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Why Men Cheat | Ep #48
1.7k Plays2 years ago
Being cheated on is a deep emotional violation of trust that comes from the very person who is supposed to be closest to you. The question is, why do we cheat? Why do we look outside the relationship for comfort, sex, affirmation, etc? Today we dive into this painful topic to try and understand the underlying forces that move men from pursuing a woman to choosing actions that blow up the relationship.
In this episode you'll learn:
- Why do men choose to violate trust and cheat?
- What exactly is “cheating”?
- How do you respond when cheated on?
- What men should do if they cheated.
Links
Host Name: Josh Cearbaugh
https://www.instagram.com/jcearbaugh/
https://facebook.com/joshcearbaugh
https://www.jumpstartyourlife.com
LinksHost Name: Seth Conner
https://www.instagram.com/sethaconner/
https://www.facebook.com/iSethConner/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/sethaconner/
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Transcript
Introduction to Masculinity and Cheating
00:00:00
Speaker
Men, we are not simple, chest-thumping, rock-smashing, fire-starting barbarians. We have depth. We intensely feel. We are scared, yet brave. We love to have fun. We're imperfect and make mistakes. We're compassionate and loving. We are multifaceted. Let's explore the reality of masculinity together.
00:00:30
Speaker
In previous episodes, we talked about narcissism and how it is the original douchebag. Today, we get to extend that conversation a little bit, not fully. It's a little bit different, but we want to dive into why men cheat. Why do we violate relationship, violate trust?
00:00:51
Speaker
And what what are the things that pull us away from the intimacy of a relationship, which for some women out of pain and others can very adequately call that guy a douchebag. And so we're unpacking an aspect of the douchebag today. Seth, why in the world do we cheat? Hmm. Well, I mean, the
00:01:19
Speaker
The whole premise behind this idea came about just a few weeks ago when I was having a conversation with a friend who happens to be a girl. I knew her background. I knew that she had been cheated on a couple of times. I've kind of talked that out with her and why men cheat.
00:01:42
Speaker
Did it have anything to do with her or does it mostly have to do with the guy or the person who's cheating, right? Because women cheat too. So I don't want to make this all about men necessarily, but just cheating in general. And, you know, the idea of, you know, is cheating strictly physical and sexual or is it emotional, which is stuff that I know we're going to break down here in a little bit.
Impact of Betrayal and Victim Mentality
00:02:03
Speaker
It just got me thinking, this is a great topic because there's so much weight behind it. There's a reason why so many of the talk shows in the 80s and 90s centered around cheating in relationships. And they span the gamut on like Jerry Springer and it was just sold, right? The cheating and sex sells. But I think it's something that nearly everyone can relate to or feel the weight of on some level.
00:02:31
Speaker
And so maybe it's not something that we've had to endure personally, like in a serious relationship. Maybe it was just experienced, like say in a high school, you know, dating relationship, or even, you know, just any casual dating relationship where somebody, the person that you're with, chooses somebody else over you, right? Or maybe it's something that we've witnessed in others, like we've witnessed it in our parents or we've witnessed it in siblings or friends.
00:02:59
Speaker
Or maybe we've just felt that similar feeling of betrayal from, say, a close friend. Either way, it hurts like a motherfucker, right? That feeling of betrayal. It communicates to us these feelings of rejection, betrayal, abandonment, which
00:03:17
Speaker
I would say, talking with a lot of women, their number one core fear is being abandoned, right? They require, they need security to feel safe and abandonment, it kind of destroys all that. So, feelings of abandonment, feelings of unworthiness, like you're choosing that person over me, so I must not be as worthy or as accepted.
00:03:43
Speaker
Um, but it just really hurts and kind of strikes to the, the core of who we are. So I feel like it's a great conversation to have, whether you've been cheated on, whether you've cheated and you need to understand the other side of things or why it is that you cheat, uh, whatever that might be. I think it's conversation. Yeah.
00:04:03
Speaker
Yeah and i think it it exposes in it this is not by any stretch of the imagination and out or a freebie for the person who does the cheating but. You know for the person who gets cheated on a lot of times it exposes some of our deepest pain.
00:04:21
Speaker
You know and in that sense of the trailer abandoned matter unworthiness you know feeling stupid for trusting you like the in the sense of. You know i put all of my faith in this relationship and trust in you and now i am left here.
