| One thing I want you to totally get out of your mind | | | | truly know the other person. |
| right now is the idea that at the deep psychological | | | | And I'll add this incredible fact to the mix. In the vast |
| level that there are any absolutes about "what women | | | | majority of relationships, The longer two people have |
| want" or "what men want." | | | | been together, the more stubborn they are about |
| I tell you, I've seen absolutely every variation on this old | | | | insisting that their hallucinations about their partner are |
| saw in the so called "literature" of my field, in the | | | | absolute truth. |
| popular literature, in television, movies, magazines, | | | | Imagine this. If you were to launch a rocket ship at the |
| workshops, and I'm totally unconvinced that at the | | | | moon, if it didn't have a capable computer that was |
| deepest, most fundamental levels that you can make | | | | making constant little corrections, and it were just one |
| ANY conclusions about "what women want and need" | | | | tenth of one degree off in its aim, it would end up |
| or "what men want and need" in relationships. | | | | thousands of miles off target. |
| Such divisions will do nothing but support your | | | | To use another, much more common image, think |
| defenses and keep you from ever discovering the | | | | about driving your car on the highway. Imagine that you |
| depth of a Great Relationship. | | | | are on an extremely straight highway (say, I-70 |
| Let me put this in front of you right now. Stop making | | | | through Kansas). Could you just aim the car and strap |
| conclusions! | | | | a rope to the steering wheel and go take a nap in the |
| Just stop making conclusions! Your mind is full of | | | | back seat? Of course not. Even on an extremely |
| nonsense about men and women, relationships, | | | | straight road, you have to constantly be making little |
| marriage, divorce, gay and straight, sex in general. Just | | | | adjustments, right? (And NO relationships are "straight |
| give it up and make yourself like a brand new baby | | | | roads" as you know -- they are just chock full of |
| who doesn't know a thing, and then, like a baby, | | | | bumps and swerves and ups and downs!). |
| discover all the ways to get the "right" information | | | | And you have to be pretty relaxed to drive well and |
| --that is, the information that comes from the reality of | | | | keep open to those constant adjustments, not resisting |
| dealing directly and without filters with your loved one. | | | | them or insisting that you are right when you are going |
| Without foregone conclusions! | | | | off the road! Yet that's exactly what happens in most |
| Just stop making conclusions that just because you | | | | relationships. People make up their minds and just strap |
| have lived with someone or been married to them for | | | | down their "steering wheel" -- their thoughts, feelings, |
| ten, twenty, thirty, forty or even fifty years, that you | | | | imagination and ideas about themselves, their partners |
| know ANYTHING about them. | | | | and marriages -- and seem not to care if they run off |
| I can't tell you how many times I've sat in my therapy | | | | the road. |
| room with my jaw on the floor from hearing the | | | | The amazing thing is that the majority of people are |
| conclusions that one person has just drawn about their | | | | totally dedicated to being right far above their desire to |
| partner and who that person is, when it is abundantly | | | | have a great relationship. |
| clear, just from what that person just NOW said and | | | | You have to be ready and willing to be wrong, wrong, |
| expressed that the other person is simply hallucinating | | | | wrong. Most people are happy to trash their entire life |
| and that they aren't talking about their partner AT ALL! | | | | just to keep their fool heads focused on the position |
| I don't care how long you have been together. The | | | | that they are right, right, right. |
| likelihood is that unless you have made a regular, | | | | This kind of stubbornness will destroy relationships. |
| ongoing, open-minded attempt without cease and with | | | | You'll never be ready for a great relationship unless |
| real courage and intensity to keep yourself open to the | | | | you are ready to be wrong, wrong, wrong! |
| changes and development of the person you are with, | | | | That is, unless you are ready to have a truly open |
| you don't know that person at all. | | | | mind, and recognize that all of the conclusions you |
| As a matter of fact, let me make that even stronger. I | | | | have about your partner over the time you've been |
| think that in the vast majority of relationships that the | | | | together could be sheer hallucinations! |
| longer two people have been together, the less they | | | | |