Baggage Reclaim » Love and Relationships

The Truth About Porkies: Are you comfortable with being lied to?

Natalie (NML) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 23:06:35 +0000

Recently, BR reader Magnolia shared a lengthy quote on lying from which the first line stuck out for me“As soon as there is any kind of deception, stop everything.” (source: Boundaries in Dating) Experience has taught me and so many others, that when you’re eager to date at any cost, you don’t trust yourself, and you’re actually willing to participate in an unhealthy relationship, you don’t stop everything – you continue.

What this immediately communicates is that you’re very receptive to lies, which may shock you if you consider yourself to be a very honest person. It’s important to remember though, that honesty isn’t just about saying that you’re an honest person or believing you’re beacon of goodness while hanging out with a shady crowd and putting yourself on an honesty pedestal.

Honesty involves being prepared to hear and say things that make you uncomfortable, with respect. It also includes respecting reality.

Lying and our acceptance of it from others is about our own moral compass and where we are on the scale of acceptance of reality. When we accept lies, on some level we recognise we’re telling a few porkies of our own.

A lie is a deliberately false statement.

There is a tendency for us to become preoccupied with ‘intention’ in relationships but if your relationship and any perceptions you have about it is based on illusions, fantasy, denial, excuses etc, the whole situation is founded on a mistaken impression.

Intention is all about acting with conscious purpose. We can always rationalise that it wasn’t our (or their) intention to lie or that we’ve even lied with ‘good intentions’, but sometimes that’s a lie too.

The reason why liars can convince is because they insert a smattering of truth to make the lie plausible.

When you’re receptive to a lie, it’s plausible because it makes your own illusions plausible. The smattering of truth may also only be true when it suits the context of your illusions.

Example: They tell you a lie about how busy they are, pressure yada yada yada as to why they’ve been unavailable.

They have been busy (possibly) although they may be busy doing someone else or living up their backside, but it’s not the reason why they’re treating you as they are. It’s plausible however, because some of the busyness may be real but also because accepting the lie means that the illusion that they care and that this relationship is going somewhere can continue.

Lies are like weeds – let one in, more will grow. Admittedly also similar with rats and cockroaches…

What would you do if you had started dating someone and discovered that they’d been lying to you? Would you stay? Or would you go? Just so you know, this is false representation. Now don’t get me wrong, I appreciate that sometimes people panic, feel nervous, insecure or whatever, however what you immediately learn, especially if it’s more than one lie, is that they lie when under pressure or fearing being out of control, and more importantly, they don’t seem to think you have a right to make choices under honest conditions.

If someone told you they were going to be and do certain things and it didn’t come to pass, what would you do? Hang around and act like a bailiff collecting on a fantasy debt? Or force your feet back into reality and opt out? Talking up a future to gain an advantage in the present is Future Faking. If they put some intense action behind it, it’s also Fast Forwarding.

What would you do if someone lied, ‘confessed’ to ‘all’ the lies, then later down the line you discover that there’s more lies? Would you wait for the next dripfeed? Or would you bounce them and exit back to reality?

If you don’t exit on immediate recognition of dripfeeding, it’s like giving someone the controls to your life to paint your reality for you and then they keep changing the ‘set’ with each new revelation.

If someone told you that they lied to you because you might not have gone out with them, or you’d have left, what would you do? Rationalise it and even feel flattered? Or feel duped and even violated? When you’re lied to, so that you’re prevented from making honest decisions, it’s obtaining goods by deception.

What would you do if someone said something to you that you recognised as being untrue? Would you recognise what this means, process it, and apply it into your action? Or would you play Columbo investigating the crap out of them or even worse, investigating yourself for reasons to blame you?

When someone says something to you that’s untrue and you know it, either because it’s all or partially untrue (that’s enough), this is mind f•ckery, especially if they deny it, which is gaslighting. It’s use of The Outrageous Principle. This relies on the recipient of the lie having their own issues with honesty – lack of self-esteem and self-trust means that you quickly offload what you know to be true, to accept their lie so that you can proceed.

They (the liar ) need to have an almost steely confidence and lack a moral code, empathy, or remorse unless…they suddenly need to take the high road for themselves.The lie is so blatant, you suddenly think maybe it’s not a lie especially if lying so callously is something you feel that you wouldn’t do. It’s either accept the lie and realise they’re dangerous, or…lie to yourself.

Now I could go in deep on this whole lying thing, but let’s stick with the topline data:

If you accept lies in your relationship that actually change the truth of what you can assume and expect about your relationship, you basically believe that there are good reasons to lie and to even be deceived. You may even see it as a sign of ‘love’ and them being so enamoured with you, they didn’t want to risk you being in reality….

It’s time to ask yourself the crucial question: How desperate are you? Particularly if it’s a new relationship (you’re in the discovery phase anyway), what kind of frickin’ potential are you seeing in someone who is getting to know you with lies? It’s a fast slide down a slippery slope – how many excuses and lies you’re willing to put up with directly correlates to how deep you’ll get into an unhealthy or even abusive relationship.

Lies are a stop, look, listen and do not proceed until fully rectified. And/or opt out. If it’s early in the relationship or there are other examples of boundary busting behaviour, do not fear pressing your flush handle.

Particularly after you recognise that one or both of you are lying and you don’t seek to immediately rectify the situation by reconciling the lie with the truth, taking responsibility, and moving into a position of honesty – one that respects the truth – it’s game over, no credits.

There’s nowhere to go because lies on top of lies on top of more lies and beyond, just digs you further into the ‘lie hole’. As it wasn’t nipped in the bud so that your relationship could be put onto a level footing, neither of you can truly trust in yourselves or the other that the truth is now ‘out there’ between you and that you’re not lying about about the fact that you’re now being honest, or even lying to yourselves. If you’ve ever been around someone who doesn’t have a realistic vision of themselves, they can actually be very convinced of their own lies so even if you decide to stick to facts, you’ll become surplus to requirements because you’re a reality check.

It’s better to start fresh and accept no lies from yourself or others – then you know exactly where you are.

Your thoughts? (Not porkies obviously…hehe)

Check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

When They’re Not Over Their Ex: A Lesson In Empathy

Natalie (NML) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 22:39:13 +0000

You meet someone, they ask you out, you enjoy yourself, you continue talking and spending time together, and feel the attraction and desire for a relationship building as the dates continue. Unfortunately, in spite of chemistry, common interests, apparent shared interests, direct and indirect references to the future etc, it becomes apparent that they’re not over their ex either because they tell you, or it becomes apparent through their actions.

Despite the new ‘evidence’ that scuppers your ‘case’ for a relationship, they tell you they like you a lot and that they want to be friends, even if you don’t shag. Or they try to get the fringe benefits without the relationship.

Here’s what empathy would look like: You’d put yourself in their shoes and immediately recognise that after a breakup, it’s a confusing and painful time where you go through a plethora of emotions – it’s time to get out of the way. You may even recognise that when you’re keen to avoid the hurt, it can feel oh so tempting to attach yourself to someone in the hope that they’ll distract, numb, or even excite, but you know that what they don’t do, is fix your breakup for you.

You’d recognise that not being over your ex, in whatever guise it takes, means still emotionally tied, whether it’s positively or negatively. It means that you might still be in touch with them, a reunion may still be under negotiation, and that you may be putting a lot of effort in to not making contact or swatting off their efforts.

It means thoughts popping into your head when you least expect them that you may feel like you have no control over. It means crying unexpectedly or feeling a sudden surge of anger or a deep wave of sadness.

Being empathetic means that recognising that they’re hurting but may be finding it hard to deal with it. There may have been no ill intention and that they were and are interested in you, it’s just they overestimated how ‘ready’ they are for a relationship. They thought they could handle this and didn’t want to miss out – sure you’ve met people when you’re not in the right place and been afraid of letting them go in case they get snapped up by someone else.

It’s recognising the futility of this three-in-an-emotional-bed-situation and wanting no part of it, because even though you are sympathetic and compassionate, this wouldn’t be good for them and it sure as hell wouldn’t be good for you. Of course they’re going to want to spend time and hold on to you (Who wouldn’t?!), but you have to do what they’re unable to do for themselves or you – the right and respectful thing, because you don’t do second best.

Here’s what not empathising looks like: You’d put yourself in their shoes and immediately recognise your pain and your experiences…even if their pain comes from a different place and they’ve in fact had entirely different experiences. You’d recognise that it’s a confusing and painful time, but reason that they’re ‘confused’ and that if you give them enough time, they’ll forget their ex. You recognise that it’s an emotional rollercoaster but you don’t trust your own feelings and judgement, so maybe they have it wrong too.

You may reason that you’ve often dated or even had relationships when you were still emotionally invested in an ex but you believe that the love you had to give was still a lot, even if you were divvying it up on the quiet – it’s not though; you’re overvaluing what you bring to the table.

You may believe that it’s the job of the next person you date if they’re that fabulous, to make you forget about your ex, so by the same token, if you snatch the hot seat, then you’re validated as being ‘good enough’. Then you’ll think “What? They’re telling me that they’re not over their ex! We were having such a great time but I obviously wasn’t good enough to make them forget about them. I feel so rejected! I just need some more time to show them!”

While not being over your ex means press your eject button, you might recognise this, you might not. You’d be worried that you were ‘impatient’ and that after allowing yourself to be a Buffer, once they’d recovered in your Rebound Hospital, they’d skip on out of there and be an available, over their ex partner with a different person. This would then translate into you seeing potential and believing that they want you to be ‘patient’.

Then you’d think to yourself that if someone was willing to love, care, and shag you even though you were hurting and not ready for a relationship, that you’d be so grateful when you were feeling better, that you’d give them a relationship full of the potential you envision as a ‘reward’.

It’s either that they said they’re not over their ex, so you decide their actions say otherwise, or you see they’re not over their ex, but decide that they’ve said different – either way, nothing matches.

You’d say stuff like “Well if I wasn’t over my ex then I’d leave” or “If I wasn’t over my ex, I wouldn’t get involved with someone else” and then reason that ipso facto, they haven’t left and they did get involved with you, so they must be over their ex. Then you’d wonder if they were talking out of their bum as a gentle way of letting you know that you’re not ‘good enough’.

You’d put yourself in their shoes and remember the good times you’ve had, even if they’re brief, and remember the potential you’ve seen, and then see it for the both of you. You’d imagine that they don’t want to make the ‘wrong’ decision, so decide to help them not make any decision.

Sometimes, you get empathy mixed up with sympathy, which is feeling pity for someone’s misfortune, and then sometimes, you get empathy mixed up with bullshitting and fantasising.

If you put too much of you into another person’s situation in the guise of empathy, that’s not recognising and sharing the feeling’s of another – that’s latching and hogging. It’s not about you.

You can relate to their situation without becoming them and making their situation about you. You will make too many assumptions about their motivations and the meaning of their actions and even tell yourself that you know what they’re thinking – you don’t.

Empathy allows you to consider another person’s perspective – if you make it about your feelings, it’s your perspective, which when you deny, rationalise, and minimise the truth so that you can remain in a situation, turns it into a fantasy.