00:04:39
Speaker
Feeling betrayed and i feel dumb for trusting you like i should have caught that's one thing that i hear from clients you know i should have been able to see the signs or catch things sooner. And you know a lot of times. Like i said if if we felt abandoned as children in the relationship.
00:05:01
Speaker
with our parents, then all of a sudden, this cheating exposes that deep, deep, deep-seated pain. Set aside the betrayal, set aside the violation of trust and everything else that is very real, but I'm a huge proponent of
00:05:18
Speaker
you know any situation regardless of what it is or what it looks like you know where are those areas of my own personal life that i need to take a look at and i need to explore and heal and can i do that shadow work where.
00:05:34
Speaker
The situation is horrible, but why does it hurt so much? Is it just the violation of trust or how I'm responding to it? Is there something deeper there that I actually, in a warped sense, this is a gift that
00:05:58
Speaker
I need to actually take a look at these certain areas of my own heart and find out, you know, why, what's that deeper seated pain? Where is that coming from? And is there something that I can do to work on my own self? Yeah. And maybe, and that's a good point. Maybe we're putting the, the, uh, the cart before the horse here, but I think it is a good point to say like, yeah, there's no excuse for the behavior. Yeah. But.
00:06:27
Speaker
Everything, nothing is coincidental, right? Things happen to us and we have a choice of how to respond to it. In the past, it's been this kind of like a child-like throwing a tantrum, complaining, whining, I'm the victim.
00:06:47
Speaker
This is happening to me and now my life sucks or this, you know, I don't, I'm, I have a reason for being depressed or whatever it might be. Or the approach is what can I learn from this? Right? What is this illuminating inside of me, which is what you were just touching on the shadow work, which I think is so key because.
00:07:06
Speaker
someone can be cheated on and be like, man, that really hurts. But you know what? If she would rather be with them, then great, go be with them. And if that's the type of person they are right now, then I just dodged a bullet kind of thing.
00:07:21
Speaker
or the person is totally internalizes it, projects everything onto themselves and says, I'm the problem. I'm wrong.
Self-Reflection and Responsibility in Relationships
00:07:30
Speaker
You know, something's, you know, messed up with me and inside of me, which is funny because we, you know, in our relationship, even with the divine, we do that same thing, right? Something bad happens and we immediately project onto ourselves. Oh, I'm not favored. I'm, I'm being disciplined that, you know, I'm getting the smack down or whatever it is. And again,
00:07:50
Speaker
It's all about the perspective. So yeah, I think that's important to pay attention to. There's no excuse for someone else's treating you that way. Yeah. But how can you, uh, what is going to be your perception of it? How do you internalize it? Yeah. And for me, it's just, it helps prevent you from falling into victim mode, right? The whole woe is me. This happened to me. That person's the bad guy or the bad girl.
00:08:20
Speaker
And then it essentially gives you an out for personal responsibility. And so taking a look at those deeper things.
00:08:31
Speaker
Again, I think there's layers to it, right? Because there is a violation of trust. There is a broken promise or broken commitment within that relationship where that in and of itself is painful and rightfully so. And they did do something wrong. Like you said, it's not giving them an excuse for the actions that they chose to take.
00:09:01
Speaker
But i think it's really easy in those situations to basically metaphorically fold your arms and go you did this now you need to fix it and. The the weather it's the pain that i'm feeling or the you know i'm just not gonna take any ownership and what got us to this place.
00:09:22
Speaker
And i'm not gonna take a hard look at myself and it what it does it breeds that whole victim mentality where. You are your it happens all the time right where there's somebody who they get cheated on over and over and over and over again.
00:09:39
Speaker
And if there's one common denominator that happens to be you in those recreating of those relationships, then what do you need to do to change what you tolerate or how you communicate or doing the hard work of taking a look at yourself, even in the midst of a violation like cheating?
00:10:01
Speaker
to to really change yourself so that you can change the relation even if the relationship makes it you know from cheating it's going to require both of you to change the way that you approach things in order for that relationship to grow deeper in intimacy yeah yeah i think that's it's interesting that we talk about
00:10:26
Speaker
the internal things that are going on, like say as a child, we had something happen to us and then obviously that trauma plays out in our relationships later in life. And we have this fear of abandonment or we have this fear of betrayal. And I don't know if you've ever maybe heard this expression before, but like we manifest the things that we fear.
