forward to discussing installing new behaviors in our next session.
Resources:
Thanks For Listening!
- With so many things that take time in our lives, I more grateful than you know that you took time to listen to this podcast episode.
- If you liked this episode and believe that it would be beneficial to a friend, family member, or colleague, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
- The Remarried Life Facebook Group is a community of people just like you who get and give support. Please join today!
As always remember that marriage is not something you have, it is something you do. Talk to you next week unless you are binge listening in the future in which case I will talk to you in about a minute! Take care.