160: Do the Opposite in Your Remarriage For One Week

The Remarried Life

Brian Mayer talks about doing the same things over and over again sometimes doesn’t produce the result we want in our blended family. So let’s take a look at everything we are doing that is not working and do the opposite for one week. Let’s call it an experiment. We hope you are inspired by today’s message. For more information and additional resources please visit our website at http://www.theremarriedlife.com

Today's Goodies

• When we are remarried and in blended families everything doesn’t go right all the time and in fact sometimes it’s the same things that don’t go well over and over again that are the most troublesome.
• But we get into a rut or we just remain unaware that our actions aren’t producing anything different. We all do this and yes of course I do this too.
• For example maybe getting angry over and over again at the kids for not knowing how to do something happens all the time.
• Or maybe in a fight or argument with your spouse, you tend to keep pushing because your spouse shuts down and won’t talk.
• Or how about you clam up around your spouse’s family because they upset you. Then when you are alone you get upset at your spouse for not sticking up for you.
• These three situations I just described are situations that possibly keep occurring over and over again. The results can tend to be the same. Hurt feelings, disconnection and a further drift away from the family you want and hope for.
• So what do we do? Well let’s take a look at a couple of people who thought that doing different might work better.
• • Albert Einstein is often credited with coining the phrase, “Doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results is the definition of insanity.”
  • Remember the television show Seinfeld? Remember the episode where George decided to do the opposite? George could never seem to get the girl by inflating his situation to be better than it seemed. For example, he would talk about how much money he made, what kind of wonderful job he had, or the beautiful apartment he had only to have women shrug him off. However, when he was honest and told them he was jobless and living in his parent’s basement, then women started to take notice.
  • A couples researcher named Sue Johnson who developed Emotionally Focused Therapy did the opposite of what many of the people who came before or even her peers did. She focused on emotional connection rather than behaviors that one must perform. Most laughed at her, but now her theory to help couples has been proven in research to work the best.
• These are really just a few examples of people that said things differently or acted differently to achieve some different results.
• I would like for one week to take a look at everything we are doing in our remarriage and blended family. Assess those things that you do over and over again that don’t work too well. And let’s think about doing the opposite.
• Now let’s only take 3 things at the very most. We can’t change everything over night and if we tried we would all fail. So I want you to concentrate on only a few things.
• Step 1: Get out a piece of paper and write down every area that you can think of that is not going how you would like it in your blended family.
• Step 2: Assess the urgent areas and the areas that you think you can change rather quickly and easily.
• Step 3: Work to hone the list down to 3 areas that you would like to focus on.
• Step 4: Think about the role you play or the actions you perform in this situation that might have an impact on what result happens.
• Step 5: Brainstorm some actions that are the OPPOSITE of what you normally do.
• Step 6: Pick one of those different actions to try for the week.
• Step 7: Assess your progress in the middle of the week. Are you noticing a difference in how you are feeling? How your spouse or kids are feeling? Are the results any different?
• Step 8: Keep doing the same action and don’t give up just yet and maybe don’t worry about tweaking. Sometimes we try something for a brief period and think it doesn’t work so we give up. Don’t do this!
• Step 9: Assess at the end of one week. How is it now? I would even resist the temptation to change at the end of one week and to keep doing it differently if you can.
• Step 10: At some point reveal to your spouse or kids that you were trying something different and ask them if they noticed? Hopefully they did notice and if not don’t give up to continue to do something different.
• I hope this episode gives you some practical tips to help to change the air or dynamic in your remarried life for the better.

Resources:

• None

Thanks For Listening!

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As always remember that marriage is not something you have, it is something you do. Talk to you next week unless you are binge listening in the future in which case I will talk to you in about a minute! Take care.