00:10:48
Speaker
And so fear is a very powerful feeling and emotion, just like love, right? And there's things that we can really pay attention to that we love. And the more that we do that, the more that we can manifest those things in our life. But the same thing with fear.
00:11:06
Speaker
But the problem is is that we're wired to lean more into the fear, you know, out of a survival mechanism. We lean more into the fear so that we can either constantly be on guard or if something bad happens, we can say, well, you know, I knew that was gonna happen, right? It's that self-fulfilling prophecy type of thing. But if we fear being abandoned, if we fear being cheated on or betrayed or whatever that might be or rejected,
00:11:34
Speaker
there's a tendency that we're going to put enough energy in that direction to recreate that over and over again and so if that is something if that's a pattern like that's something to pay attention to you know that if somebody does constantly get cheated on like maybe you're picking the wrong people because you are attracting that to you
00:11:56
Speaker
Right or there's something that you're just your that energy you're putting out there creates that situation over and over again and just getting back to like what the cheating causes I it's funny I had somebody come clean the carpets yesterday.
00:12:12
Speaker
and he was telling me about his his last his ex-girlfriend or his last girlfriend uh where they just split up not too long ago a couple months ago maybe and how his car started to make these really bad sounds this morning
00:12:27
Speaker
And he went out there and there was like three bolts that were just laying on the ground underneath his engine. And he's like, he's thinking, I think, I think she, she did something in my car. She's the type of woman that would do that. And it just, I mean, it was funny cause I was thinking about us talking about it today and I was like,
00:12:44
Speaker
When we feel hurt by somebody or cheated on or betrayed, which I don't know if that was the case in this situation, but he did mention another girl or something like that. I'm thinking this woman feels so hurt that she is driven to the edge to be vindictive.
00:13:01
Speaker
It's so angry that I'm going to do something to hurt you back as much as you hurt me. But the problem is she's not helping herself, Annie. She's not taking herself to the next level. I mean, it just kind of made me feel sad for them both. But yeah, those feelings of betrayal, man, that goes deep. I know I've felt that before. Yeah, that's a tough one.
00:13:29
Speaker
Yeah. And I mean, it's, you know, the age old saying, hurt people, hurt people. Right. And and so that's what your default reaction oftentimes can be. And you can feel really justified. You know, that pain that you feel can help you justify actions that are outside of your what you know your character to be and who you know, you know, you actually want to be in life.
00:13:54
Speaker
And so i think it's that's an important point is if you find yourself in that position to. As best you can hit pause on your initial reactions and to not go into that i'm hurt so now i'm going to hurt them in reaction because it. Well first and foremost for the relationship if you actually want it.
00:14:20
Speaker
is not gonna help the relationship move forward at all. And more times than not, all it does is create a bigger mess for both people that has to get cleaned up in some shape or form. Sometimes through the legal routes, if they're doing something crazy, and other times just relationally, you're actually hurting yourself by expending that energy to try to hurt that person back because of the violation of trust.
00:14:50
Speaker
Yeah, those feelings of, you know, I trusted you and now I feel really stupid for trusting you. Yeah, yeah. You said you made a promise that you were committed to me and that's broken. What can I lean into now? If that's broken, what else can I not trust in my life? Or even just the fact that like, okay, you cheated on me, now I'm alone. Like you chose somebody else
00:15:19
Speaker
and you're not with me, you're not my partner, you're not my team member anymore. I feel really alone in this now. Or just ashamed. I got cheated on. Who can I talk to about this? Who's going to be on my side? They're going to think I'm stupid because I trusted that person. So you're constantly putting yourself in this isolation place because of all of these different lies that are coming in and facilitating
00:15:44
Speaker
you know, that greater victim mentality. And yeah, like you said, it's a violation of trust. I don't know. Do you, do you feel like talking much? I mean, has this happened to you? I don't want to lead you into anything, but is there a part of it? I want to hear more like what it, you know, if it's happened to you, what did you feel? Yeah, yeah. Well, I think there's,
00:16:10
Speaker
Kind of like what you had touched on earlier, I think it's an important point to distinguish and we'll get into my story for sure. But, you know, you have like what is cheating? That's, I think some, there's a lot of people that try to justify
00:16:26
Speaker
in my opinion, emotional cheating just because they're like, well, I never put it in her, you know? We never had sex, so we didn't cheat. But I think you can, if you are committed to somebody in whatever that looks like, but if you're committed to somebody and you go outside of that commitment to get your emotional needs met in an unhealthy way from someone else,
Emotional vs. Physical Cheating
00:16:53
Speaker
That is cheating. And there's a variety of reasons why we do it, but I personally don't think that having sex is the threshold of cheating. It happens all the time, especially in workplaces where you're just practically spending more time with people than sometimes you might even be with your own significant other.