Genuine empathy allows you to be real. Genuine compassion for someone in a difficult situation does not always boil down to doing the easy thing, especially if you doing that, is more about keeping you in your own comfort zone – you may do more harm than good, including to yourself.

When someone shares a piece of information with you that’s critical to the status or perception of your relationship, such as “I’m not over my ex”, first ask yourself what it means about them/your perception of them, and then ask what it means about the future of your relationship/the potential you had in mind. This then helps to form action points or the basis for asking important questions to clarify their position, which then can help you make healthy decisions in reality.

What you shouldn’t be asking is “What’s wrong with me?” Nothing’s wrong with you – they’re hurting/struggling/whatever. They’re emotionally dealing with something from their past, so they cannot recognise and truly participate in a good thing in front of them.

Your thoughts?

Check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

Change Doesn’t Come Without…Change

Natalie (NML) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 23:02:39 +0000

Making decisions and change are two things that many people find very difficult. When you need to make a judgement and act upon it, it’s essentially being faced with the choice between staying in your comfort zone which may also involve trying to find an ‘easy’ route, or getting uncomfortable and making change.

It is hard to exchange limiting, unproductive, unhealthy and even dangerous habits that tick your short-term boxes for the unfamiliar. It’s not that you may not recognise that there’d be some clear benefits to making change, it’s just that the distance between your current state and where you need or desire to be, plus the effort involved with getting and remaining there, seems ‘too hard’. Many BR readers feel like this.

We doubt our abilities or we procrastinate. We try to do it in small doses for a short period of time, which may even give a little shift, but ultimately not enough. Sometimes off the back of these small doses of effort, we expect a result that greatly exceeds the reality of what we’re doing because in our mind, a little feels like a lot and we may even rationalise that we’ve been through ‘so much’ and have made the hard decision, that the least that life could do is give us a sign like making us feel better immediately or making it easy.

So instead, what we actually try to do is keep striving for what we say we want/need and trying to hold onto habits which are a combination of thinking and actions. We expect something to ‘give’…just not us.

I realised this the other day that if you take an average weekday, I try to get a two and four year old ready, fed, get myself ready, sneakily check emails and approve overnight comments, school run, work, dribs and drabs of chores, more work, errands, school run, reading with the four year old, cook dinner (unless the boyf is doing it – I like calling him ‘masterchef’), bath the kids (if I haven’t run over schedule which means I’ll have to do it in the morning), eat dinner, try to chill, probably catch up on some work in the evening, try to be chilling by 9/10pm with a view to being asleep by 11. Yesterday I squeezed in a chiropractor appointment, trying on some wedding dresses, and a sneaky visit to Anthropologie.

For the past few months since my eldest started school, even though I’ve lost a chunk of my week as a result so am even more time strapped than ever, plus the two year old going to childcare 3 days, so being busy with her on 2 of the days, somehow, I was still trying to get up at 6.45 and pressing snooze till 7.20 and expecting to go to bed early. The reality is that I’m harangued in the mornings and I work till 11 and sometimes struggle to settle until nearer to 1. Did I mention I also love having 8 hours sleep?

This is quite frankly ridiculous! What am I? On crack? I know I’m not Wonderwoman. It is impossible for me to achieve what I want without ‘budging’. Since last week, the alarm is now set for 6.25 and I tend to be up by 6.45 – the difference is already great although for the first few days, I moaned about being tired and grumpy. There are a number of other habits to be knocked on the head but the message became clear to me:

Just like when I wanted to hold onto my old thoughts and my old ways and get the relationship I felt I was entitled to, even though I had low self-esteem and some rather unhealthy love habits plus I was never with people who were actually healthy relationship material, change does not come without…change.

I said I wanted a relationship and that I was sick of being with guys who were hot out the gate pursuing me, only to back off and pull a whole bait and switch. I’d then start talking to guys, going on dates, talking the big talk. My desire for a relationship might have changed and even my need for one, but do you know what I was also doing when I was saying all of this stuff and dating? Seeing the guy with the girlfriend or pining for him. Or seeing whatever guy felt like giving me a pseudo relationship while privately thinking “I’m not good enough” and not believing I could hold down a relationship anyway.

Change doesn’t happen overnight, but it does happen and actually, if we even start small and keep at it day after day after day and build up, we start to see the fruits of the cumulative effort plus new habits just become habit.

What I can’t promise you is instant results, instant gratification and a shortcut, which is what a lot of people want.

I hear from people who make changes or make a decision that puts their sense of self front and centre. How do they feel? Resentful and almost begrudging of having to do a decent thing for themselves. It’s like “Look! I’ve made a decision/opted out of an unhealthy relationship that has more holes in it than a pair of fishnet stockings! So where is my reward? Why don’t I feel great? I’ve been robbed! I could have been crying and complaining with them instead of being on my own!”

This is when you have to say to yourself “Am I for frickin’ real?”

I was with a man who had a girlfriend for 18 months, and hit rock bottom emotionally, physically, spiritually – it took me a year to recover and the truth is, it would have taken a shorter period of time if 1) I hadn’t spent 5 months seeing another Mr Unavailable, 2) I hadn’t spent 3 months doing No Contact but hoping he’d be provoked into blazing in on his white horse, climbing up a trellis and whisking me off into a fantasy. That said, 5 of those months were profoundly productive in my life, emotionally, physically, and spiritually. It’s amazing how thinking you might be dead in ten years and have a shite quality of life in the meantime, can spur you…

Change doesn’t come without change.

If you’ve had habits for years or even all your life, it’s just unrealistic to think you can pay lip service to change for a few days, weeks, or months and shazam, you don’t have to put in effort and life is easy peasy.

Change doesn’t come without change and if you think you can have big bad habits and make small changes or none, change just isn’t going to happen or you’re going to get frustrated at the minor results and think “Shag this for a game of soldiers – I’ll just go back to what I know.”

You deserve better than something that may be comfortable for you but you already know doesn’t work and that you’ll be complaining about soon enough and hoping that something or someone else will do what you can’t even do for yourself.

You deserve better – you deserve change.

Your thoughts?

Check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

It’s JUST Christmas/The Holidays – Stay off the Relationship/Drama Crack

Natalie (NML) — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 23:12:26 +0000

This time of year, whether you’re single or in a relationship, can bring about an incredible amount of anxiety. It can also have you thinking and doing things that in retrospect, when you get to January, will have you wondering if someone was coming into your home and spiking you with a cocktail of Drama and Relationship Crack. I of course, say this with experience.

One particular December was spent ‘negotiating’ (read: stating my case, laying it down on the line, discussing, arguing, wheedling, telling him all about himself and lather, rinse, repeat), with the guy with a girlfriend.

I had this fantasy that he would be so devastated at the thought of me being out of the country with my family and having the possibility of being swooped up by a better man (’cause ya just know I kept reminding him that plenty of guys would want to treat me better), that he’d break it off with his girlfriend and announce that he was coming to Dublin with me. The reality could be summed up in four words – “You know my situation…”. Then I accidentally left my mobile phone in London – I spent the whole Christmas hiding in the toilet crying and making sneaky phone calls plus I’ll admit I wondered whether he would have fulfilled my fantasy if he’d been able to reach me… Thank God I stopped taking the delusion crack.

I’ve also had several Christmases – about fourteen of them actually – where the anxiety about buying a gift for my mother and ‘measuring up’ has had me overspending and/or being riddled with such a desperate urge to be validated that I’d feel ill.

I’ve ended a relationship before Christmas because I couldn’t face having to grin and bear it, and then I’ve grimaced my way through another and thought that I was going to experience a Miracle on Assclown Street when it was more like A Nightmare on Assclown Street – cue me having to wear the ‘gift’ of clear heeled hooker shoes, ‘nude’ coloured tights and short leather skirt so as not to ‘offend’ while I grimaced through tears. I left the bar after 15 minutes and literally felt like I’d sold my self-esteem to the devil.

If like me, you’ve done all manner of bonkers stuff around The Holidays, whether it’s suddenly reaching out to an ex or being receptive to their rather pathetic overtures, or suddenly thinking you’re owed a miracle and a happy ending, it’s time to ask:

What’s so fricking special about December? Why do you allow December to take on all manner of meaning and start making grand assumptions, even grander plans, and buy into the fantasy?

I get December on a whole spiritual and religious level. Even on an emotional level, I recognise that as the end of the year approaches, it’s natural to be reflective, but it doesn’t explain why we allow what is another month in the calendar along with some heavy marketing, peer pressure and more importantly, internal pressure along with our overactive imaginations, vaginas/penises and libidos to turn us all crazy.

It’s just December. It’s just The Holidays/Christmas – how much power do you want to give away again?

For people who are struggling with their self-esteem or an unhealthy relationship, you spend eleven fricking months of the year handing your power over to other factors such as your current partner, or an ex, or your job, or your past, or your family or whatever, and now December comes along and it’s like it owns you.

I remember a very old episode of The Simpsons where Homer almost gets himself into an affair situation with his coworker Mindy. All evening he appears to be getting signs, including from a fortune cookie, that he’s going to have sex with her. He ends up sitting beside her on a bed in a hotel room looking utterly miserable as he announces that they’re going to have sex. Mindy tells him he doesn’t have to and he says “Yes we do! The cookie told me so.”

That’s what December is like for a lot of people.

They hook up with exes, buy cards, send texts, reply to what can only be regarded as low level contact, break their necks trying to think up the perfect gift for someone undeserving, allow themselves to be used as Christmas beards where they keep someone’s bed and their ego warm for the season so that they can pretend that their life is better than it is, hold shit relationships together as if the magic of ‘December’ will fix problems that only you both can fix, bust their proverbial nuts about how crap their life is in comparison to an image of happiness that they’re being sold by companies that want to make money out of them, and essentially allow themselves to be ‘led’ by an image of a month.

When January arrives or even before the month is out and you’re asked why you did this stuff, it’s like “I had to do it! December told me so!”

For some of you it’s “I had to do it! The adverts like the soppy John Lewis one or the Coca Cola ‘Holidays are coming’ ad told me so!”

This is bullshit! It’s no wonder we get angsty about it when we’re being sold ‘Christmas’ from as early as October – we’re being sold and if you don’t have the presence of mind to remember who you are, your values, and the fact that there’s eleven other months in the year, you may end up doing something in the short-term that leaves you with a medium to long-term hangover.

It’s like “Screw it! I’m going to throw caution to the wind and send that text or buy into the fantasy (again) that my ex who has already shown and told me who they are might gift me with my fantasy of them making me the exception to their rule.”

It’s just The Holidays. Yes it can be a pain in the bum if your family are crackerjacks and descend into arguments at the dinner table (that would be mine), or you’ve fallen out (that was us last year), or you’re hurt (I’ve ticked a few Christmases off with that one), or you feel like it highlights everything that’s missing from your life. But don’t get things twisted – it’s just a few weeks and you can make them as big or as small as you want to, but whatever you do, put yourself in the driving seat of your own life.

