The Surrendered Wife by Laura Doyle

Author:Laura Doyle
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Touchstone
Published: 1999-01-06T05:00:00+00:00

“Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.”

—BUDDHA

I have noticed that many of us pride ourselves in “knowing” how our husbands will react to a given situation. The logic goes something like this:

• I already know what he’s going to say before I talk to him.

• I don’t like what he would have said if I had talked to him.

• I am disappointed and angry with my husband because he didn’t say the right thing when I didn’t talk to him.

On the other hand, maybe you don’t mind the answer you assume your husband will give, but you’re completely bored with the fact that you always know what he’s going to say and therefore never have to ask him. That one goes like this:

• I already know what he’s going to say before I talk to him. This “same old, same old” thing sure is getting dull.

• I wish my husband would say something different once in a while.

• I am now bored with my husband because he would have said the same thing he always says if I had talked to him.

In the examples above, you are now irritated with your husband even though he has not even spoken to you. Anticipating your husband’s reaction is the same as reading his mind. Just as you can’t know what he’s thinking, neither can you know what he’s going to do.

Every second you spend thinking about what he’s probably going to do or say is another second that you miss interacting and connecting with him in the present. Seconds turn into minutes, which turn into hours and days. Some women spend their entire marriage anticipating instead of connecting, which means they never get the chance to be intimate. A good rule of thumb is to avoid dwelling on thoughts that start with the word “if” because they’re not about the present. You cannot anticipate and be intimate at the same time.

Jessica got a sizable bonus at work and was lamenting about how her husband would spend it on stocks instead of the vacation she’d been longing for. I reminded her that she didn’t know for sure what he would do with the money, and to just enjoy the possibilities for the moment, and that she could always tell him what she wanted.

She resisted this at first, but then admitted that she certainly wasn’t finding any enjoyment in complaining about his choices before he’d even made them. Instead, she focused on how proud she felt that her family would have something extra from her bonus—even though she didn’t know what it would be. She soon admitted that celebrating and enjoying the satisfaction she felt at providing an unexpected gift sure beat thinking about how she would feel if he did something she didn’t like. In fact, thinking about being disappointed is as bad as actually being disappointed.

Anticipating is a second cousin to setting up negative expectations. If you are anticipating hostility

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