00:17:19
Speaker
And out of that you have to guard your heart from letting that emotional cheating kind of take place and make sure that you are. Choosing your partner when it comes to those hard conversations those honest conversations what's really going on in your heart and I think a lot of times people to avoid those.
00:17:42
Speaker
those hard truths that you're feeling or the hard conversations with somebody, we avoid that. And we look to somebody else to just go, oh, they're, they just get me. They understand me there. And all of a sudden the other person
00:17:59
Speaker
Becomes the you know the source of conversation like all my wife such a bitch. She just is doing that and it starts there so rather than having the conversations required to change your relationship for the better. Then all of a sudden you are essentially having an affair emotionally.
00:18:18
Speaker
with another person because you're in the victim mode and you're not taking ownership for actually doing anything to change the reality of the situation or being brutally honest with yourself with the reality of the situation.
00:18:36
Speaker
then you're essentially getting the needs met that you should be getting from your partner from someone else. And to me, that's a definition of cheating. Yeah, absolutely. I'm complete agreement. And it's great that you bring that up because that was part of the conversation I had with this friend last week was from her background, it was
00:19:04
Speaker
Cheating was really just physical. It was a sexual, you know, going outside of that relationship. And for her who had experienced that, I'm like, it's more than that. It's a lot more than that. I mean, yes, it is that, and it could just be that.
00:19:23
Speaker
You know, maybe it was just like a one night thing. Maybe the person is cheating just by the use of prostitutes or sex workers. And it doesn't have anything to do with emotional. It's just an intimacy. It's like a shot in the arm of intimacy that's not really authentic, right? It's just that physical intimacy I get in a moment because I don't have it anywhere else. But yeah, I think the emotional affairs
00:19:50
Speaker
And most affairs start on the emotional level, right? If it's an affair that keeps going on and on, starts emotionally. And so it's inevitably gonna lead to that physical affair, that sexual affair anyway. So yeah, and I like how you said it's getting a need met outside of the marriage. And so I know I tried to pull you into sharing your story. I'll share a little of mine on my side, but you know, I've never,
00:20:18
Speaker
I've never, I can say I've never physically cheated, never sexually cheated. But there were definitely times in my marriage where I was getting an emotional need met from other women. And it usually was just brief. It was just like a flirtation. It wasn't like an ongoing thing. But looking back, I recognized that
00:20:44
Speaker
there was so much emotional division between me and my wife at the time that I was just like hungry for some sort of attention on the female side that made that maybe validated who I am or made me feel important or significant for a moment, right? And
00:21:05
Speaker
And I and I entertained that there was there was one time where there was a I remember specifically there was a flirtation between me and and a Starbucks barista And man, it felt good. I was like shit. Yeah, like that feels really good because I don't get that at home I don't get that validation, you know at home but then afterwards I felt really bad about it, you know, and some people will be like why are you feeling bad like
00:21:29
Speaker
So you flirted, you're going home to your wife. It's not like you are having an ongoing affair or even sexually cheated with this woman. But for me, I felt like there was still a violation. I felt like I was getting a need met outside my marriage. So I actually went home and told my wife about it.
00:21:44
Speaker
And she didn't take it very well, but at the same time, it did help the relationship to say, hey, I'm being honest. I'm communicating like there's something I'm not getting or I'm not feeling. And it's a hard conversation, but we need to have it.
00:22:02
Speaker
You know, and so, um, but I've seen cheating happen across the board. I've seen it in the church. I've seen it at workplaces. You know, it is not, it is something that's taboo and we try to like, you know, not talk about it, but it's everywhere because people.