Unless you’re taking part in a nativity play, you’re not a sheep.

Whatever your religious inclinations, the true meaning of Christmas/The Holidays was never about opting back into a poor relationship to massage your ego for a few weeks or holding onto something that detracts from you just so you can say that you’re miserable but you’re with someone.

Stay off the Relationship/Drama Crack – it doesn’t work for you during the rest of year, it’s not about to suddenly give you the ‘fairytale’ because it’s December!

Your thoughts?

Also check out 45 tips for surviving Christmas and dealing with Happy Birthday’s and big occasions.

Check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

Are you worried about being ‘good enough’ for something you don’t want or are not even doing?

Natalie (NML) — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 23:08:19 +0000

Last night I had a well overdue catchup with one of my closest friends and as we filled one another in on our respective lives, it was both scary and hilarious how we’ve actually been going through a number of the same things. I experienced an ‘Aha Moment’ when she told me that after near running herself into the ground worrying about making some decisions about her career, a friend said to her “So let me get this right – you’re worried about not being good enough for a job that you don’t even like or want? You’ve worried about whether you’re able to do a job that you’re already doing well at?”

This is what I come across every day on Baggage Reclaim and have experienced in my own life. Concerns that sound like:

I’m trying to ‘win’ someone that I don’t actually want because we don’t share similar values and they’ve treated me without love, care, trust, and respect, but if I don’t make them love me, change, and basically win them, it will mean I’m not good enough.

Say what?

I’m worried about why I’m not good enough for someone that I actually know is not good enough for me and I’ve even called them an ‘assclown’.

I’m losing my mind over the fact that someone who was unavailable when I met them because they’re attached is still, yep you guessed it attached. In fact, if I’m entirely honest, I’m agonising over why they haven’t left them yet and why they don’t want me…even though I don’t trust them.

I’m worried that I’m not able for a relationship that is actually working well and healthy because I’m used to being in relationships that have issues I need to fight for.

I’m worried that I’m not good enough for a relationship that I ended for valid reasons and that I don’t even want anymore.

I’m worried about why I’m not good enough to have a better relationship even though I’ve never put myself out of my comfort zone and have stuck with my type.

In fact, I’m worried I’m not good enough for a relationship and I’m not even leaving my house and meeting people.

I’m worried that I’m not good enough for someone I claim is a narcissist. I combed the internet, everything says run Forrest run, but I’m wondering why they couldn’t make me the exception, even though they’re dangerous.

I’m worried that I’m not being and doing enough in spite of the fact that people keep saying to me that they don’t know how I do it, that I’m brilliant etc.

I’m worried about whether I’ll ever love again even though I’ve decided that I’ll never risk loving again and don’t trust anyone.

I’m worried about why someone at work/school/the gym/whatever doesn’t like/talk to me even though I don’t like or actually want to talk to them.

I can’t believe they didn’t invite me to something that I didn’t want to go to. Oh and did I mention that I don’t even like them?

I’m worried that I’m not good enough at my job even though I’ve been promoted several times, have been headhunted, offered different jobs, am regarded as an authority in my field etc.

Who needs to change here?

Is it the person you don’t like but are trying to change and/or win? Is it the person who’s still attached? The person trying to have a healthy relationship with you? Your ex? The narcissist? The people who keep telling you how great you are? The person you don’t like that doesn’t talk to you? The people who manage, headhunt, buy from, and even revere you?

When you lose your way, you get caught up in inverted ego issues where you make everything about you, including Other People’s Behaviour, take responsibility for everything (blaming and shaming) or avoid it all together (denial), or become obsessed with being ‘right’, having the last word, and fighting for something that is working against you and that you don’t actually want.

Think about it. If you’re not living the relationship you want or the person isn’t behaving in ways that are conducive to a healthy, mutual relationship, why do you want them?

This is how you get distracted from your values, your purpose, and basically yourself.

It’s important to stop focusing on not being good enough and look specifically at what you’re concerned you’re not good enough about because by putting yourself at conflict with you, you’re undermining everything you’re supposed to represent, desire, and need because you’re not listening and acting in line with your values so that you can do start to do what will actually make you happy, feel good, etc.

Ask yourself: Why am I worrying about doing well at a relationship that isn’t working for me and isn’t actually representative of my values? Why am I worried about pleasing someone that isn’t fricking pleasing me? Why am I worried about how I look to someone who doesn’t give a damn about how they look to me or others?

When you worry about something that’s in direct conflict with what you profess to want or be, it’s a sign that you’ve stopped listening to yourself and are not being authentic. It’s also a sign of avoidance – how can you be so concerned with something that you don’t want when the issue of what you do want hasn’t been addressed?

Often what we don’t want is tied to something or someone beyond our control. Often what we do want is within our control because ultimately achieving what we want has us in it. When we fear putting what we want on us, it’s easier to focus on everything and everyone else.

In recognising this shortfall in reality, you have an opportunity to address an area of your life that will have you failing to match your actions and words, which can wreak havoc in your life. If you’ve ever been a Fallback Girl (or guy), this is something you’re also on the receiving end of – the person concerns themselves with winning you over at all costs (blowing hot, Future Faking, Fast Forwarding etc) and worries about why you don’t want them or are ‘resisting’…even though they know even though they may not admit it, that they don’t want a relationship or will find a reason to ‘abscond’ or create problems at a later date. You then as the Fallback, end up dragging out this situation if you start ‘fighting’ for the relationship in spite of how you’re being treated.

Conversely, I get so many people saying that these depleting relationships are what they want and that this person is the only person that will do – but then we have to ask ourselves how can we complain so much and be upset about something and someone so great? The two things don’t match!

What are you worried about? What are you worried that you’re not good enough for? Write them down and be a little descriptive. If you read it out loud or you even said it to someone else, would it sound like you’d been at the crack pipe? Does it sound confusing? Conflicted? Irrational? Bearing in mind how much of your life can be devoted to worrying about these things and avoiding making and sticking to a decision, it’s a long time to spend in confusion, conflict, irrationality or even an emotional crack den, which is stressful which has repercussions elsewhere in your life.

Many of us worry about being ‘perfect’ which doesn’t exist. We think we’re seeking to be ‘good enough’ but when we keep flogging ourselves about not measuring up, it means we’re actually not even recognising when we’re more than good enough. The person who embraces themselves and doesn’t strive for ideals that don’t exist and is self-forgiving and looking for growth in a positive way, ends up being far happier than the person obsessed with being the ‘perfect version of good enough’, blaming themselves for everything (because they’re all or nothing) and focusing negatively on themselves.

You’re good enough already. You’re good enough to go for the things that will positively benefit you. Stop fighting it.

Your thoughts?

Image source JuliaF SXC

Check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

Those Who Doth Protest Too Much: Stop ‘advertising’ and just ‘be’

Natalie (NML) — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 23:15:57 +0000

Over the years I’ve had the privilege of having many people tell me about the person they’re in a relationship with and I’ve noticed, that when things aren’t that great, or aren’t actually as great as they’re making out, they go to great lengths to emphasise certain characteristics and qualities. One acquaintance said at least thirty times in a recent 45 minute conversation that her guy was “great”, “nice” and “really not that bad once you get to know him.” While I’m sure a part of her was hoping to create a positive perception of him, my spidey senses and too much experience of this told me it’s Those Who Doth Protest Too Much.

The more you have to go to the trouble of saying something about yourself or another person, the less real it sounds. In fact, the more you emphasise a characteristic or quality, the more it begins to sound like convincing and justification. But who are you trying to convince? Them or you?

Probably the most popular examples of Those Who Doth Protest Too Much are people who keep telling you that they’re ‘honest’, ‘nice’, or even that all of their exes are ‘psychos’.

I’m going to tell you straight – I’ve never come across someone who goes on about how honest they are that is actually trustworthy.

The more they say it, the less likely I am to put my handbag down around them or trust them with anything of importance. I’ve had dates tell me they’re “really honest” several times and all I thought was “I wasn’t thinking you weren’t until you felt the need to advertise it!”

Those Who Doth Protest Too Much is advertising – let your actions, or the other person, or the situation speak for themselves.

You’re supposed to be a decent human being – the least you can do is show up with the bare basics of some integrity and be a respectful, trustworthy and caring person. People who are genuinely nice don’t keep telling you that they’re nice, they just act nice. It’s not even necessarily that they’re shady, but what you learn about them is that instead of being authentic, that it’s very important to them to convince others of who they are. They don’t believe in themselves enough to feel that you’ll ‘get them’ without giving you regular intermissions to push their ‘wares’.

An old colleague of mine would tell stories about exes and each one was written off as a ‘psycho’ – he was protesting too much! What he was advertising was that he was deluded about the reasons why he broke up and disrespectful. Either that or he was advertising that he had poor taste in women and playing the victim.

Some emphasise how generous and giving they are, often itemising what’s been done for others, what’s been purchased or donated, and the length and breadth of helpfulness. I’m sure many are generous and giving but they’re often overgivers who have hidden expectations and need to get something back. They’re acting nicer than they feel and are often motivated to give because they feel they have to in order to feel worthy, and then to validate that worthiness, they need external confirmation from a third party that they’re doing good. Or…they just like preening like a peacock.

Another interesting area of Those Who Doth Protest Too Much is post breakup. Now, it’s not about villanising a person but you do know that you can call a spade a spade, or talk about things that in retrospect you now recognise as unhealthy or at the very least as strong indicators of why you weren’t compatible, without saying “They were a good person though” or even “But they weren’t as bad as [insert someone who you have no problem saying how shady they were]“? The more you stress it, the less believable it is and invariably it’s not that they’re a villain but that you aren’t at the point where you’re ready to accept that irrespective of who they are, you didn’t feel good.

It’s also important to remind yourself that you’re not Judge Judy, God or a higher power – you don’t get to determine for the universe whether someone is ‘bad’ – all you need to worry about is judging the situation that has or had you in it.

On the very shady side of this issue are the people who go out of their way to create a particular image of themselves – they’re the worst protestors with something to hide. It may be nothing out of the ordinary other than that they’re not this exaggerated version of themselves that they’re putting across, but often, it’s duplicity.

Several years ago I was friendly with a couple who had been together for nearly a decade and married about for about a year. I kid you not when I say that every time I saw this guy in a social setting, he would stride around the room saying “I love my wife!” loudly. The first few times he said it, I didn’t pay too much attention although I did wonder why he was so declare-y, but after hearing it numerous times over a period of a few months, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was definitely up to no good. And he wasn’t. A few months later, it all came out that he was cheating with at least two other women, living part time with one of them, and handy with his fists.

One of the things I’ve learned the hard way in life is that people make up their own minds and unless we’re networking for business purposes, we don’t need to go around pitching ourselves or others. It’s also important to recognise that to be fair, when you have the verbal trots about someone it’s because you have a vested interest. Often you’re not ‘done’ yet and it may even be that you’ve carefully constructed your reality of things so it’s becomes imperative to get everyone else on side.

