246: How to Get Honest with Yourself

Relationship Alive!

Have you ever gone through a major life change, and then, in retrospect, wondered how you could have possibly been living the way that you were living? Everything seemed so great at the time, right? Or, at least, great enough. But when the spell is broken, and the veil is lifted - suddenly everything looks different. Hindsight is 20/20 - and one of life's biggest challenges is to see things accurately in the moment. In today's episode you'll get strategies to get past how you *wish* things were - in order to see things as they actually are.

As always, I’m looking forward to your thoughts on this episode and what revelations and questions it creates for you. Please join us in the Relationship Alive Community on Facebook to chat about it!

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Transcript:

Neil Sattin: Hello and welcome to another episode of Relationship Alive - this is your host Neil Sattin. Have you ever had a David Byrne moment in your life? I’m not talking about David BURNS - author of Feeling Good and Feeling Great, and frequent guest here on the show. I’m talking about David Byrne, of the Talking Heads - and thinking of that song “Once in a Lifetime” - where in the video he slaps himself on the forehead asking “Well, how did I get here?” - one of those moments where you look around you, almost as if a spell is broken, and see things as they really are - versus how you were imagining them, or wanting them to be?

Neil Sattin: Now you may say to yourself - of course, I know how I got here. Where I’m at right now makes perfect sense, it’s the sum of all the decisions that I’ve made up until now. Great - that’s a perfect way to come to understand what led to your current circumstances, and perhaps to see the patterns and habits that led you there.

Neil Sattin: But...how ARE you doing in this moment? And what can you do to snap yourself out of the spell, so that you have the best chance of seeing things as they really are in the moment? And making a choice, taking the next right step? In the context of love, and relationships, it really can be like a spell. You’re pulled in by a dynamic that intoxicates you on some level, and when you’re intoxicated the odds favor that you won’t necessarily make the best decisions. Oh sure, you’ll make the best choice that an intoxicated person can make. Some might argue that this intoxication is important for the survival of our species - in other words, that we have to be rendered lovestruck in order to serve our biological imperatives. Even if you end up NOT procreating, it’s most likely that energy of gene preservation that got you there, in partnership with your beloved, in the first place. That and your common love of REO speedwagon, or whatever.

Neil Sattin: Today we’re going to go over some simple strategies to help you assess your current circumstances - whether you’re in a relationship or not. And these strategies will help you figure out if you’re where you want to be, or if some sort of course correction might be in order...

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