00:22:20
Speaker
are broken. They don't know how to talk, communicate their feelings. They don't know how to communicate their needs and their relationships. And it's just easier to go outside of it, outside of their relationship to get that need met. And maybe for some people it's even a rush and they're addicted to the adrenaline rush of doing what they know they should not be doing. Yeah. And I think you bring up a really good point, which this may be a semi controversial point, but
00:22:47
Speaker
I think that there's another side of the whole getting your needs met that we don't often talk about and that is that it's unfair to expect that your wife or your partner is going to meet all of your needs.
00:23:04
Speaker
you can that's a recipe for codependent relationship and and so.
Balancing Needs and Avoiding Codependency
00:23:10
Speaker
You know, to me, I've always said now, obviously, your significant other should be the person that is at the core, you know, that knows the core of who you are, but.
00:23:23
Speaker
You know, like with my girlfriend, I have other friends that are girls, that it's not, I am getting, in a sense, I'm getting a need met from those other girls, but I'm not going outside of our relationship for it, but I'm also not putting all of this pressure on her to provide all of the feminine energy that I need in my life. And so, I think a well-balanced man is able to
00:23:51
Speaker
Guard his heart and guard the temptation to get unhealthy needs met for a variety of reasons, but at the same time, be okay with and understand that the feminine energy, it's okay to
00:24:08
Speaker
to have certain needs, desires to be affirmed, to be appreciated, to be a loyal friend, all of those things with other women. Because what it ultimately leads to, like I said, is just this codependency where I'm saying, okay, I'm now looking to you for all of my feminine needs. And I think that's unfair in a relationship and unfair expectation
00:24:37
Speaker
It's the same thing as you are responsible for helping me heal. It's that same dynamic where as long as the intimacy and the connection is
00:24:52
Speaker
strong and a good place in the relationship and I keep her at the core and I keep her close to my heart and I guard my desire to get those unhealthy emotional needs met from other women, that it's actually healthy to have other females in my life that see the good in me, that appreciate me, that value me just as a man and I'm doing the same for them.
00:25:21
Speaker
you know, like in in my relationship, she knows of all of them. And we talk about all of them and kind of like you said, if there is and this hasn't happened, but if there is that a moment where I kind of get that check or I feel bad or I realize, oh, that's a need that I actually shouldn't have gotten met.
00:25:43
Speaker
and I did, then I'm honest with her about that. So to me, it goes back to maintaining that trust and that connection and that intimacy within the relationship, but also not put the burden of getting my needs met on my partner exclusively.
00:26:00
Speaker
Yeah. And I think you're absolutely right. There should be needs that are met by our friends and our friends circle. We've got that really close intimate circle or sphere that surrounds us that we only bring certain people into, like our spouse or our significant other, even our kids. And then outside of that, different family members,
00:26:27
Speaker
And then outside of that is friends. And each layer has a different level of intimacy and each layer fulfills a different needs. And so being able to have needs met by the opposite sex that are just friends is healthy. And when that's not there, there's probably something disjointed. But when you bring that friend
00:26:50
Speaker
or other person closer into that sphere where only the significant other should be or the spouse should be, then we've got something that is dysfunctional. There's a perversion there that it's the wrong version. That person should not be within that sphere. And so I think it's just levels of intimacy that we control.
00:27:12
Speaker
you know i can have and go to work and have a coworker that's a female and we we can have a great connection and be great friends but i should not be necessarily talking to her about my problems with my marriage that's bring her into an intimacy level that she doesn't belong right and that's a recipe for disaster even though i need someone to hear me i need someone to
00:27:35
Speaker
help me feel like I'm not alone in these issues, I probably should be talking to some guys that I trust that can give me a better perspective or a father figure, a mother figure, whoever that might be. It should not be this girl, because who knows what her problems might be.
00:27:51
Speaker
Right? And now she's going to connect with me. Like it's going to be puzzle pieces fitting together going, Oh, you've got those problems. I got the same problems. We relate. Now we're connected and now everybody else, you know, we're the victims and everybody else is treating us poorly. And we've got a reason to gratify certain desires that go outside of our relationships. So, I mean, that's just something to be aware of, but, um, yeah.
00:28:18
Speaker
And I mean, I've always said that it's important to have a core. And what I mean by that is one to three guys or one to three people of the same sex that are, you know, those are the people that you process with, that you are unfiltered with. I mean, that's the friendship that we have where sometimes I'm just like, I need a verbal vomit for a little bit, you know, like, and then just get it out of me, especially for me as a verbal processor.