Take the acquaintance I mentioned at the beginning – this guy’s like a bull in a china shop when it comes to boundaries and has been physically and verbally abusive. She thinks she can change him by telling him about himself periodically, cutting contact and then giving him another chance. When she told me that I and her various friends and family have him all wrong, I asked “OK then, tell me three good things about him.” After a minute of er’s and waiting, we both laughed.

People with Those Who Doth Protest Too Much tend to fill in the gaps of action and genuine experiences that demonstrate these qualities and characteristics with too much words.

I get it – sometimes we’re really eager for our friends and family to like the person that we love, but you do have to ask yourself 1) why you have to keep emphasising certain things 2) why you can’t just let them see for themselves and 3) who you’re really trying to convince?

Stop ‘advertising’ and just ‘be’ or let things be. If you have to advertise someone else, let it be a warning to you that you don’t trust enough in these people’s judgement or even the ‘subject of the ad’, for them to either figure it out themselves or to demonstrate it themselves. It’s also safe to say that when you’re genuinely happy with someone…you have a happy life that reflects this with happy experiences to talk about that would illustrate this person without you having to say “They’re a nice person you know!”

The best way to convey the person you are is to be the person you are, living congruently with your values and doing things authentically as a natural extension of living your life in a way that makes you feel happy and good. Stop advertising and start living.

Your thoughts?

Check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

Image source SXC

Disclosing Your Past and Insecurities

Natalie (NML) — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 23:39:16 +0000

One of the things that I discovered through various relationships and not just romantically, is that you can share information about yourself but as soon as it leaves your mouth, you have no control over how it will be perceived and what impact it will make on that relationship.

I remember a couple of exes telling me that because of my fraught relationship with my mother back then, that there must be something “wrong” with me. I told another ex all the things that bugged me about the previous ex and he adjusted his behaviour, something that to be fair, many people do when they’re eager to win over a partner but it can be quite manipulative if it crosses into a territory of being 1) deceptive and 2) covert abuse.

In lighter terms, the ‘adjusting’ is as simple as being on a date with someone and them telling you that they were always arguing, not getting enough sex, and feeling quite neglected with their ex. Next thing you know, you’re cautious about avoiding conflict, think you need to be riding them like a pony 24/7, and you’re in overdrive pandering to their every need. We forget then that although these issues may have been real, it doesn’t mean that they’re the true reasons that broke the relationship or that if you’re the polar opposite that you’ll ‘win’ them.

I’m frequently asked how to deal with sharing past experiences or ‘revealing’ insecurities – the healthiest type of information sharing is the type that doesn’t have the quiet agenda of generating a specific emotion or action out of a person. Whatever you impart, you’re comfortable with it, you’re at peace with it (or are on the way to being so), and it’s part of your emotional honesty.

There’s nothing wrong with talking about your past or even your insecurities (to a point) because it’s part of what broadens the depth of knowledge about one another, but if you share for misguided reasons it will backfire. Probably spectacularly.

In fact, in the wrong hands, this misguided sharing can be the equivalent of handing someone the blueprints to screw you over.

The key is to understand your motivations. Are you trying to draw sympathy? Are you trying to draw empathy but actually getting it mixed up and still trying to draw sympathy? Are you even being manipulative in that you hope that this new found knowledge will quietly coerce them into changing their position or even their behaviour/character? Are you trying to warn them?

Often when people ‘share’ their past, hurt or insecurity, it’s like “Please don’t hurt me!” or “You can’t or at least you shouldn’t hurt me because look what at what happened to me!”

From personal experience and listening to many stories, what we don’t realise when we ‘overshare’ is that somewhere we feel a need to impart this information because we suspect that we have reason to be cautious.

Rather than lay out all of your insecurities and pour out various ‘Hurt Stories’, it would be better to address the insecurities and make peace with the painful incidences so that when you do talk about these things, you’re talking about something that’s in the past. It’s very difficult to evaluate a relationship on its merits and know whether you’re dealing with a present or past insecurity or issue, when you’re carting your baggage from relationship to relationship. It’s like you’re together for a while and then one night, you show up with all of these extra bags. “What’s in there?” they ask. “Oh just some problems I need to make you aware of because I’d really like not to be hurt again so I’m going to tell you in the hope that if you were thinking about hurting me, you’ll change your mind” you reply.

We all have pasts and sometimes, they’re ones that we’re not proud of, that we have some regrets or embarrassment about, or that still impact us. That said, while your past experiences can contribute somewhat to who you are, they don’t represent all of who you are and can actually distort you.

They’re getting to know you. Anything you’re telling them should be done so organically and not the equivalent of vomiting out your insecurities and your past so you can get it out on the table before either of you get too comfy. I know I’ve been guilty of saying some stuff because it was like “OK they’re definitely going to turn into an asshole now that they know this”, as if I was trying to force the self-fulfilling prophecy.

Also never allow yourself to be coerced into sharing or find yourself having to apologise repeatedly for something you did ages ago because both overstep your boundaries and they cannot control the uncontrollable. You cannot ‘make it up to them’ for a past that they weren’t a part of.

How your past or insecurity comes out has a lot to do with where you are with it. A number of readers have said they’re embarrassed about being married a few times or being with a few jackasses. If you talk like you’re ashamed, you’re setting yourself up to fail. You’ll also find that we’ve all got at least one ghost of shady relationship past in our closet – I’ve practically got a little cemetery going on!

Instead of going into intricate detail about your exes (you shouldn’t be talking about them on the first 1-3 dates anyway as you have better things to talk about), the simple answer is “We wanted different things.” This is 100% true. This is a lot better than “They were a psycho” or pouring out your life story. Detail, where needed can be gradually added later. I’ve found that buffering what you disclose with contrasting who you were then with who you are now, also clarifies that you’ve moved on from it.

When I told the boyf about the guy with the girlfriend, I felt slightly embarrassed about it but more in a “I can’t believe how silly I was and what an awful mistake” way as opposed to “I’m so ashamed and I may not be good enough for you.”

Don’t Fast Forward unloading your past and insecurities – it’s best to establish a relationship, to gradually get to know one another, to gradually share, and to have positive, healthy experiences in the relationship that build your trust. You should obviously disclose anything of direct relevance to this relationship like a STD, convictions, that spouse you forgot to mention somewhere, etc. The rest comes out organically – you’ll always find out new things about one another. You will find that you can talk about your past or even your insecurities with more confidence when you have a secure footing in the relationship because you know each other enough for it not to impact.

That said – as I explained in the last post, don’t offload all of your insecurities as it makes for a very toxic atmosphere that will increase your insecurity. They’re your insecurities to address. Unless the insecurities are about them and related specifically to things that are currently happening in your relationship, you telling them that you’re insecure because an ex did something in 2005 will only tell them that you’re not over this situation. They can’t prove themselves to correct someone else’s eff up. You have to judge them on the merits of their own actions and the relationship.

They’re getting to know you. If you’re emotionally honest, authentic, and living congruently with your values so that words and actions match, they’ll ‘get you’ without you having to do the equivalent of doing the entire Dynasty boxset of your past and a Powerpoint presentation on your insecurities. Your past is a part of you, but not all of you.

Your thoughts?

Check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

Are You Insecure About Whether You’re Insecure In Your Relationships?

Natalie (NML) — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 23:28:39 +0000

If you’re someone that regards yourself as feeling or being ‘insecure’ in general, which is having a lack of confidence plus the anxiety and uncertainty surrounding it, you’ll find it difficult to know where you and others begin and end. It then puts you in a bit of a quagmire when you experience problems or a breakup, causing you to ruminate on “Is it me or is it them?” It then becomes you being insecure about being insecure in your relationships, which will have you going round in circles.

I’ve felt insecure in all of my relationships, even in the early days with the boyf. The difference between this relationship and all of my previous, is that there was no external evidence to support my insecurity – my lack of confidence was about me and my beliefs, my uncertainty was about me in the context of the relationship and being afraid to believe I wasn’t going to drop the ball, and my anxiety was my own Dynasty level drama going on in my head.

This is something you have to remind yourself of – you can be insecure and be with someone who is behaving in ways that will actually make even the most confident of people struggle to have confidence in the relationship.

All too often I come across people who have a list of things that tick the unhealthy boxes that would rightfully remove anyone’s confidence from the relationship and yet when they want to find reasons to blame themselves and stall the process of letting go, they get it into their head that being insecure and being with someone that may be behaving like a jackass are mutually exclusive.

Whatever insecurities you have, they don’t turn an otherwise decent person with character and integrity into someone that at best takes advantage of you and at worst, abuses you.

I’m not saying that insecurity doesn’t affect relationships but if you put together a list of what has happened in your relationship and you have stuff that’s code amber and red territory, you being insecure is the least of your concerns.

If you meet someone who is actually behaving in ways that are conducive to a healthy relationship but you’re insecure anyway, you’ll still battle with the lack of self-confidence, the uncertainty and the anxiety and gradually, if you don’t get a handle on yourself, it will erode the relationship.

Your lack of confidence will be bolstered for a period of time by the other party’s confidence, and if it continues, the relationship will become imbalanced. If you won’t be secure in spite of external evidence to contradict your lack of confidence etc, you have to ask yourself why they should keep trying to ‘convince’ you? You might think it will show how much they love you if they’ll spend their time constantly reassuring and proving themselves and the relationship to you, but what are you bringing to the table? You’re not showing confidence in them and the relationship so who is reassuring and convincing them?

Many people are under the misguided impression that in the ‘right’ relationship your insecurities will ‘vanish’ just like these same people might believe that their commitment-resistance, addictions, persistent problems and hurt from a previous relationship/experience will disappear, as if ‘love’ fixes everything. Then when all of these things still exist, it actually only adds to the insecurity.

It’s not unnatural to be insecure about certain things but it is unhealthy to be generally insecure or to enter into relationships lacking a good level of personal security as it actually becomes an invitation for someone who reflects your insecurities.

Personal security means knowing who you are, having a reasonable level of self-esteem (boundaries, treating yourself with love, care, trust, and respect), and being a whole person instead of someone with a person shaped void to fill. You don’t inflate people’s value and carry on like they’re that special, and you’re not desperate.

In my last post I talked about when you can’t figure out what’s bothering you because you’ve normalised treading water in stress. By the same token, you need to be careful of treading water in insecurity. While some people get off on it and call it ‘passion’, ‘chemistry’, and ‘fireworks’ and ‘once in a lifetime love’, for most of us, insecurity will have a detrimental effect on our sense of self, particularly because if it remains unaddressed, it does become difficult to distinguish between your insecurity and Other People’s Behaviour.

Your first port of call when you do feel insecure is to ask yourself if your concerns are valid. This helps you to identify the source.

You are right to feel insecure when someone has promised to change umpteen times and then come back claiming that they’ve changed again. If you don’t genuinely feel, see and experience that change, your insecurity is telling you to stop flogging the chance donkey.

