Sex Begins in the Kitchen by Dr. Kevin Leman

Author:Dr. Kevin Leman
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: Sex in marriage, Marriage
ISBN: 9781585581238
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2015-01-17T04:54:36.993828+00:00

FEELINGS DRAW YOU CLOSER, JUDGMENTS PUSH YOU APART

One of the reasons we have trouble understanding our own or our mate’s feelings is that we layer those feelings with judgments, opinions, and values, or we blame someone else for giving us those feelings. As in: “She makes me so mad!” “That guy drives me crazy.” Or even, “You made me love you.”

Statements such as these are examples of how we project another person as the source of our own anger or other emotions. The fact is that your feelings are made, manufactured, and distributed by your own self. Anger, joy, happiness, fear—every emotion comes from within you.

The next time you have to wait in a long line, take a look around you and see how the other people in the line are reacting. Some will obviously be angry and even talking to those around them. “This is ridiculous! I can’t believe we have to wait in this line. Who do they think they are?” All that sort of thing. And yet other folks will be calm, collected, even serene. It’s an inconvenience, yes, but it’s not the end of the world.

If you listen to what’s being said, you’re likely to find that the angry people are the ones who are blaming someone else for this problem: “They have no right to make us wait like this.” “They should be better organized.” “Who do they think they are?” And so on. Those who aren’t angry aren’t assessing blame. They’re just thinking, “Well, these things happen sometimes, so I might as well make the best of the situation.”

Am I saying that it’s wrong to get angry? No, we all get angry at times, and our anger may be justified. All I’m saying is that you need to understand where your emotions come from and quit assessing blame for them.

Try to begin expressing yourself with “I” statements rather than “you” or “they” statements. The idea is to say, “I feel very angry when you say things like that.” In this way, you are focusing first on your response rather than upon the other person’s actions.

H. Norman Wright, in his book The Pillars of Marriage, says that “there are four main ways to describe feelings verbally: 1) Identify or name the feeling. ‘I feel angry’; ‘I feel sad’; ‘I feel good about you.’ 2) Use similes and metaphors. . . . ‘I feel squelched’; ‘I felt like a cool breeze going through the air.’ 3) Report the type of action your feelings urge you to do. ‘I feel like hugging you’; ‘I wish I could hit you.’ 4) Use figures of speech, such as, ‘The sun is smiling on me today’; ‘I feel like a dark cloud is following me around today.’”[4]

Learning to express your feelings and recognizing that nobody but you is responsible for them will help you to stop being judgmental. And a marriage is in big trouble if both partners are blaming each other for the way they feel. Think how fulfilling

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