00:28:48
Speaker
I can get stuck in my head, so I need those outlets.
00:28:55
Speaker
Just to, for me, a practical step of guarding my relationship and guarding the intimacy in my relationship, I don't do that with the opposite sex because of the very thing that you mentioned, the sense of it leading what it leads to. And so I think it's important to, as a man, to identify who that core is for you. Again, it could just be one other guy. I don't see it being more than three guys
00:29:22
Speaker
And it's those people that you really trust, that you really let in to your internal world. We all need those. Like we need those men who are there for us that are in the trenches emotionally. And as you know, what we do with each other on a regular basis is, you know, we say what we need to hear and not necessarily what we want to hear.
00:29:49
Speaker
And I think having that is one really important just in life in general, but specific for cheating, it prevents me from creating that unhealthy bond with another person that's the opposite sex.
00:30:08
Speaker
And it also helps me see my blind spots because in a relationship, you know, I can feel justified. But then if I have a friend who is going, yeah, you know, um,
00:30:23
Speaker
Given the way that you've been approaching your relationship lately, I can understand why she's doing X, Y, and Z. And I think that it would be really good for you to just take a look at these things that's going on in your heart or whatever it may be. And it's not a matter of, you know,
00:30:44
Speaker
a accountability but it it is a sense of accountability to someone. Because we can all get wrapped up on our own inner world and a lot of times i can get cloudy and confusing and emotions aren't clear. And all of that and so just choosing to remove.
00:31:04
Speaker
opening up to the opposite sex and having that core group for you, whoever that may be. It could be a father figure, it could be a mother, it could be whatever, but I think it's important to identify who those are and to really establish and nurture and maintain those relationships so that when the inevitable happens, right, when relationships not going well or there is confusion or you're getting deeper in intimacy and you're scared or whatever it may be,
00:31:33
Speaker
you've got someone that isn't going to lead to an affair, right? Like I'm not gonna end up sleeping with you if I'm sharing my heart with you. And just having that sounding board I think is just a really important and practical way to prevent creating those unhealthy bonds with the opposite sex. Yeah, if you don't have that in your life, that's something that you need to seek out right away. You know, even if you're not in a relationship,
00:32:03
Speaker
It doesn't matter whether you're in a relationship or not. Having that group of people, even just one person in your life that you can be vulnerable and honest with and trust that they're gonna challenge you. They're not gonna tell you what you wanna hear necessarily. They are going to call out your blind spots and just be real with you because that's the thing is we get wrapped up emotionally. We can't see straight. We're kind of drunk on the emotion of
00:32:33
Speaker
fear or anxiety, depression, and we can't see straight. But that person can step outside and look in and objectively give us their opinion. And that is so important. I mean, church leaders, politicians, people all the way up.
00:32:51
Speaker
don't have this sometimes and they desperately, desperately need it. And so if you don't have that, I encourage you to do that because that is something that is going to allow you, like you said, Josh, just to be able to have a sounding board and to purge those emotions before you make some serious mistakes.
00:33:09
Speaker
And just to get back to the whole I guess guarding your intimacy because I had a thought like I was just thinking about my girlfriend and she is you know, she is this like beautiful woman that men just swoon over all the time and there's
00:33:25
Speaker
levels of flirtation that probably most men would feel threatened by. But in my relationship with her, I've learned to trust that she guards her intimacy, her energy really well. And that's something that I even want to do. And that's something that I learned through my marriage too is like, how do I guard those levels of intimacy? And so being able to watch her
00:33:46
Speaker
Be able to interact with these people These men that are just like they want from her they want They want that interaction. They want that attention. They want that intimacy with her and her being able to you know Interact with them, but but at the same time guard guard that intimacy level and keep them on on the outside that that in my opinion is is really healthy and something that
00:34:11
Speaker
If we can all learn to do that, then we can avoid a lot of these mistakes too. But I mean, I guess, I guess it comes down to now, it's like, what, you know, what causes us to look elsewhere?
Exploring Causes of Cheating
00:34:22
Speaker
You know, like what is going on inside of me to make me want to betray trust with this person that I'm in relationship with to go
00:34:35
Speaker
start something with somebody else or just get a need met even just briefly with somebody else. What causes me to look outside of my relationship that I'm supposed to have with this person that I'm supposed to be best friends with or really close with and risk hurting them or even consider hurting them. What is going on inside of me to cause me to do that?