You’re right to feel insecure after you’ve been back and forth waiting for your married lover to ‘choose’ you and leave their partner. You’re even more right to feel insecure if they say that they’re getting divorced as a way to get back into your life and then shazam!, nothing. You then feel like you’re being distrusting by chasing them up and are afraid to say anything for fear that they’ll say “Right! Well you obviously don’t trust me, so I’ll just stay with them!” Someone who is leaving will leave. If they could change their mind over you rightfully querying what the frick is going on, they were never leaving anyway. If you tell me you’re getting divorced and then say nothing, I’m not being impatient asking you what the hell is going on – it is my right.

If you feel insecure due to previous experiences this is natural, but these are issues that you should resolve before you take them into a new relationship and expect a partner to iron out your problems and play armchair psychologist. I’m not saying you can’t have your wobbles but whether it’s that you’re tormenting yourself or throwing all your fear at your partner, you will suck the life out this relationship faster than a publicity stunt marriage.

Offloading all of your fears and lack of confidence into a relationship is toxic.

It’s not that you shouldn’t discuss concerns with your partner (of course you should) but if your insecurity is internally driven, you would serve you, them, and your relationship well, by doing some work to support yourself. Write an Unsent Letter either to yourself or them and write out all of your concerns. Just vent them and then identify recurrent themes and look at specific ways to address them.

If there are insecurities being triggered by specific things in the relationship, this gives you a starting point for discussion – this is better than lumping all of the insecurities in and then overwhelming and drowning out concerns specifically pertaining to your current relationship.

Anything that’s a recurrent theme throughout all (or most) of your relationships is for you to address – you’re the common denominator. Whether that means talking to a professional, keeping a Feelings Diary, going a little bit slower – make sure that you’re addressing the insecurity rather than just letting it it eat away at you and the relationship.

What I do know is that if it’s internal and you have no real external concerns, you’ve just got to exhale, put both feet in and let it be. Equally I know that if there are real external concerns, don’t invalidate how you feel, because whatever you feel, it’s real in that you feel it which means you must address it. When you’re honest with yourself, you can differentiate between a personal wobble and…a wobbly relationship.

Your thoughts?

Image source: SXC trubluboy

One Shot – Keep it simple: If they reject you, it’s time to bounce

Natalie (NML) — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 23:37:15 +0000

Talking with a male acquaintance a few days ago, I was once again reminded of how the sexes handle aspects of dating so differently. He was asked out by a woman and flattered in spite of her not being his “type”. He accepted, went out, had a great time and was eager to go out again. When she kissed his cheek at the end of the date, she even licked his ear (ew), so he was a bit caught off guard when he asked her out within a couple of days and found himself being fobbed off with feeble excuses.

“So will you be seeing her again?” I asked, curious, because I know that based on the many tales from readers, that if this was a woman, she’d likely be giving the benefit of the doubt. “No way man! I told her it’s like JLS (a UK boy band) said – ‘You only get one shot!’…” which had me cringing and laughing at the downright cheesiness of it. If she wasn’t going to blow him out before, she likely would have after that line…

As I read through various tales this week including being stood up in the same way by the same person a couple of times, being disappeared on, lied to, umpteen chances to get back together, and even knocked about repeatedly, it reminded me that if we gave what is outright shady behaviour just one shot, how different our lives would be. My encyclopedia of dodgy relationship experiences would become A4 or even postcard sized.

Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, give someone the chance to reject you more than once, especially with obviously disrespectful and unhealthy behaviour.

While there are some things that can appear ‘confusing’, there’s nothing confusing about open and shut cases of assholery. And it’s critical that you don’t focus on them rejecting you as if you’ve been and done something to warrant their behaviour; it’s not about you. To focus on it to that level of granular detail is to take responsibility for other people’s behaviour. What you need to take responsibility for is letting them do it more than once.

Yeah I know it’s nice to give second chances, but you don’t give second chances to shady stuff, which basically falls into at best code amber and at it’s very worst code red.

Someone that will stand you up once, will stand you up twice.

Someone that will disappear once, will disappear twice, and more if you allow them to.

Someone that will lie to you in order to weasel their way into your life or back into it, will lie again. And again.

Someone that will keep drip, drip, dripping the truth to you, will keep drip, drip, dripping it, even after they’ve told you that you have the ‘whole truth’.

If they lay a fricking hand on you or pull any other abusive behaviour, you can be damn sure that they’ll pull it again. Why gamble at the roulette table? You might think you’re ‘different’ to other people that are being abused or have rationalised that it was an ‘off day’ or it wouldn’t have happened if you’d been or done different. It would have. Maybe not that day, maybe not the following, but soon.

If they can make very little effort but manage to get a shag, an ego stroke and a shoulder to lean on, they’ll be the person of diminishing returns if they’re allowed to have more airtime in your life.

They’re just not that special.

Stop giving people a chance to ‘prove’ themselves to be better than what they’ve been. You’re not God or a higher power – it’s not you that gets to judge them or have them redeem themselves. Let them go and ‘redeem’ themselves elsewhere!
Stop thinking up reasons as to why someone would pull this rinky dink behaviour. Stop blaming yourself because the truth is, no person, male or female that engages in open and shut cases of assholic behaviour is worthy of your time, energy, or love, never mind the steam off your pee.

Yes, they might have had some poor experiences that you can empathise with, but you know what? That’s not an excuse. It’s a possible reason, but it doesn’t excuse their behaviour. One shot. If more people that behaved in these ways only had one, they’d be forced to address their behaviour because there would be serious consequences.

It frightens me how receptive we can be. And let me give it to you straight: If someone asks you out and while dating they pull some of this stuff, it’s pointless giving them another chance. Just like when a friend’s ex said “Just give me a week!” when she broke it off with him after he messed her about for 8 years, what the frick could he prove or do in a week? What is another date going to do?

You’re not that desperate.

Stop being curious about someone that you’ve been around for a hot minute that’s already showing their arse, or someone that’s already had their one shot (or even more) at disrespecting you.

They’re not going to make you the exception to their rule. They’re not.

If they’ve had two shots or more, they know that they don’t have to. Life isn’t a fairy tale and as I explained to a reader, there’s no fairy tale or any story that you want to tell your kids, family, friends, or an acquaintance: “Oh we met when they stood me up several times but I stuck it out until they loved me” or “We were shagging while they were married and I waited and waited and waited and finally, they left…OK they were thrown out”, or “We used to text, email, and have sex from time to time. We finally got it together when they’d run out of other options. Look at us now eh?” or even “They used to punch, kick, and bite me over not emptying the dishwasher but we got there in the end.” What the what now?

Stop being territorial. The amount of women I hear from that are losing their minds over someone they’ve only just met or haven’t dated that’s messed them around is scary. Do you know why they give them another shot? They’re worried that their ‘prince’ could be the person that just disrespected them or is vaguely interested, and are afraid some other woman is going to snap them up. There are sharks out there waiting to sniff around the desperation blood.

Don’t allow someone to have more than one opportunity to reject or abuse you. You’re not a charity or a rehabilitation unit for young offenders. If they reject or abuse you, bounce, walk, and basically don’t look back.

Your thoughts?

Check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

When They Come Back Claiming That They’ve Changed…But Have They?

Natalie (NML) — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 22:58:04 +0000

Picture this (adopts Sophia from Golden Girls voice), Dublin, 2000. It’s a few days before Christmas and I’m making my way to the arrivals hall with all of my baggage (literally and figuratively…) after getting off a flight from Miami. My parents thought I was just coming home for Christmas in between semesters, but I was actually moving back and getting myself as far away as possible from what I’d slowly come to realise was an abusive relationship creeping up on me.

My relief at being home quickly dissipated when within minutes of arriving, my mother told me that my ex had been in touch with her, apologising, saying how mean I’d been to him, how much he’d changed (oxymoron right there), and that he wanted to get back together with me. I felt panic grip my insides and the dark cloud I thought I’d left behind me in Fort Lauderdale was back.

Hours later he showed up in an ill fitting leather jacket, with a large bunch of flowers, and an overwhelming need to win me over. In theory you’d like to believe you’d be happy when your ex ‘comes crawling back’ after treating you badly and he was ticking boxes with flowers, apologies and engagement references, but I just couldn’t muster up happiness. Instead I felt afraid. He apologised repeatedly but really it meant “Hurry the eff up and accept my apologies so that I can stop feeling out of control.” He pitched me a life where I could have a “little car” and a “little job” and go and do a “little course”, and we could be so happy together.

But do you know what was odd though? During that visit and over the course of five weeks when he pursued me and harangued me about taking him back until I stopped sleeping, he was never once able to tell or consistently show me exactly what was different. Oh he felt bad that I had felt bad about him treating me bad, but in truth he was a Future Faking wrong footed man.

“How do I know if they’ve changed?” is a question I’ve been asked thousands of times. Too Good To Be True Exes will have you saying “They say they’ll even go to counselling” or “They say they’ll never hurt me again and that things are going to be different this time”.

When someone comes back to you claiming that they’ve changed, that they’ve missed you, are sorry, full of regret, that they’re never going to do or be whatever again and yada yada yada, they should be able to tell you what is different.

What is different in their thinking and actions now that they’re saying that they’ve changed and want to get back together? What problems have they identified that they’ve addressed that can have them claiming they’ve changed?

Anyone can claim they’ve changed but it takes someone of action to show it.

When they come back saying they will change, they’re asking you to take a punt on something that hasn’t happened yet. And it can’t have because the truth is, if someone treated you badly and really had changed, they’d have the good grace to leave you be.

What amazes me, is that the great majority of people when confronted with these claims, don’t take enough time and energy to find out what’s been happening since you broke up.

Where have they been? What have they been doing? Who have they been doing? How did they come to these realisations? What help have they had so far if professional help has been needed and would they still be doing it irrespective of whether you were around? Have they said they’ll change before? If so, what’s so different this time? – Make a list.

What they won’t say is “Well…after we broke up, I quickly got onto a dating site and started collecting attention, followed by an attempt at a relationship. That hasn’t worked out and I suddenly realised that I miss the familiarity of that someone that loves and believes in me no matter what I do to them.”

They’re definitely not going to say “To be honest, I was kind of surprised by how you cut me out of your life and even told me all about myself. I suddenly wondered if I’d misjudged you/our relationship. I also hate being out of control. This whole situation makes me think I look like an assclown. If you take me back, then obviously I’m not.”

Being out of control, something that many unavailable people equate with desire, feeling lonely, fear that you’re not an option, rejection from elsewhere, the problems they had with you following them elsewhere and creating problems, are just some of the reasons why they may find themselves claiming that they’ve changed when they haven’t.

Just like someone can overestimate their interest or capacity for a relationship, the desire or capacity to change can also be overestimated. Sometimes they’ve been Future Faking the possibility of changing over and over again down the years to their family, co-workers, friends, and exes – you just don’t know it. You’re just someone else believing in them and buying into the pipe dream that they’re going to have to disappoint when you expect it to be delivered on.