00:34:57
Speaker
Yeah i mean that's that's a loaded question right because there's so many things that can lead to that poll or that desire and i think. Yeah there's there's two sides of it right there's one which is if the relationship is is strained for whatever reason.
00:35:17
Speaker
And you know let's say that you're in a relationship with the narcissist and you are not being appreciated you're being gaslit and. You know all of that so you're not actually being seen or heard within the relationship. That's that's kind of the negative side but then there's the other side which is.
00:35:37
Speaker
You could be in a relationship and be actually afraid of the intimacy that you are creating and so then you go out of your way to sabotage it to essentially end the relationship and.
00:35:52
Speaker
A lot of times that stems from this fear of rejection where if I can blow up the relationship before she rejects me, then it keeps me safe or gives me a false sense of safety and security. I think there's two sides of it.
00:36:11
Speaker
Everybody knows about the honeymoon phase of a relationship where, you know, you're googly eyes over each other and it could be that, you know, you're missing that attention or that excitement or that fun. Because you've just gotten into the day to day routines and the rut and you have kids and you're going to work and you just, you've become essentially roommates instead of partners.
00:36:34
Speaker
And so you look to try to find that excitement again or find that attention again where you don't feel like you're having it within the relationship.
00:36:45
Speaker
you know, that's just a couple things that come to mind. Yeah. I think it's interesting that you, you pulled on the fear of intimacy and maybe that's something we should touch on real quick. Cause, um, I had, I had forgotten about that. That, that was something that I experienced in probably the first half of my marriage is just a fear of intimacy, intimacy issues. A lot of victims from that. I think that's probably a great root cause for a lot of these decisions is one,
00:37:11
Speaker
I'm afraid of being vulnerable and transparent with this person. I have a fear of intimacy, which probably comes back down to fear of rejection. Like if I expose myself in this intimate way, they have the power to reject me and totally
00:37:29
Speaker
destroy me, right? And I don't want to put myself in that kind of vulnerable position, right? But at the same time, we are people that desperately need intimacy. We are built to have relationship and to be intimate and go deep with each other.
00:37:45
Speaker
And just to feel that need met in intimacy. So if I'm not giving the opportunity for that in my relationship, I'm going to try to go get little fixes, little bits of intimacy elsewhere at work, whatever it might be, where that opportunity is.
00:38:06
Speaker
Which is why I think that doing the shadow work is so important because that is confronting and addressing those core drivers of the fear of rejection, of the fear of intimacy. What actually causes that inside of you? And again, it could be that the relationship's not at a good place, but I think for a lot of men, we have this
00:38:32
Speaker
Deep seated fear of actually. Exposing who we are that the reality of who we are the humanity of who we are our insecurities are fears are doubts you know we don't quote unquote have it all together.
00:38:49
Speaker
If if i keep you at arms distance and i have it all together and you reject me that's one thing but if i open up my heart. And i actually let you in and then you reject me or and then you know i have this fear of. You ultimately rejected me by saying you know it doesn't matter why the relationship would end it could just be that it wasn't the right person or the right fit.
00:39:13
Speaker
But the way that I take that is that the essence of who I am was rejected, not the perception of who I am, not the career man of who I am, but really the core of who I am.
00:39:29
Speaker
And so I think we go out of our way to try to protect and guard and present a certain facade of who they think that we should be out of that fear of ultimately rejection because that's true intimacy is letting them into the reality of who you are.
00:39:55
Speaker
It's the old saying, it's better to have loved and lost than not loved at all. It's better to have opened yourself up and let someone actually see the reality of who you are. And ultimately, if they choose out from seeing that, then it wasn't the right fit anyways. So why would you waste time and energy and life on something that ultimately wouldn't be the right fit
00:40:22
Speaker
Because, you know, there is out of the billions of people on planet Earth, there is a partner that is out there that will accept you for who you are. Yeah. Well, it's because we want we want our cake and to eat it, too. Right. We don't want to be alone.
00:40:39
Speaker
right so we will we will endure a shitty relationship because we don't want to be alone but then i realize my needs aren't getting met and i'm going to go outside of that relationship and you know what that relationship the one i'm in right now i don't really you know it's
00:40:55
Speaker
It's not really going much, you know, going anywhere anyway. So even if I hurt that person, not a whole lot is lost. Obviously that's a terrible mentality. But again, it all comes down to that intimacy issue. There's a term out there called intimacy anorexia.
00:41:13
Speaker
I don't know if you've ever heard of that before. That might be something for whoever's listening to look up. There's a lot of different characteristics that kind of fit into the intimacy anorexia category, but it really kind of just, it's talking about, you know, emotional intelligence. It's talking about just that, that fear of rejection. I mean, it dials down to even like, if you have problems with money, a lot of times it's connected to this intimacy thing. I'll let,
00:41:39
Speaker
The audience decided to go out and research that themselves. I won't yeah, we'll throw something in the show. Yeah, that's right. That's right I'll throw a link in there, but um, but I mean it comes down to I am NOT you know, I there's something broken inside of me and I'm not
00:41:56
Speaker
And I'm looking to this person I'm in relationship with or to start this relationship with this person to heal that pain inside my heart, to fix me or to make me feel better about myself or whatever
Healing and Personal Change after Betrayal
00:42:14
Speaker
it might be. I'm looking to this person to do something
00:42:17
Speaker
and they're in my external world, I'm looking at them to fix my internal world. And when they don't, then I'm gonna go look somewhere else, right? And I see this person, I'm like, wow, there's an attraction there or there's some sort of energetic pull. And this person might be able to heal my pain or fix this thing in my life or make me feel better about myself or whatever it might be. And we perpetuate that cycle.
00:42:44
Speaker
when the answer is nobody out there is going to fix it. It's an internal problem within us that can only be solved internally. And let me just say that everything we need, we already intrinsically have. Everything we need to heal ourselves, to fix ourselves is intrinsic. We have it all in us. Now, there might be people that help us pull that out, you know, help us recognize that internally, but we can't rely on somebody else to do it for us.
00:43:14
Speaker
Yeah, so I think the question is then if you are someone who's listening to this and you have cheated, then what do you do? What's the next steps? You find yourself in this place where
00:43:30
Speaker
You're saying, yeah, you know what? A lot of what I'm listening to is resonating, but I'm the one that cheated. Like I'm the one that is getting these needs met or I'm looking to someone else or I'm finding that attraction or the energy there outside of my partnership. Then I think first and foremost, you have to start by being honest with yourself and taking a really hard look at
00:43:57
Speaker
What has you at the place that you're at? And then, you know, probably even the scarier thing is to be honest with your partner because nothing is going to change and it's not going to end well unless you're willing to take ownership of your own life and ownership of your situation. And that has to start with taking a really hard, honest look at yourself and
00:44:23
Speaker
Yeah looking at the relationship how do you feel about the relationship how do you know what has you. Holds outside of the relationship and has caused you to cheat and whether it's just emotional or physical.
00:44:37
Speaker
And and to really begin the process of cleaning up your mess and you know that's it's going to be whether the relationship makes it through it or not. Without you being willing to look at yourself and begin to unpack what's going on in your own internal world.
00:44:56
Speaker
then not much is going to change. You're just going to be that whole recreating the cycles and self perpetuating self-fulfilling prophecy of, well, you know, there's guy after guy I've talked to that, you know, most relationships last about six months and then lo and behold, it blows up because that excitement is gone or that fear of intimacy is there or whatever it may be. And they
00:45:23
Speaker
I mean normally when they're working with me that's when they're in a process of taking a look at what's going on internally. And figuring out what's driving that you know that deeper poll to create these messes. And then to begin the process of looking at those.
00:45:42
Speaker
root causes and addressing them. So whether that's inner child work that you need to do or that is inner king work and really establishing that or learning how to connect to your heart and figure out what's going on in there in your inner world.
00:45:59
Speaker
You need to do that work because like you said, it's you, it's internal for you. And doing that work as well as being honest with yourself and honest with your partner is quite frankly the best chance and only chance that you have of that relationship working in the first place or getting healing from the betrayal that happened there.
00:46:23
Speaker
But, you know, we're all more than capable, even if we don't want to, we're all more than capable with taking ownership of our situation, taking ownership of our life and our internal world. And it's really up to you to decide that, you know, enough is enough in the sense of what I've been recreating or creating within this relationship.
00:46:44
Speaker
and to take the proactive steps to change your inner world so that you can deepen the intimacy within the relationship and change your external world.