If you do know it and are thinking “Things will be different this time” and ‘this time’ is the third time (most people love giving out second chances) and beyond, it’s a sign that you’re still holding that defibrillator on your flatlining relationship while wearing rose tinted glasses and the fur coat of denial.

This isn’t to say that people can’t and don’t change – hell I have, as have many other people, but we do it because of our own motivations and the change takes place regardless. There has to be major consequences to not changing and often that doesn’t equate to not being with you. Why? Because if you’ve put up with all sorts of inappropriate, boundary busting stuff from them, they know you’ll take ‘em as is. If you haven’t moved on and left them in the dust while also being receptive, it says “I’m hopeful that you’re ready to make me the exception to your rule of shady behaviour. I’m up for negotiation.”

This is why It’s absolutely critical that when they come back claiming that they’ve changed, that you don’t prompt them or put words in their mouth. Actions speak louder than words but if someone’s going to come squawking about change, they’d better match.

Do not fill in the blanks. Make no assumptions. Let them explain. For all you know, you could assume they mean the thing you’ve been on their arse like Zorro about for a gazillion years and they could have latched onto something minuscule as a way to get their foot through the door.

If they have an issue that requires professional help, they should have been doing that for a few months at least before they come rolling up for a chance.

Hard as it may be to hear, some people say that they’ve changed because they know it’s a conversation and even leg opener. Claiming change will end silence or even calm down anger. They know that they have to front like they have changed to get your attention and gain your trust. If you’re receptive, your imagination is up and away Betting On Potential. Or you’re naked.

Before you sell yourself in on a new deal, do your homework and make sure you had something good enough in the first place to warrant returning to. If you don’t, it’s like allowing the dodgy door to door salesman that sold you the busted vacuum cleaner to come back and sell you another one. Anyone who has previously sold you a dodgy relationship is only back to sell you another one. Instead of being curious, close the door on their foot or just don’t answer.

Your thoughts?

Check out my posts – Why some relationships don’t work out, Knowing when to work at your relationship and Giving Them a Second Chance

If you have a habit of having partners claiming that they’ve changed, have dealt with Future Faking, and being a Florence Nightingale, check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

Image Credit: SXC

The Trouble With Feeling Owed After a Relationship ‘Investment’ Goes Sour

Natalie (NML) — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 23:28:44 +0000

I’ve heard from more than a few readers recently who are feeling resentful after being in a relationship where they feel that they gave and gave and gave and that they got nothing or very little ‘back’. Leaving more than a sour taste in their mouthes, they feel ‘owed’ and even lose sleep ruminating over whether someone else will reap the benefit of their ‘investment’.

In truth, the area of investment into relationships is very shady territory. Just like in my last post where I explained how when people are confronted with what they know to be at best inappropriate, and at worst downright dangerous carry-on in their relationship, that they increase their trust, you will step up your level of investment when it feels like you’re on a crumb relationship diet.

It’s like “Hmmm, this relationship isn’t panning out how I expected. I could fold but instead I’m going to ramp up the level of my investment so that when they realise how much I love them and that I’m more than good enough, that they’ll match me.”

The trouble with working hard at a greatly imbalanced relationship is that of course it’s going to feel like incredibly hard work and a huge investment of your energy, because it’s like putting your bucket down an empty well repeatedly and hoping that water will come back up. Or trying to break concrete with a plastic shovel. At its worst when you’re actually in a relationship where the person is busting up your boundaries left, right, and centre, it’s like peeing into the wind – it all comes back at you in a rather unpleasant manner.

Relationships are 100:100 – you never have to feel like you’ve busted up your back, contorted yourself into a pretzel, or sold yourself down the river if you 1) arrive to your relationships as an equal and if you 2) only remain in your relationships when it’s mutual. If you feel ‘owed’ it’s because someone left some of their effort on the table.

Once you start ‘topping up’ the other party like a Pay As You Go Relationship, or doing things with a view to triggering their fountain of love, or even doing all of their effort for them, of course you’re going to feel like you’re ‘owed’ because in recognising that there’s supposed to be two of you in this, when all is said and done, it looks like the other party has reaped the benefit of your over investment.

When people tell me that they’ve given someone a roof over their head, money out of their back pocket, cooked, cleaned, turned a blind eye, taken them back repeatedly, ‘overlooked’ what they shouldn’t, and basically been incredibly indispensable across the board, I hear where they’re coming from, not least because I’ve been there…but, and there is a but…aside from some of these things being silent contracts with uncommunicated expectations, sometimes we do this stuff to substitute for really stretching ourselves.

If may seem easier to pander to their every need and even fix their problems, because if you strip it down to the basics of mutual love, care, trust, respect, shared values and intimacy, commitment, progression, balance, and consistency, it would cause you to realise your fear of being vulnerable and ‘risking’ yourself plus you’d come up short from the other party.

You can focus on their problems and lack of ‘matching’ and then remind yourself that you’re ‘there’, that you ‘love’ them, that you’ve suffered the most for this person and that it takes someone special to put up with some of the stuff that you have.

If it was a question of how much you ‘suffer’ for someone’s love, we’d all be shackled to assclowns. Pain is not love. Forget love against the odds or ‘sacrificing yourself’ – that’s bullshit! If you’re ‘suffering’, you should be exiting.

If it was a question of how much you love someone, you wouldn’t need their input because in theory you could say “I love this person to infinity and beyond!” and qualify yourself for the relationship and their ‘love’ based on what you perceive to be this grand love. Unfortunately we’re not very objective when we consider ourselves in the love equation and may have very unhealthy ideas about what constitutes love.

In the new edition of Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl, I talk about being an indispensable overgiver, where I explain:

“I’ve heard from many indispensable Buffers who basically cook, clean, babysit, chauffeur, and nursemaid uncommitted men. This is excessive. In a healthy relationship, he’ll prioritise having shared values and mutual love, care, trust, and respect over your housekeeping and other abilities.

Focus on getting your relationship in order and addressing issues. Being indispensable will not address your problems. Don’t substitute taking an active role in your relationship and being emotionally available with doing stuff like cooking, cleaning, etc., because they’re not one and the same thing. A man who has one or both feet out of the relationship and has emotional and/or legal ties elsewhere will lose respect for you while availing himself of the fringe benefits of a woman that just doesn’t know when to step back. If you did, you’d soon see where this relationship really was, and ultimately, why do you need to run yourself into the ground?”

People only talk about ‘investments’, feeling ‘owed’, what the other party ‘isn’t', and only have a sense of what they’re doing and essentially keep tabs, in unhealthy relationships. If you become too focused on what you’re ‘giving’, it ceases to be wholehearted – it becomes The Stuff I Do To Provoke You Into Giving Back What I Want. That’s not giving to them; that’s giving to you albeit via a very convoluted and painful route.

If you’ve ever given someone a home, material goods, money etc with the idea being (even if you didn’t quite verbalise it), that the person would ‘reward’ your generosity with a relationship, you’ve likely already discovered that this isn’t what happens and you’re probably out of pocket too. Hard as this may be to hear, the most they owe you is a thank you, some respect (although not a given), and potentially rent or monetary payback, not a relationship.

If you ‘give’ to drive a relationship that doesn’t exist in the way that you hope and expect it to, you’re getting your relationship action back to front. Establish the relationship first and ensure that it’s mutual and co-pilotted. If you’re giving to provoke a match, you’ll wind up bankrupt, emotionally and possibly literally.

You don’t have a ‘claim’ on an ex or even all your exes – they don’t owe you their better selves, just like if and when you make positive changes to your own life, much as an ex might try, they don’t have the right to collect what they feel they’re owed.

We have to invest ourselves into relationships – it comes with the territory. If we don’t put ourselves in, we’re out. The key is 1) choosing healthy relationships and 2) knowing what our deal breakers are so that we fold when the relationship ‘deal’ can’t continue. If you don’t do the due diligence, ignore code amber and reds, or you then stall to trust yourself and make decisions, you’ll end up knee deep in an unhealthy investment trying to ‘recoup’ what you’re ‘owed’.

When you do feel like you’re owed, it’s confirmation that your relationship isn’t or wasn’t mutual. It means it’s either time to walk or, if the relationship is now over, confirmation that it’s right to be over, because if you feel owed, and you stay, you’re just going to end up feeling more owed.

Your thoughts?

If you have a history of spending too much time hanging around in an unhealthy relationship, check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

You’ll Learn To Trust Again When You Learn To Trust You

Natalie (NML) — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 22:37:09 +0000

Many BR readers struggle with learning to trust themselves and learning to trust again. It’s particularly tricky if it feels like you went out on a limb and got burnt. Badly.

You then struggle to wrap your head around the fact that you may have been with a Future Faker or that you may have even Future Faked yourself by having little or no boundaries and denying, rationalising, and minimising things that in retrospect, if they’d been acknowledged and acted upon could have saved you further pain.

I’ve found that often in unhealthy relationships, when people are dealing with something that they know is inappropriate or even dangerous for their relationship, they increase their level of trust. Yes, increase.

This is a bit like being robbed by someone who breaks and enters via the back door and then deciding to leave the front door wide open for them in the hope that next time they think “Ah. How nice. I’ll reward their ‘obvious’ trust in me by not robbing them.” If you’ve ever ramped up your efforts once major problems have been revealed, it’s exactly what you’re doing.

It’s like thinking “OK I know I’ve just found out that you’re only up for sex / physically menacing / are shagging someone else / have cheated on me / are married / claim you don’t want a relationship and yada yada yada, but you know what? Today is your lucky day! Someone else might think ‘Shag this for a game of soldiers! I’m cashing in my chips!’ But not me! I’m going to invest in you in spite of the fact that I should be slamming my finger on the eject button because I really want to be loved, especially if it’s against the odds. I reckon, if I show you how good, kind, generous and loving a person I am by trusting and having faith in you in spite of your problems, you’ll love me. Oh and change.”

Don’t believe me? If you’ve ever taken someone back after a breakup or stayed after a betrayal, there’s a distinct possibility that you still think that the other person is ‘earning’ your trust even though you’ve ‘given them another chance’. However in making the decision to take them back or to ‘work at things’, even though you may be saying you don’t trust them ‘yet’ or that they’ve ‘got a long way to go before they earn their way back into your good books’, in resolving to be together, you have trusted. Even if you think you haven’t trusted, particularly when you take them back after shady behaviour on their part that they 1) haven’t felt and expressed genuine remorse and apologised for, 2) are in denial about, 3) don’t fully understand what the issues were that broke your relationship, you continuing to be with them is an offer of trust. Blind trust.

There’s also an implicit understanding that’s often not understood by them – If you get involved and then, for example, discover that they’re addicted to drugs and not addressing it, or are married/attached, these two issues are a no-go for a relationship and should be sending alarm bells and have you backing away. When you stay, it’s because what appears to be the implicit understanding is that you’re taking a leap of faith on them so they must stop being addicted or leave their partner.

This is why we can be very angry with ourselves and struggle to trust because in over arching with our benevolence, we recognise that we’ve made a big mistake. When we keep plugging away, it’s because it would be ‘better’ for them to prove our trust investment right than for us to admit we’ve made a mistake.

The ability to trust yourself and trust others actually comes from having your eyes and ears open and processing feedback. When you’re honest with yourself, you’ll feel and acknowledge the impact and what it means in relation to you and your relationship. You’ll experience your feelings, acknowledge any discomfort or what new information you have learned as a result of the impact, and take a view on it, and ultimately do something whether that means proactively addressing any code amber concerns, or inflating your opt out parachute and jumping from a code red concern.

To work the feedback into your trust system and use it, you need to use the positive and negative ‘impacts’ to adjust your levels of trust. To make dating into a positive experience regardless of whether you go on one date, several, or progress into a relationship, you need to start out with a reasonable level of trust. As you don’t know them, trust starts with you which means you need to have confidence and faith in yourself and in others and ultimately be capable of acting in your best interests.

Using your basic level of trust that you walk around with (let’s call it 70%) and using your relationship smarts (boundaries, self-awareness, etc.), you increase or decrease (credit or debit) your level of trust based on actual feedback from your relationship – i.e. their actions, how you feel, etc. If you have less trust than when you started out, it means it’s time to take a parachute and jump. If you keep experiencing positive, healthy relationship behaviour, increase.

So for example, when they say “I’m married/attached”, you’ve been around you for longer than you’ve been around them so you have to trust you and failing that, at the very least trust the norms of healthy relationships instead of deciding you’ll play the long game and gamble where so many have already trodden the path of pain.

What all of this does, aside from helping you to completely avoid Betting On Potential in LaLa Land, is give you confidence in you and your ability to act in your own best interests and make judgements, plus you also act consciously and make decisions.

When you have too much illusions and BS in your life, you’ll flip flap between not trusting yourself, others, and the universe, which causes you to stagnate in indecision and choices that are working against you. What’s critical to realise, is that being indecisive or opting not to make a decision, is a decision in itself and a choice.

People who don’t trust themselves are worried that they’re going to sell themselves down the river because they’ve often mentally already talked themselves into having their underwear off in two seconds flat, or casting themselves in a grand romance with someone that they’ve known for a hot minute, or being back together in a happy ever after with someone they have a pain in the arse past with. The decision is already made in their mind because they’re helpless due to a lack of trust in themselves.

If you don’t learn how to trust yourself, you’re either never going to trust anyone else, or runaround offloading the responsibility for your wellbeing to others who are not appropriate ‘decision makers’ for you.

You learn how to trust yourself by exercising your judgement through experience. This is how you learn to have confidence in yourself because you can trust yourself to look, listen, and act in your own best interests. It also means that even in the face of ‘bad news’, you’re OK because at least you hear and see and know it’s bad news and are acting upon it so it doesn’t become something considerably bigger and unnecessary.

You only get to know what’s right and good for you, when you’re willing to know and act upon what’s wrong, or not so good for you. Any ‘bad’ experiences you have are not only your personal encyclopaedia of what doesn’t work for you and ‘things you know better for next time’, but they’re opportunities to go down a different, positive path.

Your thoughts?
The new edition of Mr Unavailable & The Fallback Girl is now available to buy both in print and in digital formats plus check out my ebooks the No Contact Rule and and more in my bookshop.

Prioritise Having a Healthy Relationship Instead of Focusing on ‘Getting One’ From a Reluctant Source

Natalie (NML) — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 22:33:17 +0000

When I read a comment by long time reader Fearless on my post about actions matching words, it reminded me how we can get sidetracked by creating backbreaking missions for ourselves.

“Well, what I realise now is that I have never seen relationships with men in terms of what I wanted from a (any) relationship with a (any) man. I always saw relationships in terms of what I wanted from this (particular) relationship with this (particular) man, so that my desire for a relationship was always about a specific man to me and never about relationships in general or about men in general.”

I can totally relate to this, as can any person who has persisted in putting their bucket down an empty commitment well in the hope that on the gazillionth try, some commitment water will finally come up.

Who you are, your values, goals, desires, plans etc then become focused on each person you’re involved with. ‘You’ drop into the background or are even completely forgotten while they and what they’re not offering become your focal point of what you believe you want, in essence distracting and even blinding you. It becomes a backbreaking mission to extract a relationship or commitment.

When you don’t have a clear view of who you are, that grounds you and ensures that you’re living congruently with your values, it’s a bit like roaming around playing pin the tail on the donkey or a very messed up game of tag. It’s like you meet someone and even if they’re the biggest jackass in the universe or keep telling you that they don’t want what you want or they show you, you keep pinning the tail on them or shouting “You’re it!”

Relationships then become this transient desire that’s tied to people not giving them which also means your values around it become transient too.

When you have even less of a clear view of what a healthy relationship looks like, it can seem like your job is to attract someone and then convince and convert them into commitment regardless of what they’re capable of or even what they want.

If you check into a hotel today and complain about the lack of sea view even though you’re bang smack in the middle of a built up area, you’ve either got to accept that the view is the view, or move to a hotel closer to the beach. End of.

In relationships, we become sidetracked because we think, unlike the view from the hotel, that we can change a person or that if we have feelings for them and want the relationship, they should give it, even if they act and say differently.

Instead of knowing what you represent, what does and doesn’t work for you, your priorities etc, you meet someone and they become the vocation that you’re sinking all of your energy into. You don’t do your homework and find out if you have shared values etc – all you know is that you now want a relationship. In fact, it becomes “What values?” This is why I hear from so many women who became focused on getting one man or a series of men to give them relationships they weren’t giving, that are regretting not folding and feeling like they’ve ‘wasted’ their lives.

You can end up wanting a relationship and commitment for the wrong reasons. Instead of it being because you genuinely have a mutual relationship with the foundations for progressing into something that’s potentially long term, you want the relationship because:

It’s not on offer and in fact, you know it many never be on offer so you want to be made the exception to the rule – chasing love against the odds because it seems more ‘worthy’.

You want to be ‘right’ and ‘win’.

You don’t want to admit that you’ve made a mistake.

You think it’s love now (or claim you love), get the relationship qualities later. In fact you may think that love and maybe some common interests and some hot sex is all you need.

They represent a ‘type’ that you’ve had little success with that is actually based on unhealthy ideas about relationships and is even catering to a long held pattern.

You feel like you’ve put in too much time, energy, emotion to turn back now so the least they can do is cough up a relationship.

You just do. Sometimes you want the relationship just ‘because’.

When you genuinely want a relationship that reflects your values, you’ll recognise when you’re around someone that doesn’t want the same things and fold. When you want a relationship from someone even if it’s not on offer, you’ll latch onto their ‘good sense of humour’, their great job, intelligence or status, ‘chemistry’, the fact that you both like Marvel comics and recycling, and claim it feels so ‘right’, when off paper it’s going so wrong.

What you don’t realise when you pin a relationship on a person that isn’t appropriate, is that while you’re trying to ‘get them’ to give you the relationship, you end up having to live by their values to a large extent in order to ‘keep’ them, which in turn leaves you miserable and out of sync with yourself. You’re trying to convince them into your values and they’re sticking to their guns – incompatible.

You’ve got to align yourself with someone that’s on a similar path to you. When you truly want something, you don’t invest a chunk of your life trying to get it from someone that doesn’t want to give it and shows they’re not giving it.

After things ended with the guy with the girlfriend and then the barely there relationship with the next guy for five months, I had to tell myself the truth:

The ‘cheater’ was in no position to offer me a relationship because he was already in one with someone else. I could throw my toys out of the pram, stamp my foot, and throw out ultimatums and threats, but I wanted something that he couldn’t give me. The other guy never actually said that a relationship was on offer. Oh he showboated very quickly out the gate at the beginning, but his actions for about 4.5 out of 5 months were not those of a man with a relationship to offer. When you throw in the fact that there was no direct verbalisation of anything and I was in some very ambiguous territory.

I convinced myself into believing I wanted a relationship from them because it wasn’t on offer so it was like “WTF? It’s not on offer? Why not? Don’t they know who I am? What does this mean about me? Right, I must get them to give me a relationship!” Privately I was very concerned that I wasn’t entirely sure that I wanted the relationship but I had set these missions to prove to myself that I’m good enough to be given a relationship, especially from a reluctant source.

When you genuinely want a relationship, when you find yourself with someone that doesn’t offer one or throws you some half baked excuse for one while telling you that their crumbs are a loaf, you walk.

Stop hammering your square peg and pinning your hopes for a relationship on a ‘type’ that may actually be working against one. Get happy with you, work out who you are and what’s important, and align yourself with a relationship that reflects this instead of only getting the ‘relationship erection’ when you know that one isn’t in the offing or having to ‘suffer’ for your mission. You can tell a lot about what someone truly wants and how they feel about themselves by the relationships they’re in and the people they claim to love. Fact is, if more of us prioritised our self-esteem and our true values, there’d be far less unavailable relationships! You’re the only person you’re in control of, so don’t stand in the way of your own progress.

Your thoughts?

The new edition of Mr Unavailable & The Fallback Girl is now available to buy both in print and in digital formats plus check out my ebooks the No Contact Rule and and more in my bookshop.

Actions Matching Words in a Nutshell: If You Haven’t Got a Match, You Haven’t Got a Healthy Relationship But You Do Have Problems

Natalie (NML) — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 21:38:41 +0000

I see so many people practically getting a Ph.d in investigating what someone said but didn’t back up with words, or investing themselves in something that looks like a relationship but the other party has said things to the contrary, that I felt it was time to break it down.

If the person appears to behave like they’re in a relationship by exhibiting the hallmarks of one such as spending time with you, sleeping together, introducing you to people, acting like you’re in a relationship, but then says that they don’t want to commit, that you’re “just friends” or ‘Friends With Benefits’, or denies that you’re even together, or says they’re not ready, their cat’s stuck up a tree, they haven’t got clean drawers, their budgie died when they were five, or whatever, if you continue, you’re ignoring the fact that their words don’t stack up with what you believed to be the actions of a relationship.

This is basically not seeing the wood for the trees because you’ll be telling yourself that action speaks louder than words, as if having the hallmarks of a relationship without the landmarks of one, trumps someone essentially disrespecting you and your relationship. You don’t realise they are lessening their responsibility, managing down your expectations, and telling you that you have the wrong end of the stick. “This isn’t a relationship so whatever you’re reading into things, it doesn’t hold the same meaning for me. I don’t feel the same way.”

It’s time to ask yourself what the hell you’re doing with someone who will shag you, get an ego stroke, play house etc but then say things that completely contradict that? When they say stuff like “I don’t see myself settling down with you”, you must be thinking “What the what now? Pur-lease! They don’t know their own mind!” That’s like thinking they’re a bit thick and need some hand holding in the relationship department.

However, when someone says any of this “I don’t want a relationship” and other such BS that contradicts their so-called action, it’s a get out clause and forewarning. If you continue, they assume you know the deal and recognise that how they’re acting is with a backdrop to what they originally said. They haven’t changed their mind.

On the flipside, I come across an incredible number of people who are sold on the wing and a prayer of words. Some have been interacting with people who have never had their actions match the words that come out of their mouth for over five decades. That’s some heavyweight Future Faking with an even heavier does of denial, rationalising, and minimising.

When you allow someone to persistently and consistently talk a good game without delivering, it’s like allowing them to bend over in your life and fart an incredible amount of hot air.

You may be thinking “Oh but they said it so they surely must have intended it” or “People who don’t love you or don’t want a relationship don’t talk like they’re in a relationship” or “They must say this stuff because they intend to do it and then it must be something about me that’s making them not do it so if I love them enough and become a loveable person then they’ll finally come up with the goods”. These people are a violation of the Trade Descriptions Act while selling you goods under deception.

Really, being with someone who talks but fails to act, is like calling up one of those chat lines over and over again. “What’s your fantasy today?” they ask, barely disguising their boredom while cutting their toenails. “Tell me about the type of relationship we’re going to have, the things you would do, where you would take me and then tell me all the excuses for why you won’t do any of those things and then reel me in again with some more Future Faking…”

I know I’ve said this many times but if actions and words don’t match, you’ve got problems. Match, match, match, match, match.

When someone is a person of integrity, they act like they’re in a relationship and talk they’re in a relationship because they think like they’re in a relationship. People whose actions and words don’t match have a disconnect with their thinking which is reflected in their actions and words, which also causes them to not live congruently with values they profess to have and desires, needs, and expectations they claim. The disconnect means they undermine what they say and do.

They don’t match because they don’t commit to what they say and/or they don’t commit to what they do.

The person who acts one way and says something else is talking themselves out of any perceived commitment to you so they can lessen their vulnerability and responsibility.

The person who says one thing and then does another thing entirely or nothing at all, is passive aggressively acting themselves out of any perceived commitment. The longer you hang around, the more they realise that you buy the fantasy so they take their foot off the peddle and just keep farting that hot air, occasionally throwing out a little action in times of panic and then gradually undermining it all over again once they think it’s safe to.

This means that there’s no point latching onto what they say about being in a relationship with you if they don’t act like they’re in a relationship with you, and there’s no point latching onto the fact that they appear to act like they’re in a relationship with you but they tell you that you’re ‘just friends’ or that it’s ‘casual’.

If you don’t have a match, you don’t have a relationship but you do have problems. No match, no healthy, mutual relationship but you’ll definitely have a whole load of mind effery going on.

When someone’s actions and words don’t match, you can never truly trust in them or where your relationship is headed, which by the way is nowhere. You’ll be left hungry for substance and very confused.

Just because an ex did those things with you and called you their boyfriend/girlfriend or you ‘feel’ like you’re in a relationship, or your feelings within this pseudo relationship are that of someone in a relationship doesn’t mean you’re in a relationship or that you know better than someone who’s acting or saying differently.

Actions do speak louder than words but don’t get it confused. When it’s not a match, the actions tell you everything you need to know.

If someone appears to act like they’re in a relationship but says different, it means that the actions are now those of someone who is not in a mutual relationship with you, which means you’re feeling and giving in what you perceived to be a relationship and now need to roll back.

If someone says they’re in a relationship, but doesn’t back it up with action, their actions contradict it or they even do nothing at all, it also means that not only is this clearly not mutual, but it doesn’t exist as stated, which is verging on a fantasy relationship.

If actions and words don’t positively match, which means you have hallmarks and landmarks, you’ve got problems. You will have even greater problems if you fail to recognise the disconnect and push your flush handle. The funny thing is that when they do match, you know where you’re at, and when it’s a good match, you’re not spending your life feeling mind screwed and ‘hungry’ for substance.

Your thoughts?

For a no holds barred guide to actions not matching words, check out my book and ebook Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl in my bookshop.

Excerpt from Mr Unavailable & the Fallback Girl 2nd edition: He Keeps a Foothold in Your Life

Natalie (NML) — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 21:33:32 +0000

Mr Unavailable and the Fallback Girl is now available in print – yay – so I thought it was high time I shared an excerpt from this completely rewritten edition. In the chapter, He Keeps a Foothold in Your Life, I explain how playing the ‘Friend Card’ and popping up from time to time in your life no matter how long you’ve been apart can make it difficult for you to move on. As many of you have already discovered, it can be very tricky to shake someone with the tenacity of a cockroach after a nuclear bomb out of your life when they’re determined to keep you as a rainy day option in their back pocket…

Let’s cut straight to the chase – he can’t keep control of you and maintain The Status Quo (his comfort zone) outside of the relationship if he doesn’t have a foot in your life and is unsure of your interest. He’s all about his comfort zone, so aside from having a comfort zone for when you’re involved, he equally has one for when you’re no longer together. In his mind, you’re either going to be together on his terms or apart on his terms. As a result, he’s quite frankly a pain in the bum.

From pushing the ‘Friend Card’, to poking around in your life, to chasing you for contact, attention, and even sex, he’s devised a number of means to attempt to maintain control even when the relationship is over. He can’t commit – whether it’s to being with you or leaving you the hell alone – so he’s ensuring that you’re an option should he change his mind or have a use for you, while feeding his ego with the security of what he perceives as your affections for him. He’s rarely upfront about this so of course this wreaks havoc in the lives of any and all Fallback Girls that give him the time of day.

The moment that you appear to be moving on is when he’ll home in on you, blow hot, and set you back ten steps. You’ll readily accept his offer of his friendship because you don’t want to let go either and you keep reminding yourself how he’s so nice, what great qualities he has, and how ‘connected’ you are, and how he’s so like your soulmate except for the small problem of him being emotionally unavailable and unable to commit. Let’s just cut to the chase:

He’s not your friend and he exploits an innate human desire to be perceived as being friend-worthy.

When he suggests that you should be friends or comes back and dangles the ‘Friend Card’ when he’s trying to squeeze his way into your life on lesser terms, it’s because if you won’t give him the time of day, let alone your friendship, aside from the fact that it will be very tricky for him to keep a foot in your life, you not being his friend communicates that he might not be as ‘wonderful’ or ‘innocent’ as he believes.

There’s a universal belief that if someone is still prepared to be your friend after you’ve broken up, it means you’re a good person. Securing friendship and respect, even if it’s undeserved, becomes of paramount importance. What he’s failed to realise is that these are things that are earned and if he’s that bloody concerned with being perceived as hurting or wronging someone, it’s about time he sought for his actions to reflect this.

You know when he asks to be friends after the breakup and you don’t hear from him for a while? It’s because, in you saying YES he’s secured enough of an ego stroke that he only sees the need to get in touch with you to check that it still stands.

You know when he pesters you about hanging out, catching up, or whatever to show that you’re ‘friends’ and then you agree and he suddenly goes ‘dark’ or the arrangement falls through? He secured enough of an ego stroke through your agreement that he sees no further use for you. For now.

You know when he badgers you to understand things from his perspective or for your forgiveness, only for him to go off and mistreat you again? It’s because he’s gained what he wants – forgiveness – so the slate’s been wiped clean. Even though he may do more stuff to piss you off, in his mind you’re ‘friends’.

The truth is: only people who are undeserving of your friendship have to badger, railroad, and guilt you into being their friend. If they were someone who acted with love, care, trust, and respect, they’d have a relative comfort in knowing they acted well enough that there is a possibility of friendship, but they equally would respect your need for space and not assume that they have a right to your friendship.

POKING AROUND

It’s easier to keep in touch with minimal effort, and with so many of us sharing aspects of our lives online that often link us to mutual friends and acquaintances, it has never been so easy for someone to poke around in our lives.

When he’s in ‘investigative mode’, he’s looking for clues either from you or third party sources that 1) you haven’t moved on, 2) you’re still the person he thought you were, and 3) that you’re still an option. Unfortunately, as Fallback Girls, we’re inclined to see poking around as something flattering – we think it’s a reflection of his feelings and inability to resist us. Be under no illusions – he’s poking around to maintain The Status Quo. Nothing more, nothing less.

If you haven’t heard from him, little do you realise, he may have done the poking around he needed without having to let you know about it. He may have asked mutual friends about you who told him that you’re OK but suffering (he thinks you’re still into him), or checked your Facebook profile and seen that you’re not happy or people sympathising with you (he thinks you’re still into him), or seen you walking around the office or town looking like someone has died (he thinks you’re still into him), seen a ‘tweet’ about how much your heart hurts (he thinks you’re still into him), or heard how you tried to date but decided to stop (he thinks you’re still into him).

Equally, he may have got confirmation that you’re still an option from you.

He may have gotten a call, text, or email from you checking in to ‘see how he’s doing’ (he thinks you’re still into him), or another message wondering why you haven’t heard from him (he thinks you’re still into him), or you told him he’s an asshole for treating you X/Y/Z but still responded to his next contact (he thinks you’re still into him), or you quickly reply to messages or agree to meet up (he thinks you’re still into him).

When you get the frenzied poking around, where he’s calling, showing up at your work or home, etc., it’s highly likely it’s because you’re not responding to any of these, or have responded in a drastically negative manner, and he hasn’t found third-party means to confirm your interest. While for a lot of Mr Unavailables even a very negative response is still attention in their eyes, for some, a very negative response will trigger that out-of-control sensation, and – yep, you guessed it – they start pursuing you, thinking they want to get back together, Future Faking etc. If you eventually move from very negative to positive again, which confirms your interest and validates their ego, they’ll bail or turn into Mr Not So Interested.

Your thoughts?

The new edition of Mr Unavailable & The Fallback Girl is now available to buy both in print and in digital formats plus check out my ebooks the No Contact Rule and and more in my bookshop.

Baggage Reclaim » Love and Relationships

The Truth About Porkies: Are you comfortable with being lied to?

Related Posts

When They’re Not Over Their Ex: A Lesson In Empathy

Related Posts

Change Doesn’t Come Without…Change

Related Posts

It’s JUST Christmas/The Holidays – Stay off the Relationship/Drama Crack

Related Posts

Are you worried about being ‘good enough’ for something you don’t want or are not even doing?

Related Posts

Those Who Doth Protest Too Much: Stop ‘advertising’ and just ‘be’

Related Posts

Disclosing Your Past and Insecurities

Related Posts

Are You Insecure About Whether You’re Insecure In Your Relationships?

Related Posts

One Shot – Keep it simple: If they reject you, it’s time to bounce

Related Posts

When They Come Back Claiming That They’ve Changed…But Have They?

Related Posts

The Trouble With Feeling Owed After a Relationship ‘Investment’ Goes Sour

Related Posts

You’ll Learn To Trust Again When You Learn To Trust You

Related Posts

Prioritise Having a Healthy Relationship Instead of Focusing on ‘Getting One’ From a Reluctant Source

Related Posts

Actions Matching Words in a Nutshell: If You Haven’t Got a Match, You Haven’t Got a Healthy Relationship But You Do Have Problems

Related Posts

Excerpt from Mr Unavailable & the Fallback Girl 2nd edition: He Keeps a Foothold in Your Life

Related Posts